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CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

For an instant, the sky exploded in a churning blast of fire before the fire itself started to splash down on us.
 

I smashed into Darien, bounced off him and quickly moved higher while the fire started to consume him.
 

Below us, the pond was ablaze, as were the trees, the grass, the gravestones and every member of his coven.
 
It was as if we were in the midst of a napalm blast or a nuclear holocaust.
 
But even at this height, I could see Darien’s witches running for protection while Paisley and her crew, cloaked in the safety of their invisible shields, moved in to slice off their heads.

Darien was caught in a maelstrom of smoke and fire.
 
His skin was shrinking, tightening.
 
His clothes had burned off him.
 
The fire was beginning to eat into him, exposing muscle and cartilage as he hung there, naked, still stunned that I’d been able to create this.
 

I raised my hands and began to drive bolts of electricity into his heart.
 
If ever there was an opportunity to kill him, it was now.
 
I fed the electricity with everything I had until he started to shake.

But even in this state, he was able to fight back, which alarmed me given the deteriorating state of his body.
 
With his ruined hands, he grabbed the bolts as if they were physical ropes and whipped them in such a way that I flipped backward and slammed against a tree.

Only it wasn’t a tree.
 

It was Anna, who also was on fire.
 
As Darien rose up to meet us, I found myself in the frightening position of being between them.
 
The fire didn’t appear to be weakening them, though it was wreaking havoc on their bodies.
 
How much longer could they take this?
 
Neither appeared to be concerned that flames were consuming them.
 
They seemed oblivious to it, as if they knew it wouldn’t end them.

They drew closer.
 
The fire bit into what was left of their skin and cut into their bones.
 
The sweet scent of burning flesh fueled the air.

“He’s mine,” Anna said to Darien.
 
“Let me show him what it’s really like to get his ass kicked.”
 
She glared at me, her eyeballs unusually large due to her fried and drooping sockets.
 
“You
think
you know what it’s like to have someone take you down, but you have no idea, boy.
 
Sometimes, you don’t come out alive.
 
Sometimes you wind up dead.”

She pulled back her right fist and punched me in the face with everything she had.
 
Darien gripped me by the shoulders and she did it again.
 
I tried to free myself, but couldn’t.
 
He was too strong.
 
Again she hit me.
 
And again.
 
Each time she did so, her burning fist scorched my face.
 
My head started to spin from the sheer force of the blows.
 
I watched her pull back her arm and before I could stop her, she gave it her all and punched me in the chest, where the amulets were roasting.

“Pull out his heart,” Darien said.
 
“Yank it free and feed it to him.
 
Then we take the amulets.”

“Just his heart?” she asked.
 
“What about his balls?”

He ripped open my shirt, exposing my chest and the amulets.
 
In a daze, I looked around and saw that no one was there to help me.
 
No one was there to save me.
 
This was the end of me and there was no one here to stop it or even witness it.
 
I’d die by their hands and before long, with the exception of Jennifer and Alex, I’d join Jim in being forgotten forever.
 

How had I gotten here?
 
Who was I to think that I’d ever be able to stand up to both of them at once?
 
What a fool I’d been to think that my life would end positively.
 
I was the same weak disappointment I’d always been and they were making a mockery of it.

Anna reached for the amulets and began to tug on them.
 
“These first,” she said.
 
“We don’t want them lost.”

“Pull them over his head.”

She started to lift them off me.
 

And then, from below:
 
“Darien….”

Her hands froze as each of us looked down at the dozens of witches soaring up to meet us.
 
The fire had no effect on them.
 
I saw women, men and children of all ages, their faces alight in the whirling blaze.
 

They surrounded us.

Sensing danger, Darien let go of me.
 
Anna dropped the amulets and edged back.

“You killed me,” one woman said to him.
 
She was beautiful, her dark hair pulled away from her face in a bun.
 
“I was in the kitchen making a pie, you walked inside and killed me.
 
Why did you kill me?”

“And me,” a young boy said.
 
“I was cleaning the barn.
 
Papa asked me to do it because he hurt his back in the field.
 
You killed me, too.
 
You took me from my parents and then you killed them.”

“He killed all of us,” an elderly man said.

Anna was looking around at them.
 
When she turned away from me, I took a chance and slipped behind her, my head still thick from the beating.

“I was at a brook,” a young man said.
 
“I was fishing.
 
I’d done nothing to you and yet you killed me.
 
Why did you kill me?”

As more people rose up and the distraction grew into a cacophony of voices demanding why they had been silenced, I imagined a machete in my right hand.

“Why do you think?” Darien said.
 
“You died because none of you deserved to live.
 
You had your chance to come to me and serve your king.
 
To be turned by your king.
 
To honor your king.
 
I offered you that chance, but you didn’t want it.
 
You spat on the opportunity.
 
You humiliated me.
 
You died because of that and because you chose Paisley White, instead.”

“Paisley White is the truth.”

“Paisley White is good.”

“Paisley White is the White Queen.”

Paisley White is behind you.

I turned and saw Paisley about a hundred yards away from me, hovering within a stand of trees.

How long have you been there?

Long enough.

Why didn’t you help me?

Because I knew they were coming.
 
And also because I knew it was critical that you rely on yourself, which you did.
 
I saw what was happening.
 
If I had to, I was prepared to intervene.

I want to take them out now.

You need to do what’s right for you.
 
You can kill Anna and you can kill Darien, or you can let them do it.
 
But you need to act fast.
 
And you need to be ready.
 
The fire may have disfigured them, but it won’t kill them.
 
They’re just as powerful as they’ve always been.

I turned and knew there was only one way to do this.
 
I lifted the machete and as I did, one of the children cried out for me to stop.
 
“No,” she said.
 
“Let us do it!”

There was a silence as all eyes turned to me.

Time seemed to stop.

Anna whirled around with her melting face and saw the machete held high above my head.
 
She looked at me in surprise and was about to push me away when I swiped the blade clean through her neck and she exploded in a gust of dust.

There was a collective gasp.
 

“You killed her.”

“She’s dead.”

“You killed Anna.”

“Why did you kill her?”

“We’re here to kill them.”

Darien started to retreat.

“I killed her out of self-defense,” I said.
 
“She nearly killed me.”

“She murdered me,” someone said.

“And me.”

“She killed me while I was asleep.”

“We wanted to kill her.”

“It should have been us.”

“Then let me offer you this,” I said.

“What?”

“What can you offer us?”

“What prize could possibly take the place of her?”

I pointed at Darien.
 
“The man who turned her.
 
Anna always was the one I wanted.
 
He’s nothing to me.
 
He’s a burning piece of shit.
 
If you want him, take him.
 
He’s yours.”

The moment I spoke, Darien fled into the fiery night.
 
He was outnumbered and he knew it, but there was no way he was going down without a fight.
 
He swept through the trees in an effort to confuse them and to keep them off him.
 
He cut through the heavy branches and the narrow twigs with skills none of them possessed.
 

But as talented as he was, it was no use.
 
There were too many of them.
 
They swarmed him.
 
Worse, he couldn’t hide from them.
 
He was leaving a trail of smoke and fire, which all of them followed.
 

Paisley moved beside me and together, we watched the ugly throes of the end of his life.
 

“A long time ago, I actually had hope for him,” she said.
 
“When he first came here, we were friends.
 
But then it became all about power, as it does for so many people.
 
That’s what mattered most to him.
 
That’s what will end his life now.
 
Over the years, when people came to me seeking new lives, he took it personally and killed them when he learned that I turned them.
 
With the help of the High Priestess, I eventually ended that, but not soon enough.”

We watched Darien carve around the cemetery, dive into the fiery pond, shoot through the boiling water and spring out on the other side.
 
And right there, a band of witches was waiting for him.
 

One grabbed his leg as he tried to pass and it cost him his balance.
 
A young man flew beside him and yanked off his right arm.
 
Darien lifted himself higher but his momentum was shot.
 
They tackled him in mid-air and started to rip him apart while he screamed not in fear or in pain, but in utter outrage that this was happening to him.
 
An elderly woman flew up behind him and wrapped her arms around his head.
 
With a quick twist and a yank, she wrenched it free and his body turned to ash.