Page 112 of Throne of the Wolf Queen

Evella rose, gilded fissures sealing, skin smoothing as she crackled with the anger of eternity. We set our gaze upon the one to usurp us. Her expression wavered, but still she raised her hand. Turned her twisted gaze towards the arch. Asher straightened, offered his hand to the sister we’d only just started to know.

We pressed against Vyrus, Evella’s spurned love, but still a remnant of rebellion clung to him as he denied us access. For a moment, the threads shivered, unsure, but damn him. I didn’t carry his blood just for him to bleed out on the floor of his temple while the Goddess he’d loved fought.

Silver, purple became one. I cried as I slammed my love, grief, my fluttering hope into them. With a roar, the God stood, locked our eyes onto Delphine. Her feet left the ground as the candles stuttered and died.

Lightning forked from her hand, thrust towards us. But we were Evella. We were protection and Delphine fell to the ground, her lightning shattering the temple. In the next heartbeat, she stood, and we laughed as a crack split her face, dissecting her eye, her flesh curling.

A wolf pushed Evella, placed a chain into her hand. A crystal heart swung towards her and we slammed it into her chest. A light, bright and blinding, exploded as her old lover, Vyrus, raised his hand. Delphine screamed as his fist clenched, her skin tearing from her obsidian skull, her very bones poisoned by the Vyrium she’d poured into herself.

‘Do you truly believe you can destroy me?’ She raised her arm. We cried as Evella fell, Vyrus screaming her name with a pain he’d forged in the stars. Delphine twisted her head, turned to the God who’d created all. ‘I have not bled, I have not suffered fools, for my story to end now.’

Vyrus faltered, the flicker of his pulse pulled towards the love who struggled to stand. The corner of Delphine’s mouth curved as she sliced through the ground where he stood. His distraction, her chance.

No. I swallowed, visions swarming my mind of budding stars, the memories we’d torn from their minds. Not frozen watercolours, not yellowing illustrations on a page. These were true, real. Moments, emotions, swathes of love and crucifying pain. We were one.

Vengeance, protector and Deviant, a single entity. A warning flickered at the corner of my mind. That this could end us all, but as Delphine aimed her hand at the captain, his guards, our sister, we swore she’d not taste victory. Power and gifts. Ancient and thrumming with devastation lay at our fingers. It swirled about us, tore our skin. With a shattering scream, we broke.

A lost temple exploded, a volcano spewed its fiery ire – and I collapsed. My body spent.

CHAPTER 45

SORROW

Blood coats each tattered bloom. The bower lies desecrated. Thorns cling to me, scrape my flesh as I tear them apart, desperate to find him. Desperate to hold him. I collapse, sobs wrenching me asunder. He has gone. Gone and I will never see his smile again.

​— ​TATTERED DREAMS OF THE WOLF QUEEN

A trembling hand swept down my face. With a gasp, my eyes opened, meeting nothing but the shadows that would be my new constant companions. A faint ringing echoed through my ears. But the volcano had stilled. The quaking abated. The world frozen.

‘She’s…’ Asher sucked in a tattered breath as his voice broke. ‘She’s gone, Sorrow. Dead…’

I knew exactly who my captain meant. His voice trailed off. Boots scrambled over rocks as the wicked sun warmed my tearstained cheeks. By my side, I sensed the Goddess, her even breathing. A faint gilded warmth on my skin. She lived. Matthias’s sacrifice had gifted Evella her heart.

‘My queen?’ I exhaled, while everything within collapsed on a loop.

Gently, I placed my numb fingers below my eyes. ‘I’m… she hit me. I’m blind.’

The softest hands cupped my face. Enfys laid her forehead against mine, sweeping away the tears with her thumb. The depth of her magic swept through me. I knew the bruises paled, bones knit together, my nose straightened.

But even a healer who unknowingly carried the blood of Vyrus wasn’t enough to repair my ruptured heart. And, as I blinked, as I’d always known, she could never repair my vision.

Shaking my head, my captain sobbed, a cracked, raw sound. But there was no time to mourn the loss of my sight. Not when I’d lost my very soul.

Enfys’s fingers gripped tighter, her chest heaved. ‘I’ll try again. I’ll⁠—’

I peeled away her fingers, clinging to her hands. ‘Don’t waste it. Not on me.’ I dragged in another breath, while my mouth worked, somehow unable to form his name, to say it out loud and make it real. ‘Go to him. Heal him. I beg you, Enfys. Please…’

‘Gone, Sorrow.’ My body crashed as Evella spoke. ‘Matthias is on the other side.’

My captain grasped me, clutched me as though he could prevent me from shattering. The wolf nuzzled into my neck, whimpers trembling through him, knowing even he wasn’t enough to prevent me falling apart. Asher’s shoulders shook beneath mine. The loss of Matthias was a claw shredding my heart. Grief had never been a stranger to me. He’d gleefully cleaved me apart over and over, but this one? This death? This destroyed me. Devastated my essence. How did my lungs keep breathing? The heart pumping my roiling blood with a will I couldn’t understand.

‘Asher,’ I sobbed against his chest, fisting his tunic. ‘How?’

‘I’m sorry,’ his voice broke against my cheek as he pulled back, his trembling fingers swiping away my vicious tears. ‘He loved you so… so much. M… He bought you time, Sorrow. Took the hearts.’

Enfys’s breath hitched. I wondered what thoughts swirled through her mind as she stood in the presence of the Goddess she revered. The other she abhorred. The warmth of the wolf receded and I knew he’d gone with her. I lay against Asher’s solid chest, his hands stroking my hair as my tears soaked his shirt. Dragging in a tattered breath, those fucking threads tugged, twined as one and yanked so hard I cried out.

‘Enfys,’ Evella’s soft voice called out to my sister. ‘No one, not even I can bring him back. He’s⁠—’