13. Maldenis #2
The light poured from her in erratic pulses, flaring and collapsing, as if she had no control over the storm she’d unleashed. Her small hands were clenched at her sides, her breathing shallow, uneven. “Make it stop,” she gasped, her voice barely audible beneath the roar of her own power.
One of the attackers lunged through the storm of light and struck, and the girl cried out.
Maldenis saw Liora move, just a blur as she sprinted straight into the chaos. “Liora—!”
Another hunter broke through at the same moment, and the strike landed just as she reached the child. He heard Liora scream, the sound cutting through everything.
It hit him like a physical blow, sharp and brutal, stealing the air from his lungs.
His chest seized, his pulse stuttering hard enough to throw him off balance for a split second.
The world narrowed, sound warping around that single, piercing note as it carved straight through him.
He felt it everywhere, under his skin, in his bones, a jolt of something raw and instinctive that snapped tight in his chest.
Not her.
The thought wasn’t even fully formed, just a violent, immediate refusal.
The next blast of power flared brighter, blinding, violent, tearing through the air with enough force to drive everyone back. The ground split wider beneath them, the magic surging in wild, uncontrolled waves, and then Liora dropped. She hit the ground beside the calf, unmoving.
For a heartbeat, the world held. Then the attackers dissolved, their forms unraveled into dark smoke, slipping through the air as if they had never been there at all, gone as suddenly as they had come.
Silence crashed down over the cul-de-sac.
The light dimmed, the violent hum of magic fading into nothing, leaving only the aftermath, cracked earth, scattered weapons, and bodies too still.
Asterion was cradling the unconscious calf, his massive hands shaking.
The sheer size of him made the tremor more jarring, each unsteady movement betraying a fear that didn’t belong on a creature like him.
Maldenis caught the look on his face—raw and unguarded—as he bent over her, protective and frantic, as if his body alone could shield her from whatever had just happened.
Maldenis didn’t think. He moved and barely registered anything around him as he crossed the distance, dropping hard beside Liora.
Her eyes were closed. And for a split second, his mind refused to process it, like if he didn’t name it, it wouldn’t be real. His hand hovered just above her, then settled against her shoulder, too careful, like she might break under the weight of him.
“Liora,” he said, his voice rough, barely steady.
No response.
Something cold twisted low in his chest.
Zara suddenly shoved into him, enough to force him back. “Move.”
He didn’t argue. Didn’t even think to. He let himself be pushed aside, his hands dropping uselessly to his sides as Zara took his place.
She dropped beside Liora, all sharp focus and urgency, Zara’s expression tightening with every second that passed.
Maldenis felt it then, that creeping dread, slow and suffocating.
“Elian!” Zara snapped.
He was there instantly, no hesitation, no wasted motion, dropping to the ground beside them.
“We need Hecate.”
The name landed heavy. Maldenis knew of Hecate, the Titan who had trained the triplets, who had pushed their abilities beyond what they’d once been capable of. If anyone could understand power like this, wild, uncontrolled, and dangerous…
Elian didn’t hesitate. He pushed to his feet immediately, already reaching for the magic, hands lifting, energy gathering, the air around him shifting as he called out across whatever distance separated them.
Maldenis stayed where he was. Frozen. Eyes locked on Liora.
“Help me,” Zara looked up at him. “Lay them flat. Both of them. They need to be ready for treatment.”
He nodded, the motion automatic, and carefully placed Liora onto the stone.
Every movement felt wrong, too slow and deliberate, as if he could somehow undo what had happened if he handled her gently enough.
His hand lingered for a fraction of a second longer than it should have, hovering near her before he forced himself to pull back.
When he turned toward the minotaur, Asterion didn’t move. He held the calf tighter, massive arms curled protectively around her small frame, as if letting go would mean losing her entirely. Up close, Maldenis could see the fear carved deep into every line of his face.
“She’s not going anywhere,” Asterion said hoarsely.
“If you want her to live,” Zara met his gaze, steady and unyielding, “you need to trust us.”
The words settled between them.
Maldenis watched the shift happen: Asterion’s grip faltered, and his gaze dropped to the child in his arms, something raw flickering across his face, fear, helplessness, the kind of desperation that stripped everything else away.
For a moment, it looked like he might refuse.
Then, slowly, reluctantly, he moved.
He lowered her to the ground beside Liora with a care that bordered on reverence, his hands lingering as if he couldn’t quite bring himself to let go.
Maldenis dragged a hand through his hair, his gaze flicking between Liora and the child. They looked wrong. Not injured.
Not…anything he could name. Just still. Too still.
“What’s wrong with them?” he asked, the question sharper than he meant it to be, edged with something he couldn’t quite keep down.
Zara didn’t answer right away, her expression tightening in a way Maldenis didn’t like.
“I’m not sure,” she said finally.
The words landed hard.
He let out a breath that didn’t feel like enough air. “Not sure?” he repeated, quieter now.
She glanced up at him, something strained in her eyes. “Their energy’s…off. It’s like it spiked and then—” she stopped, jaw tightening. “Collapsed.”
He looked back down at Liora, his chest tightening at the sight of her lying there, unmoving.
“Hecate will be here soon,” Zara added, her voice firmer now, like she was holding onto that as much as he was.
He didn’t respond. He just stayed in place, staring at Liora, willing her to move.
The minutes that followed blurred together.
Time stretched and warped, each second dragging and slipping all at once, and then the air shifted. A surge of magic rippled outward, and two figures appeared.
Hecate and a woman beside her.
Maldenis barely registered anything else at first, just the weight of Hecate’s presence, ancient, controlled, powerful in a way that pressed against the air itself.
But then his focus snagged on the other woman.
She was unfamiliar, Asian, with dark hair braided over one shoulder, her expression calm but intent, her eyes already locked on the bodies on the ground like nothing else in the world mattered.
Hecate’s gaze flicked once to the fading smoke curling through the air—the last remnants of the attackers, before she turned to the woman beside her.
“Go.” The command was quiet, but absolute.
The woman moved instantly, dropping to her knees beside Liora and Korinnae, her hands already glowing with a soft, golden light that spread warm and steady against the cold aftermath of the fight.
It felt like he was watching from somewhere outside himself, like his body was there, but everything else had gone distant and unreal.
He heard Elian’s voice, dim at first, then sharpening as he forced himself to focus.
“They appeared out of nowhere,” Elian was saying quickly. “Multiple hunters. We held them back, but the girl, her power—”
“It erupted,” Zara cut in. “Completely uncontained.”
Maldenis’s gaze dropped back to Liora as they spoke, tracking the rise and fall of her chest, but it seemed too shallow, too slow.
“Something hit them,” Elian added. “Right before the surge collapsed.”
Hecate nodded once and stepped forward, kneeling beside the other woman. The moment she joined her power to the golden light, the air thickened, layering over with deeper, older, and heavier magic.
And then the illusion broke.
Wounds surfaced across Liora and Korinnae’s bodies as if pulled from beneath the skin, dark, spreading, and wrong. Marks that hadn’t been visible before now bled into existence, jagged and unnatural, like the magic itself was forcing them into the open.
Liora whimpered.
The sound hit Maldenis harder than anything else had.
Korinnae cried out a second later, her small body jerking as the pain caught up to her.
Asterion surged forward with a roar, instinct overriding everything, but Brontaios and Hektor were already there, grabbing hold of him, forcing him back.
“Don’t,” Brontaios snapped. “You’ll make it worse!”
“She’s hurting—” Asterion’s voice broke, raw and unsteady in a way Maldenis hadn’t thought possible.
“I know,” Brontaios shot back. “So let them help her.”
Every sound, every breath, every flicker of pain carved deeper into Maldenis as he watched Liora lie there and there was nothing he could do. Nothing.
“Poisoned,” Hecate said.
The word dropped like a verdict.
Her gaze flicked briefly toward Maldenis.
It was only a second, but it felt like longer. Long enough for him to feel seen in a way he didn’t want to be. Like she could read everything written across his face, the fear he couldn’t hide, the helplessness clawing its way up his throat.
“Do what you can,” Hecate said.
The woman nodded without hesitation and summoned a small bundle that unfolded into a kit filled with vials, sachets, and neatly arranged instruments catching the light.
Maldenis watched as she worked with practiced precision, pressing a vial to Liora’s lips, then to Korinnae’s, before placing her hands over their wounds.
“Don’t worry,” Hecate added. “Ariadne will be able to heal them.”
Maldenis barely heard the words. Or maybe he did, and just couldn’t bring himself to believe them. His gaze never left Liora: the rise and fall of her chest, the faint tension in her face, the way her hand lay too still against the stone.
He stayed there, rooted in place, as the magic pulsed around them and the world narrowed to the space between one breath and the next.
Waiting for her to take it.
Waiting for her to come back.
And unable to do anything but watch.