AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Don't argue,” I groan, clutching my head as the heat rushing through me eases off but lingers around the edges, my head pounding with knowledge and power in excess.
“Aleera,” Tobias hisses, rushing over to me, but my eyes go to Darius. Guilt floods me through the bond, only amplifying mine.
“I have done something stupid,” I murmur, and Darius watches me for a second waiting for me to explode at him stopping the shred even if only temporarily. I just hope he would forgive me because I truly fucked up, and that clarity has me shoving past them and running for the bathroom.
I rummage through the basket of soaps and pull out the Moonstone just as Darius comes in behind me. The furious growl that leaves him as every hair stands on end as he stalks toward me.
“What have you done?” he asks, and I swallow. The moment my magic touches it, it glows, and my eyes widen as I feel the energy inside it.
“Aleera,” Darius panics, but I step back, knowing if I don’t get it out of here soon, it will absorb his wards just as it was my magic, stealing it from me, every ounce I just absorbed, and I look at them in panic as Darius reaches for it. Jerking my hand back, I shake my head.
“None of you can touch me. It will take yours too,” I tell them before groaning as cramps ripple through my stomach as it devours the devil's bane and forces the shred, the stone urging me to complete it so it could take my power, our power.I will kill her. I will fucking kill her. This was never to protect me but to absorb my magic after I completed the shred, to weaken me and take my mate’s power from them.
But she fucked up, because I figured it out before I completed it, and now the only power she would get was the wrath of phoenixes. She had taken so much from them, and I wasn’t allowing her to take anymore.
“Aleera, No!” Darius screams, feeling my intention through the bond.
Using the remnants of what I still contained, I toss up a shield blocking Darius as he goes to take it and run for my old room. Blasting the window, I grab a cloak, I spot hanging by the dark fireplace before whistling. The moment I do, I hear Sparks caw, and I do the stupidest thing I have ever done. I jump from the window, praying to the fates that Spark reaches me because, with the loss of my power, I just lost my wings, and we were six stories high.
ChapterFifty-Three
Wind rushes past me as I fall, and I watch the ground grow closer. It is like time stops, everything slowing down. Then, I see every particle in the air, every vapor and streak of light from the moon, when suddenly arms wrapped around my waist. The stone glows and burns hotter in my hand as I try to fight it from taking his magic through me when Darius opens a portal directly beneath us.
My eyes widen when Darius grips my wrist, shaking my hand, but I refuse to let go, knowing what dropping that stone would do to the city. He opens a portal. When I refuse, he blasts me with his magic, stunning me, and I scream as my arm spasms, my fingers twitching, and the stone slips through them, falling toward the portal. I grasp the air, trying to catch it, when Spark caws loudly, swooping off the roof toward us.
My fingers are outstretched, reaching for the stone, as I try to stop it, knowing the destruction it would cause, the power it would absorb. Suddenly, talons cage around my body, and I scream as Spark grabs us, plucking us from the air and he takes flight, his powerful wings taking us higher. In contrast, my scream of horror rings out loudly as I watch the stone disappear into the portal before closing.
He killed them; he killed them all. Spark moves toward the field below before dropping us to the ground. I round on Darius the moment my feet hit the ground, my hands slamming against his chest, and he staggers backward. Spark lands on the ground not far from us, but my anger is ignited like a match had been struck, and my rage is the fuel it needed as I call on my phoenixes.
“How could you?” I scream at him, tears streaming down my face as I shove him. Darius puts his hands up, backing away from me. The phoenixes on the roof caw loudly, feeling my burning anger and take flight. They circle the sky above while Darius' anger also ripples, his energy amplifying, and the air around us heats as the tension simmers between us, my shred tries to override my anger, calling on his power I can sense while mine is lost with the Moonstone.
“Don’t put this back on me! You brought it back home; you lied! You should have told us!” Darius yells at me. “I did what I had to do!”
“The city, that city. You just killed them all, and led the power hunters straight to them!”
“I had no choice. That stone would have absorbed you, absorbed the wards and the power of your phoenixes,” Darius says, walking away from me toward the castle. Still overcome with anger, I charged and tackled him, furious that he would sacrifice an entire city when I could have led the phoenixes straight to them.
“You monster, you just wiped out a city,” I scream angrily, and Darius rolls, pinning me beneath him.
“It’s better than leading them here!” Darius bellows at me before pushing off me and getting to his feet. I shake my head knowing that that stone would absorb any protection the city’s wards offered, absorb the power of those that lived there, and lead the power hunters directly to them while they are defenseless.
“I could have taken them down; I have the phoenixes,” I scream at him, getting to my feet when the sky suddenly ignites, glowing crimson as lightning streaks across the sky. We all look up at the trees toward the city as the power of the blast, it ripples over the dome encasing the castle from Darius' wards, shielding us from the blast, but I knew the city’s wards with an explosion that strong would have shattered, leaving them open to attacks. My eyes widen; I cup my mouth with my hands in horror before getting to my feet. I whistle calling on my phoenixes when Darius charges me, clamping his hand over my mouth.
I struggle against him, shoving him off. “I can help them. I can save them!” I spit at him, and he stumbles back.
“You don’t know that! I am not willing to take that risk,” Darius screams back at me
“But I am!” I yell at him as Tobias, Lycus, and Kalen emerge from the castle, jogging over to us, their eyes casting nervous glances at the sky where light sparked and illuminated in the distance. Tobias waves his arms in the air trying to calm us. I want to beat Darius senselessly for his stupidity. And I wanted to kick myself for believing my so-called mother, trusting the one woman they warned me about.
Picking up a rock, I chuck at him as he walks away. It hits him in the back, and he whirls on me, stalking toward me and Tobias backs up. Our mates watch from the sidelines as he reaches me, and I pummel Darius, hitting him wherever I can. My phoenixes above caw and swirl in the night sky above like glowing beacons of infinite power, their magic zapping and recharging me with each cawing blast. “I could have taken them; I would have ended them,” I scream at him when he grips my arms.
“And at what sacrifice, your life? That sort of power, the power needed to kill the power hunters would have killed you. You can’t harness that kind of power blindly, you aren’t ready!”
“Better me than them!” I cry as our mates draw nearer. “How could you?”
He was a monster. Thousands, and thousands of lives he has just put at risk because of me.
“Better them than you, because if it is between you and them, I choose you. I have lost you once. I won’t lose you again. I can live with their death on my hands. I can’t live with yours!” he says, shaking me.
