Accepted.
The phone vanished from my hand.
Simply vanished, as if reality itself had decided it was done dealing with modern technology. I’d never liked the thing anyway.
The water began to drain, reversing through the channels Artemis had identified earlier, drawn back into the ancient systems carved into the stone. The level dropped steadily, revealing more of the chamber floor with every passing second.
We both exhaled at once.
The room fell quiet, save for the low sound of receding water and our own unsteady breathing.
I braced my hands on my knees, laughter threatening to spill out of me in sharp, disbelieving bursts. Artemis clutched my arm, her presence warm and real.
We were alive.
The entity receded slightly, its chains settling, interest apparently satisfied—for now.
I turned to Artemis and felt the full weight of what she had done settle into me at last. She had run toward danger. She had read Atlantis like a living system. She had trusted me to follow.
I drew a slow breath, then another.
“We should leave,” I said, because that felt safer than everything else I wanted to say.
“No,” she said, voice steady in a way that made my chest tighten. “There are things you should know.”
I turned fully toward her.
She looked exhausted, and she was shaking a little now that the danger had eased. But her eyes were clear and focused.
“The being didn’t just take my knowledge,” she continued. “It gave me knowledge in return. That’s how I knew what to do with the water. That’s how I knew how to stop Hadrian.”
I swallowed. “What do you mean, gave you knowledge?”
She took a breath. Then another. Like she was bracing herself to say something that could not be unsaid.
"This is how your family got its power,” she said gently. “By bartering with the entity. Except they were not trading knowledge. The power your clan obtained was stained with the blood of those that have been sacrificed over the years. Unknowingly and against their will.”
The air shifted.
I felt it before I saw it. A pressure change, like the world leaning closer to listen. We both looked up.
The entity was no longer humanoid.
It had reshaped itself into a dragon. It was massive, ancient, and slightly transparent, as though it existed half in this world and half in some ethereal plane. Its wings were vast sheets of shimmering light, its body etched with the same glyphs carved into the temple walls, chains still wrapped around it, still binding it no matter the form it took.
It was beautiful and terrible.
Artemis stepped closer to me, not touching, but near enough that I felt her presence like an anchor.
“Hadrian knew pieces of it,” she said. “He knew the ritual brought power. He knew it elevated your bloodline. But he didn’t know the sacrifice itself. He didn’t know what it demanded.”
My pulse hammered in my ears.
“Just like we saw through the trials, the Atlanteans built this place as a conduit. They used it to move power through the world. Your ancestor didn’t create anything. He redirected it. He made a bargain to siphon vitality into your clan.”
I shook my head slowly. “From where?”
“From everywhere,” she said. “From people. From magic. From life itself.”
