Chapter 17

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I wasn't entirely prepared for what a battle with gods and titans would look like. I thought it would be like the fight at Olympus, but watching an army made from bright crimson magic race overhead, their commander yelling orders from a glowing magic chariot, I realised I had severely underestimated the scale of this. I was so out of my depth it was insane.

Celestial arrows dripping golden tears flew overhead, driving deep into Cronus's shadow form and, just for a second, lighting up his skeleton—and illuminating the people trapped inside him.

Fuck, they were really in there.

Water surged out of the pools either side of us, rising into two enormous water ogres brandishing heavy-looking clubs. My heart leapt. Poseidon. He must have been using his magic from inside Cronus.

"Zara," murmurs went through the crowd, killing my hope but not diminishing my howling need to draw blood. "Daughter of Poseidon."

I vaguely remembered him screaming about Cronus abducting his daughter in Olympus. Right before the titan ate him.

We couldn't let Cronus devour anyone else. He absorbed the arrows that drove into his body like they were drops of sunlight and not wicked weapons.

"Remember the plan," Kai urged, staying close to my side even as the army picked up their pace, our ordered march collapsing into a frantic sprint.

Lili released a battle scream at the heart of the front line, and I had to turn my face away when light surged so brightly that instinct told me it would blind me.

"Fuck!" Harvey barked, and I gasped in concern, twisting towards him. "I'm fine," he hurried out, sensing my panic. "Just fucking crying now."

"Don't stop," Emlyn growled, reaching for me. "If we fall, we'll be trampled."

I focused on my legs, making sure each footstep landed as we ran. Clumsily grabbing a fistful of magic, I hurled it at the vile titan lurching towards us. I wasn't the only one who attacked him; a thick vine lashed his leg like a whip, coiling around his ankle and tugging so hard that he lost balance. He didn't fall, but it was enough to make me gasp.

You dangerously wounded him, even if he healed the cuts. The damage runs deep. There's an advantage you can press—his physical weakness—even if his power is vast enough to swallow the entire world.

Erebus was right, yet again. Before my first blast of magic met Cronus's body, I formed another, and this time I was joined by a surge from my mates and the army around us. I tasted power on the back of my tongue, every bit as intense as the bone pin.

Fuck. What could this much magic do, if Cronus swallowed all of us and stole it for himself? He could reduce every lifeform in the universe to rubble. He could—

Wane sent a wave of love and confidence to my soul, like a velvet brush of shadow, and I gasped as darkness gushed from the ground like a hundred broken geysers vomiting water. Only this water was as black as ink and writhing with magic. With rage. Wane had crippled Cronus's stolen magic, had unmade his buildings, and now he reshaped the world to suit his own whim.

Building after building rose from the ground, not sleek and ominous like Cronus's but matte like unpolished stone. Raw and beautiful. I was so focused on throwing more and more magic at Cronus, at keeping my feet under me when the mist and water in the air slicked the bricks underfoot into a deadly path, that it took me a moment to realise which building Wane had made.

Our house, by the Forest of Halwen. Over and over and over, like an accusation, like a promise that he'd never forget. We were surrounded by a hundred replicas of home.

I jumped when light flashed between me and Emlyn, but a weight fell off my soul when Wynvail leapt out of the beam of light, his expression blazing. Pure, unadulterated panic shone from his silver eyes. He didn't say a word, but I felt his stare linger on me even as the army drove us onward, all of us caught in the undertow of boots and rage and magic and armour. Cronus matched our steps, the giant stalking close enough that I could feel the menace rolling off him. Like a poison, like a mark on whatever he had instead of a soul.

Every kind of magic in existence filled the air, turning the stormy grey skies into a kaleidoscope of blue, green, purple, red, pink, gold, silver, and so many more that I couldn't track them. Fire and water clashed into deadly steam; dawn light and shadow collided to make something unknowable and dangerous; swords and arrows and riders and monsters streaked across the air, all converging on Cronus.

"Fuck," I breathed, gasping at the intensity of my power. It crackled like bolts of electricity, zapped my heart into overdrive, encouraged by the furore until it salivated for blood.

Blood—it was everywhere. Pounding through every being, roaring through every soldier. All five hundred of them. No, a thousand converged on the destroyed Capitol, swarming Cronus from all sides. But compared to his towering, onyx form, we were ants.

My heart beat unnaturally fast, but I formed fistful after fistful of magic, not letting nerves dent my rage when it was absorbed without wounding him. We needed more, just a little more.

Wane rebuilt the city around us, but when I threw another fistful of blood and shadow and time and whatever the fuck else writhed in my core of power, my other mates attacked the bastard at the same time. I tasted it on my tongue, felt it all the way through my soul, and my magic arched like a hissing cat. No. Like a purring cat, leaning eagerly into a stroking hand. I shuddered, cold and heat clashing in my body until I almost tore the bone pin out of my waistband. Too much, too much, but we needed more.

I could feel my mates' magic, like a part of me resonated with their sunlight, venom, moonlight, and severing magic. Others chasing across the sky called to me, too, and my stomach knotted as I felt that torrent of power slam into Cronus like an explosion.

The air was full of so much magic I could barely see one foot in front of myself.

I rocked back at the force of the blow, my legs faltering, but Kai and Wyn grabbed me, and down the line Lili yelled, "Fire! Don't you dare stop now; he's weakening."

He was. I couldn't breathe at the sight of it, but Cronus wavered on his giant feet, and another vicious coil of ivy snapped around his ankle. Through the chaos and melee, I followed the vine to a woman with fire-red hair, battle-black leathers, and magic vivid green and so bright I had to look away. I just caught the brutal smile that crossed her face as she yanked Cronus to the ground.

"Attack!" Lili screamed, her voice ringing through my ears, blending into the rattle and thud of our frantic march. Were we winning? Were we losing? "Keep him down!"

Keep him down. My heartbeat assaulted my throat with crazed drumming; my breathing shortened. That was my signal. It was time to put down my magic and take up my dagger.

"No," Wynvail growled when I jumped off the ground, slamming air into my wings. He reached for me with a desperation I'd never seen, straining to pull me back down to Earth. White light gathered around him like an aura, reflecting in the whites of his eyes. But I was already too high, already out of his reach.

When I glanced down, a naked plea tightened his beloved face, and—he knew. About the baby. I saw it in his eyes, shining, desperate silver. He knew.

I shook my head, my wings ruffling as a bolt of deep magenta magic tore past me, my feathers damp with the first raindrops of a storm. It won't make a difference, Wyn. We'll never get to keep this baby. But I can kill him. Right here, while he's weak. I can kill him.

"I'm sorry," I mouthed, and beat my wings hard, carrying me through the stormy sky to the fallen titan.