Days passed from the battle, but it felt as if the tremors of the earthquake had yet to subside. Like aftershocks, sorrow still managed to permeate through New Rome and Camp Jupiter. As predicted, there had been casualties from both the war and the earthquake, but for a valley that had never experienced a natural disaster aside from the havoc of war, it felt like the dust from the rubble was still settling. A hush had fallen over the Roman training ground, and Tessa wasn't sure when it would be broken.

Rebuilding had already begun in New Rome, which had been hit the hardest by the quake. Multiple sectors of the city had been closed off to allow for construction, and as Tessa had watched Kaya reform and repair ancient pillars and hippodromes, Ben sketch and execute the designs on his blueprints, along with countless other Romans who milled about the worksite.

Everyone wore expressions of grim certainty. They knew the cost of battle, but New Rome had been a haven within a world of chaos. That had been taken away from them twice now, and safety was a right that even demigods deserved.

Now, Tessa stood at the foot of the Senate House, along with the rest of New Rome's population. Tessa hadn't seen this many people gathered within the city since the night of Collin's death, but everything still felt like a funeral. Torches blazed where they hung on the pillars of the city streets, the stars illuminating an obsidian winter sky.

Kaden and Kaya emerged without fanfare, the world silent except for the snapping of their violet cloaks in the wind. The two praetors marched to the top of the stairs of the Senate House, looking out over their people. Tessa's eyes went straight for Kaden, and she could practically feel the tension bouncing off of him.

"Citizens of New Rome, we thank you for your hardly sought effort these past few days. These have been troubling times, a shadow upon the legion's history, but we are Romans through and through. We will recover from this setback. We will rebuild our city. We will further prosper into the future, and Rome will continue to be eternal." Kaya's voice echoed through the city street as she spoke over hundreds of watching eyes.

Kaden straightened his posture as he spoke, a hard look on his face. "We know some of you, if not all of you, are wondering about what could have caused the earthquake that destroyed parts of the city. Kaya and I, as well as our associates, are spending whatever energy we can muster into finding the cause of the problem before anyone else gets hurt. But know this: no matter what tragedy strikes us, we will always conquer through. We are unconquerable. No army in any world will take that from us."

The legion responded with a single panegyric of 'Ave!' before falling back under the somber spell of silence. Tessa glanced to her side, at her friends that surrounded her. They all watched Kaden and Kaya absently, ghosts in their eyes.

"63 people." Reese whispered, his sapphire eyes like shadowed horizons. "63 people just up and gone."

Tessa inhaled, looking at the marble steps before her. "It's war."

Reese was silent for a moment, but when he spoke again, Tessa wished he hadn't. "Did the Oracle want us to defeat our demons or become them? Because it seems like the latter, and due to that, 63 innocent people are dead."

Most of the casualties came from the earthquake. Only about nine legionnaires had perished in the battle against the Regiment, and the other 54 were innocent veterans of the Twelfth Legion. They had been mothers, fathers, doctors, scholars, children. They'd believed their city to be unbreakable. They'd followed the command that would lead to their deaths.

It made Tessa sick to her stomach with guilt.

"We'll find out what did this," Tessa managed through the rising well of anxiety in her chest. She blinked away the stress, taking deep breaths to calm herself down.

"And then what?" Reese asked.

Tessa's eyes trailed to where Kaden and Kaya finished their speeches and eulogies for the fallen. She locked eyes with Kaden before he disappeared back into the Senate House, and thought back to the time he had told her about a future that they didn't have to fear.

"We adapt." Tessa managed.

Because with them, nothing was sure. Everything you held near and dear to your heart could be gone in an instant. Their lives were constant waiting games of who would die, what battle would be lost, when their time had finally come. They had more battle scars than they could count.

But while scars and wounds ached for a while, they eventually began to fade. This chaos would pass in time. Tessa just had to wait for that time to come.

~~

When Tessa found Kaden, it was nearly midnight. She'd spent two hours wandering about, lost in a cocoon of anxiety, when she'd gotten Kaden's text. He'd asked her to come see him in the Principia, and left it at that. And so Tessa continued on her way, arriving at the immaculate building in a matter of minutes.

Kaden was in his and Kaya's throne room, perched atop his throne. His cape was fanned out around him, pooling at his feet. He seemed to be lost in thought, a hand to his lips as if he were considering something. He was a king in his element, brooding over his kingdom.

"Is this where you've been cooped up these past few nights?" Tessa asked softly, snagging Kaden's attention.

The son of Venus' irises darted to where Tessa stood in the doorway of the throne room. He exhaled, lowering his arm to rest on the throne. "You came."

"Of course, I came," Tessa said, walking towards him.

Kaden dragged a hand through his hair, making the chestnut mass stick up on end. He wrapped his arms around Tessa, resting his head against her. Tessa ran a soothing hand up and down his back, shutting her eyes.

It was silent for a while, but neither Kaden nor Tessa minded. In moments like these, each other's company was all they needed. It recharged them, helped them take on whatever was headed their way.

"What's on your mind, Kade?" Tessa whispered.

Kaden sighed, pulling away to look up at her. "You might want to sit down."

Tessa arched an eyebrow, but settled onto the armrest of Kaden's throne. She took in Kaden's aura, how he was sitting, how tense his face was. Whatever was plaguing him wasn't pretty.

"Vinny has something to do with the earthquake," Kaden exhaled, gauging Tessa's reaction.

Tessa's eyes widened in shock. "What?"

Kaden nodded. "He somehow managed to escape being tracked by Lukas, Sierra, Jett, and Aspen. I don't know how, but he got into New Rome during the battle. I followed him and he mentioned something called Project Maelstrom before he disappeared." He explained.

"What's Project Maelstrom?" Tessa knit her eyebrows together.

Kaden shook his head. "Vinny called it Armageddon. I've done as much research as I could these past few days, but nothing is coming up. It's like it doesn't exist, but it does, and whatever it is, it killed 54 people."

Tessa felt that familiar coil of ice wrap around her heart. The purr of darkness had silenced since her defeat of the General, but her omnipresent guilt would never escape her that easily.

Kaden exhaled in exasperation, sulking over to a nearby table. He braced his hands on the ends, staring daggers into the files and maps that were spread over the tabletop. "Vinny thinks he can get under my skin. He thinks that by throwing our old friendship in my face that he has pull on me. But I'm not the same kid I was back then. I'm praetor of New Rome, and as long as I reign, Vinny Maxwell will not have a single safe space to hide on this earth or any others."

Tessa stood from where she sat, walking over to Kaden. She rested a hand on his shoulder, and he turned to look at her. His emerald eyes were blazing with determination, fueled by his passion of making sure all those under his authority were granted protection.

"So what's the plan?" Tessa asked.

Kaden's eyes scanned the table, and he grabbed a certain file. "Lukas sent this in this morning. The last place that they saw Vinny was in an old asylum in Pennsylvania."

"They tracked him that far?" Tessa asked incredulously, taking the file.

"Apparently," Kaden continued. "But what they found inside was a little...disturbing, to say the least."

Tessa flipped the file open, and instantly fought the shudders. There were images inside the report of the asylum's interior, straight out of what seemed like a horror movie. Decrepit rooms and hallways, eerie rust-like stains, and blurs that did nothing to appease Tessa's imagination. However, the last series of pictures trumped all the prior ones combined.

One of the rooms had been occupied, it seemed. Dirt and debris still lined the floor and walls, but all over the walls were photos and clippings of paper. A whole collage of photos lined the main wall, and Lukas had gotten a few pictures of what was in the photos.

Tessa recognized Union Station in Chicago, from when she and her friends had fought the Hydra. The picture was blurred, the Hydra hardly depicted, but there was Tessa and her friends standing before it with their weapons, also blurred. Other pictures included their group at Yellowstone, in Vegas, Los Angeles, seemingly every place they had been on their quest. There were even pictures of Sera Brennan on the wall, which sent even more shivers down her spine.

And one picture was in perfect condition. A photo-booth stub ripped from a series of others, depicting a boy with a mop of blonde hair and a girl with dark locks.

"Do you know that photo?" Kaden asked.

Tessa exhaled shakily. "My mom has the other part to that photo strip. That boy...that's Jared Knight."

Not only did Tessa and her friends have a stalker, but whoever this was that was in league with Vinny had been obsessed with Sera and Jared. But what would someone want with a former huntress and a mortal boy?

~~

Tessa tried to ignore the chilling file from Lukas and Sierra's expedition. Their group was on the way back to Camp Jupiter, but the photos within their report had taken the cold from the winter air and settled them around Tessa's bones. Someone had been watching her, her friends, her family. How did she know she wasn't being watched right now?

"Tessa?" Mark's voice shook her out of her reverie. "You alright?"

The daughter of Poseidon glanced up to see her friends looking at her expectantly. They were sitting in the Principia's headquarters, around the glass meeting table.

Right. Council meeting. Rebuilding strategy. Focus.

"Sorry, I spaced out," Tessa mumbled. "What's the problem?"

"What are Ariel and Kiara supposed to do now that their universe is, y'know, pretty much destroyed?" Eli asked, raising his hand slightly.

Tessa looked across the room to where the two daughters of Titans stood. They were listening intently, their presence slightly unnerving.

"That's up to them," Tessa decided. "If they'd like to receive training and education at New Rome, they can stay. If they'd rather pursue a more mortal side of life, they can do that too."

Kiara snorted from where she stood. "Training, my ass."

Tessa narrowed her eyes at the daughter of Asteria before addressing the rest of the group. "Is that the last of the issues?"

"On the itinerary, yes. In our lives, definitely not." Adhara said breezily. The daughter of Nemesis stood from her seat, her waves of onyx hair bouncing as she moved.

"Actually, I'd say there's one more problem," A voice Tessa vaguely recognized chimed.

Everyone in the room shot to their feet, battle stances in place. Tessa whirled to face the golden elevator doors shutting closed behind a tall boy with black hair and ice blue eyes.

"You," Tessa whispered.

The British soldier of the Regiment put his hands up in surrender as he took a step forward. "My name is Liam Caspar, and if you let me speak, I'll try to let all of you live."

"You wanted Ariel's location during the battle," Mark said, his knives drawn. "Why the hell should we trust you know?"

Liam rolled his entrancing eyes, giving Mark a look. "Because I have information on Vinny Maxwell's next plan of attack. If you allow me to explain sans the useless brawling and accusation-throwing, you might be able to prevent the end of the world. So shut up, sit down, and let me do the talking."

~~

The Underworld was sticky and hot, but Vinny didn't mind it that much. He knew he'd be sitting in the flames of Hell one day or another, but part of him really didn't want that day to be too close on the horizon.

Given his acquired abilities from Orion and the General, Vinny was able to slip into the Underworld and through the crowds of lost souls as easily as if he were walking down the street. No one saw him, no one asked questions. This would be easier than he thought.

In order to initiate the next phase of the Regiment's plan, Vinny would need some help. He needed as much ammunition against Kaden and his infernal friends as he could get, and there were a few people he had in mind. However, a good majority of his ideas had been banished to Tartarus or the depths of the Underworld that not even Vinny could break into. So that left him with one last plan.

The hissing of steam in the Fields of Punishment reminded him of the echoing voice of the Oracle of Delphi. Her voice rattled around his head, one line beating in time to his footsteps and heartbeat.

Defeat the traitors of bronze and gold.

Traitor of gold? Covered. Traitor of bronze? An asset he was about to acquire.

Vinny slipped through the various sectors of the Fields of Punishment. He spotted Sisyphus and his boulder, Tantalus chained to the tree in a lake of water. All the world's worst in one place. The mortal world would have a heart attack if it saw all its enemies united.

Vinny smirked as he slowed his footsteps. His asset was chained, slumped against a cavern wall. He was dressed in the ragged tunics of the dead, soot and scars dotting his skin.

"Who the hell are you?" He barked, his voice gruff.

Vinny took a deep breath. He waved his hand, and Matthew Baines' chains dissolved into nothing. "Your ticket to the world above."

Matthew arched an eyebrow, "And I'm George Washington." He scoffed. "What, is this some new kind of torture I'm supposed to suffer through?"

"No torture, no punishment, just freedom." Vinny explained. "And if that's not enticing enough, there's another prize up for grabs."

"Which would be?" Matthew rolled his eyes.

Vinny's eyes flickered maliciously. "Revenge on Tessa Brennan and all of her pathetic friends. They locked you in here. Come with me, and you can condemn them to the depths of Tartarus for all eternity."

A muscle flickered in Matthew's jaw. His lips stretched into a serpentine smile. "I'm in."

Vinny grinned in malevolence, waving his hand. The Underworld faded around them, sulfur and obsidian melting into fresh air and snowy fields.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," Vinny mused, tossing Matthew the sword he had hanging from his waist.

Matthew held the sword with expertise, as if he hadn't spent over a year in the clutches of the Underworld. Vinny watched as the son of Ares slashed the frosty air, and imaged that he was tearing the daughter of Poseidon to shreds.

They had hell to pay, and not even the Olympians would be free from their wrath.