Page 102 of The Blood Rites

“What’s your plan, huh? Kill everyone from Earth, Fire, and Shadow? Then what? We all live happily ever after in the Embrace?” His laugh breaks into something uglier. “The Mother Shard is just as happy to kill us herself, or have you forgotten the wave?”

I put my hands on his shoulders, trying to steady him, but he’s shaking so hard I feel it in my palms.

“You’re right,” I say, because lying to him would be worse. “Maybe there isn’t a way out. But there’s still a choice before the end. Who we stand with. Who we protect.”

He glares at me. “Who am I going to help exactly? My Mana lets me make a gust of wind at best.”

I want to answer, but I can’t. It is Marissa who speaks.

“My Mana is weak too,” she says, voice trembling but clear. “But I’m not giving up. I’m not going to stop trying. I want to live for as long as I can.”

Fen looks at her as if she has spoken from another world. “Good for you, Marissa. But I can’t say the same.”

Fen twists out of Alaris’s grip. Before I can reach for him, he channels his Mana, unleashing the same gust of air he claimed was all he could manage. The force knocks Alaris and me backwards.

He runs, boots sliding on the smooth stone, but he still finds enough traction to break into a sprint.

He stops at the edge and looks back at Alaris. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

Then he jumps.

Alaris makes a sound I have never heard from a human throat.

For several breaths, nothing happens. We watch, waiting for the number on the Mother Shard to increase. But it doesn’t. Instead, the pink crystal pulses darker, glowing magenta, and the number four turns an inky black.

Wrongness crawls over my skin. The wind screams. The island shakes so hard that I’m thrown to my knees. Marissa clamps her hands over her ears. Alaris stands frozen, his face drained of colour.

The wind pummels the island, pelting grit and loose stones at my face. Something rises from the mist below. It is Fen’s body, but it’s not Fen. His limbs are twisted, his skin waxen, his hair plastered to his skull. His eyes are milky white, and his lips are blue. When he lands on the ground, the impact is silent.

For a second, we just stare.

Then Fen’s corpse moves.

It lifts a hand, and the air around us collapses. I am slammed to the ground, my ribs squeezed as though caught in the fist of a giant. Marissa is pinned beside me, her mouth open in a silent scream. I cannot even move my fingers to reach for her. Lyssandra and Morwen lie thrown together, limbs tangled.

Alaris is the only one standing.

He looks at Fen, his cheeks tear-stained. “Please stop,” he begs. “This isn’t you.”

But the thing that was Fen only stares, its white eyes blind and endless. It raises its arm, and the pressure increases. Beside me, something in Marissa creaks. I gasp for air, my vision going black at the edges.

A shape shimmers above us—an Overseer, glass-faced and blank. It floats down, hovering beside Fen’s body. Its voice is almost gentle.

“Death must come at another’s hand,” it intones. Then it screeches, “These are the rules!”

No one moves.

Alaris looks at me, then at Marissa, and finally at Fen. “I won’t do it,” he cries. “You can’t ask that of me.”

The corpse shrugs.

The Overseer tilts its head. “The boy will remain this way until the count is true.”

Then it phases into the ground.

Fen’s corpse raises its hands again, and the air bends. My own bones creak beneath the force. Beside me, Marissa gurgles. I try to reach for my Mana, but it stays locked down.

“Alaris!” I manage to scream. “You have to—”