Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Briony
At first, I think the Empress’s elite guards have come to arrest us, assuming Odessa is much cleverer than I ever gave her credit for and has reported us to the authorities.
Then I hear the screeches and cawing, the crack of wings and the evil hissing.
I would know those sounds anywhere. They are sounds seared into my very soul.
Demons.
Demons here in the capital of Slate Quarter. Deep within the realm, they’ve infiltrated this far.
I peer across the crowd, a crowd that’s now panicking. People pushing and charging, screaming and shouting, clinging to children and pulling loved ones in all directions. The sky is already dark with dusk, but I see them in the air, swarms and swarms of demons. So many I can’t even count them.
Blaze sees them too, tossing back his head and roaring, breathing streams of fire up towards the heavens.
The sound only throws the crowd into more of a frenzy. People fall. Some stumble. People trample over each other or barge them out of the way.
And the demons seem delighted by the chaos, swooping down to attack the people below them, scraping at them with their claws, biting at them, tearing their flesh with their talons, carrying a small child up into the air.
“No!” I scream, shooting my magic toward the demon that has the child in its grasp, vaporizing it into dust and then catching the falling child in the embrace of my magic.
My mates race to join me on the platform, all of them funneling their shadow magic toward the attacking demons.
“Demons!” I say. “How is it even possible?”
Beaufort shakes his head, as mystified as me.
The Professor says, “There’s no protective barrier anymore, Briony. It was only a matter of time.”
This is our fault. All our fault. The demons are attacking the people from Slate, from my home, because of us and our foolish actions. The guilt pangs in my stomach as I continue to fire my magic toward the attacking demons.
It’s mayhem down there in the crowd, and that’s my fault too. These people gathered to listen to me and created the perfect opportunity for a demon attack. All of us caged into this market square, easy pickings for the demons circling in the dark sky above us.
“We need to get people out of the square!” I yell. “Away from here and into their homes!”
I swing my head from side to side until I spot Fly and Clare watching aghast from behind me.
“Clare! Fly!” I snap. “Get the people to safety! Get them away from here!”
When they don’t move, I shout louder. “The children! Fly! Clare! Help them!”
Immediately, my friends race toward the crowd while together, the five of us fight off the demon attack as best we can. They’re not even interested in us this time, more obsessed with the easy pickings below them.
From the corner of my eye, I see Clare and Fly reach the edge of the crowd, beckoning people toward the streets, pulling them away, helping an old man to his feet when he stumbles.
Thank the stars for my friends. Thank the stars for their clear thinking and steady heads.
I continue to fight, and I can see we’re starting to make a dent in the attack. I try to focus on that and not the bodies on the ground, the blood running through the cobbled stones. There’ll be time for healing in a moment. We need to stop them first.
“This isn’t working,” I shout, as a demon slips past my light, swooping down to swipe at a man sheltering his wife and children in his embrace. “We need to combine our magic. It’s stronger that way.”
The others murmur their agreement.
I take a step forward, ready to blast the hell out of these demons.
And that’s when it happens.
Like slow motion. Like time has deliberately altered so there’s no way I can miss the awful events in front of me. Like a horror story unfolding before my eyes. And I’m too slow to stop it.
Clare’s deep in the crowd now. She reaches out to grab someone’s arm, someone frozen in terror.
Odessa.
Odessa’s arm.
She goes to yank her into moving, but Odessa swipes at Clare’s grip, pushing her away, and Clare stumbles. Stumbles backward. Tumbles to the ground, hits it hard, and there’s a demon there.
“No!” I scream, swinging my light in its direction.
But I’m too slow. Too late. Too hopeless.
It stabs its sharp talons into her soft belly, rips through the flesh.
Clare cries out, her face full of pain, anguish, astonishment, betrayal.
I hit the demon with my light, and it explodes into ash. Ash that floats away on the harsh cold wind and falls onto the open wound in Clare’s body.
“Clare!” I scream, running her way.
Fly is already by her side, dropping to his knees, the cobblestones soaked with her blood.
“It’ll be okay. It’ll be okay,” I say. Just like Thorne, I’ll save her. Just like Dray, I’ll heal her. Just like Fox, I won’t let her go.
I run as fast as I can toward my two friends, blasting demons from the air as I go, pushing through the people with a determination and anger I think I’ve never felt before.
I drop to my knees beside Fly. He’s cradling Clare’s head. Her glasses are missing from her face, her eyes fluttering closed.
“Briony,” Fly says, his hand on Clare’s belly, attempting to stem the blood that gushes from the open wound. “Do something, Briony! Do something!”
I send my magic into the wound. I find the torn flesh, the slashed organs, the blood pooling inside my friend, the potent venom. I try to mend it, to seal it, to stop it, but there’s so much of it. So much damage. So much carnage.
And all the time, more of her blood pools around our knees, soaking into our pants and into our boots. The metallic scent of it is harsh in my nose.
Clare murmurs something. I think it’s my name.
“No,” I say. “No, no, no, Clare. Hang on. I can do this. I can heal you.”
I try again. I mend one bit only to find another bit splurging blood, and another bit.
And then there’s the poison. The demon venom. I can feel it in there too, cold and bitter and deadly.
“Beaufort! Dray! Fox!” I yell. “Help me!”
It feels like an age, but finally Beaufort’s there beside me. I feel his magic alongside mine, helping to pull at the wound, trying to shut it. I hear him grunting and groaning.
I’m working so hard, my arms tremble and sweat drips into my eyes. I can feel the light flickering, as if I might be drawing the last beams of it, as if it’s reaching its end.
“Briony, I don’t think—” Beaufort says.
“No!” I say. “Don’t say it! Don’t say it, Beaufort! We saved Fox. We can save Clare. We’re magical. We’re powerful.”
He doesn’t say anything else, just keeps on working.
Then I hear Fly sobbing beside me.
I glance at him.
“It’s too late, Briony,” he whispers, holding her precious head against his chest. “She’s gone.”
“Don’t you say that, Fly,” I scream. “Don’t you say it!”
“Briony,” Beaufort says softly.
“No!” I yell.
I jump to my feet, nearly slipping on the blood-soaked cobbles.
“Fox!” I yell over the din, the noise and the chaos. “Fox!”
He’s by my side in a flash.
“You can save her,” I say, pointing toward Clare’s body, unable to look there myself. “You can turn her. Turn her into your kind. Give her immortality, Fox.”
He stares back at me, a blank expression on his face. He doesn’t move.
I take the lapels of his coat in both my fists and shake him, shake him hard.
“Fox,” I say. “Do it. Do it now!”
He doesn’t move. Instead, he wraps his arms around me, pulls me against his chest.
“I can’t, Briony. It’s too late. She’s already gone.”
“No,” I say. “No!”
I sob, my whole body shaking, shuddering, acid burning in my stomach and up my throat. My legs buckle. My head thuds.
I push him away.
“No!” I scream, snapping back my head, my arms outstretched around me—
And then this light. This light from deep within me, soars up into the sky.
I thought my magic was gone. I thought I’d used every last drop of it. But this is something else. Something deep within me. Something so strong it’s blinding.
Beside me, Fox staggers away, lifting his arm to shield his face against the scorching heat and intensity of it.
It finds every last demon in this place – every demon hanging in the sky, feeding on the corpses, lurking in the shadows – and it obliterates every last one of them into ash.