As much as she wanted to deny it, she wasn’t ready for him to die. It had been agonizing enough when she had thought Taren had killed him. But now, with him standing before her again as his old self, everything was different. She couldn’t lose him again, not this time.
A feral darkness burst through her body, flooding her senses, and fangs dropped in her mouth. They weren’t serpentine like the ones he had, but something far more dangerous. Something worse. A pulse of hunger stirred deep within her, creeping through every partof her being. It was a twisted, insidious power she normally kept locked away, lest she become one of the threats she was sent to destroy.
She could feel it now, bubbling up from the depths of her anger and fear, sliding through her veins like poison. She knew there was a brighter power buried even deeper, though she was forbidden from touching it, lest she release something even worse. But she couldn’t think about that now.
Her lips curled back over piercing teeth, and she snarled with the demonic force within her demanding release. Plunging into the swarm of the dead, her body blurred into motion, cutting, slashing, too fast to track, too strong for the dead Hollow-born to counter.
Rynna drove one blade upward, cleaving through a revenant’s throat and sending it crumpling to the ground in a heap. In the same motion, she spun on her heel, ducking beneath the outstretched arm of another corpse, her other sword carving through its neck in a swift, deadly arc. The head rolled from its shoulders, bouncing once before it landed with a dull thud in the dirt.
Limbs flew as she carved her way through the mob, leaving nothing but a trail of twitching parts in her wake. Another lunged at her from the side, but she sidestepped, her blade flashing out to sever its arm at the elbow, sending it spinning to the ground. In a heartbeat, she was already on to the next, her swords cutting a clean path straight to Kaelith.
By the time she reached him, he was on his knees, blood dripping from fresh wounds as he ripped one of the undead off him, the corpse’s fingers still latched onto his throat. With a snarl, he hurled it across the glade, the body crashing into a tree before falling limp.
“Get up!” Rynna yelled, her voice barely human as the darkness surged through her veins. “We need to get out of here.”
Kaelith gasped. “The girl…”
Rynna’s eyes flicked to the unconscious form on the ground. “Since when do you care about a random Hollow-born?” Even that small trickle of power dulled the warmth of her humanity.
“She… she…” Kaelith panted, struggling to get the words out. “She has your scent on her. You don’t know her?”
Rynna hissed, her gaze locking onto the unconscious person lying limply in the dirt. At first, the blood-smeared face and tangled hair obscured the features, but somethingtugged at her memory. Her eyes scanned the curve of the cheek, the familiar shape of the nose, and the delicate slope of the jawline. Recognition hit her like a punch to the gut.
“Calli!” The bloodlust stilled within her, momentarily doused by the shock of seeing her friend in such a state.
She looked at Kaelith.He risked his life, his second chance, to save someone I might have known.
Before she could fully process it, another of the dead dove at them, knives flashing, teeth gnashing. She spun, parrying with her blade and kicking it away, but they kept coming, relentless. Even the dismembered parts she’d left behind began to wriggle, grotesque fingers and limbs crawling back toward whole bodies, ready to attack again.
“Rynna?” a weak voice rose from the ground. Calli’s eyes fluttered open, her voice fragile. “You have to get out of here…the dead…there’s too many.”
Rynna’s mind whirled. She knew what she was supposed to do in a situation like this. Fate had decreed that Calli was meant to die here. Maybe Kaelith, too. But the thought made her stomach churn.
Fuck that.If there was any leeway, any chance to rewrite what was coming, she was taking it now. She couldn’t watch her friend die. She couldn’t watch him die.
Her grip tightened on her blades.Not today.
Smothering the fear, Rynna forced herself to focus, slowing her heart’s frantic pace. She stilled her mind, reaching deep within, past the darkness, past the doubt, searching for that elusive, forbidden light buried in the core of her being. The fire she was NEVER supposed to touch. Just a sliver. She didn’t think the Weaving would pull her away again, not with the final war already unfolding.
Her nerves hummed with the tiny spec of raw power coiling beneath her skin.
“Burn.” Her voice was barely audible as she commanded the untamable. She could feel it then, that brighter, hotter throbbing behind her eyes, growing stronger, surging through her like molten lava.
But it wasn’t just a pool of elemental force within her as she’d always suspected. It was hotter than fire, more dangerous than any flame or fire element she’d ever summoned.
What have I done?The panicked thought flashed in her mind before the inferno exploded outward, roaring to life, devouring everything in its path. It raced across the undead horde, searing through their unnatural flesh with a hunger that mirrored her own barely contained fury, as if the flames themselves had become alive.
The decayed bodies ignited like dry paper, their brittle forms crumbling into ash without so much as a scream. Then the blaze spread further, licking up the trees and underbrush around them, the forest itself becoming fuel. In every direction, for nearly a hundred yards, the flames consumed everything.
Rynna gritted her teeth, using the last reserves of her strength to wrestle control back.
She inhaled, summoning the flames, calling them back to her. The heat flared, resisting her control, then abruptly gave way, vanishing with a soft hiss. And all that remained was a barren field of ash, stretching out in a blackened, smoldering circle for as far as she could see.
What the fuck was that? What was that fire?
She staggered, legs trembling beneath her, but she held herself up long enough to check on the others. Calli lay motionless but alive, her chest rising and falling steadily, while Kaelith, bloodied but alive, caught her gaze with a weak smile.
Doesn’t matter what it was.Relief washed over her like a wave, making her limbs go weak.
