by Laken Cane
Waiting.
Somewhere below would be her crew, her loves, standing with the others, agonized stares on her and the witch.
No fear.
She grabbed Damascus by her skeletal shoulders and began to fight for her soul.
Her monster ran toward her, slammed against the wall of the witch’s inner prison, and then fell to a bloody heap on the floor.
But it held out its hand.
Rune had only to grab it.
She did. She yanked the monster to her, back where it belonged, and every other soul, spirit, and being imprisoned by the witch leapt through the hole she created.
Damascus screamed and intensified her efforts. Her concentration was on trying to keep Rune from escaping—the trapped souls were less important than her hold on the power inside Rune, and she let them go.
Rune wasn’t keeping them hostage.
They drifted from her, into the world, into wherever they needed to go, and the emotion was overwhelming.
Not just theirs, but hers.
She could feel everything they felt. Every thought, every pain, every longing. Torment and tears and relief.
They were free, free after centuries of an existence Damascus had not allowed them to escape.
When they left the witch, they weakened her.
They’d powered her, kept her strong, kept her nearly invincible. Not by choice.
The witch had forgotten.
Rune could tell by her widening eyes the moment she remembered, and by then, it was much too late.
They would have stayed to help Rune defeat the witch, but Rune didn’t need them to. She no longer needed anyone’s help to destroy the witch of Skyll.
They fled like specks of dust someone had blown upon.
Rune understood at that moment her purpose hadn’t been just to destroy the witch. It’d been to free those trapped souls.
Hundreds of trapped souls.
And the worlds were changed because of it.
Something beyond the worlds was changed because of it.
Was made right. Balanced.
Why she’d been chosen as the champion, she would never know.
It didn’t matter.
Rune wrapped her fingers around the witch’s upper arm, keeping her afloat.
She’d never been more calm, more sure of herself.
Damascus was little more than a human woman—thin and old with faded blue eyes and dirty black hair. Her power was gone.
Gone.
“Mercy,” she said. “I beg for mercy.”
Rune knew her stare softened, for the witch’s own held a sudden gleam of hope.
“You’re not mine to forgive,” Rune said. “You belong to the worlds.”
And they both knew the worlds would not be kind to her.
Rune released Damascus.
She shot out her claws and dropped her fangs, and tears she knew would be tinged with red stung her eyes.
“Rune,” the witch begged. “Please.”
As Damascus started to fall, Rune fell with her, driving a claw through the witch’s heart, and decapitating her at the same time.
Her remains fell to the crowds below, and by the time Rune’s feet touched the earth, every piece of the witch had disappeared.
Her body had gone to the people.
Her soul had gone to hell.
Chapter Fifty-Two
“Rune!”
She hit the ground hard. When she landed, the impact shattered bones and caused injuries that were as familiar as they were painful.
And she began to heal immediately.
It was so fucking good to be complete once again.
To be her.
To be her monster.
Z reached her first and pulled her off the ground and into his arms. “Rune, Rune.”
She wrapped her arms around him and let her bloody tears flow.
“It’s over,” she said. “It’s finally over. The world is free.”
“You’re my world,” he said, his eyes bright. “I might forget, someday—”
“But today is not that day,” she interrupted. Then she lay against his chest, listening to the cheers of Skyllians and breathing in his scent. Wallowing in his love. Relishing the fact that for that moment, she was with Z.
Z.
There was no other place she’d rather have been.
“Rune.” She felt Z resist for just a second before he allowed Strad to pull her away from him.
“Berserker,” she said. “We did it.”
“You did it.”
“No. It was everyone I met along the way.”
“Like me?” someone asked, and she pulled away from the berserker to face a smiling Roma. The girl slipped her slingshot into her pocket and leaned forward to kiss Rune’s cheek. “I failed you. I will never fail you again.”
Rune laughed, then gave Roma a hug that nearly crushed her. “Shut up, you silly girl.”
Lex was next to arrive, smelling of smoke and sulfur.
“You became your demon,” Rune said.
Lex nodded, grinning. “And it felt almost as good as seeing.”
“Lex…I need to tell you something.”
But the people were celebrating and ecstatic and could not be kept from their princess.
Later.
Later she would tell Lex what she needed to tell her, and she would show the berserker his son.
Skyll contained a cheerfulness it hadn’t possessed in centuries. It was as though the sun had burst through black clouds that had kept the world dark and cold for too long to remember it any other way.
But they remembered, and they rejoiced.
Every spell Damascus had either cast or shaped or commanded her doctors to create was gone, and the change was in the air.
“Tell us what to do,” they begged her. “Help us start anew in this world. Be our queen.”
She shook her head. “This world belongs to you. Make it a world you want to live in.”
They could finally breathe.
“We’re free,” they shouted.
And they shouted as they went to bury their dead and clean up their shimmers.
The crawlers melted into the depths of the earth, and she didn’t think the people would see them again.
Not unless someone, over the years, managed to obtain the degree of power Damascus had wielded. Then, he or she might bring them once more to the surface.
If so, that would be a task for another time and another person.
It would not be for Rune.
“Blue,” Z yelled, and Rune stood back with the berserker, Lex, and Roma as Z hurried away to greet Blue.
Rune couldn’t help but smile, even though her belly tightened with fear. She knew exactly what was coming.
She’d made her choice.
“Mad Naddy?” Rune asked, when Z led Blue to her.
Blue shook her head. “She didn’t make it.”
Rune took Z’s hand and held it so tightly it surely hurt him, but he didn’t pull away.
She’d have to let go.
Eventually, she’d have to let go, but she’d hold on to him for as long as she could.
She didn’t find the remains of Snow’s mutilated body, and knew she’d have to empty the belly of every carricorn and crawler around to find the pieces of her sister.
She let Snow go.
“I have to go home,” she told Z. “I don’t want to.”
He nodded. “I know. You didn’t save the people of my world to allow the people of yours to die.”
My world.
Z had transitioned.
She was glad for him.
He was forgetting her, and that broke her heart.
But she would be glad for him.
Because she loved him.
Z lived.
He lived.
“Rune,” Strad asked, “did you hear the echoes?”
“Not yet,” she whispered. “But I will, as soon as I’m ready to.”
One chance.
She’d get one chance.
But it was not time to listen for the echoes.
She still had work to do.
Cree slipped forward and stood beside Strad. “Thank you,” she told Rune.
Rune studied her for a long, silent moment. “What will you do now, Cree?”
Cree shrugged. “Maybe I will search for Abby.”
It would give her a purpose.
She didn’t know Abby was dead.
And Rune wasn’t going to tell her. She just nodded. “I hope you find everything you’re looking for.”
Maybe the bird would find Fin.
Maybe she’d find peace.
Rune jerked her head around at the sound of a puppy’s loud bark, and the milling crowd, laughing, parted to let Grim through.
The dog was not alone.
Owen stood beside him, weak, limping, blind, but awake. Healing.
“Rune,” he called, his fingers buried in the dog’s fur.
Rune didn’t move.
Grim barked again, and his bark sounded, to her ears, disapproving.
Owen smiled. “Rune.”
He looked like hell. He had scars that would never go away, and the horrible torture he’d been subjected to would surely haunt him forever.
But his hat was firmly on his head, and he was still able to smile.
He was still the fucking cowboy.
She cleared her throat but when she tried to speak her voice cracked. Finally she simply strode to him and wrapped her arms around his damaged body. “Fuck you, Cowboy,” she murmured.
He heard the forgiveness, and he heard, maybe, the complicated love she had no choice but to feel for him. And that was all it took to break the cowboy.
He wilted against the big dog, sobbing.
His dreams had been shattered, much like the bones in his body, but the one he loved forgave him.
“I’m not one to give up.”
Truer words had never been spoken.
He’d be okay.
Owen would always be okay.
And she’d do everything she could to make sure of that.
Chapter Fifty-Three
Brasque Dray welcomed her into his shimmer and his castle, not, perhaps, because he wanted to, but because right then she was the love of Skyll.
The people worshipped her.
If she’d but tossed a displeased glance his way, the people—her people—would have cut him down where he stood.
Shimmer lord or not.
Rune took Strad’s hand and he gave her a quizzical smile as they were led to the shimmer lord’s throne room.
“Why are you afraid?” he asked her.
Her mouth was almost too dry to speak. “I brought you here because there’s someone you need to see.”
He frowned. “Brasque Dray?”
Just that second the doors were shoved open and they were ushered inside the huge, echoing room.
“Rune,” Brasque called, and stood.
Strad looked away from Rune when Brasque spoke, and then he froze.
Standing beside the shimmer lord was the shimmer lord’s hand.
Matthew Matheson.
The blood drained from the berserker’s face and he stumbled, his eyes wide. Disbelieving.
Even though he’d witnessed the return of Z, he could not believe.
Because Matthew was his child.
He shook his head, hard, trying to clear his confusion, then dragged his stare away from Matt long enough to look at her. “Rune?” His voice was a hoarse whisper, and along with the doubt in his eyes was the fervent need to believe.
She nodded. “It’s Matthew. Blood and Fire brought him here to serve as the hand of Flesh.”
She didn’t think he heard her. Probably couldn’t over the roaring and buzzing that was surely in his head.
He turned back to the throne.
The people in the room were quietly ushered out, likely by an order from Brasque that Rune hadn’t heard him give.
All her attention was on the berserker.
Was it better for him that he saw Matthew there? That Matthew was no longer really, truly Matthew?
Probably not, but letting him know had been the right thing to do.
She hoped.
The berserker couldn’t move.
His blue eyes blazed in his pale face. He clenched his fists and said something under his breath, once, and stared.
But he could not move.
Matthew went to him.
They stared at each other, the big man and the little boy. They bore no resemblance to each other except for the somber, sad looks in their eyes.
At last, Matthew reached out and took the berserker’s hand in his.
Strad dropped to his knees and then slowly, carefully, he touched Matthew’s face.
No one made a sound.
Rune couldn’t breathe. Her eyes were hot and tight and she wanted to break down and beat her fists against the wall until either the wall or her bones shattered.
She could only imagine how the berserker felt.
Finally, he pulled the child into his arms and stood.
Matthew wrapped his arms around his father’s neck and sobbed, loud, messy sobs. He hadn’t forgotten.
And he wanted his dad.
Rune forced herself to take her stare off the floor and look at Strad, because she knew, she knew he’d be looking at her.
She didn’t want to see what he was about to show her.
She shook her head and the tears standing in her eyes overflowed. “No. Berserker. God, no. The portal will close.”
“Sweetheart,” was all he could manage, but that was enough.
She pushed her fist against her mouth, unable to stop crying, to stop shaking.
He leaned forward, still holding his son, and kissed her forehead. “Go now.”
And really, what choice did she have?
She’d understood when she brought him there what his decision might be.
She turned away, her body shaking, her heart breaking, and when he called her name, just before she left the room, she thought maybe…maybe he’d changed his mind.
“I love you,” he said.
She nodded, smiling through her tears. “I know.” Then she turned to leave.
And once again, for the last time, she stopped before she went through the doorway. “In the morning I‘ll be just inside the gates of Wormwood. If you can’t come…”
He just nodded.
“Brasque,” she said. “Walk with me. I need a word.”
After her talk with Flesh Shimmer lord, she walked away with a heavy heart and a velvet-lined case containing Owen Five’s eyes.
She forced herself to leave the castle, the shimmer, and the berserker.
And she didn’t look back.
That night, she buried her pain and swallowed her sorrow in the arms of her Z.
She’d have to live with a shattered heart for eternity, because she would live forever and her heart would never mend.
Chapter Fifty-Four
The next morning, she met with the citizens of Skyll. It was time to do her one last duty and appoint a king.
“Lex. Say something.” She’d chosen Wormwood for the gathering. It felt right. Wormwood was part of them all.
And afterwards, she was going home.
She stood on a rock the size of a car. It was completely flat on the top with enough step-like indentations to make climbing it easy.
Z, Owen, Strad, and Roma stood a little distance away, giving her some time alone with Lex. She’d almost decided to keep the story of Ariessin from Lex. Almost.
Lex shook her head. “I don’t know what to say. I have a father. A demon. A man with a fucking name. And he’s here.” She turned to pace the rock, hugging herself. “I knew he was here. Remember?”
“I remember.”
Rune’s spark was dimming.
She was so tired. Tired of losing people.
Tired of choices.
She had
to go home. She could not leave a world full of Others—their numbers already lessening because of her—to die.
She could not leave Jack to his demons. She could not leave the twins, or Raze. She could never leave her Ellie.
“Lex,” she asked. “What are you thinking?”
Lex couldn’t look at her.
“Oh, Lex.”
“I need to see to my own destiny. I need to find my blood. My roots. I need to find a parent better than the one I grew up with. But I can’t stay if I’m worried about you. Tell me you’ll be okay. Tell me that, promise me that, and let me go, Rune.” She sobbed, her hands crossed over her heart.
Holding in the pain.
“Okay, baby. Do what you have to do.”
“It won’t be goodbye,” Lex said, desperately. “I’ll come home.”
But she knew the portal would close with Rune’s departure.
She knew it would be goodbye.
Rune understood. She’d wanted the same things Lex wanted. Had wanted them for so very long. Of course she understood.
She didn’t like it, but Lex…
Lex needed to follow her own path.
“Lex. If Ariessin is your father, and he’s one of my creators…”
Lex’s eyes widened and she slapped a hand over her mouth. Her eyes filled immediately with tears. “Don’t say it,” she finally whispered. “Don’t make it harder.”
So Rune shut her mouth and pulled the girl to her. She held her for as long as she could.
Not forever, because she had to go home.
She had to.
Finally, she went to Z.
“I wouldn’t hesitate,” he said, his arms around her. “If I could go with you, I would go. I…God, I love you, Rune Alexander. I’ve loved you forever.”
She closed her eyes and pressed her face into his chest, barely able to speak. “I’m losing you again. I’m losing everyone. And it feels like dying.”
“Stay, sweet thing,” he begged. “Stay with me.”
Stay.
“Will I forget?” she asked. “Will I forget Ellis? Will I forget Gunnar? Will I forget that I withheld the cure from a world of sick and dying Others?”
“I don’t know,” he murmured.
“I can’t forget who I am. I have to go home.”
He pressed his lips to the top of her head. “I know.”
“Z. My Z.”
“I will never forget I love you,” he said.
