The dead pressed closer, their skeletal fingers brushing against Elara's arms, their whispers a chorus of accusation.
Thieves. Murderers. Liars.
She slashed through them, her dagger carving arcs of silver in the dim light, but for every one she felled, two more took its place. At her side, Kael's blackfire was a dying ember, his breaths coming in ragged gasps.
The crown still hung in the air, untouched.
Elara gritted her teeth. "We can't fight forever!"
Kael kicked back a revenant, his voice strained. "Then don't fight. Think."
She knew what he meant. The god-king had offered them a choice—take the crown, or die. But there was always a third option.
Break the game.
Her eyes locked onto the floating silver circlet. If it revealed truth… then maybe it could also reveal weakness.
She lunged for it.
Her fingers closed around the crown.
Pain exploded behind her eyes—white-hot, all-consuming. Visions tore through her mind like shrapnel:
_A younger Kael, kneeling before a different throne, a blade pressed to his throat._
_Herself, screaming as silver vines pierced through her skin, not from her will, but another's._
_The god-king, not as a shadow, but as a man—bleeding, falling, a silver crown tumbling from his brow._
And then, clearest of all:
_The amulet. Not a curse, not a bond._
A key.
The vision shattered. Elara gasped, the crown slipping from her grasp. It clattered to the stones, its glow dimming.
Kael caught her before she could collapse. "What did you see?"
She gripped his arm, her voice raw. "We've been playing the wrong game."
The god-king's amusement faltered.
"You were not meant to see that," he hissed.
Elara straightened, wiping blood from her nose. "You're not a god. You're a corpse."
The words struck like a blade. The shadows around the throne rippled, the illusion of grandeur flickering—just for a second—to reveal something beneath.
Rotting flesh. Broken bones. A crown embedded in a skull, not resting upon it.
Kael understood faster than she did. His laugh was a dark, terrible thing. "You're not the judge. You're the prisoner."
The god-king screamed.
The city shook. The dead faltered, their hollow eyes turning toward the throne—not in reverence, but in hunger.
They remembered.
And they were angry.
The revenants turned on their master.
Bone fingers clawed at the shadowed throne. The god-king lashed out, his power flaying the dead where they stood—but there were too many. Always too many.
Elara didn't wait. She snatched the fallen crown from the ground and slammed it onto Kael's head.
He recoiled. "What the hell—?"
"Trust me," she hissed.
The moment the silver touched his brow, the amulet burned—but this time, not with pain.
With purpose.
Kael's blackfire reignited, not as embers, but as a storm. It tore through the remaining dead, a wildfire given will.
The god-king howled. "You do not understand what you've done!"
Elara bared her teeth. "We're done playing by your rules."
The throne splintered.
The god-king's form unraveled, his shadows peeling back to reveal the truth beneath—a wasted, withered thing, bound to the crown just as they were bound to the amulet.
"You cannot kill me," he rasped. "I am death itself."
Kael stepped forward, the crown gleaming on his brow. "No. You're just a man who forgot to die."
He raised his hand.
The blackfire consumed.
When the flames cleared, the throne was dust. The city was silent.
And the amulet's chain around their wrists…
Was loose.