The onpyrs lunge, limbs flailing, bodies quaking, but I don’t cower. I unleash my dark umbras—the blackest parts of my tortured soul—in a ripple of violence that swallows the creatures whole, leaving only bubbling piles of goo behind.
I heave an exhausted breath, and just as I’m about to bolt full-speed toward the tunnels that will take me to Sangeries, Killian’s hand wraps around my wrist.
“There’s a faster way, my love,” he says as the shadows take over, our bodies disintegrating into mist, in that in-between worlds state where it’s just the two of us, stripped bare to the embers of our immortal souls. His essence wraps around mine, choking me with so much devotion and a promise to always be by my side.
The next moment we’re palpable again, standing on the crenellated rooftop of a crumbling castle, devoured by unforgiving flames.
Our home.
Morweena stands like a blade of nihility, flaming mane crackling with electricity as she cackles venomously.
“Careful what you wish for,little sister. You come searching for death at my hands?”
Her fingers glow silver, static hissing from her ashen flesh as she releases a wave of perverted power our way. Hands tightly gripped, we block her attack, creating a shield of swirling shadows around us. Argent sparks fly everywhere, trying to breach our domed barrier of crimson-black.
Her crazed, sick gaze slides up to Killian’s face, traveling up from his leather-covered chest to the column of his neck, thick with corded muscles, halting at his plush lips, set in a feral scowl, fangs bared.
I don’t miss the look of venomous longing swimming in those haunting, milky orbs. I can’t pretend to understand how unrequited, age-old obsession turns into a rampage of destruction, damning the entire world to one creature’s revenge.
“I would have made the entire realm our playground, Akaori. You could have ruled beside me as absolute Gods of this forsaken domain, all the living and the dead cowering before us,” she tuts, shaking her head at our joined hands. “Instead, you will perish alongside the filth you call a lover, and I will ensure history forgets you both.”
“There is no reality in which that would have happened, Arwan.”
The powerful feminine voice uttering Killian’s words gives me pause.
A part of me has never heard Akaori’s rasp before so clearly. Only subtle inflections woven through his voice.
The other part? It yearns to hear one last time those sweet nothings she used to murmur to Aeon.
“Power hungry monsters like you don’t understand devotion, only crushing possession.” His pupils glow red with ancient anger. The sign of a soul unleashed from all its shackles.
“You don’t know what I understand,” she screams, zaps of silver shadows exploding outwards, catching fire on the wooden wall-walk behind us. Flames lick the outer walls, turning the stone black.
“You are a monster yourself, Akaori. You killed our unborn, you chosehimover me,” my sister spits, pointing an accusatory finger my way. “And I was still willing to forgive your betrayal.”
The way she frames her villainy, making herself the victim in the story instead of its knave, breaks any vestiges of fright holding me back. My shadows discharge with a thunderous boom of cracking stone as they hit her full force, throwing her over the battlement. I break into a run and jump over the stone crenels, the hot air wheezing around me as I fall, fall, fall.
I land in a crouched position in a melted puddle of snow. She’s nowhere to be seen.
“Fuck.”
Killian materializes next to me, his predatory gaze sweeping over my body, searching for any damage. His relieved breath is barely audible above the roaring flames eating up Sangeries.
“Where is she?” he asks, taking in our surroundings.
“By my side, where a Queen belongs,” comes a voice from behind us, a silhouette emerging from the darkness of the gardens.
A blond Fae male draped in gold armor and wearing an opulent, bejeweled crown takes two steps our way, hundreds of crimson eyes blinking open behind him. His obnoxious smirk widens as the creatures surround us.
“What a cheap replica of Aurora,” he tuts derogatorily, sizing me up with his sleazy gaze. “No wonder she wants you gone.”
Fucking Noahlin. The royal prick.
“We have no business with you, boy,” Killian says through gritted teeth. “You don’t know what you’ve gotten yourself into.”
“Oh, but I do. Hundreds of years I watched my father enforce a treaty that should never have existed. Your kind is an abomination. A stain on the face of Imiryion.”
The onpyrs part, letting Aurora pass through, her body morphed back into the split image of mine.
