Lyria's POV
The song poured out of me like a river breaking through a dam.
Golden fire erupted from my throat, spreading across the palace walls. Not normal fire—this burned cold and bright, consuming lies and darkness and everything false. The flames sang with me, harmonizing with my voice in a chorus of pure truth.
Selene screamed and threw up a shield of moonlight. The fire crashed against it, making the barrier crack and splinter.
"STOP!" she shrieked. "You don't know what you're doing! You'll destroy everything!"
But I couldn't stop. Wouldn't stop. All the pain, all the suffering, all the years of silence came pouring out in my song. And with each note, I felt more of my power returning—memories unlocking like doors I'd forgotten existed.
I remembered who I was. What I was.
Lyria the Melodious. Goddess of Songs, Stories, and Memory. The Voice of Truth.
And I was ANGRY.
My song shifted, becoming sharper, more focused. The words came without thinking:
"SELENE, GODDESS OF MOONLIGHT, BETRAYER OF BLOOD, MURDERER OF SOULS—BURN IN THE TRUTH YOU TRIED TO HIDE!"
The golden fire obeyed. It wrapped around Selene like chains, burning through her moonlight shield. She screamed as the flames touched her skin, not consuming her flesh but something deeper. The fire was burning away her lies, her pretenses, her stolen power.
"Please!" She fell to her knees. "Sister, please! I was just following orders! The Supreme Council made me do it!"
Even now, she was lying. I could hear it in her voice, see it in her eyes.
I walked toward her, still singing, the fire following my every step. My voice grew stronger with each word. Behind me, I felt the palace walls crumbling—not from destruction, but from truth. The Silent Realm was built on secrets and hidden things. My song was exposing everything.
"Lyria." Selene looked up at me with tears in her eyes. "I'm your sister. Your family. You can't kill me. It's not who you are."
She was right. Even after everything she'd done, I didn't want to kill her. That's not what I was made for. I was made to heal, to help, to give voice to the voiceless.
But I wasn't going to let her win.
I changed my song, pouring all my will into the words:
"SELENE SHALL SPEAK ONLY TRUTH, HER LIES BURNED AWAY, HER CRIMES LAID BARE FOR ALL TO SEE!"
The golden fire flared brighter. Selene opened her mouth to scream, but what came out instead were words—words she didn't want to say:
"I killed the mortals! I harvested their souls! I betrayed Lyria because I was jealous! I wanted Father's love! I wanted to be the favorite! I wanted—"
Her confession echoed through the collapsing palace, carried by my magic to every realm. Every god would hear it. Every mortal. There would be no hiding now.
Selene clutched her throat, horror on her face. She couldn't stop talking. The truth poured out of her like water from a broken dam.
I should have felt victorious. Instead, I just felt tired.
My song ended, and I collapsed to my knees. The golden fire faded, leaving only smoke and silence. My throat burned like I'd swallowed hot coals. Using that much power all at once had nearly killed me.
Selene lay on the ground, still muttering confessions, unable to stop. She'd be like that for hours, maybe days. Long enough for the other gods to come and deal with her.
But I didn't care about her anymore.
I crawled across the broken floor to where Kael lay. His silver eyes were closed. His chest didn't move. The pool of blood beneath him had stopped spreading.
"No," I whispered, my voice cracking. "No, no, no. You don't get to die. Not after everything."
I placed my hands on his chest, right over the wound Selene had made. My palms came away wet with silver blood. So much blood.
I tried to sing a healing song, but my voice was gone again—not stolen this time, just exhausted. I'd used everything I had to defeat Selene. There was nothing left.
Tears streamed down my face. "Please," I begged. "Please don't leave me alone."
His hand was so cold in mine.
Then I felt it—a tiny flutter under my palm. His heart, beating once. Weak but there.
He wasn't dead. Not yet.
But he would be soon unless I did something.
I remembered what Nyx had said: my powers were sealed, and using them broke the seal bit by bit. Each time I used my power, it hurt, but I got stronger.
What if I gave Kael some of that power? What if I shared my life force with him, the way he'd shared his realm with me?
It was crazy. It might kill us both.
But doing nothing would definitely kill him.
I closed my eyes and pressed my forehead against his. "I don't know if you can hear me," I whispered. "But I'm not giving up on you. You saved me twice. Now it's my turn."
I searched inside myself for any scrap of power left. Found a tiny spark—barely a ember, but it was there. I fed it with my will, my determination, my desperate hope. The spark grew into a small flame.
Then I pushed it into Kael.
Golden light flowed from my hands into his chest. His body jerked. His back arched. For a horrible moment, I thought I'd killed him.
Then he gasped—a huge, shuddering breath that sounded like someone breaking the surface after drowning.
His silver eyes flew open.
"Lyria?" he croaked, staring at me.
"You're alive!" I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. "You're actually—"
The floor beneath us exploded.
We both went flying in different directions. I hit a wall hard enough to knock the air from my lungs. Stars burst across my vision.
When my head cleared, I looked up and my blood turned to ice.
A man stood in the center of the palace. No—not a man. A god. He was massive, at least seven feet tall, with muscles like carved stone and eyes that burned like twin suns. He wore golden armor that hummed with power, and in his hand was a sword as long as I was tall.
"LYRIA!" His voice boomed like thunder. "GODDESS OF SONGS! YOU STAND ACCUSED OF ASSAULT ON A SUPREME COUNCIL MEMBER!"
The God of War. Theron. Selene's fiancé.
Of course she'd called for backup before coming here. Of course she'd had a plan.
Theron pointed his massive sword at me. "Surrender now, and your death will be quick. Resist, and I will make you suffer as you made my beloved suffer."
Behind him, more figures appeared. At least a dozen other gods, all armed, all ready to fight.
I tried to stand but my legs wouldn't work. I'd used too much power. I had nothing left to fight with.
Kael staggered to his feet, putting himself between me and Theron. He could barely stand, but he raised his hands anyway. Shadows gathered weakly around his fingers.
"You'll have to go through me first," Kael said.
Theron laughed—a sound like rocks crushing bones. "Gladly."
He raised his sword.
This was it. We were going to die.
Then someone else spoke. A woman's voice, cold and sharp as winter ice:
"I don't think so."
A figure stepped out of the shadows beside me. At first, I thought it was Nyx returned. But this woman was solid, not made of shadow. She was tall and beautiful, with long white hair and eyes like frozen stars. She wore a simple black dress, but power radiated from her like heat from a furnace.
"Who dares—" Theron started.
"I dare," the woman said calmly. She looked at Kael and smiled. "Hello, nephew. It's been a while."
Kael's eyes went wide. "Aunt Nyx? But you're... you're in the Void. You've been trapped there for—"
"Ten thousand years. Yes." The woman—the REAL Nyx, not the shadow servant—turned her frozen gaze on Theron. "Long enough to get very, very angry about what you and your Supreme Council have been doing."
She snapped her fingers.
The dozen gods behind Theron froze in place, their bodies turning to ice from the feet up. They couldn't even scream as the ice consumed them.
Theron's face went pale. "The Primordial Goddess of Night. Impossible. You were sealed—"
"And now I'm unsealed." Nyx's smile was terrifying. "Thanks to this brave little goddess here, whose song of truth broke seals all over creation. Including mine."
She walked past me and Kael, each step leaving frost on the ground. She stopped in front of Theron, who towered over her. But somehow, she seemed larger.
"Here's what's going to happen," Nyx said softly. "You're going to leave. You're going to tell your Supreme Council that Lyria and Kael are under MY protection now. And if anyone tries to hurt them again, I will personally drag every single member of your corrupt Council into the Void and leave them there until the end of time. Understood?"
Theron's sword shook in his grip. He looked at the frozen gods, at Nyx's cold smile, at me and Kael.
Then he vanished in a flash of golden light, teleporting away.
The moment he was gone, Nyx's terrifying aura faded. She turned to us with a genuine smile.
"Well," she said. "That was fun. Now, shall we discuss why my nephew decided to fall in love with the one goddess who could accidentally destroy the entire universe with a single song?"
I blinked. "Fall in love? We're not—"
Kael coughed. "Aunt Nyx, this really isn't the time—"
"Oh, it's absolutely the time." Nyx laughed, and it sounded like bells in winter. "Because that little song you just sang, dear Lyria? It didn't just break MY seal. It broke ALL the seals. Every monster, every imprisoned god, every forgotten horror that was locked away for the safety of creation."
My heart stopped. "What?"
"You just set them all free," Nyx said cheerfully. "Every single one. And now they're coming here to thank you."
She pointed toward the broken window.
I looked out and saw the sky splitting open. Cracks spread across reality itself like a shattered mirror. And through those cracks, I saw things moving. Huge things. Ancient things. Things with too many eyes and not enough faces.
"So," Nyx said. "Who's ready for the apocalypse?"