Chapter 39 #3
Or something similar.
I’d beat the odds in Tiers once.
To my knowledge, more than one battle had occurred on this ground. That seemed like a lot of dead people to me, let alone all the ancestors of the coven.
Carmine was getting to his feet. He shoved aside the crimsons, and though he cast a glance at Adeuto, the monster had decided that I had to go first. Or be controlled.
I released my divination affinity into the earth. I sent my demon power with it to support and speed its whispered message. My power swept through the meadow like a breeze, quickly whipping to a storm. The wind howled and lightning struck. Dark, furious clouds rolled in.
I spoke my request to the dead.
The dead answered my call.
My mother and grandmother appeared before me, and the monster’s eyes locked on them. Grandmother glanced back at me. “About time. I’ve wanted to maim him for five years.”
Mother smiled. “Good work, my little love. You know what to do.”
And I did.
So did they.
Not just Mother and Grandmother, the hundreds of others I’d summoned too. An eerie and echoed battle roar rose from the dead Magus and they charged upon the demon army and Carmine.
Some of the dead demons had answered my call, too, though most had remained apart from the battle, and apart from fighting for the side who had killed them.
As the first dead Magus punched through the chest of a demon and ripped out his iron-encased heart, I heard the tumult of the coven, Luthers, and Vissimo behind me.
I didn’t turn to look.
I maintained my stream of power into the earth and into the demon army. Into my mother and grandmother, who launched at Carmine.
He backed up, then flung smoke at them.
The smoke passed through.
Grandmother laughed, then round-housed the demon king in the face. Mother wrapped around him, then sank into the ground to bury him. She left his head free, then formed a bubble around him.
His eyes bulged, and she smiled wide.
Mother was enjoying depriving him of air.
They may not succeed in killing him, but my ancestors would make him pay. And his army was paying the price too. They sprinted for the trees. If they hadn’t watched a similar version of this play out in Tiers, then they’d seen enough to hint at their future.
Crimsons descended on the king to help him, and Grandmother decapitated one. Then another before the rest got the hint.
As Mother continued to torture Carmine, the meadow emptied of demons.
Until Carmine remained.
My heartbeat thudded in my ears, and time slowed in a way it rarely had. The way it had when Athira had held a dagger to my son’s throat.
Carmine’s terrified scream from earlier rang in my ears. Syera. Stop me.
Blood had poured from his body. He’d tried to kill himself.
My exhale shook.
It was true.
All of it was true.
The wrath curse was real. Carmine was locked inside himself.
All of the maybes I’d clung to in order to see my goal through were eradicated in that shaking exhale. Carmine was in there. The mate I’d seen glimpses of during my time in the realm. That version of him was a prisoner in his own body. I finally believed in it.
That scream couldn’t have come from anyone but a person who’d rather die than do what was being demanded of him.
I’d forced myself to see killing Carmine as freeing him—if Neti’s version of the past had proven true. But as my mother tortured the demon king, and as Grandmother cheered her on. As my twin started to wake from her stupor.
As the army at my back watched on while wondering what I’d do next…
Suddenly, after more than three years of carrying the same goal, my goal was brought into question.
What would Carmine do if I were trapped?
What would my soul cry out for if I had never known freedom?
I’d lived in fear for so long, but my actions had been my own.
When they weren’t for a short time after the joining ceremony, I hadn’t been truly aware of the change in myself.
Carmine was aware of everything he was doing, and he was powerless to stop any of it.
I’d never been forced to kill the family of my mate.
I’d never been forced into an attempt to kill my son.
Maybe Carmine couldn’t be saved. I couldn’t imagine how many blue gems would be needed to save him. Perhaps the dosage needed would kill him—if I could even find that many gems.
Perhaps he’d kill me.
Perhaps I’d end up killing him after all.
I didn’t know. All I could put together in the middle of a blood-soaked meadow with my son behind me, and my monster-claimed mate before me, was that my goal wasn’t as clear as five minutes ago.
My goal was murky.
Branched.
Down one path, this all ended the same way I’d always envisioned. Down the other path… the path that felt impossible and foolish and fucking dangerous… down that path, I possibly had a mate for immortality, if he could survive what lay ahead.
And in both futures, I had a son.
I had everything in one future.
I had my son in the other.
And if I risked it all, then I would likely lose my life and have no future with either. I wasn’t just risking Adeuto. I risked the lives of the supernaturals here. Of Tempest. Owu.
I risked everything.
For him. For someone he might be.
That had never been enough. Not until an exhale shook its way past my lips. Yet now I believed that he was in there.
And I believed that Carmine wanted a future for his son. He wanted his son to live.
That was the difference.
I glanced back at Adeuto. “I love you, my little love.” He didn’t often swallow my lies, but he would right now. “I’ll see you soon.”
I blew him a kiss, and he blew one back.
Seeking Tempest, I looked the other way.
She was on her feet. Just barely. She focused on me and then around me. My twin blinked at Carmine, then whipped to focus on me again.
Tempest nodded, and I nodded back.
This was the murky future she hadn’t been able to access. My subconscious had been working hard against me this whole time.
I strode to join the rest of my family.
“Mother,” I said.
“Is that all I have time for?” she asked, looking up.
Carmine’s head lolled.
“I hoped you enjoyed yourself.”
Mother straightened. “Of course. What point is there otherwise?”
“I miss you,” I whispered to her.
Grandmother clapped me on the back. “Thanks for letting us fuck him up, darling. Enjoyed that a lot. Stay well.”
“I love you,” I called after them as they faded away to wherever they’d risen from. There were some things that even divination affinities would never know.
The meadow was quiet.
An army looked on as I crouched before Carmine.
Decapitate him.
Rip his heart out.
Set him alight.
Crush his scales.
I’d dreamed of each one hundred times.
Instead, I took his hand and remained impassive as he cracked open an eyelid to deliver me with a chilling glare.
It wasn’t too late to kill him. I’d worked so hard for this moment. He’d recover soon. His army was long gone.
The demon king—Tyran—was more vulnerable than he’d ever been.
Another thought occurred to me. What next?
What next, after I killed Carmine?
When I took the crown as regent for my son. And Tyran’s curse fell upon me.
Then fell upon my son.
This had to end, one way or another. The magic in Carmine had to be defeated. If he survived that, then I would spend my whole existence wondering how I’d managed the feat. If he didn’t survive, then the magic would still die.
My son would be safe.
Our son would be safe.