Chapter 24
Chapter
Twenty-Four
Barbie
Two miles from the Veil, our army carved defensive positions into the rocky terrain. The morning sun painted the grey stones in hues of pink and gold, a moment of beauty before the horror.
We formed a U-shape with military precision: the heirs led the blade-wielders on the left flank, magical users were lined up behind me on the right, and Killian held the center in his terrifying half-dragon form.
The heirs looked like they’d just stepped out of legend.
Rowan made the ground pulse with each breath.
Silas’s wolf-human warrior form rippled with violence, his amber eyes tracking the horizon.
Louis had gone full vampire, fangs extended, movements unnaturally fluid and unmistakably lethal.
Cade’s armor shone like liquid metal. Each carried a blood blade, saving their elemental magic for when I would need to channel it.
I tapped my foot restlessly. Hundreds of our strongest magic users were arranged in rotating groups behind me. The plan was simple: they would channel their power through me in waves, I would devastate the Shrieker ranks, and then our bladed forces would clean up the remnants.
Cassius and Rock flanked me, serving as my bodyguards whether I wanted them or not.
Killian commanded the center. Instead of a blood blade, he wielded the starlight sword I’d once considered stealing from his bedroom. It hummed with otherworldly power in his clawed grasp.
The horizon went dark.
The ground vibrated, a constant tremor from thousands of metallic feet pounding the hard dirt.
“Steady!” Killian’s roar shook dust from the rocks around us.
“Steady!” the heirs echoed down the line.
Our warriors gripped their blood blades, knuckles bleaching white, but not a single soldier broke formation. These were no green recruits; they were hardened veterans and survivors of the last Shrieker assault.
The enemy crashed into the tips of our U-formation like a tsunami.
Up close, the Shriekers were worse than memory served, a horrific fusion of machine, animal, and humanoid, all wrong.
Bones leaked black oil, tentacles writhed from their backs, and scorpion tails dripped acid that hissed and ate into the stone.
They were creatures held together by nothing but my father’s will and pure malice.
“Hold!” Cade’s voice carried over the beginning carnage. “Wait for Goddess Barbie’s signal!”
We let them push deeper, drawing them into our kill box.
“Channel!” I screamed.
The first group of magic users, a dozen including America, slammed their power into my back. Fire, air, metal, earth, water, and raw rage merged in my core. I shaped it, compressed it into a single, apocalyptic point, and released.
A vertical line of annihilation carved through the Shrieker ranks. Where it passed, nearly a thousand simply ceased to be, vaporized into drifting piles of ash. A triumphant roar went up from our forces.
“Group two!”
The first wave of mages staggered back toward the Veil, utterly spent.
The second group slid into place, power already coalescing around their hands.
This time, I unleashed the energy in a horizontal arc, scything through the enemy’s front line.
Hundreds more vanished, their death shrieks a symphony that made my ears ring and my smile widen.
A third blast punched a hole straight through the center of their ranks, shattering the abomination army’s formation.
“Now!” Cade screamed.
“Charge! Mighty vampires!” With a piercing battle cry, Louis led his warriors into the breach, a streak of crimson lightning under their flapping banner.
Shifters poured in after them, some outpacing the vampires in fierce, unspoken competition.
Blood blades sang through the air. A wolf warrior decapitated a Shrieker while simultaneously dodging tentacles aimed at his spine.
Another shifter wasn’t as lucky; a scorpion tail caught him mid-leap, its venom dropping him to the ground, convulsing.
In response, an enraged vampire buried his blade deep into the Shrieker’s faceted eye.
The battle dissolved into controlled chaos.
Our strategy held firm. Fae warriors at the top of the U-shaped line showcased centuries of swordsmanship, turning slaughter into a grim art form.
Mages at the bottom-left flank cut down any Shriekers that tried to circle around.
But for every abomination we destroyed, three more clawed their way forward.
I worked through the fourth group, then the fifth and sixth. Each magical blast bought us another sliver of ground, but my channels were burning out fast. Soon, I would need the heirs to channel, and then…
A new darkness rose from the heart of the Shrieker army.
My father had arrived.
He didn’t walk onto the battlefield; he manifested like a blight upon existence itself. Our forces faltered as Ruin’s foul power pressed against their minds in a wave of pure despair.
Instinctively, my goddess power surged upward, merging seamlessly with Killian’s blazing starlight.
Together, we wove a shimmering barrier over our army’s collective consciousness, a shield against the psychic onslaught.
We pushed back against Ruin’s crushing presence, holding our forces from the brink of collapse.
“Don’t look directly at him!” Rowan’s voice boomed across the field, even as he himself stared down the god without flinching. “Focus on your tasks! Trust the warrior beside you!”
Killian raised his starlight sword high, its light a defiant challenge to the gloom. “We don’t kneel! We don’t bend! Warriors, steady! Today, we defend our home!”
“Today we make each other proud!” Silas roared in response, a sharp, acknowledging nod passing between them. The rivalry was gone, forged into brotherhood.
With a thunderclap, lightning erupted from Killian’s blade as he charged, a demigod dragon hurling himself against a god. The chaos warriors rallied with a unified cry, following their king with blood blades held high. They would not let him face the evil alone.
The two armies met with a cataclysm of sound, a collision that felt like the world was ending.
“Kill them!” I screamed, hurling a wave of dark flame ahead of my mate’s charge. Where it touched, two thousand Shriekers ceased to be, turning to ash. “That’s for Texas, you piece of shit!”
“And California!” a voice shouted from the ranks.
“And so many places they’ve laid waste to!”
“Good job, Scorpion!” Rock called as he led warriors through the path of destruction I’d carved. “Pace yourself! Don’t burn out!”
Deathsong giggled in his grip. Let’s go, Rocky! Time to drink some foul blood!
Cassius remained glued to my side, a silent vow to Killian. His eyes constantly scanned for threats I was too focused to see, his blade a blur whenever a Shrieker strayed too close.
My throat tightened as my mate collided with Ruin—the impact like two titans breaking the world.
Foul darkness rolled off the god in waves, an inverse flame that poisoned the air and corrupted thought. Warriors who had moved to aid Killian were already cooling corpses, slain by mere proximity to that foul power.
Icy fear stole my breath and flooded my system. My feet carried me forward. I had to get to Killian, to fight beside him.
“He’s fine, Barbie.” Cassius’s hand on my shoulder was an immovable anchor. “Trust your mate. Focus.”
“Stay outside the ring!” Killian roared at the surrounding warriors, not breaking his stare, his eyes fixed on Ruin. “Now!”
They fell back reluctantly, forming a wide perimeter, weapons ready but honoring his command.
Killian’s starlight blade met a crimson sword that materialized in my father’s hand. The impact sent a shockwave through the earth, turning the stone around them into powder.
“You are my daughter’s mate,” Ruin’s voice hissed, the sound of boiling water poured over broken glass. “For you, she betrayed me.”
“You’ll pay for every second you tortured her!” Killian snarled, the words ripped from the depths of his fury. “They say you can’t die, but I will make you wish for it!”
No being had challenged him in eons. Until now.
“You dare speak to your god this way?” Ruin bellowed, the sound shredding the air. “You will die screaming, and my daughter will watch!”
“Eat worms!” Killian roared. “You’re not my god, or anyone’s. Crawl back into the void you came from.”
They crashed together again in a brutal exchange. My mate moved with a hybrid’s lethal grace, raw dragon power fueling every strike, each blow calculated to kill a god.
It wasn’t enough to win, but it was enough to hold. He just needed to keep Ruin engaged long enough for us to cull his army.
But Ruin flowed around the attacks like smoke. Where Killian’s blade should have severed a limb, shadow simply parted and reformed. A thrust that would have pierced any heart found only void. My father wasn’t just fighting; he was demonstrating the utter futility of the struggle.
Dragon fire erupted from Killian’s jaws, a torrent of fury hot enough to fuse sand into glass. The inferno engulfed Ruin completely, and for one breathtaking moment, hope flared within me.
But then my father’s charred flesh knitted itself back together, seamless and whole.
It was unfolding exactly like his battle with the Earth deities eons ago.
My father could heal indefinitely while his opponents were worn down, their strength spent. Even Killian’s enhanced regeneration, supercharged by his dragon and our mate bond, was no match for that instant, effortless repair.
My eyes burned with pure hatred. Why couldn’t that fucker just lie down and die?
I wanted to help so badly my very bones ached. But a reckless charge would only distract my mate, giving him one more vulnerability to protect.
“Is that all you can do?” Ruin sneered, the sound grating like stone on bone. “My daughter should have picked another mate more worthy of her.”