“Trust me,” Damian says from the other side of my door, “you do not wish to make me open this door myself.”

I leap up from my desk chair and, neatly avoiding the rivulets lacing across my floor, pull open the door. “Damian, I’m—”

My mouth drops open and my apology sticks in my throat.

Normally impeccably-dressed-in-a-suit-and-tie Damian is standing there wearing board shorts, Birkenstocks, and a shark’s-tooth necklace. Oh, and he’s soaking wet.

“Omigods, Damian,” I blurt, staring instantly at the floor—I do not need to see my stepdad’s bare chest, thank you very much. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to, um . . .” I wave my hand up and down in his direction, still averting my eyes. “Sorry, sorry, sorry. I was just thinking about how much I miss L.A. and that I’ve never learned how to surf and now that school’s out I could go if I didn’t have the Pythian trials and my stupid powers weren’t—”

Damian holds up his hand and takes a deep, deep breath. He lets it out super slow, with a little bit of a growl from the back of his throat. And then he takes another. And another.

I’ve really done it this time. I mean, the palm tree in the living room had been bad enough, but he is clearly beyond furious at the moment.

Instinctively I inch back a step . . . right into a growing puddle. The sloshing sound of me smacking into the water breaks his deep breathing.

“I am not angry with you,” he says, carefully enunciating each word. “Truly.”

I’m not convinced.

He runs a hand through his wet hair, sending a fresh spray of water droplets everywhere.

“Oh, for Hera’s sake,” he mutters. For a second I’m nearly blinded by a bright glow, and when I open my eyes again, Damian is back to his dry, fully clothed self. The puddles are still there. “Let us speak in my office, shall we?”

I hang my head and follow Damian through the house. Why do these things keep happening to me? I mean, you’d think after all these months I’d have improved a little. At least enough so that things wouldn’t go haywire when I’m just randomly thinking about completely non-powers-related stuff.

“Please.” Damian gestures at a chair in front of his desk. “Have a seat.”

Sinking into the soft leather—hard-core-hippie Nola would have a field day with the cruel and unnecessary use of animal hide—I try to clear my mind of all thoughts. It’s thinking that gets me into trouble. If I could go the rest of my life without thinking, then—

“I know you are using your powers neither carelessly nor intentionally,” Damian says as he lowers into his chair. “But in the several months since your powers first manifested, your control has not improved. In fact”—he pinches the bridge of his nose like the idea of my uncontrolled powers gives him a headache—“it may have gotten worse.”

Worse? My heart sinks. I’ve been spending hours upon hours working on controlling my powers. All right, some of those hours—okay, many of those hours—were spent with Griffin. And maybe we don’t always spend every second on my training, but hey, a girl can’t focus on work all the time when in the presence of such a god. Can she?

“I don’t blame you, Phoebe. We both know that, since you are the third generation removed from Nike, your powers are stronger than most. It is not surprising that you are having difficulty controlling them.” He smiles kindly and my stomach kind of clenches.

I don’t need pity . . . I need help.

“I don’t know what else to do,” I say, trying not to whine. I am so not a whiner. “I’m sorry. I’ve been working hard. Maybe I just need a little more time.”

“Unfortunately,” he says, “we have little time left.”

Little time left? What is that supposed to mean? No one ever said anything about a time limit. No learn-to-use-your-powers-by-summer-or-else speech. Suddenly I have an image of myself, chained to the wall in the school dungeon—not that they have one, but this is my nightmare and I can be as creative as I want—being tempted by cheesy, yummy bougatsa I’m not allowed to eat until I learn to—

“Phoebe,” Damian says, interrupting my fantasy of torture and bringing my attention back to his desk—which is, I realize with sad resignation, now covered in the cheesy pastry treat. Damian waves his hand over the bougatsa, erasing it as quickly as it came, and says, “Please, try to restrain your rampant imagination. No one is going to torture you for your lack of control.”

“Sorry,” I say for like the millionth time. I don’t mean it any less, but it’s starting to feel like the only thing I know how to say.

I shake off the self-pity. Feeling sorry for myself is not going to solve the problem.

Damian leans forward, resting his elbows on his pastry-free desk. “I was hoping this would not be an issue. That you would harness your powers in your own time without intervention from the gods, but—”

“Whoa!” I jump forward to the edge of my seat and wave my hands in front of me. “The gods?”

Damian smiles tightly and tugs at the knot in his tie.

Oh no. In the nine months since Mom and I moved in, I’ve learned that an uncomfortable Damian is never a good sign.

“Since we discovered your heritage, the gods have been closely monitoring your dynamotheos progress.”

“My dyno-what?”

“Dynamotheos,” he repeats. “The official term for the powers derived from the gods. They’ve been observing you—”