Page 34 of Shadow Fall: Part Two

A cry of shock and panic went through the soldiers and gods behind us, and I turned with a frown, already gripping my dagger and calling more magic, gathering it in my chest where I could unleash every bit of it on the threat. But it wasn't a threat that made them shout, and a laugh of disbelief left me when I watched the shadow Wane ripped from Cronus's buildings glide along the ground, parting a path in the army. It poured over the bricks and flowed up Wane's back, attaching at his shoulders in a long, menacing cloak.

My heart drummed so damn fast. I'd never been so in love with Wane as I was right then.

"Is there time for a quickie?" I asked seriously.

Harvey snorted. Wane smiled, flattered, a strange mix of affection and murder in the bond between us. The part of me that had always loved dangerous men2 preened and pressed itself against him. It was a good thing Em was between us; I'd have climbed Wane like a tree.

"No," Emlyn rumbled. Killjoy. "Where the fuck is Wynvail? What's taking him so long?"

I didn't know, and I didn't like it.

"I can feel him," Wane said suddenly. Not Wynvail. Cronus. "His presence, his power." He shuddered, shadows thickening around his shoulders. "He knows I unmade his buildings. He's coming."

Any playfulness left me, replaced by dark, seething rage. Bleed him, break him, kill him.

Give 'em Hell, Erebus had said. I'd show Cronus exactly why demons were villainised, and why Hell was feared.

"Draw!" Lili yelled, but I was way ahead of her. I'd had my magic ready to unleash for an hour, and I'd been pulling up more and more during this whole march down the avenue. With the bone pin pressed to my skin and my own magic building, evolving, I wasn't entirely sure what I was capable of.

There would be no chance for tricks this time, no fake timelines, no alternate lifetimes to break me. If he wanted Wane's shadows, he'd have to face us as we were, and see if his spiteful, all-reaching power was a match for the storm growing inside me.

Storm. That would be a cool name for a child. I shook my head to free the thought, letting my rage build into an inferno. I tasted blood and ashes on my tongue. Like I had the day Cronus unmade Wyn, and he died in my arms.

He needed to pay. Needed to suffer.

Wane's low laugh made me jump. He was terrified of Cronus, feared him more than anyone else, but that laugh—auspicious and wicked—was a refusal to be afraid. And I turned at a sudden rush of movement and magic in the air, stared at the black, jagged skyline as it just … collapsed. Wane unmade it with half a thought, and never once looked away from the Capitol where Cronus waited. Or where he hid? Did he know we were here to bring about his end?

"Hold!" Lili yelled as rubble shifted in the building ahead of us, chunks of masonry crashing to the ground as something surged out of the wreckage.

"King's final stand, titan's last breath," I said, blood pounding in my ears as I watched Cronus's twenty-foot-tall shadow form erupt from the ruins, "A hellborn angel will deliver death."

Kai let his snakes erupt into the air around us, twenty of them brushing past me. No, fifty. No—I couldn't count how many. My heart swelled even more. I was so fucking proud to be the mate of these incredible men. But where the hell was Wyn?

Kai cast an unreadable look my way and finished, "Gods and mortals and titans all will bring the end at shadow fall."

"Hold!" Lili screamed louder when a few errant streak of magic escaped our company. The other three were close enough now that I glimpsed soldiers to our left and right, the others just visible behind the collapsed Capitol.

Cronus was surrounded. My pulse thrummed.

Cronus stepped over the bricks and shards of mortar, towering over us on the long path up to the building, as grotesque and horrific ever. This time, I knew exactly what those flashes of light within the darkness were. Knew they were gods he'd consumed. Eaten, like they were jelly babies and not people with families and lives of their own.

Power thrashed under my skin, desperate for an outlet. I bit my tongue and held it back, but my whole face burned with the bone pin's power, and I felt the magic all the way to my little toes.

Lili waited until Cronus was ten giant feet away from us, close enough to trample us if he rushed us, and then screamed, "Fire!"

My breath caught. I twisted my head when someone roared my name. Wyn? But the army rushed forward, and I was swallowed by the collective furore, the need for blood and vengeance shared by each and every one of us.

He dies here. Now.

I drew my dagger, ripped the metaphorical lid off my power, and screamed as we drove towards Cronus.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Iwasn't entirely prepared for what a battle with gods and titans would look like. I thought it would be like the fight at Olympus, but watching an army made from bright crimson magic race overhead, their commander yelling orders from a glowing magic chariot, I realised I had severely underestimated the scale of this. I was so out of my depth it was insane.

Celestial arrows dripping golden tears flew overhead, driving deep into Cronus's shadow form and, just for a second, lighting up his skeleton—and illuminating the people trapped inside him.

Fuck, they were really in there.

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