▃▃▃ ᴅᴏɴᴛ ʟᴇᴛ ʜᴇʀ ʟᴏᴏᴋ ᴏꜰ ɪɴɴᴏᴄᴇɴᴄᴇ ꜰᴏᴏʟ ʏᴏᴜ ꜱʜᴇ ɪꜱ ꜰᴜʟʟ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ʙᴇꜱᴛ ᴋɪɴᴅ ᴏꜰ ʙᴀᴅ-ᴊ ɪʀᴏɴ ᴡᴏʀᴅ
▃▃ ʙᴏᴏᴋ 1 ▃▃ In which the only daughter of Persephone sneaks on a quest to see the world for the first time since she's been at camp. The daughter of wisdom...
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𖥔 ݁ ˖ ⭑ ‧₊˚ ⋅ જ⁀➴๋࣭ ⭑๋࣭ ⭑
The stars shattered like glass above me.
One blade came for my side. The other swept toward my throat. I dropped to the ground, rolled, barely missed the second strike—again. Again. My arms were shaking, my lungs burned, and still Nyx's voice rang out, sharp and cold.
I spun. Blocked. Barely. One of them slashed across my arm. Pain flared, white-hot.
"You're too slow," she hissed. "You fight like a mortal."
Her children were shadows with swords. Slipping through flame and smoke like nightmares, too fast to track, too brutal to breathe around. This wasn't training. It was slaughter in slow motion.
"You hesitate," Nyx called from the edge of the field. "You think about mercy. About fear. About him."
I gritted my teeth. My boot slipped in ash. One of them landed a hit—across my ribs this time—and I stumbled back.
"You told me to fight," I snapped. "I'm fighting!"
"No," she said. "You're surviving. Barely."
And something in me snapped.
It started behind my ribs, deep and pulsing, like something ancient clawing up my spine. I let out a sound—half scream, half sob—and then the dreamworld broke.
The stars died. The sky twisted.
And suddenly we were standing in a forest, burning alive.
Flames clung to the trees like ivy. Smoke poured from the cracked earth. I stood in the middle of it, heaving, shaking, glowing. The shadows were gone—vaporized or maybe too afraid to stay.
Nyx stood untouched at the edge of the fire, watching me.
Her voice was low. "There she is."
I turned on her, furious. The power was still radiating off my skin, my fists clenched like I could tear the stars apart with my bare hands.
"I don't care what you want!" I shouted. "You want a weapon? A pawn? Some perfect little puppet?"
My voice cracked as the words ripped out of me. "What I want is Luke Castellan dead."
The forest howled around me. Branches split. Fire roared. My whole body was trembling.
Nyx smirked. Cold. Pleased. "She's ready."
Behind her, I saw movement. A shift in the smoke. And there he was—Morpheus.
He stood near the edge of the ruined dreamscape, pale and quiet, his eyes flickering between Nyx and me.
