I was on my feet in an instant, snarling with bestial rage. My wings flared wide, a thousand hardened feathers ready to fly like daggers. I tried to lunge, just like I had on the pier.
My strength abandoned me all over again, and I collapsed, shaking with exhaustion. “What did you do? What’s happening?”
“You don’t need me to tell you that, Keres,” Charon replied.
I looked around and realized we were no longer on the pier. Instead, we were on one of Charon’s barges, and he was guiding us through the silent canals of Asphodelia.
Where were we going? For what purpose? My mind felt fuzzy, and there was only one answer and one reality I was interested in. “Restore my bond. Now.”
Charon continued to pole the barge, undeterred. “It cannot be restored.”
“Liar.” I never thought I’d say such a thing about Charon, but clearly, I’d misjudged him. “You used your magic. You severed the connection. Where is she?”
“She is where her thread guided her. I am taking you to her.”
It was almost too good to be true, yet I had no choice but to believe him. I looked up at him, my fury and my weakness warring within me. I saw no malice in his ageless features,no triumph. Only a profound, weary resignation. “If you have harmed her...” I managed, the menace in my tone hollow and meaningless.
“I know,” he rumbled, and the simple answer silenced the vitriol still on my lips.
The barge glided through the canals, a silent ghost in the city of the dead. Every splash of the pole in the black water, every scrape of the hull against stone, echoed in the hollow space inside me. I focused on that emptiness, trying to find its edges, to understand the shape of the wound. It was a clean cut, a perfect void. The work of a master.
I didn’t think I’d hated anyone more than I hated Charon now.
Finally, the barge bumped against a stone walkway. I easily recognized the massive building looming ahead. We were at the foot of the Weavers’ Hall.
A small crowd had gathered on the steps, indistinct silhouettes against the light of the death crystals. My sisters stood to the side, their wings held tight to their backs. Aion blocked the main thoroughfare, keeping others from approaching. And Theron... the Cerberus was there, his massive form a bulwark of black fur. He had a hand on the shoulder of a trembling, golden-haired figure.
Callista. Her shoulders shook with silent, ragged sobs.
And at their feet, lying on the cold obsidian, was a splash of color that did not belong. Fiery red hair, fanned out like a fallen sunset against the black stone.
Daphne.
I struggled to my feet and stepped off the barge, my legs unsteady but moving of their own accord. Charon didn’t stop me. I walked through the silent crowd. Their gazes were heavy on me, but I felt nothing. My entire universe had narrowed to that red-haired figure on the ground. The hollowness in my chest began to ache, a throbbing pain that grew with every step.
She was so still. Too still.
I made my way to her side and dropped to my knees. Surely, this wasn’t happening. Surely, she’d open her eyes and smile at me again. Any moment now.
I reached out with a trembling hand, my fingers hovering over her cheek. Her skin, a canvas of life and warmth only hours ago, was pale. Waxy.
This was not sleep. This was not a trick.
It was the stillness of a doll, a beautiful thing with the life gone out of it. An empty vessel.
I looked up, my gaze finding the Cerberus, my old rival, the only other being here who might understand the soul-crushing agonyof a severed bond. The syllables that formed in my throat were a stranger’s, a hollow rasp. “What is this? How can this be? She was safe.”
Theron looked down at me, and for once, there was no animosity in his gaze. He glanced at the serpentine creature hiding behind Callista’s skirts. “Phonos... it seems... she looked into Zoe’s eyes.”
“Why does that matter?” I clutched Daphne’s hand, the cold of it seeping into my skin, a horrifying, invasive chill. A hysterical note began to fray the edges of my numbness. Nothing made sense. “A basilisk’s gaze is nothing to the death-touched.”
“She was never death-touched, Phonos.”
A collective sigh went through the small crowd as three figures emerged from the great bronze doors of the Hall. The Moirae. They moved as one, their presence silencing the very air around us.
But no one could silence me now, not when I had my mate’s body in my arms. “Of course she was. All brides of Asphodelia are death-touched.”
“But she wasn’t a regular bride, Phonos,” Clotho replied. “You saw that at your auction. Why do you think all those monsters went into a frenzy?”
