CHAPTER 34

Aldrick’s body sparked like aged, dried kindling, rupturing in flames until every inch of his skin was engulfed in them.

I felt nothing for him as ash peeled from the bundle of fire and drifted skyward on the spring breeze. Through the haze of licking, hungry fire, I couldn’t take my eyes off him as his flesh melted and bones charred black.

Grunts echoed around us as the Hunters regained control of their own minds. The once steady wall was now a mess of shouting Hunters with stark, pale faces and blinking, distant stares.

I wished it took longer for Aldrick to die, but even the universe seemed to want his soul with such desperation, he left the realm of the living too quickly.

Althea didn’t release her dark flames as she withdrew from Aldrick’s charred husk and faced the crowd.

“I will give you all the same opportunity, so listen carefully,” Althea called out, whips of flame hissing like serpents from each of her fists. “Now your minds are your own, will you continue to fight against us or lay your weapons down and stand beside us?”

Figures slipped from the line of Hunters, scratched and battered but alive. I noticed Gyah stride forward, a deep gash sliced above her brow, blinding her left eye with blood. Lady Kelsey followed, limping with the aid of another fey who had joined us from Aurelia. One by one, the humans allowed our kind through until the middle of the gate’s circle was filled with us.

Arms engulfed me, pulling me tight into a hard chest. Beneath the harsh tang of death that covered him, I still smelled Duncan. His hand cradled the back of my head, his lips pressed atop it.

“It’s over,” Duncan whispered, voice muffled into my hair. “It’s fucking over.”

I wish it was, but I knew that we were far from the end of this story.

Aldrick was evil, but he, too, was a puppet to a master. Duwar was still the threat, we couldn’t forget it.

“Is it?” I replied meekly. I forced my eyes closed. My fingers wound into the material of Duncan’s jacket, and I held firm. “Aldrick may be dead, but the gate still stands. Duwar is still a threat.”

“Robin is right.” I pulled away from Duncan enough to see Rafaela. She used her hammer as a walking stick to keep herself upright. Her wings were torn and thin, feathers had been ripped out in clumps by the hands of those who attacked her. One hung at her side, unmoving, unlike its twin, which twitched with energy. “For as long as the keys play a part in the realms, Duwar will always have a chance to return.”

This was the part of mine and Rafaela’s plan that we’d not divulged to anyone. The price I’d offered to pay for her help.

Althea continued calling out to the humans, not knowing what was brewing in the centre of the gate. “I will regard you all as victims of Aldrick’s control until you give me a reason to think otherwise. Lay down your weapons. No one else needs to die today.”

There was a clatter of metal as weapons were thrown to the ground in surrender. Many of the humans fell to their knees with their hands raised behind their heads. Those who continued to stand, hands still gripped around a blade, were targeted by our forces, who surged back toward the crowd to deal with them.

I saw Erix then, standing in the same place he’d held Duncan. His heavy breathing and hunched frame told me of his exhaustion. He had one hand pressed against the side of his head. He must have felt my eyes upon him because he looked up then. The gryvern – his gryvern – screeched in the sky above us. A cloud of grey skin, coiling and twisting among one another in a bundle of black blood-covered bodies. Not a single Draeic was left in sight.

Had they fled as Aldrick’s control had slipped from them? Did Duwar even recognise the failure waiting for it?

“It wasn’t me,” Erix mouthed. Each word clear even from a distance. “I wasn’t in control.”

I blinked, parting my mouth as I formed my reply. “ I know.”

Erix was no stranger to being controlled by sinister people . Doran had used him to hurt me, and Aldrick almost succeeded until Jesibel…

Where was she? Daveed had teleported her to safety, but I still needed to see her, the desire was burning inside of me.

“It’s now or never, Robin,” Rafaela whispered at my side. “You know how we can save this realm. This must be done before the chance is taken from us.”

I sensed panic edging her words, the way her knuckles paled as she gripped tighter to her hammer. I sensed there were more reasons as to why she wanted the keys destroyed – forever removing them from the game board that was this world. Her purpose was to protect them, and yet she would happily default from the Nephilim and go against them, for this one purpose.

But she was right. As long as the keys were in play, the gate was always under threat to be opened. Duwar would find another person instead of Aldrick, and attempt their campaign for freedom. The only way of preventing it was making sure this gate, or any other, could never be opened.

I locked eyes with Rafaela and nodded in silent agreement.

“What is the meaning of this?” Duncan moved his body before me once again, but I pushed at his upper arm.

“Duncan, please,” I begged. “Don’t stand in my way.”

“All well and good asking that of me, but what from exactly?” he barked. His blood-splashed face was twisted in confusion as he took hold of both of my arms and held on. “How can I stand in your way if you do not tell me what it is you’re doing!”

Rafaela winced as she hoisted the hammer above her shoulder where it rested. “Aldrick is not the first and will not be the last whose mind is infected by the will of the Defiler. Gates will be erected, and Duwar will not stop his campaign to be free. But the gates are useless if there are no keys to open them.”

“They need to be destroyed,” I said, aware everyone was listening. “The keys. Duwar will never have a chance of freedom again.”

It was the only way.

Duncan’s face shifted between emotions. He wrestled with what I told him. Before he could refuse or say anything else, I stepped in close and pressed both hands onto him. On tiptoes, I raised my aching body and placed a kiss on his hesitant lips. “I need you to stand by me. It will be one less person I’ll need to ask for forgiveness when it is over.”

“This was always the plan, wasn’t it?” he said, looking between Rafaela and me.

I nodded, glancing at Rafaela and wishing I could borrow some of her defiance.

“Why?” Duncan breathed. “Why did you keep this from me?”

I shrugged, unsure which excuse to pick from. “This is my choice. The key is in me. For as long as it dwells inside me, or any other Icethorn – we threaten the lives of the people we are sworn to protect.”

He knew I was right, deep down, they all did.

Duncan looked to Rafaela, distrust thundering in his verdant stare. “How dangerous is it?”

We both noticed the grimace on her expression. She did well to hide it. “The labradorite is the second vessel strong enough to contain the key. If Robin binds the power into the stone, I can destroy it.”

“You are asking Robin to do exactly what we have just fought against Aldrick to prevent.” Duncan’s entire body hardened into a shield before me. “No. I can’t let you both do this. Not until we have all discussed every option. This is not only your fight but also ours. All of ours.”

“This is the only way,” I pleaded.

“Perhaps so, but I love you enough to make sure you make this decision with a clear mind. We have time to make it,” Duncan spoke softly, although there was no ignoring the demand that lurked beneath each word.

“Erix,” I called out, noticing Duncan wince as I did.

In seconds, my guard was there. It seemed it was my turn to take control of his mind. Doran had done it, then Aldrick. I refused to let him suffer in the hands of another again. But for that, I had to play the game of monsters.

I dropped my hands from Duncan’s stomach, reluctantly tracing my fingers down his frame.

“You called on me, Robin?”

I nodded, locking eyes with Erix, not able to look anywhere but at Duncan. “Restrain Duncan.”

“Robin, wait.” Duncan tried to stop me, but his attempt was futile. “Think about this.”

I had, over and over, so many times.

“I do not understand…” Erix said, looking between me and Duncan. “Why?”

“Do it. Don’t let Duncan out of your hold until I give the command. Have your gryvern stop anyone, friend or foe, from getting near me. As your king, am I clear?”

I expected Duncan to fight, but he didn’t.

“Yes,” Erix said, grimacing as he stepped toward Duncan and took a hold of him.

Since when did victory hurt so badly? Because right then I felt nothing but pain, like a thorn in my heart. I tore my gaze from Duncan, unable to witness the anger that coiled in his eyes when he looked at me.

We all knew he could’ve fought free, Erix wasn’t exactly holding him tightly. But it was the meaning of my action that hurt him. But I silently vowed that this would prevent true destruction from ever gracing Wychwood. I did this to save them from a future always under threat.

I knew little of how Erix controlled the gryvern, but suddenly they screeched in threat and broke apart, flying down to the ground. The Hunters scrambled for their weapons again, and even the fey gathered at their sides at the new threat.

Althea locked eyes with me before the gryvern thudded into the ground, creating a wall between us. She’d not heard this conversation, as her focus had been on gathering the chaos left after Aldrick and controlling it.

I sensed the question in her eyes, but there was no time to answer it.

Erix pulled Duncan away, deeper into the circle of the gate. The mist had returned, twisting around their ankles. Both men looked at me with similar expressions. I couldn’t stand to punish myself with their attention any longer. I knew this decision was the right one. They would see.

It was the only way, just as Rafaela had confirmed, to finally stop this.

“They will hate me for this,” I said to her, allowing my inner anxiety to spill out of me.

“Hate is the other side of love,” Rafaela replied. “My people will also hate me, but it is the only way. You are saving their lives. Doing this will prevent Duwar from ever returning to this realm and laying waste to it. It is not only the right decision, Robin. It is the only decision.”

Destroying the gate was temporary – more could be built. But without the keys, a gate was nothing but stone.

“I hope you are right.” I faced the labradorite before me. Altar’s bones .

“I give the stone the Icethorn key, and you shatter it?”

“Precisely,” Rafaela confirmed.

“If only Aldrick had been alive long enough to see this,” I said, reaching out and pressing my palms into the sharp edge of the stone’s surface. I felt it sing beneath me. The stone trembled to life beneath my touch. It drew me in with such force, I knew that trying to remove my hands would result in a battle. “It would have been one of life’s greatest pleasures to see as he watched all his years of hard work crumble before him.”

It was an odd feeling, the blood seeping out of my wounds to creep toward the stone, defying the laws of nature. Ice crept over my fingers the more I pushed it out of me and into this vessel. It crackled across the dark stone slowly, spreading and devouring. I opened the power deep within me and pushed it harder, expelling the pressure into the stone. There was no need to spill blood, it helped with the extraction, but I could’ve done it without it. As Aldrick had said, the key could have been given willingly. He just chose otherwise.

It wasn’t my innate power that flooded out of me, but the wild storm that dwelled deep inside. The presence of cold, which filled me the moment I’d accepted the Icethorn power all those weeks ago, awoke.

I closed my eyes as the sensation overwhelmed me. The stone flickered its unseen tongue, tasting the Icethorn key. Then, its teeth peeled back and sunk inside it, latching on like a leech. I cried out. The sudden pain was overwhelming, all-consuming.

I tried to call out for help, but my body refused me.

“Do not stop, not until it has it all!” Rafaela shouted, but her voice seemed quiet.

At what cost?

My mind pleaded for me to pull away, but I feared the stone had me shackled. It pulled and pulled, sucking the power out of me. I felt the marrow in my bones shiver, my veins knot and blood hiss.

I squinted through the wild winds that tore around me. Rafaela fought against it, hammer poised and ready. Her braids whipped like snakes around her skull.

As the stone drew the Icethorn key out, I witnessed a new horror. A vortex of dark smoke turned the middle of the gate into a sea of shadow. All but one stone was alive, fuelling the gate, opening it.

Deep inside me, I felt the gate crack. Like a door being forced, but not completely, just enough for someone to peer through the crack on the other side.

“I’m… opening the gate!” I shouted, my throat raw and bloodied. “Rafaela, what have you done?”

“You are not, I vow it.”

Erix and Duncan were swaddled in the shadow, trying to reach me. My scream had made them forget orders. Duncan, now free from Erix’s hold, ran into the centre, my name sliced across his lips. Behind him, Erix flapped his wings and became airborne. He looked down at the reaching waves of shadow that tried to pull him back down.

Duncan couldn’t have escaped it. His powerful arms cut through the walls of shadow and mist that slowed him down, trying to fight his way toward me.

The darkness rose up to his waist, then his chest, then to his chin.

Deep in my bones, as the stone continued to drink the Icethorn power from me, I sensed it crack open like a door on hinges that desired oil. I tried to pull back from the stone, but it was too late.

One moment Duncan was there, the next, he was gone, slipping beneath the wave of shadow and not coming back out of it.

And I knew, without question or thought, where he’d gone.

The gate had claimed Duncan. It had pulled him from the small slip my power had encouraged open. Without Elinor’s key, it wouldn’t have been enough to free Duwar. But his presence leaked out into this realm and captured what he desired.

I locked eyes with Erix, who flew out of reach of the shadows. For a moment, the world went quiet. I saw into Erix’s wide eyes and read his intention.

Erix didn’t hesitate. His silver eyes dropped from mine, and then he was gone, diving into the swell of shadow beneath him.

Like Duncan, I felt Erix’s soul leave this realm and slip into the one that waited through the crack in the gate.

The key’s presence was fading within me. I felt it, the final will of the power clinging onto me. I reached out my will and held onto it, entering a competition with the labradorite stone. I refused to give it up. If it took the key completely, Rafaela would destroy it.

Duncan and Erix would be lost.

Forever.

The gryvern dispersed with Erix’s disappearance. Wherever he had gone, his command on them didn’t stretch. The creatures scattered, clawing through the air and fleeing from the gate.

Althea was suddenly visible, standing just out of reach from the gate’s boundary. She was shouting, commanding no one to pass into it, human or fey. All the while, her attention was on me. I would never forget the look on her face. I was sure it would haunt me for all of time.

“Stop resisting, Robin,” Rafaela commanded. “Finish it, give it all and I can break it.”

I hissed through clenched teeth as I expelled my desperation. “I can’t… I need to keep it open.”

“They’re gone!” Rafaela’s hands twisted around the handle of the hammer, her biceps protruding as she kept it hoisted. “Before anyone else is put at risk, give the gate the key and let me destroy it.”

I refused to listen, refused to believe they were gone. I didn’t deserve to feel the sadness that stabbed through me. Not when there should only be room for guilt. “Give them more time.”

“No,” Rafaela spat. “You do not understand the threat this poses for the future. Finish this, or I will destroy you alongside the gate.”

Her threat was wasted, I didn’t care. How could I fear for my life when my actions had already destroyed me? I wouldn’t wish to live if I came out of this without Duncan. Without Erix.

Despite Rafaela’s warning, I held on for as long as I could. Rafaela promised me this was a choice, to give the key up – she was wrong.

“Do not resist it, Robin.” Her screams coiled with the winds that became one.

Come back to me. Come back to me.

“I – I can’t.”

I will not give up on you. Come back.

I felt the grasp of the key weaken, loosening its grip one finger at a time.

Cold tears stung my cheeks. I refused to blink for fear I would miss something within the shadows of the gate.

The force pulling me into the stone weakened. It was as though it repelled me. Now the stone had the key, it no longer wanted me. It had what it thirsted for.

I understood then why death was a kinder option than experiencing the extraction I’d just been through.

I stumbled back, legs giving way as I fell into the bloodied mud at the stone’s base. The shadows reached for me now. I reached for them in return, wanting to slip through the crack in the gate, to follow the two men who’d been taken from me.

Rafaela brought the golden hammer up above her head. It caught the fading light across its golden head.

“Forgive me,” I spluttered into the shadows. Then Rafaela brought her blessed weapon down upon the labradorite plinth. It cracked, fractures running across the stone in veins. Golden light burst outward.

Three attempts. That was all it took.

Pelts of stone exploded outward. The rain of debris fell upon me. I felt my skin split as the stones sliced across it, but I had no energy to lift a hand to shield myself. Nor did I care.

Rafaela moved to the next stone and the next. She destroyed the keys with grace and ease. The Cedarfall key broke first, and then the Elmdew key, which required more force than the rest.

Only the final stone, powerless and keyless, was left standing.

Rafaela fell to her knees. She pawed into the ground, hammer discarded at her side, wings splayed out around her like a tattered blanket.

I scanned my eyes over the gate as the smoke that twisted around us melted into the earth until not a single sliver was left.

My breath hitched as my eyes fell on the bundle of two bodies in the middle.

No. No. No.

I dug my fingers into the sodden ground, dragging myself toward its centre. Toward the tattered grey-leather wings of Erix, who unfolded his body from the second body – off of Duncan, who lay motionless beneath him.