Chapter 52
Terra
The five of us bolt through the decaying forest. Screams of terror fill the night air and my lungs burn viciously with each step I take.
“What’s happening?!” I shout over my shoulder as I dare to look back. The trees are draining of their color, as if the dirt sucks the life away from the roots. They shrivel before falling and breaking the earth with their hollowed trunks.
Finn’s hand is clasped tightly over mine, fear blazing through his eyes. Raine, a few steps ahead of me, yells above the crashing trees, “Someone is getting rid of the forest, so we’re all out in the open. Stay on high alert!” A tree falls in our path as he says the latter and more screams bellow in the distance.
“Fuck,” Finn growls before pulling me in another direction. Kai and Corvus curse under their breath as well.
“Should we take to the sky?!” Kai yells but Finn shuts that idea down quickly.
“And be an obvious target with two crowns up in the sky for all to see?” Finn shouts back. The roar of the falling trees is deafening. Kai curses again between breaths.
We finally reach an opening and burst out into a large meadow. Four other groups are already gathered here too, opposing one another with their crowned students hidden in the center of the groups. Everyone seems too stunned to do anything. We all just watch as the trees crash to the ground. The entire forest is leveled in a matter of minutes.
Dust and black smoke rise from the debris and one sole individual stands in the center of the destruction, clutching the long black hair of a severed head dangling at his side.
“Edgar?” I whisper his name.
The students recoil at his power and disperse in different directions, herding their crowned individuals to the backs of their groups.
The five of us remain still, stunned and shocked, not certain yet if we should be running as well.
Edgar’s lifeless eyes lift to me and he starts walking slowly towards us, raising his hand in front of him just as he did when he attacked me on the bridge.
“Move, now!” Raine shoves me behind him as his Shadow falls over his shoulders as heavy black smoke. Finn doesn’t waste a second, pulling me to run, but I can’t unlock my eyes from my brother.
More than anything I don’t want to give up on him, but he’s not giving me a fucking choice anymore.
I plant my feet firmly and I tear my arm from Finn’s grip. He looks back at me with surprise.
“We can’t leave Raine to fight alone,” I shout. Kai and Corvus stop running too and glance uncertainly at one another.
Finn’s brows pull together in anguish but he nods. “Okay. Kai, keep going and keep your fucking head.” It’s not funny in the slightest but Kai bursts out laughing, maybe from the shock of it all.
“I’m staying,” Kai says firmly.
I look back to Raine. Edgar approaches at the same slow pace, calm and forceful, the head in his hand bleeding profusely and making my stomach churn. It’s one of the queens, her long black hair muddied from the ash of the trees and her own blood. It doesn’t look cleanly cut; it looks like he ripped her head from her body.
Raine’s Shadow grows to an enormous size, bones rising from the darkness around him and forming the ominous Shadow dragon I’ve only seen once before. The bones of wings rise into the sky, and an entire being made of nothing more than shadows and bones lets out a roar so deafening it shakes the ground.
“Are you sure he even needs our help?” Kai says in awe as the Shadow beast flies above us. Raine looks back at us. His eyes aren’t as confident as his power suggests.
Amser calls from the back of my conscience. Sully has broken all the casts. The Destiny Shadow cannot fight him alone.
My stomach clenches and dread consumes me entirely. “Yes, he does need our help.” I run back to Raine’s side and ignore his angry shouts for me to flee.
Finn takes my other side and glares at Edgar. “We don’t need to fight. You already have a crown,” Finn says icily to my brother in an attempt to prevent any more bloodshed.
Edgar’s soft brown hair is matted with crimson. His face is already horrifying with the missing flesh over his jaw and teeth, but there’s something sinister in him now. More than just his Shadow’s darkness. It’s his own rage and malice too.
“I have to collect two,” Edgar says eerily. His voice is a ghastly, broken sound. It shatters my heart because it makes him seem so inhuman.
“Two?” I say, eyes widening. How fucking terrible.
“It’s nothing personal,” Edgar mumbles as he raises both hands toward Finn and darkness whips out toward his neck. A flash of fire catches and lines Finn’s neck like an iron neck guard. The darkness collides with Finn but he holds his footing.
For a moment, we stand in silence. It’s too morbid to imagine how it came to this. How my sweet, pure-hearted brother became this.
I step forward, conjuring my power. Tick marks of time arch above my head like a clock. Edgar looks at me and a flicker of pain sears through him, but the emerald green that once lit his eyes is gone. An unsettling red has taken its place.
He looks like he’s merged with Sully, but his eyes aren’t gray. Amser speaks quietly in my mind. The headmaster cannot control Sully. No other Shadow can.
I grit my teeth and prepare to attack my own flesh and blood.
“Don’t interfere, Terra.” Edgar’s eyes narrow on me.
It’s too late for him. I’m not going to let him kill Kai or Finn.
I shut my eyes briefly, then imagine slicing his leg off. A second later, a flash of black cuts into Edgar’s flesh and his legs sloshes to the ground. He throws his head back and laughs.
Kai vomits behind us. Raine doesn’t wait to see if Edgar will retreat. His Shadow dragon sucks in air and a blinding light forms in its mouth. Not a fraction of a second passes before it unleashes its fury. It douses Edgar in a powerful assault, the strength of which causes the wind to lash around us violently.
I shield my eyes and sturdy my stance. My heart is wearing a hole through my chest.
The light vanishes, and Edgar is still standing. My chest sinks as I stare at his bleeding leg. He easily shielded the attack from Raine and dismissed the remnants of it with the flick of his fingers.
“No fucking way,” Raine growls between gritted teeth.
My brother lifts his hands once more and aims for Finn. It’s now or never, I tell myself as I instinctively pull Finn out of the way. Edgar’s attack makes a snapping sound but is invisible to the naked eye. Remember what Arthur taught you.
I take a long, deep breath and link my fingers with Finn’s. He looks at me, those amber eyes flashing with affection and fear.
“Do you trust me?” I ask as Raine’s dragon collides with the ground and shakes the earth beneath us. Kai clings to Corvus as he unleashes his massive flying Shadow.
Finn looks at me steadily, unwavering. “Completely.”
I siphon his Shadow into me. The space it takes burns like fire inside my flesh. Finn sucks in a breath and winces against the dust that surrounds us. His flames wisp around his body as if the phoenix is dancing at our power. My clock etched in the air in turquoise shines brightly with Finn’s flames.
“Together,” Finn says through gritted teeth.
The pain that burns inside me is agonizing but I smile weakly at him and nod. “Together.” Then I shut my eyes and sever the Shadow perfectly, leeching Laphia from Finn.
The burning ceases and the dust clears as Edgar guts Raine’s dragon. The Shadow cries out and withers away. Raine falls to his knee and looks a moment away from passing out. Sweat clings to his brow and his jaw clenches tightly.
“Edgar.” I say his name not with rage, but with gentleness. His hate-filled eyes lift to me and I hold my hand up with resolve. The power inside me is strong enough to destroy him completely, but I hesitate.
He looks relieved when he sees the flames and time marks lingering above my head. He wants me to finish him.
But how can I?
He sees my hesitation and lunges for me, his Shadow emerging from his spine and crafting into a truly horrifying creature, a decrepit, bony person holding strings like a puppet master pulling at Edgar’s limbs.
Amser roars inside me. Now or never.
That snaps me back. My jaw trembles but I crush the last remnants of our bond and let my Shadow loose. Amser erupts from my veins, cloaked in fire, bearing four tails and a vixen appearance as it descends on Edgar. It takes the strings of his Shadow between its teeth and severs them. Then it turns on my brother and ignites his entire body into an inferno.
The sight of his body going up in flames makes my knees give in and I fall to the dirt. Finn clutches me and helps me back to my feet, carrying me over to Raine. The three of us stand together, watching the flames in silence.
Amser looks at me for a moment and a flash of black strikes through its torso, sending it back into my vessel. I clutch my chest painfully and wince. Edgar lies on the ground with his arms spread out. He’s burned badly, but his skin is already repairing itself. He slowly stands, lets a low chuckle out, and spits blood.
“Fine. I’ll leave your precious friends alone, dear sister,” he says coldly.
Edgar’s skin completes its healing, leaving behind the cursed wounds that remain bony, and sways his gloved fingers over his leg. The blood vessels come to life on the detached portion of his limb and reach back up to his body in greeting, connecting with all the corresponding pieces. His bone aligns as he walks away from us without another word to find another crowned student.
We don’t try to stop him.
“He’s—” I trail off.
Finn bends down next to me, setting his hand on my shoulder and taking a deep breath.
“Let’s just be grateful he took pity on us. I can’t say I’ll do the same for them,” Raine says with disdain and I look up in time to see another group approaching us. They want our crowns.
“Raine, we?—”
Corvus gives me a grim, understanding glance. “We have to, Terra. They aren’t really giving us a choice and I want to get the fuck out of here in case Edgar has a change of heart.”
There’s always a choice, isn’t there? To not be vile? What are we giving up if we concede to the dark? Perhaps this is what the exam was made to do: break our spirits. Loosen our hold on our humanity.
Two crowns glisten within the opposing group. The sun rises behind them, casting their faces in shadows. That shift in reality settles upon me.
I’ll do it here. I will save Raine.
Silence ensues as I watch Finn’s phoenix tear through the sky and rain down on them with flames too bright to look at. Kai and Corvus slice students across the chests with their Shadows extended on their arms like blades. And as the blood starts to tickle my nose, I shut my eyes slowly.
My Shadow shifts outside my body once more and attacks other Shadows approaching us. They bleed black liquid as the different creatures bite, stab, and tear at one another. It’s all so volatile and raw. The heat of the massacre rolls into the dawn and I spot a male student reaching up and aiming an enormous ebony bow at Finn.
He will do.
I charge at him and place both hands on the male’s back, forcing all my focus into drawing the blight from Raine and funneling it into this vessel. I don’t think of anything but the future I crave with Raine by my side. Amser thrums in my bones and a surge of energy passes through me and into the man’s back.
The male cries out and falls to his knees, writhing and pulling himself into a ball as the blight takes hold of him. I stare at the man’s face and horror falls over me as I realize what I’ve done. Who I’ve placed this curse upon.
Aervin.
Raine gasps behind me as he throws a lifeless body to his side. He looks from me to Aervin and back. His eyes are so much clearer than they’ve been and I think he might smile at me, but a forlorn frown pulls at his lips.
“Terra, what have you done?” he says in a low, disappointed voice.
My hands tremble and I look back down at Aervin. He was aiming right at Finn, wasn’t he? His eyes are wide and he cries out in agony, clutching at his chest.
“I—I can’t let you go, Raine,” I cry and look up at him with desperation. He only gives me a sad, distant look before he lowers his head.
“I’ll take care of the rest,” Raine murmurs as he presses a weary kiss to the top of my head. I open my eyes and look at him, my lower lip quivering. He brushes his thumb over it, looking at me with great sorrow burning behind his eyes. “Don’t watch.”
But I do.
I watch as he walks past Finn and the others. He stops in the center of the battlefield, his dragon above roaring with fury that must resonate deep within Raine’s own heart. I watch with a defeated frown and slumped shoulders as he reaches his hand up and fists the air. The students on the other teams still, their eyes wide with horror. Then Raine pulls his hand down quickly, and as he does, blood spurts from all of their noses. Brain matter mixes in the fluids that exit their skulls, drawing vomit to my throat. They fall one by one and then all at once.
Not a single person remains standing, and the stench of their deaths hangs heavily around us. My throat tightens and I want to scream. I want to leap into the depths of the sea and scream until I drown, taking all these horrible images with me.
I look down at Aervin, no longer squirming in pain. Blood leaks from his nose and his eyes stare far into the distance. His blonde hair is muddied from the ash.
A chill sets deep into my bones. I killed Edgar’s friend after he spared mine.
I’ve become the one thing I hate most.
Raine wades through the bodies until he reaches the crowns. He bends down and severs their heads and then he stands in place and looks at what he’s done. At least fifty bodies lie motionless around us. The ashy terrain provides a somber embrace for them.
Finn’s phoenix dissipates into the air and Raine’s dragon fades until it’s nothing but black dust on the wind.
“We’ve become exactly what they wanted us to,” I say in a hushed voice, staring at the bodies.
Finn falls to his knees and lets his head drop, but Kai starts to sob. His soft cries are all that I can hear as we gather ourselves enough to walk to the center of the arena.
Raine holds one head while Corvus holds the other. They cradle them gently, as if they can still feel. I guess it’s better than the callous manner in which Edgar carried his.
“Raine,” I mutter but he ignores me. I clench my hands at my sides. “Raine, I only did it to save you.”
He finally looks back at me and grits his teeth. His lovely black hair is wind-blown and falls over his forehead messily. “I know,” he says slowly and pauses. “But what did it cost you? What did it cost your brother?”
I flex my jaw to keep the tears from falling. “I didn’t know it was Aervin.”
“You can’t trick fate. I wish you would’ve listened to me,” Raine says sadly. The others look at us, not bothering to say anything. What can be said?
The gilded bowl glints in the distance and I let out a relieved breath. I want this to be over.
Edgar stands over the bowl, dropping two heads before we get close enough to draw his attention. He shoves his hands in his pockets and waits for Darkflies to arrive. He has his two crowns, so I guess now he doesn’t want to hurt us.
We remain on guard as Raine and Corvus drop their heads into the gilded bowl. The six of us wear blood and silence alike.
I can’t look at Edgar—because of my guilt and because he’s no longer my brother.
After five minutes of waiting, someone else appears in the distance, a female, carrying a male comrade behind her. My heart falters as I catch sight of her white hair stained with blood.
Lucina has Aervin’s limp body slung over her back, struggling to carry his weight, and she screams.
“Edgar—she killed Aervin!”