My shield shot toward him, threads of gold and black weaving a barrier in the space of a heartbeat. The hellhound twisted mid-air, hundreds of pounds of muscle moving with shocking grace. One head stretched out, jaws gaping.
He caught the arrow between his teeth.
It exploded on contact, fire racing across his fangs and burning through his thick hide. He howled—all three heads in unison—a sound of agony and fury.
But he kept diving toward me, landing in front of me with a crash that shuddered through the ground, snarling at the onslaught, even as fire ate across his body. I sent him a weave of healing while searching for the third arrow.
Three arrows had been shot at once. A coordinated volley.
One caught by my hellhound. One aimed at me—I deflected it at the last instant, the arrow ringing off my longsword before burying itself in the earth.
The third pierced Sindy’s neck before I could stop it. The tip emerged crimson with blood and divine light.
She stood perfectly still, her hazel eyes wide with shock. Her hand rose slowly, fingers trembling as they brushed the shaft. Blood pooled in the hollow of her throat. More welled from her mouth when she tried to speak to me.
“No!” The cry tore from me. “No, no, no!”
My blood turned to ice despite the battle’s heat.
Ihadshielded her. I’d woven a protection around Sindy. But it wasn’t enough against that god-damned arrow. I should have woven a blood shield. Should have been faster.
This was my fault. My failure.
Sindy’s knees buckled, then she fell sideways, the arrow stuck in her throat. I couldn’t even cradle her as she fell.
My friend, the girl who’d welcomed me, who’d stood by me, was dead.
And the battle still raged on, not caring. Screams and steel and tearing flesh assaulted my ears.
Dante and Cerberus were a tapestry of wounds. Cerberus’s left wing hung broken, the hide on his shoulder blistered. One of Dante’s horns was cleaved in half. Yet they fought on, cleaving through the onslaught with relentless fury, guarding me on either side.
More gods and creatures poured through the gate, trying to overwhelm us by sheer numbers.
Then I saw Demeter framed in the gateway, one hand pressed to the stone as if for support. She was yelling something lost in the din. Her face was pale, eyes wide. Her gaze found me across the chaos. And in them, a mournful horror. Recognition of what she’d helped create.
It was too late.
We were losing. The math was brutal and simple: too many enemies, too much power arrayed against us.
On the balcony, my mate roared in rage as lightning struck him down again. Zeus’s bolt took him full in the chest. He crashed to the marble, and before he could rise, they swarmed him—all of them at once—lightning and beams and forged metal combining to keep him pinned.
I screamed in rage, and a wildfire answered in my veins, consuming everything in its path. I would not lose them. Not Sindy. Not Dante, Orren, or the surviving students.
Hades’s power was still bound by their curse. But I was free.
And I was done watching my enemies beat my husband. Done pretending to be weak, mortal, helpless.
Done pretending to play by their fucking rules.
It was time to spin the wheel. To flip the board and scatter every carefully laid plan.
Hundreds of gods watched from the stands, so sure they had won.
Fuck them.
Blood tears streamed from my eyes. I threw up my hands to the sky, palms open. Power gathered in me—not a trickle but a flood. Every drop reclaimed from the Fates. Every ounce of a hundred lifetimes.
It built like a tsunami. Wave after wave, multiplying, crashing inward and outward at once.
