“I don’t think you can talk him down. Not all the monsters are on our side, Alena,” Remo shouted, and Cerberus began to turn back to him. It was now or never. I pushed myself to my feet and scrambled up his neck to sit behind the ears on his middle head. Or where his ears should have been. I dug my hand into the edges of the burned and charred skin and pinched hard. He whimpered and went to his knees.

“I don’t want to hurt you more than I already have, dog. But I have to get to Hades. So either you are going to take us, or . . .” I had no real threat, so I left it hanging in the air.

I hoped that the big dog had something of an imagination, and it would fill in the blank with something truly horrendous. Maybe fire hydrants that attacked him, or a herd of cats that would chase him up a tree, I really didn’t know. Below me, he whined and licked his lips. He tried to shake his head, but only got one flick in before I gripped harder, pinching him again. Mostly to keep my seat, but he didn’t need to know that. Cerberus let out another whimper, and I dared to let go and slide down his back.

That was the mistake, though. He lunged at me the second my feet were on the ground. I threw myself out of the way, but one of his teeth caught the edge of my leather jacket, hooking me close to his slobbering mouth. I stared into his maw, thinking that I was done like an overcooked cake, ready to be tossed. But Cerberus stumbled, which threw me upward and unhooked my jacket from his tooth. I hovered in the air for a moment and then fell to the ground with a heavy thud. Cerberus whimpered, cried out, and fell back away from us, a length of pipe protruding from his chest, air and blood bubbling around it. Remo grabbed me and hauled me to my feet. “I don’t know how long that will hold him. We have to run.”

I struggled to put together what had happened. How had Remo lifted that big pipe without his vampire strength?

“I have muscles, Alena. I am not really as weak as a newborn kitten, you know.” He ran beside me as we wove our way through the junkyard, dodging sharp metal and leaping over deep holes. I glanced down at one of the holes, noting the bones sticking out, the pieces of skull that had been shattered and half buried. Cerberus was not a nice dog, not a nice monster at all. I clung to Remo as we ran, left, right, left, right, trying to find our way out. We circled around a chunk of metal that looked like a downed airplane hull, and skidded to a stop. Cerberus was in front of us, on his side, struggling for breath.

He was in pain, that much was obvious, and again I felt bad, I couldn’t help it. Wasn’t his fault he’d been turned into a guard dog.

“Stop feeling sorry for him; it’s going to get us killed.”

Remo was right, but I couldn’t help it. I liked dogs. “This place is like a labyrinth.” I tugged him back behind the equipment and out of Cerberus’s line of sight. “How are we going to find our way out?”

A flutter of wings snapped us both around. Ernie grinned down at us. “That’s where I come in.”

I held my arms out, and he swung into them for a hug. “I have never been so happy to see you, Ernie.”

“I thought I’d find you back at the swamp, but Strike told me he brought you to the dog.” He shook his head and then peered over my shoulder. “He’ll be okay. He can’t be killed, which means we need to get you two out of here before he pulls the pipe out and heals up.” As if his words were the cue, there was a loud squelching, sucking sound of a pipe being pulled from flesh. Ernie swept up to our head level. “Come on, this way.”

He flew ahead of us fast, and we ran after him, fear nipping at my heels. I kept glancing back. How long before Cerberus was on us again? We couldn’t kill him, so we had to get past him. A howl of a hunting cry ripped through the air, and the ground shook.

“Faster, Ernie!” I yelped, true terror whipping my arms and legs into an even greater frenzy.

“Left, and then into the plane,” he yelled back at us. “Shit, don’t look back.”

Oh, why did he have to go and say that? I couldn’t seem to stop myself. I glanced over my shoulder. Above the piles of junk, I could see Cerberus’s heads bobbing here and there as he chased us down. He was probably only twenty feet or so back, but the curves through the junk created something of a barrier.

I stumbled, and Remo grabbed my elbow, steadying me. The airplane hull came into view, and we leapt for it as Cerberus roared behind us. Warm, wet spit slammed into the back of my neck, and I fell to the floor of the plane. The world shifted, and I clutched at Remo as the plane spun as if it was falling from the sky. Heat and explosions ripped through the air around us, and I tucked my head against Remo’s neck. “I love you.”

If we were going to die, I wanted those to be my last words. Love might not be strong enough, but it was a reason to keep fighting, to keep on doing what we were doing and hoping for the best. Remo pulled back a little, his eyes on mine. “I love you too.” His lips were on mine, and we fell through the strange sky, clinging to one another.

We landed with a thud, but not so hard that we were more than bumped apart, sliding over the interior of the plane. I sat up and brushed hair out of my eyes. Adrenaline still coursed through me, and I shot to my feet as I searched around for the next monster, the next challenge we would have to face, the next ghost from our past. But there was nothing but a flickering light from outside the plane. I held a hand out to Remo, who still sat on the floor. He wove his fingers between mine, and I helped him stand.

Ernie fluttered around us. “Here we are, Hades’s house.”