78. Elianna

Chapter seventy-eight

Elianna

The once-calm winds became a storm from booming wyvern wings, rustling the leaves and tousling the flowers as Nox’s immense shadow eclipsed the castle garden.

His landing shook the ground, but I was up and running before he had settled. The echo of Jace calling my name from our mount carried to me on the breeze, but all I could focus on was finding my aide.

“Veli!” I called, but my voice only echoed through the floral tunnels.

I raced to the garden’s center, hoping to climb its fountain and get a better look over the area, but my steps faltered the moment the stone structure came into view.

“Oh no,” I whispered, my fingertips flying to cover my lips.

“Jace, over here!” I frantically screamed as I ran toward the sorceress.

Once I reached her, I fell to my knees beside her lifeless body. My gaze shot to the sky, then whipped in every direction of the garden, searching for any sign of Azenna .

Jace caught up to me then as the sound of the others’ racing footsteps funneled into the garden. He called to them as I gently placed my hands on either side of her shoulders.

Her body was broken, as if it had been shattered as it collided with the garden’s floor. Veli’s chest didn’t move with steady breaths, and her skin was white as porcelain, icy to the touch.

My stare met Jace’s, and all I saw in his eyes was sorrow.

“She’s not dead,” I said, voice cracking.

“Lia…”

“NO!” I roared. “I didn’t accept it with you, and I will not accept it with her either.”

“Lia…she isn’t breathing.” His voice was barely above a whisper, and I shot him a look as silver lined my vision.

The others finally reached us, and Finnian rushed over, dropping to the ground. Checking Veli’s pulse, he shook his head as he sniffled and slowly stood back up, confirming the unthinkable. Avery’s hands flew to cover her mouth as tears welled in her eyes. Zaela looked…devastated. There was no other word.

I wouldn’t accept this—I refused.

“Veli. Your stupid, reckless, foolish girl is here demanding that you come back to us. You saved us. Don’t you dare fucking die on us!” My voice rose with each word.

My jaw locked, veins bulging from my neck in anger. It wasn’t fair—nothing about this was.

Zaela fell to her knees beside me, and I lifted my stare to hers. Something rarely seen lay in her eyes—tears.

“She’s truly gone,” she whispered .

A sniffle left me, and I looked up to the sky that was falling into twilight. “You said there was an eruption?”

“Yes, but it could have been anything,” Jace answered softly.

My eyes drifted around once more and then back down to Veli’s body, halting on her hand. Gaze narrowing in on her taloned fingers, I noticed she clutched something between them—and then the sound of it carried to my ears.

“It could have been anything,” I mimicked him. “Even a witch.”

“What?” Zaela gasped, her stare boring into the side of my face as I stared down at Veli’s broken body.

I took hold of Veli’s wrist and placed her fist in my lap. Swallowing thickly, I carefully unraveled her fingers from what was held between them, and my eyes flared when they were met with a black, beating heart.

“Holy gods,” Zaela breathed. “Is that…?”

“I believe so,” I answered softly, sitting in just as much disbelief.

“Witches are immortal,” Avery whispered from behind us, forcing us all to turn.

“Well, apparently not, Avery,” Zaela snapped.

“They are,” she shot back, just as viciously. “Aside from their hearts. They can’t live without the essence of a beating heart.”

My own heart raced as I realized what she was trying to say.

“I can’t place the heart inside of her, Avery,” I said, and the words hurt more than I was willing to admit. “There isn’t a hole where her heart would be. Her body was likely crushed at the impact, and her bones were shattered. For all we know, they could have impaled her heart.” My voice cracked on the last word.

“Magic is will and intention,” Avery whispered. “And the heart still beats.”

Zaela’s breath caught at my sister’s words, and she reached for Veli’s hand, which lifelessly rested on my lap, and gently lifted it.

Carefully wrapping her hands around Veli’s talons that clutched the heart, she guided it to the sorceress’ chest, directly above where her own once beat.

“Listen here, witch,” I started, a false laugh leaving me. “I refuse to let you die. We have lost too many today and every day for a century. You’re not like those other witches. You are good .”

Zae looked at me and then back down at Veli’s body before she spoke. “Our queen needs her aide…if you leave us, you are leaving one of the rest of us to be that for her, and only the gods know where that will bring the realm. So stop being so damn selfish and come back to us,” she demanded. “Come back to me.” Her last words were spoken so softly I barely heard them.

Zaela’s hand trembled as she held Veli’s in place.

“Zae,” I started, but she shot me a look, so I sat back on my heels in defeat. Her head fell, sagging between her shoulders as the loss slammed into her, too.

“Oh my gods,” Avery breathed from behind us, and both of our stares snapped back to Veli.

Right there before us, beneath Zaela’s hand that clutched her lover’s, shadows appeared—leisurely emerging from between the witch’s talons, dancing and swirling as if carried by a faint wind.

“Mother of the gods…” Zae gasped softly.

“Don’t move your hand,” I ordered.

She flashed her hazel eyes at me, nerves filtering through them, but she obeyed.

The heart emitted an unnatural, scarlet glow, casting an ominous light that shone through both her and Veli’s intertwined fingers.

With a sudden surge, the heart in the witch’s hand pulsed a brighter red as more darkness emerged from its depths until it burst into nothing but shadows. As if made of smoke, the dark tendrils glided and danced in the air, draping themselves over her lifeless body, cloaking her like a second skin.

Zaela’s hand snapped back toward herself, clutching it close to her chest as her eyes remained on Veli.

“How did you kill the crone, Avery?” I asked warily, half turning to face her.

“I stabbed her in the heart and twisted the blade,” she answered. “She erupted a second later.”

“Essence,” I breathed after a moment. “What she spoke of was literal—it truly is the essence of a beating heart that a witch needs to survive.”

Veli’s body twitched as her bones snapped back into place. A flicker of movement stirred beneath her closed eyelids, and my lips parted as we all watched in awed silence. Everyone behind us rushed forward, looming over our backs as we all held our breaths .

The shadows enveloped Veli's entire body and seeped into her as if they were a phantom. My aide’s eyes snapped open, now aglow with their usual otherworldly radiance, except now they were a full scarlet hue.

Life surged back into her veins, causing her to take a sudden intake of breath. Her gaze, now sharp and piercing, surveyed all of us who stood over her.

“Veli?” I whispered in shock.

“What have you done?” she asked. “I was gone…no longer in my body, floating to the vale of the afterworld alongside my wretched sisters, and then I was called back…” Her eyes drifted between me and Zaela. “You called me back—willed it.”

Zae’s cheeks flushed a vibrant pink. “I don’t know how,” she answered, and suddenly it felt as if we were all intruding on a very intimate moment between the two. “This is impossible. We don’t possess magic.”

Veli slowly sat upright, both of us reaching out to catch her in case she fell. Her red gaze then drifted down to her hand, the one that had clutched the High Witch’s heart. “The realm itself is magic, Zaela. It has been woven into its soil since the day the gods conjured us all from it,” she stated. “It is why the land answers to the descendants of the first of the fae, and it is why the beating heart of a sorceress listened to her sheer, stubborn will.”

She paused. “Although, being bright enough to place it atop my corpse did help its essence sense where it was needed.”

A few nervous chuckles left me. Placing my hand on Veli’s shoulder, I said, “I have never been more thankful for stubborn will.” And she smiled—a genuine, beaming smile that I had never seen the witch bear.

She was different, though. An intense, ancient otherworldliness radiated from her like never before, and I had a feeling it wasn’t just because of her eyes morphing to that of a dark sorceress.

Zaela pulled Veli to her feet, but her gaze flared as their skin touched. She eyed her as if trying to understand what she felt from her, just as I was.

Their stares were locked on each other, and while Zae looked skeptical, Veli was giving her an almost mocking, knowing look.

“You’re different,” Zae announced.

Jace came up to my side then and wrapped his uninjured arm around my waist as if he would need to move to protect me from my own aide. I shot him a look with a raised brow.

“I am,” Veli answered her.

Shadows came out from beneath her silver hair, dancing around her face as if in answer. “They are the same, though. The shadows will not harm you unless I will them to.” Her grin was wicked.

The realization of it all hit me then. “You’re…” I started.

“I am High Witch,” she finished for me. “The coven, even when dissipated, needs balance, and the power transferred to me upon Azenna’s death.”

My mouth popped open and a nervous giggle left me as I remained beneath her stare. Despite being nearly half a foot shorter than me, Veli always had a presence that made her seem significantly taller—even more so now.

“Wow,” Finn let out from behind us all, where he stood with the others as they watched. “Well, isn’t that just the most terrifying thing I’ve heard all day…” We all gave him a look. “And we went to war ,” he added with a half laugh.

Avery slapped her hand over her mouth to hide her own giggle.

“Heir of the Realm,” Bruhn’s voice broke the brief span of silence after his joke, and we all turned towards its echo. “Your prisoners have been taken and are lined up throughout the city. We await your orders.”

I blew out a breath and turned to my mate.

“Are you ready?” he asked, and I looked to my court, whose bodies were bloodied and half-broken, but I couldn’t have been more thankful that we had made it through.

I looked up into the sky, where the sun had been setting, slipping the realm into darkness.

“It’s time. They will be given a choice to take a knee to my claim or meet their end in Nox’s blaze,” I answered, and then turned back to Bruhn. “Bring them to the battlement gates.”