Page 54 of The Princesses of Ruin (The Princesses of Ruin #5)

Chapter fifty

Scarlett

C onsciousness grips me like the burning hands of a fever. I gasp, throwing myself from whoever’s arms restrain me. The world is normal. The ground is the ground and the sky, the sky. There is no seam, and no door.

Hundreds of people swarm a narrow walk, flying up and flying off. I recognize their clothes.

Spiders.

My soldiers.

“Scarlett.” A voice murmurs my name.

My name.

I turn to see a young woman leaned against the wall. She’s covered in black ink and blood. Her face is gaunt, her eyes barely open.

“You’re so…so strong,” she murmurs. “You sapped the life right out of me.”

I can feel the stone beneath me. The air around me. I feel the clouds and the coming snow that will turn into rain because the wind is too hot. Too hot, like my fever.

There’s a fondness for the girl leaning on the gray stones. The feeling is so deep in my chest it makes my eyes water. I keep my crouch and take a few measured steps closer .

She reaches out for me. “You can defeat Ashai.”

Why do I want to cry for her?

“Sister.” Another voice ripples through the air. Another woman. She sounds like the one leaned against the wall, but with more vitality.

I take the girl’s hand, watching as strings of green magic flow from her body into mine.

What am I?

“We’re coming. Let her go.”

The woman’s eyes close and I release her hand.

A dark figure moves through the air behind me. I whirl around, prepared to attack, but their approach is not aggressive. I hear their intensions—whispers of hope and fear.

Can she really defeat her? Is she that strong?

The man lands on the stones and unfurls his arms, revealing a woman with brown-red hair pulled tight in a bun. She unclasps the straps around her waist and steps down from the ledge, walking toward me.

My body moves back of its own accord, though I don’t feel fear.

“She’s erasing you,” the woman says, holding out her hands. “Touch me. Take my power. Strengthen your wall and remember yourself. Remember what you’re supposed to do.”

“Vessel.”

That’s right.

My destiny.

A piece of parchment flutters through the sight in my mind. It has words on it that I don’t want the others to see. She sees everything.

You know your role in this, Vessel. Don’t fail, or they all die.

They all die? Who?

“Touch me, please,” the woman says .

I trust her. I know she means well.

Our hands connect, and gold magic spirals down her arms into me. She lurches, gasping for air. The man behind her swoops in, grabbing her away.

“No!” she screams. “She needs more. Please, Kaz!”

The man with a wicked scar on the left side of his face snarls at me.

The woman reaches out again, fingers stretching, hands yearning. I connect with her and the flow of power sates the deep hunger in me. More. I need more.

“Reina,” Alyse calls.

Alyse!

I gasp, pulling my hands back. I was draining her.

My gaze darts to Lily, leaned against the stone of the Wall, the hulking monstrosity that separated me from my sisters for twelve long years. She’s slumped, her eyes closed.

I’ve killed my sister…

“She’s not dead,” Alyse says. “And you need more power. Take it.”

She reaches out again and my stomach churns with revulsion. How could I take from them their very life forces?

“You must, ” Alyse says.

Reina and Jasper drop to the stones behind me. I’m caged in by them.

My face is hot with a fever I don’t want. Tears burn their way out of my eyes, and I blink to keep them from blurring my vision.

“Alyse told us everything,” Reina says, coming closer. “We know this is the only way to kill her.”

My gaze shoots to Alyse. Kill her? You know it’s not that simple!

“They’ll never consent to your sacrifice. ”

But she will.

“And you didn’t when you burned the evidence?”

It feels like a lifetime ago that I realized I could not only duplicate the powers of those I touched, but pull the very life force out of them alongside the magic. Lily’s darkness was easier to take; it called to the bits of Ashai in me.

“Scarlett.” Zane’s voice breaks me.

He pushes past Reina and I gasp as I fall into him.

It’s too soon. I wanted more time.

“I know. But you’ll have another chance to be together,” Alyse whispers to me.

When? I cry into Zane’s chest and he cradles me, ignorant of the reality about to fold out before us.

“When the time is right.”

I swallow hard and calm myself.

Alastair lands behind Lily and pulls her up into his arms. He glares at me, and I know I deserve it.

“I’m sorry. For everything.”

“We’re not without hope,” Alastair says. “The Wall is holding.”

The trumpet call of the strange world sounds and I jump.

Over the edge is a monster fifty feet tall.

It has a wide face and a mouth large enough to swallow the Nest. It pummels the barrier with fists of stone and bloody, ichor-covered bodies.

Flares of green and gold spark with every hit, but I can feel the defenses waning inside me…

because of Lily’s power. I can sense her runes.

Our people scream and flee on the Underbelly side. There’s nowhere for them to run from her, and only one solution that will end this all.

“A coordinated attack,” I start. “Reina, whatever you have left, you have to attack her at the weakest moment. ”

“When will that be?” she asks, her voice loaded with that same fire I saw the first time we met after our separation.

She still hates me. She still wants to beat me and be better than me. I know she will.

I square up, straightening my spine and lifting my chin. “When she’s begging for mercy under my fists.”

The air between us shifts. They look to me like I have the answers. I don’t know if I do.

“It will work,” Alyse promises.

I turn to Zane and throw myself into him. His chest is cool against my too-hot skin. The sweat and smoke cling to him like a sheet. I breathe in the scent of him, of the herbs and iron, and remember.

The way he held me against the wall of the tavern. The loving caress of his spindles against my sides. The hot brand of his blackmail kiss. The soft bath when I was broken. The claiming kisses when he knew he owned me, and I owned him.

I look up, stretching on my toes to meet his mouth. His fingers dig into my back, and he grimaces against my lips but still parts them with his tongue. He pours into me.

Magic.

Love.

Hate.

Yearning.

Fear.

Desire.

Desperation.

He knows I can’t survive this.

A whimper escapes me as I feast on him, tasting blood. I don’t know if it’s his or mine, but it feeds me. My fever grows, the power building to inescapable levels.

I step back from him all at once. One more second of his embrace and I’ll back out. I’ll take him away and hide until the end of the world.

I put my arms out and my sisters come to me…their men, too. They touch my shoulders, my biceps, my fingers, and their magic flows into me.

Heat upon heat assaults my body. It’s overwhelming and maddening. I’m too large for my bones, too full for my skin, and the confines of my mortal shell have held me long enough.

I take my last breath as a woman and let it lose in a scream to shake the heavens.

The gods’ fear trembles through the fifteen realms. They sit parallel, their thrones of souls withering at my omnipotent glance. I stand before them in immortal form, the power they’ve been building come to fruition.

Yegress, the man with doe ears and a soft complexion, stands in his flowing green robes. “How dare you enter this place, creature ?”

Zephrom sits at the end, her throne small, made of the crushed souls of those she deemed unworthy of the magic in their blood.

I look upon all the gods and find them wanting.

“They don’t need you,” I say, my voice a voluminous whisper that fills their space. They clasp their ears and shake their heads. Only Gaien listens to my words and nods her head, blood spilling from her eyes.

The realms contract and I’m birthed back into my home. I hover just above the ground, my black robes sliding over my silken body on an unseen wind. I perceive the entire world all at once but force my attention through my eyes and into the body I have gained.

My sisters stare at me, mouths open and breath shallow .

“Stop gawking,” I say with a smirk. “You’ve seen a goddess before.”

“My monster,” Zane murmurs, his eyes glossy and full of magic.

The flame for him burns so bright in my chest I could incinerate the world myself and spirit him away to an untouched corner. I promised him as much…

But Ashai started this fire, and I need to extinguish it.

For them.

“I love you to the stars and back,” I say.

He grits his teeth, baring them in a snarl that hides his tears. “I love you eternal.”

I swallow my anguish and lean over the Wall, plummeting toward the monster. I need not swords or shields any longer. My body is a living weapon.

My fist hits its face with a thunderous crack. The beast splits in two, spilling bodies and blood across the houses and stones. I hover above it all, watching as Ashai cobbles herself back together.

I stretch out my hands and feel the power running through the villainous ichor. It comes to me easily, lighting up the runes she carved into me. Her magic glitters through my veins and I breathe her in.

I am Vessel.

And she is mine.

“You can’t consume me,” Ashai roars all around me and in my head. “I made you!”

“And I am unmaking you.”

I bear down on her with my will. Each stream of dark magic flowing into my fingertips is a deep sickness that wars with the other magics in my body.

So I release them. I wrap gold around her consciousness and squeeze until she can’t think.

I wrap her body in green until she can’t move.

Blue rips across her skin and turns her to ash.

She shrieks, writhing like a worm in the rain.

“There is no escape. You made me for this,” I say, pulling on her deeply and filling myself with darkness. "To kill gods."

Her arm slices through the air and a shockwave of power follows. I dodge, releasing my control on her for just a fraction. Her attack cuts my leg, and though I’m as deified as the others, I’m still killable—just like she is.

I hold my wounded thigh and rush toward her, my other hand outstretched. I slam into her, hand clutching her throat. She struggles, tearing at the skin on my arm with her nails. Her eyes bulge as she looks up into my face and sees her future.

Her death.

I sense the magic left inside her and pull harder. She is a goddess after all, and there is much to consume.

Ashai releases my hands and bends reality, folding us high into the air above the city. We plummet, my stomach inverting. She thinks I’ll blink. I wrap my legs around her hips and put both hands on her throat. My thumbs skate over her pulse point—she does have a beating heart.

I sit astride her as we fall through freezing air, pulling harder until she’s surrendering to me. The black blood pumping through her gives way to even more strength. I siphon everything that she has, turning her body into a quiet, desiccated husk.

I land, the ground exploding away from me.

Bliss thrums through my body. I roll my head around my neck as I stand, feeling the body as it grows to fit all of me. My hands flex and joints pop. Smoky air fills my nostrils and saturates my being with the scent of battle .

So much strife.

So much perseverance.

All because Zephrom told us to. All because the goddess who hates us wanted to see us suffer and fail. She wanted to come here in the darkest hour to be the savior, to curry our favor, to gain our prayers. She wanted our souls…

I was never the vessel of the gods. I was the vessel of our will. Of our rage. Of our hope.

Now, I will be the vessel of vengeance.