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Osiris bolted away as Anya collapsed. Thea scrambled for her, Wilder’s hand on her shoulder. All around them, Thezmarr was burning in the wake of her sister’s lightning.

With a sob, Thea pulled Anya into her lap, cradling her there as blood trickled from the corner of her mouth and pulsed at a deep open wound in her side.

‘I will leave this world worse than I found it,’ Anya rasped, a tear tracking down her face.

‘No —’

‘You can’t lie to a dying woman,’ Anya said weakly. ‘Perhaps the gods will see fit that this dawn of fire and blood will wipe the slate clean. They will start anew when I’m gone…’ She wheezed, her breath rattling in her chest as she gave a dark laugh. ‘If I were them, I wouldn’t have the stomach for it. Not after what we’ve done to this place…’

‘Just hold on,’ Thea begged, rocking her sister and looking around for someone, anyone, who could help.

‘Thea,’ Anya murmured. ‘It’s over. Finally, it’s over.’

Thea’s own face was wet with tears as she watched Anya’s face drain of colour. ‘I don’t want you to go.’

‘I’d stay if I could.’

The reality of her sister’s wounds hit her hard. It was Kipp all over again, only this time, there was no vial of Aveum springwater to save her. Thea could feel Death’s shadow creeping nearer. She struggled to swallow.

‘Don’t leave like this, without any hope for the world.’

‘I wanted to scorch the earth with my fury,’ Anya croaked, trying to shake her head. ‘But there’s hope… Just not with me.’ Anya’s tired eyes stared at Thea meaningfully, and then flicked to Wren, who was surging towards them.

Anya breathed out, the sound ragged and pained.

She did not inhale.

With a cry, Wren fell to her knees beside Thea, just as the light left their sister’s eyes.

‘No,’ she pleaded. ‘Anya, wake up.’ Wren shook her by the shoulders, but her body was limp, her gaze blank.

‘She’s gone, Wren,’ Thea told her, passing a hand over her sister’s face to close her eyes and gently removing the fate stone from Anya’s grasp. ‘It was hers,’ she said. ‘This never belonged to me.’

Wren didn’t seem to register her words, and Thea wasn’t sure she had either. She knew distantly that Anya had lied to her by omission. For twenty-seven years Thea had thought that the stone was her burden to bear, that death was lying in wait for her, and she’d acted accordingly.

‘All those risks,’ she whimpered, horrified at her own behaviour. ‘All that recklessness…’

‘You truly were Althea Nine Lives, then,’ Wren said quietly, clutching their sister’s lifeless hands.

For a moment, unimaginable anger coursed through Thea, all directed at their dead sister. Anya had let Thea believe she was not long for this world, she had —

But the anger morphed into something deeper, something far more painful than rage.

Grief.

Thea’s chest was too tight. A vice-like grip squeezed her heart and wouldn’t loosen. She couldn’t judge Anya for how she’d chosen to live her life, not when she was still here and Anya was not.

Thea didn’t bother to wipe the tears as they rolled down her cheeks, as she placed Anya’s scythe in her hand and across her chest, like the warrior she was.

‘I will etch your name upon the stone swords of the Furies,’ she vowed. ‘You were just as much a hero as any Thezmarrian. You defended the midrealms until your last breath.’

Wren placed her own hand over Thea’s.

They both gasped —

For Anya’s magic was leaving her body.

And surging directly into them.