The Commander’s journal.
The truth slammed into me with vicious clarity—and fury followed, white-hot and blinding.It was him.
He had stood beside me, touched me, sworn himself to me, while knowing exactly what he was.
He was the monster created to kill me.
My chest burned as betrayal ripped through our bond, twisting every memory into something sharp and poisonous.
I wanted to scream. To reach inside my soul and destroy the bond that tethered me to my killer. To make him feel the same pain I was feeling.
And yet?—
“Rythos!” I screeched his name like a curse.
“Do not say his name! You are supposed to bemine!” Riven yelled down at me, spittle flying from his mouth.“I made him into amonster,and you stillchose him over me!” His fist slammed into the ground, those golden flecks in his eyes blazing with fury.
“Helion,” I whispered, voicebreaking on a sob.
“I’ve missed the way you say my name,” he smirked at me in a flash of dimples.
My heart didn’t break. It stopped. Shuddering like it didn’t know which betrayal to die from first.
Cerilla had betrayed us and turned to the fallen Sun God.
Riven was alie.
A trick.
A manipulation.
And the Commander—Rythoshadn’t told me who he really was.
My breath shuddered out of me as though I had been winded. Riven closed his eyes, features morphing to reveal the real him. He filled out, becoming more muscular. Taller. The build of a god.
It broke my heart that he still looked like Riven.
“Edgar here has watched over you for me. Harvesting your blood for me to slowly resurrect the powers those other fuckers stripped from me. You were different, Lyra. The other versions had never dared to touch the Dead Sea. That’s how I found you before my monster could kill you, pet. I kept you weak enough that he couldn’t sense you.”
My breathing was coming quicker, tears spilling down my cheeks.
He was the one taking my blood.
“Until you fucking Ascended, plunging into my own ritual.” Riven chuckled.
I looked down at the symbol below my knees. The same mark worn by the Iron Guard.Hismark. Ascension hadn’t been a plea to estranged Gods. It had beenfeedingthe one God who had fallen.
In that single, shattering moment—I understood. Ihadn’t escaped my cage that night. I had run straight into the arms of the god who built it for me.
“Don’t cry, there will still be a wedding tonight.” His voice sounded far away over the roaring in my ears. “Ours. And together, we will take back the Throne of Gods.”
Rythos roared from the other side of the ballroom, a primal heart-breaking sound that shook the heavens.
Helion lifted me into his arms, cradling my numb body against his chest.I was so numb. Sobroken.
My head lolled to the side, and through the swarm of monsters, I sawhimfall to his knees—panic etched into his eyes as they locked on me.
Rythos. My cursed lover. My monster.
