61
“So,” Bryce said slowly, as if letting the words sink in, “why not use the Horn to open the portal to nowhere?”
“Because no one knows what that is—where it is. The sword and knife are pinpointed to its location, somehow. They are the only way to get to that nowhere-place.”
Hunt’s head spun. Hel, his head had been spinning nonstop for the past ten minutes. But Bryce was having none of it. “What if I never got the knife back? What if I never came to Avallen? What if I never got the chance, or refused to come here, or whatever?”
Apollion and Thanatos shifted in their seats, either bored or on edge, but Aidas continued speaking. “I do not know how Helena hoped you would be able to retrieve the knife from her home world. As for Avallen … Helena wanted me to nudge you along. But you harbored such hatred for the Fae—you would never have trusted me if I had pushed you to travel to their stronghold.”
“That’s true,” Bryce muttered.
“My brothers and I had doubts about Helena’s plans. We continued to rest our hopes on reopening the Northern Rift so that we could continue the fight against the Asteri. If someone like you, a world-walker, did come along and Avallen was somehow not accessible for you to claim Theia’s power, we still needed a way to … fuel you up, as it were.” He faced Hunt at last.
Hunt could barely breathe. Here—after all this waiting … here were the answers.
“You are the son of my two brothers only in the vaguest sense,” Aidas said.
Something in Hunt’s chest eased—even as his stomach roiled.
“Thanatos refused to help at first,” Apollion added, glaring at his brother.
“I did not approve of the plan,” Thanatos snapped, gripping his helmet tight. “I still do not.”
“My brother,” Aidas said, nodding to Thanatos, “has long excelled at crafting things.”
“Funny,” Bryce said, “I didn’t take you for a quilter.”
Hunt gave her an incredulous look, but Aidas smiled before he said to Hunt, “During the First Wars, as you call them, Thanatos helped Apollion breed new types of demons to fight on our side. The kristallos, designed to hunt for the Horn—so we might find a way into Midgard unobstructed. The Shepherd. The deathstalkers.” A nod to Hunt, like he knew of the scar down Hunt’s back from one of them. “They were but a few of my brothers’ creations.”
Bryce shook her head. “But the kristallos venom can negate magic. If you knew how to do that, why did you not use it against the Asteri in the war?”
“We tried,” Aidas said. “It did not have the same effect on their powers.”
“I’m sorry,” Hunt interrupted, “but are you implying that I was made by you two assholes? As some sort of pet?” He pointed to Thanatos, then to Apollion.
“Not a pet,” Apollion said darkly. “A weapon.” He nodded to Bryce. “For her, whenever she might come along.”
“But you didn’t know the timelines would overlap,” Bryce said a bit breathlessly.
“No. There were previous experiments,” Apollion said. “We hoped they would spread and multiply throughout Midgard, but the Asteri caught wind of our plan and removed them.”
“The thunderbirds,” Bryce said, gaping. “You guys made them, too?”
“We did,” Aidas said matter-of-factly, “and sent them through the cracks in the Northern Rift. But they were hunted to near-extinction generations ago. Blessing an angel with their power, a perfect soldier … it was a gift of poisoned honey. The Asteri believed they had somehow, through their selective breeding of the malakim, finally achieved a flawless soldier to serve them. That it was their own brilliance that brought someone like Hunt Athalar into the world.”
“But you rebelled,” Apollion said to Hunt with no small hint of pride. “You were too valuable to kill, but they wanted you broken. Your servitude was that attempt.”
Hunt could barely feel his body.
“Can we please rewind for a moment?” Bryce cut in. “You guys made the thunderbirds to complement my power—in case I never got the sword and knife, and if I ever needed a boost to open the Rift. But when they were hunted down, you … made Hunt, and then I was born …”
“Athalar was already enslaved by then,” Aidas said, “but we kept a close watch.”
Apollion nodded to Hunt. “Why do you think you’re so adept at hunting demons? It’s in your blood—part of me is in your blood.”