Page 69 of Resurrection
Beneath the mounting emotions, a tsunami of energy and the rising pain, he teetered. Was he still standing? He put his hand to his side, over the pain, the lower edge of his chest, and a rush of heat and liquid poured over his hand. Fuck, he hated being shot.
It was hard to breathe through the mounting rage, but he struggled to rein it in and focus. The Goddess had a lot to be angry about, and She was more than happy to let Seiran use that as fuel, tying Her rage to each mounting injustice of his life. This bullet, while trying to save a life, was another pebble added to an overfull bucket.
The entire area was silent. The echo of the shot fading into nothing. The center of a storm, the magic growing and swirling around them. Seiran had to blink hard to see through the roll of power. His chest ached like there was too much weight on it. The bullet hadn’t gone that deep, had it? Piercing something vital? He blinked back stars and waves of darkness, though couldn’t tell if they were from the power or the wound.
Page was on the ground. Gabe holding him down, gun kicked away, but Page wasn’t resisting at all.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” Page cried. It tugged at Seiran’s memory, the dozens of times in his life he’d found himself broken, lost, and without hope. Why did he keep getting back up?
“Seiran?” Gabe called; voice tight.
Seiran stood very still, his heart racing, his mind filled with endless ideas of revenge and natural disasters he could use, power pulsing in every cell. He had never let it overflow like this. Had never given Her the chance to completely take him. He had always thought She would force him to shift and he’d forever wander as a lynx, lost to the simplicity of his animal half, not that She would use him to end the world. He fought to hold back while She beckoned him to let Her have control. She wanted to use him. Instill Her will into him and tear everything apart. And if he was hurt enough to let Her have it…
“It would mean the end of humanity,” Gabe said softly. Seiran felt the words in his mind more than heard them. “This rage is not yours.”
But it was. A molten lava of burning anger as familiar as the air he breathed. A lifetime of being slapped down, shoved aside, abused, and left abandoned, had fostered this rage. The Goddess was merely an echo of what was already inside. Seiran could feel storms building across the globe, a surge of power mounting in the core of the earth as it readied itself for a massive global shift of tectonic plates. The destruction of all of it on the tip of his fingers. He wouldn’t have to do much, simply let go of his control. She would step in and complete the necessary change.
Change. Seiran had wanted change for so long, but been unwilling to be the force behind that chaos. Not anymore.
He swayed, dizzy, lots of blood lost. His arm was numb, head swirling with magic and pulsing life as the Goddess rushed to heal him while demanding his obedience. He wouldn’t die. Never did, even when he’d wanted to a thousand times. It added to his pain and rage. Not being allowed to rest, or to end the grief of being forever alone. He wouldn’t die, but he might pass out.
Gabe appeared there in front of him, reaching out blood covered fingers. Seiran blinked, disoriented by the pull of the endless swells of power and Gabe in front of him, bleeding.
“Not me,” Gabe whispered. “I’m not hurt. You are.”
Seiran glanced down to find himself bleeding, a hole neatly through the right side of his chest. The burn of a collapsed and pierced lung distant beneath all the power, but as it filled with blood his brain tried to tell him he had to do something or he would die. All alone again, to suffer and sink in the darkness, then dragged back to repeat it all over like some miserableGroundhog Dayredo.
“You’re not alone,” Gabe whispered, his hands on Seiran’s face, kissing the tip of his nose. “You have the kids, your brother, your friends, and me.”
But he was going to leave again, wasn’t he? Gabe had been pulled from the ground too early, which meant he’d go revenant and people would die if they didn’t put him back. Seiran didn’t think he could handle that, not again. He’d been grieving for over a decade, tired and lonely, heartbroken by fate’s turn, and trying to put on a happy face for those around him.
All that pain added fuel to the rage. The Goddess taking hold and fanning the flames to a raging inferno. It would have been so easy to give in, and let himself dive into hate. He stood as Her scion, but also the last barrier between Her and world destruction.
Funny, he didn’tfeelthat important in the grand scheme of things. One lone man, happy to be hidden away from the world with his family, and wishing for the man he’d loved back, even if sometimes that hurt.
“Sei…” Gabe whispered, his arms strong as they surrounded Seiran, keeping him upright. “I’m not leaving. Look at me, okay?”
Seiran had to work to raise his head and meet Gabe’s gaze. It was blazing green with power and magic. Beautiful.
“You are beautiful,” Gabe said pressing his forehead to Seiran. “And incredibly strong.”
“I didn’t mean to…” Page sobbed from his place on the grass. “I would never hurt him.”
“I need you to hear me. Sei?”
“You don’t even remember me,” Seiran said absently.
“I do remember,” Gabe whispered. “More every day. Have you written me off completely? Was I such a monster to you?”
That stung. Gabe a monster? No. Absent. Yes. Matthew had been a monster. A monster both Seiran and Sam had survived. Sam had become a bit of a monster himself, ruthless at times, but also a squishy marshmallow inside. As a vampire he got to let the monster out often. Was it as freeing as Seiran suspected it would be? But wasn’t that what Seiran was too? A monster? Letting innocent witches die?
“You are mine. Everything to me, even if the Goddess forsook you, you’d still be mine. With or without all my memories, your trauma, and our combined power, you are mine. Can you focus on that?”
Even if he was evil? But that was a thought burned into him from a lifetime of brainwashing. What was evil? He’d caught glimpses of it over the years. It began with madness and corruption of power. He was on the edge of that now, right?
Would he ever just slaughter people for the hell of it? Probably not, at least not while he still retained control. If he gave the power to the Goddess, broke down that final barrier, would he be evil or simply a tool She used?
“If you let Her rage, what will we have left to save? What about your kids? And Page? The Goddess would destroy them too.”