Pritkin, I thought desperately, trying to reach him through our bond. But either he couldn’t hear me, or he couldn’t respond from more than a century away. Mircea—but he was already doing all he could. I had power; I just didn’t know how to use it!

A giant booted foot came down, half a dozen times in swift succession, carving swimming pool sized divots in the riverbank. I watched them fill with Thames water from a perch on the embankment above, where I’d shifted out of the way—filthy, mud-covered, and panting. And desperate because I couldn’t think; I couldn’t think of anything!

But then it came out of nowhere, a single, shining picture in my mind. I didn’t ask who had sent it; didn’t care. I grabbed hold of the thought, concentrated on it, tried my best to will it into existence. And the next second, a whip of golden energy was coiling outward from my hand.

It felt solid, just buzzing slightly under my fingertips, and looked like the Pythian power as I’d seen it sometimes in my mind. And maybe it was, maybe this was my power guiding me, but I didn’t have time to wonder about it. Because Aeslinn had spotted me, and it looked like he’d decided to end this fight the old-fashioned way, and crush me to death.

Only instead of wrapping around me, his reaching hand—

Went sailing off down the Thames.

The whip I’d lashed out with had cut through flesh and bone as if they were nothing, sheering off his hand and cauterizing the wound, all at the same time. Aeslinn screamed, a strange, high-pitched sound, unlike anything he’d uttered before, and so loud that it was actually painful. It made me want to stop and hunch down, covering my ears, especially when it went on and on. But I didn’t stop. I lashed him instead, over and over, in a relentless flurry of strokes because I might be small, but the whip was as big as he was.

And it was easy; it was so unbelievably easy! It shouldn’t have surprised me, as the main problem with the Pythian power had never been with the power itself. It had always been with the exhaustion of the user. Humans weren’t built to channel the power of a god.

Unless they were jacked up on godly energy, as it turned out.

Because what I’d pulled off Aeslinn was life energy, giving me the stamina of—literally—the gods. The Pythian power flowed through my fingers like it was weightless. I felt no strain, no exhaustion, and for a moment no fear. I laughed again, in complete disbelief—

And saw a sight that I wouldn’t have believed just a few moments ago: a flash of genuine fear crossing those noble features.