Magic.
It has to help.
I wedge the tip into the seam and push, trying to pry it open, forcing the blade deeper, angling it, twisting, but there’s nothing. The metal doesn’t shift. The stone doesn’t crack. Thedagger scrapes uselessly, the glow flickering as if even it knows this won’t work.
“Come on,” I whisper, forcing harder, desperate enough to risk hurting the blade, if that’s even possible. But it doesn’t give. Not even a fraction.
“Damn it,” I choke out, yanking the dagger free, resheathing it, and scrambling back to my feet. I grab the handle again, throwing my full weight against it, over and over, like if I just hit it hard enough, fast enough, it might break.
The impact rattles through my bones. The machine doesn’t care. It keeps moving. Keeps ticking.
There’s another cry, this time Ashton, low and rough, as the blade presses deeper. My chest constricts.They’re running out of time.
“Alette,” Sylvian says, softer now, even through the pain. “Listen to me. If you can’t stop it?—”
“I can,” I snap, even as my voice shakes. “I just haven’t found out how to yet.”
There’s a pause. A beat where they all look at me.
Then Oberon exhales sharply, something shifting in his expression. “Fine,” he grits out. “Then stop fighting the handle. Look at the base. Something’s feeding it. Something’s driving the rotation.”
Cassius nods tightly. “He’s right. Follow the movement. Find the source.”
I stagger back, breath coming too fast, forcing myself to stop thrashing long enough to think. My gaze sweeps the chamber again, sharper now, following the grind of stone, the rhythm of the turning circle, searching for anything I missed. Another lever, a hidden release, a weakness in the design.
Anything. There has to be something.There has to be.
Sylvian’s voice holds a hint of fear breaking through his usual calm. “If you can’t find a way, it’s okay. We won’t blame you.”
“I said no!” My voice echoes through the chamber, louder than I intended.
I freeze, afraid that the cyclopes had heard, but the room remains silent, save for the relentless ticking of the circle, a grim reminder of time slipping away.
I don’t know what to do. My hands are raw, my arms trembling from the effort of trying to stop the machine, and the blades are rising higher now, their sharp edges gleaming like a cruel promise. The men’s breaths come faster, their fear palpable as they glance at the creeping death beneath them, and I can see in their eyes the weight of despair threatening to consume them.
Tears sting my eyes as I slam my fists against the stone, frustration and desperation boiling over.I can’t let this happen. I can’t lose them.But as I stare at the machine, at the unyielding stone and iron, I feel the crushing weight of helplessness settle over me, the realization that I may be powerless to save them.
What the hell am I going to do?
2
Alette
The sound of their cries tears at me, each one sharper than the grinding of the blades that inch higher and higher. I watch the blood start to drip from their bodies, thin rivulets snaking across the etched lines in the stone floor, pooling in the basin at the center of the room. My stomach churns as I see it, red and glistening, every drop a reminder of the lives hanging by a thread.
And that time is ticking away.
It feels unreal, like I’ve stepped into a nightmare I can’t wake from. The smell of blood is too strong, coating the back of my throat, forcing me to understand that this is happening. This is real. They are bleeding. They are being carved apart slowly, deliberately, and if I don’t do something right now, they are going to die in front of me.
“Hold on!” I whisper fiercely, though I’m not sure who I’m saying it to, them or myself. My voice shakes anyway, betraying me, thin against the relentless grinding of the mechanism.
My gaze snaps between them, panic surging higher. “Can’t you use your powers?” The question breaks out of me before I can stop it. A question that I should’ve asked a long time ago, buta question I already think I know the answer to. “Burn it, break it… anything!”
Cassius’s head jerks slightly, his jaw tight with pain. “No,” he grits out. “There’s too much iron.”
My stomach drops.
“The structure,” he forces out, breath hitching. “It’s threaded through the stone… and the chains. It’s suppressing everything. We can’t access enough power to matter.”
