Bryce was dimly aware of her shaking body, her shallow breaths.
They found us on Midgard in 17002. Tried to convince our lured prey of what we were, and some fell to their charms. We lost a third of our meals to them. War lasted until nearly the end of 17003. They were defeated and sent back to Hel. Far too dangerous to allow them access to this world again, though they might try. They developed attachments to the Midgard colonists.
“Theia,” Bryce whispered hoarsely. Aidas had loved the Fae queen, and …
Hel had come to help, exactly as Apollion had said. Hel had kicked the Asteri from their own world, but … Tears stung her eyes. The demon princes had felt a moral obligation to chase after the Asteri so they might never prey upon another world. To spare others.
Bryce began sifting through planets again. So many worlds. So many people, their children with them.
It had to be here—the Asteri’s home world. She’d find it and tell the Princes of Hel about it, and once they were done beating these assholes into dust here on Midgard, they’d go to that home world and they’d blow it the fuck up—
She was sobbing through her teeth.
This empire, this world … it was just one massive buffet for the six beings ruling it.
Hel had tried to save them. For fifteen thousand years, Hel had never stopped trying to find a way back here. To free them from the Asteri.
“Where the fuck did you come from?” she seethed.
Worlds ripped past her fingertips, along with the Asteri’s dispassionate notes. Most planets were not as lucky as Hel had been.
They rose up. We left them in cinders.
Firstlight tasted off. Terminated world.
Denizens launched bombs at us that left planet and inhabitants too full of radiation to be viable food. Left to rot in their waste.
Firstlight too weak. Terminated world but kept several citizens who produced good firstlight to sustain us on travels. Children proved hearty, but did not take to our travel method.
These psychotic, soulless monsters—
“You will not find our home world there,” a cold voice said through the intercom on the table. “Even we have forgotten where its ruins lie.”
Bryce panted, only rage coursing through her as she said to Rigelus, “I am going to fucking kill you.”
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Rigelus laughed. “I was under the impression that you were only here to access the information for which Sofie Renast and Danika Fendyr died. You’re going to kill me as well?”
Bryce squeezed shaking hands into fists. “Why? Why do any of this?”
“Why do you drink water and eat food? We are higher beings. We are gods. You cannot blame us if our source of nutrition is inconvenient for you. We keep you healthy, and happy, and allow you to roam free on this planet. We have even let the humans live all this time, just to give you Vanir someone to rule over. In exchange, all we ask is a little of your power.”
“You’re parasites.”
“What are all creatures, feeding off their resources? You should see what the inhabitants of some worlds did to their planets—the rubbish, the pollution, the poisoned seas. Was it not fitting that we returned the favor?”
“You don’t get to pretend that this is some savior story.”
Rigelus chuckled, and the sound knocked her from her fury enough to remember Hunt and Ruhn, and, oh gods, if Rigelus knew she was here, he’d find them—
“Isn’t that what you’re doing?”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“You left such a noble audiomail to your friend Juniper. Of course, once I heard it, I knew there was only one place you could be going. Here. To me. Precisely as I had hoped—and planned.”
She shut away her questions, instead demanding, “Why do you want me here?”
“To reopen the Rifts.”
Her blood froze. “I can’t.”
“Can’t you?” The cold voice slithered through the intercom. “You are Starborn, and have the Horn bound to your body and power. Your ancestors wielded the Horn and another Fae object that allowed them to enter this world. Stolen, of course, from their original masters—our people. Our people, who built fearsome warriors in that world to be their army. All of them prototypes for the angels in this one. And all of them traitors to their creators, joining the Fae to overthrow my brothers and sisters a thousand years before we arrived on Midgard. They slew my siblings.”
Her head spun. “I don’t understand.”
“Midgard is a base. We opened the doors to other worlds to lure their citizens here—so many powerful beings, all so eager to conquer new planets. Not realizing we were their conquerors. But we also opened the doors so we might conquer those other worlds as well. The Fae—Queen Theia and her two foolish daughters—realized that, though too late. Her people were already here, but she and the princesses discovered where my siblings had hidden the access points in their world.”
Rage rippled through his every word. “Your Starborn ancestors shut the gates to stop us from invading their realm once more and reminding them who their true masters are. And in the process, they shut the gates to all other worlds, including those to Hel, their stalwart allies. And so we have been trapped here. Cut off from the cosmos. All that is left of our people, though our mystics beneath this palace have long sought to find any other survivors, any planets where they might be hiding.”
Bryce shook. The Astronomer had been right about the host of mystics here. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Why do you think we allowed you to live this spring? You are the key to opening the doors between worlds again. You will undo the actions of one ignorant princess fifteen thousand years ago.”
“Not a chance.”
“Are your mate and brother not here with you?”
“No.”
Rigelus laughed. “You’re so like Danika—a born liar.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” She lifted her chin. “You knew she was onto you.”
“Of course. Her quest for the truth began with her bloodhound gift. Not a gift of the body’s strength, but of magic, such as the shifters should not have. She could scent other shifters with strange powers.”
Like Sofie. And Baxian. Danika had found him through researching his bloodline, but had she scented it, too?
“It prompted her to investigate her own bloodline’s history, all the way back to the shifters’ arrival in this world, to learn where her gifts came from. And she eventually began to suspect the truth.”
Bryce’s throat worked. “Look, I already did the whole villain monologuing thing with Micah this spring, so cut to the chase.”
Rigelus chuckled again. “We shall get to that in a moment.” He went on, “Danika realized that the shifters are Fae.”
Bryce blinked. “What?”
“Not your kind of Fae, of course—your breed dwelled in a lovely, verdant land, rich with magic. If it’s of any interest to you, your Starborn bloodline specifically hailed from a small isle a few miles from the mainland. And while the mainland had all manner of climes, the isle existed in beautiful, near-permanent twilight. But only a select few in the entirety of your world could shift from their humanoid forms to animal ones. The Midgard shifters were Fae from a different planet. All the Fae in that world shared their form with an animal. The mer descended from them, too. Perhaps they once shared a world with your breed of Fae, but they had been alone on their planet for long enough to develop their own gifts.”