Chapter 1
CHAPTER ONE: THE JEALOUS EYE
The sun was a tyrant.
It had been seventy-two hours since the last shadow died in the city of Oakhaven. There was no gold in this light; it was a bleached, surgical white that peeled the paint from the houses and the sanity from the people. The "Golden Gods" called it the Eternal Grace, but as Artemis crouched on the rusted skeleton of a billboard overlooking the interstate, she knew it was a siege.
"They’re breaking," Artemis whispered. Her voice was raspy, like dry leaves skittering over stone.
She adjusted her silver-rimmed goggles. Below her, the humans moved like ghosts in a fever dream. Some had taped cardboard over their windows; others walked the streets with heavy bandages wrapped around their eyes, weeping salt-streaked tears because their brains were screaming for a sleep that wouldn't come.
"Of course they are breaking, little sister," a voice answered from the empty air beside her.The space rippled. It didn't darken—it simply folded. Hecate stepped out of a seam in the heat haze. She looked like a razor blade in a room full of cotton; her black tailored suit was so matte it seemed to pull the sunlight into a gravitational well. She held a heavy iron key between her fingers, twirling it with a lethal, rhythmic grace.
"Apollo thinks that by abolishing the Night, he abolishes the Truth," Hecate said, her three-toned voice vibrating in the air. "He thinks if he can see everything, he can own everything."
"He doesn't own the forest," Artemis snapped, her hand ghosting over the silver riser of her bow. "But he’s killing it. The sap is boiling in the trees, Hecate. The wolves have gone silent. They are waiting for a moon that hasn't risen in three days."
"The moon hasn't risen because the Mother hasn't allowed it," Hecate murmured, looking up at the sky.
To a human, the sky was a blinding white void. But to the Goddesses, they could see the Veil. High above the atmosphere, a translucent, violet shroud was stretched thin—a cosmic barrier held in place by the sheer will of Nyx. It was the only thing keeping the Earth from becoming a charred cinder under Zeus’s ego.
"She is tired," Artemis said, her amber eyes softening for the first time. "I can feel the Mother’s heartbeat slowing. She can’t hold the Veil forever."
"She won't have to," Hecate replied. She reached into her jacket and pulled out a second key—this one glowing with a sickly, bruised purple light. "The Alchemist’s work is done. I’ve found the fracture in their 'Grace.' But I need a scout to plant the seed, and a Queen to give it room to grow."
Artemis stood up, her tactical gear creaking. She looked like a baddie from a dream the world had forgotten how to have. "Tell me where to aim the arrow."
Hecate pointed toward the highest spire of the city—the Temple of the Sun, where the Golden Gods were feasting on the energy of a world that couldn't close its eyes.
"There," Hecate smiled, and it was a cold, sharp thing. "We’re going to give them a sunset they’ll never wake up from."
