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Souls of the Night – Vol 3
53.
Trigger warning:
main character death, blood and violence, emotional breakdown.
I ran into one of the firemen so hard that we both bounced off each other slapstick-style and fell to the ground. I groaned at the new blow to my injured shoulder, but kept my wits enough to once again keep the smoke closing in around us at a distance with little more than a finger wave and my will. The firefighter whimpered and crawled to me, and when he lifted his head in his whole-body garment, I saw through the glass of his helmet that it wasn't a real firefighter but Floyd-the instructor who had wanted to beat me up and whom I had beaten up instead.
It didn't cross my mind for a second that the guy had simply retrained as a firefighter in less than three weeks.
"You," I hissed and bared my teeth. Suddenly all the pieces of the puzzle fell into place.
Explosions, almost all of the company's buildings affected at the same time, sprinklers and other safety equipment malfunctioning ... and someone in front of me who had only recently been made redundant here.
But Floyd stared some seconds at me- then just wanted to get past me, to find a way out despite the thick smoke and the obvious panic that had gripped him.
"Mo-Mo-Monster!" he yelled as I grabbed him by the wrist and I couldn't help but laugh viciously and hurl him with a violent gust of wind down the hallway he had just come running from.
"YOU are the monster if you planted those bombs! People are hurt! People are dying! Just because Lex fired you!? You couldn't have done it alone! Who else was involved?!" I screamed and ran after him, letting him slide helplessly on the back of his protective suit, or rather the oxygen canisters he was carrying, like a turtle on its shell. I knew I was torturing him, making more wind - literally - than I had to, clearing whole sections of it in my anger. But this was not a situation to be reluctant about conflict. And it just felt too good!
He screeched, trying to hold on to this doorframe or that piece of crumbling wall, and it sounded like music to my ears. With a wave of my hand, I flung Floyd into one of the labs. Clambered in after him, wafting toxic smoke away from the fire burning on one of the tables from burst chemical vials. With the windows now cleared, the room was lit not only by the flames but also by the blue and orange lights of the emergency vehicles outside. Whisp fluttered inside me in anticipation, urging that this would be MUCH better if I turned the fire that this asshole himself had caused against him.
"No, I don't have it anymore. You know that," I growled, almost feeling my eyes light up gargoyle-style. Floyd crawled backwards until he bumped into one of the cabinets, I took just one step towards him and he cowered in fear. It didn't faze me that I liked it. I felt overwhelmed by everything here and overpowered by this horrible situation that had ripped away a part of my life that was new but so dear to my heart. Then there was the fear for Lex, who might have been here somewhere - or somewhere else entirely! But terrifying one of the perpetrators gave me back some of the control.
Demand it back. More power, of control, Whisp hissed urgently from inside my ear. I shook my head, not knowing what it meant or how to ask for anything back. From whom? But one thing was clear to me.
"We don't need it. Thanks to you, smoke doesn't come to us and we can blow out the flames. Two of us are powerful enough."
Floyd was wailing loudly now, the lens of his helmet all fogged up despite the dry air. He was so pathetic, so helpless. I loved seeing him like this. To see him at my mercy. Kneeling on the ground where his place was. A heat rose in me that seemed familiar but couldn't have the same cause, because Alex had drawn the fire out of me. It was probably just the real heat building up around me. At the same time, I knew I was right. Whisp and I would make this work. The thought of testing our powers and blowing that same toxic smoke around us directly into Floyd's lungs suddenly seemed very appropriate. But so did beating him with my fists. I would probably start with that.
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Ares narrowed his eyes as a cloud of smoke suddenly billowed out of the destroyed windows on the third floor and immediately dissipated unusually quickly (as if by magic?). At last Ares could see what was going on in one part of the building! Finally - finally, no matter what Sharif did in the building, it seemed to reduce the smoke. And there! He saw him. He squinted his eyes.
Sharif was beating up a fireman? Okay. Dishonorable- didn't really improve his opinion of the guy but good to see Sharif had a modicum of pugnacity. Or the brutality was due to the remaining thing in him? More reason to take him out. Why did the man in the protective suit hardly put up a fight even though he was superior to Nathaniel in terms of muscle mass and size? Whatever - concentration! As soon as Sharif had forced the man in front of the window with his blows, he would have a clear field of fire. He put the arrow with the magical artifact that would block Sharif's powers into the bow without taking his eyes off his target. He only had one chance to shoot. The needle was supposedly unbreakable, but if it bent when he hit the wall or something else hard, he would have to straighten it out before he could use it again.
He loved the sound of the bowstring stretching.
Then Ares heard the air-slicing glider wings of a gargoyle. He just managed to throw himself to the side, but hadn't expected Tachi to slam the bottom of the fire extinguisher she was carrying against his forehead as soon as she landed on top of him. The metallic PLONG of the canister against his brow bone literally shook him from his toes to his very core. Then she raised the canister again and struck again. And again - and again. Until he stopped lifting his head.
Ares had always thought that "seeing stars" was a stupid comparison. Oh, he'd had no idea, then simply lay there and admired them. Tachi was able to unlock the canister without further resistance and spray him with white powder that took away all his vision. After a few seconds, only farting noises came out of the thing. Then she simply let it fall to the ground - directly onto his stomach, causing him to heave a strangled "ouch". Ares gasped for air, choked because he got powder in his throat, turned his head and wiped the cool, damp mass from his face in a daze. The heavy-breathing female's voice was strained but cool and definite.
"I said I'd stop you."
"You said that," Ares huffed, turning to the side with a pounding headache, feeling the laceration that had been inflicted. He took advantage of his somewhat deranged state to look for his weapons. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Sharif was still "fighting." However, he also saw his quiver of arrows, the bow, and the arrow with the needle. All very close to him.
"Don't even fucking try," the rookling growled. He lowered his head to the ground again and glared at the child.
"Impressive... how fast gliders can be when they want to. But it's not over yet. We can still stop it."
"Hardly."
"Don't you at least want to know what!"
"It doesn't matter, Ares, when are you going to get it? What has to happen will happen because it has happened."
"So I have no chance of changing your mind?"
"Just as I have no chance of turning you from your foolish ways."
Still standing over him, she lost her footing as his tail wrapped around hers and tugged. He immediately kicked at the stumbling girl, the claws on his feet slashing her blouse but not her skin as she just managed to jump back. Ares jumped up with a growl and went into a crouched attack stance. He hoped it looked like intent- because of the massive dizziness, he didn't trust himself to stand upright right now. Tachi hissed and in the next second was holding two things that looked like... fans? He blinked, half-blinded by the white powder and blood running down his temples over his brow. Time - he needed more time to collect himself. Just a few seconds.
"Sorry about the blouse," he said, and he meant it because jacquard fabrics were so hard to repair - that always looked like crap.
The seamstress nodded gravely, her eyes darting over him.
"I regret the use of the blotting powder - the millefleur pattern suited you perfectly and Egyptian cotton with this pattern is hard to come by."
"Absolutely, the customs regulations are a pain in the ass," Ares said, rolling his eyes in indignation, even earning a rare genuine tachi-smirk. Something that really pained Ares, because he didn't want to like anyone in this clan. He would lose his mates if his plan failed. And he would lose them if it succeeded. He accepted that if he could turn the tide. But not more. He couldn't cling to other people. It would break him to lose them.
"I want to save you!" he shouted much more emotionally than he wanted to. "I want to save my mates! Why are you all so difficult! So illogical?"
Tachi grunted grimly. "Save us? How do you not know that your saving doesn't just bring another kind of doom? A clan rises together, a clan falls together - we don't kill our own. Never."
"Lexington is probably already dead! And no one tells me those explosions were a chain of unfortunate circumstances. Humans did this! And forces SO much more powerful than a few assassins are coming soon. Your clan will fall apart because of your weakness! You are making yourselves victims! If I have to jeopardize the well-being of the human Sharif to avert the worst, if I have to accept Lexington's sacrifice for it ... then so be it."
Across Tachi's young features slid the flicker of terror, of grief, of determination before she narrowed her eyes.
"We will find ways - we always try to find ways. You're new, you don't have that confidence yet - no one blames you for that. It hurts but we also grow from setbacks. The only true victim I see here ... is you. You don't want to hurt anyone but you think you have to. You're scared."
"I'm not!" Ares shouted, spreading his wings and widening his stance so Tachi wouldn't realize how close he'd already gotten to his bow again.
"You're walking a dark path that others have walked before you. And it has made NOBODY happy. Not Demona. Not Coldstone. Give up, come home with me. Goliath will tell you our stories."
"Telling tales while we're heading for disaster?" screeched Ares and felt tears running down his face. He didn't want to cry in front of the cursed rookling with the genius spark. He was a warrior, the most important pawn on the chessboard. He SHOULDN'T be weak. SOMEONE had to be strong. Tachi seemed tired of the discussion. Not once had her features turned hateful. But pitying. Ares was ashamed that HE felt like the petulant child. He was tired of the dispute himself. No matter how weak Sharif's blows were down there - he had to shoot soon. He sensed the tide was about to turn.
"Stories of the past teach us how to deal with events of the future," Tachi lectured him.
"You are too clever and wise for your own good. You argue like a philosopher. But can you fight like a gargoyle?"
He hissed, eyes aglow, spreading his forearm spikes.
Tachi grinned, her beak full of sharp teeth. "More than that. Come and find out, uncle."
She let her mother's battle fans snap open with a metallic clink.
.
Thrashing someone in a full body suit and helmet without claws or Gargoyle strength was hardly a satisfying challenge. I was faster and more agile than Floyd- without a combat suit and anyway. But although he seemed completely traumatized by something (perhaps the general situation) and hardly put up any serious resistance, I could not get a good grip on him in his suit. He kept slipping through my soot-stained fingers and we wrestled more like children than two adults. My injured shoulder was no help either. It wasn't completely out of action, but it hurt so much that I kept feeling dizzy and nauseous. Or maybe it was the toxic fumes in the air. I finally got the snaps on his suit open and was able to rip his helmet off and give him a chinlock that was a real wallop. But he- probably on reflex kicked me hard in the lower abdomen that I screamed and stumbled back against - ( I dove away in an effort to avoid another opponent- maybe one of Floyd's accomplices), whirled around at the other end of the room- Floyd and the new person in the room in view, raised my head with a snarl and saw CHAD!
He had grabbed one of the Beefys from Laser Tag by the suit but dropped him when he recognized me with a stunned look on his face. He was half naked, his shirt and undershirt probably thrown off because it had burned, his shoes gone. However, he was carrying something in one arm that was small but still didn't quite seem to fit into the bloody protective suit. A small shift in his stance and I saw a bare, soot-smeared head poking out of the bundle.
I jumped to them, oblivious to Floyd who instantly started screeching shrilly as if it wasn't me who had just (tried to) beat him up for 5 minutes but as if Chad was the Antichrist along with the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Internal Revenue Service all rolled into one. I stumbled towards Chad, tried to take Lex from him, but his whole side was ripped open, his flying skin torn off there, his arm-! It was so surreal that his suit was almost intact, with only the fabric of his sleeve fused to the remains of his skin. His skin? No... Black charred muscle flesh and smoldering bones.
I pressed a trembling hand over my mouth to block my strangled howl.
"He's alive," Chad said so softly that the cracking and crackling of the fires, the groaning of the building around us, and Floyd's hysterical shrieking drowned him out, but I could read his lips. I was actually relieved when Floyd crawled past us and fled - who cared about that asshole? I blinked away the tears that ran down my cheeks but didn't impair my vision.
Yes- Lexington's chest rose and fell barely noticeably. His eyelids weren't even at half-mast but ... he was looking at me. I reached for his hand - the one that wasn't nearly charred to a skeleton and kissed it.
"I love you so much. It's going to be okay, m'love," I whispered shrilly, but Lex actually managed to smile and ... squeeze my hand. So weak that I couldn't even tell if it was my wishful thinking that was making me imagine this. At the same time, despite the breathing apparatus, his breath was so whistling and bubbling that you would have thought his lungs were just air holes with water running out of them. Only, of course, it wasn't water.
Chad carefully placed him in my arms. How could Lexington Wyvern - such a clever, strong, overwhelming, for me all outshining person - be so small and light? I was afraid something about him would break off. He barely had any life left in him. How could he still be alive with these injuries?
"We need to get him to an ambulance ASAP. And to the hospital," Chad picked up on my thoughts which were running off in all directions.
"Yeah, quick," I croaked, swallowing down untimely panic and premature grief. I could struggle inwardly when Lex was safe and I knew he would survive. In the back of my mind, Whisp began to chant that Lex could be saved with the fire. All I had to do was ask for it. And still I didn't know who to ask or how. But Lex wasn't dead! He wasn't going to die and was already saved because he was safe in my arms!
So I ignored the soundless words but raised my head at the sudden alarming tug on a strand of consciousness. A man neither Chad nor I knew, but in familiar protective gear, suddenly stood in the room, a gun pointed at me. Even through the spider web pattern over the cracked viewing window of his helmet, you could see the traces of tears and hatred on his face. His voice sounded tired but loud across the room.
"My brother was right. All these years. You are shapeshifting monsters - allied with nightmare creatures." His gaze went from me to Chad. "You're all monsters." Before he could pull the trigger, a jolt went through him.
The strange man looked down at himself, at the arrow sticking out of his chest. And then fell over.
Chad and I were silent and shocked for a few moments. Before Chad sighed, trotted over to him, took off his helmet, felt his pulse and then put on him his last breathing mask.
.
"See!" exclaimed Tachi, "You're not bad. You have a choice to be good."
Ares grumbled at this misjudgment and involuntarily moved further away from the edge of the roof before Tachi's battle-fan could inflict ANOTHER cut. She had allowed him to take her down briefly, had permitted him to eliminate the deadly threat to Sharif. As mentioned- truly killing Sharif was only a last resort. But afterwards, when he had reached for the magic arrow, she had ripped open his arm with the blades, cutting off a dozen of his spines in the process. His leg was bleeding profusely - one of the cuts had been very close to a tendon. The individual fan blades were as sharp as cutters' knives.
The rookling was barely half his weight and three heads shorter. But she fought like a demon, making up for her supposed disadvantages with dirty tricks like throwing gravel in its face. She had even bitten him! Bitten! But his spikes had hurt her badly before he'd even gotten to his bow and wasted a normal arrow to save the Sharif worm's life. She held her side where he had rammed his arm into her. The foxglove coating on his spikes didn't kill her, of course, but it burned and made her weak. One more blow like that and she would faint. Actually, with her body weight, one hit was probably enough if he just waited. In fact, the female just went to her knees, groaning. Her hands on the fans were shaking. Ares was on her faster and had snatched both fans from her than she could lift her head. He pushed her gently so that she toppled to the side.
"You fought bravely, Tachi. Deceitful and dirty but with honorable purpose. But your honorableness won't save anyone-my approach at least has a chance."
Ares reached into his pouch. Tachi's eyes widened as she realized what he had just pulled out.
"No! Ares. Please! This clan is capable of more. So much more. But you have to believe. My uncles-"
He let the light brown dust trickle down on her. The same one he'd used on Fu Dog on his very first night in New York. Her eyes began to flutter.
"Sleep, little Rhydderch. When you wake up, it will be over. You can hate me, but I will save you."
"No!" someone screeched and suddenly Ares had Heather hanging by the scruff of his neck. She yanked so hard on his hair that he shrieked. He stumbled, flailing his wings and arms, and dropped the bag of magical sleep dust. The hatchling dragged her claws across his face and Ares reflexively yanked the child away from him by her hair and accidentally flung her into Nash, who was about to land. Both gargoyles fell to the ground. Ares whirled around, ran to his bow and picked up the arrow with the artifact. Another look - Nathaniel was standing perfectly! And probably alarmed by his previous scream and fidgeting, and no longer affected by the smoke Sharif had managed to keep away, he just looked at him in disbelief.
.
Ares was standing there on the roof of House E, goggles and half-torn breathing mask on his face, blood running down his cheeks. When the man who had just tried to shoot me had been hit by an arrow, I had immediately thought of Ares. That the gargoyle, of whom I hadn't heard much (certainly nothing positive) since he had come with Alex and Flora from Avalon, should be here ... as my back-up - I could hardly wrap my head around that. But there he stood. With a bitter scowl, though - another arrow at the ready. He tensed his arms and I saw the bow bend under the tension of the bowstring. Chad shouted for me to duck, but all I could do was stand there and stare. He wouldn't - he couldn't - but he did.
He shot.
I didn't even think about it, my hand shot up and caught the arrow before it could scratch me. I looked down at the arrow, bewildered. Had that been my reflexes? It had not felt like Whisp.
A little clumsily, I readjusted Lex so that he was safely in my arm, shoved the arrow into one of my jeans loops and would call Ares on it later. I was as shocked as I was grateful that he'd taken out that other assassin, but the most important thing now was ...
"Die, you freaks!" someone shouted, snapping me out of my stream of thought again.
The guy - one of the Beefys from Laser Tag - whom Chad had dropped at the other end of the room earlier had regained consciousness, was standing there holding a big dark egg, ripped a metal wire off it and threw the thing at me.
"Grenade!" Chad yelled, throwing himself to the side and it was just like with the arrow before and out of pure reflex I jerked my arm up and hurled the explosive back at Beefy with a gust of wind that was again reminiscent of telekinesis. It went up in front of him and tore his body to shreds. More Whisp than me yanked up a force shield between Chad, the man pierced by the arrow, me, Lex and the rest of the room. Likewise, it was reflex to press Lex against me and turn away from the threat because even though Whisp made me aware that me and my mate and our ally were safe - when a bomb goes off, you seek cover - period.
Nevertheless, the explosion was deafening. The floor, already burdened by previous explosions, shook and for several long seconds I was afraid it would give way beneath us. Then the shaking subsided and the ringing in my ears became quieter. I slowly opened my eyes, lifted my head and saw chunks of concrete, glass and wet human scraps falling to the ground just as the soft green shimmering force field seemed to dissipate. Hell - Beefy was practically trickling from the ceiling! I swallowed down the nausea. I had never seen a human being die before. Never before had I seen someone blown to bits by a bomb. And I had practically thrown this bomb at him. I didn't know what the lawyers or the police would make of it, but we had to get out of here before ANOTHER attacker tried to kill us. Why crawl all the lunatics out of their holes on the same day?
I looked at Chad, who had just gotten back up and picked up the guy with the arrow in his chest. He did seem shaken up by all of this- but not as traumatized and shocked by killers, unexplainable smoke-clearing wind, arrows out of nowhere, exploding people, and magical force fields as he should be. Also something I couldn't possibly deal with now, tonight or this week.
Chad nodded at me as if he'd read my mind. Just out of here. The ambulances were waiting outside, and even as a gargoyle, Lex needed treatment fast. He might lose his arm. His one flying skin too. But he was a genius and rich - he'd probably build himself new body parts and I'd see him glide again - eventually. As I looked down at my dearest with a sad smile, he stared back at me. But his eyeballs were dried out from the heat and covered in dust from the detonation. His chest was no longer moving and there was no more condensation from his weak breathing into the plastic mask.
He had died in my arms.
.
Ares had been taken down by Tachi, Nashville AND Heather as soon as he had shot the arrow, so he had only marginally seen Sharif catch the projectile not a second before it pierced him, with reflexes that were inhuman AND ungargoyleesque, an icy blue glow in his eyes that was nevertheless hot, glowing, magical. Ares was struck by this defeat like it was a blow to the stomach. He had failed AGAIN. Now Sharif had the arrow and, stupid as he was, he would give it to Brooklyn and there would be no chance of hitting him again. The clan would never let Ares get that close to the threat again. And could he have stopped it at all? Right after he had caught the arrow, their surroundings had shaken under the pressure of another explosion in the very room where Nathaniel was. The children had screamed - but only briefly before a stunned silence had spread. And Ares himself, in Nashville's headlock, had had the opportunity to see the other's powers directly. A protective shield! One like OBEREON himself would have used, shimmering with the ethereal green of higher magical beings! The other was already so much stronger than Ares had hoped.
The children holding him on the ground (Nashville was biologically even older than him, but he refused to see him as an uncle) held their breath tensely as they heard Sharif's voice. A choked, questioning but basically already knowing "Lex?!"
Ares craned his neck but knew by the suddenly slack grips that all the children were watching Nathaniel mourn his mate in the other building. A stab of pain went through his heart, regret and pity that he knew wouldn't help. Tachi even stood up slowly and fixed her gaze on the other building. A sudden feeling of dread prickled the back of Ares' neck - the sensation of strong magic building up. Now he knew completely that he had lost. Perhaps he had from the start. This was no longer the place he was supposed to be.
Ares sighed, relaxing under the children's grip. Now that their attention was no longer on him, it was easy for him to take the hand mirror he had conjured up from his pocket and let himself be swallowed by it, causing the children to grasp at nothing.
.
Chad stumbled over to me and put a hand on my shoulder, but I backed away. He couldn't touch me! Not now! He - he didn't have to comfort me because Lex wasn't dead. He wasn't dead. He couldn't be dead! He was my spark, my thread, my connection to the world and to everything beautiful and my will to live.
"Lex?! Lex - wake up - breathe! Come on," I shrieked, shaking him, hating myself for sobbing like a baby between each word.
"Nathaniel! Lex- he's-."
"No! NO!" I sank to my knees, unable to hold either of our weight any longer and equally unable to keep the flames and smoke from the nearby fires at bay. Lex was so limp in my arms, all body tension gone and he looked so ... pale and old and alien! Chad stood with me, not knowing what to say. I felt the beat of wings at the edge of my perception. Tachi knelt in front of me, but I couldn't take my eyes off the ... thing that had once been Lex. It was staring at me! Without an ounce of life in it, it stared at me. Where was Lex? He had to, HE HAD to still be in there. He was overpowering someone like he COULDN'T -
"He passed away, Nate. Let's get out of here. Lexington wouldn't have wanted you to get poisoned by the fumes here," I heard Tachi's voice, and it sounded croaky, like she was fighting tears herself. Somewhere outside I heard someone yowling inhumanly and the rookery keeper in me wanted to go there because it sounded like Heather.
Tachi's clawed hands gently stroked the bare skull of the lifeless body in my arms and still I couldn't look up. Why couldn't I lift my eyes, why did I have to - he looked so horrible, my heart was bursting in my chest but worst of all were Tachi's words because as soon as she said what I had been thinking she made it REAL and that was IMPOSSIBLE!
If anybody had ever wondered what it would feel like if your heart didn't take a second from racing to a standstill, they should have asked me now. As if you braked abruptly from fifth gear in a sports car, everything in the car was flung forward by the centrifugal forces and you yourself were pressed so hard into the seatbelt that you got whiplash from that alone. Except that it happened to my heart. All the noises - Chad and Tachi's words, the crackling flames, the cracking and groaning of the building with its bursting pipes and shattered ceramics, even everything from outside. Everything faded away at the sight of my loved one.
Lexington was dead. My thread to hold on to it torn, my ... spark ... extinguished? Whisps scratched at my insides, but that was the least painful thing right now. If only it would stop ranting about "the solution" in its ethereal toneless child's voice. I just wanted to die myself.
I felt the flames licking at me and the poisonous smoke now seeping into my lungs and I couldn't even scream even though I was about to burn. I felt movements around me, someone tugging at me, trying to get me on my feet, even claws scratching me to bring me back to reality, to make me function. But why still function? For what? For whom?
Dead. Dead. Dead! DEAD! LEX was DEAD! My MATE was ... gone.
I was so hot. And nauseous. I felt so destroyed, sad and miserable. It hurt, my skin was about to become a victim of the flames myself, I could almost feel my eyebrows, my eyelashes glowing as if they were being torched. My tears evaporated on my hot cheeks. Just a few more seconds and my skin would start to sizzle. Char black like Lexington's arm. My lungs poisoned like his.
The flames, the fire were no longer my allies. Not in this body. I HATED this human body. It suited Nathaniel Sharif-it was weak and brittle and prone to flaws, just like my psyche, but I hated it, and I felt like the terror of Lexington's death, the fear that Tachi and Chad would burn to death, and the dread of burning myself alive were all retracting into myself, forming into a little ball. A ball? No. A black hole. Everything that wasn't flaming rage at this cruel fate was sucked into the void. The thread I had been able to hold on to was gone. Nothing was important anymore. I wanted to watch the world burn.
Whisp had the audacity to laugh in my head. At my stupidity. He would help me save my mate, turn back the clocks for us and let the world burn and rise anew to eradicate any further threat forever-if only I would believe and ask.
"I-" I heard myself say into the silence of my own head. "I want him back! This is not fair! This isn't happening! It can't happen. I refuse to accept this! I don't want this! I want-"
What do you want? Demand and you will receive! hissed the child's voice of the entity inside me that had made it possible for me to be here in the first place.
I raised my head again for the first time, ignoring the dancing shadows of Chad and Tachi trying to extinguish the flames that now had the upper hand again. "I want the power to undo this!" I shouted louder, "-I want him to live! I want to be happy. I want the power to control these flames and send them against those who want to hurt us! I want my power back! I want to be Gargoyle! I want my FIRE!"
And with that last word - screaming into the silence even as chaos and destruction reigned around me, the black hole inside me exploded into an infernal supernova.
.
AHHHHHH! Flora was catapulted off the bed as Alexander reared up and writhed and screamed like she didn't think a human or fey could scream. She jumped up and in that moment, through her magical bond with Alex, felt his magical barriers burst open like raw eggs. She herself was torn to the ground again by a spike of wild primal magic, feeling her skin tear open in a dozen places just from the slipstream of power Alex had kept locked inside himself against its will. Then it was gone - out of the casement windows and only the singed curtains bore witness to the beast that was free again.
Flora gasped for air, scraping together what energy she could muster. Or what she could muster again. For the pressure in her head, the pin cushion on which every inch of her body had lain for the last few weeks in an effort to carry at least a fraction of Alexander's burden, was gone. What remained were tired limbs, fatigue, but the deep relief that "it" was over.
Alex coughed in bed and Flora pulled herself up by the frame to help him turn to the side so he could vomit up a stream of ash-black mucus. When he had finished, she cradled him in her arms.
Alexander caught his breath for the first time in weeks without a frown of massive pain adorning his handsome face. He looked like someone who had finally been allowed to rest but didn't dare close his eyes.
"He's got his power back," he said in a raspy voice. Flora stretched out her rods (no longer brittle and sapless but bursting with life again - she was recovering fast) and poured him a glass of water, which he drank with reluctance.
"The war will come," she murmured, her lips against his temple.
"We will fight or die trying," Alex murmured.
"Doesn't that actually mean; we will win or die trying?"
"Not in this case, my heart."
Flora took a deep breath.
"I wish we hadn't had to leave Ares alone with this?"
"We had no other choice. We can't decide his further fate. He can only do that himself."
His phone rang on the bedside table.
Her mate (perhaps now her only mate, Flora didn't know yet) grinned his world-ruler smile again as if everything around them wouldn't shatter in a few months.
"Heh, ten bucks it's Owen," he said.
Flora - not averse to gallows humor in the face of certain extinction any more than Alexander was happy to oblige,
"I'll put fifty on Brooklyn. As a former Timedancer, he must have felt the outburst."
"Still no song?" ask the masses.
I answer. "Shut up! This chapter has 6100 words and is emotional as fuck. My main character dies here and is fucking dead, have a modicum of decency you greedy moochers!"