The guards hustled us to the aft deck, which featured six hot tubs, a multicolored fountain, and a flashing gold and purple dance floor just waiting for partyers to arrive.

Affixed to the stern, a red-carpeted ramp jutted across the water, connecting our boat to the prow of the next yacht. I guessed all the boats were linked this way, making a road across Santa Barbara Harbor, just in case Caligula decided to do a golf-cart drive-through.

Rising amidships, the upper decks gleamed with dark-tinted windows and white walls. Far above, the conning tower sprouted radar dishes, satellite antennae, and two billowing pennants: one with the imperial eagle of Rome, the other with a golden triangle on a field of purple, which I supposed was the logo for Triumvirate Holdings.

Two more guards flanked the heavy oak doors that led inside. The guy on the left looked like a mortal mercenary, with the same black pajamas and body armor as the gentlemen we’d sent on the wild fish-taco chase. The guy on the right was a Cyclops (the huge single eye gave him away). He also smelled like a Cyclops (wet wool socks) and dressed like a Cyclops (denim cutoffs, torn black T-shirt, and a large wooden club).

The human mercenary frowned at our merry band of captors and prisoners.

“What’s all this?” he asked.

“Not your concern, Florence,” Amax growled. “Let us through!”

Florence? I might have snickered, except Florence weighed three hundred pounds, had knife scars across his face, and still had a better name than Lester Papadopoulos.

“Regulations,” Florence said. “You got prisoners, I have to call it in.”

“Not yet, you won’t.” Amax spread his ears like the hood of a cobra. “This is my ship. I’ll tell you when to call it in—after we interrogate these intruders.”

Florence frowned at his Cyclops partner. “What do you think, Grunk?”

Now, Grunk—that was a good Cyclops name. I didn’t know if Florence realized he was working with a Cyclops. The Mist could be unpredictable. But I immediately formulated the premise for an action-adventure buddy-comedy series, Florence and Grunk. If I survived captivity, I’d have to mention it to Piper’s father. Perhaps he could help me schedule some lunches and pitch the idea. Oh, gods…I had been in Southern California too long.

Grunk shrugged. “It’s Amax’s ears on the line if the boss gets mad.”

“Okay.” Florence waved us through. “You all have fun.”

I had little time to appreciate the opulent interior—the solid-gold fixtures, the luxurious Persian carpets, the million-dollar works of art, the plush purple furniture I was pretty sure had come from Prince’s estate sale.

We saw no other guards or crew, which seemed strange. Then again, I supposed that, even with Caligula’s resources, finding enough personnel to man fifty super-yachts at once might be difficult.

As we walked through a walnut-paneled library hung with masterpiece paintings, Piper caught her breath. She pointed her chin toward a Joan Miró abstraction.

“That came from my dad’s house,” she said.

“When we get out of here,” Jason muttered, “we’ll take it with us.”

“I heard that.” Peak jabbed his sword hilt into Jason’s ribs.

Jason stumbled against Piper, who stumbled into a Picasso. Seeing an opportunity, Meg surged forward, apparently meaning to tackle Amax with all one hundred pounds of her weight. Before she took two steps, an arrow sprouted from the carpet at her feet.

“Don’t,” said Timbre. His vibrating bowstring was the only evidence he’d made the shot. He had drawn and fired so fast even I couldn’t believe it.

Meg backed away. “Fine. Jeez.”

The pandai herded us into a forward lounge. Along the front wrapped a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree glass wall overlooking the prow. Off to starboard, the lights of Santa Barbara twinkled. In front of us, yachts twenty-five through one made a glittering necklace of amethyst, gold, and platinum across the dark water.

The sheer extravagance of it all hurt my brain, and normally I was all about extravagance.

The pandai arranged four plush chairs in a row and shoved us into them. As interrogation rooms went, it wasn’t bad. Peak paced behind us, sword at the ready in case anyone required decapitation. Timbre and Crest lurked on either flank, their bows down, but arrows nocked. Amax pulled up a chair and sat facing us, spreading his ears around him like a king’s robe.

“This place is private,” he announced. “Talk.”

“First,” I said, “I must know why you’re not followers of Apollo. Such great archers? The finest hearing in the world? Eight fingers on each hand? You would be natural musicians! We seem made for each other!”

Amax studied me. “You are the former god, eh? They told us about you.”

“I am Apollo,” I confirmed. “It’s not too late to pledge me your loyalty.”

Amax’s mouth quivered. I hoped he was on the verge of crying, perhaps throwing himself at my feet and begging my forgiveness.

Instead, he howled with laughter. “What do we need with Olympian gods? Especially gods who are pimply boys with no power?”

“But there’s so much I could teach you!” I insisted. “Music! Poetry! I could teach you how to write haikus!”

Jason looked at me and shook his head vigorously, though I had no idea why.

“Music and poetry hurt our ears,” Amax complained. “We have no need of them!”

“I like music,” Crest murmured, flexing his fingers. “I can play a little—”

“Silence!” Amax yelled. “You can play silence for once, worthless nephew!”

Aha, I thought. Even among the pandai there were frustrated musicians. Amax suddenly reminded me of my father, Zeus, when he came storming down the hallway on Mount Olympus (literally storming, with thunder, lightning, and torrential rain) and ordered me to stop playing my infernal zither music. A totally unfair demand. Everyone knows 2:00 a.m. is the optimal time to practice the zither.

I might have been able to sway Crest to our side…if only I’d had more time. And if he weren’t in the company of three older and larger pandai. And if we hadn’t started our acquaintance with Piper shooting him in the leg with a poisoned dart.

Amax reclined in his cushy purple throne. “We pandai are mercenaries. We choose our masters. Why would we pick a washed-up god like you? Once, we served the kings of India! Now we serve Caligula!”

“Caligula! Caligula!” Timbre and Peak cried. Again, Crest was conspicuously quiet, frowning at his bow.

“The emperor trusts only us!” Timbre bragged.

“Yes,” Peak agreed. “Unlike those Germani, we never stabbed him to death!”

I wanted to point out that this was a fairly low bar for loyalty, but Meg interrupted.

“The night is young,” she said. “We could all stab him together.”

Amax sneered. “I am still waiting, daughter of Nero, to hear your juicy story about why you wish to kill our master. You’d better have good information. And lots of twists and turns! Convince me you are worth bringing to Caesar alive, rather than as dead bodies, and perhaps I’ll get a promotion tonight! I will not be passed over again for some idiot like Overdrive on boat three, or Wah-Wah on boat forty-three.”