“Now!” I roared, and every House magic answered. Wild magic from Underhill and the magics of the combined might of six houses joined our effort.
The stolen power channeled through us and erupted outward in every direction. My will guided each stream back to its source.
Through my mind’s eye, I watched the healing begin. Dead earth sprouted the first green. Dry riverbeds flowed. Cities where technology had failed as magic vanished flickered back to life. They would never match Mist of Cinder’s raw magical density—the mortal world lived by different rules, technology over mysticism—but even a spark would help.
The transfer seemed to go on forever. Power flowed through us in torrents that should have torn us apart. My knees buckled. Black spots danced in my vision. But Killian held me up, and Rowan supported Sy. We endured and prevailed.
Then, finally, the flow stopped.
Silence fell like a hammer in the chamber of infinity.
Where the void god had been, something impossible lay on the not-ground.
A baby stared up at us with one crimson eye and one black eye, confusion, hunger, and rage written across its features.
“What the fuck?” Silas said, summing up everyone’s thoughts perfectly.
Chapter
Thirty-Eight
Sy
“What the actual fuck?” Louis echoed, and we all stared at the fucking infant.
Fortunately, Ruin was still bound by the five elements despite his shrunken size, the chain of dark material—enhanced by dark flame and shadow death—still firmly attached.
“That is the evilest baby in the universe,” Cade said, taking a cautious step back.
I didn’t blame him. That thing freaked everyone out more than the void god at his full strength and height.
“Whatever!” Silas yelped. “Just push that evil baby to the other side already!”
“Do it, wolf!” Louis shot back. “Go ahead.”
Isis and Nephthys struck at the same time. Ancient power erupted from them, earth and sky combining into a force that made the air hurt. The stream shot toward the baby Ruin?—
“No!” Barbie and I shouted in unison.
Barbie’s dark flame burst from her hands, intercepting the deities’ attack before it could reach Ruin. The powers collided in a shower of fizzling sparks in the middle of the infinite room.
“He can still feed on your power,” Barbie warned, positioning herself between the two deities and their former tormentor, “baby or not!”
Their forms shifted in agitation, their edges crumbling faster. Frustration rolled off them in waves that made my skin itch.
Barbie threw out her hand again, her dark flame—infused with Killian’s death power—wrapping around the evil infant like a cocoon. She lifted him, chains and all, and hurled him toward the fog marking the boundary to the void.
The baby hit the fog and bounced back like a rubber ball, landing exactly where he had started.
“It cannot stay here!” Isis snapped in panic. “The abomination will eventually break free! No prison in this realm can hold him forever.”
I wanted to help, but Ruin craved my magic above all else. One drop of my power might give him the strength to break his bonds. That was why Barbie and Killian had positioned themselves as a wall between us, even though Ruin had been reduced to an infant.
“It must be sent to the void!” Nephthys shrieked. “We have guarded this path for eons, waiting for his final fall!”
Barbie tried again, using pure force. The baby sailed toward the fog and bounced back again. Killian sent his death shadows to shove it through with the same result. The evil infant in its chains just rolled around the center of the infinite room like the world’s worst, most unwanted toy.
“Shit! Shit!” The heirs looked at each other in growing panic. “We can’t get rid of this ticking bomb!”
