Page 102 of Soulmarked
Black smoke poured from the pentagram's remnants, demons trying to escape hell while the barriers were weak. They swirled around us like a hurricane of corruption and hunger, but they couldn't touch me anymore. I wasn't entirely here, wasn't entirely anywhere.
Asmodeus's shriek of fury cut through dimensions as the void began to pull him in. His skeletal form thrashed against inevitability, black wings made of shadow and spite beating uselessly against power older than time. “This means nothing!”
“No.” The word carried weight beyond sound, making reality ripple. “This ends now.”
The Prince lashed out with desperate strength, but I wasn't flesh anymore, I was purpose given form, destiny made manifest. His attack passed through me like smoke through flame, and the void pulled him deeper.
“This isn't possible,” he snarled as his perfect form began to fragment.
“Watch me.” I had spent my life researching, understanding. Now I was putting all that knowledge to use in the only way that mattered.
More power surged through the mark, turning my blood to ice and fire. Demons howled as they were drawn into the void, their smoke-forms dissipating like mist in sunlight. But I could feel something bigger trying to break through.
Sean's hands found what was left of my shoulders, gripping with desperate strength. “Let me help. Let me...”
“You already have.” I managed to say without looking at him. “You showed me I could be more than what they made me for. That choices matter more than destiny.”
“Then choose to stay. Choose...”
“I am choosing.” The words echoed between worlds as more of my body began to fade. “I'm choosing to protect what matters. To use what they did to me for something better than letting these demons destroy everything.”
The void pulled stronger, hungry for the power building inside me. Above us, the gate began to close, but not before I caught glimpses of what waited beyond.
“Sean. Find me.”
His grip tightened, though his fingers passed through me like I was already gone. “Always.” The word held more weight than any vow.
The Prince's final scream cut off as the void consumed him completely, leaving nothing but echoes between dimensions. More demon smoke poured from the closing tear, but it was drawn into my body like iron filings to a magnet. I could feel them inside me, all that ancient hunger and spite, all that power that should never have been freed.
Reality buckled as I gave myself completely to what had to be done. The mark blazed brighter than stars, colder than the space between galaxies.
“I'm sorry,” I whispered, though I wasn't sure I still had a mouth to form the words. “For everything that comes next.”
Then I let go.
The explosion was silent, absolute, a moment of perfect stillness before the sphere of power collapsed in on itself, taking me with it.
The last thing I felt was Sean's fingertips passing through where my heart should have been.
The last thing I heard was his scream of loss, echoing through dimensions as I became nothing but light and power and purpose.
Then the void closed completely, leaving nothing but empty space where I had stood. The pentagram was destroyed, itsancient symbols burned away to nothing. The tear in reality had sealed, though wisps of demon smoke still curled through the air, the last remnants of what had almost broken through.
The city was safe. Reality remained intact. The walls between worlds held firm.
But I was gone.
24
BETRAYAL
My hands passed through empty air where Cade had stood moments before, fingers closing on nothing but cold and absence. The void collapsed in on itself with terrible finality, leaving behind scorched earth and silence where reality had nearly torn apart.
“No.” The word came out broken, barely recognizable as my voice. “No, no, no.”
Around me, Central Park began to right itself, twisted trees slowly straightening as whatever force had corrupted them faded. The purple-bruised sky cleared to normal dawn light, though wisps of demon smoke still curled through the air like the last echoes of a nightmare. Everything returning to bloody normal while my world lay shattered.
Bodies littered the ground, the possessed people Cade had freed with his sacrifice, their chests rising and falling with breaths that seemed obscene in their normalcy. Some stirred, blinking in confusion. Others lay still, but alive. All of them saved by what he'd done.
