I’m frozen.
Somewhere in the last thirty seconds the world has rearranged itself.None of it makes any sense.Lucy is gone.She dissolved in my arms and now there’s a version of this campus with a battle raging between fallen angels, our tower has collapsed and Ignatius’s hand is on my collar trying to save me.
“You need to run,” he says again.
I turn and focus on the dean of Finis Academy.The demon who has owned my soul intending to reap it for a decade, is urging me to run, to save myself.I think that’s what finally makes this all real.
It takes a second for me to process the scene.I’m distracted by the flood of wraiths and ashspawn flowing into campus and the sight of Finis Tower.It’s nothing but a gaping maw and crumbling ruins.
The cracked remnants loom above us like chipped teeth.The symbol of our education and the heart of our city stands broken and grotesque—a stark contrast to the tiny beacon of realisation blooming in my mind.
Time is up and I’m still breathing.
I’m alive.
A beautiful thought filled with hope bursts like the crashing of a tsunami as a second far more devastating realisation creeps in next to it.
Lucy is dead.
It should be me.
Ignatius should have reaped me.And instead, Lucy is gone and I am left with… what?Her magic?Am I a demon now?
Finis Tower drags me out of my thoughts.Stood in the middle of the destruction is the angel responsible for punching through the heart of our campus.She stands tall and regal amongst the rubble.The enormous void leers behind her.Serrated seams of the Veil hang loose, floating in the wind.Strips of obliterated fabric drift in the air like dandelion seeds.If it weren’t horrifying, it would be stunning.The edges and all the severed pieces dance like a murmuration of shadows.
The carnage beneath the shimmering fabric snaps into focus, and nothing is beautiful anymore.
The few Societas members that survived the explosion crawl out from the rubble and bricks.
Limbs barely attached.
Blood streaking cheeks and necks.
Clothes torn.
The agonising shrieks that make my body crawl.A metallic tang fills the air along with the scent of soured milk and stale cigarettes.
But what climbs down my throat and makes me want to throw up is the knowledge that Lucy is gone.
My heart clenches.I bend over and heave as images of my hands clinging to the scythe and tearing through Lucy pour into my mind.
Puke spills onto the cobbles as I empty the contents of my stomach.I’m vaguely aware that my legs don’t seem to be working and yet I find myself standing.Ignatius grips my jacket, holding me upright.
“Interitus…” Architecti says, her gaze zeroing on Thalia.
“Thalia is Interitus?”I whisper, letting my mind wander back to the vision Architecti gave me inside her prison.
The black-tipped wings.
Thalia’s black-tipped hair.
The mismatched eyes.
The push.
The fall.
I glance back at the two angels, everything solidifying.
