Page 32 of Mantle (IMMORTAL FLAME #3)

“You tell him you don’t care about him, that he’s nothing but a thing to you, a monster, that he’s a broken god only worthy of being enslaved by me—somebody who knows well how to wield power, how to rewrite the supernatural world using said power.”

I looked at Ketheron, grimacing at his physical agony.

His eyes were swimming with emotion, more expressive than they even were before.

He hadn’t just imprinted on me, he’d somehow made me his anchor.

His hope through all that he was enduring.

If I cut that connection off, it would destroy him utterly.

It would also dehumanize him completely.

It would unleash an unstoppable threat upon the world and turn him into the very thing he was fighting so hard not to become.

“No,” I ground out. “I won’t forsake him. He deserves better than that.”

Despite everything, Ketheron smiled.

“Thank you… Ariana,” he groaned.

I jolted as a derisive laugh from Corvin sounded through the lab.

“Did you really think I’d put that decision in your hands? The abomination? The weak little cunt who ran from her own power? The fool who refused to act unilaterally and squandered her abilities and greatness instead?”

Ketheron snarled at the insults Corvin was leveling upon me.

Ignoring him, Corvin held the sword up and gazed at it reverentially.

“This is now imbued with your blood and your power, mixed with Dark Fae magic that violates free will in the way that the spellcaster can determine very specifically. Seeing as though Ketheron is being held back by the bond he’s formed with you, this will work to sever that forcibly. ”

“No. Do not fucking touch him with that thing!”

Ketheron roared and fought against his bindings with renewed vigor.

But it didn’t stop Corvin.

He breached the dome and approached Ketheron, spinning the sword in his hand again, getting off on Ketheron’s panicked reaction, him trying to twist away to no avail.

No. This was not happening.

I clenched my fists in the Celestial Suppression Manacles, glaring at the spikes digging into my flesh as they continued to deliver just enough of Ketheron’s stolen blood to try to weaken me, while not making me heave my guts up all over the place like last time.

It was actually frightening how well Corvin had calculated the dosage.

What he knew about me and my power.

He had access to the knowledge bestowed upon him from the Celestial Plane.

But it was knowledge that they had about True Celestials who were tethered to it.

That wasn’t me.

So, while a lot happened to be the same, there were also things that set me apart.

And I’d been learning and examining those differences in a very intensive way with Cassius.

I’d been caught off guard before when Ketheron’s blood had infected me. I hadn’t been prepared, or had any idea how to handle it, how to save myself without joint effort from my loved ones.

That was then.

I pulled on my power, feeling a shitload of resistance and burning in my veins as I did, Ketheron’s blood fighting against my attempt, trying to nullify it, to snuff it out when it had barely sparked.

I pushed through it. I even accepted the resistance and essentially went around it, making my power circle it, rather than trying to tear through it.

And it fucking worked, that warmth rising and then evolving to uncontainable heat as it rose and strengthened, as I summoned what was mine, refusing to allow what wasn’t to deny it and keep it down.

The manacles shattered as it exploded out of me, the poisoned spikes ripping from my flesh in the process and making me grunt at the sharp pain.

Pain.

I looked out at Ketheron, his eyes shining with hope as he saw what I’d managed to do, while Corvin was distracted uttering another monologue at him that he wasn’t even listening to, his full attention on me.

I winked at Ketheron.

And the misunderstood sweetheart winked back with a strained smile through his agony.

I thrust my arms out, touching the Hellfire directly.

But as it seared my skin, I invoked Corsecus, my silver power swirling around me, growing more violent and encompassing by the moment and tearing into the Hellfire, not just beating it back this time, but actually destroying it, bit by bit.

Corvin did notice then. “No!” he screamed. “Not possible!”

He lunged at Ketheron, driving Valkrith into his gut.

“Stop!” I cried, as Ketheron’s bloodcurdling scream echoed hauntingly off the walls.

Corvin ripped it out, then watched with sadistic glee as Ketheron’s eyes turned white.

Expressionless.

He stopped struggling.

He looked away from me.

And then he addressed Corvin, “What do you wish of me, my lord?”

“Yes, good boy. Very good.”

I pushed through the rest of the Hellfire and strode toward them, dropping Corsecus and shoving my hand through the dome confining Ketheron.

“Don’t touch him!” Corvin yelled, rather frantically and desperately for him.

I thrust a bolt of my silver fire at the son of a bitch and he shrieked and dropped the sword as my blow propelled him across the lab and into the disgusting pods, decimating them in one brutal impact.

As he landed, stunned amid the wreckage, I went to Ketheron.

But he had me jolting as the chains suddenly dematerialized and then he was springing to his feet and snatching up the sword.

He stood there staring at me for several moments.

My gut twisted as there wasn’t anything there now.

He was… gone.

Corvin had stripped that away from him.

“You know the first place to strike at!” Corvin called over, pushing to his feet. “Go now. Make them fear you, broken god.”

“Don’t do this. You’re better than that, better than him.”

He thrust his hand out and grasped my throat, then hauled me off the floor. “Pretty angel.” He snarled in my face. “Bad angel.”

Then he hauled me across the lab with such force that I blew through the walls and out into the surrounding forest, slamming into several trees and downing them.

I choked when it finally came to an end and I laid sprawled on my stomach, choking, and spluttering. He was the only one who could overpower my impenetrable form and actually truly hurt me.

I staggered to my feet, my body burning and in pain every fucking where.

And then I saw Ketheron snatching up Corvin respectfully and dutifully, before they both then disappeared in a burst of teleportation.

I started after them, but collapsed into the brush.

Shit. I just needed a moment.

Just a fucking moment.