Zodiac Academy 8: Sorrow and Starlight

I had a rough shield of metal cast against my arm as Dragon fire rained down on me, and I lifted it skyward to remain safe beneath it, freezing my shield with ice so the fire stuttered out against it.

The Dragon asshole I was fighting was tall, muscular, with a thick grey beard and mean eyes. I knew him well. Lionel’s friend, Cyril. Or Uncle Cyril, as I’d been encouraged to call him. My father had tried to tighten the bonds of the Dragons by making it seem like we were all closer family than we really were, commanding Darius and I to refer to his friends as aunts, uncles, brothers, and sisters, as if we were some sort of incestual Dragon cult. Which in a way, I guessed we were.

I’d always hated Cyril and his creepy aura, the way he acted as if he was better than everyone else. He was involved in running the Nebular Inquisition Centres now, and I had no doubt that he was responsible for countless atrocities in this war.

“You are a stain on your father’s name, you should be ashamed of yourself, you little runt,” he spat at me, fire blasting from his hands again, and I sent my own fire back at him. “He should have drowned you at birth.”

Max was just beyond us, standing on a pillar of air and firing his Phoenix arrows at anyone who got too close, working to move nearer and nearer to Lionel as he went. I prayed he would get a chance to finish him, but the odds here were stacked firmly against us. The Oscura Wolves had joined the fight, but there still weren’t enough of us, and I could see the way this battle was turning. If the rebels didn’t make a run for it soon, they were going to fall.

My fire curled around Cyril’s head, blinding him and I ran forward as he worked to take hold of the flames, yanking my metal horn free of my pocket, my hand shaking around it. I hesitated, rage twisting through my chest, but I held back for a fraction of a moment, unsure if I could really do this. But then I thought of all the Fae who had suffered at the hands of men like Cyril, the monsters who made up my so-called family were a plague on this earth. And before he could escape my flames, I made the decision, plunging the horn into his chest, a shout of effort leaving me and my arm jarring as I cut right through bone.

I was surprised at how good it felt, how a twisted kind of justice filled me up and set my heart thumping with his oncoming death.

He spluttered, blood splashing over me from his lips as the fire died out and he was left looking at me eye to eye.

“I’m no runt,” I snarled, turning the horn as he tried to get hold of his Element, but death was coming in all too fast now. I’d sat across so many dinner tables from this man, listening to him harp on about the ‘higher Orders’ and the need for more laws to ‘control the numbers of the lessers’. He wanted inter-Order marriages banned and even spouted bullshit about finding ways to stop Orders like mine from breeding at all.

He was a monstrous nothing, and I found a twisted pleasure in watching the life fade from his eyes. I’d been pushed to the edge, had my family stolen from me, and now I was offering some vengeance in payment for that. This might not have been the Fae who’d killed them, but he was certainly one who’d tormented them. Darius had hated him as deeply as I had, and Mom had been forced to pretend she liked him when inside she’d probably been screaming.

“This is for them,” I hissed, all the poison of grief gushing out of me into this foul Fae. “And you won’t be the last.”

I yanked my metal horn from his chest, setting fire to his body and taking a moment to watch him fall to nothing in my flames.

I turned my back on him in a final insult, adrenaline making me dizzy as I ran to take on another enemy with the taste of blood on my lips. I didn’t know this side of me, but I didn’t want to harness it either. I was on a path of destructive revenge at last, finding an outlet for all this pain which had been consuming me day after day.

I sought out Dante in the sky, but nothing but flashes of lightning far up in the clouds signified his movements now, and as I searched for Gabriel, I saw no sign of him either.

Gabriel’s family were retreating from the fight as the Dragons decimated our numbers, the Oscura Wolves baying wildly as Rosalie led the retreat, only a few rebels still standing and a whole host of Dragons killing anyone who even looked in Lionel’s direction.

My father’s gaze locked with mine and a sneer lifted my lips as he saw me, truly saw me, as I stood above Cyril’s burning body.

I was moving before I could even think about the consequences, leaping over dead bodies and raising my horn while keeping my shield high. I needed to kill him, to slice his worthless head from his shoulders and hear the satisfying thump of it hitting the ground. For Mom, for Hamish, for Darius.

A bellow of determination left my lips as Lionel boomed an order for his Bonded Dragons to turn their attention to me. I felt no fear as I ran on, every muscle in my body working to bring me closer to the man who had stolen so much from me.

I knew this would equal my end, but it didn’t matter if I took him down with me. If it bought my friends peace, and made sure Tyler and Sofia were safe once and for all. They had each other. They would mourn me, but they were together. I wasn’t leaving them alone.

As fire and death was cast my way, I urged the ground to rise at my sides, blocking their blasts of magic with earth and keeping my feet. The sand was quaking with the Dragons’ combined power as they tried to tear the world apart to defend their false king. The man they were now bonded to and would do anything to protect. But I had three Elements and a whole lifetime of hatred burning through my core, and somehow between the ground rising around me and the shield I held above my head, I managed to avoid the strikes aimed my way.

Lionel raised his hands and added his magic to the fight, the ground turning to lava at my feet and red-hot magma spewing up from miniature volcanos that burst from the sand either side of me. Deep down, I knew it was unlikely I’d be able to make it to him, but I kept running all the same, placing my faith in the stars and praying they’d grant me one infinitesimal chance to end him.

I was almost at the edge of his air shield when fire burst out around Lionel, and I lost sight of him among the flames. Everywhere I looked the fire was raging, my boots were melting against the sand as it continued to liquify under the intensity of it all. The heat was overwhelming, sucking away all oxygen with it, and even my shield began to soften as fire curled down from above.

I was in a melting pot, about to be cooked alive, and for what? I hadn’t gotten close, hadn’t landed a single blow on my father, and now I would die in this furnace with nothing to show for it. The only comfort I had was that Darius and Mom would be there to welcome me beyond the Veil.

I wasn’t ready to die. I’d tasted such a small slice of freedom, and I craved so much more than I’d been offered. My life had been small, insignificant maybe, but it had been mine. And I’d only just reclaimed it.

The heat blazed at my back and my clothes set alight, my adrenaline high but not enough to steal away the pain that was driving into me now.

I sought out the stars above me on instinct, but all I could see was fire, so bright and hungry it seemed it would burn on forever.

A shadow descended from above and a hand reached for mine, taking it and squeezing tight. It was familiar and pulled me close, my heart cracking as I waited for the pain to stop and my soul to be led into the beyond. It had to be him, his large hand locked around mine, the way he drew me closer with force so very like Darius.

“I’m sorry I failed,” I spoke to him, wrapping my arms around his neck, the sensation of flying taking over me as I left my body behind in that burning pit.

He held me tighter, and I buried my face against his shoulder, hating myself for this failure and wishing I could rewrite the fate this night had offered. But at least I was with my brother again. At least my mom would be here now, and I could spend eternity with their souls. We were free, even if we were lost.

I was suddenly thrown onto my ass and doused in freezing water, the flames clinging to my clothes hissing as they went out.

“Xavier,” Max gasped, kneeling over me, and pressing his hands to my chest which was now bare as the scraps of my shirt turned to ash in his water.

Healing magic washed into me, and I blinked in shock at my saviour, realising it hadn’t been Darius holding me at all. It had been Max, coated in armour built of ice with a whirlwind of air magic surrounding me. He’d leapt into those flames to save me, risked everything just to pull me from them.

“I flew us to the edge of the palace, but we need to get to the Savage King’s passages. All the rebels are dead. Dante and the Oscuras are on the run, but the Dragons were keen on their heels. Can you move?”

Grief filled me over so much death and a ragged breath left me as I processed that. All the rebels we’d tried to save had fallen. We’d failed them.

“I can move,” I said, then lunged up, wrapping my arms around him. “Thank you.”

“Save it for if we actually get out of here,” he said firmly, pushing me off of him and yanking me to my feet. My pants were half burned off, but scraps of denim still clung to crotch and thighs, though a wind around my ass cheeks said the back of them hadn’t fared too well, so that was great.

I glanced back at the amphitheatre, spotting lines of the Oscura Wolves spilling out of it with a lilac-haired girl shooting ahead to lead the retreat, racing for the edge of the wards where they would no doubt stardust to safety.

I guessed we were all on our own now, and as I spotted a group of Dragons charging towards us across the frost sprinkled ground I knew we were almost out of time too.

I wrenched open the closest door and ran into the palace, the sound of Dragon roars heading our way at an alarming pace.

Max and I sprinted along the pristine corridor, our hands tracing the walls as we searched for a way into the passages.

No secret door opened, and my heart rioted as we ran on, moving faster and faster through the palace.

I shoved through a carved wooden door and Max darted after me into the enormous dining room where a table ran the entire length of it with enough seats for over a hundred people. It was laid out with golden plates and cutlery, a feast ready and waiting on the table for the Dragons.

At the far end of it was a golden throne with a red velvet backing and two dragon heads for arms, like a cheap mockery of the real Solarian throne that had belonged to Hail Vega. But that wasn’t what stole my attention most. Beyond it, mounted on the wall as a sick trophy were my wings, the two of them glittering lilac with a rainbow sheen to them like oil imbued in the feathers. My heart lifted and I found myself moving towards them instinctively.

“Come on, keep looking for an entrance to the passages,” Max called, not noticing what I’d seen as he hunted the walls for a way out.

I grabbed a chair from the table, carrying it to the wall and climbing onto it, my fingers just grazing the tips of the feathers.

“Help me,” I called to Max. “I need your air magic.”

“What?” Max snapped around, looking over at me and he stilled as his gaze fell on my wings.

“Please,” I urged, knowing this was small in the face of all the chaos of tonight, but it meant everything to me.

He ran over to me, the decision brightening his eyes as he raised his hands and used his gifts to lift them from the hooks they were hung on, folding them carefully and placing them in my arms, their heavy weight making me grunt.

I jumped down from the chair, holding onto them tight and thanking him on my next breath.

Lionel’s roar rattled the whole palace, reminding us that we weren’t out of danger yet and the sound was so close it set my heart hammering. They were just beyond that door, the heavy footfalls of his Bonded Dragons about to corner us, and with them acting unFae, we stood no chance at all.

“Keep looking for a way out,” Max commanded, and I nodded.

A thick layer of ice built around Max’s hands, the temperature plummeting as he flexed his fingers, building up the magic there and summoning the wrath of winter into his palms.

I ran to the nearest wall, brushing my hands over it and seeking out an exit, not even bothering to ask the stars for help.

Our escape was down to us, and I’d already survived one death tonight, so I didn’t plan on falling prey to another.