Chapter 41
FORTY-ONE
athena
“Everyone stay calm.” The words came out surprisingly smooth considering I was, in fact, panicking. “None of this is real, right? We’ll just take them all out if we have to. That was the plan in the first place.”
A few of the earthlies below us were shouting.
“Who are they?”
“Are those mystics?”
“What are they doing here?”
Huh. If they could so easily pick us out of the crowd, I guess it was a small town.
And four foreign faces, along with a pile of bloody bones, really drew attention.
“Have you lost your fucking mind?” Florence retorted. “This is all very, very real. This city is full of innocent earthlies the Ministry wants us to kill.”
My mind spun. “No, that can’t be right. Simon told us—”
“Simon?” She tossed her head back and laughed. Loudly. “You really believe a single thing that shit-weasel said?”
I blocked her out and zeroed in on Elijah. “This is all part of the test, right?” I asked. “What’s real?”
He would know, right? I needed him to know the truth. To tell me what to believe, because I couldn’t decipher what was part of the Ministry’s little war games and what was reality.
Everyone in front of me looked very real.
But this was our final test.
Hell, maybe Florence herself was a test from the Ministry. Maybe she wasn’t really here at all.
“It’s the test,” Elijah replied. “It has to be.”
“No.” Florence rushed forward and gripped my forearms. Her hands shook, her nails digging into my skin. “Listen to me, you cannot kill them. Look at them.”
I reluctantly obeyed, taking in the large crowd of now very confused earthlies below us.
“They’re people,” she rasped. “Just like you. They’re the type of people we want to protect. The type of people the Ministry wants you to simply plow over. This is what they want.”
Some of the earthlies below shuffled near the back of the plaza. We had very little time before they’d come for us.
And I was tired. Tired of fighting. Tired of deciphering war games from reality.
“If you don’t kill them,” Elijah whispered behind me, “I will.”
That wasn’t a bluff. He wouldn’t hesitate. He firmly believed this was all fake, and to him, Florence’s interruption was simply another layer of the charade.
I was losing touch. Losing sense of reality, unable to separate fact from fiction.
“Just give me a second.” I yanked away from Florence and pressed my palms over my face, blocking out the world. If this wasn’t real, I would know, wouldn’t I?
Wouldn’t there be signs that told me this was all a mirage?
It felt so. Damn. Real.
“Athena.” Elijah pulled my hands away from my face. “I need you to trust me, okay? We’re running out of time.”
This. Elijah. This was real. He was real.
And we didn’t have another option if we wanted to get out of here alive. “Fine,” I said. “You’re right.” I looked at Florence and Riot, who were staring at us with panic on their faces. “I’m sorry, but we can’t trust you.”
I made the decision.
Elijah nodded, and his phantoms exploded around us, holding Florence and Riot in place while I gathered my focus.
I could kill them all. I could.
I just needed to push my power out. Expand it, spread it out over the plaza and will death upon everyone at the same time.
Eyes closed, I blocked out the rest of the world. The tingling sensation in my chest told me my power was ready to act, ready to act on my desire. Ready to wield my death magic onto the crowd of earthlies below.
Fake earthlies.
This was a test. One the Ministry surely thought we would fail.
I pushed my magic further and further and further until the entire plaza was wrapped in the invisible force.
With one thought, I would end them all.
With one thought, they would all drop dead.
The idea alone sent a powerful thrill through my body. I ignored Florence’s bloodcurdling screams, I ignored Riot’s desperate demands to stop, and I focused.
Die.
This didn’t feel like the last time I’d ordered my magic to kill. Killing Alexander…killing Leon and the other two men onstage felt forced. Rushed. Implacable.
This? This was a simple dance. A flow of raw power—a healing wave of self-expression.
My chest warmed as my power poured outward from the bottomless well of magic inside me. Elijah pressed his chest against my back, supporting me. Accompanying me.
My power might’ve been the one declaring death upon these earthlies, but Elijah never would’ve let me carry that alone. We were one—we acted as one, wielded as one.
Slaughtered hundreds—thousands—as one.
One minute—the war games mattered. The earthlies in the plaza below mattered. Our way out of the Ministry’s grasp mattered.
But I blinked my eyes open, and the realization of my power’s strength blanketed me.
Death.
That was all I saw. The only thing for miles and miles.
No laughter. No dancing. No music. No movement.
Just bodies. As far as the eye could see.
Like Leon.
Like Kylar.
Like Mother. Father. Jasmine.
Every. Single. One.
Dead.
Florence and Riot stopped fighting. Florence was sobbing now. I hadn’t targeted my power toward the mystics, but they still looked at me like I would turn on them next.
“Relax,” I explained. “It’s okay. This city isn’t real. It’s all a massive mind game. A simulation.”
Florence’s knees buckled, but Riot caught her, holding her upright. Her hand shook as she covered her open mouth.
“Ignore them,” Elijah said in my ear. “They’ll see the truth soon enough.”
He was right. Now it was time to walk through that dead, lifeless city. To the end the damn war games.
But a shriek of horror rang out, startling me.
Elijah whipped around, his eyes narrowing.
I followed his line of sight, searching the pebble road that led to the balcony.
The voice had been so familiar. I knew that dark hair. Knew that slim figure. Recognized the sporadic bundle of limbs that bolted in our direction.
“Margaret?” I asked.
“Stop! Don’t do it, Athena! Don’t freaking do it! It’s all real!”
She wasn’t alone, either. A dozen others raced down the street behind her, all of them just as desperate to get to us.
To stop us.
I turned to Elijah, who’d gone rigid. Still. Lifeless. “Is that…”
“My sister,” he breathed. “That’s my sister.”
“Do you think this is part of the test? It has to be, right?”
Elijah didn’t answer. He stood like that—paralyzed—until Margaret finally reached us.
I don’t really know what I expected. A hug? A nice, warm reunion of sorts?
Instead I was greeted with expressions of horror and disgust.
It had to be part of the simulation, because Margaret—the real Margaret—would never look at me like that.
Brows scrunched. Eyes wide. Shoulders slumped.
I’d recognize that look anywhere.
Fury. Disgust.
“Athena,” she breathed. “What the hell have you done?”