I’ve killed plenty of animals. There’s a look they give you—panic braided with the dull knowledge they’re done for—and you learn to take the shot and move on. But this is different. This is the first time I’ve seen that look in a human eye.

  Bile rises like a fist in my throat. Cold slides down my spine. My legs shake so hard I have to lean on the ledge. Tears crowd my lids; I blink them away like a coward.

  There’s no triumphant rush, no tidy rationale. Just a hollow—static behind my ears where a heartbeat should be. My hands won’t stop trembling. For a moment the world narrows to the scrape of stone and the sound of my own breath, too loud in the dark.

  Please—god, goddess, anyone—let me take it back.

  Strong fingers catch me and pull me away from the ledge. Arms fold around me—warm, solid, unyielding.

  “Breathe, lass,” Frankie whispers. “Stay with me now. That’s it. In and out.”

  “She…” My throat refuses to work.

  Frankie holds tighter, her breath steady against my ear. “You protected us.”

  “Is she—”

  “I don’t know.” Frankie’s hand strokes my hair, her thumb tracing my jaw. “She hit hard. Might be dead… might not. But right now, you breathe.”

  Voices in the cavern swell and fade. Someone—Jenny, maybe—crawls past, just a blur of motion. My whole world shrinks to Frankie’s arms.

  Maybe the woman lived. Maybe they have a medic. Did our colony even have more than one? There had to be… right? What was the staffing ratio? Five hundred to one? A thousand? Why can’t I remember?

  Surely there were nurses. Female nurses. Maybe one’s still out there—maybe she’ll find Rhea before it’s too late.

  And if she serves Catalina… goddess help the poor woman. I hope her mercy is stronger than her orders.

  “They’re leaving,” Jenny whispers—not to me, just into the air. My thoughts drift like Highland mist after a storm.

  Lenora hisses, “The cave keeps going, but we’ll never fit. Not with Tess—”

  “Lizzy’s in no shape for a crawl,” Frankie cuts in.

  “They’re going for reinforcements,” Jenny says. “We might have half an hour before they’re back. They mentioned deep-exploration bots. And the idiots didn’t leave anyone to guard the cavern.”

  “Damn,” Frankie breathes. “Can we get past them?”

  Jenny shakes her head. “No.”

  Frankie swears softly. “That just leaves the—”

  “No,” I whisper. My own voice sounds foreign.

  “It’s that or we find out firsthand what Catalina does with men,” Frankie mutters.

  “But we’re in female bodies,” Lenora says.

  Frankie snorts, low and bitter. “You really think the usurper-in-chief will care?”

  My stomach knots. “We don’t even know where it goes.”

  “Chains or chance,” Jenny says quietly.

  I grip my leprechaun charm and push energy into it. It warms, pulsing like a heartbeat. Around me, the others’ charms spark, casting faint emerald light through the narrow tunnel.

  I swallow. “Chance it is…”

  We slip out behind the falls one by one, sliding down the slick wall into the pool. The water should be freezing—but it isn’t. It’s hot, almost bath-warm, rising in lazy curls of steam.

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  The stone around us is polished black lava, rippled like frozen waves. Our hands skim smooth ridges where molten rivers once flowed, carved now by centuries of water. Mineral veins glow faintly, feeding light back through the spray like trapped embers.

  We float low, keeping Tess between us, bodies just beneath the surface. No splashes—only the drum of the waterfall and the hiss where hot water meets cold air.

  The closer we drift toward the low arch on the far side, the stronger the pull becomes. A gentle tug turns into a steady drag. Warm water funnels downward, mixing with a colder current that bites against my skin. I try to plant my feet, but the basalt is slick with algae and glassy slime.

  One heartbeat I’m upright—then the world tilts. My feet shoot out. I squeak.

  The current grabs me like a hungry hand and yanks me under the arch. Heat vanishes—replaced instantly by ice. Glacial water slams into me, crushing the breath from my chest. Darkness clamps down. The only light is the flicker from my belly button, a desperate spark in the murk.

  I’ve been to exactly one water park—Schlitterbahn, central Texas. Lazy rivers. Slides for the bold and foolish. That summer felt wild.

  Now I know better.

  This isn’t a water park. This is the inside of the mountain—the bones of an ancient volcano turned inside out, steaming in its heart and freezing at its edges.

  The tunnel bucks and twists without mercy—one moment boiling, the next arctic. Water claws at my face, fills my nose, steals every breath. I burst into pockets of air just long enough to scream before I’m dragged under again.

  Bumps become bruises. Rocks—or bones—slam into my ribs, hips, legs. Thought evaporates. Sight breaks apart. Everything collapses into one frantic rhythm: kick, gasp, pray.

  Pressure builds until my ears scream. The tunnel narrows, crushing my shoulders. The roar sharpens to a shriek of water and stone. Then—release.

  We’re fired out like bullets from a cannon.

  Cold slams into me again—but this time with sunlight. Real light. It explodes across my vision, rippling green and gold through endless water. For a heartbeat I think I’ve died. Then I see Jenny’s hair drifting beside me like a halo of fire, and Frankie tumbling through a storm of bubbles.

  The current carries us upward, slower now but relentless. My chest tears with the need to breathe. I kick, desperate. Emerald ribbons spill from our charms, lighting the depths.

  And then—open water.

  We burst into a vast under-lake cavern, a loch so deep the surface is only a silver shimmer far above. Shafts of light pierce the water, catching flecks of silt like stars. The silence is holy.

  I hang there, suspended in the green gloom, lungs on fire, heart hammering, the world around me wide and terrible and beautiful all at once.

  My chest screams for air. I kick harder, every muscle burning, eyes locked on that distant shimmer of light. The glow from my belly fades, drowned out by the sun filtering through the surface.

  We break through together—Jenny first, gasping; Frankie next, hauling Tess’s limp body up beneath one arm. I erupt last, coughing lake water and precious air in the same breath.

  The world is huge and cold and quiet. Mist rolls across the loch like ghostly breath. The cliffs rise around us, dark and jagged, crowned with moss and ferns. The only sound is the slap of waves and our ragged breathing.

  “Shore—” croaks Frankie, chin jerking toward a scatter of rocks jutting from the water.

  We swim, dragging Tess between us. Every stroke is agony—our limbs heavy from the long tumble, lungs raw from screaming. Jenny’s hands glow faintly blue as she keeps Tess’s head above the surface, murmuring prayers or code or both.

  My feet hit stone. I half stumble, half crawl onto a narrow shelf of rock slick with algae. Frankie lifts Tess out of the water as if she weighs nothing, laying her gently on the cold stone.

  For a long moment, none of us speak. We just breathe. Water drips from our hair and armor. The loch stretches behind us, deep and endless, as the mist swirls and hides the tunnel’s mouth from view.

  We’re alive. Somehow—against all odds—we’re still alive.

  Mist coils around us, cold and silver, veiling the black stone in shifting lace. Jenny wrings water from her curls; Frankie leans over Tess, checking for breath. Lenora’s fingers shake around a vial.

  The air tastes of brimstone and rain. Steam sighs from cracks in the rock, whispering through black basalt veined with gold and green. Sulfur stings my tongue—but beneath it lies something gentler: loam, crushed pine, faint heather.

  To the east, the mountain dominates the horizon—a broken cone of glassy stone streaked with rust-red scars and glowing vents. Smoke drifts from its summit in long, horizontal ribbons, flattening where the warm air meets the cool valley mist. Every few breaths, the ground trembles—softly, like a giant turning in its sleep.

  Our loch lies cradled between the mountain’s cooling arms, water tinted turquoise by mineral run-off. Warm eddies rise where underground vents feed the basin, blurring the reflection of the sky. Beyond the banks, the land shifts in impossible ways: black volcanic cliffs give way to emerald slopes thick with ferns, foxglove, and juniper. Olive trees stand shoulder to shoulder with birch and ash, their roots tangled in soil that should never have supported them together.

  It’s a patchwork world—Italian heat wrapped in Irish color. Lizards bask beside bluebells; a raven and a kestrel share the same sky. The wind hums with life, but it’s the kind of life that feels… misplaced.

  I draw a shaky breath. The earth underfoot is warm. The world feels alive—still molten beneath its skin.

  My gaze sweeps the shore—then stops.

  On the low rise beyond the rocks, no more than fifty feet away, someone sits watching.

  Rhea.

  Soaked. Bleeding. One arm clutched tight to her chest.

  And in her other hand, steady as sunrise—

  a pistol.