I walk toward my group of humans as they gather again at the statue, because I doubt they’ll dare come to me. Atlantians watch me, crowding the square. My power grows even stronger, magic still filling my endless wells. They’re grateful here despite my role in their tragedies. Are they also disappointed to see how similar we are to them? The same troubles, the same joys, the same heartbreaks and healing. And just like them, we make the same mistakes over and over until we finally learn.
The Firebringer wipes stone dust and the sting of magic off her skin as if trying to make herself presentable for me when I see nothing but strength and loyalty. Their pulses are all chaoticand drumming, and I hear Hera’s heartbeat again in my ancient ears. Did it accelerate when our lips touched? Mine did.
But she would have destroyed a kingdom of men to be a queen of gods. There was no world in which I could let that happen.
I stand before the Firebringer. Bellanca Atlantis. I have little to say now that all has been done, though there is still one matter left unresolved. “To live unhappy and die young is unjust under any circumstances. You believe Cleito was the victim of Hera’s Olympianomachy, but my brother and I have a gift for you.” Her eyes, the color of the sea around Atlantis, widen. Her lips part, but on a breath she holds, waiting, and I dim the lightning in my eyes to show their true color. A clear, light green, the very hue of Olympian magic. “My Chaos Wizard did die, but a powerful seer was born. I give you back Cleito, your sister.”
That breath she holds rushes out. “My sister?” She looks out to sea, where Poseidon rises from the surf. A thin, red-haired woman sits between two prongs of his great, golden trident, swinging her pale legs and smiling. She waves.
“A seer?” Carver questions.
“My Chaos Wizard served me bravely for years. A clearer mind is my gift to her now.”
The Firebringer brushes past me, reaching the high wall just as Poseidon tips his trident forward and Cleito slips off it and into her sister’s arms. “How?” Bellanca chokes out. The joy and confusion in her voice echo in my heart. I seem all too human these days.
Two men suddenly race across the square, one coming from Apollo’s temple and the other from my own. One is Hoi Polloi and the other is a Magoi healer. I feel his new magic pumping through his veins. They join the Firebringer and her group of friends with Cleito. Watching them, I feel alone.
The young Magoi, who’s just received his ancestral magic,shoulders his way to the seer’s side. He wears my amulet around his neck and has saved many lives. “Are you all right? Do you need healing? I’m a healer now.”
Cleito looks him up and down with clear recognition in her eyes. “I know. And no—I’m fine. Poseidon saved me from my fall into the sea. He brought me to Aeaea. Then he brought Atlantis to Aeaea and raised it here.”
“Poseidon did?” The Firebringer turns and looks at my brother. All heads, including mine, turn as well. He stands in the deepest part of the harbor, looking smug, as usual.
“With Zeus’s permission, of course,” Cleito adds.
Ah, my girl to the end. I find another smile. My paternal feelings don’t end on Mount Olympus, it seems. In fact, I see too many souls I care about too much now.
Poseidon chuckles, either because of Cleito’s little revision or because he’s reading my thoughts. “And it was no small undertaking to keep this island together while merging worlds in the middle of a clash of gods.”
No wonder he looks smug. He’s right, though. It can’t have been easy.
Atlantians finally fully flood out of the temples, trying to get a better look at Poseidon. I feel the growth of my power slow as their devotion automatically shifts to him. Luckily, my ego is not so fragile that I can’t share the gratitude of Atlantians with my brother. He might have been absent from the visible battle, but that didn’t mean he didn’t do his share.
The gratefulness of the Firebringer is especially potent—heartfelt, powerful, and pure—just like her magic. My portion of her devotion doesn’t diminish as she hugs her sister again.
The new healer still hovers over Cleito. “I’m sorry I never helped you. I should have.”
Smiling at him, my seer lifts her hand and brushes a speckof blood off his cheek. “It wasn’t your destiny. You weren’t supposed to intervene.”
“Aeaea’s a dangerous place to drop you off.” Carver frowns at me and then at Poseidon. While I don’t appreciate the accusation in his tone, I’m pleased at how well he’s always defended Cleito, no matter the cost to him. “The Minotaur… Circe… You could’ve been killed.”
“Oh, I didn’t go into the maze or onto the island.” Cleito’s face brightens with a huge smile, just for him. She knows a true brother when she sees one. “I stayed on your boat. You left plenty to eat and drink there.”
“TheAthena?” Clearly delighted, the Firebringer looks across the sea toward Hera’s island. I feel the thought ofhomerush through her mind and body, but it doesn’t take up all the room there. Her heart anchors right here, in Atlantis, and satisfaction fills me. I, too, love the salt air, the orange blossoms, the bright sunshine, and the Nereid-crested waves of this island. I think I’ll be less absent here.
“You seem much more clearheaded,” Carver says to Cleito. “Are you well?” His care for my Chaos Wizard, his selfless sacrifice, factored into my decision to brand the shard onto his chest and make him immune to his wife’s magic. There’s little point in punishing bad deeds if good ones go unrewarded.
Cleito smiles at him, affection in her still-golden eyes. I made sure the color remained unique, but the fathomlessness is gone, the infinite swirling. Eyes that were unfocused all her life easily focus on her new brother. “My work finished when Hera dropped me. I’d never seen anything about myself beyond. I think I was supposed to die. Or maybe I did in a way. But here I am again, and I’m just a plain old seer now.”
“I don’t see anything plain about you,” the new Magoi healer mutters.
Cleito cocks her head at him, smiling a little and maybe seeing what I do. There might be another union to bless soon.
The Firebringer’s happiness is a blazing light inside me. Maybe that’s why I’ve followed her so closely lately. Her passions are so raw they jump straight out at me and demand attention. As she looks around at the people she’s gathered in Atlantis, her close circle, she sees the family she never had forming before her eyes. Sisters. Brothers. Parents. A husband. I open my mind and her thoughts are mine.
This is a life.
For the first time in eons, goose bumps ripple over my skin. But then I don’t need to spy on her mind, because she says what she feels aloud. “There’s nothing we lost in Thalyria that we can’t rebuild here.” Turning to her husband, she grips his hand and smiles. “And better still, we can go back to visit. We can even sail theAthenathere.”
