“I’m not sure. It happened when I brought Leticia back from the dead.” Luckily, my conversations with Medusa were completely private. We spoke only in my mind, so Alex couldn’t overhear anything.

“How did Leticia die?”

“I don’t know. I was sort of out of it when it happened. I heard her choking and gasping for air. Then she fell to the floor. Randy checked for a pulse and said she was dead.”

“Why were you out of it, Jodi?” Medusa eyed me suspiciously. She knew I was holding back.

“There’s a new student at the school.”

“Yes, I met him earlier today.” Medusa only ever appeared to me, but when another Ophi connected with her statue they felt her power and Medusa could tap into their emotions.

“Right. Well, we were all watching a movie in my room.” I swallowed hard before continuing. “Chase started touching my feet. It was weird at first, like a tingling in my feet and legs, but then I recognized it was power I was feeling. Only it wasn’t like the power I feel when I raise souls. I don’t think this power came from you.”

Medusa nodded, like she understood. “Jodi, when you arrived here you were told that the blood in the left side of my body could not harm you, but that was not entirely true.”

“What do you mean? I thought it was only poisonous to humans?”

“It is highly poisonous to humans, but in its purest form it’s poisonous to Ophi as well.”

I shook my head. “In its purest form? What does that mean?”

“It means you weren’t mixing your blood, Jodi. You were pushing all the blood with the power to restore life to a very concentrated part of your body and allowing the poisonous blood to spread throughout the rest of you.”

I started to feel dizzy again, but this time it was from information overload. “How is that possible?”

“How much do you know about Chase?”

“Just that he’s from Serpentarius. He studied with Mason, but he wanted to learn more about his power, so he came here. They don’t actively train there. They don’t believe in it.”

“Keep him close, Jodi. I sense he isn’t like the others.”

“Do you mean he’s like me? He has more power than other Ophi?”

“More power, yes.” Medusa looked down at our hands. “That’s enough for now. You don’t want to indulge in too much of my power at once.”

I wanted to know more, but Medusa was right. Connecting with her for too long drained my energy completely. “Thank you.” I let go of her hands.

“Well?” Alex asked the moment I opened my eyes. I’d only been connected to Medusa for a few minutes, ten tops, but he looked like he’d been waiting an eternity. “What did she say?”

He wasn’t going to like this. “She said Chase isn’t like the other Ophi. He’s more like me. He has more power.”

“You’re kidding, right?” His voice was full of disgust.

“No.” I conveniently left off the part about Chase touching my feet, the incident that had started all this power overload. “When we combined my power and his, it was too much for my body to contain.”

“So, now we know not to let you work with Chase anymore.”

“Actually, I think I need to work with him more.”

He folded his arms in front of him. “How do you figure?”

“We need all the power we can get. Hades is breathing down my neck, and my power alone isn’t enough to keep him away. Maybe if I can figure out how to work with Chase, then—I don’t know. But if it might help us, it’s worth a shot.”

“What about before you raised Leticia? You were acting really weird. What was that about?”

“Stress, I think.” I turned away so he wouldn’t be able to read my face. I was sure it had “big fat liar” written across it.

He stepped forward and hugged me. “We’ll figure it out. But just so you know, whenever you train with Chase, I’m going to be there to make sure nothing like this happens again.”

I nodded. I’d expected as much.

“Let’s get you cleaned up. The blood-streaked face is very last season.”

I smiled. He always could make me feel better.

The movie party was definitely over, so I said goodnight to Alex and took a long, hot shower. Nothing calmed me down better. I was looking forward to crawling under the covers and sleeping my problems away. I couldn’t deal with another thing today. Before I shut my eyes for the night, I said a little prayer—that I wouldn’t have a single dream.

I woke up still feeling slightly exhausted from the previous day, but I didn’t have any dead guys pounding on my door, so I was content. I couldn’t remember dreaming at all, so I took that as another sign that today would be a better day. In fact, I started to think the only reason I was drawn to Chase in the first place was because the power in my blood recognized the power in his. He was like me. That didn’t mean I liked him. And maybe he didn’t even really like me. Maybe he was only drawn to my power.

I got out of bed with a smile on my face. Things were starting to make sense again, starting to look better. Maybe Chase and I would be able to figure out how to combine our powers and get the other Ophi to join us. Be a real family. And more importantly, keep off Hades’ radar.

Alex was waiting for me by the stairs. I ran up to him and threw my arms around his neck.

“I guess you’re feeling better this morning,” he said.

“Good as new, and I think I’ve figured things out. I’ve got an idea. One that might convince a few more Ophi to come here and join us.”

Over breakfast I told Alex and the others all about my plan. “So, here’s what I’m thinking. Chase seems to have different powers than other Ophi. Stronger powers. Kind of like me. That’s good news for us.”

Leticia and Randy turned to Chase, looking him over with jealousy in their eyes. They were both still struggling with their powers, and now here was another Ophi with more abilities than them.

“What did you have in mind, Jodi?” Tony sipped his coffee.

Even Arianna had stopped fussing over the food and sat down. “Have you seen evidence of these powers Chase has?”

“Yes. Last night, something terrible happened.” I looked at Leticia. She’d begged us not to tell Tony and Arianna what had happened, and since I hadn’t wanted to deal with any more drama either, I had made the others agree. “I think an attack was made on Leticia.”

“An attack?” Leticia looked horrified. Clearly, she hadn’t considered this was a possibility.

I nodded. “I hate to admit this, but I think Hades is purposely trying to make me screw up. Do something he can deem as a deal breaker so he can come after me.”

“You think Hades did that to me?” Leticia’s voice cracked.

“I don’t know how else to explain it. You just started choking. On nothing.”

Leticia shook her head, still not believing this. “I thought it was the popcorn or something.”

“You really think a popcorn kernel could take down an Ophi?” Alex asked.

I knew Alex was trying to help, but Leticia was sensitive. She wasn’t going to respond to jokes. “Leticia, I think Hades came after you to get to me.” I looked around the table. “I’m afraid he might come after all of you.” My eyes lingered on Alex.

“So, we need to be ready,” Alex said.

“Yes, and here’s how.” I got up and walked over to Chase. I took a deep breath and reached my hand out to him.

Chase looked at Alex and smiled before taking my hand. “Don’t get too excited,” Alex said. “She’s only demonstrating a point.”

I closed my eyes and felt the surge of power between us. My hair danced like a gentle breeze was blowing it. Even without seeing him, I knew Chase felt it, too. I didn’t want it to go too far, not with Alex and the others staring at us. Last night the connection between us had been… well, more than PG rated. I wasn’t ready for the others to witness that. I let go of Chase’s hand.

“When we form a connection, I can feel Chase’s power. Like it’s communicating with my blood.”