The corpse belonged to some unlucky spearman, tall and lanky. Instantly Eliza pinned him as a poor farmer conscripted to the service not long ago; he looked like a gawky younger brother playing dress up.

  But the rising night wind lent an air of theatrical solemnity to his upright corpse. Some invisible hand plucked and fluttered the tattered rags, his long strands of hair. “Okay,” Eliza said, striding forward. “Seriously, who is this for? I know it’s you.”

  Still, her annoyance was buoyed with the first feelings of hope since her and Abyss had arrived at the massacre. Finally, progress.

  “Can you walk slower?” asked Abyss, craning his serpentine neck. “I kind of want to see where this goes.”

  Eliza shook her head. “You know, the last time there’d been an opera. We had to wait thirty minutes before the intermission.”

  “Well I don’t see any dead musicians this time,” Abyss sniffed. “Besides, I think it’s good for gods to have hobbies. You know, outside of drowning civilizations or inciting war. That’s so overdone.”

  As though in silent agreement, the wind began to pick up, and the soldier’s rags began to lengthen and grow, snapping furiously in the wind like a banner. Eliza felt the subtle hum of mana as more corpses rose around them, like puppets pulled from shaky, twitching fingers. Sweeping her gaze revealed a ring of mosaic corpses - hulking tattooed Orcs, plated human knights, Berserkers, archers, peasants - all on their tiptoes, arms raised, still as stone.

  “Oh this is different,” Abyss cracked a toothy grin, as the corpses surrounding them began a perfectly choreographed balletic dance, limbs rising and falling in unison in a swift moving circle.

  “We’ll visit a theatre after I kill my brother,” Eliza snarled. She took a deep breath. “Hades, I know it’s you! Quit wasting my time and show yourself!”

  The corpses went still at the same time, mid-pose. One giant Orcish brute froze poised on one tip-toe, eyes gaping black pits, next to a peasant in the same pose who’d had half their limbs charred to a nub.

  The spearman at the center of the hill slowly descended, now taller and shrouded with an inky cloak. He looked every bit as morose as Eliza remembered - gaunt cheekbones, pale skin, and eyes of solid black Obsidian.

  “Evelyn Baroq’s The Dead Forest,” said Hades. His voice was soft yet raspy. “It’s about a wandering explorer in search of immortality. It’s such a shame we’re in a hurry. I’ve got the most amazing idea for the Second Act.”

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  “I’m not in the mood for games Hades. Why are you here?”

  “Aside from doing my divine duties to the dead?” Hades sighed, patting the frozen Orc’s hulking shoulder. “I’ve been looking for you actually.”

  “Me? Or my brother?”

  “Him, at first.” The god of the underworld turned his gaze across the bloodied hills. Unlike his own brothers, Hades had always looked less like a king to Eliza and more an outward watcher, an uncaring gargoyle overlooking his dominion instead of ruling it. “I think we were both a bit too late to catch him.”

  Eliza and Abyss traded a wary glance. “What did he do this time?”

  The god paused and then extended his hand. The mist gathered before them and in its depths Eliza saw the halls of Olympus. Golden, radiant columns speared through marble floors and huge braziers of fire.

  Abyss blinked, his huge head snaking lower. Eliza knew he’d only crested the heavens twice in his youth and was eager to see what lay beyond sprawling mountain tops of the dragons. She, however, was frowning. “Is that…?”

  In the center of a dias lay a golden body. One sculpted glowing arm dangled languidly over the edge, fingers splayed. Greek excess, Eliza thought, until she realized the gold was leaking to the floor. It was Ichor, the golden blood of the gods, and the body was drenched in it.

  “Who would dare…”

  “My nephew Apollo,” said Hades. Did his voice betray the barest hint of sorrow? “We found him like this two hours ago. And this.” The vision drew closer and Eliza’s blood went cold as she saw the spear impaling his chest. Her brother’s spear.

  “Torren did this?,” she said in disbelief. She remembered her brother’s decree over a century ago. That he would bring this whole world collapsing down. “To kill a primary god in the heart of Olympus…he’ll be dead within a week. Not even my brother can hide from all twelve Olympians.”

  And yet he had escaped her grasp for nearly a decade, had he not? What secrets and lines had he crossed since their split? Was this his plan, to incite a divine manhunt across the mortal planes?

  “That was my thought too, Eliza,” said the god of death. His Obsidian eyes watched her, as though searching for something. “If not for this.”

  The mist rippled and shifted again. This time the Blood Elf heard the distant sounds of battle, so familiar to her, like the voice of an old friend, suddenly firing her nerves. The mist revealed the same hill they stood at - only during the morning - smothered with the clash of steel and screams of death as two tides of men crashed into one another.

  In the midst of the battle, as clear as day, was her brother, Torren the Trickster, clad in his grey leathers, wielding, not a spear but two bright daggers. Eliza watched with building dread as he danced through his foes, cleaving them apart with a deadly dexterity she knew so well. Then, like the slow progression of a dream, she saw five Orcs converge on him and drive their scimitars into his body.

  “Eliza…” said Abyss carefully.

  She was gripping his own sword tightly, her heart hammering. She realized she was about to release another concussion of mana. Slowly, she forced herself to calm down. Her pale green eyes snapped up to Hades. “When did this happen?”

  “Twelve hours ago,” said Hades.

  “And has he entered your kingdom?”

  “No. I’ve been searching for his soul here since.” He leaned closer. “Yet Torren is dead. I was not the only witness. Ares and Athena happened to be here as well. You know how they are. The Trickster’s life soul clearly left his body. There were no illusions, no tricks - at least none my eyes couldn’t pierce.”

  “And then ten hours later, Apollo is found dead in Olympus a thousand miles away in the sky. With a Blood Elf spear in his chest.”

  Eliza felt it finally, the breath she’d been unknowingly holding since they’d arrived on this battlefield: the other boot finally dropped.

  “Naturally my siblings are perplexed. But there is only one other Blood Elf on the mortal plane who has the power to kill a god. And who happens to be related to Torren.”

  “Bloody stars,” Eliza cursed. She stared at her brother’s impaled corpse. “I didn’t do it, for the record.”