Beneath the Burning Sea (The Kingmaker Chronicles #5)

Chapter 1

Pan. Carver narrowed his eyes on the large, cloven-shaped hoofprints leading into the cavern. “That goaty son of a Cyclops was here again.”

The god of the wilds, shepherds, and flocks had just wreaked havoc in Thalyria, the world Carver had left behind. The up-to-no-good god was in Atlantis now, potentially to do the same.

On his right, Bellanca leaned forward and peered into the shadowed entrance. She crowded his sword arm, and he could smell the almond-scented cream she’d been using lately. The nutty-sweet fragrance permeated every corner of the rented rooms they shared. “There are more prints in the sand than last time,” she murmured. “Some even look human.”

Carver flexed his arm between them, trying to create more space for himself. It was hot enough on this godsforsaken island without the Firebringer squashing him. Bel barely moved, probably annoying him on purpose, and he shifted half a step to the side, the still-damp sand silent and a little spongy under his feet. The jumble of prints in the little-used cove couldn’t be more than an hour old. The inexplicable Atlantian tide seemed to be on its way back in again, though, which meant they likely didn’t have a whole lot of time before the water trapped them here with whoever—or whatever —might still be in the cave.

They stared into the dimness, watching for movement. Carver listened. The dark cavity slicing open the soaring cliff wall below the city of Atlantapol was, as far as they knew, fast becoming a hotbed for seditious behavior. Rebellion brewed on Mount Olympus—and beyond. Thalyria hadn’t been spared. Atlantis wouldn’t be, either.

Carver drew his sword in silence, the leather harness on his back well-oiled and soft. Everything about the situation left a bad taste in his mouth. Gods plotting against gods was nothing new, but they were dragging whole kingdoms into their machinations now. His lips thinned. He’d been born into war and would probably die in one. He’d just expected to die fighting humans, not deities. And the murderous magical creatures gods dragged into the fray… Well, he supposed they were something else entirely.

Bel gave him a questioning look he knew well. He nodded, and she conjured a fireball, growing it in her hand to a strong orange-white glow before tossing the crackling sphere into the cavern. The light illuminated the rough rock walls and empty first chamber before fizzling in the sand several paces beyond the entrance. “Looks like this part’s empty.” And with that, Carver’s partner in arms and perpetual thorn in his side peeled herself off his elbow and strode forward.

He watched her advance, glad she remained cautious for once instead of charging in, hands blazing. They’d explored here before. Over the last six months, they’d explored every accessible part of the island. A lot of it was taken up by the thickly populated, sprawling city of Atlantapol with its steep, winding streets and numerous fishing harbors. Orchards, farms, and pasturelands occupied the western and southwestern sides of the island, where the terrain wasn’t as rugged and rocky. Beach ringed the entire landmass anywhere that wasn’t a cliffside, the strong tides fast and unpredictable—maybe not a surprise, considering Atlantis was trapped in a huge, open-sky trough at the bottom of the ocean.

Carver glanced over his shoulder at the incoming waves, wondering how quickly they’d charge up the beach this time. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it, and as far as he could tell, the rules of nature as he knew them didn’t apply here.

Turning back to the opening in the cliffside, he studied the ground again, mentally taking Bel’s fresh footprints out of the mix. “The tracks go in and out.” He looked back up at her. “It’s hard to tell if anything’s still in there.” Only once had they found one of the cavern’s inner chambers still occupied. They hadn’t found anything else of interest to their mission. Anywhere.

What made here the meeting place? Why this cave at the tip of Atlantapol’s great peninsula and not somewhere else? Couldn’t magical creatures find places to gather in the shadow of Mount Olympus? Present on all the gods’ worlds, the imposing peak seemed to rise straight out of the cliffy northern shores of the island and would be the perfect spot to escape notice, since Atlantians carefully avoided it. Here, they couldn’t be farther from Mount Olympus, and this close to the densely occupied coastal neighborhoods of the city, it was almost a given that humans would stumble upon these meeting grounds—maybe even that they would. Here they were, after all, he and Bellanca.

Bel ventured deeper into the cave and faded into the darkness except for the slight fiery glow of her hair and the denser coating of flames brightening her hands. Carver followed for a few steps and then hugged the rock wall close to the entrance, waiting in the shadows and watching the outside to make sure no one tried to sneak up on them from behind.

There was no movement in the cove, and he squinted against the hot glare of the morning sun. Shallow fishing waters spread out for leagues around the island. He could barely make out the great ocean wall surrounding them. The tide seemed to have already made a small leap in their direction, and he frowned. It was either check out the inner chambers now or leave and miss out on whatever information they might be able to gather.

Pivoting, he trailed Bellanca into the gloom. Under most circumstances, he would avoid magical creatures and do his best to get Bel to do the same, but with the traitor Pan clearly up to something, and a god—or gods —plotting an insurrection on Mount Olympus, it was their duty to try to stop whatever was afoot in Atlantis. In a sudden and unexpected twist of fate, he and Bel had somehow turned into the island’s only two soldiers in Zeus’s army.

He came up beside her, and they both studied the sand. “What do you think?” There were more prints than they’d ever seen before, which was both tempting and worrisome. He didn’t want to finally get information only to take it straight to the Underworld.

Bel shrugged, but a daring spark lit her eyes as she turned to him—that magic-bright, blue-green flare that was always seeking out a challenge or an adventure.

Or a fight. She did like to pick them.

Her luminous gaze flicked toward the long tunnel leading to two large chambers deeper under the hillside. “I think we don’t know anything yet and need to keep going.” Fire blazed in her hand, brightening the dark edges of the cavern, and tiny, fast-moving flames sizzled down her long red braid, letting off the scents of baked sugar and hot, ripe cherries in the sunshine.

Carver moved closer without meaning to. Bel’s magic had never smelled in Thalyria. In Atlantis, it made his mouth water.

The strong glow of her magic revealed even more hoofprints at the back of the main chamber, all smudged together.

Her nose wrinkling, she scanned the ground. “I’d say a bacchanal happened here. Dancing?”

“Definitely satyrs.” Carver crouched, using the light she provided to get a better look at the tangle of prints. “And a lot of them.” Zeus might’ve stripped the people of Atlantis of their magic a long time ago, but magical creatures still roamed freely and could cross worlds—unlike humans. The universal peak of Mount Olympus gave them access to all the gods’ worlds.

He studied the tracks. Bel was right. Some did look human. Or at least not un human.

Just ahead of him, the only Magoi in Atlantis cocked her head, then shook it, her mouth flattening. “I don’t hear a thing. If anything’s left in here, it’s deep inside, all the way in the back chambers.”

Carver nodded. He stood, and they started down the tunnel that they knew would split and then eventually open into two large, cold hollows under the hillside. Bel’s magic lit the way for them. He was Hoi Polloi to the core and didn’t have magic, but he had a blade he’d trust more than most people any day. Bel kept her weapons at her belt, her hands glowing and ready. He’d seen her burn more than one enemy down to ash—human and monster. Maybe the goat god was next. Carver wouldn’t get in the way. Pan had been nothing but trouble.

With silent communication, they separated to opposite sides of the tunnel, Carver moving left and Bel moving right so as not to disturb the jumble of prints in the middle. More prints seemed to go in than out, and the persistent prickle on the back of Carver’s neck told him they probably weren’t alone in here.

“Stay behind me,” he whispered, the dull gleam of his sword pointing them toward where the underground passageway branched off in two directions.

The sound of derision that left Bel’s mouth could’ve won a trophy. “Stay behind me .”

“In Atlantis, men take the lead.” Neither of them were strangers to prejudice, but in Thalyria, it had been about magic. Atlantians lost their magic and leaned hard into another way to discriminate. “ Especially husbands.”

Bel shot him a slit-eyed glare. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“I guess it’s too subtle.”

Her sharp, acidic huff echoed a little too loudly in the quiet confines of the stone corridor. “I’ve half a mind to only restore magic to women here.”

“If we can even do that,” he muttered. Bel was the only human alive in this place with any magic. Her gods’-given mission was to bring magic back to the people of Atlantis and get them to join Zeus in his battle against whoever was trying to usurp his throne on Mount Olympus.

They’d seen the start of the brewing conflict before coming here. It hadn’t begun with outright battle between the gods but with sly, deceitful maneuverings to divide Olympians into two sides—those who supported Zeus and his undertakings against those who didn’t. The insurrection began with a terrible curse against Thalyria’s newly crowned queen and Carver’s sister by marriage—one they’d barely managed to break—but gods never did things halfway. These stirrings of rebellion would no doubt end in an all-out war for dominion over the kingdom of the gods. Sides had already been chosen, in Thalyria, on Mount Olympus, and their job now was to make sure Atlantians chose Zeus in the impending Olympianomachy—the War of Gods.

There’s no one alive with more powerful fire magic than yours. Use it to fan the flames.

These few words from Persephone, along with a broken amulet and some vague instructions to rekindle magic in Atlantis before the enemy could do it first, had led both him and Bel to upend their entire lives. Carver hoped it would be worth it.

The tightness that abruptly gripped his chest had nothing to do with the danger they might be walking into and everything to do with missing home and family. Parents. A brother and sisters. A new niece he’d never even set eyes on. Thalyria was where both he and Bel belonged, except the gods, with their selfish schemes and looming civil war, had decided otherwise.

“We can do it. We have to.” Bel sounded more worried than sure, which Carver understood after six full moons and zero progress.

He slowed, tilting his head to the left. “There.” All the tracks veered that way.

Falling silent, they followed the chaotic prints down the left-hand tunnel.

“I’ve never fought a satyr,” Bel whispered.

“If— when —we find something,” he whispered back, “we question it. We don’t roast it to a blackened crisp before we can gather information.”

“I would never do that,” she protested in a voice that managed to be both muted and strident. Carver tossed her a sidelong look that spoke volumes. “ Again. ” Bel shrugged. “That thing surprised me.”

“So if I jump out at you, you’ll kill me?”

“Possibly,” she shot back under her breath. “Don’t try it.”

Carver narrowed his eyes. Now he wanted to surprise her and see what happened.

Noises started to reach them, grunting and panting. Light filtered toward them from the cavity around the bend, and Bel snuffed out her magic. Carver motioned for her to hug the right-hand side of the tunnel while he did the same on the left. The damp, uneven surface lightly scraped his back as he moved forward on silent feet, his senses alert, his sword ready.

One of the large caverns they’d already explored finally opened before them. Last time, it had been dark and empty except for that one harpy that sprang out at Bellanca. She’d grabbed its wing and incinerated the creature before Carver could blink. There hadn’t been time for questions.

This time, the cavern was neither dark nor silent. Writhing, moaning bodies filled the underground chamber. Bright torches. Heat and sweat. Empty jugs of wine and half-eaten platters of fruits and cheeses. Satyrs everywhere, rutting with nymphs. Rutting with each other. On top. Behind. In piles. Arms and legs and mouths and cocks all tangled into places and positions Carver had only ever imagined. Blood whooshed in his veins. The scene was so erotic he instantly started to harden.

Standing stock-still, he glanced at Bel across from him. An accidental spark popped in her hair, adding the aroma of hot, sweet cherries to his suddenly overloaded senses. Mouth open, eyes huge, she stared. Then she bit her lower lip, slowly releasing it.

Carver exhaled sharply. He turned back to the wild carousing, heat billowing through him. He hadn’t been with a woman in years and hadn’t really missed it. He’d missed a person, not the act of joining. The orgy in front of him abruptly made several years of celibacy feel like flint on steel, need igniting hot and hard inside him.

Sweat pricked his face. He swallowed, his grip tightening on his sword.

Bel saw the tiny hint of movement in his arm and motioned for him to stay still. “Pan,” she more mouthed than whispered, her eyebrows lifting as she pointed to the massive figure in the middle of the cavern. “He’s still here.”

Worry pulsed through Carver’s already rushing blood as he turned his focus to the lesser god in question. Larger than the satyrs, more imposing and humanlike, Pan gripped a dark-haired nymph by her long, loose locks and tipped her head back almost brutally. He drove into her from behind. Her hands dug into the sand. She keened in pleasure. Or maybe in pain. It was hard to tell sometimes.

Heat and tension simmered in Carver’s groin, and he fought his growing arousal. Now wasn’t the time for his libido to wake up. It had been mostly dormant for years, killed by Konstantina walking away from him without any warning and then dying just months after marrying another man.

A familiar anger swept through him, and he embraced it. That was what he needed now.

His senses sharpening on what was important, Carver motioned for Bel to back up. They weren’t looking for a fight; they were looking for clues. Even if someone here had the answers they needed, they wouldn’t just spout them out, and the satyrs outnumbered them by far. Then there was Pan. A god . They knew for sure he was in Atlantis now. That was at least more information than they’d had before.

Bel shot him an incredulous look. She jerked her head at Pan and scowled as if he hadn’t understood.

Carver sliced his head back and forth. Magical creatures weren’t known for their friendly welcomes. They didn’t simply die because you burned or stabbed them, and Pan wasn’t going to casually answer questions while he copulated in a cave.

Bel narrowed her magic-charged eyes at him, and a bad feeling swooped through Carver the second before she stepped out, her hands blazing to life. “Kneel!” she cried, her voice rising above the revelry. “Kneel before the future queen of Atlantis!”

Carver’s stomach hollowed. All lust died in an instant, and his heart zoomed sideways as he sprang forward to flank her. “Impetuous much?” he ground out. And maybe premature in her claim—they hadn’t accomplished anything yet.

She smirked. Her flames blazed brighter, engulfing her arms to her elbows and throwing huge shadows onto the rock walls as the nymphs and satyrs scrambled away from one another and fled the chamber. Pan released the female, pulling out of her and turning to face them. His eyes blazed an angry ochre. His erection jutted out like a ruddy marble column. Good gods. It was a good thing human men weren’t held to the same standards as gods, because that thing was enor—

“You command a god to kneel?” Pan shoved the nymph aside and sent her stumbling after the others. The creatures must not have been looking for a fight, either, because the revelers all raced past them and out. The cavern turned eerily quiet except for the sound of the waves. They crashed louder, creeping closer to the entrance.

“You’re a goat, not a god.” Bel looked Pan up and down with the disdain she’d perfected over years as a seemingly ice-cold Magoi princess in Thalyria. That frozen veneer cracked the day she threw her lot in with Cat and Griffin and let out all her fire to help them claim a throne. “Who sent you here?” she demanded.

Instead of answering, Pan opened his mouth and spewed out a Great Roar. The terrifying noise—long, loud, horrible —slammed into them, but they’d heard it before and somehow stood their ground. Gritting his teeth, Carver beat down the primal chill it dredged up inside him along with the vivid memories of a harrowing clash and lives almost lost. He locked himself in place by sheer force of will. Pan’s roar had once sent gods fleeing. He battled the impulse to do the same, hoping Pan’s legendary shout couldn’t reach greater Atlantis. If the cavern didn’t muffle it, the dreadful, all-encompassing sound would cause panic, stampedes, mass hysteria… They’d seen it all before.

Carver rejected irrational fear even as his body reacted on instinct. His pulse surged. His heart pounded, and cold sweat dotted his brow. The roar beat at his eardrums and rattled the cavern, shaking rock dust to the ground.

Bel suddenly leaned forward and roared back. Her unexpected shout wasn’t anywhere near as loud and hair-raising as Pan’s, but it surprised the duplicitous son of a Cyclops into shutting up.

Carver smiled despite the danger. His fake wife just one-upped a god.

Pan’s knife-sharp amber eyes sliced over them, back and forth. “Who sent you here?”

Bel huffed. “Answering a question with a question has got to be the most annoying thing anyone can possibly do.” Her magic flared stronger, throwing a surge of heat into the underground chamber and half cooking Carver’s right arm.

“Who’s behind the Olympianomachy?” Carver growled, Bel’s fire almost too hot to bear. He didn’t move away from her, presenting a unified force. She wouldn’t burn him, even if she’d burn everything else. “Who’s trying to steal Zeus’s throne?”

“A true leader,” Pan spat. “Not one who leads puppets to war.”

“So you’re not a puppet?” Carver scoffed. “Isn’t that exactly your role?”

“I’m a general.” Pan squared his shoulders, growing in size. His horned head nearly scraped the cavern’s ceiling. “And the first to answer the call.”

“Yes.” Bel eyed Pan’s diminishing erection. “I can see how staunchly you’re gathering troops and leading the charge.”

Pan hissed. His lip curled, and the pointed beard trailing from his chin quivered in rage. “You should not be here, Firebringer.”

“I see my reputation precedes me.” Bel looked pleased.

Carver couldn’t smile this time. Unease thumped behind his sternum, tightening his ribs. How much did Zeus’s mysterious enemy already know about their mission? He and Bel had next to nothing so far. Only a medallion with a missing jewel—“the key” to rekindling magic in Atlantis, according to Persephone. And the instructions to spark magic here before the enemy did. Pan had already placed himself firmly in the adversary’s camp in Thalyria, which made Carver think the lesser god must be in Atlantis to find the key, too.

“We’re here,” Carver said flatly, fearing the race was on to locate the lost piece of Bel’s necklace. “The question now is, what are you and your master going to do about it?”

A long, strong, whiplike vine of ivy appeared in Pan’s hand. A menacing smile curved his mouth. “Turn a problem into an advantage. Let’s see how long your confidence lasts.”

Horns, hooves, and a whip? Carver shook his head. “Your companions have all fled, and we’ve fought worse than you.” The Minotaur came to mind. The Gorgons, too. Between his sword and Bel’s magic, he had faith they could defeat a being known for startling easily and screaming in terror, even if he was a god.

Pan’s slow smile didn’t bode well. “Fled? No… They were just telling the reinforcements that you were finally here.”

Noise scraped behind them, and Carver’s hair instantly stood on end. He glanced over his shoulder. Dozens of satyrs stalked back down the tunnel, blocking their exit. One grated a horn against the rock, sharpening it to a lethal point. Several carried weapons—daggers and short, curving swords. Carver ground out a curse.

“Is outnumbering us supposed to scare us?” Bel sounded genuinely confused.

Carver just regretted being stupid enough to believe the creatures had fled. The nymphs were gone, but the satyrs had circled back. And brought friends.

His nostrils flared, catching the scents of seawater and sex. Menace rolled off the creatures in waves. Violence rose inside him to match. He and Bel hadn’t been on the losing side of a battle since the day they teamed up, but he still worried this had just gone from a fight they could win to anyone’s guess.

Bel shot him a look. Then her eyes flicked to Pan. Carver nodded. He’d take the god with his sword. She’d take the rest with her flames.

He moved first, lunging at Pan without a sound. Pan turned with a sharp, athletic twist, narrowly avoiding the blade that sailed past his ribs. Carver spun while Pan was still off-balance, the ball of his foot gouging into the sand as he brought his weapon around at the level of the god’s neck. Gods were immortal, not unkillable, and a severed head would do the trick.

Instead of cutting into flesh, his blade pounded against a bronze-studded shield that Pan conjured from thin air. They both stumbled back. Carver’s arm rang from the impact.

He clenched his jaw. So this won’t be easy. Fine.

Behind him, flames roared and satyrs squealed. Bel stayed unusually quiet, maybe to better hear the man-beasts howl. Carver didn’t turn and kept his eyes on Pan. The god cracked his vine at Carver’s sword arm. The ropelike whip bit into his shoulder, and pain bloomed at the point of impact, radiating up and down. Snarling, Carver struck back, moving fast and attacking low.

He got under the shield before Pan could adjust it and sliced deep into a thickly haired thigh. Pan sucked in a breath. Carver jerked his blade back out just as he kicked Pan in the other leg, sending the goat god crashing to the ground.