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“Raina,” he whispered, shaking his head. His white hair grazed his shoulders with the movement. “I’d have thought she’d learned her lesson not to tangle with mortals.” His gaze softened, just the slightest as he added, “You have her nose.”
Ignoring my confusion, he turned to Patrick. “Our deal is done,” he snapped. “You never told me what he was.”
“I told you everything you needed to know!” Patrick said, pushing up and wiping at his stained clothing.
Lorian shot him a warning glare. “No, you told me he was a vessel, nothing more. I’m sorry, but I will not spill Raina’s blood this night.”
Patrick had said something about me being Raina’s true descendant, but now that Lorian had insinuated the same, the reality of it crushed me. “What do you mean—”
Kiara’s scream shook me back to reality. I whirled away from the god and charged to where she battled the final wolf. It had its claws in her shoulder, and although Jake had jumped on its back, the creature had easily shaken him off.
I took his place, but I wasn’t as lucky as I’d been the first time.
Instead of focusing on Kiara trapped beneath him, the wolf thrust upward and spun. She scrambled to her feet, and for a second, I felt only gratitude.
It was short-lived.
The wolf reared back and sent me flying through the air.
I couldn’t stop myself, and I silently cursed seconds before I struck a tree, my bones rattling. It cracked at the force of my body colliding with its thick wood, its mighty trunk snapping in half. Splinters cut my skin, new scars that would be added to the rest.
If the throbbing in my head was any indication, I was going to lose consciousness.
Kiara’s voice sounded. I thought she called my name, but the face I saw hovering above me wasn’t hers.
Patrick lowered to his knees, the Godslayer in his hand. He lifted his arm high in the air.
“Goodbye, commander,” he whispered. And then his arm fell.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Kiara
Love is not the absence of self, but rather, the absence of fear,
For only the brave drop their armor and walk onto a battlefield with their hearts exposed.
Asidian proverb
Few people knew that the night spoke.
Even fewer knew how to answer when it did.
Right then, I didn’t merely answer its call for destruction. I roared.
Jude jerked slightly to the side as Patrick’s arm dropped, but that god-killing dagger slid into Jude’s flesh with a sickening crunch, missing his heart by a half an inch. I felt the healed wound on my own chest pulse, a matching wound to Jude’s.
Patrick grunted and yanked out the knife, preparing to bring it back down. I knew he didn’t plan on missing his target this time. That’s when the last stone in a wall holding back the power of a goddess slipped…
I was both the night and a forgotten light.
The vast universe of black and the endless possibility of the day.
I shattered and broke and reformed, all in that split second. Still my eyes never left Jude, and that final, shuddering breath he took roared in my ears.
Blood pooled from where the blade had struck, and his eyes flickered shut. Death would come today and steal him away from me before we even had a chance to begin. The world, whether ruled by the moon or the sun, had been cruel to me long enough.
It wasmyturn to be cruel.
