I always knew it would be you
I would call on my deathbed
An abominable stream of demon-lizards was on them, but Alvise stepped backwards, his pugnale in front of him. He had to try to help Niall.
“Micol! Cover me!” he called, and Micol stood in front of him, a deadly shield of light around her body. A demon-ape crouched in front of her, growling and gnashing its teeth together. Suddenly it pounced, and Micol exploded in a storm of multi-coloured lightning. The trees around them were illuminated red, green, yellow, blue, as she hit the Surari over and over again with her deadly charges. Sean gaped as he saw the outline of her skull through her skin, her bones through her arms, as her hair stood on end and her eyes sparked and glimmered.
The demon-apes kept trying to get close to her, but time and time again they were hit with her electrical current and thrown back, their fur smoking. Soon they didn’t try any more, and Micol began looking for them, sending sparks to ignite and singe.
“Niall!” Alvise shouted above the demon-apes’ shrieks and the demon-lizards’ scurrying towards him. Niall was still standing, trying to get the song going again. But no sound could come out of his mouth any more – the poison was spreading through his body.
“Alvise . . .” Niall had time to say before his legs gave way and he fell to the grass. Alvise saw a demon-ape rising as if from nowhere and lolling in front of the Irishman, as if it were enjoying the spectacle. It pounced on Niall, ready to bite into his flesh – but Alvise threw himself onto the Surari and stabbed it over and over again with his pugnale. The beast shrieked and released Niall, turning around with its arms open, ready to tear off Alvise’s head.
Alvise was faster. He sank his pugnale just between the demon-ape’s eyes, and the Surari started screaming and pawing at the blade, trying to dislodge it. But it had sunk too deep, and the beast fell backwards and didn’t move again.
“Alvise! Watch out!” It was Micol. Alvise didn’t manage to turn around fast enough when two demon-apes leapt on him from behind. One sank its teeth into Alvise’s back and took a bite of his flesh, while another grabbed his legs and threw him onto the grass. Micol was on them at once, one hand on each beast, frying them with bright-red charges. Smoke was coming out of their ears and nostrils, and they were juddering and trembling as the fire consumed them from the inside.
Alvise lay stunned for a moment, then crawled on his hands and knees towards Niall. The Irishman lay pale and lifeless, his throat and chest bloodied, strange purple bruises surfacing all over his skin. He was still breathing, but his heartbeat was as soft as a butterfly’s touch.
Alvise sobbed, a sob full of all the sorrow of the world – and then his cry was interrupted by a swarm of demon-lizards that ran towards him, their bodies tight together like black molten rock, their pointed teeth making a rattling sound. For a moment, Alvise stared death in the face – and then he saw a shroud of blue flames envelop the whole horde of Surari, a terrible smell of singed fur and burning flesh hitting his nostrils and making him gag. The flames were so close they brought tears to his eyes; through his tears he saw Nicholas holding his head in his hands and crumpling on the grass, blue sparks still emanating from his fingers.
Elodie watched in horror as Nicholas wailed. His father had struck him again.
“No! Please, no!” he was pleading, his words confused and jumbled, as the pain was too strong for him to concentrate on making sense. Soon he could only scream.
“Nicholas! Nicholas!” Elodie kept calling, as if her voice could somehow guide him back from the world of pain he was lost to. And then she started feeling it too.
Acid began burning her from the inside, her brain, her forehead, her eyes, her ears, her neck. She screamed, and then curled into a ball, hot tears rolling down her cheeks. Even in her agony, she felt around for Nicholas’ hand, and they held each other, their souls one in the searing pain.
Sean heard Elodie screaming and called her name. While she was whimpering on the ground, another swarm of demon-lizards emerged from the trees and began their descent towards them. Sean’s runes exploded scarlet, like shards of glass, impaling the lizards against the trees before they could reach Elodie.
“Elodie!” he called again, trying to reach her, but a demon-ape rose from the high grass and threw itself on him. Sean fell supine, the dead weight of the Surari falling on his chest and crushing his ribs, so heavy that he couldn’t breathe. Everything around him went black.
Leave Elodie. Please leave her alone! Nicholas kept begging, but it was no use. Through the haze of his own agony, he listened to Elodie’s desperate screams until he couldn’t take it any more. Blue flames burst from his fingers once more. He could accept being tortured – in a way he deserved it, with all the horrible things he’d done – but not Elodie. He wouldn’t let his father hurt her.
Soon the flames were everywhere, thick smoke blinding him, suffocating him. He couldn’t hear his father’s voice and he couldn’t hear Elodie any more. Everything was silent; everywhere he turned there was only smoke. He closed his eyes, tears of pain and despair flowing down his cheeks. He wished the flames would eat him, too, but the cold blue fire would never kill its creator.
And then he realised that grey and blue and white were dancing in front of his eyes. The darkness was gone. He blinked and blinked. There was no more black. He walked on and he emerged from the flames. He saw the green of swaying grass and the black and silver of a starry sky.
The screams had stopped. Elodie dragged herself to her feet, agonising pain still behind her eyes but slowly dulling. She took Nicholas’ face in her hands, sweeping the ash away. Nicholas looked back at her. He saw her face, her eyes black like his.
He couldn’t rip his gaze away from her – the lips he’d kissed and the body he’d made his and the golden hair he’d sunk his fingers into – and a wave of sudden, absurd happiness swept through him. A blessed moment of pure joy in the middle of hell.
“Elodie,” he whispered.
“You can see me?”
“Yes. I can see you. I can see again.”
But the moment was short-lived. Something moved behind Elodie, something rising from the stones – a cloud, a shadow, a shapeless figure.
The three waves of evil, and the third is coming, Nicholas thought, and he wished he still had no sight, as he saw the face of the third Guardian take shape in front of him, opening his mouth and letting its deadly fog hit them and swallow them all.