Peter's head lolled forward, then jerked back up as though the small motion pulled something vital loose inside him.

  The rune-forged chains had bitten deep into his wrists and ankles; the skin around the cuffs was swollen and bloody, ridged where metal met flesh. His torso looked like a brutal watercolor: fresh purple bruises layered over fading yellow, old fractures re-knitted crooked then broken again, corrected again, the work of someone who had turned cruelty into a careful craft. Indeed, the gods had used their infinite time on improving their crafts.

  Theo stood close enough to smell the copper tang of blood on him, close enough to catch the faint shimmer in Peter's pupils every time the boy forced himself to stay conscious.

  "Sick bastards…" Theo muttered as he traced the rune-lock with a fingertip, memorizing its guttery pulse, then pressed a thin metal sliver into Peter's numb palm—insurance if things went worse.

  Peter's gaze lifted slowly. "Theo," he rasped. "Did he… tell you to rescue me?"

  Theo's jaw tightened. He hated how that question landed, not because it was unfair, but because it made the world feel simple for half a heartbeat: save the kid, get out, win. His fingers paused on the chain. For a second, he didn't breathe.

  "He told me to find you," Theo said, choosing his words with care. "Check your condition. Keep you breathing until he came."

  Peter blinked slowly, weighing the difference between rescue and check like it was the difference between living and dying. As he had learned his lesson, when his lord spoke, it should be done accordingly, no buts and no reasons.

  Then he gave Theo a smile that had no business being on a body this broken.

  "Then leave."

  Theo stared.

  Peter's voice sharpened, harder than it had any right to be. "You heard me. Leave."

  "The hell is wrong with you?" Theo hissed, eyes flicking toward the corridor as though he would be beheaded with the whistle of sound alone. "You think I came all this way just to look at you and walk out?"

  Peter drew a breath that caught on pain. He closed his eyes, and when they opened again stubborn clarity filled the blue and made Theo freeze.

  "Lord Aron is here," Peter said, each word measured. "If he didn't tell you to break me out… then breaking me out isn't the move."

  Theo's throat tightened. "You don't know that."

  "I do." For the first time Theo heard something in Peter that wasn't naive hope. Peter's shoulders squared despite the chains; his chin lifted a fraction.

  Theo leaned in, voice dropping to a rough whisper. "Listen to me, little herald. You're hanging in chains. He can come back any second. You really think a plan matters more than—"

  "Than what?" Peter cut in. His voice rose despite the pain, sharp enough to make Theo flinch. "Than my life?"

  Peter laughed once, a dry, cracked sound that ended in a wet cough. When it passed he spat a thin thread of blood onto the stone.

  "I trust Lord Aron," he said quietly, "and the words he speaks should always be absolute. So follow orders, Theo. Don't feel, just think."

  Theo's eyes narrowed. "Don't you dare."

  "Don't I dare what?" Peter's stare hardened. "Don't I dare be useful? Trust the plan, trust the order. He is not some narcissistic god; he is the Golden Slayer. Have faith in that name, have faith in that title."

  Theo's hands curled into fists.

  He wanted to argue. Wanted to say these kinds of orders were just pretty lies people told themselves when survival ran out. That being a pawn and trading loyalty only buried hearts as cleanly as Peter's. But most importantly, Aron didn't need another corpse on his tally. That Theo had already buried too many good people who died for plans that looked flawless on paper and bled real on stone.

  But Peter kept speaking, voice steady now. His chained wrists trembled once, then stilled with deliberate force.

  "Trust him," Peter said. "Not blindly. Not like a child. Trust him because he's already paid for what happens when he fails."

  Theo's mouth opened, then closed.

  Peter's gaze dropped to the stolen crest at Theo's belt, to the faint rune glow pulsing like a heartbeat.

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  "And you," Peter added, softer, "you're not here because you love me. You're here because you hate them."

  Theo didn't answer.

  Peter exhaled. "So hate them properly. Follow his plan."

  Theo stared at him for a long moment, waiting for the wide-eyed innocence to crack and show fear underneath.

  It never did.

  Peter's eyes stayed clear.

  "Leave me," Peter said again. This time the words didn't ask. They commanded. "Get out. Before he comes back and smells you. Before you give him something else to torture out of me."

  Theo's fingers twitched. He glanced down the corridor. Hermez's presence still clung to the air with the fear of instant death he could have faced.

  "You're telling me," Theo murmured, bitter and disbelieving, "to walk away and let you scream in agony again and again."

  Peter's lips quirked. " For God's sake, I'm telling you to stop pretending you're the hero. You're a blade. Act like it."

  That hit.

  Theo swallowed hard, anger and something worse grinding together in his chest. He hated that it landed. He hated that the boy was right.

  "You're not as naive as I told myself you were," Theo muttered.

  Peter's smile softened. "No. I was just late to learning. Don't mind me."

  Theo nodded once, stiff, reluctant, like the gesture cost him pride—and it did. "I'll tell him you're alive," Theo said. "I'll tell him what I saw."

  "And Theo," Peter called as Theo started to turn.

  Theo paused.

  Peter's voice dropped to a whisper. "If he asks you to do something… terrible… don't hesitate for my sake."

  Theo's eyes narrowed.

  Peter's gaze didn't waver. "I'm already dead if he wins."

  Theo forced himself to turn. He stepped back into the corridor, posture loose, expression blank, letting the invisibility fade as he moved, another slave in a palace full of slaves, another obedient piece in the machine, but obedient to tonight's machine.

  Meanwhile, at the upper edge of the valley, it wasn't just cold. It was deliberately cold, temperature shaped with intent, frost carrying orders from magic and runes. The snowbanks rose too evenly, the wind sliced in predictable angles, and when Aron exhaled, his breath didn't drift. It slid along invisible lanes like it had been given instructions.

  He felt James close behind him, close enough to hear the tension in every breath even when James tried to hide it. Because the immortal he knew, the lord he knew, would never talk to a god, much less make a deal like that.

  Then the system chimed. Not a warning but a connection request.

  The interface unfolded in thin gold script—elegant and unkind.

  [Contract Link — Freya]

  Status: Active

  Duration: 24:00:00

  Condition: Concealment + Olympian Signature Cloak

  Cost: Karma Interest Accrual — Variable]

  A sharp, hot pain stabbed into his forearm. He rolled back his sleeve. Ink—not ink, living rune-work—bloomed across his skin. Spiraled vine and sharp Nordic angles wrapped around his wrist and climbed toward his elbow, pulsing once with a heartbeat that wasn't his.

  James stared.

  "My lord," James murmured, voice tight. "That's…"

  "A leash," Aron said simply. "And also a connection."

  The tattoo pulsed again. Aron felt the weight of it—Freya's magic fused into his system permissions like a parasite given legal standing. He flexed his fingers. The pulse slowed. Satisfied.

  Then the echo of their march reached them. Boots in formation. Hundreds of boots. Bronze plating tapping against stone that wasn't quite stone. The sound rolled over the ridge in steady waves.

  James dropped lower, eyes darting for cover. "Hide," he breathed. Aron didn't move.

  "No need," he said.

  James looked at him like he'd misheard, but Aron's gaze stayed calm, a precise edge lying beneath it. "Freya's concealment isn't smoke and mirrors. It's myth-grade. It doesn't just bend sight. It tells reality what it's allowed to notice. She is the mother of Loki, the greatest trickster of all time."

  James swallowed. The muscle in his jaw jumped. "And the price?"

  Aron's tattoo throbbed. "I'll pay it later," he said.

  The demigods crested the ridge in a tight column: half-bloods in polished bronze, spears upright, helmets tucked under arms because the air here was "safe." Their hair caught the false sunlight wrong.

  The front pair stopped when they reached Aron and James. The leader's gaze swept over them, lingered on the Olympian illusion: golden hair, faint radiant aura, the arrogant posture Freya's glamour insisted on.

  "You two," the leader barked. "Why are you here? Your patrol route is three sectors east."

  James's pulse hammered. Aron tilted his head like he was annoyed to be questioned at all. The disguise carried the attitude as naturally as skin.

  "Abnormality detected," Aron said curtly. "Grid flicker at the ridge line. We came to confirm."

  The leader's eyes narrowed. "We didn't receive—"

  "Then your comms are lagging," Aron interrupted, voice sharp. "Or you're not important enough to get the update on time."

  A few demigods bristled, but the leader hesitated. Hierarchy mattered even when it was fake. Especially when it was fake. James leaned into the performance, voice bored and disdainful. "Do you want us to file a report saying you delayed us? Or do you want to go check your grid like good little soldiers?"

  The leader's nostrils flared. Pride wrestled discipline, and in the end, discipline won.

  "…Fine," he said. He jerked his chin. "Two of you. Check the ridge. Quick."

  Two demigods peeled off and walked past, scanning the snow with rune-lenses embedded in their palms. They muttered, tapped spear-butts against ice, and found exactly what Aron knew they would.

  Nothing. Freya's magic smoothed the world. The two returned, shaking their heads.

  "Nothing," one reported. "No distortion."

  The leader glared at Aron like the universe had personally insulted him. Aron shrugged with Olympian arrogance. "Then the flicker corrected itself. Congratulations, guys. You witnessed stability."

  The leader scowled but nodded, already eager to move on and forget the encounter.

  "Return to patrol," he snapped to his unit. "Keep formation and don't fucking loosen." The column marched again, spears swaying like metallic reeds.

  Aron watched them pass, eyes half-lidded, nostrils flaring subtly. Then he spoke without turning. His next decision should be simple: blend in with them and infiltrate the dominion of Hermez. But he sniffed the air. It wasn't the smell that bothered him, but something else.

  "Blend," he told James.

  James blinked. "My lord?"

  "Go with them."

  James's spine went rigid. "What will you do?"

  Aron's gaze stayed on the snow, on the way the wind slid along invisible lanes. "I smell bullshit," he said.

  James frowned. "Smell… what?"

  "A lie," Aron replied.