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Silence settled over the room, and I didn’t need to look at Atlas to know he had already reached the same conclusion I had.

“My brother,” he said quietly.

There was no question in his voice.

Only certainty.

His gaze remained fixed on the table as though pieces of a puzzle he hadn’t even realized existed were suddenly beginning to slot into place. Around him, the room seemed to grow impossibly still. Even Aster remained silent, watching Atlas carefully while Lazaros’s expression darkened.

I nodded. “Yes, it was Lazaros, but not really. The same darkness that had consumed Riley was wrapped around him, too, and somehow, I knew they were connected. Both of them, connected to Demetrios.” I shook my head, struggling to find words that adequately described something that had felt more instinctive than logical.

“I don’t know how to explain it properly. It felt less like three separate people and more like a single web. Like corruption spreading through all of them, binding them together.” The memory made a chill creep down my spine.

“Then something changed. Riley fought back.” A small smile tugged at my lips despite everything. “Only for a second, but it was enough. The connection broke, the darkness vanished, and suddenly I was back.”

As I spoke, I watched Lazaros’s expression tighten. The mention of Riley seemed to affect him almost as much as the mention of Demetrios. And I wondered what exactly they had endured together inside that prison of the mind.

Across from me, Atlas remained silent, listening carefully.

For once, none of them interrupted. The memory made my stomach twist.

I hadn’t intended to tell this much. Hadn’t intended to relive it so vividly. Yet now that I was there, sitting amongst those memories again, I found myself slipping deeper into them with every word.

“The visions, I don’t really know how to explain what happened, but it was like someone had taken thousands of pieces of a story and thrown them at me all at once.”

Atlas watched me carefully and asked, “What else did you see?”

“I saw fragments. Faces. Places. Pieces of conversations. I remember this overwhelming feeling that something terrible was coming. That there was a betrayal at the center of it all, something that had been set in motion long before any of us realized. I knew Demetrios was connected somehow. I knew Lazaros mattered. And I knew somebody was trying to destroy your bloodline.”

I hesitated before continuing, “At the time, I didn’t understand most of it. Honestly, I still don’t know if I understand all of it now. It felt less like being shown answers and more like being handed pieces of a puzzle I wasn’t ready to solve.”

I glanced towards Lazaros.

“But it was enough. Enough to convince me that what was happening to Riley wasn’t isolated. Enough to make me realize there was something much bigger behind all of this.”

Across from us, Lazaros looked drained. The color had yet to fully return to his face, and though he carried himself with the same quiet dignity I had come to expect, the exhaustion was becoming impossible to hide. The wound at his throat, the possession, the memories he was now being forced to live with, it was all catching up to him.

We still hadn’t explained everything that had happened after entering the Rift. The Badlands. The Labyrinth…The Gorgon King.

The pact I had made with him.

I knew Atlas would be furious at that part in particular, which is why I couldn’t bring myself to tell him just yet. It also felt strange how much remained unsaid after everything we had already revealed, yet somehow none of it seemed important right now. The explanation of my vision and the connection between Riley, Lazaros, and Demetrios had left a heavy silence hanging over the room. One that nobody seemed eager to disturb.

“Lazaros, you look like hell,” Atlas said at last, and despite the bluntness of the observation, there was genuine concern beneath it.

“Go and get some rest. We will continue this tomorrow.”

Lazaros didn’t argue.

“Aster,” Atlas continued, his voice shifting slightly. “You and I will be having a word tomorrow to discuss anything that might have been left out of this conversation.” I gulped at that and shot Aster a panicked look.

To absolutely nobody’s surprise, Aster appeared completely unbothered by the threat. If anything, he looked faintly amused by it. He nodded, accepting the warning with far more grace than it deserved, before turning towards the door.

Just before he stepped through it, however, he glanced back over his shoulder. His gaze found mine, and then he winked.

The smug bastard.

“Alexandra.”