Total pages in book: 362
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
I’d taken lives. Countless lives.
Oh, gods.
I stumbled, my heart thumping. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, my chest seizing. In my mind, I saw the villagers, their arms raised to a sky I’d brought down on them in an act of justice.
An act of vengeance.
I kept walking backward, hands and arms trembling. My thoughts raced. I had to fix this. I had to. I could. I would.
I returned to Terra. The bells of Masadonia had ceased ringing as I walked into the blood-drenched forest. Slivers of moonlight filtered through the heavy canopy of crimson leaves, reflecting off the ash-hardened shells of the fallen villagers.
I knelt by one and saw there were two. A man or a woman with another beneath them—a desperate attempt to shield a child.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, lightly placing my bloody hand on the shell. “I’ll fix this.”
I put my other hand on the ground. I didn’t know what I was doing—it was instinctual. I summoned the eather, and it responded in a hot rush. My skin tingled with warmth, and gold-laced eather seeped from my pores and dripped onto the ground beside drops of blood that had fallen from me. I lifted my head and stared at the forest floor through strands of pale, bloodied hair. Tendrils of eather rolled out, casting a glow as the essence swirled under and over the shells of the dead, leaving glittering daylight in its wake. My fingers dug into the soil. Wisps of Primal mist seeped beneath them, curling and spreading across the ground.
Beside me, the shells shuddered, and the ash flaked off. Patches of pink flesh and ragged clothing appeared. Singed blond hair. My eyes locked with wide, blue ones full of fear and awe, reflecting the golden glow of eather. I pulled my hand back, and ash mixed with blood, smearing my fingertips.
“Momma?” a small voice trembled. “I had a bad nightmare.”
The woman’s attention immediately shifted to the small one in her arms. A sob shook her body as she held the little boy close.
I rose slowly, my body aching. Villagers stood throughout the forest, their faces pale or marked with confusion as they shook ash from their hair and clothing. They moved slowly, helping others stand, and some stood transfixed as the gold-laced silver tendrils disappeared into the mist, still gathering along the forest floor—
“Thank you,” a man whispered, dropping to his knees, the weathered skin of his jaw slack. “Thank you, my—”
“No.” I flinched as the man looked up at me how that guard Wil Tovar had. Others followed suit. Like I was a blessing. A miracle bestowed upon them. A benevolent Primal Goddess of Life. But I wasn’t. I was the opposite. The nightmare the boy had spoken of. I had not earned their praise or worship. I deserved their fear.
“Rise and leave,” I said, pushing with my voice—with my eather—until all were standing and backing away from me. “Leave this place.” The corners of my vision were filled with silvery, golden light. “Leave this place and never return. There is nothing but death here—in the Blood Forest.”
As they fled, I left and returned to Wayfair. To my family.
It was not quiet here. Deep, hollow bells rang from the Shadow Temple in a solemn rhythm of death as I limped forward. My gaze lifted to where Ezra remained impaled to the now-cracked wall.
My heart shattered again.
But I would fix it. I was the true Primal of Life.
I could bring them back.
All of them.
My clever, fair sister and her kind, loyal wife. My mother, who had named me after the brave and revered Queen of the Vodina Isles. The small ones in the gutters. Those in the sea, lying in the streets, and beyond Lasania. I would return them to what they were, just as I had with the villagers in Terra.
I moved fast, summoning the eather to draw the spikes from the bodies of those impaled and gently lowered them to the ground. I kept Ezra and Marisol side by side, not changing the direction in which Marisol looked. It didn’t feel right as I knelt beside my sister.
Purpose filled me, and the humming eather rose once more. I reached for Ezra’s hand—
“Sera?”
I spun, eather crackling from my fingertips.
Awash in a fiery glow, Holland stood before me, the heated wind tugging at the white linen pants and tunic he wore. Somehow, the pristine material remained unblemished as he stood among the dead—those he’d shared suppers and stories with. His ageless face mirrored those scattered around him. His expression showed horror. He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at everything around us.
Seeing him stunned me and conjured a wealth of emotions and memories—from when I was just a young girl holding a blade for the first time up to the last time I’d seen him in the throne room. In an instant, I was some other version of me. A mixture of that young girl and the woman he’d raised like a daughter.