The blackness crashed through the ceiling and bounced off the surface of Mason's shield like a million gallons of water. The dome shuddered under the demon avalanche, and I swore I heard it crack.
"What's happening?" Mason hissed, his arms shaking as he poured his power into the haven, reinforcing its curvature and protecting our souls from certain obliteration.
"We killed the delegate!" Eagan cried over the roar of the assault. Blocks of concrete fell down around us, leaving yet another gaping hole in the skeleton palace. "The demons are free!"
My gaze flew to the courtyard, where humans and supernatural energies collided. Mason's recruits had enabled us to fight back, and with the bridge closed, we'd finally outnumbered our enemies. But we'd failed to anticipate their evolution.
Streaks of black smoke enveloped the Pans born on the battlefield, infecting them with more anger, more greed, more power. I couldn't make out the physical enhancements from this distance, but I could tell they were larger, fiercer, and not unlike the horrible creature I'd encountered in Will's mind.
Suddenly, Rover's men were up against concentrated forces of evil—ten demons to one soul. And these feral mutants didn't care for conquest or longevity. They no longer had a purpose to fulfill, no vendetta to carry out.
We'd become nothing more than sick entertainment to these "Otherkind," and that mindset had released them from an orderly execution, opening the doors to exquisite torture.
Cinder raced off to assist our forces, and I suspected she could smell the monstrosities we'd created—the vile threat we'd just unleashed.
Gritz...what do we do?
How did it come to this? How did humanity's salvation depend on five young adults and a magic-wielding ten-year-old?
When I turned back to my companions, their expressions matched the swelling terror within me. I could see it on each of their faces—the fear of losing this war and what it would mean for everyone we loved, the fear of Godric's sealed victory and a meaningless death.
It took another wave of demons crashing into the dome to snap us out of it.
"Dammit," Mason groaned, falling to his knees with his arms above his head. Magic poured from his palms like blistering steam. "What now?"
"...The portal didn't close," Will whispered, his gaze still on his brother's corpse. "It wasn't him. He wasn't the anchor..."
My heart splintered at the sight of his blatant guilt and horror. He'd killed Regulas in hopes of ending this war, only to release Pandora's nightmares upon our comrades. He'd killed his king, and nothing had changed.
It was then that I realized everyone else was staring at him too, but not because they were concerned for his mental state.
No one wanted to say it, of course. Not with me here, ready to rip out the throat of whoever uttered it first. Not with the demon king lying before me, painting the ground red. But they were all thinking it—Valerie's horrified tears confirmed it.
One of two princes had perished today, and an anchor remained. That left us with one obvious, agonizing answer.
"No," I said, my nostrils flaring at the mere thought of sacrificing my person. My pillar. I shook my head at Will and the awful, contemplative look in his eye. "Not you."
It was my death Nova had foreseen, not his.
This was my burden to bear, no one else's.
"No," he agreed after a few seconds, and the devastation on his face burrowed into my chest like a bullet. He stared past me, and I followed his gaze to his sister, who sat at the windowsill in the foyer, untouched and unbothered by the demonic deluge. "Not me."
A charged silence followed, like the portal's lightning had left us in a state of electrical imbalance—burdened with a sense of dreadful incompletion.
The demons did not approach Lucy. They swept past her like silent wraiths, avoiding her completely. Sparing her life, her mind, and consequently, their finite existence.
Her age and apathetic nature had blinded me to it before, but she made the ideal candidate for a mad man's failsafe: she was fiercely protected by her family, she was obedient, and she was quiet. Her heart wouldn't satisfy Godric's war plans, but it would beat long enough for his son to execute them on her behalf.
Godric had molded his daughter into the perfect anchor, and it made me sick to my stomach.
But I wasn't alone. Tori looked like his breakfast had threatened to reappear, while Valerie had her eyes closed, as if she were tuning out the world, receding to the only safe nook left in her violent mind. And then there was Will, who just sat there staring at the blood on his hands, his soul screaming in pain.
We were all deathly still, afraid even the slightest noise might crack our fragile dome, when Will finally spoke.
"I can't," he managed. "...Not Lucy."
No.
No sane man could.
The demons continued to rain against the shield above us, and Mason was now red in the face, groaning and panting against the weight of humanity's undoing.
The second his ward shattered, all of us were done for. We only had minutes left—if that.
"There's gotta be another way," Tori insisted, glancing worriedly between Will and his sister. "Something."
Eagan's pitying gaze suggested otherwise, and Mason, ever the logician, didn't shy away from the facts. "The portal's tied to her life source," he said, trembling with exertion. "Her death would instantly abolish the bridge." And save us all. "What other choice do we have?"
Will flinched at the question but didn't offer a solution, and I placed my gloved hand on his thigh. It was all I could offer him right now—barely anything at all—and I hated it.
"This was all done by magic, which means there has to be a way to undo it with magic," Valerie pressed, her knuckles white around her bow. "The Order built all these loopholes into their spell, and yet nothing for the portal itself? You can't convince me that our success hinges on the death of a child."
She turned to me, begging me to agree with her, to save us from this horrible predicament. Because not only was our mission barbaric and unthinkable, but only two people here could kill someone from a distance, and no one was leaving Mason's dome alive. So if the princess were to die by anyone's hand today, it would have to be mine or Valerie's.
By palm or arrow, one of us would save the world, and in doing so, we'd break Will.
I glanced at the Rhean prince again, sitting in a puddle of blood in his childhood home, suffering in every conceivable way. Losing his baby sister would send him over the edge—and killing her would kill the parts of him I loved most.
Lucy was the one person Will regretted leaving behind. The one person he'd failed to save. And consenting to her murder...he couldn't survive that.
So I wouldn't make him choose.
"Let me out," I ordered, and four pairs of eyes latched onto my face, incredulous and terrified.
Slowly, Will rotated his head to look at me, but I couldn't meet his gaze. One look, and I'd succumb to his request, even if it meant letting the world burn to ruins.
"Let me out," I repeated, stiffly and painfully rising to my feet. My leg felt like it was hanging onto my body by a shredded tendon, and the pain was nauseating as hell, but I convinced myself it wouldn't last much longer.
Mason cursed from his kneeling position, glaring at me through sweaty, golden curls. "Alex. Are you blind? You don't stand a chance out there!"
I flexed my fingers. "Mason, in ten seconds I need a blast big enough to stop this shower. Give me another Styx and double it."
His lips unfurled when he realized what I was saying—what I was about to do—and that lovable anger melted to hurt, then silent understanding.
I could feel Will's gaze burning holes in my temple, his denial, his heartbreak. He recognized the goodbye in my tone, and it killed me to leave him like this, so helpless to intervene. But this was what I was here for. Somehow, someway, the Order knew it would all lead to this.
Mason stared back at me with unwavering trust—and irritation, of course. But he knew it had to be done. He knew this was my end.
"Sorry, Will," he muttered, and the sky exploded.
I wasn't sure which spirits Mason had sacrificed for my benefit, but their warm, blinding detonation blanched the entire world for a few heartbeats. My companions shielded their eyes as our assailants went flying in all directions, soaring across the courtyard or crashing into their descending brethren.
It was a small moment of reprieve, but it granted Mason the opportunity to open a slit in the barrier—just long enough for me to kiss the top of Will's head and sprint through the exit.
I didn't look back, even as Tori and Valerie screamed my name. Even as fists pounded against the wall protecting them from annihilation. I didn't want to see Will's bruised gaze. I didn't want to know what he might be thinking in this moment, or how, in his mind, this was the only line I could cross.
I ran straight for Lucy, limping through my pain, pushing past my fear. Ignoring the bone-chilling screeches from the battlefield and my savior's fading radiance. I reached the windowsill in six seconds, kneeling before our final hope, and Lucy Sterling stared down at me with wide, glistening eyes.
She'd just witnessed the murder of her brother, and like Will, she was teetering on the edge of sanity right now. We had half a minute—tops—and I was negotiating with someone a hair's width from derealization.
"Lucy," I gasped, sensing the shadows reappear in my periphery, the demons closing in us, "we can stop this."
Black smoke rippled in blue irises—rising, growing, dominating my surroundings. "...How?"
I almost let out a sob at that beautiful word.
Curiosity. Now that was an emotion I could work with.
With a wobbly smile, I extended my bare hand. "Let's find out."
She studied my face, seeing me for the weapon I was and the executioner I'd been. She knew I could kill her, right here and now. One touch and I could end this the easy way. A soldier's way.
But she remembered my speech from before, the partnership I'd proposed, and she placed her delicate, unsullied hand in mine.
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AHHHH. We're getting so close to the end of this story??!! WHAT THE HECK.