Chapter 71

Chapter 71

E verything in Mariah’s world tilted, instincts wrapping around her like soft hands.

“ That’s … impossible. I would never …” She released a devastated, frustrated rumble.

“ Impossible, or simply forgotten? ” Kol’s dark voice chuckled. “ Some stories are true. I was cursed from this world, bound to a prison in Enfara by the magic of all the gods. And Zadione used her blood as the key. But that meant she had to be imprisoned as well, her essence as tied to Enfara as mine.”

Mariah’s tail twitched against the rubble of the risers. “ No. You kidnapped her. Zadione is free.”

“ Her prison was not the same as mine.” Kol’s lip curled, smoke billowing from his nostrils. “She found a way out. But she is far from free.

“None of the gods are free, and they know it. Because the magic they used to bind me had a flaw. If they returned physically to this world, then my bindings would fail. Freed, all I would need is the right key, and I could return.”

A hand touched her side. “ It’s a lie, nio. There is no god of the sun.”

Mariah speared her mind for Andrian’s. “ You can hear him?”

“ Yes. Of course.”

Waves of confusion and fearful anger washed over her from her other Armature. “ I think you might be the only one. ”

Kol stretched, burning eyes fixed on them. “ Of course he can hear me. He is one of mine.”

Mariah ignored him, ignored the way her stomach dropped at the possession in his voice. “ The gods haven’t returned. If what you say is true, you can’t be here.”

“Are you so sure they’re gone? ” Red-gold eyes flickered with shadows. “ Because I am looking at one right now.”

“ I am not—” But she stopped herself. Dug her talons into the ground. Her wings quivered, her mind racing.

It was impossible.

It was … impossible .

Kol growled a laugh. “ Yes, little goddess. You are Qhohena’s—and Zadione’s—little hidden creation. That light magic you flaunt so brazenly. Have you never wondered why it’s so different from all the other gifts of your world?” He shook his massive head, more smoke and shadow drifting around him.

“Qhohena’s line of queens was her worst-kept secret. She gave that first queen her grace—all that made her a goddess—and spelled it so it would be passed down to a new bearer every few hundred years. The real golden moon goddess has been hiding in plain sight this whole time. And when Zadione followed her sister, as she always does … well, they were always foolish.”

A dull ringing filled Mariah’s head. The scent of blood and fear and her broken family still swirled around her. “ Why—why would Qhohena do that?”

Kol’s wings rustled. “ To remove the temptation from herself, I assume. With her grace hidden in a mortal, she could not be tempted to return. To break my prison and free not only me but her sister.”

“I don’t understand,” Mariah murmured. “ But Zadione escaped. ”

Behind Kol, his demons— mudae, as they’d once been known—sidled out of the gardens, claws gleaming and jaws dripping. The crowd they’d been holding at bay shouted their panicked relief, sprinting for the castle. Her Armature brushed into her closer, finding their weapons and unsheathing them. Their alarm at the advancing demons brushed her mind down their bonds, and Andrian’s gaze swept over her with concern.

Instinct pulled a growl from her throat, her body shifting around powerful hind legs.

“ I told you—those sisters are foolish. Zadione just as much as Qhohena. I mean.” Kol chuffed. “ She spelled the key to my prison to her own blood and then made an entire line of priestesses with that same blood. When I discovered the newest bearer of not only Qhohena’s grace, but Zadione’s as well, was of that same line?” The black dragon rumbled in vicious, terrible delight.

“They made it all too easy. All I had to do was manipulate those easily swayed lords to kill the right bitch, and I’d have the key unlocked and the god’s curse broken. Take your mother’s blood, force you to shift, and my return was solidified.”

The world fell away from Mariah. That ancient beast of fire and light and moonstone wrapped around her, spreading great, opalescent wings.

Kol reared up, his wings of smoke and shadow stirring the air in great beating strokes. “Over five thousand years in a prison and I have dreamed of this day for every single one of them. The day I would rise from the ashes and take my place once again, as the great ruler of this land. All people shall kneel, all people shall serve. For what is a world without its sun?”

Mariah’s gaze dropped, ignoring the risen god and falling to her mother’s body, still leaking dull black-red blood into stained and scourged grass.

The heavens held their breath.

I’m sorry. Sorry I wasn’t strong enough. Sorry I failed you.

Mariah leveled her forest green eyes at the fallen god of the sun. “ The world has existed without its sun for five thousand years. I’m sure we can manage many more without it still.”

And she launched herself with a mighty roar, snapping gleaming white teeth at Kol’s exposed throat.

Kol’s orange-red eyes narrowed and flashed. He ducked his head, protecting the vulnerable flesh. But he couldn’t evade Mariah’s powerful leap, and as her body collided with his, chaos erupted.

The demons hissed and vaulted into the sky, flying past Mariah. Drystan gave a wild cry, echoed by Quentin and Trefor before the clash of steel against serrated claws filled the gardens. Mariah snapped her teeth, lashing at Kol with razor talons. He snarled below her and they fell, crashing into more risers, toppling stones into the blooming trees and garden flowers.

With a powerful shove, he forced her back, hind legs raking down her side. She roared into the air, leaping away, her tail sweeping a path of destruction across the gardens behind her. Her Armature battled the demons as she lifted her lip in a snarl.

Mariah might’ve had the advantage of surprise, but Kol was larger and accustomed to this form after eons spent in it.

Kol shook dust and bits of shredded plants from his black scales, eyes still blazing. “Do you truly wish to challenge me here, little goddess? You hardly know this form. And think of your family, so exposed.”

But her pain and her rage and her heartbreak blinded Mariah. “You took something irreplaceable from me. You will die for it.”

Digging into the darkest, most festered parts of her soul, she pulled on the heat churning in her belly. Let it claw its way up her throat until it rested behind her teeth.

With a breath that was almost like a sigh, Mariah opened her mouth, and silver-gold flames spewed forth.

They pummeled Kol, wrapping around him with a lover’s embrace. He screamed into the air and jumped into the sky with a mighty beat of his wings. Mariah closed her mouth, swallowing the rest of her flames.

The gardens around her were now nothing more than piles of smoking rubble. Shouts of concern filled her mind and she shoved them back. A battle still raged behind her, but her focus was on the sky.

On the black dragon circling above, a shadow in the light of the sun.

“If you want me, little goddess,” Kol taunted, “you must go where dragons dance.”

Mariah lifted her lip. Spread her wings across the gardens.

“Mariah—”

Her Armature’s desperate cries were lost in the great down sweep of her wings. She shoved against the ground, lurching into the air.

Muscles she’d never used screamed in agony. Instinct took over as air filled and grazed the sensitive membranes of her wings. She clawed against the sky, releasing a mighty roar. She was off balance, but she surged up with each great flap of her wings.

Above her, Kol hovered. “ You are bold, little goddess. I will give you that much. ”

Mariah snarled, urging her wings faster. He grew closer with each burning down beat. Almost there?—

She opened her jaws, lunging again for his neck.

He dove, nimbly swooping away from her despite his size. A laugh echoed in her mind. “ Do you want to know why those lords let you go? ”

She twisted, fighting the wind, muscles in her back barking in protest. Kol banked below her, a slow-moving shadow, and she tucked her wings and dove.

He again snapped away, moving too fast for her to even react.

“ I suppose it hardly matters to you,” he murmured. He sounded almost relaxed, as if she wasn’t fighting her body and the winds to claw him to pieces. “ But when I first gave the order to have you captured … I thought you were already ascended. Only a queen could shift, you see. And I very much needed you to shift. ”

“ Fuck. You. ” Her lungs burned beneath her ribs as she again bent her body in the sky, scanning the clouds.

There. A massive shadow lazily cut in and out of the bright rays of the sun. She snarled, pumping her wings.

Kol sighed into her mind. “ Imagine my disappointment when you arrived here. Just a single bonding short!”

Mariah was beneath him now, catching her breath on an updraft, focused on the soft scales of his belly. Just one good lunge, and if she got her claws there …

“ That’s when I ordered you released. I needed to give up my little plaything to do it, but … we all make sacrifices for what we want. Isn’t that right?”

She shook her head. His voice had a way of wrapping in her mind, circling and looping her thoughts.

Enough.

She gathered her body, and with a great beat of her wings, shot through the clouds.

Mariah slammed into his underside, a surprised roar sawing from his chest. She sank her teeth into his leg, her own claws flipping, desperate for purchase.

Beneath the rays of the setting sun, its fallen god screamed. Hot blood, like liquid shadow and brilliant flame, burst across her tongue. She clenched her jaw tighter, trying to crunch the bone.

A furious, burning pain tore through her abdomen. Her jaw loosened, wingbeats faltering.

Far below, an agonized bellow echoed.

Kol twisted away from her, hissing in pain as his leg leaked blood. Mariah tried to hold herself aloft, fighting against the wind.

But the pain.

With her own desperate cry, she plummeted to the earth, her wings catching her at the last minute. She slammed into the ground, talons sinking deep, as she heaved breath into her lungs.

The pain, the pain, the pain …

She swung her head, searching her body, but … she was unharmed.

“ Feran!” That same cry rang out again. Mariah’s blood cooled.

Her Armature still fought desperately, savagely. The bodies of demons lie around them, some still twitching in the grass. Dirty and haggard and covered in blood—mostly black, but some red, too. Behind them crouched her father and brother, the former holding a short-sword and wearing a fierce, broken expression.

The guilt hit Mariah like a crushing, impossible wave.

They’d formed a ring against the encroaching demons. And in the middle of it, sheltered from the fighting, lay Feran.

The tang of his blood struck Mariah first.

He’d been cut, from chin to hip. A long, devastating slice, deep and deadly. His chest still rose and fell, his face scrunched in agonized, staggering pain.

The same pain Mariah felt coursing through their bond snapped open the moment he’d been struck.

Drystan was bent over him, blood-streaked golden hair hanging loosely around his face. His cries still filled the gardens, even as the battle raged.

Even as Kol drifted down from above, a descending shadow upon the world.

He landed heavily, favoring his uninjured leg. Dark blood dripped from the other, smoking as it hit the grass.

Despite the broken carnage around her, that sight brought Mariah some grim satisfaction.

“Enough!” Kol’s roar shattered the bloodshed. His demons halted, retreating into the rubble of the gardens.

Mariah didn’t give her Armature a similar order, but they did not follow. They bunched in tighter, hardened concern and terror and rage wrought across their faces.

“ That is enough ,” Kol seethed through sharp teeth. With a hiss, he lifted his injured leg, pushing it into a ray of sunlight speckling the grass.

Dread joined the turmoil in Mariah’s gut as she watched his skin knit back together, as the pain left his face, as that wicked gleam returned to his eye.

“ You have had your fun, little goddess. But I grow weary of these games. ”

A figure stepped out of the circle of her Armature. A figure carrying a broadsword in one hand, and wielding shadows in the other.

Andrian was defiant and furious as those shadows curled, brushing against the sensitive membrane of her wing. His fury, his fear, his love was so tangible, so potent, she could taste it.

Kol cocked his head, his gaze turning curious.

“It’s you. How interesting.”

Andrian’s jaw tightened, his fist clenching as more shadows brushed her wings. “I know you.”

The world tilted beneath Mariah.

Kol only chuckled. “I’m glad you remember.” He swung his formidable head to Mariah.

“I will make you a deal, little goddess.” Flames and shadows flickered in the depths of his eyes, the brightest light of the sun casting the longest of shadows.

“I will let you live. Take yourself, your wounded, your Armature, and your family, and leave. I will grant you temporary safety from my wrath. And in exchange …” Smoke curled from Kol’s nostrils. “ I keep him. The last of the reykr . My greatest creation.”

Mariah’s world had stilled many times that night.

This time, though, her heart truly froze.

Everything dulled. Her bright senses narrowed and focused, her world becoming only herself, Kol, and Andrian. Those heartbreakingly beautiful tanzanite eyes turned to her, and she could read his answer in them.

Too bad that, despite her failures, she was still his queen. That was not an answer she would allow him to give.

They’d only just found each other again. This monster would not be what tears them apart. She would rather cleave the world in two, would rather shred apart her body and her soul before she denied herself this single morsel of happiness. Not after everything, not after what she’d already lost.

“No—”

“I accept.”

“NO.” Mariah roared, both across the bond and into the air, the castle shaking behind them.

“No. I will not leave you. Not after everything.” She broke at the end, pain shuddering through her.

“ There’s no other choice. Feran needs a healer, and fast. Your family needs to get out of here. You either choose me, or you lose them.” Andrian glared at her. All his love and heartbreak and anger poured into those miraculous eyes. “And I … I am not worth it. Not worth all of that.”

“ No. You are worth everything.” But even as she said it, his words landed their mark. She glanced over his shoulder.

Her Armature, bloody and bruised, leaning heavily on weapons. Drystan crouched beside Feran, whose blood still soaked the grass, his breathing growing shallower.

Wex and Ellan behind them. Her father, sword outstretched despite the brokenness in his eyes. Her brother, shattered and shadowed, black and gold cuffs still clamped around his wrists as he huddled behind Wex.

It should have been an easy choice. Eight lives in exchange for one.

But she was dealing in games and trades of love, and love would always be her weakness.

Andrian rested a hand on her wing, his warmth seeping below her scales, racing straight for her heart.

“And you are worth everything to me, nio. My moon, my stars, every light that has ever graced my life. Let me be the one to ensure those lights keep shining.”

Dragons could not cry. As her grief and anguish and rage and fury heaved in her chest, scratching down her throat, Mariah realized it had nowhere to go. So instead she unleashed another roar, tilting her head back to the sky. More silver-gold flames burst from her maw, and the sound of her despair and fury clawed its way to the stars. Across the continent people turned skyward as impossible heartbreak washed over the lands.

Kol simply watched, humor glinting in his orange-gold eyes. As if he was drinking in her pain, feeding the sickness in him that had festered for five thousand years.

Mariah swallowed her flames and her pain, turning to Andrian one last time.

“I will come back for you, Rhoi. I am Queen, but without you, I will rule over ashes and dust.”

Andrian smiled. A soft, sad smile.

“I would have gladly ruled by your side, even over a kingdom of rubble, until the gods called us back to the stars. But please, nio. No matter what.” His smile fell, grim hardness tumbling over him. That mask going up, the wall of ice freezing him in.

“No matter what, do not come back for me.”

Mariah snarled.

“We will finish this conversation. When I see you again. ” She lowered her body to the ground, sending a blind tug out to her Armature. They leaped into action, Sebastian and Matheo falling beside Drystan. Together, the three men carefully lifted Feran’s limp form. Drystan face was wrought with the worst type of devastation as he cradled Feran’s head.

Something in Mariah both warmed and chilled. She’d been so wrapped up in her internal struggles, she hadn’t noticed … hadn’t seen …

And now, Drystan might lose something precious. All because Mariah was too broken to stop herself from becoming a monster.

As her Armature and her family climbed over her wing, onto her back, she fixed Kol with a world-ending glare.

“I will end you for this.”

Kol tilted his head. “I have no doubts you will try, little goddess, even though this destruction today has all been caused by you. Driven by so much emotion, you moon goddesses. But remember—” His wings rustled as he shifted, testing the weight on his healed leg.

“No matter how bright the moons shine, the sun always burns them away.”

Her family was now all settled across her back. She hadn’t realized how large she was; not truly. Not until she rose, and barely felt their weight between her wings. Her muscles were sore and tired, but she extended her wings regardless, gritting against the pain.

Mariah cast one final, heartbroken glance at Andrian, whose shadows had withdrawn beneath his skin.

“Stay alive, Rhoi . I will come back for you.” She cracked, heart splitting. “ I love you, Andrian.”

“I love you too, Mariah.” He spoke aloud, tears lining his eyes. “But, nio … don’t come back.”

Mariah latched onto his bond with all her might as she cast a final snarl towards Kol, arched her wings, and leaped into the air.

She stayed latched onto that bond for as long as she could, until the distance between them stretched too thin, and his words vanished behind her on the evening breeze.