Scarlet was free, and everything was wrong. She was undefined, her senses bled outside of her body, not totally attached. Waves of dizziness and nausea washed over her.

Ange brought her a waterskin to sip on. The sensation of drinking didn’t feel right in her throat, in her stomach. It was like she watched her body from the outside, an observer.

Ange wouldn’t stop staring at her. “Whatever you did,” she said, “I don’t think you should have done it.”

Scarlet did her best to hold herself up off the ground as she struggled to remember how to breathe. It took a moment for her to figure out how to form words. “Too late now,” she managed.

Energy flowed from her emissary bond to her. It didn’t fill her with power to use, like when she had drawn on Death’s power before, it simply gave her enough to sustain herself. She was leaking out, her energy dissipating nearly as fast as it was replenished. The god was saving her, for now.

Scarlet’s heart hammered as she continued to gasp for air. What has she done, what was happening? Death had little energy left; if this problem was long term, she wouldn’t be able to help Scarlet for long. Scarlet definitely couldn’t break the emissary bond now. It was the only thing keeping her alive.

The hemorrhaging of energy began to slow. She wasn’t quite stable, but she also didn’t feel incapacitating vertigo and as if she were floating out of her body… as much. She was able to sit upright. Ange sat down across from her.

“Death saved my life when I was first brought here.” Scarlet swallowed. Bodily sensations were still weird. “I thought she saved me so she could have more emissaries. She needs mages, but she never used me for anything, even though I’m a good one. It never made sense to me. Why use so much of her power to save me, when she wasn’t even going to use me as a tool to fight Riordan? Especially because I want to, I want to fight him, to find my mother, everything. Why save me, and keep me here? Why?”

“For Kiera,” Ange said softly. There was an edge in her voice, like she was holding something back.

“Death doesn’t seem like the type to do favors.”

“She has a soft spot for Kiera. They”—Ange gestured vaguely—“were involved.”

“Involved. You mean, romantically?” Scarlet knew her mother liked women as well as men, but Death of all people? “You can’t be serious.”

“It’s true.”

“What about my father?”

“This was before Kiera met him. She and Eva had ended things quite explosively some time before that. Things weren’t the same after. Eva chose to call herself ‘Death’ as a tactic to intimidate her new emissaries. She didn’t used to be as… aggressive.”

Scarlet’s memories had been clouded since plunging in the stream, and severing… whatever connection she had severed only pushed them further away. Even before then, she had tried to distance herself from recollections of her father. She would never forgive him for leaving them. “Did you know him?”

“Only a little.”

There was a mischievous glint in Ange’s mismatched eyes. Scarlet was too dazed to try to interpret it. “So what, my mom broke up with Death and then she turned into a monster?”

“Eva’s transformation was a long time coming. She has lost a lot, and not dealt with any of it well. Do you know about Deia?”

“Like, Deianira? The castle?”

“The woman the castle is named after.”

Scarlet shook her head.

“I’m not surprised. Eva does not speak of her easily. Deia was her first love, back when she was still a mortal. Perhaps all might have ended well, but then Eva became Death’s first incarnate. This caught Riordan’s attention. To him, she was something exotic. Something wild, that he wanted to control, just like he does with everything else. But of course, she spurned him. As revenge, he killed Deia. And, as you know, he has not gone away since. He will wear her down until she has no power to hold him away.”

Scarlet drank this information in. “I won’t do it solely for Death’s sake,” she said, “But Riordan does have to be stopped.”

“For many reasons, yes. If he has his way, he may also disrupt the cycle of souls, which would be disastrous for any souls entering or leaving the World. The Magus War may begin anew. Mortals will be caught in the crossfire between gods once again, and I will not let that happen.”

“So. When are we going to Saridian?” Scarlet asked.

“I’m not sure you should come to the World, given your condition.”

“Oh, don’t you pull this on me now.” Sparks lived in Scarlet’s fingertips, ready to break loose. “We had a deal. You want me to find your sword? You want to fight Riordan? Take me to the World. You said you have a plan, didn’t you? No time to waste.” Time might be limited, after all, if she kept leaking out her energy. If Death didn’t have the power to keep sustaining her.

“Fine,” Ange conceded. “Let’s go.”

#

As the afternoon drew on, Ange took Scarlet through Cascara’s realm, using a boat to navigate the rivers crisscrossing through it. The sun lowered in the sky, and the twin moons of the Crossworld rose to take their place as they crossed over into Riordan’s realm.

They spent an hour or two trekking through a forest, eventually reaching a clearing. A tall black stone stood in the center of it. Something her mother once told her about something like this tickled the back of her mind, but she couldn’t put together the thought. Ange stopped and slowly turned to Scarlet.

“This is the place?” Scarlet asked.

Ange seemed hesitant, her eyes flickering briefly over Scarlet as she scanned the area. “Yes.”

“But?”

“I don’t think you should come.”

“What? I’m coming. You wanted me to and you already agreed. You took me all the way out here—”

“Yes, well.” Ange huffed out a sharp breath. “It’s unfortunate. I wasted a lot of time helping you free yourself from your bonds—”

“So I’m coming.”

“You can barely walk straight.”

Scarlet grimaced. She had tried to hide the dizziness that plagued her their whole journey. She certainly wasn’t in the best shape, but there was no way she could turn back now. “What other option is there?”

“Stay here and wait for me. I need to touch base with my contacts in the World, and then I’ll come back and try to help you figure out… whatever’s going on with you.”

“Contacts?”

“Yes.” Ange didn’t elaborate. “I’ll be as fast as I can.”

“And in the meantime, you’re leaving me alone in Riordan’s realm?”

“Can you make it back to Cascara’s realm? You’ll probably be safe enough going back there yourself. Riordan should be pretty distracted shortly.”

Just then, a new wrongness stirred in Scarlet’s gut. “Riordan is coming for Death.”

Ange nodded, grim. “She’s been worn too thin and has no one left to defend her. He’ll come soon, if he hasn’t already.”

Death had sent Dante away, as well as Scarlet, and perhaps Bronwen too if she’d gotten her way. Death knew she was done for. Plus, on top of it all, she was feeding Scarlet energy now. Scarlet didn’t know how to feel about her patron god keeping her alive because of her past relationship with Scarlet’s mother. It was still too strange to wrap her mind around.

But if Riordan was coming for Death, her kindness, regardless of motivation, might not be able to last for long. Time was running out for them all.

Scarlet sighed. “How long will you be gone?”

“Give me a day.”

A day. It seemed far too long.

Ange picked up on her hesitation. “I’m sorry. I need at least that much time to arrange everything. I’ll meet you back at the river by sunset tomorrow.”

“What exactly are you arranging?”

Ange pulled her lips tight.

“You’re going to fight him.”

Ange brushed a lock of hair out of her face, but didn’t answer.

“If you’re fighting him, there’s no way I’m staying—”

“I’m not taking you with me now,” Ange said. “That’s final. The plan has to go forward, before we’re out of time. We’ll get you fixed up after and you can help me find that sword.”

Scarlet snarled. Reflexively, she tried to draw energy to her fingertips, prepared to fight if she had to, but she couldn’t coalesce enough power before it leaked out of her body.

Ange turned around and waved a hand, the air in front of her ripping open into a circular portal. Scarlet’s heart dropped. That was Saridian, through there. Everything she wanted, only a few steps away, and yet she still couldn’t go.

“You’d better start heading for the river,” Ange looked back to tell her before she stepped through. “Riordan will come to us through the Crossworld, and you don’t want to be caught here when he does.”