Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
S tarlight City is falling. I can’t breathe through the smoke as I watch the city begin to scream, and those screams reach my ears as our alpha shouts for his guards to save him, to get him out… He isn’t going to defend the people down there. He is going to let them be drained and die. No, he can’t do this! Rhodes is reaching for me as I turn and run to Alek, who’s standing still like a statue in the smoke, blood all over his hands and clothes, dead guards at his feet. I step over them to get to him and pause.
“Hello,” he purrs. I look straight up into his Nexus, and it’s like looking right into Aleksander’s soul. I want to ask what is standing between us—I want to know what is holding him back—but I don’t. This isn’t the right time. His clothes are ripped, his shirt is half hanging off, and my breath hitches when I see scars. Black scars all over his chest and shoulders. Alek grips my chin, angling my face up and away. “I took them for you.” His eyes are blood red. Anyone else would be terrified, but not me. Not with him. Not with any of my mates because they are mine. Aleksander is mine.
“Hello, mate,” I whisper back. “What are they?” He doesn’t tell me, just as secretive as usual. “The Vian are attacking our city and killing innocent people. We need to help them.”
“And we will, but I want to meet her again. Let her out to play.” His voice is like velvet, sliding over me, and my Nexus perks up. Oh, now you want to come out? Horny bitch.
I clear my throat. “Maybe we should go play with the Vian first, and then afterwards, we can do this.”
I hiss at the nails scratched across my mind—she doesn’t want to help them. I don’t know how to feel about that, about how okay she is with a city full of innocents dying while we could help. Rhodes is waiting as Alek’s Nexus leans down, kissing my cheek before he walks around me, goes up to one of the parked cars, opens the door, and yanks out a ranger onto the ground. The normal ranger yelps but soon goes quiet when Aleksander growls. Two more rangers lift their guns and shoot him. “ALEK!”
My shout is pointless because the bullets bounce off Alek, and Rhodes lifts his hand, sending the bullets back into the chests of the rangers who shot them. “You didn’t have to kill them.”
Rhodes takes my hand. “They would have shot us next. They work for the alpha.” Alek speeds off in his stolen car, and I turn to the academy, knowing I need to get to Finnegan, but I could also do a lot to help at the battlefront. Rhodes makes the decision for me by leading me down the steps, over the bodies, with a tug of his hand. There is one more car left, and I’m surprised to see Howard in the driver’s seat. “Finnegan is awake and getting weapons with Hollis. He will be fine.” I’m relieved, but something tells me to go and check myself. How does Rhodes know that already? I shake the feeling away and trust him.
“What are you doing?” I ask Howard as he opens the door for us to get in. Rhodes looks at me like he is asking if I trust Howard enough to go with him, and I nod. We can trust Howard, he is too kind and sweet to be anything but on our side.
Howard starts the engine. “I saw what happened, and I saw the alpha run away. I might not be strong, but I am a ranger, and I am going to the front to fight, like we all should do.”
I’m weirdly proud of him. Rhodes is silent as Howard drives us to the city, using the off-road paths, which are empty, to get close to the west side of the city before he parks up. The second he does, Rhodes turns to me. “Wait in the car a minute. I need to talk to Howard about what to do before we go in there.”
“Alright,” I agree, needing a moment with my Nexus anyway to ask for help. The smoke covers Howard and Rhodes, but I can just about make them out. My Nexus hides in my mind, but I push her to the surface before getting out of the car, knowing I will at least be able to tap into some of my powers. My footsteps are hidden by the screams and explosions in the city as I walk up to Rhodes and Howard, but Howard is on the floor, pale and still, and Rhodes is touching his arm. I can’t understand what I’m seeing, what is right in front of me as Rhodes turns his eyes my way and his eyes are glowing like gold. I take a step back, fear echoing around my body and locking my muscles in place.
Rhodes doesn’t explain himself.
He doesn’t tell me what happened.
Howard is dead because he murdered him…drained him. I can’t fight as Rhodes’s magic wraps around me and takes me back to the car, the seatbelt locking around my body like a vice before he climbs into the driver’s seat and starts the car. Silent tears are streaming down my cheeks, and I feel like I can’t breathe. “I want you to know, while we’re alone this one last time, everything I did was to keep you safe. I never expected to find a mate and not for it to be you. Not everything was a lie, but you’re going to hate me, anyway. Don’t bother reaching for your Nexus; I’ve been drugging your food for months to make her distant.”
“Y-you killed Howard.” I sob but he doesn’t stop. He keeps driving through the chaos of the city, and the Vian move out of the way for our car. He drives past the city limits and to the forest, to a hill right in the centre, and parks up next to a bunch of other cars with the headlights shining onto a group of people. It’s true. He’s lied to me. “You’re Vian.”
“Half,” Rhodes answers, his voice cold. “And all of me is in love with you.”
“You fucking lying piece of shit!” I scream, wriggling against his power, but I can’t move, I can’t do anything to get out. He doesn’t look at me, and part of me is glad that he doesn’t. He killed Howard, he lied to me, and he is working for our enemies. All this time…I’ve been fooled by him.
“Commander Rhodes, bring her out.” My stomach plummets at the old, deep voice. A voice that I’ve never heard before but instinctively know to be terrified of.
Rhodes gets out and comes round to my side, grabbing my arm to pull me out, and I glare up at him. “I will never, ever forgive you for this.”
He is completely impassive as he looks at me, and my heart breaks with every step as he walks me up to the clearing. Car lights make it bright and hard to see as I’m dragged to the top of the hill, and Rhodes pushes me in front of him before he bows his head low to the man standing in the centre. At his feet is Finnegan, tied up and unconscious. “FINN!” I try to move to him, but Rhodes keeps his power locked around me and makes it clear he isn’t letting go anytime soon. Hollis is here, one of the cloaked people, and Rochelle is too, her cloak hood down, and she smiles.
“We haven’t met yet, but I have been very much looking forward to meeting you properly in person.” My head snaps back to the man. The Vian king and his presence alone makes my blood run cold. His voice only makes my stomach turn. I put him in his fifties if he was human, but it’s very clear he is not, and it has nothing to do with the black crown in his blond hair. His eyes are like glittering gold, dying stars, and he’s wearing a long black cloak. There is a resemblance to Severi, and the prince himself casually walks up to his father’s side. “She is on her way. A family reunion. Just what we need.” He looks at me. “Gwenieve.”
“Fuck all of you,” I snap.
“Oh, a broken heart is one of the worst pains,” the king begins, and his voice grates on my nerves. “My commander did have to betray you, but the mate bond is real. Being half Vian is always kept a secret, but breeding our way into your city and race has been a long-time mission of mine. The best way to bring down an empire is from within.” He leans down. “Seeing you through my son’s eyes is not quite like seeing you in person. The Morrigan, it is an honour to meet you in person. I was alive when you last walked this earth. Welcome back. It is time to end this now.”
“Is that what you think I am?” I shake my head. “Some Goddess? Reborn? You’re out of your fucking mind, and I’m not doing anything for you!”
“That’s what you are. There is so much you don’t know.” He sighs. “Your mother was such a terrible, betraying liar. She took you when she had no right to do that. You were born to be my weapon, just like Georgina.”
“My mother wasn’t a liar,” I snarl. I will defend my parents to the end.
“She was, and she worked for me. Your father did too.” He leans down so his gold eyes are closer than I’d like. “Your real father. You’re half Vian too, Gwenieve. Your power, the grey magic, is what half Vian and half Nexus can do, but yours is stronger. You drain the world around you, but we need to touch to be able to do that. I won’t lie to you like everyone else, but you will do something great for me.”
“No. You’re lying!” I whisper but something cracks in my soul. The truth cracks me open.
“I have no interest in lying to you. Not when you’re everything that I’ve waited for to end this war for once and for all.” He looks above me. “Ah, here she is.”
I don’t need to know Georgina is here. She runs up to my side and bows to the king. “I did what you asked.”
“You did well, and you will get the reward you asked for.” He touches her shoulder. “I am very proud of you.”
I’m going to throw up all over them both. Severi’s eyes find mine and I can’t focus on anything but him. I swear he looks conflicted. The king blocks my view with one step to the side. “Are you ready, Georgina? Gwenieve is. This might cause you a little bit of pain, but pain is nothing but temporary, like I taught you. This will end the war.”
I can’t move, I can’t breathe, as Rhodes lets me go, his power drifting away. Rhodes, the one that was always kind to me. Hollis, the one that always hated me. They’re half Vian. They’re working with Vian, and they are commanders. The king thinks my mother is someone she couldn’t have been and that my father isn’t the man who brought me up. It can’t be true, none of it can be. Everyone leaves me alone with Georgina.
She pushes her cloak back from her shoulders, and it falls to the floor. “I was careful never to touch you, never to get too close. But your Nexus is so strong, like mine. I think she knew exactly who I was to you from the very beginning. She tried desperately to show you, but I pushed her down.”
“Stay away.” I take a step back, holding my hands up.
“Don’t bother trying to run now.” Georgina closes the space I made. “This is what we were born to do, to rewrite the world. We do it all together. The truth is, I can amplify magic, and I have trained to do this. It will hurt, but we both know you deserve the pain.”
She grabs onto my wrist, and I scream. My Nexus is ripped to the front of my mind, every cell in my body changing, and I feel it, feel it like knives being slammed into me over and over. My feet leave the ground as I hover in the air until we’re above the tree line and there is nothing but us. The wind stills. The world stills. My grey magic spreads around us both, dancing in the air in spirals that get bigger by the second, and my body feels weaker too. I can’t move and my Nexus is screaming. I think I’m screaming too.
“Who are you to me?” I manage to claw the question from my chest.
“Your twin sister, and we are finally together again. I’m sorry you have to die now. Really die.” I can’t do anything as my power rips out of my soul, controlled by her, and like a wave, washes across the city, destroying half of it within seconds. No. No. No. The buildings turn to grey ash as the lights go out one by one, as I kill hundreds of thousands in the blink of an eye, and there is nothing but the light of their souls hovering in the air in their wake. Horror and sickness rise in my throat as I try desperately to pull away from Georgina, but her grip is tight, her magic unmovable. The wave goes on, and I cry out for anyone to help me, for this to stop, but she just smiles. “This is what we were born to do.”
We are death.
We are destruction, and with me, she is going to end the world.
Something slams into us hard, and Georgina cries out as a sword is shoved right through her stomach. Her grip on me is ripped off, her nails drawing lines down my arms as she flies back in the air. I fall, the world spinning, and I gasp as I slam into someone’s arms. Severi. He holds me close to him, and he moves so fast through the forest, the trees blurring until we come to a stop. He gently puts me down, and everything around me keeps spinning as I nearly fall over, but he holds me upright.
“Are you okay?” he demands, and I look down, seeing he is bleeding from several places.
“Me? You’re bleeding,” I mutter.
“And you can’t stand. Are we really fighting about who is worse off when they are going to find us at any moment.” He goes to the car parked up behind us. Finnegan is in the back seat, still unconscious, with his sister and father in the front, waiting. He saved Finnegan for me. “You need to go now.”
I look at the city in the distance…it’s so silent. The orbs of light, the powers and souls from who I just killed, are floating up into the dark sky like stars. “I’m a monster…you shouldn’t free me. You need to find a way to kill me for good.”
“You didn’t kill, Georgina did.” He turns me from the lights and cups my face. “And they’ll keep killing with you. You need to go. Go and have a life with Finnegan. You’ll also find Alek and Onyx. I’ve sent word on where to meet you. You can never trust Hollis and Rhodes, do you understand? They are hundreds of years old and my father’s most trusted commanders.” I shake my head, as I can’t hold back my tears.
“When Georgina’s around, nearby like she is now, my father can’t get into my head. He can’t control my body and mind, where I only watch like a witness as he hurts you and tortures you. I hate myself for it, but I have never, ever laid a hand on you when I’m in control, because you are my mate. I’m a fucked-up asshole, but I want you alive. Anytime I don’t call you Tulip, it’s not me. Anytime I call you Gwenieve, that is him. To me, you’re Tulip, do you understand? Your father knew, and he told me to call you that. He might not have been your biological father, but it never mattered to him.” He kisses me and I gasp, his lips devouring mine. “But it doesn’t matter now because you’re never going to see me again.”
“Come with us.”
“I made the wrong choice once. Just once. It cost me this, it cost me a life with you, and I’ll never forgive myself for it.” He shakes his head and pushes me away from him. “Run, Gwen. Fucking run from me, and don’t let me find you, because I can’t stop what he will use me to do to you. No one can stop him if he has you as his weapon.”
“But…” I take a step closer. “But he will kill you. He will hurt you for betraying him. Come with me and we can?—”
“I’m his heir. I’ll live, but I’ll wish I’m dead if he has you. Run. Don’t make me threaten one of your other mates to make you leave.” He stares at me.
“You don’t want to hurt me.”
“I never did.” My heart breaks as I do what my former enemy tells me, and I run to the car. I feel numb as I get into the car, as Feyre holds my hand, as Finnegan’s father drives us away from the destruction.
Everything is a lie…and I’m a living weapon who could destroy the world.