Page 87 of Vanish Into Light

“Naturecanchange,” Morgan countered. “If you’re strong enough to try.”

“Heh.”

The next blast of thunder felt as if it would take the house down.

“So. What now?” he asked, but he knew. Heknew.

A sound began overhead, a long, thin, mounting sound like cloth ripping.

“I’m sorry,” Morgan said. “But this is outside my control. Things have been set in motion.”

Ripping, ripping, shredding. The sky unspooling. The heavens clawing their way through to the mortal plane.

Beck closed his eyes, and thought of Rose, her mouth soft, her gaze pleading, her hands desperate to hold him here, in this world. Thought of Lance, shining like a beacon, so very good – and so very sweet when he submitted.

He thought of Kay, bleeding out alone in a hallway.

Of his brother, choking slowly to death on his own blood, as disease carved away his body one slice at a time.

He took a shattered breath, and opened his eyes. Morgan was a blur before him. “Time to go home.”

She opened her arms. “Yes. I don’t have the wings to take us there.” Brilliant white light spilled down through the hole in the atrium, a blinding shaft centered on her. “But you do.”

~*~

Rose woke to the sky cracking open. She bolted upright, and the room was glowing, lit up like spotlights were beaming in through the windows. Her skin tingled, and goosebumps chased across her body.

Beck was gone.

Sound of fabric shredding, overhead, and the skywhitebeyond the glass.

“Lance!”

He pushed up on his hands, wincing against the light. “Shit. What…”

“He’s gone. Beck’s gone!”

The house shuddered around them.

His expression went from half-asleep to panicked in an instant. Their gazes locked.No, she thought, and saw it reflected back from him, terror and grief, and denial all at once.

They stumbled out of bed, and found clothes, hands fumbling, shaking. Lance left his belt undone and Rose didn’t bother with shoes. They ran.

The house seemed to sway as they pelted down the stairs. Chunks of ceiling plaster fell, and rained down on them; one clipped Rose’s shoulder, but she didn’t feel the pain. She just kept running, sprinting, lungs burning, Lance hot at her heels.

When they reached the main floor, she landed ankle-deep in water. The whole hall was lit up, impossible light beaming in through all the windows, brighter than daylight had ever been.

Movement from a doorway drew her eye, but only briefly. Gallo called, “Hey, what’s–”

She kept going.

She knew what they would find, before they staggered into the great hall, kicked-up water splashing around her knees, but that didn’t make the sight any easier to behold.

Beck stood on the dais, wings spread, head tipped back so that he stared up into the dazzling white light that poured in through the torn-open ceiling. Morgan stood in front of him, her gaze on his face: on his open mouth, and his leaking eyes. She held her sword down low, to the side, its hilt huge in her small hand.

“Beck!” Rose shouted, and started forward–

Only to halt when Lance’s hand gripped her arm from behind.

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