Chapter 36
His name left my lips in a hushed whisper. Not fear, nor revere—only acknowledgment of the monster who’d ruined my life hundreds of years ago. “Zaelos.”
“Saintess. You are here to kill me.”
“I am here to take back what’s mine.”
He smiled, showing too many teeth. “You know I am not your end. You will not find peace in death. Slay the monster, and you become one.”
Perhaps. The little sliver of godly magic he’d stolen from the Faerie Queen might corrupt me.
Drunk on power, I might give in to my most basic desires—end up no better than him.
It was that possibility which had led me to nearly give up.
But if I gave him what he wanted—full control over me—it was a certainty that he would destroy everything I’d ever loved.
I would take the chance on myself a thousand times before I let that happen.
“I’m willing to become what I must.”
Zaelos clapped his hands together in mock applause. “How honorable of you. The people who supposedly love you may not feel the same, considering they left that little Fae Lord to slay you the moment you emerged from the Soulseer.” He sneered. “Clever, to bring us here, by the way.”
My fingers tightened into fists on the hem of my shirt. “Jyuri is there should I fail to remove you.”
“Is that what he told you?” Zaelos snickered.
“You think that filthy lapdog of the Queen has any intention of letting you take another breath when you rise with her magic unbound within you? You’re a reminder of his failures.
Only your death can right his mistakes.” He brought a finger to his lips.
“Although he might return you to gain her favor. If that’s the case, you’ll wish you were dead.
The bit of magic I stole won’t hold a candle to the full extent of her power within the Fae realm. ”
“Which is why you settled on destroying Lustria.” I took a step closer. “Because you were too weak to make it in your own realm.”
“Lustria is a necessary stepping stone. I need worshippers to grow this power of mine. Our ideas of destruction are vastly different. My followers would be blessed.”
“And those who refused to follow you?”
He grinned. “You know the answer, don’t you?”
“Gods don’t belong on the mortal plane.”
There was a reason gods couldn’t walk amongst mortals. There needed to be balance—order.
“Little hypocrite. If you survive this, what do you think you’ll be?
When this power is no longer halved, this body no longer burdened with the weight of two souls, what do you think you will become?
” He raised a hand up above his head. “To a true god like the Faerie Queen, you’ll be no more than a bug, of course, but on Lustria? Where she can’t reach you herself?”
“No one will ever know what I am.” I took another step towards him, closing the gap between us almost imperceptibly. “I don’t have plans to use this power.”
His laughter seemed to echo through the darkness.
“Until you need it. Until someone you love needs it, and you taste for the first time how delectable it is to have such power coursing through your veins. And then it’s just one more time.
And another. And another.” Zaelos’s laughter turned wicked.
“That’s the problem with true power. Once is never enough.
A little bit is only good enough—until it isn’t. ”
“I’m not you,” I bit back. “Amorphael would have loved you as you were.”
He finally stopped cackling to frown, and his voice turned frigid. “Do not speak her name or deign to claim you understand what transpired between us.”
“I saw the memory. When she gifted you with the faylin lusoth. I may not know exactly how things work amongst the Fae, but I can recognize the look of someone in love.” Another step closer. “You never needed to be more than you were to be loved by her.”
While I couldn’t imagine loving the beast who’d tormented me for hundreds of years, it didn’t matter what I thought.
I knew what I’d seen. Amorphael had loved him once—if she didn’t still.
I’d never known a Zaelos who wasn’t twisted and cruel, so I couldn’t pretend to understand her affection, but I could take advantage of it.
A distraction made from pressing and twisting the invisible knife in his side until his bitter anger boiled over the top, unrestrained. I poked and prodded at his weakness while I closed the gap between us. He’d strike me down in a battle of magic alone, but if I could get close enough…
“You know nothing, stupid girl,” he spat.
Shadows slowly crawled up his arms, drenching his marble-pale skin in darkness.
“You are a vessel, a box to hold my magic, nothing more. If not for me, you would have perished long, long ago. I have gifted you many extra years of life in this godforsaken realm, and it is time you repay me.”
Just one more step, and I would be close enough.
I took that final step at the same time his eyes fell to my hands, taking in the dagger clutched between my fingers—my early ‘graduation’ gift.
Truly the first gift I’d ever received, and from the male who would change my life forever.
I could think of no better weapon to slay Zaelos.
He smirked and shot a sharpened point of shadow at me. My time was up.
I gripped the dagger with the force of everything I held dear to me—my love, my friends, my hopes, and my dreams for the future—and plunged it straight into Zaelos’s heart.
An emotion I never thought I’d see from him lit his face—shock.
And then fury, so potent I thought he’d murder me right then.
But he was too weak from the fatal wound I’d dealt him.
“You—you can’t live without me. We’ve spent lifetimes together.
I’ll always be there, haunting you. You can’t so easily purge the darkness in your soul. I was never the source.”
I ripped the dagger from his chest and held it at my side. “No. My soul is mine now. I am not the little girl who took your hand in a moment of weakness. I am so much stronger than my first life, and I will never lose the part of me which is good.”
Blood spurted from his mouth as he smiled, teeth coated in gore. “How many times?”
I’d asked him the same thing in the moments following our last death. But this time, it would not be both of us fading to nothing. “The eighth and final time.”
Something strange and melancholy settled in his eyes. “Nairu, I’m glad it was you.”
Before I could say another word, he collapsed—first to his knees, then onto his back, lifeless.
Beside him, I fell, my mouth open in shock, hands clutching my chest. I never thought I’d react to a kill in such a way. I didn’t expect to feel joy and relief the first time I had to use that dagger to end a life. I reached up to wipe my cheeks. When had my tears fallen?
I’m glad it was you. Zaelos’s last words left me stricken.
Eight lifetimes together…. I’d severed a piece of myself, one so twisted up inside of me I couldn’t ignore the absence it left.
He was the worst part of me, but he was a part of me nonetheless.
I could never forgive him, but I could allow myself to mourn that missing piece, regardless of how wrong it felt.
It was over.
I was free.
Pain came shortly after the realization. The visceral ache of a seam being ripped inside of my soul only for new parts and pieces to be sewn back together again. I could only lie there in the darkness, gritting my teeth while the sensation overcame me.
I knew when the final stitch was tied off only because of the sudden emptiness.
I’d spent more of my lives sharing my mortal coil with Zaelos than I’d spent in it alone.
It was suddenly too horribly desolate to exist as one mind in one body.
My thoughts, once clouded by the influence of another, were now clear. My movements, my actions, my own.
It would take getting used to—this unburdened existence—but I was free.
I whispered a last goodbye to Zaelos, my severed soul, and the heavy weight I’d grown used to lifted off my shoulders. This was letting go. Of all of it. I was letting go.
My feet began to sink into the darkness below, though this time, I did not panic. Not as I was dragged into nothingness, and not as I fell.
The Soulseer—the voice that lingered inside of it—left me with only one message. Do not squander the second chance you have been blessed with.
No, I would never return to the weak girl who had faced hardship and given up.
Who had taken the hand of a monster to retaliate against those who’d slighted her.
Who had existed as a shell of a person, unformed by a purpose.
I didn’t even feel like that same person anymore.
This Nairu was strong, resilient, and she would not falter. Never again.
I rose from the Soulseer slowly, my eyes closed as the strange liquid ran rivulets down my cheeks, dripping from the ends of my hair into the pool below.
When I fully emerged, feet perched upon the Soulseer as if it were solid, I was fully dry.
Untouched as if I’d never entered at all.
But much time had passed, I knew, for when I opened my eyes, before me was not only Jyuri, but Alandris, Lorian, and Makatza, as well.
They watched me strangely, unsure. I could almost see the questions racing behind their perfectly focused eyes. Who had emerged from the Soulseer? The woman or the monster or something in-between?
I smiled, soft at first, and then a grin so wide it stretched my cheeks to discomfort. “It’s me. I did it.”
Alandris was at my side in an instant, wrapping me in his arms and lifting me, spinning me in a dizzying circle as he laughed into the crook of my neck. So long he had waited for me, and at last we would have our time.
He set me down on my feet so I could embrace my crewmates, both of whom squeezed me until the air left my lungs.
“I do hate to interrupt this sickeningly sweet moment,” Jyuri said as I pulled back from Makatza. “However, there are a few matters we need to investigate.”
I stepped towards him. “Such as?”
He held his hand out to me, expectant. “Your wrist.”
Jyuri dragged a claw along my skin until a small line of blood ran along the cut. He held my wrist in an iron grip as he dipped his head down and ran his tongue along the wound. He paid no mind to my squirming, only releasing me when he was done with… whatever he’d been doing.
Alandris glowered at the male, his voice a deadly calm. “Did you just… lick her?”
Jyuri wet his lips, removing any trace of crimson. “A necessary means to an end.”
And then something I had not been expecting at all happened. Alandris stepped forward and punched Jyuri square in the jaw.
Shaking his battered knuckles, he sighed in bliss. “Oh, how I’ve longed to do that. You infuriate me so.”
The Fae rubbed at his chin, and I expected retaliatory bloodshed, but he simply laughed. “I’ll give one to you for free, Elf.”
Alandris gave a nod, and I saw something stranger still pass between the two of them—respect.
“Explain,” I demanded curtly.
“I needed to determine if you still possessed my Queen’s magic,” Jyuri answered.
“You do. Not a drop of it is missing, which is both impressive and problematic. Possibly even more concerning is the fact that her magic is no longer twisted up and fractured. I imagine it will no longer harm you to call upon it. You no longer look like you’re a breath from death, either. ”
“You got all of that from my blood?” I shook my head. “Never mind. I don’t want to know. That aside, why is this a problem? Those seem like wonderful revelations to make.”
“The Queen may not take kindly to this knowledge.”
“Convince her Nairu is not a threat,” Alandris spoke up.
“Ah, I may be oddly fond of your mortal pets, however, I can not make demands of the Unseelie Queen.” Jyuri screwed up his face. “Imagine the worst possible punishment you can, and I assure you she will make it worse for me.”
“If I may,” Lorian stepped forward. “Did you not make a bargain with my sister to protect Nairu?”
“Our deal has concluded. Nairu is safe from Zaelos. Your sister now owes me payment, in fact, which I intend to collect upon our return to Nil’Faerith.”
“You bastard,” he spat. “You worded it like that on purpose.”
“Of course I did. You can’t expect me to babysit the girl for the rest of her life. She has the blood of an immortal now. How terribly boring it would be to sit around for thousands of years at her beck and call.”
“We also need to worry about the Divine Council coming for her,” Makatza added.
“Also not a part of mine and Zorinna’s bargain.”
Makatza shot him a glare.
“Listen, there is no use sitting around arguing about what could happen,” I sighed. “We should return to Nil’Faerith. Whether it be the Divine Council or the Unseelie Queen’s minions, we should make a plan to deal with it together with everyone. For those who wish to remain, that is.”