Page 102 of Witch Queen

Shudders shook the Brooklyn Bridge. She gritted her teeth and widened her stance, clinging grimly to the artifacts quaking violently in her hands.

Brimstone appeared at her left flank and pressed against her. Hellreaver whooshed into view and supported her right side.

Mae swallowed. “Thanks, guys!”

Of course, my witch, they rumbled, pleased.

A spectral shape whooshed out of Vedran’s body. Mae’s pulse quickened at the glimpse of a dark face full of menace before it vanished under the effect of the magic drenching the air.

“Was that—Davor?!”

Yes, Na Ri said.

Vedran twisted onto his back and convulsed, dark foam bubbling from his mouth. His hair turned white. His flesh shriveled. His body contorted and shrank.

Ran Soyun looked away from the awful sight and met Mae’s gaze steadily. “Goodbye for now, my daughters.”

Mae’s throat constricted. “Goodbye, Mother.”

I love you, Mother, Na Ri murmured brokenly.

Ran Soyun’s magic danced across Mae’s forehead as she kissed her brow.

“RAN SOYUN!” Barquiel roared. “Don’t you dare leave meeee!”

Rambrog muzzled the demon.

“Come back to me, Ran!” Azazel’s eyes were dark with grief where he, Vlad, and Cortes blocked Barquiel’s path. “You promised you would!”

Ran Soyun smiled at her husband. “And I always keep my promises, my love.”

The flow of time seemed to stop when she looked at Mae. Their gazes stayed locked as the souls of the first Witch Queen and her familiar shivered and broke apart in pale threads that vanished with sparks of dazzling white magic.

Grief tightened Mae’s chest until she could barely breathe, Na Ri’s sobs rocking her soul.

By the time theBook of Shadowsstopped quaking, all that was left of the Sorcerer King was a skeletal husk that began crumbling to dust.

An enraged shout sounded behind Mae. She spun around.

“Mae!” Azazel yelled, fear raising the pitch of his voice.

Her father was chasing after Barquiel, blood pouring from the deep cut his archenemy had inflicted on his shoulder.

Barquiel raced ahead of him, mouth open on a silent snarl.

Wrathseared his right wing off.

The demon reeled, shock flaring in his crimson eyes. His dazed gaze swung to the cauterized stub of his pinion, his motions jerky.

The voices of the fiends inhabiting Hellreaver shook the air on a deafening roar as he flashed toward Barquiel. The demon cursed and parried his attack with his sword.

The blade snapped, Hellreaver chomping neatly through it.

Magic ignited Mae’s cores. She marched toward Barquiel in a dazzling haze of crimson, black, and white, her brow furrowed in a heavy scowl. The spell left her lips on a hiss of rage.

“SOUL UNCHAIN!”

Barquiel shuddered. His form shifted.

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