by Tricia Barr
By the time they reached the end of Constitution Hill, only a small fraction of the original army remained, some of them littering the path behind them with their corpses, the rest having spread out to continue to the fight with the snipers.
They were coming up to Buckingham Palace now. Directly ahead of them was an expertly molded monument atop which stood a golden angel pointing toward the heavens—the Victoria Memorial. Once Joran occupied the palace, it would be over. Something needed to happen.
Out of the corner of her eye, Phoenyx saw black-clad men darting through the trees to the left of them. Skylar spotted them, as well, and made a move that turned the tide in their favor.
He leapt out of line and tackled one of them, wrestling him for his gun. This appeared to be a maneuver in defense of Joran, but Phoenyx saw it for what it was immediately. Skylar fell behind, and Joran lost his reception of Skylar’s powers. The telekinetic barrier popped, leaving Joran defenseless—well, less defended, at least. It also meant that Joran no longer had access to their thoughts. This would be the perfect time for Vincent to strike.
A gunshot fired from the side of the Victoria Memorial, and Joran faltered and stumbled to the ground. Instinctually, Phoenyx and her friends backed away to avoid getting shot themselves, making Joran the focus of everyone in sight.
A deep, wicked laugh rumbled out of Joran’s throat, amplified by the layout of the courtyard in which they stood. Joran rose to his feet and stood tall, sending his shooters a mocking smile.
“You think your bullets can stop me?” he roared, raising his arms ostentatiously. “I am immortal. You cannot kill me!”
Several more shots fired, striking him in the chest, the abdomen, the thighs. The force of the shots pushed him to the ground, but he laughed maniacally the entire time.
Vincent ran forward to help him to his feet as a handful of their followers spread out before them to shoot at their attackers. Sam rushed forward too, attempting to distract Joran while Vincent accomplished the task.
Phoenyx’s eyes were glued to Vincent. This was it. Do it. Do it!
Vincent took Joran’s arm, pulled him up to his knees, then paused as if to brace for Joran to stand. Sam kept talking, stalling, holding Joran’s attention away from Vincent. Phoenyx saw the glint of the dagger as Vincent removed it from the inside of his jacket, her pulse racing with anticipation. Vincent snuck it into position under Joran’s ribcage, and then—
In slow motion, their plan backfired.
Joran’s eyes landed on Phoenyx’s, and he must have seen her keen focus on Vincent, for he looked down at Vincent’s other hand. His face twisted in outrage, and he snatched Vincent’s arm and yanked it away.
He got to his feet and held Vincent up by the arm, Vincent’s feet dangling off the pavement.
“What is this!” Joran demanded, looking from Vincent to each of the four of them. “You.” He pointed at Phoenyx with his free hand. “You did this. You compelled him to stab me. To what end, my traitorous little vixen? The dagger is what made me immortal. Do you actually think it could kill me?”
Phoenyx stood her ground, fighting the urge to run ispired by the murderous look on Joran’s face. She didn’t mean to, but she quickly glanced at Sam, and Joran didn’t miss that little slip up.
“Unless…” Joran turned to Sam, understanding registering in his bloodthirsty eyes. “Well, haven’t you been a busy little bee.”
Joran snapped Vincent’s neck flippantly and tossed him aside, then advanced on Sam.
“Sam, no!” Lily shouted, and ran for him before Sebastian could grab her arm to stop her.
“What a waste,” Joran said, and in a show of incredible strength, he grabbed Sam by the side of his head and slammed his skull into the pavement in one fluid motion.
Blood gushed out of Sam’s head, and Phoenyx’s jaw dropped. Sam’s body was motionless.
“NO!” Lily bellowed, collapsing over Sam’s lifeless body.
“Ah, I see. Young love,” Joran jeered. “Fear not, Earth, you’ll get to join him soon enough.”
Joran grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her up, locking his arm around her neck as he faced Phoenyx and Sebastian. Skylar, who had somehow escaped his brawl with the sniper, returned to stand on the other side of Sebastian.
“Don’t you dare hurt her!” Phoenyx barked, igniting her hands threateningly.
Joran chuckled derisively. “Your powers can’t hurt me, remember.”
Phoenyx looked at Sebastian and Skylar, and with one mind they stepped backward until they were far enough away.
“They can if you can’t reach us,” Phoenyx said, and she shot an arrow of fire at his shoulder as a warning shot.
“Careful, you’ll hurt your little flower here,” he said, constricting his arm under Lily’s chin and making her struggle to breathe.
“She’ll heal,” Skylar said, and suddenly a gust of wind smacked at the side of the monument and cracked it in half, sending the top half crashing down in Joran’s direction.
Joran curled himself around Lily and rolled out of the away, never loosening his hold on her. He got back to his feet with that same arm secured around her neck and scowled at them.
“Enough of this.” He snapped Lily’s neck and let her fall to the ground at his feet.
Phoenyx gasped, the shock of it momentarily making her forget that Lily was not truly dead, that she would regenerate. But why had Joran not just taken her soul? The answer became obvious very quickly.
The earth grumbled beneath their feet, and the pavement cracked all around them, thick thorny vines shooting out of the ground to constrict them. The thorns cut into Phoenyx’s skin, slicing her up as the vines tightened around her. She tried to use her fire to burn through them, but they were growing back faster than her flames could incinerate them.
She looked at Skylar and Sebastian, desperately hoping that they were faring better than her, but to her defeat, they were more heavily bound than she was.
Then she looked for Ayanna, who was huddled on the ground a few feet from her, looking frantic with indecision. Joran still didn’t know that Ayanna had her memories back. It may be curtains for them, but Ayanna could still get through this alive.
“Don’t worry,” Joran said. “I’m not going to kill you. I’m just going to bury you in the ground like you did me. Give you a few thousand years to reconsider your loyalties. Or maybe I’ll leave you down there forever.”
He turned to Ayanna.
“What about you, my queen?” he asked, his expression softening slightly. “Where do you stand? With me, or against me?”
Ayanna stood up. She looked at Phoenyx, Sebastian and Skylar for a deciding moment, and then said, “I stand with you, my love.”
Ayanna started walking toward Joran, and Phoenyx saw the rainbow-colored stone of the dagger’s hilt twinkling in the light of the morning sun from behind her back. Ayanna had the dagger, and she was going to use it. If she did, he would surely kill her.
“Ayanna, no!” Phoenyx yelled pleadingly, the sound choked by a thin vine that coiled around her throat. “Don’t do this!”
“I’ve made my choice,” Ayanna yelled back, giving Phoenyx one last look of farewell before she reached Joran. “I choose you, Joran. Always.” She reached up with her free hand to caress Joran’s face, and then leaned in to kiss him.
Pleased as ever, Joran gave in to her kiss, and Ayanna took advantage of his lowered guard. She thrust the dagger into his chest with one swift motion.
Joran’s eyes popped open in shock, his lips ripping away from Ayanna’s as he gasped for air.
Ayanna held the dagger in place, and the two of them stood there for the longest moment, staring at each other. A look of sheer heartache came over Joran’s face, and he put his hand over her cheek.
Then it happened. Ayanna’s soul ascended upward, her body crumpling to the ground in its absence. Joran’s own body fell soon after.
“No, no, no! Please no!” Phoenyx shouted to the sky.<
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The vines that restricted the three of them rescinded and began to wither. But Phoenyx didn’t care. All she could do was look at Ayanna’s still, pretty form and cry, waiting for that head of honey curls to rise and turn in her direction.
They had succeeded. Joran was dead. But so was Ayanna. She sacrificed herself to kill the man she loved and save the world.
Ayanna was gone, and the world would never be the same.
The war was still raging around them. Though the law enforcement agents who had confusedly witnessed this supernatural show down knew that the leader had been vanquished, there were still the unknowing, blindly fighting followers to eradicate. A symphony of gunfire and shouts and screams surrounded them, but Phoenyx was deaf to all of it.
Lily roused, coming back to life with a piercing gasp. She didn’t hesitate to take stalk of what had happened. As soon as she saw Joran’s body laying a few feet away from her, she scampered to her feet and rushed to her friends’ aid, withdrawing the vines back into the ground from whence they sprouted.
The instant the vines released her, Phoenyx ran to Ayanna, touching her all over to find some way to resuscitate her.
Sebastian was soon at her side, gently attempting to pull her away.
“No, we can bring her back!” Phoenyx shouted, shoving Sebastian away. “Lily, heal her now!”
Lily knelt down beside her, jungle green eyes shimmering with tears.
“Phoenyx, I can’t heal her,” Lily said softly. “She’s gone.”
“No, she’s not,” Phoenyx snapped. “Just heal her, dammit!”
“There’s nothing to heal,” Skylar said, putting his hand on Phoenyx’s shoulder. “Her soul is gone. The body can’t live without a soul.”
“No,” Phoenyx cried defeatedly, her shoulders shaking as she put her hands over her soaking eyes.
Sebastian pulled her into his arms, and she let him, desperately needing comfort. Her best friend in the entire world was gone. Forever. She would never see her again. There would be no reincarnation for Ayanna. Joran had succeeded in stealing her from them, and there was nothing Phoenyx could do. It was over.
“Why did she do it?” Phoenyx yelled, looking up at them for an answer. “She knew he would kill her if she stabbed him. She had to. We could have found another way.”
“You know that’s not true, Phoenyx,” Skylar said. “We might not have ever gotten another chance to kill him. Ayanna saw an opportunity and she took it. And…she was ready to die. She invited me into her mind as she went to him. She had been alive for so long. She had known so much loneliness. She wanted to go with Joran on his journey to the afterlife to make sure he found peace, and to find her own peace.”
“But she wouldn’t have been lonely anymore,” Phoenyx denied. “We are all immortal now. We could all have been together forever.”
“Being without Joran would have made her immortality miserable,” he rebutted. “It already had, she just didn’t know what it was. This was what she wanted.”
Phoenyx shook her head, unwilling to accept any of this, but too full of grief to argue anymore. There was no point in arguing. What was could not be changed.
Lily slowly left them and moved over to Sam’s body, mourning the love they could have known. Phoenyx joined her, with Sebastian and Skylar in tow, and they all cried together.
“Wait,” Skylar said, narrowing his eyes down at Sam, as if listening for something imperceptible to the rest of them. “He’s not dead. His mind is still in there. His…soul is still there.” Phoenyx could see the little light bulb switch on over his head, and he snapped his eyes at Lily. “Lily, heal him.”
Lily was confused, but she did as she was told, putting her hands over his broken and bleeding head and concentrating on bringing it back to its former glory. The three of them watched as Lily’s healing power did its work, Sam’s skull sealing where it had cracked, until it was covered in solid, smooth flesh once again.
Lily stared down at Sam, her brows twitching fretfully. Phoenyx was holding her breath in anticipation, waiting for some sign that Skylar was right.
“Damn, that will give you such a headache,” Sam grumbled with his face still against the concrete. He opened his eyes and sat himself up, pressing his palm to his forehead where the crack had been, then repelling at the blood he found there.
Lily threw her arms around him, and he caught her, smiling jovially.
“Oh, Sam, I thought you were dead,” Lily wept.
“Well, technically I was,” Sam said.
“You clever bastard,” Sebastian said with relief. “You used the dagger on yourself before you cast the spell.”
Sam shrugged and smiled charmingly. “I couldn’t resist.” He pulled Lily back enough to look into her eyes. “You won’t ever die, and I didn’t want to ever leave you. I had to take my only chance to secure a future with you. Now you’ll never get rid of me.” He smirked almost nervously.
“I wouldn’t ever want to get rid of you,” Lily said, her words dripping with the love she felt for him.
Phoenyx’s heart warmed. Lily was going to get her happily ever after.
“You never know, maybe Ayanna did, too,” Skylar whispered to Phoenyx.
The warmth left Phoenyx’s chest, making her feel hollow and cold all over.
“No one is going to get a happily ever after if we don’t clean this mess up,” Sebastian said, waving his hand at the shooting all around them. “Innocent people are still dying.”
Something inside Phoenyx clicked, her own self-interest switching off and her focus aiming at heroism. “You’re right. We have to try to put a stop to all this. We have to save as many people as we can, show the people of London that we are not the enemy.”
“Let’s go,” Skylar nodded in agreement.
They spread out. Skylar went about telekinetically ripping the guns away from any of Joran’s followers that he came across, helping the police apprehend as many of them as possible. Sebastian and Phoenyx worked together to put out the fires left by the bombings, and to fight off the bombers that had stuck behind to cause more mayhem. And Sam went around with Lily to heal as many of the wounded as they could find, whether it be in the rubble of the destroyed judicial buildings, or on the streets in the wake of Joran’s march.
It became clear to the local authorities that the five of them, who had originally been with Joran, were not a threat to the citizens. No one questioned the uses of their powers. The help was a necessity, so the evidence of the supernatural was something that the people receiving the aid just accepted, to ponder the meaning of it at a later date.
By nightfall, almost all of Joran’s followers were accounted for—either behind bars or in body bags. Thanks to Sebastian’s clever irrigating skills, all the fires around the city had been put out, and crews were working to clean up the damage. And thousands more deaths were prevented due to Lily’s diligent healing hands.
When the five of them had done all they could, they returned to Victoria’s Memorial, where Ayanna’s and Joran’s bodies were wrapped in body bags in the back of a white mortuary van. Thanks to some very resourceful news reporters, the world had gotten to see Ayanna’s sacrifice, so the coroners were handling her body with the care and respect it deserved. Unfortunately, so was Joran’s, but out of fear for the powers they had seen him wield.
“Where will she be buried?” Phoenyx asked, taking one last long look at Ayanna’s beautiful face before they zipped up the bag and took her away forever.
“Highgate Cemetery, madam,” the coroner replied. “Take your time.”
“Thank you,” she said as he walked away.
Phoenyx looked down at the pallid face of her best friend and sister of thousands of years. Her one rosy lips were already purpling.
“I understand why you did what you did,” she said quietly. “You saved us all. But I am going to miss you more than you will ever know. I love you so much, my sister. I hope Skylar is right. I hope you do get your happily ever after, somewh
ere in the next world. Goodbye.” Her voice lost all sound on the last word as her throat tightened with unshed tears.
She zipped the bag the rest of the way up and rejoined her friends at the fallen statue to watch the van drive away.
A man emerged from the gates of the palace, heading in their direction. He was dressed in a very official looking uniform, and Phoenyx assumed he was high up in the Queen’s guard. He stopped a few feet in front of them, as if he was afraid to get any closer, and regarded them with a mixture of respect and caution. His posture was rigid with propriety nonetheless.
“The royal family sends their deepest thanks for your service to our nation,” he said. “We cannot thank you publicly, for obvious reasons, so her majesty would like you to accept this as a token of her deepest gratitude.” He handed them a check with too many zeroes for Phoenyx to process at the moment. It had each of their names written on it, and Phoenyx was amazed out how easily the Brits had been able to identify them. Had any of this gone wrong, they could easily have been marked as terrorists and hunted as fugitives.
Sebastian shook his head and pushed the check away. “We can’t accept that. We were only cleaning up the mess that we helped create.”
“Please, I have been instructed not to take no for an answer,” the man said, firmly holding his outstretched hand with the check. “Or I can simply have it wired into your bank accounts, if you prefer.”
Sebastian took the check, and then ripped it into pieces. “I guess you’ll have to, if you can get to any of them before we close them.”
There was a moment of silence as the man assessed the five of them.
“What are you people?” he finally asked, curiosity blazing in his hazel eyes.
“We are nobodies, and we’d like to stay that way,” Sebastian said with a suggestive tone.
