Page 97 of A Rising Hope

My body protested, alive and yet begging for the relief of death, but I kept my mind chained, shackled with only one thought.

Finnleah.

There was no room for weakness, no room for a mistake.

I called on the flicker of my fire available and let the castle burn.

The walls crumbled around us as the mountain turned to ash, until there was nothing left of the castle other than dust.

59

FINNLEAH

The moment the saltwater breeze hit my nose, I knew I only had seconds to save the world.

The Queen’s dead body lay flat near me. The earth trembled, quaking underneath the magic’s pull as if it were going to explode and shatter the entirety of Esnox to piece.

I yanked Heart Piercer out of my chest, wincing at the unpleasant feeling of the blade.

My mind was already chanting the words I learned from the High Ladies.

Perhaps we didn’t have a stone to contain the magic, but I was the next best thing.

There was no point in cutting my skin for my own blood, the dagger was already coated in it. The earth shook once more, though this time the castle exploded with loud flames, and ash and stone rained from the sky.

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Gideon’s loud voice roared as I froze with a dagger above the Queen’s heart.

“Worried I’ll be too powerful for you?” I snickered nervously, unsure of whether to laugh or cry as his figure appeared from the clouds of smoke and ash.

He was alive.

He looked like a dead man walking, face almost unrecognizable, body so disheveled I was sure I had seen corpses look better, and yet I couldn’t mistake his mighty voice and his intense glare.

He was alive, and I wanted to run and shout and burst from the relief that flooded me.

But there was no time for that.

The earth shook violently again.

“Put the damn dagger down, Finnleah” he ordered, limping towards me as fast as he could, dragging a chair stump behind him in a place of a foot.

“We will all die, you know that. I have to fix it,” I reasoned. There was no time for arguing and yet a part of me wanted to hear his voice, even if it was only for a split second longer.

“Wewon’t. The rest can go for all I care. Put the dagger down.” His chest rumbled another command. He was only a few steps away, his overwhelming presence already calling my name. And gods’ hell and heaven above, I’d fold at another step, another command from him and I’d come crawling to him.

I loved that man, undead, dead or alive.

“See you in the next life,” I anxiously winked before he could reach me. I plunged a dagger into Insanaria’s chest as well as one more into mine as I uttered the words the Dead had taught me.

A call upon the magic.

Magic erupted, levitating my body as beams of light, as bright as the sun, shone from me. Limbs flared, eyes vacant. Air wheezed from my chest.

An unimaginable magnitude of power rippled through every cell in my body, testing its limits as it pushed and tore each piece of me in different directions.

“Fuck,” Gideon’s voice sounded below me like a distant echo.

I could no longer see the sky, only blinding light tormenting me, searing through all my thoughts and feelings, ripping through the walls and fortresses I had built, destroying any memories I cherished.

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