Page 111 of Of Blooming Embers
“What kind of deal? How do you remember that if she wiped your memories?” I murmured.
Marah’s glazed stare shifted to the protruding boulder. “She wiped our minds clean often, but left some details behind. The mystery of what happened haunted us; a torment without an end. What I know is thatwe’ve outlived our life spans. Ascension should have occurred long ago, but Melina’s made it her mission to hunt and annihilate anyone who could be a Scion. She could never be certain of controlling or imprisoning a new Elder, and our blood bond intricately connects us and our enhanced gifts. Her life’s purpose is to live and rule into eternity.”
One of her hands fluttered toward the amber, and Endurst placed one of his on her shoulder. “For the last century or so, Mel-Melina and the other Elders gathered us every so often. It’s like looking through clouded water, but there are glimpses of being d-down here. Of th-that thing’s power shooting through us.”
Marah cringed, her voice distant, as if she was drifting away in the sea of her lost cognizance. “Melina’s fated. He … he wasn’t a good male. He was cruel. Violent. Melina wasn’t always … Their relationship twisted her into the monster she is today. Something … something broke within her. And then she broke anyone who stood in her way.” She dipped her chin, eyes closing. “She refused to die once her khorda was gone. So, she beseeched Phobetor. Agreed to his demands.”
My breaths came in uneven gasps. Melina’s footfalls were closer, the beat of them controlling my pulse. “We have to destroy this. She’s too close.”
“We’ll stall her. Do wh-what you must. I’ve no doubt a Nightshade is more than up to the task.” An encouraging smile lifted Endurst’s mouth as he and Marah went off to meet their peer. Matching looks of retribution flit across their features as their halos burned around them.
“Prophecy time,” I said, trying to convince myself that I was, in fact, up to the task.You can do this. You must.Pushing my jawline up and my shoulders back, my aura burst around me. My mantra bounced around my skull.
I am you, and you are me.
Blinking iridescence snapped over my skin, the patterns on my arms writhing. My fingers weaved until a gyrating ball of variegated radiance formed.
“You’ve got this,” Kaden murmured, allowing his clover-like halo to flicker. He wasn’t as apprehensive of my power as he once was.
Gavrel’s rune blazed as I pushed more power between my hands. The pull of Gavrel’s energy to mine droned through me. It wasn’t just that my aura was latching onto his—his was reaching for mine as well.
The orb was as big as my head now, and my heart stuttered as the center imploded, sucking in the light directly around it as a black hole would. It was like looking into the eye of another universe with twinkling stars caught in its web.
Through the intense buzz reverberating through my every sinew, Gavrel’s hand found my lower back. A tether to reality. Trembling, I bit down hard, concentrating and sifting my energy through my limbs.
“Let go, my star,” Gavrel whispered.
My forehead furrowed, and I followed the prickling burn driving up my spine, prodding it until it flamed through my arms and sank into the center of the twisting halo. Fear and doubt gnawed at my confidence. I didn’t yet know what I was capable of, and Phantasos had stopped me when the void had formed before.
I am you, and you are me.I breathed in, held it, and then exhaled, wiggling my jaw.
Before the epicenter could get any bigger, I lobbed my creation toward the boulder, and it bonded with the carved surface and oozed over it. I continued to push my ember into it, my face pulling taut.
Golden brilliance burst within the boulder, light seeping through every tiny fissure until it escaped in a rush of blinding luminosity.
A few levels up, flashes of smoke, azure, and yellow burst. The Elders’ shouts fell upon us. Kaden’s halo flared around him, and he placed his hand on my shoulder.
“Take it,” he offered, bracing himself.
Instantly, my ember siphoned his. It pulled at Gavrel’s energy as well, but he felt different. The current of his resolve whirled along the cord that tethered us, strengthening my will.
Kaden’s shoulders slumped, but he squared his jaw as I fed our combined power into the stone. Finally, a crack rent the air, and awide fracture split down the center of the boulder. Kaden’s hand slipped limply from my shoulder, and he dropped to his knees.
My pulse was trying to break free from my veins, but still, I forced the rest of my incandescence into the crevice.
The skirmish above grew louder as the massive stone quaked. Melina’s angered shrieks skittered over my back, forcing goosebumps over my flesh. I’d never heard her so distressed before.
Good.
I hoped she was suffering. Was frantic knowing we were about to destroy whatever was keeping her alive.
With a final gilded spasm of coruscation, the cobble exploded upward in a blazing fit of flashes and amber. Veiled behind a cloak of shimmering haze, the being collapsed in an unmoving mound as the burnished pebbles rained upon it, splashing into the molten pool around it and blanketing it in a sheet of fragmented bronze. If the creature wanted to harm us when it awoke, we’d need to deal with that then. My control was slipping, darkness creeping into the edges of my vision.
Enough, I rasped within my mind.
Fizzling into the air, my ember dissolved, and the tingling sway of it under my flesh stilled. My knees hit the obsidian, and I grimaced at the bite of pain that rocketed through my bones. I slung one limp arm around Kaden and the other around the back of Gavrel’s knee.
The glow of my fated’s rune simmered when he brushed his fingers against my cheek, tucking loose curls behind my ear. A humming warmth melted into my flesh at his touch, and I relished in the soothing relief it offered. Leaning, just a bit, on his sturdy frame. His thigh and calf muscles flexed as he braced his leg more firmly to support me.
