serpents. Her skin seemed aflame. He saw a pale circle burning at her brow as if it had been inscribed into her skin. She seemed more shadow than flesh, growing in size, filling the hall. Scaeva loomed larger also, the pair of them colliding with another clap of thunder and flash of moonlight. Mirrored fragments of a murdered god, the two halves within him at war now with themselves and ripping all to ruins. The air was a storm of daemons, a choir of black screams, all the Abyss breaking loose.
The city about them shuddered, thunder crashing in the sky above, the wind like a hurricane. Mercurio had crawled away from the brawl, back to the edge of the room. He found Sidonius clutching his butchered belly among the wreckage, soaked in blood. The gladiatii was holding his intestines in with one hand, trying to drag an unconscious Bladesinger to some kind of safety. Mercurio saw Marielle crouched in the shadows nearby, pressed by the howling wind, lank hair plastered to her tortured skin.
It seemed the whole world was coming to an end. All their stories along with it. And there, amidst all the chaos, all the sound, all the fury, a thin black shape appeared on the cracking floor beside him, tail twitching side to side.
“… you must lead them away from here, mercurio…”
“I’m not leaving her!”
“… you will always be with her. and she with you. but it is time to let her go, old man…”
“No! She doesn’t end like this, I won’t let her!”
“… you promised to remember her. not just the good parts. the ugly parts and the selfish parts and the real parts, too. all of her, mercurio. who can do that, if not you…?”
The old man looked at the not-cat as the black storm raged all about them. The love they both bore her as real and sharp as broken glass, cutting him to the bone. But he knew the shadow spoke true.
“… remember her…”
Ever since he began, he’d known how this story would end.
We all did, didn’t we?
“Marielle!” he bellowed, turning to the weaver.
The woman seemed almost comatose, lost to her grief, to the chaos around them. Leaning against the wall and staring at titans clashing and waiting for death.
“Marielle!” Mercurio roared again.
She blinked blood-red eyes. Looked at the old bishop.
“Can you walk?” he shouted.
The weaver flinched as Mia and Scaeva collided with the far wall, tearing a mighty fissure through the gravebone. The remains of the ceiling shuddered, more cracks spreading through the support pillars as Mia’s legion shrieked and howled about them. The island shook so violently, Mercurio was tossed onto his knees. Sidonius covered Bladesinger’s body with his own, prayers on his bloody lips.
“Can you fucking walk?” the old man bellowed again.
“Aye.” Marielle blinked the shadow of her brother from her eyes. “Walk I can.”
“Help Sidonius! We have to move!”
The weaver grit her teeth, crawled across the bucking floor. Reaching the wounded gladiatii, she held out one twisted hand, whispering beneath the roaring winds. Sidonius gasped, clutching his sundered gut. But before his wondering eyes, his innards crawled back up inside him, his wound sealing closed as if it had never been.
“’Byss and blood…,” he breathed.
“The weaver knows her work!” Mercurio yelled. “Now get the fuck up!”
Sidonius swayed to his feet, staggering as the shadow titans smashed into another wall. Mercurio’s eyes were narrowed against the sight, as if the dark they shed were somehow too bright to look at. Mia and Scaeva were almost entirely unrecognizable now, looming black figures with translucent wings and bodies rippling like shadowflame, crashing against each other like tidal waves amidst a storm of howling passengers. Only Mia’s long, writhing hair and that circle scribed at her brow served to tell the pair apart.
“Merciful Aa,” Sid breathed. “Look at her…”
“Where shall we go?” Marielle demanded. “Without Adonai—”
“We’ve got to get off these fucking islands!” Mercurio shouted. “A republic in ashes behind her, remember? A city of bridges and bones laid at the bottom of the sea by her hand! We all know what’s going to happen here!”
“What about Jonnen?” Sid yelled.
Mercurio looked to the boy, crouched and terrified near the wreckage of Scaeva’s throne. He was sealed behind bars of solid shadow, eyes wide, cheeks wet with tears as he watched his father and sister collide.
“… the boy must remain…”
Mercurio looked to Mister Kindly, sitting calmly on the broken ground and licking at one ink-black paw.