Page 83 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

We crash into the side of the mountain, our bodies slamming into the hard surface enough to release the air from my lungs. The echo of flesh on stone rings through my ears.Azai’s responding chuckle sends me into a rage. Punching out, I slam my curled fist into the side of his face, releasing his middle enough to bring my hands together and slam them down on the back of his head as he bows under the pressure of my blows.

A leg swipes out—his—and knocks my feet together. We tumble to the ground, first on our sides and then I’m flipped onto my back. Grappling, cursing silently, the pain in my ribs screams for relief as something vicious stabs at my insides, lighting up a fire in my side that burns away conscious thought of anything save for the agony. When his fist flies into my face, it drags me back from the precipice as my whole head jerks to the side with the force of his blow. Blood fills my mouth and the sharp, stabbing sensation spreading across the side of my upper abdomen intensifies.

Gritting my teeth, I let myself fall and take the brunt of the impact, only turning and shoving him off me as my uninjured side hits the ground. When the clouds above separate just barely and a beam of moonlight shines down from above, Azai comes into full view and I freeze at the sight. The skin of his face is pulled taut over the bones of his skull and his eyes glow an eerie red as he bares sharpened canines. The taste of rust and salt sit heavy on my tongue as I lift my gaze to the shadows behind him. They’re not shadows at all but bodies. Moving in swaying motions, bobbing back and forth on their feet, I watch as the empty faces of Terra stalk forward, Nubo behind them.

The Mortal God Terra doesn’t smile. He doesn’t even seem to look at me so much asthroughme. I grope for my side as I feel liquid soak into my tunic. My bones creak and my ownflesh contracts as I breathe shallowly, trying not to hasten the damage before my natural healing can kick in. It’s taking its sweet fucking time.

As if seeming to realize just how injured I am, Azai smiles and gets to his feet. The red in his gaze lessens as he smooths both hands back over his long hair, shoving the strands out of his face. Twisting my head to the side, I spit out a wad of blood to get rid of the taste of death in my mouth.

“I had hoped you would prove to be more, Ruen,” Azai comments, his tone almost lazy as he holds a fist up. The Terra all halt their movements but not Nubo. He comes forward, passing through them like a ghost whisperer controlling his own dead souls until he arrives just behind my father’s right shoulder.

“What are you planning now, old man?” I demand, cupping my hand over where blood gushes from a tear in my side. I don’t have to look down to know that bone has broken through. The stabbing agony racing up my body and making my vision grow hazy is enough to tell me it’s bad.

Get up,I command myself. My thigh muscles contract and release and then sag, but I don’t move. Fuck.

Azai bares his teeth in an expression that’s not quite amused, but it is certainly smug. He steps forward, coming to a stop in front of me before he crouches low. The brown boots that lace up his calves are tight and scuffed. I raise my eyes from them to where his tunic collar gapes slightly and I blink at what I see.

A mud-brown snake eases out from beneath his shirt and Azai lifts a hand, letting the creature creep onto his fingers. It’s so tiny that it's more of a worm than a serpent, but its beady black eyes stare back at me as it flicks its tongue into the air.

“Did you truly think Kalix was the only one with these familiars?” Azai asks, keeping his gaze on the snake on his fingers. “If you met Ariadne, then you should know that herdaughter’s familiars are also hers.” He turns his hand over, letting the serpent wiggle into the center of his palm. “It never occurred to you that Kalix got his familiar from me, did it?”

My stomach knots and my side burns in pain. My flesh crawls with a horrifying awareness as that damn snake curls up into a small circle against Azai’s skin—as if it’s comfortable there, as if it’s used to his touch.

“Not all Mortal Gods get their powers from their God parents,” I croak out, but I know the words are useless. The truth is before me regardless of what I want to believe. If Azai’s been using Kalix’s snakes to spy on us, then they must knoweverything.

Dread sinks into me, curling into my bones and turning my blood to ice. Azai nods at my comment. “True,” he says. “But of my three sons, Kalix is the most like me.” He curls his fingers over the baby snake, creating a makeshift cage. The snake doesn’t move, doesn’t try to squirm out of the dangerous place. “It came as no shock when he developed an affinity for the serpents that I left to look after him. I didn’t even mind when he killed one or two—I understood him in a way you never could, though you tried so desperately, didn’t you?”

More blood fills my mouth, this time tasting like vomit more than rust. “Why?” I don’t know if I expect an answer. I don’t even know what I’m asking ‘why’ for. There are so many ‘whys’ in my head. Why did you bother to have us? Why did you put us together? Why did you leave us in the Academy? Why did you wait until now to reveal your true self?

Drip. Drip. Drip.Fresh blood steals across my tunic and down to the waistband of my trousers, so much that the fabric cannot contain it and it plops onto the stone beneath me. Even my shallow breaths become violent fire in my lungs, burning a path up my throat. My vision blurs in front of me, the grand hallfading in and out, but I keep my gaze trained on Azai, on the snake for as long as I can see.

“Why did I let you live?” Azai guesses. I don’t correct him, I just swallow past the lump forming against the back of my throat and wait. My legs are growing numb, my muscles stiffening as the pain spreads. There will be no fight. “Come now, Ruen,” Azai says, sighing. “You’re my most intelligent son. You should know the answer to that.”

I finally let my eyes slide shut. He’s right. I do know the answer.

The great taboo Caedmon warned us about. They’re consuming Mortal Gods’ ‘Divinity’ to keep themselves alive and young. That’s why they kept having children. Why hiding any Mortal Gods was made illegal. Why humans had to be punished, why my mother had to die. Azai didn’t care about her or Theos’ mother or Kalix’s. All he wanted was us—our strength, our lives, our powers.

It was all to feed his own.

Chapter 39

Kiera

Ahiss leaves Kalix's lips as he jerks back from me, our mouths separating in a sudden retraction that has me reeling. The rain has slowed to a trickle now. The light mist covering my cheeks and forehead as well as the bridge of my nose is far easier to see through than the earlier downpour and I spy the snake coiled at Kalix's side with its fangs sunk past his tunic and into his side.

"Little fucking—" Kalix reaches down to pry the animal off him, but I stop him with a hand. Something about the snake makes me frown as it looks up, unblinking at the two of us.

"Don't," I warn. Kalix goes still as I hold out my hand and the snake retracts its fangs from Kalix. As soon as it does, Kalix reaches down and lifts his tunic. I ignore the dips and hollows of muscles underneath and instead focus on the reveal of the twin bleeding holes, but I see no quick coagulation of the blood. No venom.

Kalix casts the animal a dark glare as he lets the fabric of his shirt fall back down. The snake slithers forward, nipping against my fingertips as its tail flicks back and forth. "It's ... upset," I murmur. Though the connection I'd made with Kalix in thepseudo-Hinterlands is gone, I don't need it to sense the animal's fright.

Almost as soon as I realize that fact, too, a smaller shadow appears from the depths of the darkness behind the bridge, scurrying forward rapidly. Ara. I pull my hand back from the snake and turn my palm over to lay it for her to climb onto. She makes a beeline straight for me, her fuzzy legs tapping with rapid succession until she practically leaps onto my palm, using it as a jumping ground to launch herself up my arm.

Spider fangs sink into my skin and I flinch before quickly reaching across and prying her loose. "No need to bite," I tell her. "I know something is up. What's wrong?"

Images slam into my mind and with a gasp, I jerk to my feet so quickly that I almost stumble right over the edge of the half wall to the cliffs below. Kalix catches me before that can happen and frowns, a growl low in his tone. "What is it?" he demands.

There are so many flashes inside my head, and they all seem to collide into one another, telling a story, but not clearly. Bodies rumbling on the stone ground. Broken flesh. A bone protruding.Drip. Drip. Drip.Blood falling to the floor. Sweat trickling down a temple. Azai's face in view and then ... nothing. Golden hair—Azai's or ... someone else's.Ruen.

---