Page 69

IRIS

Tucking my flaming wings, I torpedo down the open shaft.

Please, don’t be too late.

Battle noises echo from below.

Flames and shadows go poom and zzzzzt , rattling the walls.

My chest unhooks.

They’re alive.

Toward the end of a long dive, the chaos finally comes into view.

Fully monstered out, my Sentinels crash around the crater, making the best of their last chance to take each other down.

Vhex is a tall ball of hellfire. Remy’s figure blurs through flashes of shadow, appearing and disappearing between attacks.

With zero sanity left to aim or identify enemies, they scatter the lich king’s forces through pure chaos, shredding and burning monsters caught between their fight.

They must be in so much pain.

I spot Simms and Tan pressed into a corner, holding off ghouls while they try to stay out of the blast zone.

Lich-Luca’s deathly power pulses, but he hasn’t moved a step from his prison.

The scale of the array holding him back shines clearer from above. All the way down, engraved lines of magic choke the walls. They’re mostly darkened, but every one was clearly built to reinforce the tight, gold circle still glowing beneath lich-Luca’s feet.

My stomach sinks.

The array is flickering.

I slow just enough to not die on impact, then angle my wings, swooping down like a hawk.

I don’t have claws or fangs.

Just combat boots and gravity.

I aim my landing at Luca’s jaw.

Smash!

I clock him on the chin.

My ankles scream and my knees buckle as I fold. Sickening pain blacks me out as I smash the ground in an explosion of screaming joints.

Vhex’s wings curl, protecting me through a few bumps before they disappear in a rain of sparks.

It’s worth the pain.

My force dropkicks Lich-Luca outside of his magical cage.

Gold light flashes. A strange, warm energy skates across my scalp.

Lich-Luca screeches in both of his voices.

I keep rolling as his screams distort. His skin sizzles.

His flesh melts off bone.

The death magic that’s been bleeding through the mountains recoils, returning to him in a biting whooooosh .

Monsters start to drop.

To save himself, the lich king draws back his energy, abandoning his minions.

The lich king crawls across cracked obsidian, desperate to drag himself back into the safety circle, but Luca’s shell rips apart from the magical punishment.

Bone shows through his melting fingers. He twitches on the ground.

“Come out,” I call through clenched teeth.

A sickly soul rises from the ruined body, bound in spectral golden chains that bind it to the array.

The soul pulses yellow and gray. It reeks of pus and rotten eggs.

But its edges are faded.

All those years in prison have worn the lich down.

It’s even more vulnerable without a host.

Before I can take advantage, the soul flashes to the closest body.

Kevan lies convulsing among the other fallen Sentinels. Whether he’s dead or undead, he can’t escape the backlash of losing his Guide.

His imprinted soul-silks glowed green. Without Luca, they lash with pain and fray apart. Some grey with decay. Some fade back to a duller shade of Kevan’s old blue.

I draw back my silks to protect my energy.

Kevan isn’t someone I can help anymore.

With a mouthless scream, the lich king’s soul jumps inside his chest.

On shaky legs, I reach for the nearest thing I can use as a weapon. I end up grabbing a long-handled hammer that’s too heavy when I already feel like I spun a full cycle in a rock tumbler.

The lich king’s soul boils around Kevan’s breastbone.

It can’t latch in?

Losing the imprint must’ve damaged Kevan’s body as well as his soul.

Senseless with agony, the lich king keeps trying to burrow. Its shrieks curl my hair. Before it thinks of jumping to a fresh host, I lift the hammer high.

“Didn’t you want my body? Come and take it.” I brace my legs and swing, using all the power in my hips.

At the last second, I tilt my head to avoid seeing the hit.

The hammer crunches through bone.

Arms rattling, barely keeping my balance through the pain, I drop the handle. A ghostly flash shoots past my face. Its cold energy feels deeply familiar, but it zooms by me without a hint of resonance.

Kevan’s soul escaped.

I guess he’ll survive.

More or less.

I have bigger problems.

Pissed and in pain, the lich king switches targets.

Its soul leaps, and an icy wrecking ball punches through my chest.

I wheeze and stagger.

Foreign energy paws through my soul, like bony, rotting hands feeling me up from the inside.

I gag as the presence roots around, trying to find the right seam for ripping out my soul.

“Get out,” I growl and grip my heart.

You’re mine, the lich whispers.

I fight back, but I’m tired and too slow. Before I can tighten my mental defenses, the lich latches onto a handful of silks.

Blechhhhhh.

Its mental touch is spongy with rot.

Once the lich has that grip, it finds another and another, slithering to surround threads of my soul faster than I can peel him off.

The last standing section of the array whines with strain.

Godsdamnit!

I dive for the flickering circle.

Too late.

Our energies are already mixing.

Mid-air, the punishment magic zaps.

My soul ignites.

I scream so hard my sight goes black.

I can’t breathe.

Can’t hear.

Wish I couldn’t feel.

Gulping shards of ice and lightning, trying not to choke on my tongue, I roll across the ground.

When I ooze into the safety zone, the pain switches flavors.

Razors instead of fire.

I’ll use this body well, the lich king mutters from inside my head.

My energy shifts against my will; the lich is setting up shop. It wants to rip me out of my own house.

“You can fuck right off.” I fight the lich’s mental grip, tearing away its nauseating fibers. Manipulating the energy uses the same mental muscles as guiding, but doing it to myself burns through much more energy than working with a Sentinel.

The lich king launches new tendrils just fast as I can weed them out.

Stalemate .

I grit my teeth.

I can hold on, but for every second I resist, more of my soul erodes. The world loses color. My thoughts slow as my senses numb.

The lich king’s ancient voice booms between my ears. Surrender.

“You first,” I grit.

This body has been wasted, the lich mutters. Submit. I’ll allow your soul to remain and witness my rise.

Sweat drips into my eyes. Running on the fumes of fumes, my muscles quake.

Today is not the day I give in to a godsdamned lich .

Never again.

“Your rise?” I laugh shakily. “You can’t even beat me.”

Is that so?

The lich king’s energy surges.

Sickening pressure builds until bile bubbles up my throat.

I need help.

I need power.

Heart trembling, I call, “Vhex! Remy!”

I hope they remember me.

With all my soul-silks desperately battling the lich, I can’t sense them outside the array.

I catch a set of shuffling footsteps. Rocks clatter down the slope as a figure appears at the rim of the crater.

Vhex.

He burned off his clothes again. Flame armor flickers in and out, highlighting the cut lines of muscles twitching with battle adrenaline. He’s all horn and claws, blood and ash.

My tongue glues to the roof of my mouth.

He’s a rugged, beautiful mess.

And he’s mine .

“Vhex,” I whisper through cracked lips.

His nostrils flare. Swaying, he watches me with glazed eyes. He takes a half step, then claws his arms to pull himself back.

He shakes his head.

Come to me , the lich calls. His energy pulses.

Vhex snarls. His silks porcupine, fighting the monster’s pull.

“You’re stronger…than…him,” I grit out as I reach for him.

Vhex’s agony vibrates at my fingertips.

I catch a hint of his emotions.

There’s no one at the wheel in his head, only instinct driving.

It’s not the instinct to bite and claim that raged when I met him on that ruined street. The instinct that was all about his needs and didn’t give a fuck about me.

Now, Vhex knows he’s a threat to me.

His instincts scream to stay away.

I’m special.

I’m worth protecting.

My stomach cartwheels.

“You won’t hurt me,” I say roughly. “Vhex. I need you.”

A pained noise rumbles up his throat. His figure blurs, and suddenly my hand is swallowed in his flaming grip.

The deep, pure satisfaction he gets from being at my side burns harder than his rampage.

For a perfect moment, I feel the beat of his boiling pulse.

Then the lich’s icy magic saws down my arm, trying to reach Vhex.

“Don’t fucking touch him,” I growl at the ball of energy eating through my chest.

In what world would I let him use my hand to possess my own Sentinel?

As I fight the growing decay, a different kind of chill curls up my calves. Out of nowhere, Remy’s claws find me. Shadow hands grip my hips from behind.

I’m hit with an empty wave of longing as Remy buries his face at my throat.

I teeter on the edge of overwhelmed—shadow and fire, pain and smoke.

The lich’s smug, cold power chokes down.

Every fiber I have fights to stop him ripping through my soul.

I can’t win on my own.

I can’t win just by gritting my teeth.

I need help.

I need to let Vhex and Remy in.

Relaxing feels like dying, but I slowly lower my walls. I tilt my head, giving Remy my throat as I reach for Vhex’s horn. “Join with me.”

Vhex and Remy may be out of their minds, but their souls have been mine.

They come when they’re called.

Their silks pour into me, strengthening my spirit. I draw their energy, damage and all. Their raw emotions firework between pain, confusion, and fear.

Even now, I can’t stop myself from soothing them.

I don’t want to stop.

With every stroke, their soul-silks curl. Our souls wrap tighter and tighter.

The bond falls that last hair shy of imprinting, but with powers as strong as ours, it doesn’t matter.

We’ve grown close enough to share senses and memories.

Now, they gift me their magic.

I take control, guiding Remy’s shadows into my chest. Together, we rope off a wisp of the lich’s rot. He holds it steady in shadow pincers. Sweating, straining, I guide Vhex’s eager hellfire to pin-point attack the decay.

The lich’s putrid power starts to sizzle.

His soul-scream claws my insides. I almost celebrate.

Then the sizzle hits me.

My teeth snap shut, and I bite the tip of my tongue as the pain of immolation burns from the lich’s soul to mine.

Fucking stars.

We’re so entangled, it feels like purging my own soul.

I can’t hesitate.

Drawing this out will only make the hurt last longer.

Shaking, I finish ashing the thread. Then I reach for more. White spots pop in front of my vision. I sweat hot and cold, guiding fire and shadow where I need them.

Together, we sear off another piece of lich.

I groan with agony and relief.

It’s working. I just need more energy.

“Venom.” I drag Vhex’s horn and pull him to my throat. Reaching over my shoulder, I wind my fingers in Remy’s scattered hair and yank him to the other side. “Blood.”

They always remember those words.

Fire flashes at my canine tooth, echoing Vhex as he dips his fang. Pain-that-isn’t-pain burns the sweet, tender spot where my neck and shoulder join.

Syrupy flames rush into me like espresso poured over ice cream.

Melting.

Exhilarating.

The venom clears my head, shaking off the numbness and returning the life to my body in a cascade of prickles that spark from my fingertips to the tip of my nose.

When the prickle morphs into more of a burn, Remy makes a muffled mff .

His fangs pierce just above my pulse.

I want power, not lust, but his sucking mouth arches my spine.

Vhex and Remy press me between their bodies, desperate to be closer. Their hips rock with the push and pull of our energies.

I muffle a moan.

Maybe I do want lust.

But not yet. Not until the lich is gone.

As Vhex pumps, Remy draws, filtering out the poison and leaving me with all the pure, hot energy I desire.

I sense the lich’s soul recoil.

It bunches inside me, preparing to jump.

“You can’t come and go whenever you want,” I say and reach for Remy’s shadows.

They move as naturally as my own fingers.

Electric, overflowing with energy.

I pin the lich’s soul in place. The rush dulls my pain.

Thread by thread, I sear the lich king out of my body.

With every hellfire-melted piece of soul, I regain a piece of myself and a little more control.

The lich king writhes, battling my attack.

An explosion of cold lead tears through my soul, leaving shrapnel holes and a nauseated, wrung out feeling that almost makes me want to fold.

I won’t. I can’t.

Still feral, with heads full of blood, sex, and mayhem, Vhex and Remy pump both sides of my throat. Joined together, the three of us each get exactly what we need.

The stronger their power, the more they have to feed to me.

I ride the seesaw of power and pain.

Thread by thread, piece by piece, I isolate and burn away the lich’s soul, slowly reducing it to an angry, yellow marble.

You can’t destroy me, the lich hisses, but its voice is weak. I am endless.

“Bullshit,” I mutter. “Nothing lasts forever.”

The Sentinels of old couldn’t kill the lich king.

But no Guide has ever tried.

We didn’t exist when he was bound.

A wave of primal fear ripples through the lich when it realizes it can’t escape my grip.

With hellfire, shadow, and my own special brand of control, I burn away the lich king’s soul.

He screams in an ancient language.

The curses leave my ears dripping blood.

I keep pushing until its consciousness fades.

Finally, finally it disappears with the zzzzzzt of a quenched match.

I taste sulfur and clay. A ball of ash explodes out from behind my sternum.

The ashes don’t drift.

The putrid, grey motes clunk to the ground, imprisoned within the last surviving circle of the array.

With the enemy purged, my body is finally my own.

My legs buckle.

Shadow arms catch my backward fall.

Feeling floaty, I find myself staring up into a wall of darkness broken by two pit eyes that gape into a deeper abyss.

Clawed hands grip my ankles, hot enough to burn my pants. I wrinkle my nose at the burning smell as gentle hellfire eats through my uniform.

Vhex’s needy heat weaves with Remy’s thirst.

Buzzing on shadow caresses and leftover venom, I just want .

I want them.

Vhex.

Remy.

Their touches and their broken souls.

I’ve been chasing some impossible, perfect forever for so long, so hung up on an imprint I can never have that I forgot the most important thing.

I could be having really good sex with really hot men right now .

I give Vhex’s flames a boost.

Zzzzzzp!

My pants and inhibitions dissolve in a puff of hellfire.