Chapter 2: Threads of Fate

                                    

                                          

Somewhere deep within Brooklyn, the Kanes were already on the move.
Carter Kane had a bad feeling about today. It wasn't just the ominous rain clouds rolling over the Brooklyn House—those were almost normal now. No, it was something else, something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. Ever since he'd woken up that morning, his thoughts had been tangled with unease, as though he were being pulled in multiple directions at once. And with Sadie missing, that unease had only grown.
"Where is she?" Carter muttered to himself as he paced the grand library. The mansion was eerily quiet, the only sound being the patter of rain against the windows. He knew better than to assume things were calm. The silence often came before the storm.
"Still looking for her?" A familiar voice rang out.
Carter turned to find Zia Rashid standing in the doorway, her arms crossed and her staff slung over her shoulder. Her amber eyes shimmered with concern, but her posture was as calm and confident as ever. Zia always seemed to carry an air of quiet strength, one that grounded Carter even in the midst of chaos.
"Yeah," Carter sighed. "She said she had something important to take care of and just vanished before I could stop her. Typical Sadie."
Zia raised an eyebrow. "Knowing her, she'll turn up right when you need her the most."
Carter nodded, but he couldn't shake the uneasy feeling that this time was different. Sadie had been acting strangely for the past few weeks, even more secretive than usual. Ever since their last encounter with Apophis, things had been tense, and it felt like they were on the verge of something big. Something much worse than a rogue god or another angry spirit.
Zia took a step closer, her voice softening. "You've felt it too, haven't you? The shift?"
Carter frowned. "What do you mean?"
Zia leaned against the wall, her eyes narrowing slightly. "The barriers between the worlds are weakening. Magic feels... unstable. I've had visions in my sleep of places I've never seen—realms that don't belong to us."
Carter blinked. He hadn't told anyone yet, but he had been having similar dreams. Strange landscapes, creatures that didn't fit into any of the mythology they'd studied. Realms where the lines between Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and even Norse mythology blurred into one confusing mess. But Zia's words brought it all into sharp focus.
Before Carter could respond, the temperature in the room dropped sharply. The air shimmered, and a figure materialized in the middle of the library—Sadie.
She looked pale, her usually mischievous grin replaced by a hard-set frown. In her hand, she clutched an ancient scroll, glowing faintly with magical energy. Her clothes were disheveled, as if she had just been through a battle.
"Sadie!" Carter rushed forward. "Where have you been? What's going on?"
Sadie's eyes darted between Carter and Zia, her voice low and urgent. "We've got a problem. A big one."
Carter crossed his arms. "What kind of problem?"
"The kind that makes Apophis look like a minor inconvenience," Sadie replied, holding up the scroll. "This—this is what I've been looking for. It's a prophecy, Carter. An old one. Older than anything we've come across before. And if I'm right, it's already in motion."
Zia stepped forward, her brow furrowed. "What does it say?"
Sadie unrolled the scroll carefully, laying it flat on the floor between them. The symbols were ancient, almost too worn to read, but Carter recognized a few of them—words of power from both Egyptian and Greek origins. The language was a mix of hieroglyphs, Greek letters, and strange symbols that pulsed with an eerie glow.
"Thou shall unite under one union," Sadie read, her voice steady but laced with tension. "Thou shall fight a common foul. With Jackson and Chase, Kane and Grace..."
Carter's stomach flipped as the names sank in. Jackson and Chase? Kane and Grace?
"Wait," Carter interrupted. "Jackson? As in Percy Jackson? The demigod?"
"Yes, that Jackson," Sadie replied, her eyes flashing with impatience. "And Grace... Jason Grace, one of the Roman demigods."
Carter tried to process the enormity of the situation. He had heard of Percy Jackson, of course, through the magical grapevine. The Greek and Roman demigods were legends in their own right, but they had never crossed paths. Until now.
"So, we're supposed to team up with them?" Carter asked, his voice tinged with disbelief.
Sadie nodded. "It gets worse. The rest of the prophecy talks about the duat and the mist, the gods and their powers no longer hiding. Carter, this isn't just about our world or our gods anymore. The veil between all these pantheons is falling apart. And if we don't act soon, we'll be dealing with the start of Ragnarök."
Zia sucked in a sharp breath. "Ragnarök? The Norse end of the world?"
Sadie glanced at her. "Yes. And if that prophecy holds true, it won't just be the Norse world that ends. It'll be all of them."
Carter felt the weight of her words settle heavily on his shoulders. They'd already stopped Apophis from destroying the world once, but this... this was on an entirely different level. They weren't just dealing with one rogue god anymore. They were dealing with the collapse of the entire cosmic order.
"So, what do we do?" Carter asked, feeling the urgency bubbling up inside him.
Sadie rolled up the scroll, her face hard with determination. "We need to find them. Percy Jackson, Magnus Chase, Jason Grace... all of them. We need to unite, just like the prophecy says. If we don't, we're looking at the end of everything."
Carter exchanged a look with Zia, who gave him a firm nod. They'd faced impossible odds before, but this felt different. It felt final.
"Then we'd better get moving," Carter said, grabbing his staff and slinging it over his shoulder. "Where do we start?"
Sadie smirked, some of her usual sass returning. "Oh, I've already taken care of that. A portal's waiting outside. The only question is, are you ready to see just how weird things are about to get?"
Carter gave a grim smile. "Weird? Sadie, I'm starting to think weird is our normal."
As they stepped toward the doorway, the scroll tucked safely in Sadie's hands, Carter couldn't help but feel that the world had just gotten a lot bigger. Bigger, more dangerous, and infinitely more fragile. But he also knew one thing for certain—whatever was coming, they wouldn't be facing it alone.
The prophecy had begun. And there was no turning back now.