Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
EZRA
Hecate reached out again, and cradled his chin in her hand. Her skin was warm, and smelled of rich earth after a rain, and a fire burning in a stone hearth. Her fingers were strong, impossibly so, yet gentle with his frail human body.
Lilith meowed from where she huddled beneath Ezra, a tiny cry that went no further than Ezra’s shadow in the massive hangar. Hecate gently squeezed his chin, making him focus on her.
“Let down your walls, Ezra Redmayne,” She ordered him. “You know what needs to be done—let me give you the strength to do it.”
He shuddered from cold and discomfort, body aching, his mind a mess from stress and fear—but he listened.
All practitioners had mental walls, born from childhood lessons on how to shield themselves from others and contain their own magic, and letting down those walls had him freaking out momentarily.
Morana’s assault on his mind was fresh and his instincts screamed at him to keep those walls up.
It took a moment or three but he managed, closing his eyes and lowering his mental walls.
Hecate was powerful—She had stopped time, and with it Morana’s magic and powers, and while Morana was a goddess herself, Hecate was not dying.
Her magic was fathomless, unending, or so it felt—it was not chaotic like the veil, nor wild like the tempest that raged around them—but a calm, unending expanse that was dark, peaceful, encompassing.
Her power flowed through his mind, soothing his exhaustion, refilling his reserves, until he was overflowing with power. There was no end to the strength She lent him, no boundaries that his mind could sense or feel.
“Wield your grave sight and do what must be done,” She said, the words echoing through his mind and body. “You know what to do.”
“Yes,” he agreed, breathing slow and measured. He did know what to do.
The residue from the Dainsleif glittered metallic gold, and he sharpened his focus and slid the merest thought beneath the far edge of the ancient wound, lifting the curse away from the divine relic.
It came away with ease, fluttering in the air above the wound, and Ezra sent a thin torrent of flame out across the curse, consuming it, eradicating it from existence.
Nothing remained, not even ash.
“Well done,” Hecate whispered. “The paradox is no more.”
He was about to heal the wound when time lurched and sprang ahead, a cacophony of sound rushing in to fill the place silence once reigned.
He cringed as the wind returned, ice and snow pelting him, puddles growing on the floor, the hangar walls groaning under the strength of the growing storm.
He ignored the storm as best he could, and reached out again with his mind, grabbing the ouroboros of life and death, his mental hands grasping and holding tight.
The cycle stopped.
The wind died immediately.
He gasped and twitched, sweat pouring from his temples, but he took the power borrowed from one goddess and used it to shatter the ouroboros of another—the death magics poured into the mortal wound, and he forced the great wave of magic to obey his will.
The death magics heeded his command and with his inner vision overlaying his physical sight, he watched as the edges of the bone grew together, fusing, flowing like water before smoothing out.
In a heartbeat, the sword wound was gone.
The skull shook violently and cobalt flames erupted from it in a spray of magic. Ezra dropped the skull to the floor. He grabbed Lilith into his arms and scrambled back a few feet as the cobalt flames grew in intensity, so bright to his eyes that he could not see through the inferno.
A voice rose from the flames, a fierce cry of triumph.
Hecate stood unbothered, a pillar of darkness against the baleful light. The wind scoured around Her, Her countenance untouched, and Her shadow reached Ezra, making the painful bite of the wind cease attacking him. He sat in Her shadow and squinted through the blue light as it grew in size.
His inner vision was near to useless, blinded by the power of Morana, and his physical eyes watered as he tried to discern what was happening.
The snow stopped falling, water dripped down the walls and the ceiling.
Metal creaked and groaned, and in the sudden quiet his ears popped and he wiped at his face, pushing back wet hair from his eyes.
He heard behind him the sounds of people shouting, engines revving, people running, but no one approached.
Lilith began to purr in his arms, kneading her paws on his wrist.
The blue fires faded, slowly, fluttering in the nonexistent wind, and in the quiet Ezra heard a soft thrumming. A deep breath, a sharp gasp of air, and the fires were blown out, gone like an extinguished candle.
A figure lay on the floor, naked and breathing hard, and vibrant red and gold hair spilled across the concrete like blood over a dragon’s hoard.
Bright cobalt eyes glowed within a heart-shaped face, and frost glittered on thick lashes and around her eyes on high cheekbones.
Around her temples and hairline shimmered ancient markings that glowed brightly for a heartbeat, then dimmed to a series of small blue tattoos that matched the symbols that had adorned the bare skull.
Voluptuous, with a strongly muscled frame, the reborn goddess was a vision of power and beauty. Her breath fogged in the air, despite the returning warmth, and as she moved, snowflakes fell from her hair to spin in the air like tiny silver stars.
Hecate lifted Her hand, and in it hung a silken length of blue and white cloth, the ends trailing on the floor, and a hand reached up and took it from Hecate.
Morana stood, and clothed herself in the wrap, Ezra politely averting his eyes until she was covered.
Where Hecate was fire and shadow, Morana was frost and light.
“Death mage,” Morana said, staring down at Ezra where he sat in Hecate’s shadow with Lilith in his arms. Her voice was a velvety alto that reached into his mind and made him smile, despite his wariness.
Hecate, he trusted not to hurt him, but Morana he did not know.
She was powerful and volatile, and if he were to make a guess, she was now restored to full strength.
Morana was a Slavic winter goddess of death and rebirth, and she was now reborn, looking down at him as if she wasn’t sure whether to thank him or squish him beneath her heel.
“Morana,” Ezra replied, dipping his chin in a respectful nod. “I am glad to see you restored to yourself.” He was proud his voice held steady.
“You would have had me fade,” she declared imperiously. “Instead of healing me.”
It sounded like she wanted to squish him.
“I thought it impossible,” Ezra replied cautiously. “I did not expect divine help.” He cast his eyes to Hecate, who stood over him like a monolith. “Such a thing was beyond me without my Lady’s assistance.”
“Fade! A goddess!” Morana hissed, frost growing across the floor under her bare feet, her hands curled into fists. The tattoos along her hairline glowed brighter.
Lilith hissed as well, her purring stopped, her ears pinned back as she stared at Morana.
“My necromancer healed your grievous wound, dearest cousin,” Hecate stated casually, as if reminding a relative to pick up the dry cleaning, like Morana was not shaking with outrage. “And here you stand, restored and free from your curse.”
Ezra kept his mouth shut and held on tightly to his familiar.
At the reminder that Ezra was a necromancer, and therefore under Hecate’s protection, Morana growled under her breath and forced herself to relax. Her hands opened and the frost growing across the floor stopped its progress and began to melt, and the glow of the tattoos faded away.
“That curse,” Morana spat, eyes glowing brighter. “Struck low by a foul fiend I hope is long dead. Long have I slept, near to death and helpless. Dain has much to answer for.”
He would not have called her helpless, considering the blizzard her skull could call down, the destruction left in its wake. And her mentioning of Dain—the dwarven blacksmith god who made the Dainsleif sword—seemed to confirm that the Dainsleif was responsible for her former state.
“Dain has not been seen for some time,” Hecate shared idly. Ezra had a feeling that both goddesses forgot he was there. Or maybe they didn’t care that he heard their conversation. “Perhaps he needs to be dragged into the light and taken to account for the weapon he made.”
“He surely does,” Morana agreed. “I must return to my lands and tend to my people, and then I shall find Dain and make him answer for his misdeeds.”
Morana glowed brightly in a flash, and power stirred in the ambient magic fields.
Hecate hummed, lifting a single finger. Morana dimmed, glaring at Hecate.
“I have revenge to administer, cousin,” Morana said, anger biting at her words.
“I believe a debt is owed, my dear. For your restoration. Surely you have not forgotten already?”
“Yes, yes, I owe you a boon for the healing,” Morana snapped, impatient to leave.
“Oh, not owed to me,” Hecate said, and She gracefully gestured to Ezra at Her feet. Lilith lifted her head and stared at Hecate in fascination. “To my necromancer.”
Oh shit.
Morana’s glare was sharp enough he winced.
“I don’t need a boon,” he tried to protest, terrified of the prospect of a goddess owing him anything. Hecate and Morana ignored him as if he hadn’t spoken.
“A mortal? You would have me owe a mortal a boon?” Morana asked, outraged. “This mortal, who wanted me to fade away into the depths of the universe, to abandon my divine responsibilities, to be nothing but an errant breeze in the chaotic storm of existence?”
Put that way, Ezra could see how asking someone to fade would be a bit problematic.
He meant for Morana to be free from her prison, and truly never considered that she might be capable of restoring herself after being so close to death for so long.
Or that Hecate would intercede and help him at all.