Page 134 of Dawn of Chaos and Fury
Movement caught her eye, and she found Razik and Eliza with Theon, helping him over to where they were. He couldn’t even stand, let alone walk. She didn’t have time to wait though. Twisting back to Luka, she didn’t know what to do.
His wings were ripped to shreds in some places. He had open wounds everywhere with small pools of blood forming. He had a dagger in his chest.
Her power snarled at the thought, and she let herself sink into it. She had no idea what she was doing, but she was lightand dark. Life and death. Beginning and endings. If she could take, she could give too. Right?
She clasped the dagger, yanking it out. Blood immediately poured from his chest, running along his flesh. Lifting a trembling hand, she let her power pool there. Let it swirl and grow, pouring everything she had into it. Then she sent it to Luka, straight into the wound on his chest. Her palm covered the wound, trying to keep blood in.
Just like when she took, her power raced through him. It wrapped around bone and muscle, seeped into his blood. It twisted around his lungs, taking shallow breaths too far apart. It encased his heart, infusing the organ that was scarcely beating.
That fluttered under her magic.
Then stopped beating altogether.
“No!” she cried, pushing up on her knees to hover over him, her face inches from his. “No, Luka Mors. You stubborn, broody ass! You do not get to leave me here. Do you hear me? I said I would let you go, set you free to live a life you wanted. I didn’t let you go so you could… No!”
Someone tried to grab her, but she threw them off.
“We need to leave this place,” someone—Razik—was saying. “It’s out in the open, not to mention enemy territory.”
“And go where?” Eliza asked.
“The Underground,” Razik answered. “It’s the safest space.”
“And warded,” she argued. “We can’t haul Luka through those tunnels, and Theon can’t even stand.”
“But Tessa can cross wards without issue,” Brecken said suddenly. Then she felt him shift, presumably kneeling down beside her because he sounded closer when he said, “Can you Travel us, Tessa? All of us? I’m told Axel is in the penthouse. Then we can…figure all this out. Can you do that?”
She gave a sharp nod, her eyes still closed as she continued to pour herself into Luka.
“Now, Tess,” Brecken whispered.
And she did just that, pulling them all through space and depositing them in the main living room of the penthouse.
“What the fuck?” Axel barked, crashing sounds echoing around her.
Tessa opened her eyes just in time to see Axel rushing toward them, but she lifted her other hand, a burst of energy sending him flying backwards. No one was getting close to him. Not until his heart was beating.
“Somebody tell me what the fuck is going on right now,” Axel demanded, a dark command that made her power pause for the smallest of moments. Her eyes were already closed again, trying to focus.
“Tessa,” came a rasped voice at her side, and she shook her head. Because if she looked at Theon right now, it was over. If he told her it was over, it was too real. Because Theon never lied to her, and if he said it, it was true, and she refused to accept that.
There were noises, people talking, but she wasn’t listening. Didn’t care what they were saying. Because this wasn’t how they ended. She refused to accept this.
Her power was still wrapped around Luka and everything he was, and she just needed his heart to start beating again. Energy flared, a shock of power that she felt ripple through him, but it still did nothing.
A touch to her back, a touch she knew. Darkness and control. She still refused to look at him. But his power was there, and she heard him grunt as she pulled on it again. If she wasn’t enough, she’d use Theon’s power too. If that wasn’t enough, she’d find more power to take.
“Tessa, stop,” someone else was saying. “Not like this.”
But it would be like this because something had to work. Something had to fix this.
“Tessa—”
She didn’t know who was trying to talk to her, but her answer was a feral scream of utter fury and anguish. This wasnothow this was going to end.
Chaos erupted around her. It wasn’t destructive like it had been beside Lake Moonmist. No, this Chaos settled onto Luka like an armor before sinking into his being. She felt it in the power she already had laced through his body, in his veins, and around his bones. It fused and merged, and she could feel it all racing throughout his being.
And then his heart beat.
