It bursts from me as I scream into the wind. “Curse you, Malachites! You are all nothing but maggots!”
A jolt shakes through me and sears through my serpent mark as one by one, the Malachite warriors change. Their swords clang against the ground. Their eyes bulge out of their sockets. They twitch and contort until they transform into writhing, slimy maggots.
The Bloodstone crush them with their swords, their boots, their shields.
Numbness assaults me, but I cannot look away from the horror unfolding. The Bloodstone keep smashing, annihilating, ridding the world of the Malachites.
As the clouds shift, and the sun rains down on us, the battle ends. Ten Bloodstone warriors lie in the valley among the squished Malachites. A Malachite warrior lies with them, his skin and flesh torn from his bones.
He was the sacrifice needed for my spell. The horrible truth grips my throat.
I close my eyes, blinding myself to the carnage.
If I don’t look, it’s not real.
None of this is real.
But itisreal.
ChapterTwenty-One
Isink to my bottom in a field full of dead grass, horrified at what I have done. Horrified that once again, the darkness creeped over me, and I couldn’t avoid it. It was a tsunami I couldn’t outrun, a plague with deadly consequences.
With shaky hands, I clutch at the grass, ripping the blades out of the earth, hating that darkness keeps winning.
I had planned to make the Malachites pay for what they did to the people of Tarra, but not like this. Not by stealing their humanity. This was no honorable battle. There is no dignity in this. No victory.
What scares me even more is that I didn’t even think before cursing them. It just exploded out of me in a burst of all-consuming darkness.
If I can cause this destruction, how am I any different than the Bloodstones who wreaked havoc on Tarrobane before the gods took their magic away? I am not. I am cursed, just like their dark magic.
Somehow, I must find a way to purge myself of it or I must learn to suppress it.
“Sol.”
I glance up at the familiar voice.
Hector.
“I need you,” he says.
Blood stains my hands, my heart. So much blood.
How red it is. How horrifying.
Frantically, I scrub my palms against the grass. The stains remain, the horror of the attack, the reality stabbing me in the chest.
“Sol.” Hector kneels in front of me. “I know you’re upset right now.” He swallows and continues. “But it’s Hero.”
“You want me to heal him?” I ask brokenly.
“Yes.”
Rock and clay push into my nails as I dig into the earth, needing the dirt to take away the memories. They don’t disappear. They keep flashing before my eyes. The blood. The cries. The anguish. The maggots.
Hector touches my arm, and I flinch. “Sol.”
Frustration crushes me as I lurch forward, slamming my hands into his chest, driving him backward onto the ground. “You cannot have both, Hector.”
