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It’s beautiful.
Casting my gaze above I finally see the heart stop. It hangs in the sky like a moon, and yet its glow is brighter, just a bit, giving the whole world a similar glow to that of a sunrise. A blue sunrise.
I fall to my knees, the tears flowing. I don’t regret saving this world, but some part of me will always regret not saving my men. “I’m sorry,” I sob, as I look down at them. “I could save the world or you, but not both.”
Suddenly, Shenra is beside me. She takes my face in her hands and turns me to her. “You have saved this world. The goddess will save them, all you have to do is ask.”
I don’t know if I believe her, but I pull away to look at my fallen men. Onyx and Dusk kneel near their heads, their gazes on me. There’s hope in their eyes, but some part of me thinks I’m about to crush them all over again.
Still, I ask, “Goddess of the Moon, save my men. Bring them back to me.” My words are broken, desperate. But I hold my breath and watch the two dead men in front of me.
But Shenra was wrong, because I asked. I did everything I was told. And they’re still dead.
SEVENTEEN
Ann
I’m completely numb as I stand over two of the people I love most in this world, dead, unable to be saved. It’s like I’m in a bad dream, and I can’t wake up from it, no matter how much I want to. My nails are digging so hard into my palms that I can feel blood running from them, but nothing changes how broken I am inside.
Somewhere between numb and the most heartbreaking pain I ever imagined experiencing.What do I do? How do I keep going?
I… just don’t know.
It feels like the moment couldn’t get worse, until it does. A rumbling builds, shaking the ground, and we know. All of us.
Our group turns to the edge of this world, to the opening into the Void. The Shadow King’s army comes pouring back into this world like a tsunami of death. The grave trolls roar, the shadow beasts growl, and the monkeys chitter eerily. All of their feet hitting the ground with a vengeance that’s similar to chaos from an earthquake.
It looks like the end of the fucking world.
Dusk grabs my wrist. “We have to go.”
“Go where?” I ask him, whirling onto the man I care for so much.
He shakes his head. “The castle. The forest. Anywhere. If we stay here, it’ll be certain death.”
But before I can answer, the rumbling stops, changes. I turn back in shock and watch as the grave trolls begin to shriek. The sounds so painful that I actually cover my ears. And then before our eyes, the trolls begin to melt. As do the monkeys. Only, instead of standing in place shrieking, the monkeys run for the half-dead forests.
It’s eerie watching the monkeys. They’re turning to ash as they run, some falling into piles, with nothing to indicate they were ever living beings. While others are half-burned, creepy-looking things that manage to find cover beneath the trees, although there’s not a lot of cover there still.
The grave trolls all melt, well, collapse into ash, and an unseen breeze seems to ruffle the particles, stirring them into the air. It’s horrific in a strange way to watch the creatures that have terrorized us for so long die, and yet, I don’t know that I’d want anything to die this way.
The shadow beasts, however, don’t turn to ash. They observe the scene before them and then begin to move again, this time more cautiously, toward us. Dusk and Onyx withdraw their swords. I hold out my hand, ready to call for what little power I have left inside of me… when Shenra grabs my wrist.
“No.”
“Shenra, they’re not our people any longer,” Dusk says, his voice grave.
“They are,” she says simply, “and without the king to control them, they can be themselves once more. Someone needs only to remind them.”
“How?” I ask, because the closer they come with their sharp teeth and claws, the more I want to run away from these beasts. To avoid being torn to pieces.
“Without Phantom, one of us should be their new leader. We just need to try to see if they’ll obey our command. If they’ll see us as an alpha. And once they accept us as their new alpha, we can allow them to transform into their other forms and remember what it is to be people. To remember who they are and that there’s more to life than being controlled. Then living and dying for an evil ruler.”
Fuck. She’s right. As much as I want something to suffer for taking Phantom and Rayne from me, it shouldn’t be them. They’re victims in all of this too. They deserve our kindness, as long as it doesn’t cost us our lives.
I let my hand drop. “She’s right.”
“And what if this doesn’t work?” Dusk asks, and Onyx gives me a look that says he agrees.
