Chapter Fifty-Six
Everything I’ve done, I’ve done for love.
Tabitha Wysteria
No matter how many times Mal’s blade sang through the air, Vera slipped from its reach with a serpent’s grace, laughter spilling from her lips, a maddening, echoing sound that lodged itself deep within Mal’s skull.
Still, she did not falter, did not dare to glance aside to check on Ash, though her heart ached to.
From the jagged breach in the wall, coils of viridian smoke began to writhe, and from them emerged witches and warlocks, striding forth like phantoms of war.
Yet Mal paid them no heed. The dead she had summoned clashed against them, steel meeting sorcery in a storm of shadows and flame, but Mal’s unyielding and unrelenting gaze was fixed on only one figure.
Vera.
With a snarl, Mal raised her sword high and struck, the blade a flash of fury, before thrusting out her hand. Power surged, hurling the witch back, slamming her into the wall’s broken stone. And still Vera laughed.
Mal’s steps were deliberate, predatory, each one drawing her closer as the witch slumped against the wall, her pale hair a wild halo, face marred with blooming cuts and bruises.
It was difficult, achingly so, not to see the real Vera in her features, the quiet maid who had once served at Mal’s side, who had worn a false smile and soft words like armour.
But this was no maid. This was Eris.
And Mal was no God-Killer. Not yet. If she struck Vera down, she would only banish Eris back to her realm, freeing her to rise again. And yet… what choice did she have left?
Mal loomed above her, knuckles whitening around the hilt of her sword. Vera’s amethyst eyes lifted to the blade, but there was no fear in them, not a flicker. Only amusement.
‘Go on, then,’ Vera drawled, her voice honeyed with mockery. ‘Kill me.’
‘Leave this body,’ Mal commanded, her tone as sharp as a drawn blade.
She cast a glance over her shoulder, to where her spectral army of the dead pressed forward, forcing the witches to retreat, their resistance faltering beneath the relentless tide of shadows.
‘Or I will see every soldier you command torn asunder, their spirits cast into the Underworld, only to rise again as part of mine.’
Vera rolled her eyes, the gesture languid, theatrical. ‘So dramatic. Go ahead.’ She lounged against the wall with infuriating ease, lips twisting into a wicked smirk. ‘Slaughter them all, every last one. Do you think I care?’
Mal crouched low before her, voice soft yet edged with lethal promise.
‘One day,’ she murmured, ‘I will be the God-Killer. And when that day comes, there will be no corner of existence where you can hide from me.’
For a fleeting heartbeat, Vera stiffened. But then laughed, the sound brittle and sharp as shattered glass. She leaned closer, eyes glimmering with malice.
‘I’m not afraid of you, Mal Blackburn,’ she whispered, her grin growing cruel, predatory. ‘If I were you, I’d start questioning where your loyalties truly lie.’ Her gaze danced with amusement as Mal hesitated. ‘Everyone is lying to you.’
Before Mal could press for more, her own body betrayed her, seizing with a violent tremor. She looked down at her hands, eyes widening as pain shot like wildfire through her limbs, stealing her breath and forcing her to stumble back.
‘We’ll talk again soon,’ Vera purred, stepping lightly over Mal’s collapsed form as blood magic coiled like chains around her, twisting her muscles in agony.
The witch had taken only a few steps when she faltered, head cocking as a dash of panic crossed her features. She turned sharply, eyes widening, unnerved.
Mal, bleeding from where her teeth had split her lip, dragged herself forward, palms scraping across stone until she clawed her way upright onto hands and knees.
Vera raised her hand once more, blood magic curling from her fingers like a serpent seeking prey, yet nothing came of it.
‘How…?’
Mal laughed, low and cold, as she straightened, the ache in her body already fading like the memory of a dream. Step by deliberate step, she closed the distance between them until she stood before Vera once more, a shadow of unstoppable intent.
‘No one can resist blood magic,’ Vera whispered, her voice trembling.
‘That’s true,’ Mal said, retrieving her fallen sword, its blackened edge humming with power. ‘But I am no ordinary soul. I am the thing even nightmares fear.’
Before Vera could even scream, Mal’s hand closed around her throat, and the world bled away into darkness.
One heartbeat ago, they had stood amidst the chaos of war.
Witches screaming, the dead clashing with the living, and now…
now they stood in a world not of earth or magic, but of darkness itself.
A realm sculpted from smoke and shadow. Mal’s own form was spectral, her body untethered, her eyes glowing with violet fire as tendrils of smoke coiled from them like a living nightmare.
Vera stared down at her own hands, now smoke and vapour, wonder flickering across her features. But then she met Mal’s glare and froze.
There was no time for fear, no space for pleading. Mal wrenched her closer, eyes burning like twin eclipses, and drove her sword into Vera’s stomach with a single, merciless thrust.
The witch crumpled, collapsing in silence as her gaze lifted. And in that moment, Mal saw not the cruel glimmer of Eris’s godly essence, but the soft, bewildered eyes of the true Vera.
‘Where… am I?’ Vera breathed.
‘This is my realm,’ Mal said softly, bending to help her rise.
‘Why am I here?’
‘Because…’ Mal’s throat tightened. ‘You’re going to die, Vera. But I wanted to give you…time. Here, in my shadows you can stay hidden. If I let you go, you’ll fall into Hell, and I… I wouldn’t be able to visit you there.’
‘Is she gone?’
Mal nodded, words too fragile to speak.
‘Good,’ Vera whispered, releasing a weary sigh as though setting down a lifetime of burdens. ‘Then I suppose it’s settled.’
‘I’m sorry this happened to you,’ Mal whispered, her voice trembling with remorse.
Vera gave a small shrug, her lips twitching into something that almost resembled a smile. ‘It was bound to happen. I was rotten, Mal. But… I did try, in the end. Promise me you’ll find Hagan and make him pay for all of this.’
‘I promise.’
Vera nodded, then glanced down at the sword buried in her stomach, her brows furrowing as though only now noticing the mortal wound. ‘Will it hurt, when we return?’
‘Probably,’ Mal admitted softly, ‘but not for long.’
Another nod, steadier this time. ‘Then let’s not waste any more time. Take me back.’
Mal hesitated, her fingers tightening around the hilt of her blade.
She knew what awaited them on the other side of this twilight realm.
When they stepped out of her world of shadows, it would only be Vera who remained.
Whole for an instant, then broken, enduring an agonising death that even gods would wince to witness.
Eris was gone now, banished back to her accursed realm, no doubt already spitting curses and weaving revenge.
‘Make them pay,’ Vera said, reaching for Mal’s hand and squeezing it with surprising strength. ‘Make them all pay.’
‘I promise,’ Mal breathed.
Vera inhaled, eyes closing, lashes trembling like the wings of a dying moth. Fear glimmered there, even as she tried to hide it. Mal did not wait any longer. She gathered Vera into her arms, and with one wrench of power, the shadows peeled away.
The real world slammed back into existence. Vera sagged against Mal’s embrace, ragged breaths rattling through her lungs before a wet cough splattered blood across Mal’s neck.
Then she collapsed, the sword still jutting cruelly from her stomach, crimson gushing like a spring freed from stone. Mal dropped to her knees beside her, cradling Vera’s broken form as a raw, guttural sob ripped free from her throat.
‘I’m sorry, Vera. I’m so sorry. I didn’t want this to happen—’ Her words fractured as she looked up and saw Ash kneel at her side, his golden hands pressing desperately against the wound, trying to stem the endless tide.
Mal’s tear-streaked gaze locked on his, trembling fingers clutching at his arm. ‘Please, Ash… do something. Save her. Make it stop. Please, just make it stop. I thought I could do this…I took her to my realm and I tried to be strong…for her…but I can’t.’
Ash ripped his shirt in a single movement, pressing the fabric hard against the wound where the sword still jutted cruelly from Vera’s abdomen, desperate to stem the tide of blood spilling over his hands.
Mal lifted her tear-soaked gaze to Adriana, who stood above them like a shadowed sentinel, her obsidian eyes wide with horror, tears slipping freely down her cheeks.
Mal’s attention snapped back to Vera. With trembling fingers, she brushed away loose strands of white hair from the witch’s damp forehead, only to smear blood across skin like a cruel brand of mortality. Her hands shook harder, the grief clawing at her throat until the words barely scraped out.
‘Please… just make it stop. I’ll do anything. I can’t—’ her voice fractured, breaking under its own weight. ‘I can’t do this anymore. Bring her back, Ash. Please…’
But then her eyes locked with his, those golden irises heavy with sorrow, speaking a truth he could not soften.
Slowly, almost unwillingly, Mal looked down. Vera lay limp within her arms, her once-vivid purple eyes now fixed on the heavens above, wide and unblinking.
Gone.
A scream tore from Mal’s lungs, raw and primal, shaking the air like the breaking of a soul.