YOU ALONE CAN WIELD HIS WEAPON. YOU ARE DESTINED TO BE THE HERO OF THEROS. Daxos had written the words on a slip of paper and slid it under Elspeth’s door at some point in the night. It was now early morning, hours after the ink had dried. She hadn’t heard him in the corridor outside her room in the night or she would have opened her door for him. Elspeth crumbled the note in her fist. It had a sense of finality, as if she might never see him again and these were the last words he wanted to say. Elspeth glanced at the rosy sky on the eastern horizon where the sun was rising. She’d been living in Heliod’s vast temple complex in Meletis since the day they’d killed the hydra. Training with Daxos in the hours before dawn had become a daily ritual. They usually met in the courtyard of the grand stoa, but today he never showed up—he just left the cryptic note and vanished. He wasn’t in his rooms—she’d checked. Elspeth continued waiting for him even after the appointed time passed.
