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They were bolstered by the fight,I guessed. It was the violence that was spurring them on, not Wild’s victory necessarily.
Riot and I broke through the first rank, and I froze at seeing the fallen agathos structure up close, the giant slabs of rock smashed into a thousand pieces in the ditch, disguising the carnage underneath.
Why hadn’t she saved them?
Wild limped forward, pulling me into his embrace. My cheek was immediately wet and sticky from the thick blood that had spurted onto his breastplate, but I didn’t care. He was here. He was whole. He’d slayed the dragon and lived to tell the tale.
I burst into tears.
“I’m sorry!” I gasped. “I don’t know why I’m crying. Yes, I do. You were amazing, but I was so scared. And all those people. Those people!” I sucked down a desperate lungful of oxygen. “T! T, are you okay?”
T had rolled off the dead, no-longer-flaming dragon. He was on his back, his greenish skin tinged black where the dragon’s wings had burned him. He tilted his head to meet my eye, giving me an affirmative grunt. I doubted anyone else could tell, but there was a soft, faint gratitude in his gaze that I’d asked, and I made a note to make sure he felt valued and appreciated going forward.
“You’re okay?” Wild rasped, wavering slightly on his feet.
Riot made a strangled sound, diving forward to drag Wild’s arm over his shoulders to keep him upright. “You cantalk?”
I slipped under Wild’s arm on the other side, wrapping my arms around his middle. “I didn’t tell you that?”
Wild was staring at Riot uncertainly, but Riot gave him a lazy grin that immediately had the tension in Wild’s body easing.
“It’s water under the bridge. We all lose control sometimes.”
“Don’t let me off the hook so easily,” Wild replied hoarsely. “There was no excuse. You could hold this over my head for the rest of our lives, if you liked.”
Riot flashed him a grin. “Maybe I will.”
Wild’s answering half smile was weak, fading to a somber expression as he took in the destruction that had once been the agathos army.
“We need to search for survivors,” he said grimly, wincing as he attempted to straighten and step away from Riot and me.
“No.” I stopped him with a firm hand against his chest, though it wasn’tthatfirm. On any normal day, Wild could overpower me with his pinkie finger. “You just slayed adragon, Wild. You’re exhausted, and you’re more hindrance than help to them in this state.”
The barest flicker of a smile crossed Wild’s face. “Are you giving me orders, my darling?”
My face flushed. “Maybe I am. Theras, could you…” I gestured at the wreckage, my throat complaining painfully as I mimed digging and pulling out survivors.
Theras didn’t seem entirely convinced, but he called instructions to the Spartoi anyway, gesturing for them to follow him. Two Spartoi lay lifeless on the ground where their fellow soldiers had dragged them so their bodies would be safe from the fighting, ready for their burial rites.
There had been so much violence, so much death. How much had the agathos who’d been trapped on the plateau even wanted to be there? Maybe they’d begun their march in service of Gaia’s honor, but she’d bribed them with food—a powerful motivator for starving people. They had been battling on the plains, and Gaia had raised them up, isolated them, trapped them in a stone cave.
For what?
What was thepoint?
I’d prayed, and I’d offered, and I’d prayed some more. I’d used my voice like Sophia had instructed me—though I was beginning to think she was wrong because she’d also told me Dare was on his way here, and he still hadn’t appeared. I’d done what I was supposed to do, and yet here we were. Notlosing, but certainly not winning. In a field of death and despair, there were no victors.
So why do this? What was all of this for?
What was thepoint?
I thought back to the times Gaia had answered me—the community center confrontation, the moment of quiet outside Zeus’ temple in Athens—they’d all been times when I’d appealed to her ego. And as much as I didn’twantto now, as much as it pricked at my pride to be even a little bit civilized to this monster after she’d let those agathos who fought in her name fall to their deaths, this was my role. I understood that now.
It wasn’t just that I had some strange affinity to deities, that they heard me when I spoke; it was that I reached out to immortals even when they didn’t deserve it. When no agathos spoke to Nyx, I’d bridged the gap. When I’d found out my soul bonds were daimons, I’d fallen for them anyway. I hadn’t shied away from T when everyone else had. So often, I’d questioned myself, my usefulness, and wondered what my strengths were, but maybe it was this simple.
“Gracie,” Riot said uneasily. “What is that face? What are you planning?”
I almost smiled, remembering Estrella talking about myself-sacrifice face.
