Page 52 of A Kingdom of Sand and Ice (Kingdom of Gods #2)

I must keep my blood magic a secret. If anyone were to discover what I’m truly capable of…

But this magic will make me the most powerful witch in my land. It will protect me from Hades. Still, I can’t help but feel a deep sadness for what I had to sacrifice to gain it. Blood magic comes at a cost. A cost I was willing to pay.

I always wanted to be a healer. To save and to protect. But that part of me had to be destroyed. It was the piece I gave up in exchange. Now, I will never be able to heal through my magic.

Only destroy.

Tabitha Wysteria

Vera examined her nails with theatrical boredom, the slow tapping of her heel echoing off the marble floor with petulant rhythm.

Across the cavernous temple interior, her eyes landed on Hagan.

It was maddening to admit, but the drakonians had a flair for aesthetics.

Even their temples—hulking beasts of stone—were adorned with an artistry that made lesser kingdoms look drab.

Phoenixians were perhaps even more talented in that regard, but drakonians had a peculiar knack for elevating the plain into splendour.

The ceilings soared above them, hand-painted with scenes of devotion, vivid depictions of their singular god.

Drakonians and phoenixians, for all their fire and pride, shared that in common: a belief in only one deity.

And yet, even on this, they could not agree.

Each swore their god bore a different name, claimed a different face.

Two squabbling brothers, each desperate to outshine the other with gilded tales and finer prayers.

The thought of siblings dragged her attention back to Hagan.

Her own brother. Her own burden. Things had unravelled, as expected.

The moment he’d raised the severed heads of the Kingdom of Fire’s king and queen, a dagger had flown, narrowly missing its mark.

The chaos that followed had scattered their forces, and the witches had whisked Hagan into the safety of the temple.

For days now, they'd been holed up while warlocks and witches clashed with drakonian resistance in the streets, those proud bastards refusing to relinquish their city.

‘What?’ Hagan’s voice cut across the chamber, his eyes narrowing.

‘I haven’t said a word.’

‘I can practically hear your thoughts grinding.’

Vera sighed and clapped her hands once, the sound sharp. She resisted the temptation to laugh in his face and instead adopted the aloof poise of the indifferent sister she had always performed so well.

‘Did you honestly think they wouldn’t retaliate when you paraded their king’s head like a trophy?’

A spark of something twisted, something monstrous, flashed in those purple eyes of his.

Eyes that mirrored hers, yet bore none of her restraint.

He licked his lips, slow and deliberate, before sauntering towards her.

His breath brushed her cheek as he loomed too close, forcing her to retreat half a step. She’d seen him devour worse.

His lips found her ear, his whisper as cold as steel dipped in shadow. ‘Did you really think I was so simple? ’

Vera’s entire body stiffened, an icy tremor running through her bones. Her mind reeled. His failures, his blunders, all of it a carefully staged performance. He had played her for a fool.

The horror in her expression only deepened his amusement. He chuckled darkly, clearly relishing her dawning comprehension.

‘It was a trap,’ she breathed. ‘A diversion.’

It had all been theatre. A distraction, carefully orchestrated to veil his true design. Whatever Hagan was really plotting, he had kept it hidden, even from Vera. And that, that betrayal, stung more than anything.

He saw it. The fury in her eyes. And it delighted him.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she hissed, her hands curling into fists, nails biting into her palms.

Hagan’s lip curled, a wicked grin spreading across his face like a shadow sliding over stone. There was madness in that smile, something hollow and haunted that made her body stiffen with dread.

‘Why didn’t you tell me our sweet sister ran off into the night?’ he countered, voice low and seething.

Vera faltered, caught off guard. ‘I—’

His hand shot out, wrapping around her throat with a serpent’s speed. She choked, clawing at his arm as he squeezed, his strength unyielding, unreal. He leaned in, breath hot against her ear.

‘All I ever wanted was for my family to love me, sister. But none of you did. None of you wanted me, did you?’

He turned her roughly, forcing her to face the temple doors. Two warlocks were dragging Allegra forward, her body limp. Her face was swollen and bloodied, her leg bent at a sickening angle.

Vera’s scream caught in her throat .

‘We shall cleanse this world of its poison,’ Hagan breathed, sinking his teeth into her ear, hard enough to draw blood. ‘And today, we begin with you .’

He inhaled her scent like a starving beast, and she writhed in his grasp, desperate to free herself.

She reached for her magic, calling it from deep within, but it twisted against her, scorched and warped by his blood magic.

Her body contorted with the agony of it, as if her soul itself were being burnt alive.

She could not move. Could not speak. Only scream.

‘Watch, Vera,’ he commanded, wrenching her face downward so she was forced to bear witness as his magic unravelled Allegra.

Their sister twisted in grotesque, terrifying angles, her bones splintering with sickening cracks that echoed through the temple like thunder.

Allegra’s screams, high and shrill, sliced through the air as blood welled from her eyes, her mouth, her ears, every soft edge of her face turned to a river of red.

Her body writhed, no longer recognisably mortal, bending in ways no living being could survive.

And still he went on. Still, Hagan broke her, finger by finger, joint by joint, slowly coaxing each crack and snap as though conducting a symphony of agony.

When her voice faltered, when the breath fled her lungs and her chest no longer rose, he continued, smiling as he folded her limbs like parchment.

‘Stop,’ Vera rasped, her nails carving trenches into his skin in a desperate plea. But he only laughed, drunk on her pain.

Something shifted in the air, something impossible.

Vera blinked through the blur of tears and blood, convinced she was hallucinating.

But the image did not fade. The temple floor split with a groan, ancient stone fracturing as if the earth itself recoiled.

From the gaping wound, tendrils of shadow slithered forth, inky and alive, writhing as they expelled two figures from the abyss below.

Mal Blackburn, a vision of fury and flame, surged into view. And with her… a man bearing the haunting likeness of Ash Acheron, who knelt beside Allegra with a reverence that stole Vera’s breath.

Mal shoved Hagan away with a power that flared like lightning, loosening his grip just long enough for Vera to twist free.

She lifted her trembling hands and struck, her magic crackling through the air, slamming Hagan backwards with a force that cracked the walls.

Then she turned, just as her heart split in two.

Allegra lay still. Her wide, purple eyes stared back, glassy and unseeing.

‘Run, Vera!’ Mal’s voice reached her through water, muffled, distant, like a memory she couldn't quite grasp. Vera wanted to ask about the stranger at Allegra’s side, the way he touched her sister’s arm before vanishing into mist. She wanted to scream, to fight, to die beside Allegra.

But instead, Vera ran.

Out of the blood-soaked temple and into the burning streets of Fireheart, where chaos reigned and drakonians clashed with witches in a dance of fire and shadow.

She ran, her name howling in the wind behind her.

She didn’t look back. She didn’t stop. Not even when the ache in her chest became too much to bear.

Not even when the tears seared down her cheeks.

Not even when her heart finally shattered, knowing, as all truths rise in the end, that Allegra’s death was her doing.

Her fault.

All of it.