Текст книги "Burning Blood"

Автор книги: Pepper winters

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Chapter Sixty-Eight

I SLAMMED INTO HIM.

Flinging ice-covered arms around his flame-licking body, I clung to him just as his heart stopped.

I felt it.

Felt that final beat.

Whatever had happened to me on my journey here—whatever level of power I’d tapped into, now included the ability to sense death and decay.

And I wouldn’t allow it to have him.

“Open your eyes,” I hissed as ice surged out of me, bolting into him. The exquisite relief of being able to share the cold. To have someone capable of bringing me back from the brink.

I trembled as winter poured from my spine, my ribs, from the frozen marrow pushing me into a crypt.

His body jerked as another glacial flood sank through his fissured skin and into his burning bones.

But he didn’t open his eyes.

Tears froze on my cheeks as ice imploded like a galaxy inside me, drowning him, blanketing him, wrapping around his charred heart and—

His back arched with a strangled snarl.

I cried out as a gush of searing sunlight crashed into me, warm and ever so wonderful. I became the vessel he needed—his perfect opposite as we traded the elements trying to slaughter us.

Fire met frost.

Heat kissed cold and the crater where we knelt became a whirlpool of steam as our feeble human bodies struggled to tame non-human power.

His heart restarted, coughing like a furnace trying to spark.

His eyes flew open.

That scarlet ring glowed around his pitch-black pupils. For a second, it wasn’t just Lucien who stared back but whatever my parents had made him. Fire burned in him. Power raged in him. Hate ruled everything, but then he sagged and clutched me close with one arm.

The sky dimmed from blood-red to bruised violet. The scalding wind paused and the bond between us reforged.

A ricochet of soundless power ripped free. It rustled in the stars and frolicked in the trees before clashing back into our hearts and slamming a door closed behind it. The fragile thread that’d allowed us to hear snatches of thoughts and see glimpses of each other’s soul solidified into something timeless.

A glittering, unbreakable bridge full of sunlight and starlight, welding our spirits forever into one.

I felt him on the other side.

All it would take was to walk across that conduit thrown wide between us and enter his heart and mind.

He kissed me. Hard and deep.

I cried out as a flood of his feelings crashed into me.

Guilt over causing me pain, despair at not being able to stop countless deaths, and resolution to end everything.

I gasped as I touched the truth.

He...he thought dying was the only way to protect—

“It’s not.” Tearing away from his mouth, I shook my head. “You’re not responsible for—”

“Don’t.” His voice came out cracked and raspy. “Don’t try to make me forgive myself.”

“But—”

“Rook.” He shook his head and wrapped his arms around the tiny bundle on his lap. The bundle he hadn’t let go of. Pulling away from him, I shifted on my knees and noticed what I’d been blind to in my panic.

I’d arrived in a blizzard of pain and breaking.

I’d flung myself on him with no other thought than staying alive, but now...now I gasped at the earth that’d buckled beneath him, leaving nothing more than smoking ruin and a pile of blackened bodies.

Whisper tiptoed toward us, his hackles up as if he’d sensed we no longer belonged in this world.

Smoke coiled around Lucien’s shoulders as he looked down and brushed matted hair off the little girl’s cheeks.

I’m sorry.

I flinched as I heard him.

He didn’t speak but the bridge between us opened every sense. My heart fisted with agony as he hoisted her higher and rocked her. I’m so sorry.

Even his inner voice was torn and tragic, hurting with so much guilt.

Tears stung my eyes. I had to fix this. But...how?

I could somehow sense death now. I didn’t smell rot or decay but coldness and stillness. An absence of heat where the soul used to be, leaving it hollow and empty.

And this little girl was...empty.

Lucien didn’t look up as Whisper headbutted him. He didn’t stop the panther as he sniffed the little girl unmoving in his embrace.

My heart broke into a million pieces as he jerked and coughed, turning his head to the side and spitting out a mouthful of tarry blood. More followed—thick and dark, dripping from his lips as if something had ruptured.

“Lucien.” Scooting into him, I cupped his burning cheeks and brought his gaze up to mine. “Are you okay? Why are you still so weak?”

Raw terror filled me that I was too late. That I’d been able to wrench him back from death but—

“I’m fine.” He forced a smile and pulled away. Another rush of his feelings crippled me. He didn’t feel worthy of my comfort. Too fixated on his failure to allow me to make him feel anything other than regret.

“I know you’re hurting,” I whispered, sending love over that bridge. Drowning him in so, so much love. “But I’m here now, okay? Let’s go home and—”

“I can’t,” he snarled. “I can’t leave them. Not after what I did.”

“You weren’t the one who did this.”

He shook his head, his entire body trembling.

His skin was fissured everywhere—his shirt burned off and gone. Some of the cracks along his arms showed dull muscle but others continued to glimmer.

My heart clenched with fear.

All those warnings my mother had given me when I’d helped her in the lab. All those notes I’d read about the crux of evolution and the failure of mortal bodies.

I’d hoped we’d reached a level of ascension the night we’d taken each other’s virginity. That I was right when I said we were the reason we’d survived but...that was nothing compared to this.

He’d tapped into a different level.

He’d become one with the fire; claimed completely.

Tears poured down my cheeks.

He’d gone too far.

The flames had taken too much.

Whatever pause I’d been able to give him wasn’t enough.

I choked on a sob as his heart hitched, making him grunt.

I felt that too.

Felt the heat devouring him cell by cell, erasing him, changing him.

And I didn’t know how to stop it.

The urge to collapse and cry almost won before I shot to my feet and tugged on his arm. “We need to go. Right now. I’ll...I’ll figure something out, okay? Dillon might know something that will work. I’ll call Frank and get him to send me my parents’ files. I can fix this. I can help you. I know I can.”

“Nothing lasts forever, Rook. Regardless of whether it’s a tiny flea or a giant star—eventually everything dies.”

My mother’s voice echoed in my head, hurtling me back to my childhood where I’d eavesdropped on her talking to my father about the latest lab experiment that’d gone wrong.

“Its bones literally melted, Kristófer. Its blood turned to ash. It burned alive, feeding off its body until it just...vanished.”

“You won’t die. I won’t let you die.” Sniffing back sobs, I wrapped my arm around Lucien’s bulk and tried to get him to his feet. “Come on. We need to go.”

Listlessly, wordlessly, he placed the girl down and brushed her knotted hair off her face. He coughed again, sending another black splatter on the ground. It sizzled where it landed, causing little pockmarks in the dirt.

His brows furrowed as he glanced at his bleeding wrist. “If they were making more like me...why didn’t my blood help?” His gaze met mine, his voice raw. “Maybe if we mix our blood together, we can revive them all.” He looked at the pile of bodies beneath the trees.

Blood.

God, why didn’t I think of that?

I brought my wrist to my mouth and bit as hard as I could. “Here.” I grabbed the back of his head and pressed my arm to his lips. “Drink it.”

“Not me. Her.” He scowled and went to push me away but at the last second, his tongue slipped over my stinging skin. He shivered as he ingested my strangely silver blood. He only took a mouthful before grabbing my wrist, pressing his to mine, and squeezing us tightly together. A single drop combined...just before our wounds healed over.

Catching the rolling duality of silver and gold, he pressed his thumb into the girl’s slack mouth.

“Come on,” he murmured hoarsely. “Take it. You have to open your eyes.” His jaw clenched. “You’re hungry, remember? So eat...”

God, I couldn’t.

I couldn’t watch him break.

“Please,” he begged.

That single plea tore apart my already broken heart.

A sob caught in the back of my throat and—

Whisper suddenly roared. Locking his glowing gaze on the forest, his tail lashed like a whip.

Lucien narrowed his eyes in the same direction.

I heard the weary curse he didn’t verbalise.

With an exhausted groan, he used whatever remaining strength he had left to clamber to his feet, leaving the girl to rest on the ground.

“Rook.” Holding out his hand, he never took his eyes off the darkness, waiting for me to take it.

Threading my fingers with his burned ones, I gasped as he jerked me tight against him.

“Whatever happens, I love you.” His gaze glowed crimson. “This is all my fault. I don’t know if I condemned you to breaking like me, but...having you here. Seeing you well and strong...it gives me peace to think you’ll somehow survive without me.” His lips twitched into a tired smile. “You’re better than me in every way, so you will find a way...I know you will.”

“W-What are you talking about?”

He shrugged listlessly. “I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I was the reason you died. I’m grateful to know I didn’t cause you pain tonight by leaving.”

I opened my mouth to tell him that was exactly what happened. He’d put too much distance between us. He’d taken away the very connection we needed to stay alive but...my throat froze over.

I couldn’t tell him that I’d been in excruciating agony. Couldn’t tell him how close I’d been to my final breath as I’d found him on this mountain top. How I’d twisted time to get to him—

How was I supposed to layer him with yet more guilt when he couldn’t stop looking at the little girl as if he’d personally murdered her?

“Lucien, I—”

“Don’t.” He shook his head. “I didn’t want you to see this, but...I know what I’m doing. I know what has to happen, and I’ll protect you with everything I have.”

Tiny flames licked along his collarbone. The pyre in him caught fire again, chewing through the frost I’d fed him.

No...

Bringing my wrist up, I went to bite a bigger wound—to force him to drink more of my blood, but...a rustle in the trees. A twig cracking.

The bond twisted as Lucien’s attention arrowed into the night.

The glow beneath his skin brightened just as a familiar nightmare picked its way through the rubble of bodies and stepped into the crater Lucien had caused.

“Well.” Marcus pulled out a pristine white handkerchief from his navy suit and held it to his nose. “This is unfortunate.”

Chapter Sixty-Nine

I’D ENVISIONED THIS MOMENT EVER SINCE the fire awoke inside me. I’d been smug with power and eager to torture him. I’d plotted all the ways I’d make him scream but now...now I didn’t care.

I’d had it so lucky compared to these people.

I’d lived in a palace—had food and shelter and Whisper.

And the immature asshole inside me who believed he was owed retribution had far worse things to worry about.

“I thought you’d turn up at Brimstone’s old head office.” Marcus drank in the carnage. “A little birdie told me you left that fortress you call home earlier today and I was rather looking forward to a visit.”

I didn’t reply.

Dragging Rook into me, I wrapped my arm around her perfectly icy waist and held her tight.

I stood on the brink of death and all I wanted to do was protect her after I failed at protecting so many others.

Marcus stepped a little closer, wrinkling his nose at the corpses. “You owe me for this, Lucien. Do you know how long it’s taken me to even come close to what lives in your veins?”

I gritted my teeth and stayed silent.

His eyes narrowed. “Twenty years I’ve been trying. Twenty years of injecting your blood into them, watching so many of them die, only to have a scant few survive and even fewer show any signs of replicating the Requiem gene.”

Rook tensed in my hold. She opened her mouth to ask questions, but I squeezed her.

He wanted us to talk. He was baiting us to ask.

And...I didn’t fucking care.

The fire in me was growing weaker. It’d burned through every inch that was edible, spluttering on the dregs left behind.

I had one shot.

A single chance to slaughter him before my heart stopped beating.

“Tell me.” Marcus arched his chin at the warped piece of metal in my chest, taking another step toward us. “Did you figure out what you could do before or after you destroyed the vitalsync core?”

My skin crawled. Whisper hissed.

“Not talking, huh?” He rolled his eyes. “I must say, you’re far more powerful than anyone expected.” His face darkened as he came to a stop. “How are you even alive? I was told you’d die if that little tool we implanted in your heart gave out.”

I refused to give him a single word.

I just glowered at him, gathering as much strength as I could.

He sighed dramatically but then his gaze shifted to Rook. “It has something to do with you, doesn’t it?” He grinned as if he’d finally figured out life’s greatest secret. “So there is hope. I was beginning to wonder. But you’re proof that there is a way to keep the power stable. How?” He looked her up and down. “How are you keeping him breathing? Are you like him and at the mercy of fire or are you...” He stepped closer, dragging his disgusting eyes over her. His gaze locked on the twinkling frost over her chest. “Ice...”

I lost my ability at holding my tongue as I snatched her hand and positioned her behind me. “You don’t get to look at her. You don’t get to even breathe the same air as her.”

He chuckled and shook his head. “You always were dramatic.”

“Fuck you.”

“No, fuck you!” His decorum broke. “Look at the mess you caused!” Waving at the pile of corpses, he hissed, “Do you know how long this has taken me? How much effort it’s taken to get this far?” Flinging his arms wide, he kicked another cadaver. “The dregs of power they offered was nothing compared to you, yet I kept trying. Kept hoping. I sacrificed litres and litres of your blood to make them stronger. Blood I could’ve drunk myself—”

“WHAT?!” Fire erupted over my skin, granting false power. “You did what with my blood?”

“Oh, come now, don’t get offended. You should be grateful. Grateful that a single cupful of your blood gave me strength that lasted months compared to the pittance that these idiots offered me.”

Idiots.

He called the men, women, and children he’d tortured idiots.

Fire wrapped around my throat.

I couldn’t speak past my fury.

I burned and burned and—

Rook stupidly shifted to my side, letting him see the gorgeous constellations of snowflakes stamping all over her skin.

Marcus sucked in a breath as sleet flurried around us, reacting to her rage just like the fire reacted to mine.

“So that’s what you’ve been doing?” Her hand turned frigid, sending ice feathering up my arm. “You thought you could siphon whatever power dwells in Lucien and replicate it? Use it? Drink it?”

“I don’t see the problem.” Marcus never looked away from her frost-glittering skin. “It’s human nature to want to live forever. I was told Lucien was designed to be immortal. That he was the first of his kind to survive infancy and every year he managed to live increased his odds of evolving into what everyone in today’s society would consider a god.” His smile was sly as he caught her eyes. “But then I found you...so that was a lie, wasn’t it? He wasn’t the only one to survive childhood. You did, too. And now... I have two of you.”

Rook bared her teeth. “How can you even think he’s immortal when he’s literally on death’s door?”

“Yes well.” He nodded. “That has always been the problem. It’s been a full-time job keeping him alive.” He rolled his eyes in my direction. “You just couldn’t keep your emotions in check, could you? Not a single day went by that you didn’t try to reach for that power and the only choice I had was to knock you out...buying myself more time to figure out how to take what I wanted.” He sighed as if the last twenty years had been such a chore. “If only the strength I earned from your blood was permanent instead of wearing off, I could’ve just drained you dry and be done with it.”

Rook sucked in a breath.

Whisper growled.

And I merely nodded as the fire kept chewing its way through me, erasing the last pieces that made me human. “If I’m worth that much to you. If these people were your backup plan...then why treat them so badly? How were they ever meant to be strong enough to—”

“Them?” Marcus laughed. “Oh, they’re just throwaways. Some of them showed potential, but the meagre power we managed to cultivate dried up too fast. They’re just used as breeders now...on the off chance they’ll produce another like you.” He winked. “After all, it’s not just me who needs a constant supply. I have friends. In fact, you know most of them.”

A movement in the treeline wrenched my head to the left.

Horror buckled me as men bled from the trees. Men who’d been there when I’d been held down for the vitalsync core and thrown into Cinderkeep as a nine-year-old. Men who’d all drunk my blood...

Brimstone board members.

They kept coming, spreading out and hemming us in.

Some I recognised, some I didn’t.

I only counted fifteen. Where were the other lot? There’d been twenty-four when I was first imprisoned...

My eyes met theirs and a lifetime of conditioning tried to make me weak. I’d been at the mercy of these bastards for so long, but Rook squeezed my fingers and hissed, “There’s a special place in hell for all of you.”

“Perhaps.” Marcus nodded and crossed his arms. “But if we manage to become immortal...” He left the sentence hanging.

Painting far too many scenarios.

Images of him and these assholes harnessing the power that broke me. Of them hurting so many others. Of them ruling unsuspecting people who would never have a clue they were unkillable, unstoppable, inhuman.

No.

It couldn’t happen.

I would never allow it.

Savagery filled me.

I sank into the furnace that’d replaced my heart.

I’d been prepared to die to prevent any other prisoners suffering. But now...now I wanted to take every one of these cunts with me.

Rook tightened her grip around my hand, sensing what I was about to do.

Our eyes met and I broke beneath the love she gave me.

I’m so sorry.

She flinched as if she’d heard me and...I gasped as she replied.

Don’t do this. Tears filled her silver-ringed gaze. Don’t you dare.

The smoke in my soul suddenly parted, blowing away my grief and regret long enough to notice something had changed. The bond between us....it wasn’t just a string anymore but a bridge—a paved and welcoming road linking us, not by thoughts and feelings but by telepathic hearts.

Did you know about this? I frowned.

She nodded and grabbed my wrist. Let’s go. Right now. They can’t hurt us. Not anymore. Just walk away, Lucien, and—

How can you ask me that? A lash of fire escaped. They have to pay. They have to die.

I agree. She stepped into me, pressing her frosty breasts against my arm. But you’re burning up and I don’t know how long you have left. I need you to come back with me, alright? Let me fix this and—

“Whatever it is that you’re doing,” Marcus snapped. “Stop it.” He smiled at the men surrounding us. “We’re here to take you home, Lucien. I did have to convince the board not to hurt you after the mess you’ve caused, but...we’re nothing if not forgiving so.” Stepping forward, he held out his hands like a long-lost father. “Come back with me to Cinderkeep. I promise no harm will come to either of you and we can continue as we were or...” His eyes shuttered with evil. “If you no longer want to live in England. Fine. You’ll live here. In this very mountain. I’ll personally design a cage that you will never step foot out of, and you can watch every little experiment I plan to do on Rook.”

The ground shook. Dirt lifted in spirals. Smoke exploded out of my shoulder blades.

Lucien...please calm down. Rook clung to me.

“Right.” Marcus grinned as if everyone had agreed. “Now that’s all settled, I’m tired and hungry and—”

Hungry.

She’d been hungry too.

The fragile, starving girl I couldn’t save.

The mountain rumbled louder beneath my feet.

“Lucien.” Rook fisted my hand, sending a wash of coldness into me. “Please.”

“I’ll see you in hell, you motherfucking bastard.” Snaking my arm around Rook, I clutched her close and flung open the gates of everything I had left.

The fire answered.

Embers ignited.

I staggered as my skin glowed brighter than the sun.

My lungs burned. My vision narrowed. The fire prepared to obliterate.

This would be the last one.

One last cataclysmic retribution and then...I could rest.

Marcus would be dead.

Rook would be safe.

She had Dillon.

She could go back to Iceland.

She would survive and never end up in a place like this.

“Lucien...stop,” she begged. “Please stop.”

More ice flooded me, trying to stabilise my meltdown.

But for the first time, I didn’t want her help.

If I didn’t kill him, he’d hurt her. Torture her. Breed her.

Whisper crouched low, fur bristling and muscles coiled.

“Lucien—” Marcus stepped forward warily. “This is your last warning. Agree to behave and I’ll treat you well. Disobey and I’ll—”

“You’ll never lay another fucking finger on me again.”

The sky dripped with blinding gold. An instantaneous blast of apocalyptic destruction blasted toward the bastards who—

“Stop him!” Marcus screeched. “Do it! Do it now!”

The men braced against the shockwave of power as it tore the tops off the trees. Their hands came up. Black weapons raised.

I laughed as fire raced toward them, ready to turn them into pillars of ash—

PAIN.

EXCRUCIATING PAIN.

My mouth opened in a silent scream.

Rook sagged against me, her own scream shrill in the night.

Whisper howled and rubbed his head on his legs as if his skull was about to splinter.

My power snuffed out.

My strength gone.

For ten unbearable seconds, the shrieking, piercing pain made me want to die.

But then it stopped, giving us a chance to breathe.

“Did you honestly think I didn’t come prepared?” Marcus’s voice cut through the residual agony. “What you’re feeling is harmonic disruption. Frequency-based weapons are the only thing that work against Requiems. Which is why every person you tried to release tonight died the moment they went past the fence. They were programmed to a different frequency than you, of course. Couldn’t run the risk of killing you now, could I?” He came a little closer. “Would you like another taste?” His hand went up and the board members surrounding us raised their weapons. “Here...don’t say I never gave you anything.”

Another bolt of rip-tearing agony.

Whisper flopped onto his side, his claws digging trenches as he seized.

Rook buckled.

I took her weight, my entire body threatening to break apart.

“You see, Lucien.” Marcus strolled around us, kicking a pile of dirt into Whisper’s face, making the panther cough and sneeze. “You might no longer be human. You might be well on your way to becoming a god but...you can still be killed. You’re not immortal yet. And no matter what you do—no matter how many times we’ve tried—there comes a point where the fire turns against the host.” He stopped in front of me and kept torturing us.

Pain tore through every inch.

Rook trembled and my legs threatened to give out but I didn’t beg him to stop.

My eyes locked on his, promising death as he shrugged. “I think that’s what’s happening to you right now, actually. You’re dying. And I might be the only one who knows how to stop it.”

Rook glowered at him, hope cutting through her.

Marcus lowered his arm and the pain ceased.

Whisper howled and took off into the forest, vanishing in a streak of midnight.

Rook panted hard, her thoughts wriggling into mine. If he knows how to stop it then...he might be our only chance.

Betrayal cut through me before I smothered it with understanding.

She loved me. She wanted to keep me. But we both knew I was on borrowed time.

I hugged her and pressed a kiss to her hair.

Her wonderful scent filled my nose with frosty cherry and ice-cream. A part of me wondered if the heightened senses—the way I could smell her, taste her, hear her, were yet another gift of this awakening.

I smelled her very spirit instead of her body. Which meant...hopefully, I would be able to find her in another life. I’d track her across whatever realms or afterlife existed and make her mine again.

Lucien... Her horror echoed through me. But I couldn’t look at her anymore.

Marcus called me a god.

He made me sound invincible, yet I was still at his mercy.

I was still that pathetic child who had no one.

But I would never, fucking ever, let him put his hands on her which meant...he has to die. Immediately.

“Ah, ah, ah.” He waggled his finger as fire coiled around my neck. “Do you really want me to punish you again? Have you not learned your lesson?” He pouted as he pointed at Rook. “Do you really want her to suffer because of you?”

I bared my teeth, smoke coalescing into ember wings. “She’ll suffer if I don’t kill you.”

He laughed like he’d done for so many years.

A sarcastic arrogant chuckle and...

I snapped.

My skin split with snarling gold.

The air combusted in expanding rings and the trees protecting Marcus and his men ignited into hot torches.

I flung open my heart.

I gave the fire everything.

Kill them.

Kill every last one of them.

Marcus raised his arm again.

The harmonic wave slammed into me. Agony detonated. My spine arched as the last dregs of blood sprayed from my mouth but...the pain wasn’t enough to stop me.

I was too far gone.

No longer human.

Flaming fingers of fire wrapped around the men’s throats. Every last one of them—including the ones who’d held me down on the table for surgery and forced needles into my veins.

One by one, their howls lit up the night.

The fire pushed them toward that inescapable edge where flesh and bone turned into a rain of blood and brain.

A single decision and they imploded.

Marcus stumbled back a step. “I-Impossible.”

Rook yelled something.

My eyes locked on the trees where Whisper had vanished and...the fire just kept burning.

The crater I’d caused widened as molten fissures cracked through the mountain.

Pure anarchy tore free as Marcus went to run.

It caught him in an updraft.

Held him aloft as his skin charred to a crisp, his bones shattered one by one, and his heart—that twisted, rotten heart—flew from his chest and sizzled into nothing.

The fire took all my fantasies of torturing him and made it a reality.

His dismembered corpse smashed against the ground.

Rook gagged and another wash her ice tried to stop me.

This time, I reached for her.

I wanted her to cool me.

I’d done what I needed.

These men were dead—

I jerked as the power that’d lifted Marcus into the air lifted me. The smoke behind me erupted into thicker, larger wings, wrapping me in thermals and making me weightless.

Rook cried out as I grabbed her.

The higher we rose, the lighter my body became. My skin thinned, revealing glowing bones. Light poured through the cracks in my flesh. Flames spiralled higher, causing a hurricane of cinders.

“Lucien!” Rook clung to me. “Stop. You have to stop!”

I tried.

Fuck, I tried.

But I was no longer in control.

Below us, the world cracked open. The forest ignited in a roaring wave.

We kept rising, lifted by pure power.

The entire mountain range began to glow.

Heat rolled outward in catastrophic waves, feeding on darkness and death. In the far distance, a dormant peak cracked open with a thunderous roar.

A volcano erupted.

Fire met fire.

And I was no longer whoever I’d been.

I was...free.

The sky glowed a violent red. Clouds burned. Fire rained. Lightning bolts cracked the heavens. And birds took flight with smoking feathers.

And in the midst of such chaos...I felt what I did when I set Uncle Wen’s bonsai alight.

I felt the world breathing. Trees growing. Wind blowing. Every little thing and every tiny heartbeat fell into the palm of my hand.

With a single squeeze, I could slaughter everything.

With a single thought, oceans would boil and continents would fracture.

I gagged on such power.

I choked on such anarchy.

I tried to pull back.

To take control—

The fire swallowed me.

The earth quaked, spewing magma into the sky. Mountains that were never volcanoes turned into lava funnels, making the entire valley come alive with ancient candles.

On and on, it roared.

Scraping me dry, killing me.

The peak where we’d stood suddenly folded in on itself. Brimstone board members were swallowed whole. The bodies of those I’d failed to free sank back into the cave’s belly as it belched with sulphur.

The dead panther slipped down a ravine and vanished into a pool of red-hot liquid.

My eyes burned as I looked toward the horizon where Whisper had fled.

My heart fucking ached.

I hoped he was okay.

That my death wouldn’t take him with me.

I screamed again as the power kept building, building, stealing my final heartbeats, pushing me closer and closer toward the end.

Rook grabbed my face as we hovered in the sky, completely at the mercy of feral power.

“Lucien!” Her snowy hands blistered my cheeks. “You’re killing yourself! Stop it!”

Hot wind tore at her hair, whipping the ice-white dress she wore into ribbons.

My body began to break.

My skin tore open, not just fissuring but tearing like rice paper. Glimmers of bone. Drippings of blood. But I didn’t feel pain. I no longer had the capacity.

I just felt lost and alone and sad. Bone-breakingly sad that I couldn’t say goodbye to Whisper and soon, I would have to say goodbye to her.

“Lucien, please.” She kissed my cheek. “I love you. Please don’t do this. We’ll figure out a way, alright? There has to be a way to stop this.”

My tattered, bleeding arm wrapped tight around her.

I no longer had the ability of speech. I forced the words into her mind.

I can’t stop. I want to stop. But I can’t.

Her eyes widened in horror.

She pressed her forehead to mine; a blast of snow and sleet flooded me.

It flooded me and flowed out of me because my body was no longer solid.

It was fading...vanishing...dissolving piece by piece.

She sobbed as we hovered above the Gaoligong mountains and the entire valley caught fire. Leylines and geothermal pockets exploded with steam. Everything shattered. Everything smouldered. Rivers of molten rock poured down the slopes, creating a landslide through the trees. The air turned alive with fireflies as burning leaves danced and birds turned into flaming arrows.