Hunt gripped Bryce’s hand atop his knee. “Is it in my DNA that Bryce and I are mates? Was that engineered, too?”

  “No,” Aidas said quickly, “that was never intended. I think that was left to higher powers. Whatever they may be.”

  Hunt turned to Bryce and found nothing but love in her eyes. He couldn’t stand it.

  Horror cracked through him, as chilled as hoarfrost. He’d been created by these males to give and to suffer, and where the fuck did that leave him? Who the fuck did that make him?

  “Okay,” Bryce said, “Helfire and starfire: a potent combination. But Helena left all this shit to help end this conflict. It sounds like you guys just want me to open a gods-damned door for you to come in and save the day instead.”

  “Is it so bad,” Thanatos purred, “to have us do your dirty work?”

  Bryce glowered at him. “This is my world. I want to fight for it.”

  “Then fight alongside us,” Thanatos challenged.

  Tense silence stretched between them. Hunt had no idea how to even begin processing this insanity. But that cold in his veins … that felt good. Numbing.

  “I could have used a bit more time to prepare,” Bryce muttered.

  Aidas only shook his head. “You weren’t ready before. And what if you had told the wrong person? You know what the Asteri do to those who challenge their divinity. I could not risk it. Risk you. I had to wait for you to find the answers for yourself. But haven’t I told you from the start to find me? That I will help you? That is what Apollion was attempting to do, too, in his misguided way: to ready you both for all this—to battle the Asteri.”

  “But how,” Hunt asked, fighting past that numbing, blissful chill in his chest, “did you kick the Asteri out of Hel the first time?”

  “They had trouble feeding off our magic,” Thanatos said, voice thick with disgust. “And found that our powers rivaled their own. They fled before we could kill them.”

  Bryce swallowed audibly as she surveyed Apollion. “And you really ate Sirius? Like, ingested her?”

  But it was Aidas who answered, pride flaring on his face. Apollion slew her with his Helfire when she attacked him—he pulled her burning heart from her chest and ate it.”

  Hunt shuddered. But Bryce said, “How is that even possible?”

  “I am darkness itself,” Apollion said softly. “True darkness. The kind that exists in the bowels of a black hole.”

  Hunt’s bones quaked. The male wasn’t boasting.

  “So why can’t you just … eat the rest of them?” Bryce asked.

  “It requires proximity,” Aidas said. “And the Asteri are well aware of my brother’s talents. They will avoid him at all costs.”

  The princes flickered, like they were on a screen that had glitched.

  “We’re running low on time,” Thanatos said. “The black salt is wearing off.”

  Bryce focused on Apollion. “You guys have been telling me nonstop about having your armies ready to go.” She gestured to the temple, the dead city beyond. “This place looks pretty empty.”

  Apollion’s eyes grew ever darker. “We have allowed you to see only a fraction of Hel. Our lands and armies are elsewhere. They are ready.”

  “So if I open the Northern Rift with the Horn …,” Bryce said. Hunt cleared his throat in warning. “All seven of you and your armies will come through?”

  “The three of us,” Aidas amended. “Our four other brothers are currently engaged in other conflicts, helping other worlds.”

  “I didn’t realize you guys were, like, intergalactic saviors,” Bryce said.

  Aidas’s mouth quirked upward. She could have sworn Apollion’s did, too.

  “But yes,” Aidas went on, “opening the Northern Rift is the only way for our armies to fully and quickly enter Midgard.”

  “After what happened this spring,” Hunt said to his mate, “you trust them not to fucking eat everyone?”

  “Those were our pets,” Aidas insisted, “not our armies. And they have been severely punished for it. They will stay in line this time, and follow our orders on the battlefield.”

  Bryce glanced to Hunt, but he couldn’t read the expression on her face. The princes flickered once more, the temple shimmering and paling. A tug pulled at Hunt’s gut, yanking him back toward the body he’d left in Avallen.

  “I’ll think about it,” Bryce answered.

  “This is no game, girl,” Thanatos snapped.

  Bryce leveled a cool look at the Prince of the Ravine. “I’m sick and tired of people using girl as an insult.”

  Thanatos opened his mouth to respond, but abruptly vanished—his connection had been severed.

  Apollion said to Hunt, “Do not squander the gifts that have been given to you—by me, by my brother.” His gaze drifted to the halo on Hunt’s brow. “No true son of Hel can be caged.”

  Then he was gone, too.

  Son of Hel. Hunt’s very soul iced over at the thought.

  Only Aidas remained, seeming to cling to the connection as he spoke to Bryce, his blue eyes intense on her face. “If you find that final piece of Theia’s power … if the cost of uniting the sword and knife is too much, Bryce Quinlan, then don’t do it. Choose life.” He glanced to Hunt. “Choose each other. I have lived with the alternative for millennia—the loss never gets easier to bear.”

  Bryce reached a ghostly hand toward Aidas, but the Prince of the Chasm was gone.

  And all of Hel with him.

  62

  Bryce opened her eyes to fire. Blazing, white-hot fire.

  Hunt’s lightning instantly surrounded her, but it was too late.

  The Autumn King and Morven stood in the chamber, somehow having caught up with them. Shadows wreathed the latter, but her father raged with flame.

  And in the center of the room, surrounded by fire that even Tharion’s water could not extinguish, stood her friends.

  Bryce gave herself one breath to take in the sight: Tharion, Baxian, Sathia, Flynn, and Declan, all huddled close and ringed by fire. There was no sign of the ghouls in the shadows, but the Murder Twins stood just outside the perimeter, smirking like the assholes they were.

  The Autumn King didn’t bother to encircle her and Hunt with fire, knowing that even Hunt’s lightning couldn’t stop him if he chose to burn their prisoners to ashes. It was protection enough.

  “Get up,” Morven ordered Bryce, shadows like whips in the Stag King’s hands. “We’ve been waiting long enough for you to snap out of that stupor.”

  Hunt hissed, and Bryce glanced over to find angry, blistered weals along her mate’s forearm. They’d been burning Hunt to try to wake him up—

  Bryce lifted her eyes to the shadow-crowned King of Avallen. To her sire, standing cold-faced beside him despite the fire at his fingertips. “What did you do with that black salt?” the Autumn King asked quietly. “Who did you see?”

  Bryce drew the Starsword and Truth-Teller.

  “Relinquish those weapons,” Morven snapped. “You’ve sullied them long enough.”

  The fire closed in tighter around their friends. Baxian swore as a lick of it singed his black feathers.

  “Sorry,” Bryce said to the kings, not lowering her weapons, “but the blades don’t work for rejected losers.”

  The Autumn King sneered, “Their taste is questionable. We shall remedy that at last.”

  “Right,” Bryce said thoughtfully. “I forgot that you killed the last Starborn Prince because you couldn’t deal with how jealous you were of him.”

  The Autumn King, as he had the last time she’d accused him of this, only chuckled. Morven glanced at him, as if in sudden doubt.

  But the Autumn King said, “Jealous? Of that sniveling whelp? He was unworthy of that sword, but no more unworthy than you.”

  Bryce flashed him a winning smile. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  The Autumn King went on, “I killed the boy because he wanted to put an end to the bloodline. To all that the Fae are.” The male jerked his chin at Bryce. “Like you, no doubt.”

  She shrugged. “Not gonna deny it.”

  “Oh, I know your heart, Bryce Quinlan,” the Autumn King seethed. “I know what you’d do, if left to your own devices.”

  “Binge an obscene amount of TV?”

  His flame rose higher, herding her friends closer together. Dangerously little space remained between their bodies and the fire. “You are a threat to the Fae. Raised by your mother to abhor us, you are not fit to bear the royal name.”

  Bryce let out a harsh, bitter laugh. “You think my mom turned me against you? I turned against you the moment you sent your goons after us to kill her and Randall. And every moment since then, you pathetic loser. You want someone to blame for me thinking the Fae are worthless pieces of shit? Look in the mirror.”

  “Ignore her hysterical prattling,” Morven warned the Autumn King.

  The Autumn King bared his teeth at her. “You’ve let a little bit of inherited power and a title go to your head.”

  Morven’s shadows rose behind him, ready to obliterate all in their path. “You’ll wish for death when the Asteri get their hands on you.”

  Bryce tightened her grip on the blades. They hummed, pulling toward each other. Like they were begging her for that final reunification. She ignored them, and instead asked the Fae Kings, “Finally going to hand us over?”

  “The worms you associate with, yes,” the Autumn King said without an ounce of pity. “But you …”

  “Right, breeding,” Bryce said, and didn’t miss Hunt’s incredulous look at her tone. Her arms strained with the effort of keeping the blades apart. “I’m assuming Sathia, Flynn, and Dec will be kept for breeding, too, but any non-Fae are out of luck. Sorry, guys.”

  “This is not a joke,” Morven spat.

  “No, it’s not,” Bryce said, and met his stare. “And I’m done laughing at you fools.”

  Morven didn’t flinch. “That little light show might have surprised us last time, but one spark from you, and your friends burn. Or shall we demonstrate an alternate method?” Morven gestured with a shadow-wreathed hand to the Murder Twins.

  Bryce checked that her mental wall of starlight was intact, but like the bullies they were, the twins struck the person they assumed was weakest.

  One heartbeat, Sathia was wide-eyed and monitoring the showdown. The next, she’d snatched a knife from Tharion’s side.

  And held it against her own throat.

  “Stop it,” Tharion snarled toward the twins, who were snickering.

  Sathia’s hand shook, and she pressed the dagger into her neck a little harder, drawing a trickle of blood.

  “You make one move toward her, fish, and that knife slides home,” Morven said.

  “Leave her alone,” Bryce said, and stepped forward—just one foot. The sword and dagger in her hands now seemed to tug forward, too—toward the center of the room. She tightened her grip on them.

  Fire blazed brighter around her friends. One of Baxian’s feathers caught fire, and Dec only just managed to pat it out before it could spread. “Drop the blades, and they’ll release her mind,” the Autumn King countered.

  Bryce glanced to the sword and knife, fighting that tug from both weapons toward the center of the room.

  Sathia stood on the other side of that burning ring, pure, helpless terror on her face, blood streaming down her neck. One thought from Seamus or Duncan, one motion, and that knife would slide into her throat.

  Bryce tossed the blades to the ground.

  Their dark metal clanked against the stone with brutal finality as they skittered to a stop nearly atop the eight-pointed star. Out of reach.

  Neither king advanced, though, as if afraid to pick them up—or even walk over to them.

  The Murder Twins pouted at their spoiled fun, but Sathia lowered the knife. Her fingers still clenched it at her side, though—clearly at the twins’ direction. None of the others dared to pry it from her fingers.

  But Bryce only stared at the Autumn King as she snarled, “You were giving me all that bullshit about how much you loved my mom and regretted having hit her—yet this is what you’re doing to your own daughter? And to the daughter of one of your Fae buddies?”

  “You stopped being my daughter the moment you locked me in my own home.”

  “Ouch,” Bryce said. “That hit me right in the heart.” She tapped on her chest for emphasis, and the star glowed in answer.

  “She is stalling for time,” the Autumn King said to Morven. “She did precisely this with Micah—”

  “Oh yeah,” Bryce said, advancing a step, “when I kicked his ass. Did he tell you?” she asked Morven. “It’s supposed to be a big secret.” She stage-whispered, taking another step closer, “I cut that fucker into pieces for what he did to Danika.”

  The Murder Twins seemed to start in surprise.

  Bryce smiled at them, at Morven, at the Autumn King, and said, “But what I did to Micah is nothing compared to what I’ll do to you.”

  She extended her hands. Starsword and Truth-Teller flew to them, as they had in the Fae world. Like calling to like.

  But she hadn’t been stalling for time for herself. She’d been stalling for Hunt.

  As the sword and dagger flew to her, Hunt’s lightning, gathering in a wave behind her, launched for the Murder Twins.

  They had a choice, then: let go of their hold on Sathia to intercept the two whips of lightning that lashed for them, or allow Hunt’s lightning to obliterate them.

  The twins opted to live. A shield of shadows slammed against the reaching spears of lightning. It was all Bryce needed to see before she burst into motion.

  The Autumn King shouted in warning, but Bryce was already running for them. For him.

  She didn’t hold back as she erupted with starlight.

  * * *

  The entire cave shook as lightning and shadow collided. Hunt gritted his teeth.

  Tharion had managed to get the knife away from Sathia before she dropped it and impaled her own foot, and now the female crouched in the circle of fire, head gripped in her hands.

  The blast of starlight that shot from Bryce as she ran for their enemies threatened to bring down the cavern. Her hair rose above her head, her fingertips shining white-hot with starfire.

  Hunt gaped at her power, the beauty and condensed might of it.

  But one of the Murder Twins laughed, a spiteful sound that promised his mate would suffer. Six ghouls burst from the shadows, little more than shadows themselves in their dark, tattered robes and reaching, scabbed hands.

  What unholy things had the twins done, to become masters of these wretched beings?

  Hunt glimpsed jaws stocked with three-inch, curving teeth opening wide, aiming for a distracted Bryce—

  With a roar of fury, he sent half a dozen spears of lightning crackling for the ghouls and a seventh—a lucky one—for the twins’ shadows.

  Where lightning met ancient malice, the ghouls exploded into sizzling dust. But his lightning fractured against the twins’ wall of darkness. It kept them from joining the fight with Bryce, though it didn’t destroy their shield.

  “Help her,” Baxian hissed over the crackling flame, but Hunt shook his head, throwing more of his lightning at the twins, who were now pushing back with a slowly advancing wall of shadow. Hunt dared a glance at Sathia, who watched with wide eyes as Bryce launched herself at the two Fae Kings.

  Bryce flew like a shooting star through the dim cavern.

  “She doesn’t need my help,” Hunt whispered.

  * * *

  Fire met starlight met shadows, and Bryce loosed herself on the world.

  It ended today. Here. Now.

  This had nothing to do with the Asteri, or Midgard. The Fae had festered under leaders like these males, but her people could be so much more.

  Bryce carried the weight of that with each punch of starfire toward the Autumn King that had him dancing away, with each smothering spate of shadows Morven sent to herd her back toward the stream.

  She hadn’t gone to that other world only because of the sword and knife, or to find some magic bullet to stop the rot in her own world. She knew that now.

  Urd had sent her there to see, even in the small fraction of their world that she’d witnessed, that Fae existed who were kind and brave. She might have had to betray Nesta and Azriel, trick them … but she knew that at their cores, they were good people.

  The Fae of Midgard were capable of more.

  Ruhn proved it. Flynn and Dec proved it. Even Sathia proved it, in the short time Bryce had known her.

  Bryce launched a line of pure starfire at Morven, gouging deep in the black-salt floor. He dodged, rolling out of reach with a warrior’s skill.

  It stopped today.

  The pettiness and chauvinism and arrogance that had been the hallmarks of the Fae of Midgard for generations. Pelias’s legacy.

  It all fucking stopped today.

  The starlight flared around Bryce, the darkness of Silene’s—Theia’s—dusk power giving it shape, transforming it into that starfire. If she could find that final third piece and make the star whole—

  She was already whole. What she had—who she was … it was enough. She’d always been enough to take on these bastards, power or no power. Starborn crap or no.

  She was enough.

  The Murder Twins were returning Hunt’s ambush now. From his angle, Bryce knew Hunt couldn’t see what they were up to behind their wall of shadows, pushing his way, blasting apart his lightning.

  But from over here … Bryce could see how they used that wall against Hunt. Used it to shield themselves from view as they turned her way.

  Even Hunt’s lightning wasn’t fast enough as the Murder Twins sprang for her with swords drawn. Right as their shadowy talons scraped down the wall of her mind.

  It stopped today.

  Bryce exploded—into the twins’s minds, their bodies. Flooding them with starfire. A part of her recoiled in horror as their huge forms crumpled to the ground, steaming holes where their eyes had been. Where their brains had been. She’d melted their minds.