The Aftermath of Gods
Chapter Thirty-Four
Pollock
The Starfall
There’s no warning.
Just the sudden shift of his weight as he rolls, and the flash of fury in his eyes. His face is set hard with resolve, jaw clenched, gaze burning with malice as Lazreth slams both boots into my chest and kicks me free of his hold.
“Kahill!” His name tears from my lungs like shards of glass and tears from my throat because I know what this means.
For a suspended heartbeat, I feel everything at once—the violent compression of bone as my body curls forward, the brutal collapse of ribs, the way the air detonates from my lungs like it’s been torn free by a supernatural force. The heat of the star and the pressure behind me as I fly backward.
The sky and the Earth spin as I do. But I twist my head just in time to see Kahill and Lazreth already turning back toward their doom.
The star aims directly for him, a massive sphere wrapped in roaring unnatural flame, its godly radiance cutting through the space like it’s slicing through matter itself. The atmosphere warps around it, pressure rolling outward in visible waves.
The heat is unbearable as it floods over me.
The earth rushes up to meet me, and I hit hard, bounce like a stone across water, the ground tearing skin from bone.
Every hot breath I pull in is a blade boiling my insides.
My eyes can’t stand the heat and begin to grow hazy.
Black bleeds in at the edges as they, too, burn.
It’s utter agony, a searing of my skin, and no part of me is left untouched.
I roll again and again, each crash sending fresh pain through me.
Instinct takes over. My fingers rip through soil and gravel as I fight to stop my momentum.
I dig in with everything I have—hands, boots, nails.
The ground shreds my hands. Gravel and packed earth bite into my knees as I finally catch on a rise in the fractured terrain.
That’s when the god strikes.
It hits like a fist from creation itself, flattening the place where Kahill lay and gouging a massive crater into the earth. Fire erupts. A violent ring of it roars outward, the sound so loud it reverberates and echoes back from the sky.
The land convulses.
It lifts.
It buckles.
What follows is a tidal wave, the ground rising in dissent.
Debris and dirt rise a great distance away from the impact point, hurling rubble skyward in violent, uneven lines.
Jagged seams rip open and race across the once-flat earth.
Trees disappear, and others snap and fall.
The nearby settlement is no exception. Buildings collapse as the ground opens beneath them.
I stagger into a run, lungs screaming, broken bones and all, because if I don’t, there’s a chance I will truly die here.
Bones grind against each other with every step, and the ever-present searing inferno from the star threatens to consume me as I stumble over uneven terrain.
Flame licks up my back, eating through my cloak.
My armor becomes a sweltering tomb, melting the skin underneath.
Thick smoke fills my mouth and throat, and I cough hard as I push myself to go faster, leaping over fissures that are tearing open beneath my feet.
I glance back only once and see the crater did indeed land where predicted, and is now a blazing wound in the world. Fire and earth combine and coil upward in a ferocious spiral. The dying god pulses as though taking its last breaths, while at the same time devouring everything it touches.
I taste ash.
I taste blood.
And still the earth keeps breaking beneath me.
When I’m finally free of it, I drop to the ground and roll, attempting to smother out the flames covering me as best I can, though most of my flesh is long gone and little muscle remains visible.
My body tries to mend itself, but the damage I’ve sustained is substantial.
Ultimately, I lose the ability to withstand the pain, and blackness consumes me entirely.
I float in and out of consciousness. Visions and memories come in waves. A youthful Orán holds two wooden swords, trying to cheer me up after another failed lesson. Where Orán excelled at connecting with nature, I felt nothing but a prickling along my own skin.
It wasn’t just my uncle's disappointment that had me down. It was Father’s hopeful expression that had fallen when I again couldn’t so much tap into the power of our bloodline and coax the fish in the stream closer, something Orán could do with ease.
Another vision…Orán lifts a leaf from the forest floor with nothing but his mind.
Try as I might, I couldn’t do the same. His offer to help had me stomping off like a petulant child and making him suffer through days of silent treatment, even though he’d left my room bearing encouragement and gifts.
Later, when I’d given up even attending the lessons, he’d meet up with me outside the courtyard where I often practiced swordplay with the other men.
We no longer spoke of it. The lessons. My brother's abilities, and how they apparently had only trickled down through our bloodline to him, not to me.
The resentment was there but buried deep, along with the frustration. I guarded those feelings during our interactions, but even now I feel them return as the memories do.
In the next vision, I’m striding down the hallway of our home, intent on speaking with my father.
I’m stopped short at the sight of blood pooling on the floor.
It seeps beneath the large wooden door to my parents' chambers, threading through the cracks in the stone.
A cold dread settles in my gut as I reach for the handle. The familiar creak of the hinges greets me when I push the door open. The sound grates against my ears as the door itself resists revealing what lies beyond.
My uncle’s head snaps up from where he’s crouched. Red blood splatter marks his face and clothing.
Beneath him, my father lies prone on the floor, unmoving. His shirt torn open, his fur cloak covered in crimson, the rich fabric matted and wet. My gaze snaps to the blade in my uncle’s hand. It also carries blood.
I note the symbols carved into flesh—my father’s. All life, breath, heartbeat, and motion cease to exist as the ramifications slam into me. Unable to comprehend—to come to terms with what’s been done for mere moments as my mind catches up.
The betrayal is unfathomable. Surely my uncle is not capable of such a thing.
But here it is…I’m seeing it with my own eyes.
The forbidden marks. The deep wounds. Blood blanketing both and most of the goddamn floor.
Dark symbols. Not merely banned, but unutterable, unthinkable, ancient, and blasphemous, never meant to be seen or talked about.
Unbridled rage builds a great tempest from within. Then I see what I didn’t before, what’s half hidden from my view by the large man standing and turning the blade on me. Mother’s limp and lifeless form, her face turned away, and she lies just as still as my father.
Something inside me shatters. Rationale departs as a growl builds and tears out of my chest. I launch myself across the room at my uncle.
A sound of my grief is animalistic—raw, feral, unrecognizable even to me.
I am no longer myself.
I am something else.
Something made for violence.
So I do not reach my uncle as a man.
Claws meet his chest. Jaw open and teeth elongate as I go for his throat. Fur, coarse hair, and paws that were visible but alien to me.
I know not what I am, only that he must die this day, before their bodies grow cold.
Whatever I’ve become slams into my uncle and knocks him to the floor. My vision shifts and sharpens. The world narrows to scent, to heat, to blood. I rip, bite, and rake claws into any part of him I can find.
I attack him as a beast—relentless, unthinking—until his hand scrambles blindly across the floor and finds purchase on a fallen bust. He swings it upward with desperate force. It connects with my skull. Pain fractures through me.
And the vision shatters.
In the next instant, a blade moves across my chest—bringing with it agony the likes of which I have never known.
My arms and legs are bound, stretched to their limits as I lie spread-eagled across the floor. I am a man once more, but trapped within my own body. When I lift my head and peer at my attacker, I see my own face staring back at me—twisted with anger—just as the blade drives deeper into my flesh.
I choke on the cloth stuffed into my mouth and thrash my head back and forth, my scream muffled by it.
God… the pain. Blinding. Endless. It steals the air from my lungs and leaves nothing but broken sound in its wake. I writhe and fight against my bindings, straining until my muscles burn, but they hold fast.
My uncle’s scent surrounds me. That—and the unmistakable stench of dark magic being wielded.
“Your brother will never wield the power he holds to do what must be done.”
Understanding dawns as he speaks. His voice changed from that of my uncle’s to mine.
He has taken my face. My voice.
“He is too soft-hearted. And you—who once bore the heart of a warrior—showed no sign of it until now. It seems it was divided cleanly between you.”
The blade presses deeper. I choke on the gag. Sound leaves my chest and throat.
“I could not risk our family’s magic dying out,” he continues. “It must endure through me. With your deaths, I will claim enough power to reunite the clans—by any means necessary. And it will pass through my bloodline.”
The ritual continues. Each cut brings a wealth of pain.
At one point, he glances at my father and then at my mother and frowns. “You have to understand, they gave me no choice.”
My head turns with effort, the motion slow, heavy, as I search for her.
I find her lying motionless nearby.
“Mah…” It hurts to talk, and it’s garbled, but a word that resonates with my own mind, a companion to the grief consuming me.
I reach for her, though I cannot touch her—my hand falling short, fingers trembling against empty space.
“This was not meant to be her end.”
Regret laces his tone.