I looked at her and grinned. She leaned down, locking eyes with my father as she continued.
“Haden is the first and only man I will ever love. And after he kills you, I will crush your soul into nothing. Then I will erase you and Diath from the history books so that no one will ever remember you. You will die, and so will everything you tried to create.”
“Not everything, my blood pumps through Haden. He is part of me, and he always will be. I am his father.” Malamay bared his teeth.
Della was quick with her response. “You were never his father. His father’s name is Henry, and his mother is Penelope. He has a lovely brother named Holden with a sweet wife named Sara. That is his family. They raised him into a man that you couldn’t ever dream of being. Your soul is black and disgusting, and his burns brightly in my favorite color; you are not even close to the same.”
Then she looked at me and kissed me, but this kiss was a display of what Malamay would never get. Della poured everything into the kiss, and I hummed as she pulled back.
“Do you want to kill him?”
“Yes.” I snarled.
“Then show him what it means to belong to me husband—God of Creation. Rip his soul from him and evaporate it. Make sure he can never exist again.”
I turned to Malamay, who stared at me as I focused on his chest, his black soul swirling inside. I shot my frost out so that he couldn’t move, then I lifted my hand and summoned his soul from him—taking my time ripping it from his body. He called to the heavens while I did this, and it made me smile. I stared at him in satisfaction as I gripped his severed soul in my hand, listening as he cried, groaning in pain.
After letting him suffer for a moment longer, I summoned lightning into my other hand and shot it into his soul, letting it explode at the impact. The pieces of it evaporated like ash in the wind as it burned away from the realm.
Della looked so proud of me that it made my heart swell. “You did such a good job, Haden,” she praised me as her eyes flashed white. “Now watch me kill Diath for being such a bitch to me while I was in the stars.”
Della walked over to where Diath was still on her knees, being held up by the ice spear Malamay stabbed her with. Della kicked the ice contemptuously so that Diath fell over, groaning in pain as she tried to crawl away. Della smiled at her pathetic form, stepping over the black blood trail she left behind her. Finally tiring of the scene, she flipped her over so she was on her back.
With a victorious smile, Della summoned her own frost magic, spearing a stake of ice into each of Diath’s wrists and legs, pinning her to the ground. Della shot her frost out again and froze Diath’s left arm, then made sure to look her in the eyes before stepping forward and slamming her boot down on it, shattering her arm into a million pieces. Diath screamed so violently that the ground shook. Della showed her no mercy, though, and repeated the process with each of her limbs.
“I warned you to stop being a bitch. You didn’t listen.” Della glared down at her. Then she leaned down, punching her glowing fist into her chest, and ripped her soul from her. Diath was dying quickly as Della tossed her soul to me, and I crushedit in my hands. Then she stared at Diath and watched the light drain from her eyes.
With a wicked smile on her face, Della stood up and looked at the five stars left. They were all trying to back up, but I realized that Della had held them in place with her magic.
“You all were kind to me, and for that I will make your deaths quick. You still sealed your fates when you agreed to help Diath and Malamay try and take over the realm.”
Strangely enough, none of the gods argued with her. They all stood in a fairly straight line in front of Della, looking as if they were too tired to fight anymore. Lightning cracked through the sky as Della lifted her hands. All of the gods looked up, thinking they were going to be struck down with lightning, but as soon as they looked up, Della’s star mist whipped from her, and the sounds of their necks breaking simultaneously echoed around the field.
Fuck.
Della’s eyes burned pure white as she summoned their souls to her. Each one of them ripped from the chest of the dead gods and immediately came to her. Sighing, she crushed them in her hands like it was nothing. Then she closed her eyes and took a long breath. When she opened them, everyone was watching her with expectant faces.
“The stars will never have power over us again. As of this moment, the stars are sealed off and shall not be entered again! The gods are self-governing, and we can make the realm a better place for it. Gods who try anything stupid again will be tried and killed by a council of the old gods.”
She looked around and smiled wickedly. “I almost forgot.” Her eyes flashed red as she lifted her hand and shot her star mist out towards the gods watching. Confusion slammed into me as she wrapped Avesh in her mist and pulled him to her.
“I want all of you to know that the stars almost got away with this because Avesh helped them. Isn’t that right, Avesh?”
“You’ve lost your mind!” Avesh was trying to break free from her grip, but he was nowhere close to being on the same power level as Della.
“Old gods, step forward!” she yelled. I glanced around as a dozen gods and goddesses stepped forward, including Abe and Mikel. “Because Avesh is an old god, we must vote on his punishment.”
Avesh was an old god?
“I propose that he be killed for his treasons. It took me a very long time to figure out what god was helping feed Malamay and Diath information about how to break their children out of Hell. It was odd that theBook of the Deadand theBook of Dark Magicboth disappeared fromyourlibrary and you never told us. You knew things you shouldn’t have known, Avesh. I almost didn’t catch you.”
“I didn’t do this. For all we know, you are the bad guy.” He tried to pin it back on her, but she didn’t flinch.
“Do you want to know what your downfall was?” she asked, her eyes full of excitement. “When I came to visit you, Haden was already in the library reading theBook of the Gods, the day I gave you my book.”
Avesh looked at her oddly.
“You can’t read that book unless you are a god. Which means you knew Haden was a god, and since you know every god, you knew who he was. You wanted him to question why my name was so high on the list. You wanted him to know who I was because your tongue is bound to keep our identities secret. Because of that, I jumped into your mind and saw all of the shit you had been up to. What I didn't understand was why or who was helping you—if anyone.”
