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My hands shook. My nails pierced half-moons into my palm. “No.”
Theron took a deep breath. “Either way, we have to make a choice, or we’ll all die. Your reasoning works just as well.” He shifted to one of his oldest friends. “A-flat, Nitsa. A-flat.”
She didn’t move. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
“Okay,” she said, lifting her foot. “I trust you.”
She stomped the panel, and it sprung up—flinging her into the air.
“Nooo!”
Nitsa sailed screaming through the ballroom window.
“Hasina, save her!”
The sphinx shot into the air. She smashed through the window without a care to injury, and was gone.
We held on with bated breath, waiting for the two of them to return.
And waited...
...and waited...
...and waited.
“Fuck!” Theron doubled over, pounding his forehead with his fists. Smoke billowed off his body.
“Theron, p-please.” Tears soaked my face. “I know... but we have to keep going. Take a breath. We’ll get through this. The song hasn’t started over, so maybe we don’t have to—”
“Fuck the song!” He ripped up, and glowing, burning red eyes shotgunned my heart into my throat. “Fuck this place! Fuck the bloody gods! We didn’t ask for this. None of us asked to be the unwilling hosts of loser gods, pouting in the dark corner of our souls because humans threw them and their bullshit out of their lives.
“None of us asked to be trapped in this monstrous hellhole, fighting a war forced on us, so that they can rise again!”
His skin was boiling. Fissures like lava cut through his arms, chest, and face. Scorching ash billowed off his skull. Theron was a volcano, and he was about to blow.
“You didn’t ask to lose your mother because thousands of fucking years ago, the gods couldn’t get the job done! I hate this!”
“Theron!”
“Hate losing everyone!”
He was so bright, I couldn’t look at him.
“Theron, please—!”
“I HATE THE GODS!”
“Nooo!” we screamed, throwing our hands up.
“Theron, don’t.”
A thin, tired voice pierced our terror. We looked up as the sphinx’s head crested the windowsill. She kept flying until Nitsa’s smile hit us. “It’s okay,” she said, tone soft though she had to be humming with fear and adrenaline.
The sphinx was gentle placing her down on the exact panel that threw her. “I’m okay.” She held her hand out to Theron, hugging him the only way she could. “Just breathe.”
Slowly, surely, miraculously, the real Theron returned to us, and the lit fuse of rage disappeared.
