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“You deserve my sword to the heart, the same way you broke mine when you betrayed me!” Atlas growled, and I could feel the emotion radiating from him. Raw. Powerful. But most of all, there was a hurt in his voice that physically pained me. A deep, devastating hurt that seemed to seep from every word, every breath, every movement. It was the sound of a man standing before someone he loved, forcing himself to do something he never wanted to do because he could no longer see another way.

The sword in Atlas’s grip remained steady. Though he had his back to me, I knew his intentions were written across the rigid set of his shoulders and the slow way he drew the blade back. There was no hesitation in him, no uncertainty, only the terrible conviction that this was necessary. That whatever happened next would kill him just as much as the brother kneeling before him.

“Atlas!” I screamed, my throat burning as the ragged sound tore free. His name echoed from the towering walls, reverberating through the throne room before crashing back into silence, yet it was as though he hadn’t heard me at all. He seemed completely shut off from the world around him, consumed by grief, betrayal, and the impossible choice before him. In that moment, there was only Lazaros, only the brother he believed had turned against him, and the sword he had already decided to drive through his heart.

“Goodbye, brother.”

I screamed again, louder this time, the force of it tearing at my throat as I threw myself forward.

“Atlas!”

My hands slipped against the marble as I pushed myself upright. The fight with the Typhon, the desperate run through the castle, every injury and every exhausted muscle screamed in protest. Yet somehow, I still managed to close the distance between us. I stumbled forward and dropped to my knees between them, throwing myself in front of Lazaros before Atlas could drive the blade home.

I would not let Lazaros die.

Not when I still had a chance to save him.

If I hesitated now, if I allowed fear to root me to the spot, then I would lose them both. One brother to death, the other to a regret he would carry for the rest of his life. I had crossed the Rift for this. Traversed the Labyrinth. Bargained with a king and fought monsters. Fought my way through impossible odds. I hadn’t come this far only to watch them destroy each other at the last hurdle.

And perhaps that was the real reason I couldn’t move aside.

It wasn’t simply because Atlas was the man I loved, or because Lazaros was innocent. It was because I had never been able to stand by while someone suffered when there was still something I could do. Not even when exhaustion and fear threatened to break me. Too many lives had already been lost to the Rift. Too many people had paid the price while I stood helplessly watching. Some of those losses still haunted me, lingering in the quiet moments, and whispering that I should have tried harder, fought harder, done more.

I refused to add Lazaros to that list.

My loyalty to Atlas burned brighter than my fear, and because I loved him, because I understood what this would do to him if he carried it through, I was willing to risk everything to stop it.

“Stop!” My voice tore from my throat, raw and desperate, and my stomach lurched as the blade came down towards me. Every instinct was screaming at me to move, even as I forced myself to stay exactly where I was.

Atlas’s eyes widened as if he were seeing me for the first time, his sword shifting at the very last second. The blade missed flesh and instead caught the fabric of my shirt at my arm, slicing through it with a whisper of steel that stole the air from my lungs.

“Al… Alexandra?” He choked on my name, his skin paling as his gaze dropped to the torn fabric, to the place where his blade had almost found me, and my heartbeat quickened as the truth of how close I had come to death crashed through me.

“What…” he stumbled back a step, then another, his chest heaving as the fury in his gaze fractured into disbelief. “What are you doing here?”

For a single heartbeat, I saw only him. Not the war. Not the blood. Not the brother behind me. Only Atlas, the man I had crossed realms to reach. The man who had stolen my heart and promised he would return for me, standing before me with a sword in his hand and horror dawning across his face. The need to run to him was almost unbearable, to throw myself into his arms and feel for myself that he was real. That he was alive, that I had made it back to him.

But there was no time for that.

“You can’t kill Lazaros,” I said quickly, forcing the words past the ache in my throat. “It’s not him. He’s possessed. Atlas, please, just listen to me. He’s...”

My explanation broke into a cry as an iron-strong grip seized my arm and yanked me upright.

I slammed back against a solid mass, shadows closing in around me as the hiss of steel echoed from behind. Instinct took over before thought could catch up, shielding my face just as a blade came in. The dagger’s tip kissed my throat before I caught the attacker’s wrist with both hands. I stopped the blade from driving deeper, though not before its edge bit into my skin. A sharp breath escaped me as warmth trickled down my neck, sliding beneath my collar and pooling in the hollow of my throat.

“Don’t!” Atlas growled, his voice little more than a barely restrained snarl. “Let. Her. Go.” His knuckles whitened around his sword’s hilt.

A dark, demonic laugh reverberated beside my ear, sending a chill racing down my spine. It sounded wrong, as if stripped of any trace of humanity. Filled instead with a cruel amusement that twisted my stomach. At the same time, his arm tightened around me, dragging me harder against him with a strength that didn’t match the broken, barely conscious man who had been kneeling before Atlas moments earlier.

“Mine isn’t the only throat that will be slit tonight, brother,” he said, his voice unusually soft, the certainty in his voice far more terrifying than if he had shouted. “Make a single move and your pretty little key will bleed rivers of crimson.”

His words brought bile to my throat as I saw the fear and pain in Atlas’s eyes.

“It’s not him, Atlas,” I said through gritted teeth, trying not to move my throat against the blade. “He’s being controlled. This isn’t Lazaros.”

Conflict flashed across Atlas’s face. His jaw clenched as his gaze darted between the dagger at my throat and his brother, every muscle in his body taut with restrained violence. I could see the torment there, the urge to attack held back by the danger to my life.

The dagger bit deeper into my skin, and I couldn’t stop the sharp gasp that escaped me before I bit down hard on my lip.