Pandora’s Flame (The Forbidden Gate #4)

Chapter 1

ONE

Aria

The fall wasn’t a descent. Gravity implies a connection between two things, a pull from one surface to another. This was an eviction. The mortal realm didn't just let us go; it vomited us out, and the Underworld swallowed us whole.

There was no sensation of wind rushing past, no whistling in my ears. There was only the violent, tearing scream of reality being shredded as we punched through the floor of the world. Darkness folded around us, not like night, but like a heavy, suffocating velvet hood.

Then, we hit.

We didn't land on stone. We slammed into a surface that felt like the frozen hull of a dead ship.

CRACK-BOOM.

The impact was immediate and unforgiving.

I hit the ground hard enough to rattle the newly fused lattice of my soul.

My organic knee hit something wet and freezing, sending a jolt of sharp, human pain up my thigh.

My left side struck the surface with a sound that wasn't a thud, but a discordant, vibrating scream of metal on metal.

It rang out, a high-pitched, harmonic shriek that cut through the darkness, echoing off walls I couldn't see.

I skidded, my metal fingers carving deep, sparking gouges into the floor before I came to a halt. I gasped, trying to suck in air, but the atmosphere was wrong. It was thick, heavy, and tasted of galvanized nails and water that had been stagnant since the dawn of time.

"Kaelen?" I rasped, pushing myself up. "Thane?"

A massive, wet thud shook the ground to my left. Heat, blistering and familiar, washed over me, dispelling the immediate chill. I turned, my eyes adjusting to the gloom.

Kaelen had landed. The Dragon Prince was a sprawled mess of obsidian scales and jagged spines.

He thrashed, his massive wings scraping against the invisible floor, unsure of his footing.

He let out a roar, but like my voice, it was muted, probably thanks to me ears still ringing from the initial impact.

Then came the others.

Crunch. Thane. The Bear didn't skid; he cratered. The ground groaned beneath his immense, Titan-heavy density.

Splash. Flynn. The Wolf Prince landed in a crouch, sliding through a puddle of something dark and oily, his claws frantically scrabbling for purchase.

Hiss. Elias. The Phoenix spilled onto the ground like a bucket of dropped coals, his fire sputtering and dimming, turning from brilliant turquoise to a weak, sickly blue.

I scrambled to my feet. The veins on my body flared, casting a harsh light over our landing zone.

We were standing on a vast, flat plain of…

something. If I had to say it looked like something, then I'd say it reminded me of iron, but that was impossible since it stretched out infinitely in every direction.

It was pitted, giving it the texture of a scarring disease.

Puddles of black, motionless water dotted the landscape, reflecting absolutely nothing.

And above us...

I looked up, expecting the rock ceiling of a cavern.

There was no ceiling.

The sky was a void. It wasn't the purple, bruised rot of the Devourer’s storm we had left behind. This was worse. It was a grey, featureless expanse of anti-light. It looked like a cataract on the eye of the universe. It was empty. Terrifyingly, hopelessly empty.

"Form up," I said, or tried to say. The vibrations in my throat felt sluggish. "We need to move."

Nobody moved.

I looked at Kaelen. He was crouched low, his tail lashing violently back and forth, slicing the stagnant air. His golden eyes were blown wide, the pupils dilated until they swallowed the iris. He was looking everywhere and nowhere, his head snapping from left to right in jerky, panicked motions.

Kaelen? I projected the thought, reaching for the bond.

The connection was there, but it was filled with static. It wasn't the screaming panic of the Anvil ritual. This was different. It sounded like some kind of interference, a white noise of pure, animalistic confusion.

Too quiet, his thoughts bled through, primitive and jagged. Where is the wind? Where is the friction?

"It's the Underworld," I said aloud, stepping toward him. My boots clanged on the iron floor. "The physics are different. Calm down."

He snapped his jaws at me.

I froze.

The Dragon wasn't recognizing me. Or rather, he recognized me, but the context was gone. He was a creature of fire and sky, trapped in a cold, airless box. He was claustrophobic on a cosmic scale.

To my right, Flynn began to whine. It was a high, thin sound that grated on my nerves. The Wolf was pacing in a tight circle, his nose glued to the iron floor.

No scent, Flynn’s mind whimpered, bleeding anxiety into the group consciousness. Dead air. Can't smell the prey. Can't smell the path. Blind. Blind. Blind.

I realized then that the silence wasn't just an absence of noise. It was a presence.

This silence had weight. It pressed against my eardrums, a physical pressure.

It was the silence of a tomb that had been sealed for an eon.

And for creatures like the Princes, beings of elemental force, of fire, gravity, motion, and design, this absolute null-state was torture.

It was sensory deprivation. Even in the Gate there had been some sensations, but not here.

"Thane," I called out, turning to the massive bear. He was the anchor. If anyone could ground us, it was him.

Thane was sinking.

The iron floor wasn't liquid like the mortal earth had been, but Thane’s gravitational density was so high here that he was simply too heavy for the plane to support.

His paws had punched through the plating, and he was struggling to pull them free, tearing the metal with groans of exertion.

He wasn't panicking like the others; he was shutting down.

I could feel his mind retreating, curling into a ball to wait out the winter.

Heavy, Thane’s thoughts rumbled, slow and terrified. The darkness is so heavy.

"Elias!" I shouted, desperation creeping into my voice.

The Phoenix was a wreck. Elias’ bird-form was now composed primarily of dying embers.

He hopped erratically across the iron, his wings twitching.

Because there were no thermal currents here, no air movement, no heat pockets, he couldn't fly.

He was grounded. The visionary who saw the patterns of the universe was suddenly trapped in a place where there was seemingly no past or future.

I was the only one standing still.

And that’s when I felt it.

My metal skin began to hum.

It started in my left hand, the one fused with the star-metal alloy. A low vibration, barely perceptible at first, then rising in pitch. Zzzzzzt.

It wasn't a warning. It was a resonance.

The star-metal... it was reacting to the frequency of the Underworld.

Pandora had warned me against using the Titan's Heart, but I had ignored her and used it anyway. I had absorbed the power that had been trapped within the Titan's heart, the seed of the deep earth, and now I could feel how connected I was to it.

I wasn't rejecting this place. I was tuning into it.

"I can hear it," I whispered, clutching my metal arm.

I could hear the structure of the realm. It sounded like the groan of a glacier shifting, deep and slow. I could feel the ley lines of death running through the iron floor like current through a wire.

But the Princes couldn't. They were still projecting their Olympian expectations onto a chthonic reality, and the dissonance was driving them feral.

Kaelen roared again, a plume of black fire erupting from his maw. It washed over a puddle of black water, expecting to boil it. The water didn't boil. It just absorbed the heat instantly.

That terrified him.

Cold, Kaelen snarled, backing away, his claws screeching on the floor. The fire dies. It eats the fire.

He lashed out, his tail smashing into a ridge of rusted iron. He was attacking the environment, trying to force a reaction, trying to make the world make sense.

"Stop it!" I yelled, running toward him. "You're wasting energy!"

Flynn bolted.

The Wolf took off like a shot, sprinting into the grey void. He wasn't running toward anything; he was just running. Motion was his defense mechanism. If he stopped, the silence would catch him.

"Flynn, no!" I reached out with a gravity tether, trying to snag him, but my control was slippery here. The magic felt greasy, sliding out of my grip.

Flynn slammed into... something.

There was nothing there. Just empty, grey air. But he hit an invisible barrier with a sickening thud. He bounced off, yelping, shaking his head.

He snarled and lunged again. Snap. His jaws closed on empty air, tearing at a shadow that wasn't casting a shape.

Enemies, Flynn’s mind fractured. Invisible. Everywhere. Surrounded.

He began to tear at the shadows. He spun in circles, biting the air, slashing with his claws at the nothingness. He was fighting phantoms born of his own sensory isolation.

"Refraction," Elias muttered.

I spun around. The Phoenix had shifted back, not fully human, but a humanoid shape of flickering flame. He was clutching his head, his eyes burning with a manic, terrified light.

"The light doesn't travel," Elias rasped, his voice sounding like crumbling charcoal. "There are no reflections. We are standing on a plane that doesn't exist."

"Elias, look at me," I commanded, stepping in front of him. I grabbed his burning shoulders. My metal hands absorbed the heat easily. "We are here. We are solid. Focus on me."

"You are a variable," he whispered, staring at my glowing violet veins. "You vibrate. Why do you vibrate?"

"Because I'm not fighting it," I realized.

Kaelen roared again, louder this time. He reared up on his hind legs, his wings flared wide, casting a massive shadow over the desolate plain. He was preparing to unleash a cataclysmic breath attack, a desperate attempt to light up the dark.

But if he did that, he'd burn out. He'd exhaust his divine core fighting the entropy of the Underworld.

"Kaelen, stand down!" I screamed, running toward the towering dragon.

He looked down at me. For a second, I thought he saw me.

Then he lunged.

It wasn't an attack of malice. It was the reaction of a trapped animal seeing movement. His massive head snapped down, jaws opening to engulf the threat.

I didn't dodge. I couldn't outrun a dragon.

Thane moved.

The Bear Prince, half-buried in the iron floor, roared. He ripped his paws free with a sound of tearing metal and threw his bulk between me and Kaelen.

CRUNCH.

Kaelen’s teeth clamped down on Thane’s shoulder.

The sound of dragon-tooth meeting earth-magic-infused fur was sickening. Thane grunted, sliding backward, his claws carving furrows in the iron.

Protect, Thane’s mind boomed, simple and absolute.

Kaelen recoiled, shaking his head, realizing he had bitten something akin to stone and brother. He backed away, smoke pouring from his nose, looking horrified and confused.

The dark... it tricked me, Kaelen panicked. I didn't mean... it moved...

Flynn was still snapping at the air, howling at ghosts. Elias was unraveling the math of the floor, weeping as he found no answer.

They were falling apart. The strongest beings I knew were being dismantled by the silence.

I stood in the center of the chaos, the violet light of my body the only steady thing in a world of grey. The hum in my arm grew louder, rising to a pitch that matched the throbbing ache in my head.

"Quiet," I whispered.

The word resonated through the star-metal.

I needed to be louder than the silence.

I slammed my metal fist into the iron floor.

CLANG.

The sound didn't die this time. I pushed the Titan's energy, the deep, earth-shattering power I had absorbed, into the strike. I used my body as the tuning fork.

A ripple of violet light exploded from my impact point, racing outward across the pitted iron plain.

It hit Flynn, knocking him off his feet and stunning him out of his frenzy. It hit Kaelen, washing over his scales and forcing him to crouch. It washed over Elias, stabilizing his flickering flame. It hit Thane, and for a second, the floor beneath him hardened, supporting his weight.

The Princes froze, staring at me.

I stayed crouched, my fist buried in the dented iron, breathing hard. The violet light pulsed rhythmically, a heartbeat in the void.

"You are looking for the wind," I said, my voice magnified by the metal, ringing like a bell. "You are looking for the sun. You won't find them here."

I stood up slowly, the iron groaning under my boots.

"Stop fighting the dark," I commanded. "Start hunting in it."

Kaelen’s golden eyes narrowed, the slit pupils focusing on me. The panic was still there, edging his thoughts, but the feral confusion was receding.

Aria? his voice was a hesitant rumble.

"I'm here," I said, walking toward him, fearless.

I reached up and placed my hand on his snout.

It was hot, dry scales over magma. "I'm the anchor.

If you get lost, you look at me. Understand?

" I could feel it through the bond now; the violet pulse from my strike hadn't just stunned them out of their panic.

It was still humming, a low frequency under everything, and as long as I held it, they could think.

The moment I stopped, the Underworld would start eating their minds again.

I was the tether. If I let go, they'd drift.

He let out a huff of smoke that smelled of sulfur and shame. This place... it is a cage.

"It's a battlefield," I corrected. "And we just landed."

I looked out at the grey horizon, where the shadows seemed to be thickening, watching us.

"And we aren't alone."