"We hold the line here," I declared. "Until the fire goes out."
Athena gripped her spear, straightening her spine. She looked at the Devourer, then at us.
"Then let's hope you burn bright, Aria Pandoros," she whispered. "Because it's getting very dark."
As the unnatural wind howled, smelling of nothingness, one question burned brighter than the runes on my skin, was there enough of us left to fight the dark?
TWENTY-NINE
Aria
The silence that followed Athena’s lowered spear didn’t last long. It was a fragile, held breath, a momentary pause in the violence that I desperately hoped would hold.
It didn't. The stillness shattered, broken not by a weapon or a word, but by the agonizing sound of a tree screaming.
To my left, near where Thane’s massive, lumbering form rested, an ancient oak tree, solid, thick, and at least three hundred years old, didn't just snap; it imploded. The wood splintered into dust as if struck by an invisible wrecking ball, disintegrating in a spray of cellulose and bark. But nothing had touched it. It simply collapsed, folded inward by a sudden, localized crush of gravity that warped the very air around the Bear Prince.
Thane?
I reached for him through the bond, offering a mental hand to steady him, but the connection was heavy, vibrating with a panic that wasn't my own.
I can’t stop it,his voice rumbled in my head. It sounded grinding and distorted, like heavy stones shifting deepunderwater.The ground... it feels like wet paper, Aria. I’m sinking.
He wasn't speaking metaphorically. The bedrock of the mortal mountain, stone that had held firm for eons, was liquefying beneath his paws. It was unable to support the immense, supernatural density of his Titan-charged form. He shifted his weight, trying to correct his balance, and the earth groaned in protest. A jagged fissure tore open in the soil, widening instantly to swallow a section of the ruined Sanctorum archway in a cloud of dust.
The Phoenix dove, his immense wings spreading to buffet the air as he tried to give Thane space. But as he strafed the tree line, the air didn't just heat up; it combusted. The oxygen in his wake ignited into brilliant, terrible turquoise flames, turning the atmosphere itself into fuel. A flock of birds, caught in the sudden thermal draft, dropped from the sky, their feathers flash-fried in mid-air before they ever hit the ground.
"Stop moving!" I yelled, throwing my hands up to shield my face as a wave of blistering heat rolled over us. It smelled of ozone and ancient, volatile spices, myrrh and ash, burning too hot to endure.
Athena stumbled back, her divine composure cracking. Her eyes went wide, filled with a fresh, dawn-breaking horror. "They are too heavy," she gasped, watching the fundamental physics of the mortal plane unzip around us. "They are resonating at a frequency this reality cannot sustain. They’re tearing the weave just by existing."
"We aren't doing it on purpose," Kaelen growled. The words were guttural, vibrating in my chest, hard to understand given that they were forcing their way through the throat of a dragon.
He dug his obsidian claws into the granite shelf to anchor himself against the tremors Thane was causing. The stone hissed and groaned, turning into bubbling orange magma under histouch. Thick black smoke curled from his nostrils, choking the already thin mountain air.
We are too big for this realm, Aria,Kaelen’s voice projected into my mind, sharp and edged with a rare, frantic frustration.We are like giants breaking the furniture just by breathing in the wrong room.
I looked around at the devastation spreading from our crater. It wasn't the Devourer eating the world anymore; it was us.
Wewere the catastrophe.
The grass withered instantly where Flynn’s shadow touched it, the green life drained away. Thane’s gravity was pulling rocks and debris out of the soil, suspending them in a hovering, chaotic orbit around his massive head. Elias was burning the sky itself.
We had survived the fall. We had beaten the odds. But we had become a lethal poison to everything around us.
"We have to go," I said, clutching my wrist. My metal arm was humming a discordant warning note, the golden filigree hot against my skin. "We cannot stay here. We have to leave the mortal realm immediately. We need to get back to the Threshold or... somewhere else. Anywhere but here."
"We can't go anywhere," Flynn whined. The sound was a high-pitched distortion of static and panic, echoing from the throat of the massive, pacing wolf.We are pinned. Aria, the world is sticking to us.
I took a desperate step toward Athena. "You have to help us. Open a path back to Olympus. Use the spear. If we stay here, we crack the crust of this planet."
Athena laughed, a dry, brittle sound that held no humor. She pointed the tip of her spear at the sky, at the swirling, chaotic storm clouds of the Devourer that still choked the horizon.
"Look up, Pandora. The gates are shut. Hera has sealed the High Seat. She would rather let the mortal realm crack like afragile egg than let you back in with that... that taint. I don't even know ifIcan get back in."
"She can't lock us out forever," I argued, the gold runes on my skin flaring hot with frustration. I clenched my fists, feeling the hum of the Gate's magic answering my anger. "They are Princes. You are all of the blood."
"Not anymore."
