Antonis raised his sword and roared, “For Perean!”
The reply came as one voice, one war cry. They surged into the pass like a tidal wave. The battlefield exploded in noise and chaos. Steel against steel. Arrows flew. A Soterran horn wailed retreat—too late.
Perean’s fury had arrived.
Dimitrios plunged back into the fray, pain be damned. He was fire and blade, every motion forged from fury. He gutted one soldier and spun to parryanother. Nearby, Nikolas had unleashed himself, his spear a blur as he carved a path toward him.
The Soterrans fell in waves, pressed hard between the flagging Perean force and the fresh reinforcements. The enemy line collapsed. Soldiers fled the mountain pass, trampling their dead, casting weapons aside in their haste.
Minutes felt like hours.
Then came the final horn.
The last Soterran banner fell.
And the silence that followed rang louder than war.
Smoke drifted low over the pass. Corpses lined the stone. And above them, battered and torn, the Perean flag flew.
Dimitrios dropped to one knee, not in surrender, but because his body had nothing left to give. Chest heaving, he bowed his head.
Someone stepped forward—Nikolas? Pateras? He couldn’t tell. A hand reached for him. He took it.
And when he looked up—it was neither.
His grandfather clasped his shoulder, eyes glassy. “They’ll remember this day, my boy. They’ll remember who led the way to victory. I couldn’t be prouder.”
Then, Antonis Nicolea took a knee.
“Kneel for your king!” he roared.
And they did.
The roar of the mine’s collapse still echoed in Kai’s chest, like a war drum that hadn’t stopped pounding. The tunnels narrowed the farther they ran. The walls wept with the runoff from the aqueducts.
Ahead, Atsadi pressed forward with Fala at his side. Kai brought up the rear, sword still slick with Usti’s blood. Her lungs burned. Her legs ached. But she wouldn’t stop, not until Atsadi said it was safe.
They took another sharp turn, and the air shifted. Not as heavy. Not as wet.
Atsadi paused and glanced around. His shoulders relaxed. “We’re out of range.”
Kai almost dropped her sword then and there. Her fingers shook. But she sheathed it, slowly, hand trembling.
Fala collapsed into Kai’s arms, soaked and shaking, her sobs renewed.
Kai cupped her head, hardly able to believe she still could. They were alive. By some miracle granted by the gods, Fala hadn’t fallen to her death, and Atsadi didn’t slip in after her.
Atsadi—
Kai blinked, breath catching, and looked up.
Her husband stood three feet away. His gaze wary. Devouring. He wore the proof of his bravery: soaked clothes, wet-clumped hair, and the torn remnants of his shirt. Across his tattooed chest, red welts marred his light brown skin.
Kai reached for him. “Husband.”
Atsadi’s steps ate up the distance, and then he surrounded them in his strong arms. His chin came to rest on Kai’s crown.
Between them, Fala loosed another sob and reached behind to hold Atsadi, too.
