Page 315 of Dawn of Chaos and Fury
Her smile was sharp as she gripped the hilt and twisted. “Cleaning up my own fucking mess,” she snarled.
Dex staggered, dropping to his knees, and she stepped back. Reaching up, he yanked the dagger from his chest, examining it before asking, “Where did you get this?”
She was circling him now. Hunter and prey. Light and dark swirling at her fingertips.
“Apparently you didn’t clean up your own messes very well,” she sneered. “Oralia was rather slighted that you kept denying her a power.”
“Oralia gave you this?” he demanded sharply, and her smile grew when he tried to hide the pained gasp he sucked in.
“She killed Brecken with it,” Tessa said darkly. “And after I killed her, I kept it.”
The tips of his pristine wings were already turning grey as death came for him, but this wasn’t enough for her.
“After all these years, this is what it’s come down to,” Dex spat, chucking the dagger aside. “When I’ve been there for you. Tried to help you. Laid the fucking world at your feet.”
The bark of laughter that left her was shrill. “I didn’t need you to lay the world at my feet. I’m taking it all on my own, Dexter.”
“A puppet of Arius,” he said with disgust, sagging onto his hands and knees as death seeped into him more and more. Those eyes too dark against the sickly grey skin. Feathers decaying. Cheeks sinking in.
“I’m no puppet,” she said darkly, circling back to stand in front of him. Summoning a black sword, she used the tip of the blade to tilt his chin up. “You, however, know all about being a puppet, don’t you? What was Achaz going to give you? Had he promised this world to you the same way he promised it to Rordan?”
He pressed his lips together in a clear refusal.
“I’d answer that question, Dex,” she sang. “I can become incredibly…wild.”
His lip curled back, but he couldn’t hide the wince when he dragged in another breath.
“Last chance,” she offered, her blade still poised at his throat.
“You are a disappointment,” he growled. “And for what? Achaz will deal with you himself. The outcome will not change. Look around you, Tessa. When has the outcome ever changed?”
But then he was bellowing in pain as the blade sliced not through his neck—no, that would have been far too fast for him—but down his back, cleaving a wing and letting it fall to the ground. She left the other wing, bringing the blade down on his arm, slicing it clean off at the elbow. Then a foot. An ear.
“All you had to do was do as you were told,” she mocked with each swing of her sword. “Answer a fucking question.” She struck out with her foot, forcing him onto his back, and then she shoved her blade straight through his gut, pinning him to the earth.
“I’m done being who you wanted me to be. Now? I’m who I was meant to be,” she snarled, letting her power wind around what was left of his limbs, his torso, up his throat. She wasn’t waiting for the blade to take his last breath. She wanted it. Wanted him to know that his life would only fuel her more.
Standing over him, she shoved her power into every crack of his soul. Listened to his bellows of agony. A song that gave her life.
And when he fell still and silent. When vacant dark eyes were staring blankly at nothing. When her chest was heaving from the adrenaline of everything, she whispered coldly, “To fury you lost.”
“Tessa?” a low voice said carefully. Black flames and silky darkness licked at her soul, calling her back. Calling her home.
She turned, finding Luka and Theon standing there, both wide-eyed and staring at her in a way she couldn’t read.
“So fucking vindictive,” Luka growled, prowling forward while Theon stayed back, alert and clearly keeping others away.
“We felt…too much coming from you,” Theon ground out, his magic undulating around him. “Grief and agony. Heart-wrenching sadness. And then…”
“Fury,” Luka supplied. “Ungodly fury, and then we found a goddess exacting her revenge.”
She smiled weakly, working to take back control. That same unsettling feeling from this morning was back.
“Look at you,” Luka went on, circling her now. “Once more covered in blood.”
Look around you, Tessa. When has the outcome ever changed?
Luka paused, feeling her sudden panic. “Tessa?”
