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 fuckingached.
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. Iwantto 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.
