“Are you awake? I need you to wake up now, Stormie.”

  Dusty stone ceiling tiles filled my vision when my eyes struggled open. I felt weak and drained. I sat up with Nix holding me upright. My body felt a hundred pounds heavier than it should’ve, and my right arm still stung.

  “Do me a favor and don’t look down at your arm. It’s for your own good.”

  My eyes immediately drifted down to my painful right arm. A green line started at the base of my elbow and wrapped around my arm like a snake’s body down to my wrist. I turned my arm over, examining it in depth. It definitely felt permanent.

  “What do you think this is?”

  Nix looked at the smooth groove that spiraled down my forearm. She bit her lower lip as she studied it.

  “I wonder if that happened because you overdid it. It looks like the coil of a snake. No, it’s Typhon’s coil.”

  Typhon’s coil, that sounded exactly like what I was looking at. Even more, it was a good name for the swirling attack that had given me the mark. Typhon had warned me about overindulgence with my power. Now I bore the cost. Even so, it was worth it to have freed Nix. For her, there was no price I wouldn’t pay to ensure her safety.

  “We have to get out of here before people start showing up.”

  She was calm, but there was a noticeable undertone of anxiety in her voice. I let out a long, slow groan. She was right, but Nix wrapped her arms around my midsection and easily lifted me to my feet. I forgot how strong she could be when she wanted to be.

  The bodies of the two dead soldiers lay sprawled on the floor around us. As I stared at them, I felt nothing. No guilt. No remorse. I should feel bad, right? What did that say about me as a person?

  “The storm does not mourn for fallen villagers,” Typhon said.

  I had to agree with him this time. I definitely did not mourn them. There was a thick gash in the stone platform where the mini-tornado had dragged the last guy away. Part of me wondered if he was still alive. If he was, it was in his best interest to keep moving away from Nix and me.

  “You really put on a show. It’s a good thing no one was around to see it.”

  My eyes traveled back to the clock on the pillar. It was still 9:13. I was just about to give up and admit to myself that the clock was broken when a red light shone beneath the white uniform of one of the soldiers.

  “What the hell is that?” Nix asked as she let me go and moved closer to the corpse.

  She reached into the dead man’s collar and pulled a silver necklace free. An all too familiar slashed eye pendant glowed bright red at the end of it. She backed away. I looked at the other soldier, and he had a similar light coming from beneath his uniform as well.

  “The Ancient Eye sent them after me.”

  Nix sounded shocked and afraid. She slid her hand into mine. She was trembling.

  “Yeah, Loverboy said they would be.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  The glowing pendant started flashing.

  “Why is it doing that?” I asked.

  Nix shrugged.

  “How the hell should I know?”

  The flashing started slow but gradually got faster until it was flashing so fast it looked continuous again. Then, without warning, the bodies burst into flames. The fire was small and fast-acting. It consumed the soldiers’ bodies in seconds, leaving nothing behind except the faint smell of charred flesh.

  The moment the bodies were gone, the clock ticked to 9:14. Sound and movement returned to the platform simultaneously, followed closely behind by the smell of diesel. Groups of people walked through the turnstile, none the wiser about what had taken place. Nix gave my hand a quick squeeze.

  “Is that invitation to stay at your house still good?”

  My pulse quickened. It was mostly a joke when I said it, but there was no way I was telling her that.

  “Of course.”

  She gave me a quick nod and started walking forward toward the edge of the platform. I followed behind her, not fully understanding where we were going. It looked as if we were about to jump onto the tracks. I wasn’t sure that was a plunge I could take with her. Just before we reached the end of the platform, a rippling tunnel of darkness opened up in front of us.

  “Don’t let my hand go,” Nix said.

  That was the last thing she had to worry about me doing. We stepped into the darkness, and the subway station vanished as it swallowed us. I couldn’t see or hear anything, but an icy chill ran down my back. I had a strange feeling that we weren’t alone in the darkness. I shuddered, thinking about what might live in a place like this.

  “Here we are,” Nix said as the darkness opened up in front of us.

  We stepped into my bedroom. Nix let my hand go and sat on the edge of my bed. She was doubled over, breathing hard and sweating. If someone had told me she had just run a marathon, I would believe them after seeing her.

  “Are you gonna be okay?”

  She nodded slowly.

  “Yeah, I just need a few minutes to recharge.”

  She looked like she needed a lot more time than that, but I nodded in agreement.

  “That was the longest trip I’ve taken through the shadow pass. It’s really draining.”

  The trip didn’t seem very long at all to me, but looking at her, I could tell I didn’t understand it fully. I climbed into my bed and lay down, pulling her to me.

  “Take all the time you need. You’re safe here.”

  I thought about how easily I had defeated those three soldiers as I said that. If the Ancient Eye sent anyone else after her, they would meet a similar fate.

  “Yeah, the pact protects this house while your parents are here.”

  She said in a weak, sleepy voice before yawning. She was lying on my left side with her head on my chest. I tightened my embrace of her and breathed in a lungful of her scent. I didn’t want the moment to end, but I felt sleep dragging me under as well. Hopefully, she wouldn’t be gone when I woke up. It would be nice to wake up next to her without my dad standing over us.

  “Do you regret saving me now that you have a permanent mark because of it?” Nix asked.

  She sounded more asleep than awake.

  “Never,” I said without hesitation.

  As I drifted off to sleep, the swirling combination of wind and acid played like a movie in my mind. I wondered what would happen if I used that on a person instead of an energy bubble. A smile crept across my face as I let my mind explore the possibilities. The next person who came for either of us was going to provide that answer for me. The smell of wood burning wafted under my nose, and I bolted upright in my bed. My immediate thought was that the house was burning.

  Instead of my room being engulfed in flame, there was a stone fireplace in the wall in front of my bed. I crawled out of my bed and crept over to the fireplace. The brownish-red bricks it was made of had strange symbols carved in them.

  I reached out and ran my fingers over one of the smooth inscriptions. The flames suddenly leapt out of the fireplace and engulfed me. I sat up in my bed screaming and patting myself trying to douse the flames.

  “Stormie, you’re safe. It was a dream,” Nix said and threw her arms around me.

  With my heart racing, I frantically searched for the fireplace. I could still feel the flames dancing across my skin. I rested my head on her shoulder and let her slowly rub my back.

  “The Olympians have sent a message,” Typhon said.