66. The Price of Vengeance #2
"I was... supposed to matter," she whispered, genuine confusion in her eyes. As if she couldn't understand how all her ambition had led to this moment, dying on a temple floor.
"Everyone matters," I said quietly. "You just chose to matter in the worst way possible."
She hit the ground hard, red blood pooling beneath her.
I spun around.
"You simply prolong the inevitable," Moros murmured through Olinthar's throat, raising both hands. Invisible forces slammed into Thatcher like a battering ram, hurling him across the temple. He hit the far wall with a crash, sliding down and clutching his shoulder.
I launched myself forward, star blades screaming through the air. Moros whirled, golden light erupting from Olinthar's hands to meet my attack. The blades shattered, but I was already forming more.
"You’ve decided to join in?" Moros laughed, and that same crushing force caught me mid-leap. I slammed into a pillar, ribs cracking from the impact. "How touching. Siblings united in death."
Thatcher pushed himself up, wiping blood from his chin. Our eyes met across the chaos-filled temple.
Remember what Sulien used to say? Thatcher's mental voice carried a ghost of a smile.
"The storm's only as strong as it is alone," I finished, another blade growing in my hand.
"But two winds together can tear the sky apart."
We moved as one. Where Thatcher twisted left, I struck right. Where his power warped flesh, my fire carved through defenses. We'd spent our whole lives as two halves of a whole, and now, facing corruption incarnate, we finally fought like it.
He sustains everything we throw at him. Thatcher groaned down the bond.
Maybe we need to try a different approach .
"You think your bond means anything to me?" Moros sneered, trying to track both of us at once. "I am eternal."
"So were the rest of the Primordials," Thatcher said calmly, his power making Olinthar's knee buckle mid-strike.
"Until they weren’t," I finished, shooting three star blades into Moros's exposed side.
The Primordial's scream of rage shook dust from the ceiling. "You are insects. I have devoured civilizations! I have?—"
"You talk too much," we said in unison, and then we were on him.
Thatcher's eyes blazed brighter. Olinthar's arm suddenly twisted backward with a wet crack.
Moros is corruption itself. Like a parasite, I sent down the bond.
Perhaps we need to cut out the toxin, then.
We just need to wait for the right moment. Wear him down.
"Enough games." Moros's fury shook the temple, and both his hands rose. I hit my knees, my light flickering as I fought against the pressure. Beside me, Thatcher struggled to stand, his power warring against the force trying to flatten us.
But we'd bought what we needed—distraction.
"Now!" Thatcher roared, and his power surged. While Moros focused on crushing us, Thatcher's will invaded Olinthar's body unopposed.
Olinthar’s flesh began to split. Muscle twisted and coiled, pulling itself apart. But Moros fought back instantly—golden light poured from every wound, trying to seal what Thatcher tore open.
"Get out," Thatcher growled.
The sound was horrific—wet tearing and snaps. Ribs bent outward with sharp cracks as Thatcher forced the Aesymar’s chest to bloom open like some nightmare flower.
"Casting me out won’t be so simple, children." Moros's growl made the temple shake.
The force crushing us faltered as Moros lost concentration. I rolled to my feet, stellar fire blazing. I’ll keep him busy , I shouted to Thatcher through the bond, then launched myself at Moros's back.
My blade found its mark between his shoulder blades. He made no sound, but he whirled to face me. And that gave Thatcher the opening he needed. More of Olinthar's flesh split and peeled, revealing the shadow-tainted depths within.
"Simple girl." Moros's hand shot out, invisible force closing around my throat again. But this time I was ready. Light erupted from every inch of my skin, burning through his magical grip. “You know not what you do.” His silver eyes stayed locked on me. I bared my teeth into a smile.
And then his chest cavity yawned open.
Wrapped around every organ was a black substance clinging and dripping like tar in some places, slithering into the ether like shadows.
Nausea claimed my throat. Vile. It was vile.
Golden energy slithered across the wound, working to repair the torn skin.
"You want to wear flesh?" Thatcher's eyes blazed, and I saw it then—just a split second, when my brother's eyes burned Primordial silver. "Then suffer in it."
I darted in from the side, star blades slicing through tendrils of golden light that tried to protect Moros's true form. Each cut made the shadows writhe and recoil, weakening his grip on Olinthar's body.
"You’re just a parasite," I snarled, driving another blade deep into the exposed mass of shadows. "What will you do when you have no true form to cling to?"
Moros's rage was volcanic. Invisible force erupted from the open chest cavity, slamming both Thatcher and me backward. We hit opposite walls, but we were in it now. We were ready for anything. And so we moved once more.
"Vorinar gave me something truly special.” A voice seemed to purr around us. No sound was coming from Olinthar’s lips. More of that black, tar-like essence poured from the gaping chest wound as Moro’s hold weakened. “New inspiration.”
And then Olinthar went completely still.
Moros's true form erupted from the chest cavity, a geyser of liquid shadow and writhing darkness that evaporated into mist.
Olinthar's body collapsed, his chest a ruin of torn flesh and exposed bone.
The cavity Thatcher had created gaped wide—I could see his spine through the gap where his ribs should have met.
His heart still beat weakly, visible through the wreckage, each pulse sending more corruption pooling across the stone.
He should have been dead.
But divine healing had already sparked. Golden light flickered around the wound's edges. Ribs twitched, trying to remember their shape. Flesh crawled slowly, trying to bridge the gap. His chest rose and fell in wet, bubbling breaths.
We did it, I sent through our bond, limping toward my brother. Blood ran down my back in rivers. We actually beat him. We ? —
"A noble fight indeed, but you know not the forces you deal with," a voice hummed through the chamber. "I existed before your pantheon drew first breath, and I will exist when the last star dies."
"Maybe." Thatcher stood calm, blood caking his arms where Olinthar’s light had burned him. "But not here. Not in this world."
“Then perhaps, in the next.”
Reality tore open.
It started as a single point of absolute nothing—the most vicious, soulless, black. Then it spread, a jagged wound clawing its way open. I stumbled, my eyes darting towards Thatcher. He was backed up, creating space between himself and the emptiness.
“This is the space between realms.”
It was the endless dark, the vast expanse where somewhere, the other three pantheons might be waiting among the cosmos. This was the hungry absence that had swallowed three-quarters of divinity during the Sundering.
And it wanted in .
The tear widened, edges fractaling and reaching. I felt its pull. It wanted to unmake things, to drag them under and scatter them.
"What did you do?" I screamed at Moros's dispersing form.
That terrible laughter echoed from everywhere and nowhere. "I opened a door. And your brother helped."
The pull intensified. Chunks of dissolving temple fell upward into nothing. But it wasn't random. The wound had chosen its meal.
It wanted Thatcher.
His feet slid across the stone as the pull focused on him. He tried to anchor himself, tried to use his power, but what living matter was there to manipulate? His abilities, so mighty against flesh and blood, found no purchase on this wound in existence.
I dove for him, our hands clasping just as his feet left the ground. The hunger pulled at him with inexorable force.
"Hold on!" Stellar fire blazed around us both as I tried to anchor us to reality. My power fought against the nothing, insisting we existed, that we mattered, that we would not go gentle into absolute night. "I've got you!"
But the expanse didn't just want Thatcher—it needed him. I felt my grip slipping, felt him being drawn toward that terrible absence.
Let go, he sent, mental voice calm despite everything. You'll be pulled in too. Save yourself.
Never! I poured everything into holding on—starlight, divine strength, mortal stubbornness, and twenty-six years of love. We stick together! Always! That's what we promised!
Some promises can't be kept, Thais.
This one can! This one will!
Laughter echoed from nowhere and everywhere—Moros's voice, bodiless but still present, dispersed but not destroyed. "If I cannot have him here, I'll have him somewhere else."
"No!" I dug feet into cracking stone, felt it dissolve beneath the strain. My fingers were going numb, starlight flickering as the hunger of the Abyss began eating at me too.
“When you ruined my initial plan, I had to form another. ”
Thatcher's hand slipped another inch. Another. His gaze met mine—wide with knowledge of what was coming. Not fear. Never fear, not from him. Just sadness—a wretched, terrible grief that spread across his golden eyes.
Tell them what happened here, he sent. Tell them about Moros. About the other realms. About the breach between worlds. Tell them they need to prepare.
Tell them yourself! Tears streamed down my face. We're getting out of this! We always do!
Not this time. I love you, Thais. I won’t go down without a fight. I’ll be waiting for you.
Don't you dare say goodbye to me!
His hands slipped from mine.
"Thatcher!"
I lunged forward, fingertips brushing his as he fell backward. Our eyes met across the threshold. I saw him mouth three words—then the tear snapped shut with predator's jaws.
"No, no, no." Stellar fire sparked uselessly from my fingers, trying to tear open a wound that had already healed. "Come back. Please come back. You can't—we had a plan—we were supposed to do this together—we were supposed to…"
Silence followed, absolute. I collapsed where the tear in reality had been, hands clawing at solid stone that showed no sign of the horror that had just swallowed my other half.
And then there was a wet cough.
I turned slowly, tears streaming, to see Olinthar struggling to breathe on the temple floor.
His golden eyes now, free of silver corruption—found mine.
Recognition flickered there. And something else that made my stomach turn—satisfaction.
Even dying, even after everything, he looked at me like I was a possession he'd created.
"Thais." Blood bubbled from his lips. "Daughter."
The word made me want to vomit. I stood, each movement mechanical, automatic. A star blade formed in my hand without conscious thought.
"There's the fire." He actually laughed, blood spattering the floor.
The blade rose. Its light reflected in those golden eyes—eyes that showed no remorse, no regret, no feelings at all.
"You're nothing." I choked out.
"Am I?" His lips curved in a smile that made me want to scrub my skin raw. "I live on in you. In every star you summon. In every breath you take. You'll never be free of me."
I brought the blade down.