“Don’t do it,” I told him. “Don’t, Father.”
His voice rolled through the battlefield. “Surrender, my daughter.”
He’d betrayed me. I’d known he would. I had expected it, but it hurt so much.
“Don’t,” I asked him. “Please don’t.”
“Surrender and I will let your people live.”
“How can you do this? You’re my father!”
“It’s for your own good.”
“No. It’s only for you.”
Hugh burst through the ranks. Behind him, the Iron Dogs parted Neig’s troops like they were water, and I saw Elara. She glowed with white: her dress, her skin, her hair all snow-white, one color blazing with power. She didn’t feel human.
She opened her arms. I heard a chant floating above the battlefield. The Covens were channeling their power. It hit Elara from the back and burst out of her as a beam of pure white. The beam hit my father. He gasped, spinning toward her. The magic impaled him like a spear.
His troops surged around him and fell on the Iron Dogs.
The beam intensified, so white it was hard to look at. My father staggered. His face relaxed. His eyes glazed over.
We almost had him. Almost. Just a little bit more. Sleep. Please, Dad, for the sake of all of us. Just go to sleep.
Magic surged out of him, blocking the beam.
Elara screamed.
Not enough. The witches weren’t enough.
Slowly, ever so slowly, my father straightened, his face shaking with effort, and thrust one hand against the beam.
He would win and then there was no hope for Atlanta and Conlan.
Julie sprinted between the fighting bodies, her sword raised above her head.
I felt the magic inside my father snap, blocking Elara’s beam. If Julie attacked him now, he would kill her. He would squash her like a gnat.
He would kill my kid.
I saw Julie’s arm roll back as if in slow motion, as she prepared for a jump.
If she touched my father, she would die. I had to stop her. I had to . . .
The muscles of her legs tensed, about to send her into the air.
No!
“Stop!” I snarled, sinking magic into the command.
I felt the precise moment my will crushed Julie’s. She crumbled in mid-leap and fell to the ground.
Oh no. What have I done?
Blood-red light burst out of my father. Elara stumbled back. The white beam died. He turned to me. “Did you honestly think that would stop me, foolish child?”
There were twenty yards between us and a wave of his soldiers behind him. I wouldn’t be able to get to him. They would swarm me and then he would hit me with his magic, and it would all be over. He could hold me in stasis until his troops secured me.
The ruby stirred in my armor, as if alive.
The ruby.
It was my only chance.
“SURRENDER, IN-SHINAR. TAKE YOUR PLACE.”
I love you, Curran. I love you, my son. I love you both more than anything. I love you, Julie. There is no way out.
I raised Sarrat and stabbed myself.
My father screamed.
I felt the blood rush out of me and twisted the blade. There we go. I’d cut the abdominal aorta. Death would be quick.
I dropped to my knees, pulled the ruby out of my armor, cradled it, and fell on my side. My father’s face swung into view. He was weeping.
“Why? Why?” He pulled me to him, cradling my head in his arms. “You had everything, Blossom. Why?”
His face was turning gray. His fingers shook. He cried out. I felt his magic fighting for his life, hungry, looking for any source to feed itself. I knew that hunger. It was blinding. He would grab at any magic just to keep himself alive, and I had a source of magic handy.
I opened my arms. They were too weak to restrain the anchor anyway. He saw the ruby. He reached for it.
Take it, Father. Take it and use it.
His skin was the color of crumbled concrete. If he’d had a second to think, he would’ve stopped. But he didn’t have a second. We were dying together, and my father wanted to live. It made him careless.
His fingers closed about the glowing gem. The crimson glow melted over him. He fed on the ruby, absorbing every drop, until everything that made the anchor what it was had been fused with my father.
I struggled to say something. Nimrod leaned over me.
“I win, Father.”
The anchor couldn’t exist without its realm, and it sought to return to it at all costs. My father had absorbed it. They were now one.
A void opened behind him. I only saw the edge of it, but I felt it. It grasped my father and swallowed him whole.
One moment he was there and then he was gone. And all was good.
We’d won. Conlan would live. Curran would live too, if he was still alive. I’d done it.
My blood was all over the ground. I thought it would hurt. It didn’t hurt.
My aunt grabbed at me, frantic. “Stay with me. Hugh! Get Hugh!”
“Too late,” I told her.
Erra stared at me, her eyes wild, and thrust herself at me. Pain smashed into my body, wrenching a scream from me. She was trying to feed her magic into me to keep me alive.
“No,” I whispered. I didn’t want her sacrifice, but I didn’t have the strength to fight her. She paled and vanished. Magic flooded into me in a cool rush.
It wasn’t enough. Julie was crying. Someone was holding me. The light dimmed. Darkness came.
I wish I could hold Conlan one last time.
I wish I could see Curran. To hear his voice. To hold his hand. To not be alone before I go.
I wish I had just a little bit more time. There were so many things I wanted to do. I would give anything for just one more day.
I love all of you.
* * *
• • •
DEATH WAS A mist.
I walked through it at random, not knowing where to go. It pulled on me, and I let it.
I was fading. The essence of me was fading, unraveling softly into the gray mist around me.
Let go, the mist whispered. Let it all go . . .
And then it parted. I stood on a vast plain, green grass under my feet. Golden sunlight streamed from a blue sky. In the distance, herds of wild beasts grazed, big shaggy shapes.
I felt a presence behind me and turned.
A colossal lion walked toward me across the plain. He was black, and his wings were folded over his body. His big golden eyes brimmed with magic. It glowed all around him, coating every hair of his fur. He was a god.
He reached me and lowered his head.
I raised my hand and put it on his nose. He had come to say good-bye. I would get to see him one last time.
The lion opened his mouth, showing me gleaming fangs.
“LIVE,” he said.
Silver magic erupted from him and into me.
PAIN.
* * *
• • •
AGONY TORE MY body into shreds and I screamed, writhing. There was something solid under me.
“I’ve got her,” Hugh’s voice said.
He was on top of me. I was alive.
I swung and punched him in the jaw as hard as I could. He toppled over to the side. I rolled to my feet.
Curran lay next to me on the bloody grass, human and unmoving. I crawled on my hands and knees to him and grabbed him. “Curran? Curran?”
He opened his eyes, saw me, and smiled. “Hey, ass kicker.”
“Are you hurt?”
“Yes. Very tired, too.”
“What did you do?”
“I resurrected you,” he said.
The pain blossomed in my stomach and I collapsed on his chest.
“This was the plan the whole time,” he said. “My plan and your aunt’s. Enough divine power for one miracle.”
I curled into a ball, holding on to him. If this was some sort of near-death hallucination, I would resurrect myself just so I could punch fate in the face.
“Sorry it hurt,” he said. “It’s my first time.”
I kissed his chest. He petted my hair.
“Last time, too,” he said. “I don’t have any divine power left, so let Hugh heal you, because if you die now, there is shit I can do about it and I’ll be really pissed off.”
I just held him. Slowly it was sinking in.
“I promised you this morning wouldn’t be the last time,” he told me. “I keep my promises.”