Filed To Story: Cursed Legacies Series Free PDF by Morgan B Lee
His lips curl up maniacally. “Done. I’ll be back soon, darling.”
He vanishes. I glance around again to ensure we aren’t about to be killed before I focus on patching Everett before he bleeds out.
Revenant magic destroys, and necromancy can’t heal the living, so I’m left with my weak grasp of common magic abilities as I struggle to minimize the worst of his deep wound. I can’t get it to close, but I manage to slow the bleeding. It’s better than nothing.
Pulling out the roll of bandages, I pause to send another blast of dark magic out around us, bringing down an approaching ghoul and a shrieking banshee.
As I begin wrapping clean bandages around the worst of the damage to the side of Everett’s face, he grimaces again, rousing.
He opens his other eye, gazing up at me in pained, disoriented confusion. Then his unwrapped eye widens, and he lifts an arm to freeze a banshee I didn’t sense coming behind me.
Somewhere overhead, Baelfire roars again before thunder rocks the heavens, barely audible over the deafening battle around us. Ash rains slowly down, along with small flurries of snow. Screams surround us, the grunts and cries and wonderfully morbid sounds of a battle in full swing.
For a fraction of a second, I plead with the universe to keep my other matches unharmed—along with Kenzie and our other allies.
“Come on,” I say urgently, helping Everett get to his feet. “We need to get you out of this.”
“I can handle it,” he argues, lifting his hand to send a massive shard of ice through a Nether vampire when it moves toward us, splitting it in half. But he stumbles, clutching at his still-bleeding chest.
Silas? I check, looking for him in the raging battle surrounding us.
I’ll be right
?
—
He cuts off with a swear, and although I can’t see where he is in the chaotic flurry of monsters, shadow fiends, Reformists, hellhounds, and bounty hunters, I know he has his hands full.
I just need to get Everett out of here before he gets killed. Then we can drive this shitstorm back, and I’ll take care of the Divide.
For several harrowing minutes, Everett leans on me, still using his powers as we fight to make headway through the bloodbath surrounding us. He’s weak and clearly in a lot of pain—and not the fun kind. He’s trying like hell not to show it.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to stop anything attacking us without killing it—because the last fucking thing I need is to lose control and kill my beautiful ice elemental myself.
Pain blooms inside my chest, so sharp and unexpected that I gasp. It’s severe enough that for a fraction of a second, I assume I’ve been hit by some spell or stabbed with an adamantine blade.
But then I recognize the cold sweeping over me. That empty, shadowy link.
Fuck. No.
Not right now.
Not right now.
I fight it, trying to breathe through the pain as my vision blurs. Only this time, I don’t expire.
Instead, I hear him again, clear as day inside my head.
You were what I made you to be. A masterpiece. A scourge. Even in your betrayal, you honored me.
What the fuck is he talking about, and why is he talking about me in the past sense like this is a eulogy? I grit my teeth through the pain, distantly aware that Everett is freezing anything that comes near and repeating my name in alarm.
Here is your elucidation. The time has come.
For a moment, the battle before me cuts out as a vision sweeps through me. I find myself watching a scene unfold—a moment that Amadeus is sending through his link to me.
But it doesn’t feel like a vision of the future.
What I’m about to see is happening right now.
I recognize Engela Zuma as she runs through an empty street in some abandoned city on the East Coast. The elemental looks uncharacteristically frightened and is covered in blood. She sends a blast of power behind her before rounding the corner onto a new street—where Bertram waits.
But instead of a lover’s reunion, he darts forward with unparalleled speed and buries his teeth in Engela’s neck, ripping her throat out.
Horror floods me as I realize what’s happening. The twin demons’ words swim in my head.
A tricky legacy. A secret mission from the citadel.
Oh, my gods. When Amadeus learned about my gambit, he decided to outmaneuver me.
And he hired…fucking Bertram.
The vision wavers as Bertram removes the bracelet from Engela’s pocket, setting it on the asphalt. He pulls out a knife and poses it above the etherium.
Just as the knife falls, Amadeus’s voice echoes through my head one final time.
Your purpose is fulfilled, daughter. May the Beyond embrace you.
No.
This can’t fucking happen. I absolutely cannot let this?—
The etherium shatters, and the vision dissipates. A cold unlike anything I’ve ever experienced sweeps through my system. I’m so numb that I don’t even realize I’ve hit the ground until I roll over and stare at the billowing winter sky streaked with flashes of lightning.
What just happened? Where are you, sangfluir? Silas’s voice demands in my head.
Distantly, I can still hear the screams and mayhem of the fight. But I feel nothing. I’m…going. This is it. The end of my purpose, and therefore, the end of me.
Fuck.
“Maven!”
Everett’s shout seems so far away, but suddenly, I’m cradled in his arms with his beautiful, half-bandaged face above me. The ash and blood streaking his skin are in sharp contrast with his soft, blue, panicked eyes.
“No, no, no, no. Breathe. Damn it, why aren’t you fucking breathing? Don’t you dare?—“
My hearing cuts out. Everything is fading to nothingness, including me.
All along, I knew there would be no happy ending for me. I can’t even fully blame the gods because I chose this fate. But that doesn’t stop the useless tears that prick my eyes as I struggle to drag in just one more breath—because this is really not fucking fair to them. Their pain wasn’t in my godsdamned plan.
I just needed more time with them.
Vaguely, I’m aware of Crypt and Baelfire frantically trying to speak to me through our bond, but I shut all four of my quintet members off telepathically. I’m sure permanent death hurts like a bitch. They shouldn’t have to go through it with me, even distantly.
Everett is shaking now, shouting something at me. I missed when it happened, but he’s created a thick shield of ice around us as he tries to get a response out of me. His agonized expression finally drags me back just enough that I can whisper hoarsely.
“Find Lillian. Make sure she survives.”
“Stop. Don’t do this. The whole final wish thing—I can’t handle this. Just keep breathing and…and…” His voice breaks, and he shakes his head helplessly. “Don’t leave me. Dear gods on high, please don’t leave me.”
I want to hug him and promise that things will be okay, but I can’t lie: we’re fucked. Without Engela’s life force propping it up, the Divide has officially fallen and the rest of Amadeus’s forces will break through as he goes on to conquer the mortal realm. I have failed epically, but I won’t even be around to take it on the chin the way I deserve.
New Book: Returned To Make Them Pay
On her wedding anniversary, Alicia is drugged and stumbles into the wrong room—straight into the arms of the powerful Caden Ward, a man rumored never to touch women. Their night of passion shocks even him, especially when he discovers she’s still a virgin after two years of marriage to Joshua Yates.