I could only watch in horror as they swarmed the guards, shoved past them, and sobbed at the taste of being free.
And...nothing happened.
The bottleneck broke as they streamed into the forest, cries of pure joy echoing against the moon. I ran after them, the little girl bouncing in my arms, fire replacing my insides with restless serpents.
But then—
A pulse rippled over their skin as if something triggered in their veins.
And they fell.
One by one.
For a blissful second—maybe the only second of their lives—they were free.
And then...they were dead.
I stood there in horror.
I fought bone-breaking despair and hate hot enough to melt the entire mountain. But then the emaciated panther appeared in the cave’s mouth.
Its eyes were so dull compared to Whisper’s. Its coat matted and patchy. Its majestic tail smashed and broken.
With a soft hiss, it limped toward the fence.
No. Please no.
Placing the little girl down, I streaked toward the panther.
I was too late.
Its ruined body broke into a lope, slipping through the hole in the fence.
Hope clawed out my heart as it kept going. Kept living.
But then...just like every animal and human before it, it grunted, seized, and collapsed.
Dead. Useless. Gone.
The guards got to their feet where they’d been run over by the frantic mob. One kicked the closest dead woman. “Stupid idiots. We told them. Theyknew.How are we supposed to tell Mr. Ward that his precious Requiems are gone?”
I tried to control myself.
I tried to stay human—
A blinding corona of flames detonated out of me, turning the guards to soot before they could scream. The water in the earth vaporised, turning the night hazy. A column of heat shot into the sky, roaring like a dragon made of fire. Flames spiralled in violent helices. The moon threatened to melt.
All of it cost me.
But I couldn’t stop it.
The tax I’d paid was almost complete and the fireraged.
Turning to the little girl, I returned to her and dropped to my knees. With the rest of my mortal strength, I dragged her lifeless body onto my lap and kept her safe.
I protected her as the world broke.
A deafening crack split the heavens as the earth collapsed. I bowed in the middle of a smoking crater as the final trade of my life for power began.
