Page 56 of Queen of Shadows and Ruin (The Nightfire Quartet #4)

FIFTY-FIVE

A rush of power surged through Zarya’s blood. Magic . But it wasn’t magic she’d ever experienced before. Rabin had saved her from near death twice, but he’d never saved her from this blackness swallowing her whole.

Her thoughts were clear, but her body felt like it was floating inside nothing a hundred miles away. She could feel her life draining away. A humming, a strange resonance echoed in her ears. She felt no pain. She was adrift in a sea of emptiness, hovering through blackness, her mind tumbling through her skull.

She was supposed to be doing something.

Waiting for something, but it felt so distant. So far away.

Something touched her. A warm hand wrapped around her wrist, and she recognized that touch like she knew her own heartbeat.

She had only a moment to register that either she had reached the end…or this was another chance.

Light exploded around her, silver and searing her eyelids. That muted numbness of a moment ago suddenly morphed into the greatest pain she’d ever known. She screamed, her back arching as a cresting wave of agony slammed into her flesh, squeezing her bones so hard they creaked.

She screamed and screamed as the light grew brighter and brighter, but she felt it.

Her life returned, flowing through her veins, her blood swirling, her dead heart stuttering to a steady pulse.

Memories rushed towards her. The seaside cottage. The day she finally escaped. Meeting Vik and Yasen. Her first kiss. Then Rabin. Everything he’d meant to her. His betrayal and her forgiveness. Falling in love and marrying the only man she’d ever truly want. She craved this life so much. She wanted everything that came next.

So, she fought for it. For this beautiful life she’d found and the beautiful people in it.

And then…her breath exhaled with a soft puff as she came back.

She blinked up at the sky as a tear escaped and slid down her temple.

With another blink, she felt a warm body closing around her. She smelled the earth and fresh, green things. She felt his tears coating her throat and how hard he shook.

But what she felt the most was the endless depth of his love.

She peered down to the top of his head, his dark hair gleaming in silver light.

She lifted her hand, almost surprised when it obeyed her command. She stroked him with the barest touch, causing him to look up.

Her gaze met his, and at that moment, she knew he’d done it.

He looked nearly dead himself, but he’d saved her.

“Zarya,” he growled, and then he was on her, his mouth crashing into hers as her arms folded around him. They kissed and kissed. They’d nearly been lost, but he’d done it. His voice cracked as he whispered her name over and over, kissing her nose and her eyes and her cheeks, then her throat and her hands as he ran his palms over her as if to ensure every piece of her was accounted for.

It took another moment for her to realize they were in Ishaan. The sensation felt like waking up from a very long dream. The sky looked wrong. Black fog hung around them, flashes of dark lightning streaking across the horizon.

Finally, Rabin pulled away and tried to help her sit up. He swayed, stumbling back before she reached out to catch him. They sagged against one another trying to settle their breathing. And that’s when Zarya took in their surroundings.

The five other members of the Chiranjivi stood in a circle, magic flowing from their fingertips. Swirls of shadow, lightning, and starlight crashed around the two men hovering in the middle.

The Ashvins weren’t fully corporeal yet—their translucent forms rippled where they hung, but they had full control of their magic. Streams of nightfire burst from their hands, striking into the fortified walls of the Chiranjivi’s power.

Zarya blinked as her head spun.

So much electricity flew through the air that the hairs on her arms stood up.

“We have to help them,” Rabin said, clutching his chest as his breath sawed in and out.

“Right,” Zarya said, trying to move. Her limbs felt like lead as she heaved onto her hands and knees. Her vision tilted as she sucked in sharp breaths. Gods, neither one of them was in any state to help.

They shared a look, and another bright flash drew their attention.

Apsara screamed as one of the twins flung out a hand, knocking her back. Her magic sliced off as she was thrown from her feet. They tossed Koura through the air next while Suvanna, Row, and Kindle drew deeper into their magic with gritted teeth.

Another strike and Kindle went flying.

A bright flash blinded them all, and Suvanna and Row were hurled back. The twins wasted no time, spiraling high into the air, coasting overhead, their arms raised and their chins pointed up.

They spun in a circle, disappearing as a silver line streaked across the sky towards the mountains.

“They’re heading for their army,” Row croaked.

The Chiranjivi spun around to find Zarya and Rabin on the ground.

“Zarya,” Row breathed, falling to his knees to embrace her. “You’re alive. You’re alive.”

He rocked her back and forth as she clung to him, her head still spinning.

She pulled away. “What happened?”

“The Ashvins appeared as soon as you…died,” Row said. “We tried to contain them, but they’re too strong.”

Their gazes wandered north, where the ominous sounds of fighting and death floated across the distance.

“We have to get to them.” Zarya struggled to sit up, her limbs like jelly as her legs collapsed under her. Rabin pushed onto one knee with his head bowed and one hand planted on the ground as he inhaled deep breaths.

She touched his face, laying a hand on his cheek.

“Did you…” she asked.

“I almost didn’t make it,” he answered.

She nodded as a tear slipped down her cheek.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Everyone helped Zarya and Rabin stand on shaking legs.

“I’ll take the two of you,” Row said. “The rest of you follow.”

He held out his hands, and Zarya and Rabin grabbed one each.

A few seconds later, Zarya felt like she was being squeezed from every side. She’d never traveled with Row like this and wasn’t sure she ever wanted to again. The world around her compressed and bent before the pressure released.

They arrived in a flash on the northeast side of Ishaan to witness a sight of chaos.

Hundreds of nairatta battled the armies of Gi’ana and Andhera, but they were bigger, stronger, and far more vicious. The fighting stretched over the plain under a blue sky choked with ash.

In the distance, the Ashvins hovered over the turmoil, surrounded by the same death and destruction they’d unleashed a thousand years ago, changing the face of Rahajhan forever.

Their ghost-like bodies had turned more corporeal, but they weren’t of this world just yet.

Zarya felt a blast of wind at her back as Apsara dropped from the sky a moment later. The winged warrior took in the scene with a grim expression.

“Can you control them?” Row asked Zarya. “That’s what Abishek planned, wasn’t it?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I think he planned to take them over first.”

“Try it,” Rabin said, still hunched over with his hands on his knees.

She swallowed and faced the twins. They hadn’t noticed her, so she cast her mind towards them. She could sense a tether still loosely binding them like they weren’t completely free of her yet. Maybe it would work.

Her eyes fluttered closed, and she pushed against the wall of their thoughts. It wasn’t different from the experience of reaching into Rabin’s head. It resisted her initially—her mind slipped against the surface while she searched for a crack.

She became only dimly aware of the screams and the clash of steel echoing around her. Her limbs trembled from the force, and she gritted her teeth against a wave of nausea. She’d been dead only minutes ago.

The tiniest fissure appeared in the barrier of the Ashvins’ mind. She realized they were one—their spirits had joined at some point during their endless lives. This is why she’d seen them both in her visions.

She shoved against the striation and felt the moment she slipped into their subconscious. Their inner plane was a dark and tumultuous place, scattered with ashes and bones. Black forks of lightning flashed against midnight black, sparking like millions of points of brilliance. She ordered them to stand down and felt their shock and surprise and annoyance at her intrusion.

Her eyes peeled open to discover one of the twins scanning the horizon—looking for her. It took him a minute to find her standing half a mile behind the battle. Their gazes met, and her stomach dropped to her feet when his mouth stretched into a wicked smile.

With a toss of his hands, he hurled her from their minds with such force that she stumbled.

“What happened?” Row asked, catching her fall.

“I think they’ve become too strong for me.”

Kindle and Koura arrived a moment later, panting heavily from their flight across the city.

“So, what do we do?” Apsara asked. “How do we fight them off? Is there another way?”

“Loka told me it had to be all of us,” Zarya said. “That we could stop them together. I think we need to join our power like we did when we saved Amrita from the blight.”

Everyone shared an uncertain look.

It seemed like a long shot, but all they could do was try.

Zarya began walking closer to the battle while the others followed a moment later. In the distance, she spied Yasen and Miraan fighting back-to-back against a pair of snarling nairatta.

She limped towards him, clutching her chest, nearly on the verge of collapse. Yasen arced his sword over his head and brought it down, slicing through the demon’s shoulder before it collapsed at his feet.

“Yas!” she called, her voice cracking.

He looked up immediately and started running. “Zee!” he shouted. “What happened?”

She collapsed against him, squeezing his biceps, and pressed her forehead against his chest to catch her breath. When she was steady, she looked up. “I’ll explain everything if we get the chance. I need you to protect us.”

She gestured to the Chiranjivi, and he understood her request immediately.

He began shouting orders to form a circle around Zarya and the others. Everyone shuffled in quickly, weapons ready. Zarya caught sight of Vikas and she lifted a hand to wave as he dipped his chin before he spun around to ward off another demon attack.

She looked back to Row and Rabin and then continued deeper into the battle with the line of Chiranjivi behind her.

As they passed, she could feel the weight of everyone’s stares.

The hope in their eyes.

Gods, she hoped she wouldn’t let them down.

When they’d reached the center of the clearing, she stopped. The Ashvins noticed her immediately, and she held their twin dark glares as she stretched her hands out. Rabin and Row took one on each side, and they formed a chain one by one as her eyes never left the twins.

One cocked his head, studying her carefully as she inhaled a deep breath.

Their army circled them in a barrier of protection, but she knew they couldn’t hold on long.

“Ready?” she asked the others.

“Ready,” they answered back.

For what? She wasn’t sure yet.

Her anchors had weakened. But her magic was the key.

Nightfire.

None of this had been an accident or a coincidence.

All of this had been carefully orchestrated for this moment by the gods. Did she care that they’d manipulated her life? She didn’t. Not when it meant she could save them all. Not only the vanshaj, but now everyone , too.

She turned to Rabin. “I need you,” she whispered.

“Anything, Spitfire,” he rumbled.

Through their paramadhar bond, she felt the surge of his strength flow into her. It pulsed in her chest, bringing her anchors back to life. They spun and sparkled in her heart, and she had only a moment to recall the first time this had happened and knew everything was about to change.

Then she started to glow.

Silver starlight surrounded her before spreading to the six others, casting them all into brightness like a line of brilliant stars.

She watched the Ashvins’ smug expressions drop from their faces as their eyes flashed like inky pools of midnight.

They attacked. Beams of nightfire hurtled towards them, streaking over the plain.

Zarya watched them barreling closer, almost as if in slow motion.

“Steady!” Zarya called. “Don’t move!”

The Ashvins’ magic rushed towards them while the Chiranjivi obeyed her command despite the fact they now stood in the path of certain death.

But the gods had chosen her for this.

Why? She might never know the answer, but she wouldn’t fall, not as long as there was a single breath in her body.

“Hold!” she screamed again as she shook, her limbs trembling and sweat dripping into her eyes. Her magic flared, her anchors spinning faster as the seven Chiranjivi grew brighter.

The Ashvins’ magic streaked across the plain and struck their line in a flash of silver.

Zarya felt it like a coal burning through her chest. She screamed as pain shot down her spine and radiated through her limbs.

She shook harder, but she held.

And then…the Ashvins’ nightfire dissipated into nothing.

She blinked. They’d stopped it.

“Yes!” she screamed as she bent over squeezing Row’s and Rabin’s hands. “That’s it!”

That’s when she noticed the inhuman sounds of the demon’s screams. The nearest were clutching their heads as they sank to their knees, and the seven Chiranjivi grew brighter and brighter. The starlight spread to engulf the nairatta, turning them to dust.

The Ashvins retaliated immediately, firing more magic in their direction.

Zarya screamed as blast after blast burned through her like she was being torched from the inside. Her head tipped up, and she screamed at the sky. It was a sound of rage and the certainty that she was on the right path.

It was a sound that ripped from her chest with the force of all her hopes.

Their line held, and that’s when Zarya noticed fear enter the twins’ eyes.

“They’re weakening,” Suvanna shouted. “Don’t let go!”

Zarya stared the Ashvins down. She didn’t blink. She didn’t move.

Their eyes were wild, full of malice. Their souls long dead.

But they wouldn’t give up yet, either. They’d been feeding off the darkness and their wrath for a thousand years.

Again, they attacked.

“Hold!” Zarya screamed as her magic flowed through her in waves, spreading out in a circle as agony seared through her limbs.

She pushed the twins back.

Finally, they were weakening. They weren’t strong enough. She just had to hold on a little longer.

Now it was her turn to gloat. She turned a smile towards them.

But the Ashvins—they, too, were smiling again.

Another dark line crested over the horizon. She exhaled a small gasp.

More demons. More monsters. Thousands of them. So many more than they could ever stop.

“Gods,” she whispered.

The Ashvins threw out another wave of nightfire. It struck her in the chest, but she could feel her resistance weakening. Her anchors were dimming again, flickering to only dim points of light.

The sphere of her silver light began shrinking, and the demons recovered as they shook off her ebbing power. Horror swirled in her gut as more nairatta advanced, their roars echoing across the mountains.

They were lost.

She’d come so close.

“There are too many!” Row shouted. “We can’t stop them all!”

Zarya gritted her teeth as another flash of the Ashvins’ nightfire struck her in the heart, and magic ripped through her bones and organs.

She didn’t know how long she could hold on.

“What do we do?” Apsara called. “This is burning her out!”

Zarya bent in half, her eyes squeezing shut and the muscles in her neck straining as she tried to cling to her power.

How could they be losing? She’d done everything the gods had asked of her.

Why hadn’t it been enough?

“Zarya,” came Row’s deep voice. “Look.”

She lifted her head and opened her eyes at where Row was pointing.

Vikas fought at the end of their circle, trying to keep the nairatta at bay. Ribbons of shadow magic swirled from his fingers and wrapped around the throat of a massive demon to cut off its air. It clawed at its neck as it choked on a scream. It took only a minute for the monster to collapse and stop moving altogether.

But Vikas… Vikas … was outlined in the faintest silver light.

“The Taara Aazheri,” Zarya whispered as she understood everything all at once. “We need them, too.”

“Vikas! Vikas!” she shouted. “Vikas!”

At first, he didn’t hear as he swung his sword and lopped off the head of a demon. The silver outline flared brighter as the creature succumbed.

“Vikas!” Row shouted, and then Vikas turned to look over his shoulder.

“Get in the line,” Zarya screamed. “Get everyone! We need all the Taara Aazheri! Join the line!”

Vikas shook his head as his brow furrowed.

“Please! I’ll explain it all later!”

He nodded and came running over, slipping his hand into Koura’s.

Immediately, she felt a surge of strength, her silver light spreading to include him in the protection of her magic.

The Chiranjivi began shouting for everyone to join hands.

The message filtered across the field until they all caught on.

They trickled in at first, and Zarya’s magic grew stronger with each addition. It filled her up, ballooning across the growing line.

That’s when she noticed the Ashvins watching her. Watching all of them.

They worked together, flinging out nightfire, sending it in every direction. A beam struck her in the chest, and she screamed, but the pain diminished in the face of her new strength.

Finally, the Taara Aazheri came in droves, forming a snaking line across the field. Hundreds of them. Maybe even thousands. Without her magic, without the Phoenix and the dream they fought for, none of this would have been possible.

Once she was sure it had to be enough, Zarya dropped her head and focused on the spinning anchors in her heart. She acknowledged each one and the role they had played. Then, she whispered to the darkness, knowing she would need it now more than ever.

Gathering each thread into her heart, she twisted them together with the full force of her magic, and then her nightfire erupted in a blinding flash.

It raced along the line, touching every person whose hands were linked, and then…a wave, a wall, a tide of pure sparkling black magic exploded from their army, racing over the land, spreading like ink.

The demons screamed as swaths of midnight death consumed them whole.

It took the Ashvins, burning through them like acid until they were nothing but dust tossed into the wind.

The magic sunk into the earth, spreading across soil and roots and water. Zarya felt it. She felt it reach from where they stood, just like the day they’d saved Dharati.

It sped over the miles, through mountains and forest, through farmland and lakes. Pure starlight purified the earth that had nearly been taken. It buried deep into another world where two evil kings had once been banished. She felt it strip away their taint and the horror they’d brought upon their own people.

This wasn’t the end anymore.

The vanshaj were finally free.

The Ashvins would soon be dead.

And this was finally a beginning.

She lifted her head as another roll of power slammed into the twins.

They screamed. It was a sound that spoke to the darkest part of her soul. They writhed and twisted as her magic burned through their clothes and then their skin, peeling it away to expose bone and sinew, blood and viscera, until their bodies glowed like the sun.

Zarya dug further into her power, focusing another blast straight into their depths, tearing them apart.

They shattered, exploding into pieces before dissolving into nothing but puffs of white.

She exhaled a choked sob of victory as her magic continued surging and flowing. It rolled from her in waves, spreading over the plain and across Rahajhan, touching everyone who had stood together and tried to change the world.