The COMPLETE Witching Pen Series, Boxed Set (86 page)

“…he watched her from afar. He always knew she was there, but he could never bring himself to even touch her. The depth of her love for all things dwarfed him, for he was ruined in a way she never would be, and he remembered how she had loved so wholly in the beginning, even though she had forgotten … loved in a way he had had stolen from him.”

She forced herself back down, forced her eyes open, but didn’t know if she succeeded, for all she could make out were sparks of dust. Was that her arm right in front of her, resting on his chest? It looked like glitter…
I’m turning into dust – dust to dust – defences, crumbling…
 

From somewhere off in the distance, she thought she heard the roar of a Dragon, or it could have been the ocean, but how nice it would be if the beautiful beasts had come to greet her … it was so hard to stay down here. Her entire being swelled with a deep gratitude for her existence …
how strange to feel it now, when it has all come to an end
… but her soul grew lighter than it had been for a long time. Where once, Tír na nÓg would have been the centre of her gravity, pulling her down and keeping her grounded, it now felt as if it were releasing her from duty; giving her to the winds…

‘Change is the only constant…’
 

“…and he prayed that she would see how strong she was – had always been – that it was the armour and the bitterness and the fear that made her perceive herself as weak, and not her love; that beneath that insurmountable wall she had built, the pulse of Tír na nÓg still beat; her compassion still flowed freely…”

‘You gave it freely…’
 

“…that in the very end, she refound her strength through her accidental mortality, for through mortality and all of its vulnerabilities, she learned how to love again…”

Love … a voice … Abaddon’s voice? The Dragon’s voice?
Strangely, the voice sounded a bit like her own, and the last of the stone around her heart fell away…
This is who I am…
 

“…and love is the greatest strength of all.”

How long had it been?

“The end.”

It felt like the wind kissed the top of her head.

“I love you,” she uttered, to anyone and no one. To the first angel, to Dragons, to the past and the future; to the land that she finally let go of. “I love you,” she said, to the world that had looked after her for too long to count, and as she faded to dust that sparkled on the wind, she heard the world whisper back,
“And I love you.”
 

~*~

The teardrop on his chest throbbed painfully as if in sympathy with his own tears which streaked down his face, made cool by the early morning breeze.

That Morgana had found peace was a blessing, but he wept for the end of, not just an era, but an entire age so old, it outdid time itself.

Her race had given them a home when they had had nowhere to go.

His hands gleamed with fairy dust and more than that: the last of the fairy queen’s essence. The fay were gone.

Ymari’s heavy tear brought his attention back to his own mortality.

Abaddon gathered himself, planted his feet firmly into the sand and stood up tall.

Because this was it.

Now, it began.

On cue, San Francisco rumbled under his feet.

~*~

The massive quake – the second one in half an hour – would have knocked Elena off her feet if she hadn’t already been sitting. But as it was, she’d spent the last few minutes aligning herself with the planet and finding the right spot to enter it from. Well, she’d found it – she was sitting on it.

She’d also reached her mother telepathically and asked her to make her way here. For some reason, she couldn’t reach her grandfather, which didn’t bode well. She hoped Amy was all right, although given the ferocity of the current quake…

“I think this is it,” squeaked Katarra from her right. The demon looked both excited and fearful, although a deep sorrow shadowed her features: she was now the only Brujii remaining.

Elena leaned towards her and kissed her cheek in reassurance. Whatever the outcome, she couldn’t say she would have made it this far without her. A warm affection for the demon took her over. “I think you’re right.”

Katarra’s four ‘gifts’ had been delicious and more than gratifying. Magic coursed through her in vast amounts, and completely filled up her succubus, but the succubus had not gone. She was still here on the surface, content, but strong, willing to work with the witch to bring this Dragon into the sky.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Katarra, clutching the grass for balance as the tremors continued.

“The Dragon must rise safely for everyone’s sake, and the sooner, the better.” She reached into her pocket to pull out Mary’s necklace.

Her hand barely grazed it when the spoken words from behind her brought all her senses to a screeching halt. She almost screamed when she heard his voice. “Oh, I beg to differ.”

They both swivelled and rose to find Karl – or God – standing some feet away.

“Humans are a creation I should have ended a long time ago – they destroy everything they touch. They’re a cancer upon the planet. I thought they could be redeemed, maybe through purgation, but I should have known … I should have known the moment the darkness touched Eve.” Something she couldn’t name flickered over his face. “I was supposed to protect her, you know.”

She stood her ground against another thunderous roll of the Earth.
How did I not feel him approach?
 

Because he isn’t there anymore,
came the very quiet answer which she chose to ignore, although she all at once realised she wasn’t nearly as strong as she thought.

God wore Karl like a comfy second skin, still in the same clothes he had worn almost twenty-four hours ago when they'd left the penthouse. And it was still Karl’s baby-blue eyes, his cheeky smile, his sun-kissed hair that stared back at her; she still saw the seven-year old boy she’d first laid eyes on, and she felt stitch after stitch of her own self fraying.

“If that’s what you’ve come to think of humans, you’re missing the finer details. The man whose body you’ve stolen is the epitome of light and grace,” she bit out, without bothering to hide her hot tears.

“Darling,” he coaxed in a tone too familiar, too gentle, and then before she could blink he had his fingers in her hair as he cupped her face.

Frozen in place, she could think of nothing except Karl’s touch, some part of her hoping against hope that he was still in there, even as she knew she should be throwing him off.

“My dear succubus … remember that when you’re draining his light from him. Now, wish me luck, like a good girlfriend should.” His mouth sealed hers in a searing kiss, which she partially melted into, unbidden, then wrenched herself from with a yelp of pain when his teeth sank into her lip, not quite drawing blood.

He looked at her in both bemusement and disgust. “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” he sneered. Then, “I can smell Brujii on your breath.”

On the force of his will, Katarra – who Elena knew had stepped back to save the little magic she had left – went spinning across the air and landed smack against a tree.

Elena hollered and drew on her own power, but half a second too late.

Karl’s golden glow burst from him and another cry of pain sounded from her as she landed on her back, the wind knocked out of her and her skin burning.

Trembling, she sat up and took in the front of her clothes, mortified. They had mostly melted away, her skin underneath, red and blistering.

He had scorched her with his glow.

Karl now stood where she had been sitting and drew out Gwain’s sword. He laughed at her, no doubt finding her forlorn expression amusing. “Don’t tell me you were fed some crap about an angel’s glow being a sign of love or something. It’s an expression of feeling; most of them feel
too
much. Another fault I’ll have to fix.”

With a war-cry, he drove the sword into the spot that would split the Earth open, and split it open it did, although she was sure it screamed its anguish through every blade of grass. She grew momentarily nauseous as if mirroring what the Earth felt, and then the moment was gone and she was struggling to get to her feet, ignoring the way her damaged skin stretched at her movements.

The split in the ground turned into an ever-growing gash that might as well have torn the planet in half. The sound of it ripping was something she’d hear for the rest of her life. Using Mary’s necklace in a spell, the way she had planned to, would never have caused this much pain.
Guess that’s out the window.
 

She thought the gash would go on forever, but after a short while the sounds of breaking rock and rubbing plates stopped, plunging everything and everyone into a silence that could have been the land holding its breath for whatever happened next.

God stared at her with eyes that held a swarm of emotions, aeons old. That wasn’t what killed the hope left in her. What killed it was the realisation that, for the first time, she’d thought of him as God – not Karl.

‘You know, if anyone can beat this thing, it’s Karl.’
 

Fuck it, she couldn’t give up! He would never give up on her so easily. You didn’t need hope anyway, when you had nothing left to lose. She strengthened her resolve and strode towards him.

“Earth was Eden,” he said, those blue eyes that threatened to break her, hardening with his own resolve. “Eden is
mine
.”

With sword in hand, he jumped into the centre of the planet through the miles-long tear he had created.

With heart in hand, she followed.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“What the
hell
just happened?! Amy, you’re not supposed to teleport when you’re—”

“I didn’t!”

“But—”

“I didn’t – it wasn’t me!”

“Then who—”

“The baby! It was the baby.”

Paul stared at her in shock as her words rang in the air.

She said them again. “It was the baby, I swear. That’s where I felt everything shift from before we disappeared: the womb. The
baby
brought us here, I’m sure if it.”

Still wide-eyed, he took in their surroundings to establish exactly where ‘here’ was.

Amy huddled closer to him and brought her bedsheet over her shoulders because they were starting to burn.
And thank you, my beautiful boy, for letting me keep the bedsheet while we teleported.
 

She received a little kick in reply and she found herself smiling.

“Do you know where we are?” asked Paul.

She surveyed the landscape. They were in the desert, although this wasn’t a part of any desert she’d seen before … not that her desert trekking knowledge was particularly good or anything. “I think this is Dessec territory,” she replied.

“Are you sure?”

“No, but the baby’s part Dessec and here we are.”

Paul nodded. “Makes sense, I guess…”

All around them in the distance, dunes rose in peaks and valleys. They, themselves, stood in the centre of some kind of flat-level basin, and by God, did it ever catch the heat. The ground was baked dry, and caked with cracks that had swallowed up every last drop of water and still gaped open for more.

“We can’t stay here, we’ll die,” stated Paul.

“Well, I can’t teleport unless the baby wants to, and I get the distinct feeling he wants to be here.”

“But there’s nothing—”

“Oh, Paul…” Her voice trailed off on a gasp. “Look at that.”

Clocking her gaze, he turned to see what she was staring at. A “holy shit” told her when he’d spotted it.

“How can a tree grow like that here?” she wondered aloud, amazed at the sight.

“Because it is not just a tree,” came the answer from someone who wasn’t Paul.

They both spun back to find an old, Dessec woman, wrinkled with age and wearing a bright blue scarf, smiling at them. Her grin widened when she took in Amy’s belly under the sheet.

Paul coughed and yanked a corner of the sheet to wrap around his nudity. “My apologies. We appear to be here by accident.”

“No,” dismissed the woman. “Not an accident at all,” she stared straight at Amy, “is it?”

She shook her head, wondering if she should be more afraid, but this woman exuded a warmth through her toughened exterior that seemed somehow familiar.

“My name is Zaynolita. I am Pueblo’s
Bel’louma
– his grandmother. You, beautiful woman, are carrying my great grandchild.”

Amy’s mouth dropped open and Paul went positively pale beside her. Oh, right – ‘cause they were both naked and he was the baby’s other father. Well … this was awkward.

More Dessec approached them – maybe around fifteen – and surrounded them, encasing Paul, Amy and Pueblo’s grandmother within a circle.

“Er…” What the fuck should she say?

Paul seemed to be wheezing slightly, and suddenly the old female exploded in laughter, the noise sounding melodious and less like the cackle Amy would have expected. It reminded her of Pueblo’s bass notes.

She found herself smiling back.

“Come!” the grandmother exclaimed, and then clapped her hands, and four Dessec came in closer and bowed in front of her and Paul.

Next, they stood and gently steered them towards the sheltered tree.

“You are welcome here, and you will be cared for and cherished. I did not know for certain that my great grandson would choose to be birthed here, but I had hoped. Oh, yes, I had hoped. What a great pleasure to see him at least once before I pass into the unknown.”

Amy was at a loss for what to say. “I’m so sorry about what’s happening with the demon tribes.”

She clucked her tongue in dismissal of her words. “All great things must come to an end, and it is our time. Come, come, come.” She ushered them into the small wooden structure that covered the tree. Stepping into its shade, both she and Paul sighed in relief and surprise. This wasn’t just shaded, it was
cool
, as if the tree was some kind of air conditioner in disguise.