Chapter Thirty-Three
Hyacinth
Hyacinth scruffed the cleric by the back of the neck the second she saw the flames touch the sky.
Throwing him over her head, she ignored his screams of terror as he was ripped asunder.
Her attention was on the golden light dancing into the sky, she flew forward.
Snuffles thumped somewhere below, keeping up in his sleeker body.
Her wings stirred up the leaves and snow.
The sky overhead was black, crackling with lightning.
What sparse trees were around her groaned under the weight of the winds she created as she bulldozed her way to the pyre.
That’s when she came upon the temple. A circular monument built out the side of a large cliff side.
An obsidian stone crackling with gold and purple, the same shape the cleric wore in the woods embossed on the pillar outside.
There were a few buildings spread around it, but the main one seemed to surround a courtyard that was currently billowing thick smoke.
And screams pierced the sky. Hyacinth didn’t even think before she flew into the massive stone doors at the front. Pressing her whole body into it, she roared as her wings slapped hard against the air. Come on! Let me in-let me in-LET ME IN!
The doors caved in, ripping open as smoke pushed its way out. She tumbled forward, head over foot, in a bundle of lumpy limbs until she knelt before a great pyre.
At the center of it was Austin. “HYACINTH!” he shrieked. “Get out of here!”
But there was no time. Silver chains lashed out from the smoke and wrapped around her.
She was undead—pain of the flesh wasn’t supposed to even faze her.
Yet, the feel of that cold metal against her flesh was like being carved up by a scalpel.
All her nerve endings screamed in agony as the chains burned against her skin.
It ran up and down her body. Pain! It’s all pain!
Searing, all encompassing, unending pain!
It consumed her till she was writhing against the cobblestone.
Her fingernails scraped against the gravel for any sort of purchase, but there was none.
Back arched, heels dug in, head thrown back, she howled into the night.
“Now…look…who…it…is.” A garbled, choked voice filled her ears as Marquis the cleric melted out of the smoke.
His eyes were bloodshot and there were little white, fluffy roots spreading out his nose and ears, but he was standing.
A chain of pure silver wrapped around his fist; he put a boot ontop of her chest. Forcing her flat against the ground, her wings rattled like a snake’s tail to no avail.
The cleric never intended to see reason.
He coughed hard into his elbow, clumps of mud hitting the gravel next to her. When he turned to glare at her, she saw the roots growing within his maw. They’d knocked two teeth from his gums and ran across the roof of his mouth. She could even see them slithering beneath the skin on his neck.
“You’re sick,” she gasped for air, tears spilling out of her eyes.
“And I know who infected me,” he snarled.
She tried to thrash but the chains dug in deeper.
Agony in the form of a wail escaped her throat.
Hyacinth sobbed, kicking her feet against the gravel.
“But that won’t matter soon. Lord Nexxus is most pleased with his offerings.
I will put you to the fire and walk out of the flames, cleansed in His name.
And once, and for all, all your evil will be purged from this realm. ”
Hyacinth kicked her feet, but they couldn’t move more than an inch.
He pressed his boot harder into her chest and she heard Austin’s words.
Your heart is a very delicate thing. Her attention switched to the flames.
She couldn’t see him anymore from the gravel.
Everything was golden flames. His howls of pain pierced the roar of the pyre and made her heart ache.
The shards of glass that made up her sense of reality grated together.
Hyacinth was a shattered, porcelain plate spinning in a hurricane.
The sky cracked overhead, lightning striking the temple in five different points.
Marquis glanced up, shuffling back from her in confusion.
The wind howled against his sanctuary, the flames dancing away from her and igniting the weeds between the cobblestones behind the pyre.
There were no words. The silver burned into her flesh, rendering her helpless…but she wasn’t alone. That’s when the rain began to pour. It sizzled against the golden flames, unable to put it out, but cooling down her skin.
They don’t get to burn him! They don’t get to have him! He’s mine! My Austin!
Snuffles broke through the smoke, of the same mind as Hyacinth. His tentacles wrapped around Marquis’ leg before he could react and sank his fangs into his ankles. The cleric yelled, kicking to knock the abomination off him, but Snuffles dug in with his claws and antlers.
Dryads reached out of the smoke and took ahold of the chains.
While her mud snake slithered up Marquis’ body, the trees unraveled her restraints.
She cried with each twitch of her body. Every chain peeled away like she was warm wax, taking pieces of her with it.
The pain made her body tense to the point she thought her bones might snap.
Her threads sizzled and the one on her right bicep nearly broke.
It hung on by a singular, precarious stitch as she was finally flopped onto her hands and knees.
Her dryads turned to ash quickly after, the silver melting through them.
Hyacinth pushed up on her arms, finding Snuffles ripping a tendon and roots from Marquis’ left foot. “Snuffles!” she croaked.
The rabbit let go, throwing himself back from the cleric as he swayed backward.
Her mud snake reared its head finally, facing the cleric eye to eye.
His screams of terror died in his throat as it dove into his open mouth.
Burrowing down as deep as it could go, paralyzing him and ripping him apart from the insides.
Little white roots poked out from the tear ducts in his eyes. Hyacinth was on her wavering feet just long enough to meet his gaze. Her face was the last thing he saw…before he fell backward into the flames.
“Snuffles!” she cried out, stumbling forward on limp feet.
Kicking gravel aside, she shuffled toward the flames.
Frosty rain fought against the pyre but couldn’t put it out.
Because this isn’t regular fire. A sob fell from her as the golden fire danced higher.
Mocking me. Her rabbit emerged near her ankles.
Austin’s cries made her tremble down to the bones.
I have to get him out. The thunder over her head bounced off every pillar.
It echoed in her ears. Drenched in the rain but unable to douse the flames, the only course of action… was to pull him from the fire.
“If I can get to him before the fire consumes his heart,” she choked, looking at Snuffles. “Go get Sebastian! Get Havershum. Please, Snuffles, GO!”
The red eyed, antlered, tentacle mouthed rabbit stood up on his back legs. Almost as if begging her not to, almost as if screaming it was a bad idea. But she sobbed harder, “Go Snuffles! Get help!”
And then she threw herself into the fire.
One foot after the other, she lumbered up a shifting hill of uneven wooden logs.
One cracked and split underneath her. It shot flames up her leg.
Hyacinth screamed. Her hands tried to grab another one, but her palms missed.
She forced herself on, despite the searing pain, or the heat blurring her eyes.
This is all your fault, Sabine! She sobbed, despite not being able to cry, her body stumbling forward.
This is all your fault! If she hadn’t killed Janus, then she’d still be alive and Hyacinth wouldn’t have been made.
If she hadn’t fought Hyacinth from the beginning, they wouldn’t be in this predicament…
because Hyacinth might have shared. What did she care for the actions of her body while she slept?
What is missing a few hours here or there when they could be home.
Safe in Rosemont Manor, knitting scarves or learning to make pie crust or letting Greggory read her another story?
What did she care about a little possession when she had Austin smiling at her.
Leaving little kisses on her forehead or cheek, holding her hand, or even just sitting with her.
We could have worked together! Hyacinth shrieked louder as she lost her left hand. It turned to ash mere seconds after her stitching gave out. Her body stumbled into a firm pillar and she gasped. We could have been happy! We could have shared.
But Sabine didn’t want to share. Sabine wanted revenge. Death. Blood. Her tree. That damn tree! I hope it burns!
Hyacinth glanced up into the burnt skull of Austin. Her heart stopped beating. His eyes were closed, his tusks barely hanging on. No—No! NO! NO! Hyacinth wrapped her working fingers around the chains. Her legs were simply bones and sinew, barely holding her up as she tugged. “No!"
She screamed and screamed and screamed as she pulled on those chains.
The fire shifted around her. It roared louder, claiming more of the temple.
Wooden roofs caught with golden flames as it devoured everything around her.
The smoke was so thick it made her eyelids stick open, burning her eyes directly. No! Please! No! You can’t have him!
With one last beat of her wings, she tore the chains free of his body. She went sailing backward. His heavy body collapsed over her as they splattered to the cobblestone beyond the pyre. The last thing she saw before the night took her was a flash of lightning…purple lightning.
It didn’t come from the sky.