Page 349 of The Curse Trilogy

I sling another rod through his torso, but no screams follow. The lightening bonds with it as well, and the red ripples slash him up more and more with his invincibility a mere taunting memory.

I stalk over to stare him in the eyes while frying his soul, and I kneel down to let my voice, my words be the last thing to go through his mind.

“When you stole my strength, you inherited my weakness. May the devil have less mercy on you than I.”

With that, the lightening surges through harder, crimson sparks flying into his body to free him from the world he planned to control; the world which will shed no tears for his loss.

His eyes gloss over as death invades, stealing his last breath, his last movement, and his last prayer that would never have been answered. I step back from the soulless bastard who has caused more pain than any one man before him. I’ll see to it no other has the chance to offer the same fate to any other breed left to live.

I start to send him into the suctioning force of my storm, but I don’t want him flying so close to heaven. He doesn’t even deserve a glimpse. Instead, I close the vacuuming sky, and the last bit of sand stirs beneath my feet as the calm air settles in with the first sighting of the tinted morning sky.

I stare at the mess of sleeping bodies, and I first stroke the cheek of Clay to allow him to wake. He coughs up the mound of sand that has entered his lungs, and he shakes his head in disbelief.

“What the hell?” he gasps.

I see the reflection of my eyes in his as my diluted pupils return to normal, the brighter violet settling into a duller hue to offer a less intimidating gaze.

“It’s done. I need you to separate the virus from the blood of the rest of these hybrids before I let them wake. Now that Ty’s dead, you should be able to do it without interference.”

He takes in another breath before letting his eyes fall on the man stacked on top of the fallen compound, the evidence of his cruel death telling Clay how he died.

“You went too easy on him,” he murmurs softly.

“It was a little exhausting to keep using so much power,” I say a little too smugly.

He smirks, and then his eyes widen at all the sleeping bodies he has overlooked.

“How did you… when did you… how is this…”

His words escape him when too many questions crash his brain at once.

“We can talk about it later. Let’s just say I’ve got a few more secrets to keep. No one needs to know how strong I really am, or my child will be at risk. For now though, let’s just worry about putting sanity back into the minds of the enslaved.”

He nods, still shaky and uncertain of what else to say, and then he walks over to the first body lying still on the ground.

“This might take a while,” he sighs.

“We’ve got time… all the time we need. I’m going to wake our people right now.”

He smiles, though I can see a hint of uneasiness in his eyes. He knows the magnitude of my new gift, and he knows as well as I do, no one else can.

“Araya, just wake the ones we trust. When I’ve finished, you can wake everyone at once. We’ll blame the sleeping spell on Ty since he’s dead.”

I nod, completely agreeing with him now that I’ve given it better thought, and my eyes fall on the two men lying side by side; my hybrid and my full blood. I almost dread the chastising screams I’ll hear when they realize I left them out of the fight.

“I think I’ll start with Angelica, Grayson, and Symphony,” I huff while moving over.

Clay laughs while shaking his head, normalcy returning when he hears the humor in my tone.

He shouldn’t fear me. None of them should. My eyes look down at my stomach as I caress the blooming child who helped give me the strength to be the force everyone needed - the weapon I hated myself for being not too long ago.

“You will be one tough little girl,” I coo to her.

Clay’s eyes perk up, meeting mine with a glassy gloss from a hidden sense of pride twinkling upon hearing the announcement of my child’s gender.

“She’ll be just like her mother then,” he gingerly offers, and my own tears drip.

I smile appreciatively, and then I move over to start the process I’ve been dreading with everyone else. Clay is the only one I knew would be more concerned about the others than my excluding him from the fight. That’s the mentality of the commander.