“You came for me,” Kellan said, his breaths of air puffing against my lips.
My throat constricted, and I forced myself to swallow as I nodded. “I did.”
Kellan’s chest rose and fell, and I scanned his body. The wounds inflicted by Ganmira and Renova had vanished. He opened his lips to speak, but the snaking feeling of another’s presence crept up my neck.
“We need to go up,” I cut in, pointing to the clouds. “The gate is up there.”
Kellan groaned, the sound sinking into my bones. “Too bad you didn’t bring Tiberius,” he murmured, the side of his lip twitching despite… everything.
Tiberius.
“I did, but he’s not here. He’s—” I began, placing a hand to my scarred chest, unsure how to explain he was still here as if our souls had somehow fused in the process of coming to this place.
Kellan frowned before shooting his eyes to the sky. He raised one hand, keeping the other firmly gripped around my waist as he sent a blast of wind shooting up through the clouds. The sky parted, and a tunnel of black appeared in the distance.
He held a hand to me, his eyes darting once again to my ears.
“If the only way out is up, then become who you need to be,” he said, his voice soft. “Take what you need.”
My brows pinched as I unraveled his words. Become who you need to be…
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I started, shaking my head. I glanced around us at the realm created from the darkness inside me.
Kellan gripped my chin between his thumb and forefinger, turning my face back to his. “You are Death,” he murmured, nodding slowly. “And you are alsoRebirth.”
I blinked once.
Become who you need to be.
I quieted my mind and strained to hear the golden light of transformation swirling in my veins. Would it be too much to change this way?
I slid my fingers through Kellan’s rough hand before reaching for the other. He closed his eyes and let his head drift back as he sent a spark of power into me. My eyes drifted closed in response, and I wrapped the Transcindiel around Kellan’s line of power that surged through my veins.
Tiberius’s image formed in my mind in all his glory. Powerful, velvet wings beat strong gusts of air as he raised himself off the ground and soared through the air like the living embodiment of freedom itself.
Pain raced down my back and up my shoulders in a single, excruciating second. I wrapped vines of darkness around Kellan’s back and waist as he kept a firm grip on my hands, sending waves and waves of power into me.
His cheek hovered against mine, and he breathed, “You’re ready, Bonscaíh. Rise up.”
Tiberius’s warmth surged through my veins, and that shared bond I had with my caeluma suddenly made more sense. Those shared moments, those shared memories. Our casting and shared consciousness.
I snapped my eyes open, and fire raced down my shoulder blades as I stretched my wings andflew.
CHAPTER FIVE
NERISSA
You’re certain the orb in Kayj is always under guard? Her Majesty spent hours in discussion with someone on the other end.
– Correspondence from Khato to Carina Ravindra, 30th of Winter, 072.3E.
Nerissa – Vael Lacrima, Kayj
“FIRE!” I screamed, my blood racing as adrenaline coursed alongside it.
Kresida and Vulcan aimed from their position at the upper ridge of the decimated mountain, and my chest heaved breaths of smoky air as my heart struggled to pick up another beat. Rubelline arrow tips soared through the air as two forms stepped through the gate of the worlds.
Dying yellow light pulsed from deep below the stone walkway, surrounding the indestructible archway in a sickly glow despite the bright afternoon sunshine that flooded theshattered cave. The carcass of the most recent abomination that crept through that archway lay smoking near what used to be the entrance of the cave.
