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May 28 - June 3, 2024
“Idiots,” she hissed. “I want her hands, not her head!” The soldiers dragged me back and forced me to kneel, placing my wrists on the stone slab. My hands! Oh gods, she wanted to take my magic.
Here lies the last key before The Rise.
One celestial event, and it will be of no worry any longer. She finished just in time. Seven more moons, and the merge happens.
steel sliced through the air with a nearly musical whistle. I closed my eyes tight, and I swore I heard him whisper, “I’m sorry.” The sound of metal rending flesh and steel hitting stone rang through the silent room. Pain shattered my mind, and I screamed.
Yup, I hate him. Death to Vincent
Maybe I’ll find you a new, less bloody coin.” Dianna’s hand brushed mine, and I tightened my fist around it. “No, I like this one.”
Gods above, I loved the smell of fear. It was almost as intoxicating as my other favorite indulgence.
I stepped into the brothel and the screaming began.
Oh shit, is that Jaska and Killium?!?!?!
akrai.
My gut was telling me something was not right.
I turned back toward the bar, looking at the array of clear and multicolored bottles on the back wall. The bartender returned and dropped a platter down in front of me. Blood dripped from the edges, the scent nearly overwhelming. Veruka and Orym’s heads lay atop it, their eyes drawn back and mouths agape as if they’d died screaming.
“This is what you’d risk everything for? Where is the rest of her?” he asked, his eyes dropping to my chest. “She barely has any tits.” My skin prickled, and my breathing quickened at the familiar sound of those boots against the floor, the measured steps I had conditioned myself to listen for. One step, then another, and every cell in my body went on high alert. “She makes up for it in other places.” Kaden.
I angled my body and clasped my hands behind my back, slipping my ring off and placing it into my pocket. Samkiel couldn’t know what was going on here.
YOU IDIOT
Isaiah sighed, and I felt him shift behind me. “So, how does this go? You come quietly, or we take you screaming?” I squared my shoulders and stepped forward, my words laced with venom. “Oh, baby, you couldn’t make me scream on your best day.”
I stepped away from Kaden. He smiled and unsheathed a glowing dagger. I snickered, my fear draining away. “Typical, Kaden. I’ve been stuck by bigger.” “Doubtful.” He grinned.
“This blade will fix everything, Dianna. No more blind hatred or broken heart.”
NO I CAN’T TAKE IT
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Kaden shook his head. “I can make it all go away. You won’t remember anything. I can make you love me again.”
He is a sick fuck
“I know that I still care, and no matter what I’ve tried, I cannot remove you from my fucking veins. You’re it, Dianna. You always have been.” “You killed my sister.”
We can go back to how it was before everything.” “You mean when you forgot every birthday I ever had? Or when you couldn’t even remember what food I absolutely hate? What about my favorite color, huh? The places I love to visit? My most precious memories. What makes me laugh, Kaden? What makes me smile? What makes me cry? You don’t know because you weren’t there. You never were. There is no us. No happy moments or love because I was nothing more than your puppet. A weapon you pointed and used. There was nothing. There is nothing. You. Are. Nothing. To. Me.”
By the old gods and new, I was no longer the scared girl who held back but a queen born of darkness, flame, and anger.
His words died on shattered glass and broken wood. The windows erupted into the room, and we both looked down as the small devices came to rest on the floor. They beeped once before exploding into a cloud of piercing white noise and deep gray smoke.
my wife.
Thunder roared behind me, the sound of Kaden’s wings. In all of our thousand years, I had never seen his true form. He’d never shown me, just like he’d never shared anything with me.
Every single part of me ached, and my lungs hurt with each gasped breath, but I would not surrender to him, to them, to any fucking one. I’d drag them to Iassulyn with me.
“I don’t know. I think I did pretty well.” Isaiah’s grin widened, showing off his bloody teeth. “Not nearly.” I grabbed my twisted, broken wrist and reset it. “Wipe the grin from your face. I’ve been fucked harder than you hit. You’ve done nothing.”
“I hope they rip her to pieces and send parts back to you.” “They?” My boot dug into his chest a fraction harder, and I crushed the bones between my fingers. He writhed but managed to gasp out, “Oh, yes. Your brothers.”
He was going to erase me? Us? All so he could convince her that she was his? Hate slammed into me with volcanic and overwhelming wrath, but the fear was even greater than that. I was terrified that I would lose her, that I had wasted my time with Ennis and not rushed to find her. If I was too late…
My Dianna
When my mother passed, and my world was once more in turmoil, instead of losing control, I focused all of that dark rage and forged the Oblivion ring and sword. As soon as it rested on my finger, all of those harrowing feelings left, and now I knew why. Now I understood the look on my father’s face and my mother’s tears as she held me that night. I did not make Oblivion. I was Oblivion.
“Bring your queen home.”
I had said it that night, and he had. Under stars, on a lake at night with sparklers and moonkrest who were rare and eternal. And now I wouldn’t remember that or the first time he made me laugh. I wouldn’t remember the festival and the face he made the first time he tried cotton candy, my heart fluttering as I laughed—really laughed—for the first time in ages. I wouldn’t remember the photo booth he could barely fit in, that stupid garden at Drake’s, or that damned flower I’d tossed away the first time we fought. That was when I thought he despised me, but I’d stared at it for days as it
...more
My world. My heart. My lost soul.
I took a shaky breath when I noticed that Isaiah and Kaden were gone, nothing left of them but ashes floating on the wind.
WAIT, ARE THEY DEAD? or just escaped?
Kaden and Isaiah
Dammit, still alive!
“Oblivion,” Isaiah whispered. “How did you get that from Mera?” My lips curled in disgust. “I did not get it. I am it. Oblivion is not something anyone can take from me.”
“Do you wish to see why I am king, and you two are a forgotten page in history, torn and tossed aside?”
“I think you’re a fool. Truly. You believe you can beat me here and return to Dianna.” I raised my hand and willed the gauntlet away to reveal the ring I had made, the one that matched hers. “Dianna will never choose you, even with all your conniving and fail-proof plans. She chose me and has every day from the moment she laid eyes on me. She left you then and never once looked back. Not. Once.” “What is that?” Kaden hissed. “You stole our amata mark, so I did the next best thing. She is my wife, my only, and she will never again be yours. Never.”
Kaden’s knees hit the ground with a dull thud, his eyes wide with shock. I watched with satisfaction as his head lulled to the side before slipping from his shoulders.
FUCK YES, PLEASE LET IT BE REAL!
I held his gaze with calm satisfaction, knowing Kaden would never again come after Dianna.
akrai?”
akrai.
but all the dried blood on her made me want to go back and kill him again.
So Kaden is legit dead?!
Her eyes dropped back to mine. “You destroyed a world for me?”
She nodded to Isaiah’s slumped form. “I’m assuming Kaden is dead?” “Long overdue, but you assume correctly.”
Vincent kneeled in front of me and pushed his cloak to the side. He pulled out a folded bundle and unwrapped it, revealing my hands. I held out my wrists, and when he carefully cut away the bandages, I felt my magic crawl forward. I jolted back as my hands mended to my wrists, feeling that comforting cool balm wash over me, my power settling into my veins again.
Wait, WHAT?!? too many twists and turns, honestly
“I’m still so sorry, Cami.”
“I didn’t mean what I said.” Tears filled his eyes, and not knowing what else to do to help him, I pressed my lips to his.
Elianna nodded, but I saw the grief in her eyes. “He’s dead. Kaden’s dead. I don’t know how or why, but I know it. I feel it.”
Oh lord, don’t tell me Elianna is technically Kaden’s mate?!
“And besides, we have this.” Vincent opened his cloak, revealing the medallion inside.
“What do you know?” “You’re out of time.” He smiled at me. “The true king has returned.”
“Prepare for Tatil’ee.”
