42. Chapter 42
Chapter 42
Zeph
S he's fading, and she doesn't even know it.
Viola's magic is almost spent, and then she pulls it further and blankets the area with shadows. I have stopped trying to hold a shield, instead focusing on gathering the devotion for her that lives within the realm and weaving it together to push toward the Shadowweaver.
The shadows drop, visibility returning to the courtyard, and my jaw drops. A visceral, primordial fear comes over me as Viola stands next to a massive seps with glimmering black scales and a pointed face.
A very familiar-looking seps.
"Is that Shadow?" Mace shouts, taking advantage of the momentary distraction caused by the seps to toss a bolt of Lightning at Solarius, who narrowly manages to dodge it.
"It sure as fuck is," I say with a laugh. "She's incredible. Holy fuck."
And she is, arm broken and restrained by her dirty shirt, hair escaping from her braids, face shining with sweat and red from exertion. She looks like fury, a dark specter coming to engulf those who wish harm on those she loves .
Avidor raises a selection of rocks to pelt Mace and me. Mace redirects them easily. I do not have the magic to waste on fighting the Harvest Lord, so my brother covers me as I focus on Viola.
Shadow opens his mouth, and as if he is breathing fire, darkness erupts from his throat. He extends his tongue and wraps it around Solarius. The God of Summer fights against it, throwing Light directly on the shadow snake and dropping to the ground. The seps unhappily rears his head back and bites the Radiant Sunfire, one of his incredibly sharp fangs piercing the God at the collarbone.
Venom.
Seps have a very dangerous venom.
It'll be interesting to see how it affects a God.
Avidor abandons his attempt to fight Mace and me and chooses to join his siblings. He must realize Viola and Shadow are the larger threat.
"Go help her," I urge Mace. "I can't fight. I need to focus on devotion. She's going to burn out." Mace nods and takes off running, using his magic to hurl rocks and dirt at the Gods as he does.
I close my eyes, trying to picture the devotion around the realm. Viola's support in Ytopie has grown, and I pull from there, pushing that magic into her as she wraps the Gods with Ice-infused Shadow magic.
"You have to take their magic!" Morrow is shouting at Viola as he swings an axe at Avidor. The God uses his Geomancy to dismantle it, leaving Morrow weaponless.
Viola ducks underneath Shadow as he sinks his fangs into Solarius again. The God of Summer is paralyzed by the venom a seps uses to liquify the insides of its prey.
Viola places her hands on Solarius' abdomen and squeezes her eyes shut, muttering under her breath.
I don't have to be near her to know she's swearing up a storm at having to be so near the God.
I can feel the moment his magic travels into her because it blows me down to my knees with its sheer power. Viola screams. The combination of Summer magic with her dominant Winter overwhelms her system momentarily, and she crumples on the ground.
"Morrow!" I yell, and he snaps his eyes to me. "Shield!" He follows my eyes and throws a shield over Viola, but not before Avidor hits her with Decay, blackening her left arm from elbow to finger.
As Morrow struggles to hold the shield, I pull all of the devotion for Viola from Ytopie, leaving it empty. I filter it to her in hopes of getting her back on her feet.
It doesn't work.
I gather devotion from Dalery, next, which proves to be enough. She gasps, sitting up and looking around. As soon as Viola realizes what is happening, she's on her feet and throwing Fire at Avidor. The flames strike true, a massive fireball hitting his chest.
Hissing loudly, Shadow grabs Solarius from where he collapsed on the ground in devastation when his magic is taken from him.
Two gulps and the God is gone, finding his final resting place in the belly of a beast.
Amaryn wails at the loss of her sibling. Vines explode from her, attempting to wrap around all of us and strangle us. I burn the ones around me easily.
She screams as if it was her own body.
Solarius was the warrior, and it becomes clear very quickly that Avidor and Amaryn are not in possession of a lot of offensive magic. Amaryn attempts to take control of Shadow. She screams commands at him.
But Shadow is not a normal beast. He is a manifestation of the lethality of Viola's magic.
She learns this quickly, and a flock of the flying beast stags that attacked Morrow and Tulip quickly descends from the sky under her command.
Shadow hisses loudly and darts off, attracting the attention of the beasts and fighting them on his own.
With the beasts gone and without Shadow to act as a shield and weapon, Viola is facing off with Amaryn and Avidor again. Both of whom are trying to use the only offensive magic they have.
Mace has managed to take control of most of the Lightning magic that Avidor throws. Viola has to dodge or try to control the few that go rogue.
She manages to control one and merge it with a vine, wrapping Amaryn in an electrical vice. The heat from the Lightning burns up the vine fast, but not without injury to the God of Spring.
Morrow holds a shield and throws Fire toward the plant life the Bloomtide controls. He keeps Viola from tripping over the vines as she dodges magic with a blade in one hand and slices at the skin of the Gods.
It's a delicate balance to damage them but not allow them to grab her, and the way she dances with that dagger is a beautiful story of rage.
Every time Viola casts a spell, I feel the pull, the draw of devotion, and I search through the realm for more and more to send her. It's getting low, but the tides seem to have turned. She's managing to hold off the offensive spells and avoid injury.
Amaryn grows a circle of hedges around her and her brother, attempting to shield them long enough to heal the minor injuries that they have sustained.
The ground beneath us begins to shake and split again, and at the same time, Viola burns the hedge. The ground wrenches Avidor and Amaryn apart. Viola takes the chance to strike, jumping on Avidor and physically pushing him to the ground.
He wraps his hands around her neck, Decay climbing up her jaw. By touching Viola, he opens up the chance for her to take his magic.
His mistake.
She pulls his Godly essence into herself.
Her body seizes, shaking as if shocked repeatedly. I rush to draw devotion from Pran to help her recover quicker than she did when she took on Solarius' magic.
"Come now, Shadowweaver," he gasps, his tone bordering on begging now. "Just let me go. You've got my magic. What more can I do? Time to showcase some of that benevolence and let me walk away."
She clearly is not fully recovered, but she still grabs a weakened Avidor by the jaw. Her hand shakes slightly, but her voice is firm. "I am a cruel God. Not a benevolent one." With a wide, feral smile, she pulls a blade from her thigh and buries it in Avidor's chest.
Again, Amaryn screams a pained cry as her brother's life drains out of him, soaking the earth he once had command of. As he stills, the Decay around Viola's chin seeps out of her, leaving only a thin ring around her neck where his hands had gripped her moments before.
With only one God left, I survey the area and I am sickened at what I see.
A large vine, covered with thorns the size of blades, wraps around my brother's abdomen. The thorns dig into his flesh, and blood oozes down his sides as he tries to Decay the cursed plant. Every time he makes headway on it, Amaryn fixes the damage he caused.
I feel sluggish from siphoning so much devotion to Viola, but that's my fucking brother. I dig deep and throw Fire toward the vine, watching it swiftly burn. Mace collapses in a heap on the ground. He bellows in pain, hand on his side and blood gushing from the wound.
Morrow holds a screaming Tulip to his chest, a small shield surrounding the two of them. It's a sign his magic is waning and that this is all he can manage.
So much is happening all at once, it's hard to know where to look, what to do.
I'm overwhelmed in the worst kind of way.
Viola rises to her feet, satisfied that the God of Autumn is dead. Her eyes immediately fixate on Mace, and what she sees has a snarl jumping out of her throat.
She throws Shadow magic at Amaryn, restraining her, as she runs to Mace and drops to her knees. On shaky feet, I follow, trying to maintain my tenuous hold on the small amount of devotion that is present in Feria.
The Shadowweaver screams, her voice breaking with devastation, as she places her hands on Mace. "It's too deep. I don't have enough power!" she wails, furious tears running down her face. She charges at Amaryn, wrapping her hands around the God's neck. Without ceremony, she pulls the Bloomtide's magic and essence from her body.
I feel the overload of Spring magic as it transfers into Viola, and she collapses. Her body is falling apart. It was not built to take on the magic of three Gods in such a short amount of time while simultaneously fighting off their attacks.
Still, she lifts her head and crawls to my brother, dragging herself through the dirt by her fingertips to the background noise of Amaryn's wails of grief at the loss of her magic.
I weave the devotion from Feria into Viola, giving her enough strength to pull Mace into her lap when she reaches him. Shadow slithers over, having destroyed the last of the flying stag beasts, and wraps his body around the newly mortal Amaryn, squeezing her tightly.
"Mace, no, no, you can't. You're not allowed to leave me," Viola cries, running her hand down the wound. His eyes are foggy as he looks at her, his skin so incredibly pale.
A puddle of blood surrounds my brother's body, crawling through the dirt towards my feet, soaking the bottom of my shoes.
I've been here before.
I've seen the way blood travels.
"Please, Mace," she says, her hands on the wound, pushing all of the power she has left in her to heal it. He's practically ripped in half, bones and viscera visible as she fights to staunch the blood flow.
Her magic is nearly gone.
I pull all of Rainworth's devotion, begging no one and everyone for it to be enough to save my brother.
"You asshole, you can't leave me," she says, holding his face. "Please, please don't make me do this alone. I can't do it without you, you know that. You're the best part of me. Please, Mace, please don't leave me."
Tulip sobs in Morrow's arms, and he holds her back from running to comfort her best friend.
"You can't leave me, Mace," she cries, her forehead dropping to his. "Don't you see you've ruined me? You've made me want a future. You've made me dream and make plans for who we could be together. I was fine without them. And then I met you. You have to come back to me."
Her voice is cracked, stretched thin with emotion that is not from a God but from a woman who loves the man who is fading fast in front of her. She places her hand on his cheek, the hot tears that pour from her eyes creating tracks in the blood and dirt on his cheeks.
"You have to come back to me, Mace. How am I supposed to be happy in a world without you?
I feel frozen at her words, my breath stuttering in my chest as I fight to keep any in my lungs. I drop to my knees beside my brother, put my hand on Viola's back, and push devotion into her.
The wound is knitting together slowly, but at least it's moving now, and Viola continues to refuse to give up on the man she loves.
On my brother.
She keeps urging her Healing magic into him, and I feel a sharp draw for devotion that is no longer present.
There is no more devotion for Viola in Krillium.
Still, she fights, healing my brother slowly but surely, pushing every speck of magic she has into him.
"Mace," she gasps, staring at the wound that is still too big, "I refuse to let you die. I refuse to live this life without you. I cannot and will not do this without you by my side. "
Her voice is broken, tears streaming down her face, and for a moment, I do not see the Shadowweaver. I see eighteen-year-old Viola Mistflow falling to her knees and crying when she realizes her parents abandoned her.
I search within myself, summoning all of the devotion, love, and belief I have for Viola and push it into her.
I can feel it traveling from my body to hers, draining me and my magic as it does.
"It's working, it's working!" Viola says as the wound continues to knit closed, the speed increasing. My body is on fire as I pour everything I have into my God.
My Shadowweaver.
I am unwilling to acknowledge what this pain in my chest means as I weave everything I have into my devotion to Viola as her high priest. I can feel the pure burst of magic transfer from me to her. For just a single moment, I see a devastatingly bright flare of devotion to the Shadowweaver centering around me.
"Mace!" she gasps, and I see the wound is healed and hear my brother take a deep breath as I collapse on the ground.
Stars fill my eyes, and everything fades black, my heart slowing down.
My limbs are so heavy.
I can hear Viola now, screaming at me, yelling, shaking me.
I want to tell her it's okay.
I want to tell her that I knew what would happen and that I chose this.
I want to tell her that being her high priest was the greatest blessing I was ever given.
I can't feel her hands on me anymore.
I can't feel anything anymore.
I thought this would hurt.
I thought I would be scared.
But I'm not.
I know I did the right thing.
After all, devotion is stronger when it comes with a sacrifice.