The earth streams with molten gold. It flows in every direction, around the scattered rocks, gleaming in the light of the fires that rage all around. Ichor, the blood of the immortals, seeping into the soil.

Smoke hangs heavy in the air, obscuring the stars. Thunder rumbles in the distance, and the horizon flashes with lightning. It dances across the sky, leaping between the clouds, a glare that dazzles, white and blinding, and is gone, only to reappear somewhere else a moment later.

Hera glances up at it, narrowing her eyes to chart its progress as she steps across the ravaged battleground.

The falling dusk and swirling ash make it hard to see. The ground is churned up, great gashes in the earth where boulders have been heaved and trees torn up by their roots. Some of the mounds she skirts are these shattered rocks and mangled trunks, but some of them are not. Some are golden-stained, sprawled, staring glassy-eyed up to the heavens. Every now and then, one might stir painfully as she passes, let out a whimper of agony so that she raises her spear. She is swift and merciless, leaving silence in her wake.

Lightning sears the sky directly above her, its livid glow rendering every detail of the carnage in stark clarity for the space of a heartbeat before it dies away into darkness again. She listens, trying to distinguish the shrieking of the winds from another scream, one of anguish and rage. The earth is scarred and brutalized, but it is quiet at last. The fighting is in the heavens now.