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“Fenrir!” Vera screamed, “Look out!”

Fenrir could not look away.

It hit him in a rush, not the Prometheus’ palm, but Vera’s shoulder, her shield taking the creature’s hit while he hurled towards the ground like a fly knocked from the air. He hit the ground somewhere between the Prometheus’ feet, dazed, on his back, dust flooding into his lungs and making it hard to breathe, let alone think.

The chasm. Orpheus was opening the chasm.

“Get up, Ama! It’s time to fight!”

Above him, emerging from the dust, stood Daedra. Like the Prometheus roaring behind her, she too was quickly healing, color returning to her skin, a shine to her hair, a rich amber fire lighting her eyes.

“A warrior does not lay down and die,” she breathed, crouching down and holding out her hand. “And neither do heroes, or so your human books claim.”

“You need to stop reading those spicy romance novels.” He took Daedra’s hand and allowed her to haul him to his feet. “You’re okay?”

“Thanks to the Netherflame.” Daedra jutted her chin at Sanctuary. “But we are out of time. Your mage has succeeded. We need to kill this beast before it heals itself and goes after the city.”

“Daedra, he’s opening the chasm.”

“Good,” she breathed. “Then we don’t have to convince him.”

“But what if Lore—”

But Daedra was already moving, towing Fenrir along to sail through the air together, launching themselves up the Prometheus to join Vera where she crouched atop its shoulder, hair a fly-away mess.

“Was it nice? The nap you took?” Vera snapped, shield tucked close to her side where Fenrir spotted a small patch of blood.

He reached for her, not realizing his hands were shaking until she put one of hers in his. Fenrir helped his mother stand.

“Mum, you’re bleeding.”

“A cracked rib, I think.” Her breathing was even though, which hopefully meant it hadn’t gotten her lung. But like Hell Fenrir was going to risk Vera’s life now, not when they were so close to victory, so close to making amends.

“Daedra, can you get her to safety?”

Daedra’s face went tight for the moment it took their eyes to meet. “Ama…”

“Please,” Fenrir begged. “Leave this one to me and I promise you can kill Ohm instead.”

“Ugh. Fine!” She reached for Vera and slid an arm under her good shoulder. “To think, I finally regain my strength, and you still steal the kill from me!”

“Thank you,” Fenrir breathed. Daedra bared her teeth, though her eyes held a warmth he didn’t expect. Then she was gone, soaring through the air with Vera in her arms, Fenrir left to take out the Prometheus alone before it could recover enough to do any real damage to him or the city below.

Maybe that’s why he didn’t see it, at first. The toppling spire, nor the arc of violet light.

He punched through the Prometheus guard with an unnatural strength, spire hitting the ground at the precise moment they reached Sanctuary’s wall. A brief flash of violet and Fenrir was bathed in darkness again, plunging into the Prometheus’ chest to burst from the opposite side in an arc of black ichor. He repelled off Sanctuary’s wall, catching a brief glimpse of a collapsing building before he was airborne again, shaking off the black goo and angling for the Prometheus’ head.

He couldn’t see it, but he could hear it: the tolling bell that abruptly went quiet. By the time he burst through the Prometheus’ skull to watch the life drain from its remaining eye, the sound had returned, but different. Not a clear ring but a deep, saddened twang that reminded him of the rubber ball Astrid was always playing with. And it was a strange thought to have right then, he realized, Prometheus crumbling towards the city below just like the cathedral at its center.

Wait. The cathedral. The cathedral was...falling?

Before Fenrir’s eyes, the whole city began to crumble.

What? No...no!

From the depths of its Hellish foundations, Sanctuary roared, a siren of screams and cries and frenetic shouting. People ran where they could, towards a safety they couldn’t find. Obsidian crashed around them, the chasm at its heart a yawning maw, waking to a destruction the man at its center wielded with more brutal force than Fenrir had ever seen in his life. A force Lore had never been able to unleash but had wanted to—desperately—which Fenrir witnessed now when Orpheus took hold of that power and wrenched open Hell.

All around him, the world fractured while Sanctuary shattered at his feet.