Chapter 22
TWENTY-TWO
Kaelen
The rubble shifted. It didn't tumble naturally; it disintegrated, the heavy basalt blocks turning to grey dust as if aged a million years in a single second.
Apollo rose from the debris.
He didn't look injured. He looked wrong. The blow from Thane’s hammer should have shattered his ribs, maybe punctured a lung. Instead, his torso seemed to realign itself with a sickening, wet squelch, the greyish skin rippling like oil on water.
"You broke my rib," Apollo observed, touching his side. His voice was a distortion, a beautiful melody played backward on a broken instrument. He smiled, and black smoke leaked from between his teeth. "I haven't felt a bone break since the Titan War. It’s almost nostalgic."
"He's regenerating," I snarled, the white fire of the ritual roaring around me like a cage. My hands were locked toward the Anvil, pouring the very essence of the Dragon into Aria, but my eyes were fixated on the threat. "The Void. It’s knitting him back together faster than we can break him."
"Then we break him faster," Flynn yelled, appearing from the shadows of the machinery. He was a blur of motion, spinning his daggers, his breathing rhythmic and sharp.
"Defense positions!" I barked the order, the command tearing from my throat. "Thane, Flynn, keep him off us! Elias, hold the lattice! If I stop burning, she hardens. If Elias drops the logic, she melts. We are the battery. You are the shield."
"I am the Wall," Thane rumbled.
He stepped over a pile of scrap metal, positioning himself between the Anvil and the corrupted Sun God.
He didn't have his hammer, it was lying near Apollo’s feet, but he didn't need it.
He raised his fists, immense blocks of scarred knuckles and divine strength, and slammed his foot onto the ground.
The iron floor rippled. A barrier of jagged earth and torn metal shot up, creating a rampart.
Apollo sighed, a sound of infinite boredom. He raised his hand, pointing a finger blackened by rot at the ceiling.
"Come out and play," he whispered.
The vortex above us pulsed. The black rain turned into a torrent. But it wasn't just rain anymore. The droplets hit the floor and coalesced, bubbling and writhing, forming stumbling shapes. Faceless soldiers. Hounds with too many legs. Birds made of razor-wire and shadow.
The Forge wasn't a workshop anymore. It was a kill box.
"Incoming!" Flynn roared.
The wave of enemies hit us.
Flynn met them first. He didn't fight like a duelist; he fought like a thresher. He dove into the mass of void-creatures, moving so fast he was just a streak of violent intent. I saw a flash of steel, a spray of black ichor, and three shadow-soldiers dissolved into slush.
Don't look, I told myself, forcing my gaze back to the Anvil. Focus on the heat. Focus on her.
Aria lay on the dark iron slab. She was motionless, locked in the paralysis of the transmutation.
Her skin was a terrifying landscape of shifting alloys, gold bleedings into star-metal grey, veins of magma-red pulsing just beneath the surface.
Her eyes were wide open, fixed on the ceiling, but I could feel her terror radiating through the bond.
She was awake. She felt every second of this.
I am here, I projected into her mind, pushing the fire harder. I am burning for you.
It’s heavy, her thought came back, a faint, metallic whisper. Kaelen... the air is heavy.
"Heat levels specifically at the sternum are fluctuating!" Hephaestus bellowed, swinging his mallet to strike a glowing rivet on her shoulder. CLANG. "Dragon! Steady the output! You're wavering!"
"I am trying to not get eaten!" I yelled back.
A shadow-harpy dove at me, screeching. I couldn't move my hands. I couldn't stop the flow.
I turned my head and breathed.
A jet of dragon fire erupted from my mouth, a plume of black and gold flame that engulfed the creature. It incinerated instantly, turning to ash that tasted of sulfur on my tongue.
"Showoff," Flynn panted, sliding past me on his knees to gut a void-wolf that was chewing on my boot.
"Elias!" I shouted, watching the Weaver deflect a bolt of black energy with a shield of geometric light. "Are you holding?"
"Holding!" Elias cried, though his voice was strained, high and thin.
He stood at the Eastern point, one hand extended toward Aria to maintain the soul-lattice, the other weaving frantic patterns in the air to create barriers.
"But the enemies are multiplying! The entropy in the room is disrupting the magical density! "
"Thane!" I called out.
I looked past the Anvil.
Thane was besieged. He was surrounded by a dozen shadowy forms, hulking brutes made of solidified darkness.
He fought with a brutal, economical grace.
He grabbed one creature by the neck and used it as a club to smash two others.
He backhanded a fourth, sending it flying into a vat of molten bronze where it hissed and vanished.
He was holding the line. But Apollo was walking through the melee untouched.
The fallen god strolled through the carnage, the void-creatures parting around him like water. He picked up Thane’s hammer from where it had fallen.
"Heavy," Apollo mused, hefting the massive weapon with effortless strength. "Primitive. But effective."
He swung.
Thane barely got his arms up.
The impact was thunderous. The hammer shielded by void-magic slammed into Thane’s forearms. The Bear Prince skidded backward, his boots carving deep grooves into the iron floor, sparks flying. He hit a pillar, the stone cracking behind him.
Thane! Aria’s mental voice spiked, a scream of panic.
Focus! I snapped at her, though it tore me apart to do it. Stay in the metal, Aria. If you reach for him, you break.
Thane shook his head, clearing the cobwebs. He roared, a sound of pure defiance, and charged Apollo bare-handed. He tackled the god, slamming him into the wall of the forge. They grappled, a clash of corrupted light and immovable earth, shaking the very foundations of the room.
"We are running out of time!" Hephaestus warned, quenching a section of Aria’s leg with a hiss of steam. "The lattice is setting! If we don't finish the integration in the next two minutes, she stays a statue forever!"
"Two minutes!" I gritted my teeth. The fire inside me was an endless well, but my body was mortal enough to feel the strain. My skin felt like it was cracking. "Flynn! Keep them off the dais!"
"I'm trying!" Flynn yelled, kicking a crawler in the face. "But they keep spawning! It’s like kicking a nest of spiders!"
A glob of black slime landed on the Anvil, inches from Aria’s face.
It began to hiss, eating into the iron.
"NO!"
I broke the stream. Just for a microsecond.
I lashed out with my left hand, the one not directly channeling the core heat, and sent a whip of fire to burn the slime away.
Pain exploded in my chest. Splitting the flow was like tearing a muscle in my soul. I gasped, stumbling to one knee.
The heat on the Anvil dropped.
Aria’s back arched. The gold in her skin dulled to grey. Her eyes rolled back, the magma light fading.
"Stabilize!" Elias screamed, his own magic faltering as the connection wavered. "Kaelen! You are killing her!"
I slammed my hand back into position, roaring with effort, forcing the fire back up. "I know! I know!"
Aria thumped back onto the slab, the color returning, but she looked weaker. The bond was fraying. The sheer chaos of the room was overwhelming the delicate work we were trying to do.
"We need a clearing!" I yelled. "Thane! Can you ground-pound?"
"Engaged!" Thane’s voice came from across the room, strained and breathless. He was holding Apollo’s wrist, keeping the god from driving a dagger of void-glass into his eye. "Cannot... disengage!"
"Then I do it," Flynn said.
The Wolf Prince appeared beside me. He was covered in black ichor, bleeding from a dozen small cuts, but his eyes were bright and wild.
"Cover me," Flynn said.
"What are you doing?"
"Buying you a minute."
Flynn turned and sprinted. Not toward the enemies. toward the magma channel.
He leaped.
He didn't aim for the walkway. He aimed for the hanging chain of a massive crucible suspended above the channel, a container holding tons of molten copper.
He caught the chain, swinging wildly over the burning river.
"Hey!" Flynn screamed at the shadows swarming the platform.
He cut the retention cable.
The crucible tipped.
A literal wave of molten copper crashed onto the catwalks. It swept across the eastern flank of the forge floor, a tsunami of liquid fire.
The void creatures screamed. Not in pain, but in dissolution. The copper encased them, burning the shadow-matter away instantly. The wave washed over the floor, clearing the immediate perimeter of the Anvil in a hissing, steaming flood.
"Hot! Hot! Hot!" Flynn yelled, swinging back and landing on the dais, his boots smoking.
"Effective," Hephaestus grunted, not pausing in his hammer work.
The immediate pressure was gone. The swarm was incinerated or trapped in cooling metal.
But Apollo was still there.
He threw Thane off him with a blast of dark gravity. The Bear hit the ground hard, rolling to his feet, but he was slowing down.
Apollo looked at the cooling copper, then at us. He tilted his head.
"Messy," he critiqued. "But pyrotechnics won't save her."
He raised both hands. The shadows in the corners of the room grew long, stretching out like claws. They bypassed Thane. They bypassed Flynn.
They aimed for Elias.
"The Architect," Apollo whispered. "Break the mind, and the body follows."
"Elias! Guard!" I shouted.
Elias saw it coming. He raised a shield of complex geometry, dazzling turquoise fractals.
The shadows smashed into the shield. It held for a second, then shattered like glass.
Elias was thrown backward. He broke his stance. His connection to the Anvil severed.
"Elias!" I screamed.
On the slab, Aria simply... stopped.
The light in her skin died. The writhing runes froze mid-movement. Her chest stopped rising.
The Soul-Lattice collapsed. Without the Weaver to hold the blueprint, the raw energy Kaelen, Thane, and Flynn were pouring in had nowhere to go.
"She is unraveling!" Hephaestus roared, dropping his hammer. He grabbed Aria’s shoulders with his bare, scarred hands. "The form is losing cohesion!"
Aria began to blur. Her edges were turning to mist.
"Elias!" I bellowed, looking at the heap of robes in the corner. "Get up!"
Elias groaned, pushing himself up. He looked dazed. Blood streamed from his ears. He looked at his hands, confusing them for something else.
"I... I lost the count," Elias murmured. "The variable..."
"Forget the math!" I yelled. "Look at her! Look at her, brother!"
Elias looked. He saw Aria fading.
His eyes widened. The turquoise light flared back to life.
He scrambled to his feet, ignoring the blood, ignoring Apollo. He rushed back to the circle.
"I have her," Elias gasped, thrusting his hands into the mist that was Aria. "I have the thread."
He didn't use logic this time, instead he just grabbed and wove purely on instinct, tying the dissipating energy back into the core.
Aria solidified with a violent snap. The air pressure in the room dropped as she became real again.
Apollo laughed. "Delays. Just delays."
He stepped forward to finish it.
Thane was in his way again.
"Move, Earth-Shaker," Apollo commanded.
"No," Thane said.
He was battered. His armor was dented, his face swollen. But he stood there, casting a shadow that covered the dying girl.
"If you want her," Thane rumbled, raising his fists, "you have to go through the mountain."
Apollo sneered. "Gladly."
Just as Apollo raised his hand to blast Thane into dust, the Forge shook.
Not a tremor. A convulsion.
The floor under the Anvil cracked.
Red light bleeding up from the fissure.
The Titan.
And Aria’s eyes snapped open again.
They weren't looking at the ceiling. They were looking at Apollo.
“Hephaestus," Aria rasped. Her voice sounded like two planets grinding together.
The Smith God looked down at her.
"She is awake," Hephaestus whispered, terrified.
"Hit me," Aria commanded. "One last time. Break the shell."
"If I hit you now..." Hephaestus hesitated.
"DO IT!" I roared, feeling the surge in her power. "Trust her!"
Hephaestus raised the hammer.
Apollo realized what was happening. His arrogance vanished. "Stop him!"
He fired a lance of void energy at the Smith.
Thane stepped into the path. He took the blast with his chest. He didn't fall. He just roared.
Hephaestus brought the hammer down.
CRACK.
The sound ended the world.
Aria dissolved into pure, blinding white light.
The light didn't fade. It expanded. It swallowed the Anvil. It swallowed Hephaestus. It swallowed me.
The sensation of holding the fire vanished. I wasn't pouring energy into a vessel anymore.
The vessel had opened.
The chaotic battlefield, the screaming void creatures, the ruined god, it all dissolved into the silence of the bond.
I looked around in the white void.
"Aria?" I called out.
And then she was everywhere.