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“The short hair is a lot easier to manage,” I said, running my fingers through it as I came to stand by Wild, kitted out in his full armor and cutting quite the dashing, albeit slightly intimidating figure.
The corners of his lips tipped up. “It suits you. Though I’d find you beautiful no matter what.”
We made our way out just as the sun was rising, the air smelling deceptively fresh and pretty while we headed for the battlefield. T flew over head, looping back and dropping low enough in the sky to cuff the short ends of my hair with a snakey leg, before swooping away with a huff.
Wild looked down at me with his eyebrows raised. “Have you got an admirer, darling?”
I laughed, shaking my head. “No. I’m his friend. He needs one.”
I leaned up to kiss Wild’s cheek, and he turned to catch my lips in a chaste kiss. It wasn’t nearly enough, but neither of us pressed for a heavier goodbye as we made our way back along the empty road to the battlefield. Anything more would have been an admission that today carried real risk, and neither of us wanted that. No, we were going to head out there as though this was any normal day, and we’d see each other later because no other alternative was acceptable.
“Stay safe for me,” Wild instructed as we arrived among the Spartoi. “Stay back. Don’t do anything rash.”
“I could say the same to you,” I pointed out. The sun was rising higher. The wall of stone that had hidden the agathos army seemed to have shifted and changed, allowing for some offensive attack through gaps in the rock. The Spartoi were already falling into formation, but I couldn’t see how they could penetrate the fortress Gaia had built for her army. Was there any point trying?
The volcano that appeared out of the ground yesterday directly blocked the horizon, and the sky had turned an ominous shade of blood red. Part of me wanted to ask Wild to turn around, to march the Spartoi away from what seemed like impossible odds. But it would just put this fight off for another day, wouldn’t it?
T flew into action while I deliberated, sending a black cloud of rain and lightning right over the plateau, forcing Gaia to close in the open ceiling of the rock structure to shield the army from above.
Wild grimaced, grabbing me and pressing a hard kiss to my lips. “I love you, my Prophêtis. See you at sunset.”
“I love you,” I whispered at his back as he walked away, the Spartoi parting respectfully for him to make his way to the front line.
The agathos attempted to hurl a wave of stones down, but T directed gale force winds that flung their own stones right back at them. The rain was coming down in a sheet at the cave’s mouth, turning the ground beneath them to sludge. A flash of lightning struck at the already weakened plateau, a targeted attack on the structural integrity. Gaia was a formidable foe, but T was her son, and it was clear that he knew what he was doing.
Had he just been warming up yesterday?
I strayed a little further back from the field, but not too far, to gather more branches to throw on the low-burning fire, watching T work out of the corner of my eye. Hehadjust been warming up yesterday, I decided. Or holding back, at the very least. Possibly, he was feeling a little more fired up this morning since the Spartoi hadn’t run from him in terror overnight.
As he fought, the volcano began to spit and rumble, the faint trickle of white smoke that had been drifting out of it thickening and growing into a dense, black plume. Immediately, there were Spartoi surrounding me, holding their shields up so I could only see through a small sliver where they overlapped. They were moving forward to rejoin the broken formation, carrying me along on the tide with them as they moved.
Shouldn’t we run?I thought vaguely. After all, swords and shields wouldn’t protect us from magma. Then again, with the speed that it moved, maybe we were too late to run anyway. Maybe Wild and the Spartoi were assuming that Gaia wouldn’t risk her own army by sending lava this way.
I wasn’t quite so confident.
Before I could vocalize my thoughts that maybe retreat was the best option, a deafening screech filled our ears, sending all of us ducking for cover. The motion caused the shields to lower, just in time to see something enormous and red, with fiery wings fly out of the volcano, shooting into the sky with another shriek of displeasure.
T wasn’t the only monster in the skies anymore.
“Drakon,” one of the men next to me whispered. I didn’t need a translator for that.Dragon. Gaia had sent a dragon.
Chapter 24
Theglowingwebfadedinto nothingness, leaving the three sisters standing in front of me. I climbed to my feet, having all but collapsed from exhaustion at some point while they worked. I may have even fallen asleep, it had all been a blur of staring souls, mumbling creepy goddesses, and the incessantly flickering web of mortality.
Ten out of ten would not recommend.
“It is done,” Clotho murmured.
I looked at her, searching inside myself for any sign of change. The hollowness in my chest felt as cold and empty as ever.
“Is it?”
“Don’t you question us,boy,” Atropos hissed. “We have given you the means, you will need to do the work for yourself. Perhaps your agathos won’t even want you anymore.”
Fuckingouch.
“Then I wish her all the luck in the world getting rid of me because I’m not going willingly. Tell me how to bond with her again, and these kind souls here will be happy to release you.”
