Daizlei Academy Omnibus Collection

by Kel Carpenter

  She stopped talking before her voice broke, but I understood what she was getting at. “Living is hard, I think. Harder than dying. When you die you go somewhere out there,” I waved my hand at the empty air before us. “But it’s the people you leave behind who suffer most.”

  “Was it quick?” she asked hesitantly. “When she killed them?”

  “It was,” I said. “Seconds at most.”

  She nodded and let out a puff of white as she exhaled. “I’m happy it was quick.”

  “Me too.” I meant it. Every single death that happened as a result of my actions weighed on me. We lapsed into comfortable silence for a while until Alexandra asked, “What is dying like?”

  I lifted both eyebrows and squinted over at her.

  “Are you asking me?”

  “Well, yeah,” she frowned a little. “You died at Daizlei, technically. That first time after the demon attack. It was only after the telekinesis exploded out of you that your heart started to beat again.”

  I nodded slowly. “Well, it was a bit . . . odd.”

  “Odd?” Alexandra asked, questioning my word choice.

  “I’d been hearing voices long enough that I just assumed it was worse at first. Our parents were talking to me, calling me from the other side. I remember wanting to go and then . . .” My words trailed off as I recalled Lucas’ face.

  “And then?”

  “Lucas called me back, or at least what I thought was Lucas at the time. It was actually Ash. He reminded me that I have something to live for.”

  “What was that?”

  “You guys.” We shared a look and she smiled, knocking her shoulder lightly against mine.

  “You know, you can be a real sap sometimes.” The retort was so off the cuff I was caught by surprise as I started to laugh.

  “And you can be a real bitch on occasion.” She let out a chuckle that seemed it never wanted to end, and she was soon doubled over with tears dotting her eyes. It wasn’t even that funny. I found myself laughing again, mostly at her response. When it all died out she resumed leaning back, her palms against the concrete floor of the balcony.

  “Will it be like this? After it’s done?” she asked.

  I swallowed hard, searching for an answer that wasn’t a lie.

  The screen door slid open again, saving me from having to respond. This time it was Blair that stepped out. She dropped to her butt beside us, opting to sit crisscross with her elbows on her knees. She leaned forward, rubbing her hands together slowly.

  “Are we out here to contemplate the end of the world and our possible demise?” she said lightly. I raised both eyebrows.

  “I mean—” I paused.

  “Yup,” Alexandra inserted. “Totally what we’re doing.”

  “Awesome,” Blair said. “There room for a third in this shindig? I promise to be equally as depressing as this last month has been.” I snorted, and Alexandra let out a sharp cackling laugh.

  “You’re ridiculous,” my sister said.

  “There’s worse things in life,” Blair shot back with a slight smile on her face. “Besides, my personality is probably the least ridiculous thing there is about me.”

  “I’ll give you that,” Alexandra muttered.

  “So,” Blair drawled. “This whole moping thing is hard to do with it this sunny outside. I’m thinking we need a change of scenery to be as dramatic as you two.” Alexandra was right, she was being utterly outrageous for her. In the last month there had been a serious damp on Blair’s personality ever since her demon came forward. They seemed to be making some progress. She pointed her index finger and whirled it around. Instantly clouds began to gather, thick and somber as the mood.

  “You really had to ruin the only good thing about today,” Alexandra said with a sour twist of her lips.

  Blair chuckled. “Actually, it’s going to help us. Once the sun sets, the bloodsuckers have better eyesight in the dark. The clouds are going to reflect the light pollution from the city so it’ll actually be brighter than it would be with a clear sky. We’ll be able to see better, but it will be a disadvantage for them.”

  Alexandra’s mouth slipped ajar. “Oh.”

  “Yeah,” Blair snorted. “I was smart once, before all of . . . this.”

  She motioned to the sky, like it was some small feat. I thanked my lucky stars now that she was on my side given the ease with which she did that. Her strength made me have faith that Keyla would make it out of this and Ash wouldn’t hate me forever.

  “Who’s being a downer now,” Alexandra muttered sarcastically.

  “I told you I was coming to join the pity party of a century,” Blair deadpanned.

  “I didn’t think it was possible for you to get more dramatic than when I met you, yet here we are,” Alexandra shot back. They bickered because it was safe. It made it feel like things weren’t as bad as they really were. Beneath our exteriors and playful facades, the unease was growing the lower the sun sank. Like an undertow, it tried to pull us all down, but we banded together, spending our last guaranteed moments with each other. They didn’t know what was to come.

  They didn’t realize the gift they were giving, and the strength that it helped me find.

  I loved them, just like I loved Ash, and Lily.

  Despite it all, I loved her so damn much it hurt sometimes.

  Their light teasing made it better because this was it.

  A prophecy went into play a thousand years ago.

  For a thousand years the ancients moved the pieces on the board.

  Today was the end of it, and if I succeeded—the beginning as well.

  The lip of the sun touched the horizon and our laughter fell quiet. The clouds turned a shade of violet. I wondered if it was a sign but didn’t have long to think before the screen door opened again, the finality of it reverberating in the silence.

  Johanna stuck her head out and said, “It’s time.”

  Chapter 164

  Dressed in black and armed to the teeth, I knelt in front of Keyla at the edge of the park.

  “You told me once that you were ‘damn good’ with a mace,” I said, extending the weapon between us, pointed spikes angled away from her. She reached out with a trembling hand and grasped the leather-wrapped hilt.

  “I am.” She nodded.

  “Good.” I released my hold. “You’re staying back until we’re ready for you. Once you start doing your thing, every Vampire in the park is going to want to get ahold of you.” She shivered, and while I wasn’t trying to scare her, she’d be an idiot to not be terrified right now.

  “I have Blair and Tori,” she said. Such confidence. Perhaps it was for the best she believed that.

  “You do, but as great of fighters as Blair and Tori are, they aren’t infallible. None of us are. I’m giving you this weapon because I expect you’re going to need it tonight.” She swallowed but kept nodding. “If you see red eyes, you swing. If you don’t recognize them, you swing. If they’re trying to lure you away from Blair—”

  “I swing,” Keyla repeated. “I know.”

  I smiled but it didn’t reach my eyes as I leaned in and kissed her forehead.

  “I will never forgive myself if you die because of this. We’re going to get your brother back, but you need to make sure he has something to come back to.”

  “He has you too,” she said almost playfully. I had to force myself not to grimace. She was going to hate me when she learned what I’d done. Young and obstinate, she wouldn’t understand for a long time—if ever.

  Perhaps that was for the best as well.

  “It’s alright, Selena,” Blair said, stepping up beside her. “Keyla will be safe with me.” I leaned back and regarded my cousin. We clasped forearms and then I brought her in for a tight, swift hug.

  “I know,” I said quietly. “When Lily goes down, you get her out of here. If you can’t find Tori, take Keyla and run. All hell is going to break loose after that happens.”

  I pulled away and look
ed into my cousin’s keen eyes. She nodded once in understanding and we released each other. I stepped away from her and the mass of paranormals behind me. They blocked the road and covered the sidewalks surrounding the entire park from every angle. Sirens were going off around the city left and right as the human police tried to figure out what was going on and why thousands of people had brought New York City traffic to a grinding halt.

  That noise faded into little more than buzzing in my ears as I approached the park. Dusk was upon us. Only moments away.

  I reached out tentatively and sensed Ash.

  “Are you okay?” I sent down the bond. A minute passed. As the second one approached and fear began to creep in, I got a response.

  “Alive. No one’s bit me yet.” I let out a sigh of relief, but it was quickly brought to a halt. A sweet, soft crooning came from the park.

  I lifted a hand to the crowd behind me, and silence fell with the night.

  “Run, run, girl of fate. Your dark mistress is here to stay.”

  Alexandra and I shared a look, instantly knowing who is was. While I’d expected her, the lilt of madness in her voice was a punch to the chest. She’d never known the lullaby. I wondered if Cirian taught her.

  “Run, run, and I pray. The madness won’t take you away.” My sister, my dead sister sang in a haunting melody.

  “Run, run, child I made. The darkness wants to come and play,” Lily continued. The wind blew through the trees and leaves scattered in a rustle of branches.

  “Run, run, don’t delay. She will take you far away,” she sang louder. Stronger. I felt a trickle of something—not in the air, but in the world around us. My heart began to beat faster.

  “Run, run, Mother of fate. They are here, you cannot stay.” We were running out of lines. Lily, in all her time gone she found she loved to play games, and tonight was the biggest game of all. She wouldn’t be singing that song if there wasn’t a finale at the end.

  “Ash—”

  “Run, run, don’t delay. They will burn you at the stake.” Her voice changed, becoming deeper. Raspier. Harsher. She still sang, but there was an edge in those words.

  “Don’t,” Ash answered.

  “Don’t what?”

  “Run, run, daughter I made. So you can come back one day.” Closer. I sensed her coming closer. Her and her alone.

  “Don’t enter the park,” he said, struggling though I couldn’t tell why.

  “Why?” I asked, toeing the edge of the line.

  “Run, run, soul in pain. So you can make them pay.”

  No answer. Nothing. Panic seized my chest and I stepped on the brown grass.

  “Lily?” I called into the near void.

  A pause.

  “Run, run, they will say. You will take revenge one day.”

  My body shuddered. I realized then that she’d been confused. She thought it spoke of her. Of her pain. Of her loss. Of her rise.

  A dark wave of power rose in the sky, but it wasn’t coming from the park. Horror washed over as I realized what she intended.

  She never actually wanted to meet in the park. She just wanted us to surround it so that we were all out in the open in one spot. Fish in a barrel.

  Her and her legion of Made had planned to ambush us.

  Screams echoed into the night as her dark power blotted out the night sky. Rising higher and higher above.

  “Everybody! Get in the park! Spread out!” I shouted, using my power to project. A wave of people ran past me as they tried to do what I said. There were so many, though. Shifters, Supes, the odd Fae or Witch. Thousands had banded together for this, and while they tried to do as I said, they couldn’t move fast enough.

  Too many of them would react too late and be devoured by that cloud of death.

  I acted without thinking and my own power rushed forth.

  I’d always referred to my block on it as a dam. That wasn’t quite true, though. A dam once broken eventually lost its strength and the water eventually slowed to a steady, even pace. While initially it was devastating, there was an end. A bottom to how much water could pour.

  My power was not like that. It was as endless and never ending as the universe. It was the power of the ancients of old, and the only thing that held it back was me and my mortal body.

  I was a vessel as much as Milla.

  My demon stepped forward as the valve turned and magic thickened the air.

  Her cloud of dark energy crested in the sky before surging downward as my own power came forward as purple and black tendrils.

  Time slowed.

  A second lasted an eternity.

  Hers rained down and mine held as they collided in a boom that echoed through all of New York City. I pushed inward, forcing her back and away from the people fleeing behind me. I’d worried before this started that she’d wipe out everyone. That I would be all that was left to face her. But we had Keyla. I just had to buy us time.

  I had to hold her back from killing our own long enough that her and I could come face-to-face and finally end this.

  My neck strained as my hands came up, opening the valve further. More than ever before.

  If I was to win this I needed my full strength, no matter the cost.

  I walked forward with arms raised.

  My fists clenched.

  My power shot through her own, a stab in the darkness, and then drilled down through the earth toward the source of where that cloud of death had come from. The darkness receded, as if sensing my intent to find her.

  Quiet fell once more.

  Staring out from the edge of the park toward the skyscrapers around us, dark figures dropped by the hundreds. They descended into the last of the fleeing crowd as the tables turned. Instead of boxing them in to try to prevent their escape, we’d been the ones boxed.

  “They’re coming from the streets!” I yelled, using my power to let my voice carry over the park. But it was too late, screams filled the air as the feast began.

  The stragglers who hadn’t made it to the park were ripped apart on sight. Blood splattered the concrete as a viciousness born of death descended onto us.

  “Ash,” I called as the Vampires rushed forward toward the park. “Where are you?”

  “Behind you,” he whispered before his connection went still. I didn’t have time to think about his sudden silence. The only thing behind me was a park full of paranormals I now needed to protect as best I could.

  I waved my hand and the first row of Vampires dissolved into nothing more than dust.

  This happened twice more before I noticed a murmuring through the crowd. I turned and behind me on the other side of Central Park, the black cloud of death was eating through the paranormal army we’d managed to gather.

  “You’ve got to be fucking shitting me right now,” Johanna growled from beside me.

  “You told us she was strong,” Alexandra said, watching in horror as the mass rolled over the park. “Not this.” They fell like flies and once more people tried to flee into the streets. They ran past me, willing to brave the Vampire horde still falling from skyscrapers instead of the instant and imminent death that was my sister’s power.

  I started to run.

  Blood pumped through my veins. I dodge around people trying to flee as I mentally pushed the cloud back.

  It resisted me, but not for long as shoved with enough force I could have cleaved the city in two. She was incredibly strong, and based on the piles of bones I had to run through to face her—she was growing stronger by the minute.

  “Selena, wait up!” Alexandra called behind me. I sensed them chasing but I needed to get ahead. I needed to be there first to shut her down before she could kill anyone I loved.

  Especially Ash.

  “Selena . . .” His voice filtered through my mind. “She’s too strong,” he warned me. I pushed harder, clearing the opposite edge of the park in record time.

  There, at the border where landscape and cityscape met, was Lily, her back turned to me.
Victor stood beside her, holding Ash by the cuff of his tattered shirt. He’d been beaten to a pulp and I wasn’t sure how he was even conscious.

  “Lily,” I said quietly, ignoring them both.

  She paused.

  Her long black hair whipped around. She’d dressed in a light blue camisole and dark brown capris. Ballerina flats molded around her dainty feet and it occurred to me that while we’d armed ourselves, she didn’t think she needed anything more. Judging by the show in her power, I almost agreed.

  She looked back at me and smiled cruelly.

  The most unsettling part of all was that her eyes were not red.

  They weren’t the black of a demon.

  They weren’t a shade short of black like a Vampire.

  They were brown.

  Warm brown. The same color they’d been before she was turned.

  “Did you know they have speakers in the park?” my sister said softly. “Well, they do. Or did, I suppose. After the fighting they might have been destroyed.” She smiled, but there was none of her in it.

  None of the girl she had been. Only the monster she’d become.

  “Se-lee-na,” Ash murmured in broken syllables. I took a step forward and Lily tsked, turning to fully face me.

  “None of that now,” she murmured. Victor changed his grip to hold Ash by the back of the neck. He picked him up like a rag doll and revulsion filled me as he swung his other hand forward, like he meant to clap. Only Ash’s head was between them.

  “Stop,” I growled through gritted teeth. A flick of my hand and Victor froze, unable to move. I started forward the moment Johanna finally caught up and fell in step behind me, just like we’d talked about. Keyla was further back, and given the ice storm starting up, I’d say Blair’s demon was already out to kill.

  “Oh,” Lily drawled. “You poor, pathetic girl. You really think you can stop this, don’t you?” She laughed. It was a peal of windchimes that haunted me.

  Another surge of her power blossomed from her skin and drifted down the streets to wash over those closest to them. Vampires and Supernaturals and Shifters alike, all ceased to breath as she pulled the life from them and left only ashes behind.