51. Bree
Bree
The glamour falls.
Not slowly. Not dramatically.
It just stops .
Phil’s body doesn’t twist or transform—it simply sheds pretense like a snake shedding skin. His eyes go black, shot through with silver that moves like liquid mercury. His voice reverberates, layered over itself until I can’t tell where one tone ends and another begins.
The air around him hums like a tuning fork struck too hard.
I try to move—try to call the Ether, something —but he’s faster.
“Don’t—” I start.
Too late.
The guys charge as one. Rhett leads with fire blazing around his fists, Gray half-shifted mid-motion, Jace’s blades flashing silver in the light. Theo and Wes channel energy behind them.
Ethos barely moves.
A gesture. A pulse.
They’re thrown back—not struck, not burned, simply rejected from existence for a heartbeat before they hit the ground hard enough that the impact echoes through the courtyard.
They fall like stars pulled out of orbit.
“No!” The scream tears out of my throat.
I lunge forward, but the world stops .
Marcus raises one hand, murmuring words I can’t hear over the ringing in my ears. My body locks mid-step. The Ether thrashes—wild, furious, mine —but my limbs refuse to obey .
My mind screams. My magic rages.
But I can’t move.
Ethos tilts his head, watching me struggle with something that might be amusement. “Don’t fight it, little queen. You’ll want to see this.”
Behind him, the army surges forward.
Five hundred soldiers crash against the Feeders and families who answered my call. Ether, fire, blood, and mist explode together. The air fills with screams—raw and primal and wrong .
The sanctuary’s walls pulse like a heartbeat trying to survive cardiac arrest.
I feel each death through the Ether like a nerve being cut.
The Feeders who came because they trusted me. The families who believed I could protect them. One by one, their lights wink out—bonds severing, magic dying, lives ending.
The world becomes a map of dying lights.
“Look at them.” Ethos steps close enough that his breath ghosts across my ear. “Your beautiful rebellion, dying for nothing. Tell me, does it still feel like salvation?”
My eyes burn. The mist around my feet writhes uselessly, unable to reach anyone who needs it.
He points, directing my gaze like I’m a puppet.
Stellan—on his knees in the dirt, chest heaving, hands drenched in blood that isn’t his. His perfect control shattered, replaced by something raw and desperate.
Rhett—flames guttering out as a blow sends him sprawling. He tries to push himself up, falls, tries again .
Wes and Theo—collapsed together near the fountain. Theo’s eyes are half-closed, blood trailing from his temple. Wes shields him with his body even though he’s bleeding from the mouth.
Gray—down but still dragging himself toward me, fingers digging into the earth. His eyes lock on mine even when he can’t stand.
And Thane—
Thane fights like a storm contained in flesh. A dozen opponents surround him and he moves through them with ruthless efficiency. But even he’s slowing. Even he’s bleeding.
“They’re dying for you,” Ethos murmurs. “Every single one of them. And you can’t save them.”
Movement catches my eye—Seth, half-hidden in shadow near the sanctuary wall.
He’s doing something. I can’t tell what. The Ether can’t reach far enough through Marcus’s binding to sense it properly.
But he’s there .
“Your newest love,” Ethos purrs. “The one you kissed like a promise. The one who bonded to you while you were in my bed. Where is he now, Bree? When you need him most?”
I try to speak—to call to Seth, to scream, to do anything —but nothing comes out except a choked sound that might be his name.
The battle rages. More lights wink out. More screams cut short.
And I stand frozen, forced to watch it all burn.
Then—
Ethos stiffens.
The change is subtle—just a fraction of tension in his shoulders, a break in his perfect composure. His smirk falters.
Pain flickers across his face .
Not mine. His .
I feel it through the air, through the bound Ether—something hit him. Something he didn’t expect.
In the shadows, Seth’s silhouette finally moves. Light flares—or maybe sound breaks through the chaos—but I can’t see what he does.
Only Ethos’s reaction.
A sound tears from his throat—low, startled, pained .
The entire battlefield stills for a fraction of a second, like the world holding its breath.
“What—” His voice frays at the edges, no longer smooth. “What have you—”