Chapter 303
As we make our way back into Atlas, the trench opens up around us, the blackstone walls rising like carved cliffs, every ledge and overhang etched with ancient designs that whisper history. The city looks different now—not because it’s changed, but because Wake has.
The people can feel it too. They don’t speak, but they watch. Eyes follow us from shaded windows and archways, from coral-wrapped balconies and the swirling schools of children darting through the currents above.
Wake doesn’t say a word.
Not until we reach the central court.
The Commander and Queen Loona are waiting. Guards flank them, but not tightly—not like before. They know something’s coming. They just don’t know what yet.
Wake stops in the center of the plaza, right on the faded crest of Dagon, worn smooth by centuries of fin and foot traffic.
“I’ve returned from the Forbidden Keep,” he says. “And I bring the will of Dagon himself.”
The Commander’s face doesn’t twitch. “Do you now?”
Wake lifts his arm. Silver fire rippes along his skin, shimmering like moonlight refracted through obsidian.
“I was born with a weight on my back, a mission to prove myself worthy of the divine,” he says. “Today is the day that Dagon brought that journey to an end.”
Loona gasps, one hand covering her mouth.
The Commander scoffs. “How convenient.”
“I don’t need your belief to make it true.”
“Is that right?” the Commander snaps. “You walk in claiming divine selection, expecting us all to bow just because you glow now?” His voice sharpens. “You didn’t complete the Rite. You didn’t claim your mate before the Clan. You didn’t follow the path every Heir before you walked. If you’re anointed, where’s the proof?”
Wake’s gaze doesn’t waver. “You want proof?”
He turns in a slow circle, arms outstretched to encompass the castle courtyard. Once obviously regal, it’s now worn and cracked with time and neglect. The statue at its heart—once Dagon himself—lies toppled and broken, a grim metaphor too on-the-nose for comfort. The stones are chipped, the mosaics faded, the coral reclaiming everything. It’s a wound on the city’s pride, and no one’s bothered to fix it.
Until now.
Wake floats above it all. He lifts both hands slowly, eyes closed.
The water stills. Then begins to hum.
It starts as a tremor—barely more than a breath. Then the stone responds.
With a groan like thunder rolling through the trench, the broken statue lifts from the floor, pieces reassembling mid-water. Its shattered torso spins and locks into place with a grinding click, arms snapping back into their sockets, head settling atop the shoulders like a crown returning to a brow.
The shattered tiles under us rise and swirl, reordering themselves like puzzle pieces drawn by an unseen tide. Coral recedes. Algae dissipates. In moments, the plaza is restored—not just rebuilt, but revitalized. Obsidian gleams under us, runes glowing faintly in silver beneath our fins.
Gasps ripple through the watching crowd.
But Wake isn’t finished.
He turns to Axel’s battalion—those sharp-eyed soldiers who’d once met his return with wary nods and sidelong glances. Wake reaches down again, this time into the earth itself, and pulls.
Armor rises.
Not forged, but grown—onyx plates shaped by the trench’s own pressure, trimmed with silver veins, carved with ancient glyphs. Each piece floats to its chosen bearer, fastening itself over their torsos, curling around shoulders, legs, arms like it was made for them and them alone.
The armor of Dagon’s first bloodguard, etched into murals across the castle interior.
I hear it before I see it—Axel’s soft “Well, Dagon’s balls.”
The soldiers don’t hesitate.
One by one, they drop to one knee, pounding their fists on their chests.
“Heir.”
The word echoes like a tidal drumbeat.
“Heir.”
“Heir.”
“Heir.”
The people of Atlas join in. First in murmurs. Then in waves. Hands thumping against hearts. Heads bowed.
The chant becomes a current that surges through the trench, undeniable, irreversible.
“Heir. Heir. Heir.”
Wake turns back toward the court, toward the Commander now standing silent amidst the rising roar of his city.
And slowly, with the weight of duty etched into every movement, the Commander steps forward.
He unfastens the insignia from his chest. The black seal of Dagon—carved from stone, rimmed in Onyx, worn smooth by generations.
He holds it out.
Wake takes it.
And the city erupts.
Fins slice the water in celebration. Horns echo from deep towers. Lanterns flare brighter, casting blue and green halos across the plaza. Children spin in circles above us, trailing ribbons of light from woven coral streamers. The celebration rises fast, impromptu and raw, like Atlas itself has been waiting for this moment, desperate to believe in something again.
But the Commander isn’t done.
He steps closer, voice low enough only Wake and I can hear it.
“You have the power now,” he says. “The eyes of this city are on you. Its armies. Its future. All the blood that runs through this trench in on your hands.”
Wake says nothing, but his fists tighten.
“This is where the struggle begins,” his father says. “This isn’t a victory you earned here today. It’s responsibility. And for all our sakes, you’d better not be wrong.”
Then he turns his back and leaves, the mantle passed but the shadow of doubt lingering in his wake.
Wake stands there, watching the crowd, hearing the chants that are now his burden.
This army are his.
They will kill for him.
Or die at his command.
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