“Stand down,” Dust said coolly as his amused stare landed on the witch edging closer.
Jamison made no attempt to even turn to face her.
“Did you forget my invitation, brother?” Reveca asked with a wry lift of her brow. “I did feel you knocking on my magic, trying to strip me of it. Too bad I was too far from your grip. Too protected by males who know true allegiance.”
“What the fuck is going on here?” Talley asked trying to get a read on Talon or Reveca. A lot had changed since he had risen from the dead, but this right here was so far off the mark he wasn’t so sure his own mind wasn’t fucking with him.
Reveca reached the bottom of the stairs and moved her playfully pissed stare to Dust, it turned colder on its landing. “I see your fearless leader is still absent.” She edged closer to Dust. “Good, that means time is on my side.”
“What have you done, Vec?” Talon’s voice barely made a sound, but to the immortals of the room, he might as well have shouted from a bullhorn.
He had seen Reveca do some crazy shit over the years, he’d helped her plan at least half of it. No matter what it was, no matter how much disgrace it brought her coven or what rule she was the first to break, they had never, ever come for her head.
“What have I done?” she asked looking at him like he was as pathetic as he felt. “What have you done? Nothing to help yourself, I see. Grown quite lazy in general,” she sneered. “First, you roll over and give our world to a traitor, and if that wasn’t enough, you have the nerve to send my coven after me.”
Confused as ever the Sons move their stares between the pair, then to the annoyed expression on Jamison’s face, ending with trying to understand the amused expression Dust had.
“I called Jamison and told him you were demanding the head of one of your own.” Languidly, Talon’s dark eyes fell over her cold expression. “I have watched you slay thousands of your own, never has the coven asked you to pay with your life.”
“You watched me slay thousands of Rogues, and denied me the only one I truly sought to end.”
Reveca’s lip twitched with fury as she turned and began to weave in and out of the others. Her hands brushed down their arms, or across their faces the way any Queen would cherish her possessions. “It is within my right to defend my life.”
“It is not within your right to be a paranoid bitch,” Talon spat.
“Scorpio will not rest until my end is here.” She looked around the room. “I’m your Creator, what do think will happen to each of you when I die, when my magic, the magic I used to steal you from death, is no more?”
Not even ten minutes before Jamison had promised the dark spell on Gwinn and Bastion would end, the Creator’s magic did. He had validated Reveca’s threat without even knowing he had.
Even without Jamison’s offhand remark, Talon knew it to be true. He’d heard King say as much, and Jamison back him up when unthinkable wars set to come were highlighted in their careful speech.
“I’ve fought for years for not only my life, but yours as well. You refused to hear me and when I had no choice but stand up and give an order for the greater good each of you turned on me.” She swayed her head in disapproval. “Me. The one leader you still have that can stand on her own two feet. Who can think clearly.”
“Killing someone for leaving the property is not thinking clearly,” Talley said in a deep, even tone.
“It is if he was leaving to find the weapon to slay me,” she raised her hands as they all started to argue with her. “I don’t care if you believe me or not, the truth will never be known because Scorpio and enemies you have yet to be introduced to will no longer be a threat to any of us. Life will resume as it has in the past. You will follow me, and you will follow King.” Her expression lost all emotion. “Or I’ll destroy you as well.”
She turned to face Jamison, grinned and then said, “Fuck off,” as she vanished.
After a tense silence, seconds everyone used to digest the insanity they had just witnessed Judge spoke to Jamison. “You’re asking my female to vote on the death of my Creator, knowing it will take me from her? You’re just as fucked as Reveca is.”
“I’m not,” Jamison’s tone was as exhausted as the tension in the room. “Reveca’s life, in theory, does sustain the magic in all of you. Because of the unknown, we could never in good conscience end her existence.”
“The hell you wouldn’t,” Talley snapped. “I’ve watched enough of your quarrels to know how shallow the love is between you and her.”
“However deep or shallow our affections may be, the loyalty to our magic will not allow us to disrupt balance.”
“What are you trying to do to her,” Talon’s voice was labored.
“Imprison her.”
“And what will that accomplish?” Talon, just like everyone else in the room knew King and his men held a power none of them had faced off with before.
“It will stop her from bartering with dark gods. It will stop her from destroying a divine race of beings and furthermore, most importantly, it will stop her from destroying this universe.”
“I’m not fucking following King,” Judge said. “How in the hell can he even think to ask you to?” he said as he stared at Talon.
At that instant, Talon fell lifelessly to the floor. Jamison was the first to his side, he and Dust exchanged a hopeless glance as they both tried to pull him back with magic unseen to the others.
Ambrosia had finally stolen him, as grim and impossible as the truth before them was, there was a ray of hope that every battle has in its last seconds. When it’s anyone’s game to win. And that hope rested in Dust’s amber stare, it was a look Jamison had seen eons before. “It begins now...” Dust whispered.
“I’m moving him upstairs,” Jamison said. He met Adair’s frantic eyes. “Tell the others, it will take us all to give him the chance he needs to remain.”
“Fuck this, I’ll sail to that whore’s realm,” Judge said moving to the front doors.
“You’ll never make it in time,” Jamison promised as he vanished with Talon’s body.
Slowly, Dust stood from his crouched position. His stare was distant as he spoke. “Those here will remain. No one outside of this room is to know Talon is compromised. No one sails through the Edge until the witches have their vote.”
“You agree with them, trust them?” Talley asked not so sure on where he wanted to throw his weight on the matter. Dust was a child to him, the boy under Scorpio’s wing.
“More than a female who would dare summon the very gods who destroyed her life in the first place.”
Two
Moment by moment, Toril had felt her strength come back into her. Scorpio had made damn sure that she had. Everything in the mountain she was sealed in was sacred, from the rocks to the waters, even the spirits that he would swear he felt in the air watching, were in place to help her through this transition.
At this point, he wasn’t sure where he was on the scale of success. There was no book on how long a body of flesh armored in immortality would take to fully recover from an endless sleep. More so, Scorpio knew as each moment had ticked by since he left Talon he had felt weaker, not stronger. The hourglass had nearly exhausted all the sands of time.
Scorpio had swayed more than once, what would nudge him would all but shift Toril back into unconsciousness. He’d tried to convince her to let him in, to let his strength carry her through the awakening rituals but her refusal was adamant.
“When will you ever trust me,” he growled in frustration.
“I don’t trust myself,” she responded looking just as innocent and tired as the day he had first met her in the flesh.
Her words baffled him and had him using every spare thought he had to search their long past for something he could’ve missed.
“He’s slipping further,” Scorpio warned as if Toril could not feel the death of someone in their Throng as clearly as him.
“Talon’s hope has warned Ambrosia,” Toril
said across a short breath. “He sensed me, felt me awake. She knows for sure now...”
With his vim cradling her, Scorpio guided Toril to the north wall. Oils amplified their scents as steam from the rocks heated them. The aromas were medicine, but the water was far more powerful.
Dangling her in the air with his essence, Scorpio climbed high in the chamber and nudged a rock to its side, a spring of water began to fall. It was warmed by the earth and as pure as the first raindrop that had ever fallen from the skies.
Toril gasped as she felt it pour over her. Mindlessly she stretched in midair until her entire gown was soaked through. Mustering all the restraint he could, Scorpio kept his eyes on her, and not the body that had haunted every moment of his life since he first laid eyes on her, more so after he finally was permitted to mark what was his.
Toril’s body rested in the smooth grove of the rocks where the water had once fallen. Each drop she took in flooded her with strength. Knowing his limits, Scorpio stormed passed her.
“Leaving so soon?” Toril said over the air in her lungs she was trying to tame. She was trying to tease him, lighten the mood, but knew it came out wrong the moment the words left her lips.
Scorpio stared her down as she felt the endless regret he had for the troubles of their past flood him. “You need food.”
Toril’s stare moved down his taught body as she carefully pressed her lips together. She needed—wanted— something far more powerful than food.
He turned to face her chasing the scent of her arousal and the ray of a chance he felt burning in his chest. Vaguely she swayed her head, then closed her eyes and let the sensations of the water sooth her wild thoughts.
She needed to study the female Ambrosia, but her mind was so full of the lives she had missed. Her Throng had prevailed, well, survived. Taking in all they had done, and where those actions would lead was a task that would have been impossible to manage on its own. Waking to the sound of a battle call, to her own turmoil still churning, made it more impossible.
Scorpio watched her for a moment, then turned. Even though each step took his body further away, a bigger part of him was with her. This action, being in two places at once, was how he survived so many years traveling separately from her.
It was a perfectly flawed concept, at a moments noticed he could rush all of his power to either his physical body or where the majority of his soul was. The issue was that if he had to move all his power to where his soul essence was, which happened more times than not, his body would fall lifeless. Never easy to explain when he did come back around, and the exact reason Reveca was able to fuck with him in the first place.
Scorpio’s body fought him every step of the way. As he moved away from Toril, he felt like a drowning man who only needed one more gasp of air to make it. The insane sensation was so strong that he nearly stopped in the cavern of snakes and grabbed bits of flesh here and there and called it done. His stubbornness pushed him through it and out a different path.
He weaved effortlessly through a crevasse of rocks that had never seen light. He climbed, he descended, and climbed once more, moving natural barriers as he did so. In time his lungs filled with the fresh night air.
For a moment longer than his urgency cared to permit, Scorpio stared at the heavens, then took in the same scents that had comforted him as a boy. There are some things no amount of time can erase; the feeling of home is one of them.
With a newfound strength, he rose and began to hunt the woods that had provided for him in the past. Hours later he had a feast cleaned and carefully wrapped in leaves, packed and ready for his journey back into the mountain.
He altered his path back, checking the woods, ensuring that he still had the seclusion he needed. More than once across the night, he had picked up a wayward familiar scent, but it was fleeting, moving away.
He stopped in his tracks when he saw Dust’s Corvette parked by his bike. Pulling his senses away from where he had them with Toril, and soaring his essence home to the Sons was not something he was willing to do. Not only would it mean him taking his watchful eye off Toril, but it would also mean that if Reveca had any kind of spell in place, she could either track him or trap him.
Cautiously as ever Scorpio approached the car that was vastly out of place in the serene wilderness. Inside, on the front seat was an ancient box, made of steel and inscribed in runes that had long since been forgotten.
With a sway of his head, he opened the door and grabbed the package. Under it was a note from Dust that said, “She’s revealed her intentions, the Sons stand with Talon, but he weakens.”
From the weakness of the scent on the paper, along with how far the person who had delivered the car was now, Scorpio knew this info was days old. No matter how aged it was he could feel Talon slipping even further.
His loyalty nagged at him to make one phone call, offer some calming words to the Sons, more specifically, to Talon. His heart knew better. He knew now, more than ever, only one loyalty could ever matter.
His pace back to the mountain was slow, not from any indecision but for the very careful acts he took to cover his path, not even a broken twig was left behind much less a scent that could be easily tracked. Most of the task was accomplished by the skills that still rushed through his blood, the rest came from the help of old magic, help from the ancestors.
When he finally arrived back in the chambers, his soul was pulsing with anticipation. Even though he had kept a watchful eye on Toril in his absence, an annoying part of him found it hard to believe this day had arrived, that he would not awake in his bed and then ache for days over his lost love as he willed the days of time to move closer.
She had moved under the water while he was gone, her damp foot prints across the floor gave her away, so did the night blooming lavender flowers she had stuck just behind her ear, lingering against her long strawberry blond hair.
A petal rested in the groove of her bottom lip, the water sprinkling from above would land there and offer flavor before she’d take in the water. From the gleam in her eyes alone he knew she was stronger.
Keeping to safe boundaries he went to work on preparing the feast he had brought. Stones were already in place for a massive fire pit, it stayed lit from the time he laid her here to when he left both her and Dust behind.
The smell of seasoned, stone grilled meat had filled the air long before he felt her approach. When he glanced over his shoulder, he found her staring ravenously down at the berries and nuts resting on the leaf by the fire.
She had taken off the soaked gown from before and was now wearing only his Kut that he had discarded before he began to cook. The sight of her in it twisted his mind and clashed worlds he knew never belonged together.
He doubted she understood the symbolism of it when she pulled it on, and telling her now would spoil the tranquility of her emotions. If or when realization dawned on her, he’d stand by the way he felt when they argued it out. Time was overdue for him to lay claim on her for all to see. In his world, she could not be making a clearer statement than wearing his patch.
He reached in the fire and pulled the meat out and placed it next to the food she was eyeing.
“I’d go slow,” he warned.
After a moment of hesitation, she lowered herself to her knees then reached for the feast.
“None for you?” she asked after a tremble of appreciation waved through her once the first bite melted on her tongue.
Scorpio never cared to eat before battle. Fasting was a ritual that had always taught him to focus, and left him starved not only for his victory but the celebration that was sure to follow.
As a mark of trust, he did reach for a morsel of hers and brought it to his lips. He let her eat as his thoughts churned on. Toril, in any state of mind, missed little, but she had yet to mention much less notice the ancient box Scorpio had returned with.
For a man who was forced to harbor endless secrets, he didn’t much care for them. He loathed anything hidden bet
ween him and his female as any male would in his situation. The only thing worse than feeling like you were missing vital information, was feeling like nothing more than a tool used to manifest an ending.
He didn’t want to be a tool, but a creator of his future, of their future.
“Is this all to plan,” he asked in the stillness of the cavern.
Toril’s eyes were locked on the waves of the low glowing fire the stones were hosting. After a moment, once his question had made it through all her thick clamoring thoughts she swayed her head once. “Not all of it.”
“What part?” he pushed trying to keep the pain out of his tone.
“Distraction was our enemy.”
He furrowed his brow in question. Neither one of them knew how to take their eye off the ball. Not even their lust for one other could sway their rapt attention, which was more by design. Victory, their end, meant they could love when they wanted, just like any other being roaming the realms.
“I only knew Talon died in a battle she sent him into, that she pulled him from death. That like you, she stirred dark magic that was not meant for her to use into your being. That she selfishly played god.”
“As did I,” he said still lost.
Toril swayed her head. “I never truly believed another Throng was to blame, or rather, were present on the playing field.”
Toril’s eyes were deep in the past. “It’s never an outside source that slays a culture, it is the wicked whispers within that souls choose to listen to that brings the sickness of evil to the surface.”
Her amber eyes swimming in the reflection of fire moved to meet his jade stare. “Reveca holds allies of the last standing in dead Throngs.”
“Why would any god allow a single member to stand?” This lore was not one Scorpio knew. He’d heard rumors long ago, but they were just that, whispers of those who hadn’t the faintest idea.
“Most they assumed, correctly, would spend their power and dissolve. I can’t say how many stand now or where they hide in plain sight. Not yet. I will assure you, if they are here, they are enemies left alive to slay any Throng as our own who seeks to rise.”