But we convinced the humans to trust us. And my mother began reaching out to some of those Fae who had followed us into Midgard—those she hoped she could trust.
In the end, my mother had ten thousand Fae willing to march, most hailing from our dusk-bound lands. And when my mother fully opened the doorway to Hel, Aidas and his brothers brought fifty thousand soldiers with them.
I do not have the words for the war’s brutality. For the lives lost, the torment and fear. But my mother did not break.
The Asteri mounted their counteroffensive swiftly, and wisely put Pelias in charge of their forces. Pelias knew my mother and her tactics well.
And though Hel’s armies fought valiantly, our people with them, it was not enough.
I was never privy to the story of how my mother and Prince Aidas became lovers. I know only that even in the midst of war, I had never seen my mother so at peace. She told me once, when I marveled at our luck that the portal had opened to Aidas that day, that it was because they were mates—their souls had found each other across galaxies, linking them that fateful day, as if the mating bond between them was indeed some physical thing. That was how deeply they loved each other. And when this war was over, she promised me, we would go to Hel with Aidas. Not to rule, but to live. When this was over, she promised, she would spend the rest of her existence atoning.
She did not get to fulfill that promise.
“Too bad,” Nesta said pitilessly.
But Bryce had moved beyond words. Beyond anything other than pure despair and dread.
Word came from the enemy right before they attacked in the dead of night: Surrender, and we would be spared. Fight, and we would be slaughtered.
Our camp had been erected high in the mountains, where we thought the winter snows would protect us from advancing enemies. Instead, we were cold and hungry, with barely any time to ready our forces. Aidas had returned to Hel to recruit more soldiers, so we were spending a rare night with our mother alone.
Hel did not have the chance to come to our aid. My mother did not even bother to try to open a portal to their world. Our forces on Midgard were already depleted—the new recruits wouldn’t be amassed for days. We begged her to open the portal anyway, to at least get the princes’ help, but my mother believed it would do little good. That what was coming that night was inevitable.
“Fool,” Nesta said again, and Bryce nodded numbly.
But my mother didn’t ask us to fight.
A bloodied Theia pressed the Horn into Helena’s hands, and urged Silene to take the Harp and the dagger. She kept the Starsword for herself.
The place where we had first entered this world was nearby. We’d been camping here in part so that my mother could eventually open a portal again and recruit more Fae to fight. She still did not understand much about voyaging between worlds—she wasn’t sure, if she opened a portal in another spot, if it would open to a different place in our world. So she’d gambled on our entry point in Midgard opening precisely into our court once more. From there, she’d planned to take the tunnels that leapt across the lands and build Fae armies. Even knowing they’d opposed her before, knowing they’d probably refuse her or kill her, she had no other options.
But there was no time for that now.
“Play the Horn and Harp,” our mother ordered, pulling them out of that pocket of nothingness, “and get out of this world.” It would be swift, a momentary opening, too fast for Rigelus to pounce on. We’d open it and be gone before he would even catch wind of what we’d done—and then we would seal the door between worlds forever.
Theia pressed a kiss to each of their brows.
She warned that Pelias was coming. For both of us. Rigelus had made him Prince of the Fae, and Pelias would use us to legitimize his reign. He meant to father children on us.
Even with all they had done, the crimes they’d committed against humans, Bryce’s chest still tightened in panic for the sisters.
Pulling her daughters close, Theia flared with starlight. And in the small space between their bodies, Bryce could just make out Theia plucking a low string on the Harp. In answer, a star—akin to the one Bryce could pull from her own chest—emerged from Theia’s body. It split into three shimmering balls of light, one drifting into Silene’s chest and another to Helena’s before the final one, as if it were the mother from which the other two stars had been born, returned to Theia’s body.
For a moment, all three of them glowed. Even Truth-Teller, in Silene’s hand, seemed to ripple, a dark countermelody to how Gwydion flashed in Theia’s hand, its light a heartbeat.