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No.
Something was off. Will sensed it.
Before Will could stop Nico, before Nico could realize what he’d done, the truth revealed itself.
The bones were not the dead, not in the way Will and Nico understood them. Will knew this as soon as the first creature’s head broke free of the earth, then pushed itself upward.
Its head was crested with sharp, serrated bones. Femurs and jawbones, ulnae and humeri. Some were absolutely not human.
When the monster fully emerged, it stood on two legs but otherwise looked like something between a goat and a woolly mammoth, its body covered in shaggy, matted fur, its eyes slitted and red. It roared, a piercing, horrifying sound that made Will clutch his ears, certain his eardrums would rupture if it went on any longer.
The monster spotted the cynocephali across the Acheron. The dog-headed creatures howled and barked, but Will watched in shock as the towering monster easily stepped over theentireriver,then swung its crested, bone-covered head down and cleaved three of the cynocephali in two with just one movement.
‘We should go,’ whispered Nico, his hand now on Will’s elbow.
Will wasn’t going to argue. He turned with Nico towards the mangrove forest, and …
Another one of the woolly mammoth–goat monsters burst out of the swampy forest. It crushed a tree under its hooves, then blew its rotting breath into the boys’ faces with a roar.
‘Dam it,’ said Nico.
Small Bob glowed brightly enough that Nico could see his skeletal outline. Nico watched as the cat elongated, then grew in height, until there was a full-size, snarling, illuminated sabre-toothed tiger next to him.
Well, that’s the coolest thing I’ve ever seen, he thought.
Nico glanced back at the first woolly mammoth–goat monster, which was making quick work of the remaining cynocephali. They didn’t have much time before the odds would be …
He grimaced. It didn’t seem accurate to say two-to-three, given that the ‘two’ were enormous monsters Nico had never seen before.
He had to focus, despite the fact that his inner voice was screaming at him. He’d sensed the dead beneath the ground and foolishly raised them, unaware that the bones weren’t bodies but attached to … those things? What even were these creatures? What monster collected the dead and fashioned their bones intoweapons? A part of him wanted to take back everything he’d just said to Will about the Underworld not being evil. Because these things seemed pretty evil to him.
‘What do we do?’ asked Will. ‘I don’t have any weapons.’
‘Maybe you can Care Bear-stare them?’ Nico suggested.
‘Them? Nico, what are these things?’
‘I have no idea! I’ve never seen them before!’
Will hesitated. ‘I’m not sure I should use my abilities just yet.’
The monster took another thundering step towards the demigods, crushing the mangrove roots beneath it.
‘How ’bout now, then?!’ said Nico.
‘What about Nyx? What if I only have enough power for a single shot?’
Nico glared at him. ‘What? Why would you say that?’
‘I’mexhausted,’ said Will. ‘I don’t know what I have in me!’
The first shaggy monster roared, and both boys watched as it opened its mouth – revealing a truly unfair number of teeth – and chomped down on the head of the final cynocephalus.
‘Well, that was awful,’ said Will.
Small Bob growled next to Nico, and he reached down to pet his head. ‘Kitty, I don’t know what strategies you have, but I’m willing to try anything.’
The sabre-toothed tiger licked Nico’s hand, and it was strangely very much like being licked by a house cat, just rougher.
