Page 20 of Divine Fate (Cursed Legacies #4)

19

MAVEN

Sending one insane match to rescue my other insane match wasn’t my best idea.

“Another hour, gone,” Douglas announces from his spot guarding the temple’s closed and magically sealed double doors. “That makes two.”

“Congratulations on your new ability to count,” Everett snarks. “Next, learn how to read a room and shut your mouth.”

He's standing with his arms wrapped around me as we watch Silas stuck in a dark trance where he sits beside Crypt’s spellbound body. Baelfire is hunched over on a nearby pew, gnashing his teeth at everything and snarling like a feral animal. The fact that I haven’t seen even a hint of the real Baelfire yet sets my teeth on edge.

It’s getting harder to believe my charming, smiley mate is anywhere in there.

Meanwhile, every moment that passes while waiting for Silas is another moment I decide I can't wait.

I needed a caster to get Crypt out, but my options were so fucking limited. My brilliant blood fae is powerful, but his curse is eating his mind right now. That’s probably why he’s struggling with this malediction.

Asher Douglas might possess holy magic, but he's not nearly as strong a caster as Silas—not to mention if this spell is what I suspect it is, there's no way in hell I'm letting him near Crypt's vulnerable subconscious. He was set on killing my incubus six months ago. Even if he's earned Everett's trust, I'm not overlooking that anytime soon.

As far as other casters who can step up, that only leaves me. The bitch who has no idea how to use her magic anymore.

Still, I have to try. And to try, I need to fuel my abilities in the only way I’ve learned how.

“I'll be right back,” I mutter, stepping out of Everett’s arms.

He gently grasps my hand to stop me. “Where the hell do you think you’re going? Out there, where the danger is?”

“Where the ghosts are,” I correct.

On the short trek to the temple after Asher transported us to this colorless city, I saw several ghosts, though they haven’t entered the temple’s hallowed ground. If I collect enough of them, maybe I can make a dent in that malediction.

Everett blinks down at me, surprise written all over his gorgeous, scarred face. “You can see ghosts again?”

“Yes. I need to go reaping.”

“ Reaping?” Asher Douglas pipes from the doors where I forgot he was standing. He frowns over his shoulder at me. “There’s only one reaper, so stop blaspheming. How the hell would you—oh, holy shit. Unless…”

The mercenary is starting to put things together. Everett gives him an impressively chilling death glare as a warning to stay quiet. I take advantage of his distraction to slip away again.

Striding through the incredibly ornate temple, I pull my etherium knife out of my boot. It immediately knows what's needed, transforming into my new favorite weapon as I push open the big double doors.

Wow.

I clearly won’t have trouble finding enough ghosts.

Restless spirits have flocked to my presence, and now two or three hundred blurry, translucent figures hover at the foot of Arati’s high temple, staring up at me. Everett moves beside me, perplexed as he looks out, seeing nothing. Meanwhile, Asher Douglas looks more disturbed by my existence than ever.

That’s a nice thought before I descend the stairs, my elemental sticking closely to my side.

Ghosts converge on me immediately, pressing silently against each other in a rush to get to their respective afterlives. I step a safe distance away from Everett and swing my glowing scythe in a wide arc, sending that haunting whistling tune echoing through this dead concrete jungle as I reap several souls at a time.

The wash of peaceful power that flows steadily over my bones is strange.

But it's also right , somehow. Over and over, I reap, turning and twisting as I wield the scythe. This otherworldly dance is intrinsic to something in my very being.

Before long, my veins are buzzing with an exhilarating rush of this strange magic—and with that rush comes another current of memories that pass from my scythe to me.

I blink when I find myself once again standing with Syntyche, but the scenery is different. This time, we’re standing on the shore of a stretch of water glittering like millions of liquid stars, watching as winged angels sitting in ornate boats fish for who fucking knows what with golden fishing lines.

“If I stayed, which I won’t,” Memory Me begins, studying the shimmering lake. “What would I even be the goddess of? Baggy clothes? Trauma? Social ineptitude?”

“As my spawn?—”

“Ew. Please pick another word.”

“—your dominion would relate to the things over which I reign,” she goes on as if I never spoke. “You’ve made your choice, so we will never know the future you have forsaken in Paradise. Yet I will tell you this: I have observed death for millennia, and it always brings those who remain two things: pain and peace. As my?—”

“Don’t say spawn,” I grimace.

Syntyche’s lips twitch ever so slightly. “As she who succeeds Death, perhaps you deliver both.”

The memory blurs and ripples until I’m standing inside a seemingly endless vaulted library interspersed with rolling ladders, cozy reading nooks, thriving potted plants, and glowing crystals etched with intricate runes. Every tome, book, and scroll is organized impeccably, softly lit in their never-ending displays. In this memory, I’m already holding a Paradisian tome?—

And suddenly, I can recall precisely what I learned from it. It was full of useful spells for holy magic, but especially one in particular: the incubi muse ritual meant to be performed in Syntyche’s temples. I was memorizing it here.

“A bit of light pleasure reading?” Koa’s voice asks as he approaches, but his tone is nervous. He doesn’t like finding me here. “I do hope you’re not planning on doing something inadvisable to my library as you did to my love’s golden armor.”

In my memory, I close the tome and smile darkly. “Speaking of your love, you and Arati have been together for thousands of years. In all that time, she must have mentioned how she helped that immortal permanently return to the mortal realm eons ago.”

Koa fidgets before sighing. “What need would I have of that information when I'm quite happy to exist here with her for all eternity? I swear upon the heavens that I know nothing about it, so leave my poor library in peace.”

There’s nothing but honesty written all over his light sage green face. That frustrates me in this memory, but this scene is again interrupted when another recollection comes barrelling in, full of raised voices and wrath.

Arati is glaring down at me as I scowl up at her. We’re alone in a grandiose golden room. Her crown of fire is taller than before, her golden eyes blazing with fury.

“You dare try your hand at tormenting us with the same irritating tactics you used on your mortal matches? It won’t work. We’re gods , Maven. You cannot reject this fate.”

“I can and I have.”

“You will cease this nonsense. I told you, your future here is final.”

“Not to be a bitch, but…” Memory Me pauses and hums. “Oh, wait. That’s exactly the fucking point. I won’t stop ruining your Paradise until you tell me how to return to my quintet.”

Arati’s powerful gaze grows more wrathful before she straightens, considering me with a slowly cooling temper as though an idea is forming in her head. “Very well.”

Surprise rocks me in this memory, but I try not to show how taken aback I am to have won this contest of wills.

Instead, I lift my chin. “Great. Then tell me.”

“I will, on one condition. If you want to return to your fate-given matches so desperately, it will come at a price you already know well. You must first…”

Her voice slurs, fading and distorting as I slowly rise out of these memories.

“Snowdrop?” Everett checks softly.

Coming back to the present, I realize I’m still standing in a barren, grayscale city street as those memories settle into place in my head. More ghosts are drifting into this area, but I've cleared enough that I'm ready to get back inside and figure out how the fuck I can use this power to get my matches out of Syntyche’s spell.

“I’m fine,” I assure my concerned elemental. “Come on.”

I turn back toward the temple just in time to see four people emerge from an alleyway several yards away. Everett immediately steps in front of me, blocking their view of me and my view of them. Frost spreads out from where my elemental stands, a visible warning as he stares down the newcomers.

The tense silence implodes with the deep, gruff laughter of a man. “Well, well! What are the odds of this? If it isn’t the pretty boy. But you’re not so pretty anymore now, are ya, Little Frost?”

I notice Everett’s fists clench at his sides, prickling with ice fractals.

“ Everett Frost?” a young woman’s voice realizes, glowing with awe.

“Must be a lucky day for us,” a second male voice agrees. “Clearly, you didn’t realize that Arati’s sealed high temple is within the safe haven owned and operated by—” His voice cuts off. “Holy shit. Look, the temple door is open!”

“What? How?” the girl demands.

Footsteps sound as she moves toward the temple. I tense, not wanting her anywhere near my two vulnerable matches. Before I can step around Everett, a gunshot cracks through the air, leaving my ears ringing as the girl screams—but only in alarm, not pain.

Douglas only fired a warning shot.

Not much fun, but it did the job.

Everett’s voice is simultaneously lethal and diplomatic. “I’m not here for trouble. We’ll be gone soon, so turn around and forget you ever saw me.”

“Ah, come on, Little Frost. You know that’s not how this is gonna go,” the first man laughs. “You know they’ve been wanting to see you—probably’ll want to see your new face, too. Tell your friend in the temple to come out, and we’ll take you to safety, nice and easy.”

I wonder why Everett hasn’t frozen them all solid already. When he shifts slightly, obviously agitated as he adjusts his coat sleeve repeatedly, I can see around him and barely glimpse a shielding spell in place around the legacies, thanks to the female caster.

The one reasoning with Everett is a bald, burly elemental with fire dancing on his fingertips. The fourth legacy with them is a fae woman with pointed ears and long luminescent purple hair. Her attention drops to me in this fleeting second, and her eyes grow huge.

She points. “T—that’s the telum! That’s Maven Oakley!”

“What?” the second man barks, trying to see past Everett. “Impossible. Everyone knows that bitch is dead!”

The fact that everyone knows my name is still fucking weird. I grip my knife more firmly. Since I’ve already been spotted, it’s better to get this over with quickly so I can get back inside to help my matches.

I step out from behind Everett. He swears under his breath as I pin the hostile legacies with the same look that used to make challengers in Amadeus’s arena forfeit before the fight began.

“That bitch is giving you three seconds to walk away before your disemboweled guts become snacks for the ravens.”

If this situation weren’t so tense, I’d enjoy how blanched and horrified they look. The purple-haired fae woman calls a transportation spell in the blink of an eye, vanishing and leaving the others behind. Meanwhile, the other three legacies are so aghast that they don’t move despite my warning.

I arch a brow. “One. Two. Th?—”

“Wait!” the bald fire elemental cuts me off, raising his hands as he sputters. “Please, just wait. I don’t know what’s happening here, but if you’re really back, they’ll want to see you immediately. They’ve got the power to pardon you. Come with me, and?—”

Before he can finish speaking, the other male turns out to also be a caster when he panics and sends a magical attack hurtling straight toward me. I tackle Everett, rolling us both out of the way just before the attack chars the place where we were just standing.

Shards of ice explode around us as Everett’s temper slips, but he’s not the only one they just pissed off. I’m on edge enough with three of my matches out for the count without having to deal with idiots who don’t take my threats seriously.

Time for them to learn how seriously they should take “ Maven Oakley ,” because I didn’t come back just to let people fuck with us.

I roll back to my feet, bolting toward the three hostile legacies. The girl caster launches an attack that I dodge before rolling under a burst of flames that the elemental directs at me. Grabbing the fire elemental’s still-extended arm, I twist it sharply to maneuver him in front of me—just in time for him to become a living shield for a cutting spell the male caster flings in his blind scramble to escape.

The bald elemental screams as deep cuts rip through his stomach, spilling his innards. I drop him and realize the panicked male caster has already been frozen solid by Everett, since he stupidly fled outside of the protective spell.

The remaining caster launches a stupor spell that slams into Everett before he can reach us. He collapses. That only stokes my fury as I run toward her, hurling my etherium knife at her protective shield. It bounces off, but spells like this can only absorb so much impact before collapsing.

From the direction of the temple, I hear Douglas shout in pain before a snarl rips through the air. I don’t have time to focus on it as I crash through the fleeing caster’s spell—but an electrocution hex flies from her fingertips, burrowing into my skin. Tingling numbness tears through my limbs, forcing my knees to give out as I nearly bite my tongue off.

I grimace, trying to shake off the daze of painful electrocution that is still sending miniature spasms through my nervous system. I manage to roll over and look up just as the girl extends her hand over me to cast a fatal spell.

But something blurs behind her before her head is yanked back roughly, exposing her neck for Not-Baelfire to rip her throat out with his teeth.

She drops dead. The shifter flings her jugular aside before his eyes connect with mine, and?—

His pupils are round.

Oh, my gods.

This isn’t the beast at all. It's him.

“Baelfire,” I breathe as relief crashes over me like cold water.

He’s trembling with rage and shock, covered in a sheen of sweat, and wildly disoriented as he drops to his knees beside me on the cold asphalt. He pulls me tightly to his incredibly warm chest.

“Boo,” he rasps, burying his blood-smeared face in the side of my neck to inhale deeply. “Fuck, are—are you really?—”

“I’m here. I’m alive.” I hug him back even tighter, desperate for these next words to stay with him even when his dragon takes over again. “I love you.”

“Y—you…” he starts to echo in bewildered disbelief.

“I love you,” I repeat firmly. “I should have told you sooner.”

A sob tries to work its way up his throat, and I know I’m not imagining the moisture on my neck. It’s fucking brutal to see him this broken as he clings to me, agony in his voice.

“I love you, too. So fucking much. Please don’t leave me again. Ever, Maven. Please .”

“I won’t,” I whisper. “I promise.”

After a moment, Baelfire makes a hoarse sound. When I pull back to see what’s wrong, his face is a mask of torture as he grips his head. His pained, miserable golden gaze meets mine again.

“I’m trying to stay,” he chokes. “But I—I just can’t get a fucking grip. I can’t?—”

All at once, his words cut off as his pupils elongate into slits. He’s gone as the dragon takes over to bare its teeth at me, inhuman feral madness eclipsing my match’s face.

But thank the fucking universe. Baelfire is still in there.

He knows I’m back.

I cradle his face. “I’m going to fix this.”

In response, the feral dragon nips at my hand, managing to draw blood. I break away from him, stumbling to where Everett still lies in a stupor.

Crouching, I try to get his attention, but his confused, pale blue gaze won’t latch onto me.

“You’re okay,” I assure him anyway, glancing around at the aftermath of the fight.

The male caster remains frozen. Both the female caster and the fire elemental now lie dead in puddles of blood with their ghosts hovering above them, wide-eyed as they stare at me. With fiends on the loose, it’s only a matter of time before the wind changes and carries the scent of their blood to monsters that will be drawn here.

Walking to the spot where my blade fell, I scoop to pick it up. It’s already in scythe form when I face the ghosts of the two legacies.

“May your afterlives suck ass,” I tell them before reaping their souls.

Moving back to Not-Baelfire, I take his leash and lead him into the temple, where I find Asher Dougas trying to heal his own arm, his forehead beaded in sweat and blood splattered all over the marble temple floor around him.

He sees Baelfire beside me and swears. “Keep that fucker away from me. Is Frost still alive?”

I nod.

“Good. I’d hate to lose a good paycheck after all this shit,” he grunts, grimacing.

Rolling my eyes, I drop Baelfire’s leash to go back out for Everett. “Watch my dragon.”

“Hey. No. That freak nearly ripped my arm off. Don’t fucking leave me alone with?—”

Ignoring his protests, I return to Everett and help the discombobulated elemental stumble back into the temple, where he collapses into one of the pews. Once we’re all safely in here, I turn toward the doors, take a deep breath, and try to use magic to seal them once again.

I don’t know holy magic spells, but casting in fae seemed to work a bit.

“Ima guth sigillum,” I recite.

Heat pulses in my veins, and the doors glow white briefly. When I try pulling them open, they remain locked, movable only by my voice.

I don’t realize I’m beaming at the proof that I can figure this shit out until Douglas grunts, “Your pet dragon just pissed in the corner. Pretty sure your aunt’s gonna smite him for that.”

My aunt?

Oh, right. As one of the three celestial triplets, Arati would be Syntyche’s younger triplet, alongside Sachar.

The thought of the queen of the gods being my auntie is too fucking weird, so I once again ignore the bounty hunter and hurry to Silas and Crypt.

Silas still sits as if he’s fallen into a dark meditation, eyes shut as magic slithers over his skin. Meanwhile, Crypt remains in a bizarrely restful state as the malediction ravages his mind.

Taking another deep breath, I will my holy magic to work as I step into the spell.