I started to push up with legs that felt like the jelly my stepsister Ezra liked to smother her rolls in. “Help…help me stand.” My cheeks warmed with embarrassment, which was so godsdamn stupid considering the situation. “I…I can’t do it.”

Features tense, Attes hesitated. It was clear he didn’t trust me. And he shouldn’t. Because if I lived longer than tonight, I would find a way to do terrible things to the fucker.

But also because I had lied—well, partially. I could stand, but I also knew the effort it would take, and that would wipe me out. I was doing what Attes had suggested: conserving my energy.

After a heartbeat, he tipped closer and shifted his hold from my wrist to my shoulders. He rose, bringing me with him. “You steady?”

I couldn’t really feel the floor beneath my feet. “Yeah.”

“Good.” Attes’s gaze searched mine, his features pinched with what looked like concern. I had to be imagining it. “So, what’s the—?”

I moved as quickly as possible, which wasn’t very fast at all. I was surprised I managed to grab the hilt of one of his shadowstone daggers before he could stop me. I’d just caught him off guard.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Attes exclaimed, eyeing the dagger I took from him. “Was I not clear enough?”

“Calm down.” I took a shallow breath, and my chest…gods, it felt weird. Like it was loose. “You aren’t worth…the effort.”

Surprise flickered across his face. He hadn’t expected that response.

Feeling top-heavy, I turned to where the two Primals had landed. Their hands were on each other’s throats, eather firing from their fingers.

I stepped forward, shouting, “Stop!”

Neither heard, or if they did, they ignored me. Their veins were lit from within, and if they hadn’t been in the process of killing each other, I would’ve thought they looked oddly beautiful.

And I also knew there might not be enough blood getting to my brain.

Panic trickled through me as I yelled again and again, feeling myself swaying. Attes, the rat bastard, steadied me. My heart was slowing, and I suspected that wasn’t good. Mainly because darkness crowded in at the edges of my vision. I didn’t know how I, a mortal, could get two Primal gods to—

But I wasn’t entirely mortal.

Not anymore.

The embers of life had changed that—the embers of Primal essence.

The back of my skull tingled, and my mind raced. The power the embers could manifest was connected to me feeling extreme emotion, just like a god or Primal as they grew closer to their Ascension. Ash had tried to get them to come out in me intentionally. It hadn’t exactly worked then.

But it was strange. As I stood, my chest oddly loose, sort of feeling detached from myself, I suddenly knew why the embers hadn’t flared.

I had been born with them inside me, but I’d never considered them part of me. I’d only been a vessel. Something to hide and store them. It was what Eythos, Ash’s father, had intended.

But that was no longer the case. The embers were a part of me. And for right now, they were mine.

I hadn’t truly understood that before. Hadn’t believed it until now.

Taking a deeper, slower breath, I concentrated on the throbbing in my chest. The embers fluttered and then pulsed as I summoned the eather, tapping into it.

“Good Fates,” Attes whispered.

What came next simply happened, almost like when Rhain told me about the deal Ash had made with Veses. Except this time, I was well aware of the essence coming to the surface. I controlled it. And when I used it, I didn’t think about how. It was just instinct, ancient and primal.

Primal essence seeped into my veins, hot and smooth, and when I spoke, I felt the power in my words. “Stop.”

I didn’t realize what I’d done until both Ash and Kolis halted, the bolts of eather fizzling out mid-streak.

I’d used compulsion. On the two most powerful Primals alive.

“Good Fates,” Attes whispered again hoarsely, clearly shocked. Ash and Kolis turned their heads toward me.

I was surprised, too. I hadn’t expected that, but I shoved my astonishment aside because while I’d been able to do that, I could already feel the embers weakening. Yes, they were a part of me, but I was dying. So, they were dying. I had to be quick. I stepped forward and did the only thing I could think of.

Ash cared for me greatly. If he could, he would love me. He’d pretty much said that himself after we’d spoken with the God of Divination, Delfai. But he’d removed his kardia, the piece of the soul that all living beings had that allowed them to irrevocably love another not of their blood and enabled them to do anything for that person. The goddess Penellaphe had said it must’ve been incredibly painful for him to do so. To me, it was just so damn tragic. He’d done it in an attempt to protect himself and whoever he might come to love from his uncle.

Kolis was an evil, sick bastard, and I didn’t think that what he felt for Sotoria was love. It was more like an obsession. But he was still in possession of his kardia, and he believed he was in love with her. If that were true, then he’d do anything for her.

Someone he believed was me.

Heart stuttering, I lifted the dagger to my throat.

“Fucking Fates,” Attes snapped from behind me, his voice low. “That wasn’t what I had in mind.”

“Stop fighting,” I repeated, ignoring the Primal of War and Accord. “Do this for me. Please.”

I was focused on Kolis, speaking directly to him, but Ash reacted first.

The thinning shadows whirling around and inside him vanished. Blood leaked from his parted lips and nose. His jaw was already swelling, and his tunic was burned in places, revealing charred flesh beneath. But it was his eyes that caused my heart to lurch. They were wide and stark, the wisps of eather still.

Kolis was slower to respond, the golden glow only fading enough that his features became visible beneath it. He wasn’t much better off than Ash. His chest was also a burned, bloody mess.

“Sera,” Ash rasped thickly, his hands lifting halfway. “What are you doing?”

I swallowed, my stomach full of knots of anxiety, but my hand was steady. “Stop fighting, or I will slit my throat open.”

Kolis’s chin snapped down. “You will do no such thing.”

I pressed the tip of the blade into my skin until I felt the prick of pain. Suddenly, Ash…gods, it seemed like he had no control over his body. He jerked back a step. “Yes,” I said, keeping my gaze trained on their chests. I didn’t trust either of them not to use compulsion. Though avoiding eye contact wouldn’t prevent them from doing it. Not completely. “I will. And if I even think one of you is about to use compulsion, I’ll do it.”

“Sera,” Ash said again. “Put the dagger down.” He took a step forward, seeming to completely forget about Kolis as his scorched chest rose and fell rapidly. “Please.”

I sucked in a sharp breath, my hand trembling. “I will—” I gasped, a sharp sting of pain slicing across my throat when someone ripped the dagger from my fingers.

Ash shouted, and the fear in his yell…gods, it was palpable. I immediately knew I’d made a grave mistake.

Oh, gods.

I’d underestimated what they would and wouldn’t do. I’d thought I could distract Kolis. That he would be vulnerable to his love, his obsession for Sotoria.

But I’d distracted Ash, too.

The dagger I’d held to my throat was now in Kolis’s hand.

The false King of Gods was so damn fast. He twisted, slamming the dagger into Ash’s chest.

Right into his heart.

CHAPTER THREE

The blow Kolis landed knocked Ash back, and horror seized me.

The blade was just shadowstone. It should have little effect on a being as powerful as a Primal, but the numerous injuries marking Ash’s body had weakened him. That much was clear.