Page 115 of Beneath the Veil of Tides
Throk’nawan turned to storm toward her, his blade flipping in his palm. “Let us not pretendyou,” he glared with disgust at the stub where her arm had once been, “will make any impact in this war.”
Zahara smiled in his face—like looking death in the eyes and taunting it. “The impact worth making has already been made.”
Throk’nawan shifted his gaze to the sleeping children. “No child so… impressionable,” he spat the last word, “will ever be worth it.”
She flinched.
Jun stepped closer to her, offering a silent comfort. Calvin flanked her other side. All three stood firm before the sire of the god we knew.
“If you cannot see their value, it is because you never learned to look beyond yourself,” she snarled. “What they become exposes the hands that shape them.”
“Let me diminish this distraction for everyone’s sake then,” Throk’nawan spat, and the clouds shifted. They split and gurgled, rain pouring and flooding the ground. He lifted his hands, power glowing a brilliant white like lightning within his palm. He threw it forward, aimed for the slumbering, drenched children.
“NO—” Zahara hurled herself into the path of the strike before I could even scream her name. Lightning tore through her chest in a blinding explosion, sinking into flesh and bone with a sickening crack that illuminated the battlefield in violent white.
Her body convulsed brutally, back arching as the power ravaged through her, every tremor sharp and unnatural. The smell of burning flesh filled the air.
Then the strength left her all at once.
Zahara crumpled to the ground like something cut from its strings, limp and unmoving, her trembling hand weakly clutching the ruined fabric over the wound as smoke curled from between her fingers.
Noctis attacked with wind right as his father did, but the godsire predicted it, reflecting the power off himself. It dissipated around him, as if it hadn’t been an attack, but merely an offering to cool the godsire down. He continued to throw power into his father, but it made no difference.
“Zah!” Calvin cried. He and Jun sprinted towards Zahara, reckless in their pursuit to save her. It was all I could do to stand beside Noctis and give them cover. Time. I prayed it would be enough, but an ache of knowing that no gods would listen settled in my bones.
They fell into the mud at her side. Jun tried to force his power into her, but the godsire threw him aside, meters away. He crawled back, desperately trying to make it to her. His nails dug into the muddy ground, clawing to reach her.
“No…” I whispered. I moved to advance, but Noctis grabbed my wrist firmly.
Calvin’s hands fisted in the glistening grass beside Zahara, tears and rain one and the same pouring down his face. A scream erupted from his slumped body, breaking apart into sobs.
Beside me, Noctis unsheathed his sword, bouncing on the balls of his heels. I could feel the nerves within him—the overwhelming fear his father brought out of him. He shifted and cast out his magic again, but just like before, it bounced right off the godsire.
Throk’nawan shifted toward the three. Zahara’s lips moved slowly, murmuring words too quiet to hear. Her eyes flitted closed. Jun cried her name over and over as he was thrown backwards, crawling back each time. The repeated action hadbegun to leave permanent indentations in the muddied and blood-soaked ground, coating Jun’s hands.
“Rather ironic, isn’t it? The healer who has always been able to mend and restore now drenched in blood, unable to fix even what’s right in front of him,” Throk’nawan drawled.
Jun shoved back into the sludge, his face twisting in pain. It was the frantic desperation in his eyes that stood out, wild, searching, as if he could will the situation to change by force alone.
“You are all weak. Empathy, love, fear. It all makes you weak,” he seethed. His hand flew out and Calvin’s leg snapped. Zahara’s head that lay in his lap slipped to the ground.
Her lips opened and closed. Breath escaped slowly.
“Luca,” she finally whispered between the blood that began to pool in her mouth. Her lips tilted in a sad, knowing smile. Her hand fell from her chest, collapsing and stilled like her unbeating heart.
He needed to pay for this.
I shook off Noctis’s trembling grip and lunged toward Zahara, ripping the tunic from her still chest, inky black skin marring the strike. Jun finally reached her, a soft glow emanating from his hands. He poured it all into the woman he considered a mother—every ounce he could give. That was the thing about him. He wouldn’t think twice before sacrificing himself for the people he loved.
I shot forward, ready to tear the heart from the godsire’s chest with my own hands, to feel it still beating, hot and furious, as it pumped its last into my grip before finally going still.
A blast of air slammed into me from Throk’nawan, hitting me with brutal force, hurling me back like I weighed nothing at all. I struck the edge of the hill hard enough to rattle bone, pain blooming sharp and immediate through my ribs as the world spun.
There was nothing I can do. Nothing anyone could do.
Calvin only shook in rageful silence, his face crinkled in agony. Not for his shattered leg bone, but for Zahara who never got to see her little boy avenged. For the woman who found life again after losing the one thing she loved. For the one that welcomed all aboard her ship and fought for them all. She was safety. She was home. She was dead.
“Keep going!” Calvin screamed, his face blossoming in crimson splotches. A broken sound tore out of him as he struck the ground. Once, twice. Like the world could be punished into fixing itself.
