Beyond the Veil (Zodiac Academy, #8.5)

by Caroline Peckham

“I will tear the heavens apart for this,” Roxanya Vega snarled, the curse of a true queen lashing across the heavens and scoring them with her conviction. “I will shred your world to pieces and rip your hold on destiny from your fucking fists with blood and fire and vengeance for this,” she screamed at the stars, her power making the ground beneath me tremble, magic unlike any I’d ever felt before burning its way between the realms as she forced the stars to take note. “On my life, I curse you. On his life, I curse you. And for our fate, I’ll end you!” The power which blasted through The Veil pushed me to my knees, and I turned my face up towards the heavens too, a snarl on my lips as I joined her in that curse and made a vow of my own. If she refused our fate, then I would too. I would fight with whatever power remained to me and use whatever I could to see an end to this injustice. If there was any way for us to reunite our souls once more, then I would give all I had to do so. There was only her. My one, my only, my wife.

“You can do this. You were born to wear the crown, and you can bear the weight of it no matter how heavy it becomes,” I swore to her.

“When one falls to the dark, the other shall be their guiding light,” Merissa murmured with a frown, those words familiar to me.

In all honesty, I had no further interest in my Acrux heritage. I was happy to leave all claims to it behind in the taking of my wife’s name. I was a Vega now.

“Hail Vega was the most powerful Fae of our time-” “That time is done,” I replied firmly. “But the time of the Phoenixes is beginning now. They will rise to power. And I will be there to help see it come to pass.”

“My daughters have been forged in a fire far hotter than any a Dragon might hope to tame.”

“The one where I swore to love and protect your daughter with all that I was for all the time I had in that world and the next. The one that I joined her in when she vowed to change our fate at the cost of the stars if that was what it required. She has sworn to defy destiny in the matter of my death, and I have sworn to do all I can to defy it too. So will you help me, or would you rather allow your distaste for me to leave her grieving and alone for the rest of her life?” I demanded.

I moved up behind her, coiling my arms around her waist, leaning in to press my lips to her neck, goosebumps rising across her flesh at my touch like she really could feel me. “I’m here,” I promised her again. “And I’m not giving up. We’ll rip The Veil to shreds if that’s what’s required for us to be together again. I’m yours Roxy. There is only you,” I swore, holding her tighter while the world fell to ruin in her flames surrounding us. “I’ll burn it all if that’s what it takes,” she breathed and I could have sworn her words were for me, that she’d felt me there, knew I wasn’t giving up. “Then burn it all, beautiful. Every fucking piece of it,” I growled, because whatever the price of our reunion cost, I’d pay it. Anything it took to return to her. Everything it might cost me.

“We never could have predicted Lionel’s allegiance with the Shadow Princess. A Nymph who was cast into nothingness by Queen Avalon so very long ago. However could you have known she would return as what she is today? How could you have foreseen the power she would offer Lionel, to strengthen and bolster him when he could never have been strong enough to claim the throne alone.”

Little Gabriel was waving a white bunny toy in front of her, and Gwendalina giggled at the sight until he hid it behind her back, and she cracked a sob like she believed it was gone forever. Gabriel brought it back again and Gwendalina’s face immediately lit up while Merissa laughed. “You will like bunnies always, I think,” my wife murmured, kissing Gwendalina’s smooth black hair.

I stroked my finger down Roxanya’s nose as she curled into me. “You are always so content, my little love,” I said. “Except when you are cold or sleepy or hungry.” “The same as you then,” Merissa jibed, and Gabriel laughed as a smirk pulled at my mouth. Roxanya’s beautiful little face wrinkled, and I could sense a sob coming so I moved closer to the fire. “Which is it then? Are you cold?” The fire’s warmth rolled over us and Roxanya looked almost smug as I held her there, rocking her close to the flames.

“The old Guild was made up of the twelve power families, as you know,” Marigold said. “The balance was set, each of them made equally as powerful as the others. Alphard, Vega, Acrux, Capella, Altair, Pollux, Rigel, Andromeda, Denebola, Castor, Betelgeuse, and Pleiades.” “Yeah, then one of them stole a stone from the other and upset the power. The story says it was Alphard from Altair, but some versions of it say it was Acrux from Vega,” I said, caught up in the story. “And that set out an unending chain of destruction,” Ren added. “Powerful assholes fighting powerful assholes for their stones, each seeking to become the one ruling power.” “The stones were hidden,” Marigold said with a nod. “Far and wide, each family fighting to keep the power from their enemies.

“Mistakes are found along paths with dead ends. The good thing about having feet is that we can always use them to turn back.”

Even in defiance I’d been his pet, his prize, his protégé. The Heir with the crooked crown.

“Never liked him. Big ego, tiny Dragon.”

She had a world waiting for her and a destiny so great that even the stars weren’t certain of it yet. She’d been born to topple mountains and make the stars quake; she’d been born to ruin and rise.

She was mine, my one good thing, the keeper of my heart and the shackles surrounding my soul.

“You’re Darius Vega now. And you weren’t built to bow to anyone.”

She was my light when I had been so lost in the dark. She was the mirror she made me face, the truth I needed to see.

When all hope hinges on a promise forged of lies, Beware the threaded minds of blood and chaos. Unlikely friends and broken bonds may shift the tide, Cleave open the walls of the lost in the depths of the unholy night. Unleash the souls tethered in the tainted dark, Unite the rising twelve and toll the bells of fate.