I threw my head back and unleashed it.
A torrent of weaponized sound ripped from my throat. Scattering the mist, it shot across the pier and slammed into the Ferryman.
And dissolved.
Ifeltthe power leave me, a physical flood of energy. Isawit hit him. But then... Nothing happened. My attack simply dissipated, absorbed into his silence. My throat burned, raw and empty. I had given my all, and it hadn’t even made him flinch.
In hindsight, it made far too much sense. Charon was an existence that predated Asphodelia itself. A mere Keres death screech wouldn’t touch him. But understanding that didn’t make me feel any better about it.
Enraged by my own impotence, I lunged, my talons extended. All thought dissolved into a single, primal need. To make contact. To prove that he could bleed.
He didn’t move. He simply shifted the grip on his pole, bringing the ancient weapon up to intercept my strike. My talons scraped uselessly against the wood. A jarring shock shot up my arm, and the immovable reality of his strength mocked my efforts.
Gritting my teeth, I refused to give up. It felt like madness, but no matter how many times I failed, I couldn’t let his schemes go unpunished.
My feathers hardened and sharpened into a thousand black daggers. I swept my wing forward, a move that had decapitated countless mortal creatures in the Korinos Wilds. But Charon was no mortal. He brought the pole around again, a simple block that met the attack with insulting ease. The dull, dead thud of my feathers striking the wood echoed in the oppressive quiet. No purchase. No damage.
“Are you trying to tear me apart like Theron did, Keres?” He pushed the pole forward, forcing me back a step. When he spoke the Cerberus’s name, the word landed like a blade, twisting in the old wound of my humiliation. “You don’t have his strength, and you are still not listening.”
A fresh wave of rage washed over me, hot and blinding. I roared, batting the pole aside. A single thought was going through my head. The Moirae had woven me into a living weapon, and so far all my tricks were useless against him. But if I could only pin him down, perhaps I had a chance.
I lunged at him, moving faster than I ever had in my life. But even then, I didn’t hit him. He only dodged and allowed me to defeat myself. I spun, bringing my other wing around in a back-handed sweep. It seemed unlikely that I’d be able to hit him now, having failed the first time, but I couldn’t even think about that anymore.
My wing was halfway through its arc when a white-hot agony tore through my soul. It felt like being ripped in two from the inside out. The warmth in my chest, the constant presence that was Daphne, vanished. One moment it was the center of my universe. The next, there was only a bleeding, gaping wound of pure nothing.
All strength leached out from my limbs. The rage, the fear, the world itself dissolved into a grey, meaningless void. My attack faltered, my body going limp mid-motion.
My knees buckled. The hard obsidian of the pier rushed up to meet me, but I didn’t feel the impact. “Daphne,” I whispered, my screech long forgotten, unable to help me now.
But my mate wasn’t there, and neither was our bond. The last thing I registered was Charon’s looming figure, still hovering over me, and then everything went black.
Sometimes, even a Keres has to walk.
As I stumbled through Asphodelia’s streets, Phonos’s words drifted through my mind, withering away like old parchment. That day, he’d taken me on a walk to show me his city.
A gift and a promise, I’d thought. Now, that memory felt like a ruinous joke. The shriek in my head was constant, a chorus of a million broken futures, all of them screaming his name. At the center of the noise, one thread burned brighter than the rest, a thick, golden cord that pulsed with a sickening heat.
It pulled me toward the Weavers’ Hall and then veered, yanking me down a side street that bordered a dark canal. Skeletal barges floated on the black water. And there, kneeling on the obsidian walkway, was the source of all my pain, and the reason I’d survived.
Callista, whose magic had guided me here through the Blighted Lands.
Callista, whom Phonos had loved first.
She was alone, surrounded by a patch of glowing asphodels. Their pure, white light seemed to mock the ugly chaos churning in my gut. I was still wearing a flower crown in my hair, but just looking at them made me feel unclean.
The gratitude and the betrayal slammed into me at once, a warring tide that threatened to tear me apart.You saved me. You ruined me.Why? Why would the Weave be so cruel? Why would it use her light to lead me to him, if he had only ever wanted her?
She was trying to weave, her hands hovering in the air, pulling at the ambient death energy with a frustrated grace.
“This isn’t working,” she murmured to herself, her melodic words a fresh poison in my ears. “Why is this so hard?”
The cacophony in my mind answered with a furious, echoing howl. I took a step forward, my boot striking the stone with a crack that made her look up.
“That’s what I’ve asked myself my whole life,” I said. “Why does everything have to be so hard? Why can’t I just lead a simple life? Unburdened.”
Callista rose to her feet, her work now forgotten. “Daphne, what’s wrong? You look pale.”
“You would too, if you found out your bond was a lie.” The accusation left my lips, sharp and venomous. “That your mate loved another.”
