Page 94 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

“That was a mistake, Son,” he tells me. “It would have been far easier had you fallen asleep, but now this is going to hurt.”

“I’m not your fucking son!” Even as I scream the rejection, my arm cramps with pain, fingers digging around the handle of the dagger still in my grip. Reacting on battle instinct, I veer upward, slicing across his face once and then dragging it back a second time. I tighten my opposite hand into a fist and sink it into his abdomen.

I’m released, crashing to the ground as darkness thrusts into my mind.

No. Not yet.My bare knees scrape against the stone. Something wet trickles down my side and back. Lifting my head, I realize that the Gods have arrived upon us—Tryphone facing off with Kiera and Gygaea with Kalix. I look one way and then another.

There’s still no sign of Ruen or Ariadne and Caedmon.

Azai’s hand returns, his fingers gripping my throat as he lifts me from my prone position, tightening until air can barely squeeze into my lungs. His face morphs into one of unadulterated fury. The thin lines that cut across his cheeks and nose, leaking blood and unhealing. I glance down at the blade in my hand in confusion, and when I see it, I start to laugh.

“Brimstone,” I rasp.

Azai reaches for the dagger and I flip it over, deftly twisting it in my fingers tossing it across the space to my other hand which I then use to raise and slam it into his shoulder. The howl of agony that erupts from between his lips has never been so sweet.

Chapter 46

Kiera

“You could have joined me.” Tryphone’s voice is no longer in my mind but before me as we circle each other. Nearby, from Nubo’s body, Kalix had procured a sword and slashes at Gygaea as she drags vines from beneath the ground to crack it and use as her own weapons.

“Had you only told me who you were.”

I shake my head. “I didn’t even know who I was until I came to the Academy,” I inform him. “Even if I had known, though, I wouldn’t have come to you. I would rather die with a sword in my chest or a dagger to my throat than live with your heels on my back.”

Tryphone’s body moves with the same languid ease that hides his emotion. Surely, he must be nervous. Things aren’t going the way he expected. Right?

“Your mother was a disappointment,” Tryphone continues, not bothering to respond to my words.

My bare feet move swiftly across the stone, little rocks and rubble from Gygaea’s call to the earth sticking to my soles.

“Then why didn’t you kill her?” I ask. “Why imprison her?”

He pauses as if he hadn’t expected that I’d know about her imprisonment. Then he begins moving again, only this time, his leisurely pace is a step faster.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.I hear the sound of Kalix’s sword cutting and hacking at Gygaea’s branches. Azai’s howl from the opposite end of the garden ricochets back to me.

“Where is Ruen Darkhaven?” I ask when Tryphone refuses to answer my question about Ariadne.

A glimmer of something—an emotion that appears and disappears too quickly for me decipher—crosses the God King’s face. “You shall never know, child,” he answers. “For I intend to kill you before he can come to your rescue.”

I freeze, his words revealing—before my mind can complete the thought, my body is catapulted into the air by unseen hands. They catch at my arms and legs, dragging me back down. Twisting my flesh back and forth until it burns.

Gritting my teeth, I reach for my own power and shadows burst from beneath my skin and at every corner of the garden. They wash over me in a giant wave, an ocean of darkness taking me into its soft cocoon of safety and ripping the invisible hands from my body. Claws rake across my skin, dragging me down, down, down.

I hit the ground and roll as a blade appears and the sharp tip slams into the stone, sending sparks into my eyes as I look back to see that it had been accurate. Had I not moved, it would now be embedded in my face.

Panting, I jump to my feet and refocus on the God King as he wields a sword at his side. “It must be convenient to have so many abilities,” I say, sucking in lungfuls of air as the shadows slither around my arms. They rope together, braiding themselves down into a whip. “It’s such a wonder that you only ever use them to be a selfish bastard.”

The sword moves for me, silver flashing as it swings. I dodge to the side even as my grip on the shadow whip tightens. I flick my wrist and jerk my arm up, aiming for Tryphone’s hand. Metal clatters to the ground and Tryphone wrathful curse echoes back to me.

Pain seizes my chest in the next instant, cutting off the sound of Tryphone’s anger and I scream as the shadow whip falls from my hand, dispersing as it hits the stone. Looking down, I gape and swallow down bile as a sword slices through my chest and out of my ribcage.

Red blood drips from the steel blade, rolling back towards me due to its angle. Tryphone straightens where he stands and there’s no mistaking the shock on his expression. Who is it? Who?—

“We are not doing this again, father mine.”

A whole new kind of pain lacerates my insides. That voice, that soft, strong feminine tone is one I recognize—one I thought … perhaps … maybe this time, I could trust her.

---