The crystal surface fractured into separate shards of light. The fragments drifted downward, dissolving before they touched the ground. Silence reclaimed the chamber. The three gates pulsed, waiting.

  Athena was the first to speak.

  “Dear cousin…” There was something new in her voice. A faint strain. A crack in her composure. She had made a mistake, and the three of them knew it. “Would you be so kind as to return my satchel to me?”

  Cassian looked at her and smiled mildly. He extended the satchel in her direction.

  She did not move.

  “Cassian, be a dear and throw it over here, won’t you?”

  He continued smiling and tossed it. It was not a wild throw. It was not careless. It was simply… off. Just enough. Athena had to step toward the green arch to catch it.

  In that same heartbeat, Cassian shifted. One smooth motion. He placed himself squarely before the blue gate. Siegfried realized he now stood between them. Athena recovered her satchel, opened it, and checked inside. The blue slab remained. As if Siegfried needed more proof of their treachery. But that was alright, his course of actions was set.

  “So,” Athena said lightly, the tension already masked behind sweetness once more. “Which challenge shall we attempt first, dear brother?”

  Siegfried drew himself up to his full height. His hand settled on the hilt of his sword. It was not forged steel but a refined synthetic alloy, blunt-edged yet perfectly attuned to the flow of Mana. In his grip, its blunted edge did not matter, it could shatter bone all the same. He did not look at the gates. He looked at them.

  “I will say this only once,” he said evenly. “Hand over your satchels.” His voice did not rise. It did not tremble. “I have no desire to hurt either of you. So let us end this now.”

  “Brother, what is this?” Athena asked, her voice trembling with perfectly measured hurt. A performance. A farce. The people watching would not see it for what it was. “Do you believe us unequal to the challenge?”

  “That matters not,” Siegfried replied coldly. “I believe you untrustworthy. Give me your satchel, sister.”

  Athena took a delicate step back. She raised her index finger to her lips. It trembled deliberately, as though she feared him. “Dear brother… I’m sorry. I can’t. I want to at least try my best.”

  He almost scoffed. A terrible actress. And yet, to the audience in the Great Hall, she would appear wounded, brave, forced into defiance by his aggression. They would believe the betrayal was his.

  It did not matter. He turned to Cassian. “And you? Will you give me your satchel?”

  Cassian met his gaze. Those eyes. Stern, yes. In that, they were alike. But for the first time, Siegfried grasped the difference. His stern look was only that, Cassian’s were filled with beauty. In that moment, in that face, he saw all the beauty of the Viamnovas that had been denied him.

  Cassian spoke slowly. “Have you thought this through?”

  The words struck harder than any blade.

  Have you thought this through? Anger surged. And then he understood something else. That thing that had unsettled him since the first time he had looked at the boy. It was in his eyes. They were shouting without sound. Screaming at him! I am a true Viamnova! That was what they said. As opposed to whom? To him?

  Was that what Cassian implied? That he was not? Have you thought this through? The echo would not stop. How dare he? How dare that boy look at him as if he was unworthy? He had no reason to! Unless… Have you thought this through?

  He was almost certain Athena had realized it by now. Could it be that Cassian had also-Have you thought this through?

  No. It did not matter.

  He stopped thinking.

  He drew his blade. The practice claymore slid free in one smooth motion. He gripped it with both hands. The weight grounded him. The metal hummed faintly as Mana answered his touch.

  “Very well,” he said. “Then let us begin.”

  And… Cassian answered, his voice calm. “Yes. Let’s begin.”

  Cassian moved first. His hand flashed, and a fistful of red stones scattered through the air. Siegfried recognized them instantly, elemental stones. But they were not aimed at him. They were all aimed at Athena.

  For a fraction of a second, she looked genuinely shocked. Then instinct took over. An ice mirror erupted before her, smooth and gleaming, catching every single fireball. Flames burst against frozen surface, hissing violently. Steam exploded outward, thick and blinding, rolling across the chamber until it visibility dropped to almost nothing.

  Siegfried closed his eyes. He drew Mana upward, sharpening his hearing instead of his sight. My senses spread throughout the room.

  The roar of the portals hummed steadily. The soft crackle of melting frost. The surge of water gathering at Athena’s feet, yes. She was moving. Water carried her forward; a rushing current aimed straight at him. But he could not hear Cassian. No steps. No breath. No shift of fabric. Too quiet. He strained to find him, but the water was already upon him.

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  Athena charged. He gripped his claymore. My arms are stronger than steel.

  Mana surged into his muscles. He swung. Metal clashed against metal. Her rapier met his blade in a shriek of force. Water propelled her forward, coiling around her legs for speed and around her sword for added thrust. That extra momentum was what saved her. But not enough. Her balance faltered. Siegfried reversed his grip and drove the hilt forward, aiming for her face.

  Athena twisted at the last instant. Ice bloomed between them. The hilt struck frozen wall instead of bone, the impact shattering the barrier and giving her the recoil she needed to slip away. She vanished back into the mist.

  He listened. She was circling. Trying to get behind him. Unacceptable.

  He shifted his sword to one hand. My sword can reach anywhere. Mana flooded his arm. He slashed through open air. The blade sent a cutting arc forward far beyond its physical length. The invisible edge tore through the vapor.

  Athena was forced to retreat the way she had come. Good. If she wanted him, she would face him.

  He planted his feet, gripped the claymore with both hands, and stabbed it into the ground. I dispel all magic. The Mana burst outward in a pulse. The mist vanished.

  Clarity returned. And there behind him, Cassian.

  Standing still. Watching. Siegfried’s eyes narrowed. Something was off. He felt it now; a faint thread of enhancement woven around him. Subtle. Weak. Almost negligible.

  Cassian was enhancing him. Helping him, but barely. Why? Had he betrayed Athena at the last possible moment? If so, why such a pitiful spell? Why offer support so slight it almost insulted him?

  He did not understand.

  But it did not matter. As long as Cassian did not become hostile, he would ignore him. Athena was the immediate threat. And if Cassian wished to play at being a quiet supporter, then Siegfried would allow it, for now.

  Athena did not charge again immediately. She had retreated to the far end of the chamber, her back nearly touching the green arch. For a heartbeat she was still.

  Then she thrust her rapier forward. A massive lance of ice formed before her and shot across the room. Siegfried scoffed. He swung his claymore with practiced ease, Mana flowing into his arms. My arms are stronger than steel.

  The blade met the lance and shattered it cleanly. But realization came a fraction too late. The broken fragments did not fall. They hovered, then they flew. Dozens of jagged shards twisted midair and converged on him from every angle.

  Siegfried reacted without hesitation. Come to my defense, snake that consumes the world, he thought.

  Flame erupted around him. A great serpent of fire coiled into existence, its body encircling him in a blazing spiral. The ice shards struck the serpent and vanished into steam as they were devoured.

  When the last fragment melted, the serpent uncoiled and lunged forward. It roared toward Athena. An ice mirror rose. The serpent pierced it. Another mirror formed. It shattered.

  A third.

  A fourth.

  Athena’s eyes widened as the serpent tore through every barrier she raised, melting them into nothing. It lunged and bit down, on ice. Her body exploded into glittering shards. An ice copy. She had replaced herself during the serpent’s advance.

  Mist poured across the room once more. Siegfried moved to dispel it again, but he sensed the shift too late.

  Water surged. Athena burst from the fog at incredible speed, rapier aimed for his throat.

  He parried instantly. Metal rang against metal. This time she kept her balance. Using the rebound, she propelled herself backward and, in the same motion, flicked her wrist.

  Three icicles formed launching themselves not at him, but behind, toward Cassian.

  Siegfried turned slightly, just enough to see. Cassian moved quickly. More quickly than he had expected. The boy twisted aside in a smooth motion, the icicles slicing past him and embedding themselves in stone.

  Cassian retaliated at once.

  He threw another stone… no, this time it was a crystal. It was clear, not red. It did not transform midair. It flew wide, missing Athena by several paces before vanishing into the mist.

  Useless. Was he going to be this useless the entire time? What was his goal?

  Siegfried pushed the questions aside. Athena attacked again. A water whip lashed toward him from the mist. He cut it in half. Another came from the side. He severed it. Then another, and another.

  Soon ten whips struck from every direction, erupting from the mist as if the air itself was against him.

  Siegfried’s claymore moved in relentless arcs, slicing through water again and again, each only seeming to make another tentacle sprout. The chamber echoed with the sound of splitting currents and the rush of displaced air. Athena was no longer testing him. She was pressing him.

  Siegfried had had enough. He drove his blade into the ground once more. I dispel all magic.

  The surge of Mana rippled outward from the point of impact. The mist vanished in an instant. The writhing water tentacles collapsed into lifeless puddles around him. And that was when he saw it.

  While he had been occupied, Athena had gathered a vast mass of water behind the fading fog. It hovered above her, spinning slowly, growing denser by the second. She was smiling madly.

  “Crush them both, my great white whale!”

  The water surged upward, shaping itself into the immense form of a whale suspended in midair. In the next breath it froze over, turning into opaque white ice. The chamber trembled as its massive body solidified. A deep, resonant cry echoed from within it, a haunting, distorted song that reverberated against the walls.

  Then it dropped. Straight toward him. Athena meant to flatten him. Siegfried did not flinch. He grasped his claymore with both hands and drew a single steady breath. I hold the key to the land of eternal fire.

  Flame erupted along the length of his blade. He swung. The arc of fire cleaved through the descending whale. The colossal body split cleanly down the center. A cracking wail reverberated as the halves separated.

  But he was not finished. Both pieces ignited. Fire devoured the frozen mass, racing across its surface, melting and consuming it before it could shatter into usable fragments. Steam burst outward, and even that vapor seemed to burn, seared by the intensity of his Mana.

  He would not allow Athena to reclaim a single shard.

  He would not allow her the cover of mist again.

  When the last of the whale dissolved into hissing embers, the chamber stood clear. And he stood at its center, blade aflame.

  He did not have time to rest. Athena was already moving. She hurled herself at him in a reckless charge, boots sliding over an icy path of her making, rapier forward, water spiraling along its length like a living thing. There was something wild in her expression now, something unhinged.

  Hasn’t she realized how this will end? he thought. Maybe she was desperate. Maybe she had one final trick. It did not matter. He would parry her again. Send her reeling. Then he would close the distance himself and finish it in a single, decisive swing.

  He raised his flaming claymore high. She thrusted water coiling around her rapier. He brought the blade down, and just before steel met steel, he felt it.

  A tug, deep in his stomach. A faint, nauseating lurch. So small it was almost nothing. But it was there. In that instant he understood. Cassian. The enhancement he gave him. It vanished; no, worse. It shifted.

  The strengthening thread that had been so faintly reinforcing his limbs was gone. And in that same heartbeat, he felt the balance tilt the other way. A whisper of power settled onto Athena instead. The difference was negligible. A breath’s worth of strength lost. A breath’s worth gained. It should not have mattered, but it did.

  His swing, so precise, so controlled, wavered by the smallest fraction. His footing, perfect a moment ago, shifted half an inch too far forward. The blades collided.

  Siegfried did not understand as he saw his blade flying out of his hands.