Chapter 37
Being home settled Jessamine’s nerves. It helped her to know that after all of this, madness hadn’t sunk its claws into her.
It had been long past time to let her people know, without any level of uncertainty, that she was alive.
Danger would now follow them wherever they went, of course.
The rumor of her survival was not the same as a crowd of people actually seeing her.
She risked Leon’s backlash once he discovered she was, in fact, within his grasp.
Now he knew for certain.
So Leon Bishop was well aware that she was back, and that there was a tidal wave coming toward him. That was why he’d been at the party. He’d wanted her to see him, to know that he wasn’t afraid of what she had brought back with her from death.
Walking down the hall to their room, she suddenly gasped as she realized why the party had been filled with so many important people. “Souls with meaning,” she whispered.
“What?” Elric asked, but then his face drew down into a troubled expression. “Shit.”
“Come on, I don’t want anyone to overhear this.”
It took them only a few minutes to get to their room, but then they were alone. Elric cast a spell that lined the rooms with shadows. She could see them writhing on the ceiling, spreading around them until they could speak in perfect privacy. No witch could hear them.
“Tell me,” he demanded in that way of his that always sent shivers down her spine.
He looked angry. Furious, even, and she realized that she hadn’t seen him look like that since Callum’s men had killed her in the alley. He was usually so calm and composed, even in the face of grave danger. But right now he was vibrating with anger.
At her questioning look, he tried to put himself back together.
Jessamine watched him shove the anger deep into the depths of who he was, using perhaps a hint of his power to make his expression serene once more.
But there was the faintest metallic scent in the air, like someone was already bleeding.
“If she touched you,” he muttered, his voice low. “If anyone touched you, Jessamine, then tell me who they are. Allow me to peel the skin from their flesh, to feed them nightmares until they go mad. It would be my greatest honor to torture anyone who dared to harm you.”
So he’d been worried.
Poor man.
She stepped forward, her hands on his chest so that he could feel she was still here. “Elric, nothing happened. Nothing… well, everything happened, but I am unharmed.”
His hand snaked around the back of her neck, tugging her close so he could rest his forehead on hers. He took a deep breath, drinking her in until he nodded. “What has scared you so badly?”
She told him what happened as they had approached the house, and how she had used his own magic to rip out Fortuna’s memories.
She told him that Leon had been in bed with Fortuna and had the distinct pleasure of watching him tense again.
But when she spoke of the last piece, it became hard to say the words.
Finally, she just blurted, “Fortuna said that Leon knew a spell that would bring the gods back. Not just bring them back, but channel a god into him. His body would be a prison for one of them, and their magic. He was going to put a god in her, too. That’s how he plans to take over not only his kingdom and my own, but all the known world. ”
Elric froze in her grip, his muscles so tense it was as if he had turned to stone. He pulled away from her slightly, his face expressionless as he took one shaky step, then another, before he landed on the bed with a low moan.
“What?” she asked. “That’s not possible, is it?”
“I…” Elric dropped his head into his hands. Bowed over like that, he appeared to be a man who had lost everything.
She sank down onto the small bench seat before her vanity. “It’s bad, then.”
Her words weren’t a question. She could see it in the arching of his shoulders and the way he’d stopped breathing.
She didn’t know how long he was lost in his own memories, but eventually he straightened and blew out a long breath. She’d never seen his face so pale or the furrows around his eyes so deep.
“The gods did not walk into this realm fully formed, Jessamine. I know the legends suggest that we were omnipotent our entire lives, but that is not true. I kept my original name. Elric Hellebore. That is who I was before…”
He paused, and her heart twisted in her chest.
“Before?”
“I was just a man.” He looked down at his hands, spreading his fingers wide as though his palms held some secret.
“I don’t remember much of who I was. It makes it hard to…
remember. When you take the powers on. But every god is more a figment of creation than a physical being.
The power is immense, but it is impossible to contain without having a form.
I don’t know who the first god was. I don’t think my siblings remember either.
“All I know is that when I was created, I woke up without a single thought in my head.
No memories of who I was. I only pieced together some bits of who I used to be because of the people I encountered and how they reacted to me.
Did I have a family? A wife? I have no idea.
One moment I was dead, and the next, I woke with more power than I knew what to do with.
“It was infinite. All the darkness and shadows that spread through my body like veins. I could see everything and nothing at the same time. It’s very natural for gods to react with confusion or rage when they ascend.
And then I had the choice of what I wanted to be and who I wanted to serve me.
But I was very young. There were many gods already, and when my sister made me, there weren’t a lot of realms left. ”
Jessamine gasped. “Which sister?”
“The Crone. She created me, although we do not call it giving birth. That was…” He blew out a long breath and curled his fingers into fists.
“That was never part of becoming a god. So when you say he wants to channel a god, that is not what he’s doing.
He’s going to take the power that was once here, a power that should have disappeared with my siblings, and he’s going to put it in his body so that he becomes a god himself. ”
There were no words. Only silence that stood like a veil between them and the world who did not know that the gods were awakening. That a man who had killed so many people was only going to give himself yet more power…
“Oh,” she whispered. The word shook with fear. “So he’s…”
“He’s going to make himself a god, yes. And if I had to guess, he is going to seize the strongest power that he can—the Warrior King himself. It is an end to all things if he succeeds.”
But that would mean the entire kingdom was lost. That would mean that no matter how hard they fought, no matter what they did, they would fail. Because that was a power that they couldn’t fight against unless… Hesitantly, she asked, “Are you more powerful than—”
“No,” he interrupted. “No, I never was.”
“What if we sacrifice—”
“No, Jessamine.” He lifted a shaking hand to his hair and ran his fingers through it.
“No, there is no way to make me more powerful than my brother was. The Warrior King was the best of us, and for good reason. We were all just replicas of his greatness, striving to be just as powerful. I certainly did.”
Well, that made everything even worse, she supposed. She’d been thinking it was terrible that he was going to use a god, because someone like Leon shouldn’t be able to channel a creature like that. But to know that he was going to be the god?
She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t get the air into her lungs fast enough, and everything felt like it was crumbling, until she didn’t know how to continue forward.
Tears welled in her eyes, tears that stung because she didn’t see how they were going to fix this.
And so she looked at him, watching to see her powerful, capable god who knew how to fix everything, and she waited for him to reassure her.
For him to tell her that everything was going to be all right.
But he just looked back at her. Those bleak, dark eyes didn’t see a way forward any better than she did. They stared at each other like they’d already lost, and she simply could not suffer through that.
“Elric?” she asked, her voice very quiet.
“Yes, nightmare?”
“Is there anything we can do?”
“Not that I can think of right now.”
“But we’re still going to fight?” Jessamine chewed on her bottom lip, watching him to see if he’d given up.
She wouldn’t blame him if he did. He was a god, just like Leon wanted to be. And if Leon succeeded, then they were the same creature. She couldn’t imagine it was easy being the only god alive. Maybe he would welcome a family of his own kind.
The thoughts festered within her and she had to say something before they exploded out of her.
“If you want…” She paused, the words sticking in her throat before she continued. “If you want to align yourself with him, to ensure that you are no longer the only god that serves this world, then I will not be angry with you.”
At his incredulous look, she blew out a little laugh.
“Fine, I will be furious. But I will understand. This must be a very lonely existence for you, and I can’t imagine it was ever your choice to be the only one left.
If you want to side with him, to help bring about another age of gods, there is nothing I can do to stop you.
I won’t even…” She took another deep breath.
“I won’t even try to stop you, Elric. This can all end now, if you wish it.
You always said you wanted to tear the world down. ”
It would break her heart to stop fighting. It would fairly kill her to know that she would never get her mother’s throne back or that her people would continue to suffer. But if this was the only way to save more lives than lose them…
Elric sank to his knees before her. He braced his hands on her thighs, spreading her legs so he could move even closer to her. “My love,” he whispered, and those words made her entire being ache. “I would never abandon you.”
He laid his head in her lap, wrapping his arms behind her waist and holding her tightly against him.
Jessamine folded. She laid her arms on top of him and rested her torso on the god who had given her so much, the god who would continue to fight until the very last of his breath, just because she wished him to.
She just didn’t know if it was the right choice.
What if she got all of these people killed?
She’d never wanted that. Death was permanent for them, and while it wasn’t for her…
maybe it should have been. Maybe they deserved more than a soulless creature who only saw a single way into making this world better.
“Stop those thoughts,” he muttered against her skin, his lips pressing against her thigh. “You are the queen they both deserve and need, Jessamine.”
“I don’t feel that way.”
“And that is precisely why you should be the one on that throne. You will not deny them the life they need, because you will always seek to satisfy their needs before your own.” He leaned up then, framing her face with one hand.
“Where is my nightmare? Where is the woman who will fight tooth and nail to get what she wants? The woman who would destroy an entire kingdom just to know that it wasn’t in the wrong hands? ”
“She is frightened.”
“Of what?”
“Of a god stronger than both of us. Of a kingdom that will be lost if I make a mistake.” Her hand shook as she placed it over his on her cheek. “What if we fail, Elric?”
“What if we win?” He drew her forward for a kiss that seared through her.
“What if you are the queen that you always believed you could be? What if you take this kingdom into a new age where there is magic in the streets? Where you could walk through the Pleasure District and spell-cast letters flying through the air. Or talking creatures in shops. Perhaps you would see the world as a different place, and if you succeeded in doing so, then Jessamine, you would be the greatest queen this realm has ever seen. Can you deny yourself and your people that future?”
Of course not. Of course she would fight until her last day to know that her people were happy and safe and taken care of. But today she would be weak. Today she would fear for what the future might become. Tomorrow, she would wake and she would fight, just as she had for all these months.
She’d come back from the dead for them. And if she had to die again, then she would. Time and time again.
She leaned forward, pressing her lips to his in a kiss that was blinding. “Make me forget,” she whispered against his mouth. “Make me forget that there is a god we have to fight and a kingdom to save. Make me forget everything but the man I love, Elric.”
He groaned into her mouth. “You don’t know what it does to me that you see me as a man. Jessamine, my heart soars when you speak with me.”
She knew the feeling. Because just the touch of his hand on hers, just the movement of his lips, the way he breathed into her like he didn’t exist without her, it did something deep inside her as well.
As he lifted her from the vanity, gracefully standing with her in his arms as though she weighed nothing, she found herself disappearing into this man who laid her out on the bed like she was a banquet and he’d been starving for ages.
He was everything to her, too. Fighting with him at her side was a little easier than without.
Jessamine arched into him, and she let all the thoughts in her head trickle away. They would fight. They would win.
Because there was no other choice.