Voren joins us. “The dead are silent. It is truly done.”
“Let’s get topside,” I suggest. “I want a drink. A strong one.”
“Tea,” Nyssa states.
“Whatever liquid you want, slayer. I’m buying.”
We move back toward the tunnel. The water outside the magical barrier presses in, dark and heavy. I keep the pressure off us with a thought, guiding the chaotic energy to reinforce the walls as we pass.
Nyssa stops at the entrance and looks back at the empty chamber. The cut stones look ordinary now. Just wet rocks in a dark hole.
“No more Devourer,” she whispers.
“No more Devourer,” Dreven confirms. He kisses her temple.
“You saved the fucking world, slayer,” I say, taking her from Dreven and wrapping my arms around her. “How does it feel?”
“Like I’m a god,” she whispers, her hands cupping my face as she presses her lips to mine.
I deepen the kiss, claiming her mouth with everything I have. She responds with equal force, her fingers tangling in my hair. She is alive. She is ours. The chaotic energy under my skin settles into a hum of satisfaction rather than the jagged need to destroy.
“As touching as this display is,” Voren says, stepping past us toward the ascent, “Pool is vibrating the walls. She is losing her grip.”
I pull back, though I keep my arm around Nyssa’s waist. “Right. Let’s not drown after saving reality. That would be embarrassing.”
Dreven takes her other side, his hand finding hers instantly. He needs the contact more than I do right now. We move up the sloping floor of the tunnel. The light from above grows from a pinprick to a disc. I keep the pressure of the water back, pushing against the crushing weight with a thought.
We break the surface and scramble onto the wet rocks of the shoreline. Pool stands there, her face pale, arms trembling. She drops her hands, and the water collapses behind us with a roar, sealing the passage.
“Don’t ask me to do that again,” she snaps, wiping water from her eyes.
“Noted,” I say, helping Nyssa find her footing on the slick stones.
She looks up at the sky. The clouds break apart, revealing patches of blue that look impossibly bright. The purple bruise of the Devourer is gone. The air is clear. “I don’t think I’ve seen it this sunny in months,” she comments.
“It’s perfect,” I say, keeping my gaze on her.
She smiles, but it has a tinge of sadness to it. “Home, then?”
I nod. “Back to the cottage for tea.”
“No,” she says, shaking her head. “Not the cottage. The Pantheon Realm.”
Epilogue
Nyssa
Six Months Later
Six months into godhood, you learn the difference between silence and peace.
Silence is the Pantheon realm at its worst: fog thick enough to choke, doors that remember your failures, the constant hungry suggestion that you don’t belong. Silence is what the Devourer wore like perfume.
Peace is what comes after you take the Throne and make the realm stop flinching.
I sit on the Chaos Throne with my bare feet tucked under me and watch the realm breathe.
It does that now.
