I was twelve at the time Thalos moved us to an old cabin tucked between forests and distant mountains—one of the many places Thalos had left us. Remote, quiet, and forgotten. But to me, it felt like the safest place in the world.

  Helena was eighteen then—barely an adult herself, but she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders like she was born to do it. She made sure we had food, protection, and warmth. She patched my wounds, trained me, and when I woke up from nightmares, she’d sit on the edge of my bed and talk until I could sleep again.

  To me, Helena wasn’t just a friend. She was my best friend. My sister. The closest thing I’d ever had to a mother.

  Demigods didn’t get to grow up like normal kids. We were taken from our human families young, trained to survive, shaped into weapons. I was four when they took me from my mother. I didn’t remember her voice. I didn’t remember her face. All I remembered was Helena.

  I often wonder what my mother’s life is like now. I have thought about trying to find her, but I know that my presence would only bring her danger. Any demigods presence attracted monsters, and my mother had no abilities to defend herself with.

  One night a monster had broken through the protections that Thalos set up—small, fast, vicious. I had tried to fight it alone, thinking I was ready. I wasn’t. It knocked me down hard, slashed my side, and would’ve done worse if Helena hadn’t arrived when she did. She took it down in seconds. Afterwards, I couldn’t stop shaking. Helena cleaned the wound, held me while I cried, then carried me to the porch where the stars had just begun to appear.

  “You don’t always have to be tough, you know,” she said.

  I leaned against her shoulder, tears stinging my eyes. “I don’t know how else to be.”

  Helena wrapped an arm around me and pulled me close.

  “Then we’ll figure it out together.”

  We didn’t talk much after we left.

  Ten hours on the road passed in silence, broken only by the occasional shuffle of movement, the low hum of tires on asphalt, and the sound of wind whipping past the windows. We were all too exhausted to fill the space with words. The kind of tired that starts in your bones and works its way inward. The kind that silence doesn’t comfort—it just echoes it.

  We took turns driving, rotating through the front seat like a quiet, unspoken agreement. No one wanted to stay still for too long. Not after what we left behind. Not after the people we couldn’t save.

  Xandor was behind the wheel when he finally said what we were all thinking.

  “We need to stop.”

  His voice was low but firm. He pulled into the parking lot of a run-down motel just off the highway—nothing fancy, but it didn’t need to be. The neon sign flickered like it was barely hanging on, same as the rest of us.

  We booked a room. No arguments. No discussion. Just the sound of footsteps dragging over cracked pavement as we filed inside, like ghosts haunting a place we didn’t belong.

  I dropped onto the first bed I saw and collapsed without even pulling the covers back. The mattress wasn’t comfortable, but it didn’t matter. My body ached in places I didn’t know could ache, and my mind felt like it was packed with static.

  Nix slipped in beside me without a word. Her presence was steady and grounding, her shoulder brushing mine as we settled in. It didn’t feel strange. It felt necessary.

  Bay had curled up in the bed across from us, trident still in reach like she was expecting another fight. Damian curled up at the foot of her bed, arms tucked under his head, already half-asleep.

  Peter was already passed out in the chair, head tilted, lips pressed tight like his thoughts wouldn’t let him rest even now.

  Xandor lingered the longest. He double-checked the locks, peeked through the curtains, and only when he was satisfied that we were safe did he settle on the floor right beside the door—like a silent sentinel, guarding the rest of us. I grabbed one of the extra pillows from behind me and tossed it toward him. He caught it with a quiet, grateful smile, and placed it behind his head as he stretched out, finally letting himself rest.

  No one said goodnight.

  We didn’t need to.

  We were alive.

  For now, that was enough.

  I don’t know how long we slept. I just know I woke to the smell of food.

  Something warm. Greasy. Comforting.

  Phoenix stood near the table with two large paper bags, steam curling from the open tops. She had disappeared sometime before dawn, and now she was back with breakfast sandwiches, hashbrowns, and a few bottles of orange juice. No one asked how she paid for it. No one needed to.

  One by one, we stirred. Bay moved first, quiet and precise, rising from the bed like she hadn’t truly slept. Damian blinked up from the edge of Bay’s mattress and groaned before flopping to the floor with dramatic flair.

  Peter was slower, but his eyes tracked everything. He hadn’t rested well—his mind never let him—but he was up, focused, already organizing thoughts none of us had the energy to chase.

  Xandor was last. He uncurled from the door like he’d grown roots there, silent and steady, always last to fall and last to rise. But when he stood, his eyes met mine, and I felt it—an unspoken thread tightening between us.

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  We ate in tired silence. It wasn’t awkward, just… understood. The kind of quiet that lets you breathe again.

  Damian nudged me at one point and handed me a juice bottle. “You okay?”

  I nodded, but I wasn’t sure if it was true. Grief was a weight I couldn’t shake, and it pressed hardest in moments like these. Moments when things felt normal, even though nothing was.

  After we ate, we started tending to our wounds. There weren’t many words—just the occasional wince, the quiet tearing of gauze packets, the soft clink of a water bottle being used to rinse blood away. Bay helped Phoenix wrap her shoulder, Peter patched up a gash along Damian’s side, and I sat at the edge of the bed, trying to disinfect the cuts on my arm.

  I stared at the ragged line across my forearm and blinked hard.

  “I always had Helena for this,” I said, voice low.

  No one answered right away, but I felt the shift in the room—the ache in every heartbeat. They missed them too.

  “We’re going to get them back,” Peter said finally. His voice didn’t rise, but it didn’t waver either. “All of them.”

  Bay nodded. “Even if we have to fight every monster in the world. We’re not stopping.”

  Phoenix’s expression tightened, but she murmured her agreement. “They’d come for us. We owe them the same.”

  Xandor knelt in front of me, reaching for the disinfectant I’d dropped. His hand brushed mine, and his eyes locked on mine for a second longer than I expected.

  “You’re not alone, Zoe,” he said.

  I swallowed and nodded, and something in my chest settled just a little.

  We were broken, bruised, and incomplete. But we were still here.

  And maybe, just maybe, that was a place to start.

  We each took turns in the bathroom, scrubbing monster ash and dried blood from our skin, rinsing out what little we could from our ruined clothes. The room still smelled faintly of smoke and exhaustion.

  Phoenix leaned against the wall, arms crossed, watching each of us quietly. She didn’t usually speak up—she preferred action over words—but something in her posture told me she felt strongly about this. When we were all back in the room, she spoke up.

  “We’re taking one day,” she said. “We’ve been running nonstop for days. If we don’t stop now, we’ll burn out before we even have a chance to save them.”

  There were murmurs of protest—Peter furrowed his brow like he already had battle plans forming, and Damian raised a finger in playful objection—but Phoenix didn’t budge.

  “One day,” she repeated, voice sharper now. “To rest. To breathe. Tomorrow, we figure out a way to bring them home. But today, we recover.”

  Her words settled over us like a blanket. Heavy, but comforting. We were too tired to argue. And maybe, deep down, we knew she was right.

  So we agreed. One day to find strength again.

  Damian was hunched over the bathroom sink, scrubbing furiously at his shirt with one of the motel’s tiny soap bars. It was a losing battle. The fabric was stained with monster ash and blood, and the more he scrubbed, the worse it seemed to get.

  Some of us—me, Bay, and Phoenix—watched from the beds, amusement growing by the second. Damian had ditched his undershirt halfway through the cleaning effort while Peter was still in the shower, leaving him bare from the waist up, muscles flexing as he scrubbed furiously at the sink. We were all trying to be subtle, but our eyes kept drifting back to him. None of us were making much effort to hide our grins—and we definitely weren’t looking away.

  Damian looked up, caught us staring, and let out a slow, knowing grin. He set the shirt down and leaned against the sink like he was posing for a photo shoot. “What? Don’t act like you weren’t looking. I know I’m a masterpiece in motion. But seriously—have you ever seen someone so ruthlessly bested by polyester?”

  Bay laughed softly, cheeks tinged pink. Even Phoenix shifted slightly, lips twitching with something dangerously close to a smile. Damian caught it all and practically glowed under the attention, reveling in the effect he had.

  Bay managed, “It’s just rare to see you lose a battle.”

  Across the room, Xandor let out a quiet sigh and rolled his eyes—but when his gaze met mine, there was a flicker of something like amusement in his expression. We held each other’s gaze for a moment longer than necessary, both of us clearly entertained by the absurdity of it all.

  Damian straightened up, eyes gleaming with mock indignation. “This is a sign. A message from the gods. We need new clothes. All of us.”

  Phoenix raised an eyebrow. “You’re saying the universe wants us to go shopping?”

  “Absolutely,” Damian declared. “The world’s on fire, our lives are a mess, and we smell like death—but that doesn’t mean we can’t do it in style.”

  I rolled my eyes, but I was smiling. And as ridiculous as it sounded, I didn’t hate the idea.

  Maybe a little normalcy was exactly what we needed.

  The mall wasn’t big, but it had a few clothing stores, enough to get the job done. Bay and Phoenix immediately seized control of our mission the moment we stepped inside.

  “Zoe, you’re with us,” Bay said, looping her arm through mine.

  “I—what?”

  Phoenix grabbed my other arm. “Don’t fight it. You’re our project now.”

  I laughed, but there was a flutter of nerves in my chest. “What about—my wings?”

  “Layers,” Bay said confidently. “We’ll make it work.”

  And somehow, they did. Within minutes, they had me buried in soft sweaters, jackets, and fitted tops that disguised my wings without sacrificing movement. Phoenix tested every fabric. Bay adjusted everything until it looked and felt perfect.

  Then they found the dress.

  It was a deep forest green, soft and flowy, with long sleeves and a cinched waist. Phoenix held it up to me with a raised brow, and Bay clapped like she’d already decided it was perfect.

  “No way,” I said, but they were already herding me toward the dressing room.

  Damian leaned against the wall outside the stalls. “Don’t keep us waiting, princess.”

  With a dramatic sigh, I slipped inside and pulled it on. When I stepped out, the world seemed to pause for a second.

  Damian’s eyes widened slightly before he grinned. “Zoe… you are absolutely gorgeous.”

  My face flushed. I tried to wave him off, but Bay and Phoenix were nodding enthusiastically.

  And then I caught Peter and Xandor both looking.

  Peter quickly glanced away, pretending to study a rack of jeans. But Xandor… his gaze lingered for just a second before he looked at me and gave a small, quiet smile.

  I wasn’t used to being looked at like that.

  I wasn’t used to being looked at much at all.

  But I liked it.

  I turned back to the mirror, letting the moment settle over me. For once, I didn’t feel like a soldier. I felt… seen.

  Eventually, I ducked back into the dressing room, carefully peeling off the dress. It was beautiful, but impractical. I settled on a new pair of dark jeans, a form-fitted charcoal shirt, and a sleek black leather jacket that hugged my shoulders and concealed my wings perfectly. Bay and Phoenix approved with matching nods.

  As I stepped out, they drifted off to find clothes of their own—Bay zeroing in on a rack of combat boots like they were calling her by name, and Phoenix methodically picking through fitted tops and sturdy jackets.

  That left one group unstyled.

  The boys.

  Damian clapped his hands with delight and launched himself between Peter and Xandor, looping his arms through theirs before they could react. “Alright, gentlemen, time to shine. Let’s add a little sparkle to your wardrobes.”

  Peter groaned. “Damian—”

  “No arguments!” Damian grinned, already dragging them both toward a nearby row of racks. “You two are too handsome to skulk around in apocalypse grunge.”

  Bay, Phoenix, and I exchanged amused looks before following close behind, ready to supervise—or sabotage—the fashion mission.

  “We’re not doing this,” Peter said, arms crossed.

  “We’re absolutely doing this,” Bay replied. “Pick shirts. Or we’ll pick for you.”

  “Come on, starboy,” Damian said, tossing Xandor a plain dark hoodie. “Try not to look so allergic to retail.”

  Xandor caught it with a smirk and muttered, “Only for you, Damian.”

  I laughed, heart lighter than it had been in days.

  For a moment, just one, we weren’t soldiers. We were just kids in a mall.

  And it felt good to remember.