Chapter 43
Lana
Anumbing cold spread through my body as I lay on top of my mate.
Gone.
Kade was dead.
I hadn’t let go of the stupid fucking dagger yet. I couldn’t.
Letting go meant it was finished.
Illiana.
The light, still depleted from purging the darkness from the world—from Kade—writhed inside of me.
My eyelids were heavy as I lay my head on Kade’s chest.
I could lie here with him. Go with him. Follow to where he swore he’d wait for me.
Perhaps I should.
Wind whipped through my hair, chilling me to the core.
“No,” I said out loud, though my voice came out strangled and hoarse.
Again, the sensation came, crawling over me.
“Leave me alone,” I hissed at the wind around me.
My body stopped drowning in pain the third time the wind whipped through my hair. Enough that I lifted my head from Kade’s body, the motion painful, as if I was ripping out my soul.
When I looked up, time had slowed. The battle continued, but for this short blink of existence, I saw everything.
The noise of my breath exhaling echoed too loudly in my ears. My hair blew across my damp face. Despite how broken it was, my heart still beat. Slow. Alone.
Ian fought, facing in my direction as if he meant to make his way toward me. Raya was close behind, the pain etched on her face unbearable to see.
Another breeze caressed my face as I noticed Storm running toward me, fire haloing his entire body as he barreled through the army.
Storm. He’d be devastated.
I blinked again, my hand twitching slightly on Kade’s chest while one still clutched Apollo.
Beyond Storm, Kalliah sat on the ground, Jax lying with his head in her lap, as Leif fought a dark one next to them. Jax was strangely still as Kalliah moved above him, unbothered by the oncoming attacks Leif faced protecting them. Fates, I couldn’t tell what was wrong.
Finally, my gaze found Thames. Cassandra moved around him, commanding his full attention.
Maybe we’d distracted him when Kade’s darkness exploded outward, but right now, wrath defined every line on his face, except his motions were sloppy.
Like fear had finally crept in. With Kade dead, he had no more ties to Atheria.
He was vulnerable.
With Kade dead.
Another wail escaped me as I looked back down at him.
Move, my light said, breaking through its own sadness. It’s time to make his death mean something. Move.
I brushed the hair blowing in the wind from his face.
A low cry came from over my shoulder, and I looked over to see a strox. The animal lowered its head to Kade’s leg, then inched closer.
It bumped my shoulder.
The beasts had been born of pain long ago. It wasn’t only Kade and I who had to sacrifice. So many others had to as well in this war against Thames.
The first feelings, other than this overwhelming heartache, churned in my body as I faced what I must do. The world came back into focus. My breathing, ragged and growing heavier, was the first thing I registered. Each breath pulled in rage and pushed down the agony I would have to face after this.
After Thames died.
His evil forced me to lose my mate.
He was to blame.
His time was done.
I called on my light for a strength I didn’t think possible and roared as I yanked the blade from Kade’s chest. I rose to my feet, my sole focus homed in on where Thames battled Cassandra across the field.
Though unsteady at first, I straightened, allowing the only remaining shards of my soul to fortify around an unyielding fury.
The strox nudged me again, and I faced the beast. It lowered before me, and I finally understood. It would carry me to our target.
I took one step, then another. Reaching down, I lifted my discarded sword in my hand after sheathing Apollo and approached the strox. Climbing over its side, I touched the bird’s warm neck, as if it could infuse me with the strength. I needed to finish this.
“Take me to Thames,” I said, shocked that my voice came out as strong as it did.
The bird took off, soaring upward, and I pressed my knees to its sides. “Across the battlefield first,” I ordered.
Though we had more fighting among us—those who’d turned back, our own soldiers, strox, and razorven—Thames’s army had been built over years.
Thames had turned countless others in his short time free from the void, even with so many sacrificed to Firestone.
My people needed hope, and though I felt none with half my soul gone, it wasn’t about me right now. It was about Atheria.
The strox flew close over the battle, and I raised my sword high in the air. “The darkness has been destroyed. Finish this fight. For our homeland, for each other. Thames will regret the day he challenged us.”
I dropped low, circling to the cheers of my people before squeezing the strox again.
“We end this,” I said, empty but determined to get my revenge before I broke.
This time, the strox took me straight toward the man responsible for all the loss and pain in my life.
I held out my sword, urging the strox to dive faster toward Thames.
Cassandra spun away, not looking at me at all but making way for me all the same, as she elegantly shifted away from her battle.
I screamed, bearing my sword down from atop the strox. Thames grinned, throwing his hand out and knocking the strox off course. I jumped off quickly, allowing the bird to regain its bearings.
Fae attacked the strox before it could make it back to me, but I landed on my feet, my knee only grazing the ground before I rose, standing before Thames.
“Ah, the great prophesized queen comes to face me at last,” he said. His arrogance from even a few minutes before had lessened.
“Your mate too strong for you?” I said, clutching my dagger and sprinting toward him, unwilling to let him live a moment longer. I whipped my sword forward as he dodged out of reach.
His chilling laugh raised goose bumps on my arms. “At least mine lives.”
I screamed, readying my sword before him as my light flared. I couldn’t let my emotion lead this fight. Not this time.
Inhaling sharply through my nose, I recentered myself. As Thames laughed, I sliced my sword at his neck, bringing my dagger into the path he’d be forced to retreat to. He dodged the sword to his neck, but my dagger slammed home into his thigh.
He cried out as a small bit of darkness seeped out of him from the wound.
“You think that pathetic cut can kill me?” he asked.
“Maybe not,” I grunted, blocking his sword. “But I hope it’s torture feeling it in your skin.”
Thames pulled back, rising on a cloud of his darkness. Thunder rumbled through the sky.
“You have no idea the power I’ve collected,” he said, his voice taking on an echo-like hollowness. “You are nothing, and you will be squashed like the pathetic royal you are.”
I heaved, my body’s exhaustion catching up to me the longer this took. “You’re wrong.”
I called forth my light. We can do this. We have to finish it.
My light responded, growing despite how much energy we’d spent. Apollo glowed in my hand, and I felt energy shifting from the dagger into me. Apparently, it wasn’t merely good for channeling into. It could be used to fortify myself as well.
I threw a ball of my magic toward the bottom of the darkness Thames perched himself on, and a hole burst through it.
Thames shouted, flinging a shot of fire toward me. I rolled out of the way but screamed as a second shot skated over my arm, burning away the sleeve of my tunic.
He has magic from centuries of kings, my light warned. I responded, Our magic was foretold to destroy him. We will not falter.
Staggering to my feet, I charged forward. I couldn’t allow him to wield his magic from afar, I needed to return to hand-to-hand combat. He’d had centuries to perfect his control of his magic even if he was trapped for a thousand years, but he was vulnerable now that his evil was dying.
Thames watched me as if I was a mere amusement. He aimed his hands toward the ground, and pieces of debris and dirt rose high before flying toward me.
I cried out, throwing my hands up and trying to use my light as a shield. It cocooned around me, and the debris turned to dust as soon as it passed through the light’s barrier.
I lowered my hands and saw the first flicker of doubt cross Thames’s face.
Smiling, I held my head high. “I am Illiana Dresden,” I shouted as I ran toward him. “I am stronger than any darkness.” Channeling my light into the base of his evil, I unleashed all I could, forcing him to return to the ground.
The darkened mist he’d elevated himself on shrank until he crashed back down. He screamed viciously, directing all of his anger and hatred toward me.
My light flickered. I was running out of power, my stores severely depleted.
All I felt was fear, but I couldn’t let it get the best of me.
I refused to let it overpower me. I had come too far, we had come too far to be stopped now.
If my magic needed to rest, I’d finish this with my blades.
Just how I’d lived my entire life, fighting for every inch, without magic.
Exactly like Ian trained me to do.
I barreled forward, fighting through exhaustion. While Thames’s strength didn’t show signs of waning at all, failure wasn’t an option for me.
His blade met mine, but he sent a lash of fire wrapping around my hand. I screamed as my skin blistered, but I didn’t let go of my weapon.
Time stilled, slowing strangely as the wind brushed against me. Only this time, when nature caressed me, it carried a whisper.
Cassandra.
“Illiana.”
This was her magic.
I looked to where the wind directed me and saw her and Vivienne kneeling on the ground next to Kade.
My heart stuttered through the pain seeing Kade lying there.
Time returned to normal, and Thames pulled back, parrying again, his attacks deliberate and strong. I blocked a blow that would’ve killed me, and my arms shook as Thames’s thin face sneered in mine. I winced as my hand flared in agony from the burns Thames had inflicted.
“Kade’s darkness needed to be destroyed, but he wasn’t the final tie to Thames,” Cassandra whispered on the wind. “I am. His mate.”
I stumbled back a step. Thames didn’t fall forward like I’d hoped, but we both raised our weapons again and continued this battle that felt unwinnable. I had to find a weakness and exploit it.
“When I’m gone, finish this, Illiana. Then live.”
The breeze died instantly, and in its place Cassandra’s cry filled the air, heartbreak lacing every second of the wailing sound.
Thames whipped his body around, distracted by the agonized scream, but I didn’t waste the moment she’d gifted to me.
This precious opportunity to end Thames once and for all.
I stepped forward, flinging the last traces of my light I could muster directly into the center of Apollo.
Straight into the place where every woman in my line had channeled their energy.
I called on their magic to help me, fusing it with my light as I stabbed it into Thames’s back. Light pulsed, shining around us.
He gasped, falling forward. I removed the dagger, kicking Thames so he lost his balance, forcing him to the ground. He rolled over in surprise, but I pounced, stabbing him in his heart.
His eyes widened, taking me in. I snarled at him, letting my hatred show on every line of my face.
"You will never be anything more than the evil mentioned in storybooks. Not a king, not all-powerful.” I twisted the blade harder, deeper into the flesh and bone of the evil plaguing our lands.
An unintelligible sound escaped from his lips as blood gushed from them.
My hands shook, but I didn’t stop pouring my light into the blade. The thrill of seeing the monster beneath me, at my mercy, sent a rush through me, giving me what I needed to see this through.
“Bested by a queen and her mate, who sacrificed everything and won.”
Thunder boomed, and the winds whipped around us, as I removed the blade and stabbed it into Thames’s chest one more time.
His darkness, his very essence exploded out of him, decimating the ground around us.
His eyes widened even further in shock, but it only lasted seconds before his face fell flat.
Thames had been defeated. Atheria was free.
At last, it was finally over.