CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Burning.

Everything burning. White and hot. Searing fire. But not the Fire Aidan knew.

Pain burned through him, wrenched screams from his lungs as the world spun and seared and he dragged himself out of the darkness. Out into a cold room, and a blinding heat. And the scent and pop of bubbling flesh.

He tried to struggle. Tried to wrench free from the awful nightmare. From the pain that dug into his arm. Through his arm. Searing down to the bone and deeper. Fire and lightning shattered down his spine as he convulsed on concrete, as strong hands pressed him down.

He screamed.

He couldn’t scream. Not against the pain that choked him.

He couldn’t scream, but that didn’t quiet the screams inside. The rage of Fire. The howls of anger and betrayal. They screamed louder than he ever could.

And when they reached their apex, when he thought his soul would rip apart from agony, the pain stopped.

He slumped against the floor. Broken.

And then, before he could speak, he turned his head to the side and vomited.

“There, there, my son,” came a voice. “The worst is now over. Your body recognizes this. It, too, desires purification.”

A face came into the light. An old man. Face lined and weathered, beard more gray than not. Black and purple robes. A bent bronze cross around his neck. Aidan knew him. How did he know him?

The stranger put his hand on Aidan’s forehead. The faintest touch. Yet it still made Aidan jerk back in anticipation of pain.

He reached toward Fire.

He reached.

But—

No.

No no no no!

His eyes went wide as he struggled, tried to reach for the power that had filled and fueled him the last three years.

“What...” he gasped. “What have—”

“Shh,” the man said. “Do not fight. Rejoice in your victory, my child. Rejoice, for you are nearly free.”

He reached down and grazed a finger across Aidan’s forearm, over the tattoo that bound him to the Spheres. The mark that could never, should never, be corrupted or undone. The tattoo that was now crossed by a terrible, smoking welt. Another man held a scalding red brand at his side. Similar to the cross around the man’s neck. Angular, sharp. More than a cross.

A sigil.

A curse.

No. A rune.

He reached to Fire again. He wanted to burn the man alive. Wanted him to suffer for what he had done. But no matter how hard he fought, inside, he found nothing.

Tears welled in his eyes. From the emptiness in his chest. From the cold that leeched through his heart. Cracked against his bones.

Fire wasn’t there.

Fire.

Wasn’t.

There.

“Now you see,” the man said. He caressed Aidan’s brow again. “Let your tears flow. Cleanse yourself in their waters. And rejoice—never again will you feel the touch of the Dark Lady. Never again will you feel the taint of her power.”

Then the man leaned forward, peering deep into Aidan’s eyes. His mouth cracked into a smile. It was then that Aidan recognized him; the serpent he’d chased from Glasgow. The man he’d hoped to never see again. And when that recognition dawned, so too did a cold deeper than any ocean.

He was as good as dead.

“We know who you are, Aidan Belmont,” Brother Jeremiah whispered. “We know of your sins. And your pain—your salvation—has only just begun.”