CHAPTER 47: THE STRAIGHT ROAD (1)

The relic slipped from Apollo’s grasp as Lyra’s voice cut through the night.

"What are you doing?"

Her silhouette appeared against the fading embers, rigid with tension. Apollo froze, the unwrapped artifact gleaming between them like a confession. The gold in his veins retreated beneath his skin, a guilty current running cold.

"Lyra, I can explain—" he began, but she was already advancing, knife drawn, eyes reflecting pinpricks of dying firelight.

"I knew it," she hissed, her voice low enough not to wake the others. "You’ve been listening to it all along."

Apollo rose slowly, hands raised in a placating gesture. "It’s not what you think."

"No?" Her laugh was brittle as frost. "Because it looks like you’re communing with the thing that’s been mocking us, leading us in circles, and driving wedges between us since we found it."

The commotion roused Renna, who sat up with the instant alertness of someone accustomed to danger. Her gaze flicked between Apollo and Lyra, then settled on the exposed relic.

"You absolute fool," Renna said, voice thick with disgust as she reached for her spear. "After everything we’ve been through, you’re taking orders from that thing?"

Apollo felt the camp stirring around him, Thorin’s snores cutting off abruptly, Nik rolling to his feet with unusual grace, Cale’s watchful silence. The dog pressed against his leg, a warm weight that somehow steadied him.

"It knows the way," Apollo said, forcing himself to meet their accusing stares. "It’s been showing me...showing us...all along."

Thorin was up now, axe already in hand, face darkening to a dangerous shade beneath his beard. "Showing us what? How to walk in circles until we die of thirst?"

"No," Apollo said, standing his ground even as Thorin advanced. "The paths. The real ones. When I listen to it...follow its instructions...the way opens."

"That’s madness," Lyra spat. "It’s manipulating you."

"Maybe it is," Apollo admitted. "But it’s also guiding us. When it told me to avoid the cliff I couldn’t see, a clear path appeared. When it mocked our direction, it was because we were going the wrong way."

"Convenient explanation," Renna said, her knuckles white around her spear shaft. "The thing insults us because it cares?"

"Not because it cares," Apollo corrected. "Because it’s teaching us."

Thorin’s laugh was harsh as grinding stone. "Teaching us what? To distrust each other? To jump at shadows?" His grip tightened on his axe. "I’ve had enough lessons for one lifetime."

The dwarf took another step forward, weapon raised. Apollo tensed, uncertain if Thorin meant to strike him or the relic...both seemed equally possible in the firelight’s dying glow.

"Wait," Nik’s voice cut through the tension. He stood slightly apart from the others, his usual easy demeanor replaced by something more thoughtful. "What if he’s right?"

"You can’t be serious," Lyra turned on him, incredulous.

"Just hear him out," Nik said, raising his hands. "We’ve been going in circles for days. Nothing we try works. Maybe... maybe we need to try something else."

Cale, who had remained silent until now, rose and moved to the edge of their small circle. "The relic responds to him," he said simply, eyes fixed on Apollo with that same measuring look he’d worn earlier. "I’ve seen it too. When he follows its directions, the path clears."

Apollo felt a rush of gratitude toward the quiet man, unexpected and powerful. "I’m not asking you to trust it," he said, addressing Lyra directly now. "I’m asking you to trust me."

The words hung in the air between them. Lyra’s expression remained hard, unyielding.

"Prove it," she said finally. "Show us."

Apollo nodded, reaching for the relic again. It warmed in his palm, a satisfied weight. "Where?" he asked the artifact, voice low but clear in the stillness.

"North-northwest, golden-boy," the relic replied, its voice audible to all of them now. "Through the thorns that aren’t thorns."

Apollo looked up, scanning the darkness beyond their camp. There, barely visible in the starlight, was a thicket of what looked like impenetrable brambles.

"That way," he said, pointing.

"There’s nothing there but thorns," Thorin objected, though his axe had lowered slightly.

"Let’s see," Apollo said, and started walking.

The others followed, Lyra and Renna flanking him closely, weapons still ready. As Apollo approached the thicket, the relic’s voice came again, softer now, almost intimate.

"Left foot first, then right shoulder turned. The thorns are lies."

Apollo obeyed, stepping forward with his left foot and turning his right shoulder as he approached what looked like a solid wall of thorns. Instead of meeting resistance, he passed through as if the brambles were nothing but mist. Behind him, he heard Nik’s soft exclamation of surprise.

"It’s a path," Apollo called back, standing now in a clear corridor that cut straight through the thicket. "Come through exactly as I did."

One by one, they followed...Nik first, then Cale, then Thorin with obvious reluctance. Renna came last, after a long moment of silent debate with Lyra.

The path beyond was straight and clear, illuminated by starlight that seemed to pool on the ground like water. It led directly toward a distant ridge, a route that would have taken them days to find on their own...if they ever had.

"This doesn’t mean I trust that thing," Lyra said, her voice tight as she stepped up beside Apollo. "Or that you should."

"I know," Apollo replied quietly. "But it’s our best chance of getting out of here."

She didn’t answer, but her silence felt less hostile than before. It was a beginning, at least.

As dawn broke over the ridge, they began their march in earnest, Apollo leading the way with the relic’s voice a constant presence in his ear.

"Left foot on stone, not soil, golden-boy," it instructed as they navigated a particularly treacherous stretch. "The ground remembers your weight differently than the others."

Apollo obeyed, placing his feet exactly where directed. The path remained clear before them, though occasionally he caught glimpses of the warped, impossible landscape to either side.