Page 40 of A Game of Monsters (Realm of Fey #4)

Duwar gathered me into the heart of its storm. Vicious clouds of white-cored flames billowed around me, ripping my skin and snatching the hair from my face. My skin did not burn, my flesh resisting the licking tongues as though they enjoyed the taste but didn’t want to devour me.

At least, not yet.

I fought against the tension, lifting a hand to shield my eyes, squinting to make sense of this hellscape.

Decay was everywhere. Ruined earth shattered beneath my feet, cracking to dry plates of mud. There was no life. Not a speck of it.

I supposed it was fitting, considering Duwar gave life, and yet it could take it away.

And that was exactly what the power did. Duwar took from the realms, just as Cassial’s intended.

I wondered when it would finally take me.

Unlike the grass of the field that had been beneath me moments ago, I stood tall. My body had not yet shrivelled, the air in my lungs scorching but constant.

Duwar screamed like a dying animal both around me, and inside of me. It unleashed its fury around me, smashing power and debris into my body. An instinct told me to release more of the power lingering within me, to prove myself worthy of surviving this final trial. But I wouldn’t give it what it wanted.

I refused the lure, instead I began to draw Duwar in. I offered the broken part of Duwar’s vengeance a home inside of me, whilst securing one for my own if I succeeded.

A home, with Erix and Duncan, with my friends and those they loved.

And it worked. Duwar’s power pierced me from either side. Thread upon thread of hot, angry power speared through my chest. The vacuous place in my chest began to fill, like a well in a storm, catching the rain and preventing the flood that would destroy the world.

The cost was yet to be made clear.

Pain. Pure, undulating agony exploded inside of me. I imagined that was what a star felt like when it died. Beautiful, no doubt, but the beauty was rooted in pure agony.

The clouds rolled over me, the darkness taking up my offer, the power sinking into my fucking bones. But it was too much. The more power that entered my body, the more I felt it press against my boundaries.

As suddenly as my own intentions worked in my favour, they began to slip.

“No,” I groaned as my feet left the floor, the strain against my skin becoming all-consuming.

Rip-roaring winds lifted me up, catching me in the swirling mass of fury that was Duwar. I kicked against it. The air, in the belly of the storm, was poisonous. Each breath burned. At first it welcomed me, but it was as if Duwar itself was refusing my body – begging for me not to steal him.

I pinched my eyes closed, trying to focus on the battle, not on the fact that my skin felt like it was cracking apart as brimstone and the fire of ruin replaced my blood.

“Duwar,” I screamed, choking on the name as though I wasn’t worthy of it. And I wasn’t. No one had been. Not even Altar as he used the chaos of the world and made the fey. Not the Creator who went to war for the unequal balance of power. “Please. Let. Me. Help .”

If the power heard me, it didn’t listen.

The shard inside of me shifted. Not moving to make room for Duwar, but it began to slip from its place. It stirred, as if Duwar was a serpent draining it from my flesh with fangs.

Panic seized me as I grappled, for the second time, to keep Duwar under my control. But like sand through splayed fingers, it left me.

I focused on my magic, mentally freezing the power in place until I could regain control. But it wasn’t working. I felt the power of the storm around me triple in strength.

As Duwar began to leave me, that was when the real agony began.

I shrieked, but no sound left me. Tendrils of power held my mouth open, spreading down into my throat, searching for purchase to the power within. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t close my mouth. My cry of desperation continued out of me without control, until my throat bled and the vessels in my skull popped one by one. Vaguely I was aware of the warm trickle of blood slipping out of my nose, down each ear and laying tear tracks down my cheeks. Even if I wanted to wipe my skin clean, my body was no longer my own.

I was a puppet on the strings of power, the puppeteer moments from destroying me.

It was just as the final thread of Duwar slipped down my mental fingers, I heard my name. It carried out across the wild storm, so poignant that even Duwar seemed to ease. I imagined the power turning its attention in the direction of the noise, surprised by the presence.

“Robin Icethorn.”

My energy waned quickly.

I had enough to crack my eyes open and find out who called for me. My tired eyes found them, amongst the raging maelstrom of ruin and decay, stood two men.

An angel and a demon, side by side. Duncan and Erix.

“Robin, I command you to beat this!” Duncan bellowed, although his command sounded more like a whisper beneath a clamour of thunder. “Do you hear me? You will win this for us .”

A single clear thought came to mind. Why were they here ? They should’ve been so far away that nothing could harm them, and yet they stood amongst the destruction with little care for their own sakes.

Amidst the shield of purple lightning which kept most of the ruin away, Duncan and Erix had found me.

Spears of dark power lashed against Duncan’s shield, looking for chinks in his armour, longing to devour them both – Duwar’s last punishment for his misuse.

“Fight it, little bird!” Erix screamed, his words carrying over to me. “I believe in you! Duncan believes in you. But most importantly, you believe in yourself.”

I blinked, vision blurring. “Go. Away.”

“Never.” Duncan fixed verdant eyes on me, boring through my weak, tired skin. “Fight it.”

Seeing them both, knowing the pain they would suffer, reignited the last scrap of energy I had.

A war of intention and will, I grappled for the power leaking out of me, trying to afford the men I loved enough time to get far away from this destruction.

“Go.” I could barely speak the word. It tore up my sensitive throat, burning like acid on the way up.

But neither man listened to me.

Instead, they proved themselves as stubborn as I was.

Without taking his eyes off me, Erix reached beside him and took Duncan’s hand in his. They forged a link of flesh and bone, sending me a signal that they were never going to leave me – not in this life, and certainly not in the next.

This time, as the warmth slipped down my cheek, it was not blood but an honest tear. Seeing Duncan and Erix – facing the reality of danger they’d put themselves in – had forced me to not give up.

I had no choice but to fight for them. No doubt that was exactly the motivation they wanted to inspire in me.

“Life is not worth living without you,” Erix shouted, his body rigid as the power battled against the shield Duncan held up. They waged forwards, light battling against darkness, life against death. “Use us. Take this as a reminder of why you cannot give up.”

“That’s why we are here,” Duncan shouted. “Are you going to beat this, or give up?”

“I’m… trying,” I sobbed, words barely a whisper, more to myself than anyone else.

Erix tore his harrowing gaze off me, laying it upon Duncan. It was a signal, a plan that only they knew.

“Then try harder, darling.” Duncan lowered his outstretched hand, and the lightning around them simmered. Magic severed, the shield popped like a bubble, letting Duwar in.

This was their last-ditch effort to motivate me. Joined as one, eyes boring into me, Duncan severed the ties to his power.

It was going to kill them. Duwar would tear them apart the moment this decay got the chance. And they didn’t have Duwar inside of them to protect them.

But I did.

Watching death race toward them was what my mind needed, just as Duncan knew would be the case.

I shouted at the power, sinking my talons into unseen flesh. Then, with the force of determination Erix and Duncan’s presence awarded me, I clawed it back. I didn’t coax it into me, but dragged it, like a fearful animal in a trap. I grappled and pulled, refusing to allow the power to reach them.

And slowly, second by second, it rescinded. Not without friction, not without a fight – but Duwar was mine, and so were the men I loved with every fibre of my being.

Saving the world was one thing and saving my own was another. And yet, both of those facts were hand in hand before me, waiting for death to claim them.

I wouldn’t let it happen. I wouldn’t allow Duwar to harm another. Not any more of the realms, and certainly not the two men who occupied my heart.

I’d had enough. Sinking my teeth into my lower lip, I focused on my task. Not once did I take my eyes off Erix and Duncan as they huddled together. The storm sensed their fear, as did I. Because I controlled it. It belonged to me.

The power was mine, so, I took it.

Every last bastard scrap.

I stopped only when the final whisp of decay slipped into my body, and the skies above were blue once more. Slowly, the raging winds died down, enough for me to lower myself to the ground.

Erix and Duncan tried to reach me before I hit the ground, but it was too late. I met it with force, slamming my hands and knees into ruined earth. Breathless, my mind detached and my body not completely my own, I could barely move.

The war may have been over, but the fight had just begun. It found a new battlefield, one inside of me. A war of wills, as Duwar’s corruption and my control clashed.

“Robin,” Duncan breathed, coming to kneel beside me. “You did it. My darling, you really did it!”

“I am so proud of you.” Erix stood over me, his shadow casting a cool relief over me. My skin felt like it was on fire, my blood sizzling. I had no doubt he hated what he saw, the blood down my face, the pain evident in every crease across it. “You’ve proved, once again, that you can do anything–”

“I. Can’t. Hold. It.” I forced out my words, knowing time was limited.

Both their eyes widened, their touches becoming hesitant as they finally noticed the cracks forming across my flesh. Duwar could free themselves at any moment, shattering out of my body as though it was made of cracked glass.

I looked down to my arm, only to find the skin parting, allowing the decay to glow like lava through cracks of earth.

Duncan jolted toward me, laying a hand on my shoulder, ready to scoop me in his arms. His touch lasted but a second. I looked up to see smoke slithering off his palm as he clutched it to his chest.

My eyes widened as panic simmered beneath the battle inside of me. “I’m sorry–”

Erix tried next, cautiously reaching for me, only to find the tips of his fingers scorched. “What is happening?”

Their relief at the success they believed I held faded in seconds. The silence stretched on. I attempted to keep it bound inside of me, but the cost was going to kill me.

I was not fey – not completely. And Duwar knew that.

“Give it to me,” Erix said, quietly at first. It took him but a second to realise why I suffered. Then he fixed his wide silver eyes on me, repeating himself but louder, with more vigour. “Give Duwar to me. I willingly take the burden.”

I turned my head, gritting my teeth, blood spoiling the insides of my cheeks. “No. I can’t – I won’t put you through this.”

“Robin,” Erix demanded, using my name as a weapon. “It will destroy you. Remember, the power is not inherently bad or good. It is what we do with it. I can survive it. I know the cost.”

Something about Erix’s words sparked a solution within me. Duwar was continuing their campaign for release, but Erix was right. Duwar wasn’t good or bad – not by choice.

It was what Duwar was used for that determined that.

I sank my fingers into the cracked, blackened earth. Erix didn’t stop begging me to give the power to him, all whilst Duncan watched in shocked silence. I looked up, recognising just how far Duwar’s power had devoured and destroyed. A blackened scar stretched out as far as I could see. In the distance, the sentinel barrier of Wychwood forest was charred, the trees skeletal. Behind me, farmer’s fields were void of life. I could only imagine how far this destruction stretched, and how much more it would’ve taken.

A plague had swept the realms, and it required a cure.

I could be that cure, Duwar could be – if only it heeded my next command.

“Duwar demands release,” I exhaled, breathless and suffering. “I need to let it go.”

“Then give it to Erix,” Duncan said finally. His tone was pleading, his words trembling with emotion. “If that is the only way for it not to claim you, then so be it. You must, Robin. Please, do it for us. Give up the–”

“No, Duncan,” I seethed, focusing on him, finding that my eyesight faltered as his features blurred before me. “You showed me what Duwar could be used for. I didn’t listen to you then – I should’ve listened.”

Realisation lit Duncan’s eyes, as though a beacon of hope sparked in the depths of his soul. “It’s destroying you, there isn’t time for talking, Robin.”

“Life,” I spat, ignoring his plea. “Duwar is not solely destruction and ruin, but it once was used for beautiful means. For life.”

Duncan’s eyes widened, realisation setting in. “It’s not worth the risk.”

I nodded, every passing moment leading to more pain, more suffering. “Yes, it is. You are. I can do it, Duncan – I can give Duwar new purpose.”

Duncan pondered my words, knowing exactly what I referred to. It was Erix who replied, silver eyes sinking through me, piercing my soul and holding on. “Remind Duwar of the good it can award. I believe in you. I trust you. And I stand by you with this decision. Your intentions for the realm are, and always have been, good.”

Even if I wanted to hesitate, there was no time left to. Duwar banged against the bars of its cage, shattering my flesh until strings of light and dark could be seen in place of muscle and vein.

I had to focus. If this was to work, my mind had to be clear of anything but the single intention I wanted from my next act.

I focused my intent and did the one thing I’d fought against. Then I released Duwar. But unlike Cassial and every soul who wished to use the power for bad, I focused on the possibilities of good . The healing, the life, the flourishment and love. I reminded Duwar what it had been before the corruption.

Fingers sinking into life-drained earth, I focused my desires and liberated Duwar.

Inside of me, it was no longer broken, no longer shattered into pieces. Closing my eyes, I focused on the two men before me. I pictured a life we could have, one together, no longer under threat.

I gathered that image in my mind, something solid and so tangible I could almost touch it.

Erix and Duncan stood in the kitchen in my home, laughing at something one of them said whilst washing dirtied dishes. I could smell the aroma of food they cooked, feel the warmth awarded by their happiness. The picture built in my thoughts, in full colour, heightening every one of my senses.

“For our tomorrow,” I stammered the promise we’d made to one another. And then I released the power back into the realms, just as Cassial had before he was killed.

Fresh shards of grass sprouted through the cracked earth between my fingers. Where the ground had been solid under my palm, it now softened with life as flowers grew. It spread in a wave, flooding out of me with the desperation of a bird fleeing a cage. I simply reminded Duwar what it could be.

Duncan laid a hand on me again, and this time he didn’t burn to the touch. “And for all our tomorrows after that.”

Erix followed suit, gathering me up in his arms, whilst I continued to pour Duwar into the ground, offering it life, guiding it.

“Until so many years pass that we forget about our tomorrow and focus on nothing but the now,” Erix encouraged. “Together, at last, with nothing but joy to separate us.”

Power had been what the gods had fought over. It had split the courts in Wychwood, turning allies to enemies, leading to my mother’s death. The realms had warred over it.

But for once, it would be power that brought us together.

“No more suffering,” I said.

“Spread those wings, little bird.” Erix pressed his mouth to my temple, holding the kiss there as I continued to free Duwar, but not from a place of hate and ruin. I was engulfed in love, and I made sure to expose Duwar to the same concept.

“No more wondering about the possibilities of what would happen if the world was in our favour,” I said as the rush of life fed the earth, imagining it spread for miles, fixing the destruction Duwar had left in its wake. “It is about our today . That is what matters. Not what came before, or what will come after. We enjoy the present, because that is what we fought hard for.”

“Today sounds beautiful,” Duncan said, running his hands in circles around my back, whilst wrapping the other over Erix’s neck.

“Today, yes,” Erix repeated, laying his forehead on mine. “For today.”

Gathered in the arms of the men who held my heart equally, my fingers buried in the dirt, the last scrap of Duwar left me. I felt relief bloom inside of me, instead of the hollow, empty void. There was room for it now.

“For us,” I said, rocking back into the arms of the men I loved. Something cool and damp slipped over my knees, soddening my trousers. I looked down, not sure what I’d find. But what I did shocked me to my core.

Where we knelt, water spouted upwards. It was crystal clear, and fresh. It welled up, building until it soaked through our trousers, not stopping until we were waist deep.

Duwar had been freed, and so had I.

We watched as more water rose out of the earth, relishing in the cold kiss as it worked at my sore skin, washing away my worries and anxieties.

My head spun as exhaustion rocked through me. I forced to keep my eyes open, not wanting to miss a moment of the miracle that occurred before us. As light spread beneath blackened earth, life sprung forth and spread like a wildfire across the ruined landscape.

“It is time to go home.”

I wasn’t sure which one of them said it, but I revelled in the promise of the words.

“Home,” I repeated, tasting the joy of that single word across my parched tongue.

Arms wrapped around me, wings beat, and we were airborne. My tired eyes opened enough to look down at the earth. Stretched out for as far as I could see, was a lake – sunlight glittering across its surface, sparkling like a million diamonds.

Where Duwar had drained and destroyed, new life was given. I watched rivers spread like searching fingers, revitalising trees and fields, returning colour to a world that had been leached of it.

My mind was slow, at the cusp of collapse, and yet I fought against it, not wanting to miss a single detail. Duwar had found a new home, just as I had secured my own. It was over – the realms saved – and even in my tired state, I knew that life had only just begun.