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A low tremor of warning went through me like an injection of cold, but I flew us closer to the wall. I kept as much distance from the darkness and ocean as I could, and I jumped when both magics slammed into Cronus like a punch to the gut. So Poseidon was good.
Cronus didn't even falter as he was pummelled by magic; his horrible featureless face cracked open again. My stomach twisted.
Did Poseidon know I un-cursed two of his hippocampi? Had he come to help because he owed me? I tried to remember the overgrown seahorses' exact words, but my head was too muddied with fear to recall them. My mates' panic clamoured in my chest, making my movements jittery as I flapped my wings, scanning the stormy sky for Emlyn.
He was unsettlingly far away, his grey wings propelling him around the inky storm and towards the western city walls like we'd had the same thought. Even from a distance, I saw Wane and Verena in his arms, and a tiny knot unfurled in my chest. Okay. Em had them; they were safe. Wane was safe. Cronus didn't have him.
Not holding back now, I flew full-out for the wall, keeping an eye on Harvey. I felt feral myself, desperate to scream for Harvey and my friends to turn around and runawayfrom the natural disasters converging on Olympus. But I was too afraid to draw Cronus's attention. Was it just me, or was the titan growing even taller, his reach spreading further?
"Faster, Haley," Kai urged, his hands quivering where he gripped me.
"I'm trying," I bit out, wind battering me from all directions, whipped up from the giant ocean wave that rammed the walls.
"Oh gods," I gasped, watching cracks erupt through the solid stone, racing through the long wall around the gate in either direction, forming branches of fissures until—the whole thing collapsed.
So much for being safer on the other side of the wall.
"We fly over the sea and keep going," Kai shouted over the wind, his eyes wild. "Renna can get us back to Hell."
Right. Good. I could do that. I swivelled my head, searching for Em, Wane, and Verena. We all needed to fly in the same direction, but fuck knows how Renna, Tali, and Harvey would meet up with us and—
"No!"I screamed when Cronus's giant arm flung up and he swatted Emlyn, Wane, and Verena out of the air. Like they were an annoying fly and not my whole goddamn world.
"Fuck,fuck!"Kai snarled, his breath catching.
Emlyn spun out of control, his grey wings twisting, arching, frantically trying to catch air.
And failing.
My stomach clenched.Move!I growled at myself, and launched into flight.
I shot back the way we'd come, swerving and diving and flying faster than I ever had before, even with Kai’s added weight. I barely saw the flattened buildings or the rubble that used to be walls. All I saw were my mates and a fuckingkidfalling to their deaths.
I can't do it again.
Not after watching them get shot by Locke. Not after Wynvail collapsing to dust in my arms. I couldn't do it again.
I won’t survive this.
Harvey roared so loudly that the sound penetrated the wind lashing us. I fought to fly faster, further. It was useless; even streaking across the city, the storm battered me back until I sobbed, useless.
"They'll be fine," Kai chanted, his arms trembling where they locked around me. "They'll be fine."
But Cronus had knocked them out of the sky and now they free-fell into the enormous cloud of black, black magic spilling through the streets of Olympus until it was almost entirely under shadow.
My eyes burned, a tear racing down my cheek and over my wobbling bottom lip. I flew until I felt my wings buckle, and still I refused to stop.
"They'll be fine," Kai said weakly as I fought my way across the city, my muscles dangerously strained after the Labyrinth.
But my mates had vanished into the dark storm, and I couldn’t see them. I dropped fast into our mate bonds and couldn’t tell if it was just my panic or was numbness spreading through my soul. Exactly like it did when I lost Wynvail. Nothing good ever happened inside a cloud of magic that black, that powerful. The wielder was a titan; they had to be.
The dark storm, the cloud of silver, and the blinding light behind us—all of them had to be titans. Cronus's backup.
We were all dead. Verena was right.
It was happening again. I'd be forced to watch my mates die, one by one. I couldn't fly fast enough, couldn't reach that fell storm, couldn't dig them out of it or save them.
I was helpless, useless. Again.
