Page 277 of Heat of the Everflame

Destroy.

I didn’t even surrender to the magic—my heart did it all on her own. She was still healing from the near loss of him to the godstone, and she’d be damned if we let the gods take him now.

The odd, destructive silvery light burst from my skin. I’d once believed it a reflex, some uncontrollable force that worked in ways I couldn’t predict let alone control, but every time I used it, I came a little closer to bringing it to heel.

I honed in on its essence—where it came from, what it did. My usual magic flowed from my godhood, but this power seemed imbued in my blood itself. And when it brushed against the toxic bleakness of the godstone’s touch, it did not cower.

It merged. Itfulfilled.

I thought I’d been destroying the godstone. But it was never destruction—it was balance.

Hot and cold, light and shadow, life and death.

In the center of that all-consuming glow, a preternatural wisdom bathed me in its eerie, quiet calm. A knowledge of all that was and ever will be, a glimpse from the gods themselves at a truth too pure for human minds to comprehend.

And yet, for that moment—one perfect, ephemeral moment—I understood.

But it was an answer I wasn’t yet meant to know.

Not until my worth was proven.

Not until my soul had been judged.

I cried out as it slipped away, evaporating like a wet stone baking beneath the sun. It tingled at my fingertips and whispered in my ear of choices and prophecies and fate, but when the light ebbed, so too did it fade.

“How did you do that?”

The King stood in the corridor, jaw agape.

“That... that wasgodstone,” he stammered. “How...?”

I raised my palms, and a burst of shadow slammed into the center of his chest. He grunted and hit the floor, wrestling with the writhing darkness that pinned him down.

Luther lay nearby, eyes closed. My heart plunged as I ran and collapsed on top of him, healing magic pouring out before my hands even found his flesh.

His insides were in ruins—organs failing, tissue rotting to an ashy grey—and yet his heart had once again been miraculously spared. It was defiant, that warrior heart of his. Just like the woman it loved.

Its fierce, persistent beat grew louder as my magic did its work. His hand twitched, then closed over mine, and when his blue-grey eyes opened and met my gaze, all the air in my lungs rushed out.

“I leave you alone forfiveminutes,” I joked, though my voice was a hoarse, shaken mess.

“Whatever it takes to get your hands on me.” We shared a relieved smile as the last of the damage mended, then his face turned grim. “The messenger hawks.”

“I heard. We can’t wait anymore.”

As I helped him stand, I spied my mother lurking in the doorway of the cell, watching me with a clouded expression. I felt a stab of guilt—I hadn’tintendedto use the Umbros magic on her, but given her willingness to let Luther die, I didn’t exactly regret it, either.

“How did you do that?” the King bellowed, wriggling free of my shadowy web. “What kind of weapon do you have? Where did you get it?”

I schooled my face to confusion. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“That door was solid godstone. Nothing can destroy it.”

My head cocked. “That door was made of iron. I melted it away with Lumnos light.”

He scowled. “Don’t play games with me. That godstone dates back to the Blessed Father himself.”

My mother slowly began to creep away.

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