“Because it takes the power of both sisters. A perfect balance to restore the Balance Realm to its true self. Have you not wondered why this myth wokenow?”
I was quiet. We had been asking exactly that.
“Your mother’s line had the blood of the Goddess since Xenique walked Ambrisk, Ophelia. But the sister legend did not wake until it was time. Until you and Jezebel were both needed as equal forces. One to kill the immortal, one tolock himin mortality.”
It was not a coincidence that the Angelblood and Godsblood had brought a myth back to life now. Not while they woke the Angelcurse and seraph within one being. There were few coincidences where fate was involved, and even less with the Balance of Power.
Echnid was no longer a god.
“How do I kill him, then?” I asked as resignation crashed over me. “He won’t forever haunt Ambrisk as a mortal, right?”
No. That couldn’t be the end. We didn’t come all this way to still be shadowed by his eternal presence. I wouldn’t stand for the god that manipulated and abused me to walk this world.
“Chosen Child,” Damien said, so softly, my spine prickled. “You know the answer to that already.”
I know the…
And the truth, as miserable as it was, solidified in my mind like some unavoidable force. Like a key I had always carried forcing itself into a lock I’d been reluctant to see.
The Balance of Power. It always came back to that.
“No.” I shook my head, lips trembling as the truth sank through my bones like lead. “No, Damien. I can’t—I—I have fought too damn hard for that to be the end.”
“You know it must be.”
Exhaustion crashed over me. I was tired of seeing people I loved suffer, of godly figures using us for their ancient feuds, and I was so fucking tired of constantly being the answer to everything.
BecauseIwas the loophole. I was the way to ensure Echnid truly died. Spirits, it made so much sense now. Somehow, in the tangle of prophecies and blessed blood and emerging seraphs, my life became the tether that balanced Echnid’s.
“Wh-why?” I stuttered. My limbs fell slack at my sides.
And Damien’s shuttered stare truly appeared sad now. “I wish there was another way.”
I walked to the edge of the roof, staring out over the battle raging below. Warrior against warrior, an unnatural opposition that would only anger the Balance further. Angels against demigods, gorgons waiting for a seraph to challenge them, and beasts prowling the shadows.
There was no other way to end it. I supposed a part of me had always known, been preparing for this. It was why I’d fought so desperately to cling to the things I loved in life. First Malakaiand my warrior training, and more recently, my family and autonomy.
It was why Echnid made such a grand display of positioning us as ateam. Why he posed as wanting me by his side, an equal.
I had been the key to Kakias’s immortality, the only life standing in the way of achieving a scheme centuries in the making. But that had all been child’s play, a warm-up for what I was truly meant to be used for.
Perhaps it had been my first lesson. A test of the Fates to see how I would react so I would be poised to accept it when the time that mattered truly came about. There were no coincidences after all.
“How?” I asked, voice dull.
“You will need an Angelblessed warrior of every clan.”
I spun toward Damien. “I won’t kill?—”
“Willing blood after a sacrifice,” he interrupted, and my rage subsided back to numbness. “We have done enough of the latter. Now, you need a union. Angel kissed of each clan and those touched by other godly hands.”
“How do I find them?” I had to do it fast. Tonight. This fight would not see the dawn.
“We are taking care of that,” Damien explained slowly, like he was giving me time to understand. As if there was not a war storming through the city below.
“Are you truly on our side, then?” I asked Damien.
“We are on our own side,” he answered.
