Linda Robertson - Fatal Circle

“Get out of there!” I screamed. My voice was lost to the lashing wind. “All of you run away. Run now!”

The beam came ashore. Where the beam touched sand its progress was slowed, and a dark strip of something glossy was left in its wake.

Glass. The temperature required for that—

The beam ran across the middle of the dragon coughing up blood—it was cut in half and left nothing in its wake! The superheated light was incinerating nearly everything it encountered.

The Beholders ran—the young painter with the broken demeanor of a pit-fighting dog was among them. He stumbled. Clawing at the sand, desperate to get up, he managed to rise to one knee just as the beam struck his still-extended foot. He lurched forward and sideways. Relentless, the beam passed over his legs. His scream was unlike anything I’d ever heard: pure agony enunciated. When the beam moved on, his legs were just . . . gone. His clothes were consumed in flames.

Fax Torris guided the beam, keeping it trained on those fleeing. The molten light destroyed two more. Then the fire fairy seemed to notice Mountain. And Johnny.

She shifted the death-bringing radiance toward them.

Menessos, taking my dagger from me and casting it to the sand, put the willow wand into my hands. “The sacrifices you have made, you made only to see that things are done right,” he said.

He aimed the tip of the wand at his chest. “Do this,” he said. “It is the right thing, for the right reason.”

“No.” Horrified, I backpedaled. Limp fingers let the wand fall to the sand.

“There isn’t time to debate, Persephone! I cannot call her. This is the only way to sever the bonds so you can seal the gateway.”

“No,” I whispered.

Menessos took up the wand and staggered to his feet. My legs were jelly. He placed the wand— a stake! —into my limp hands, curled my fingers around it. “Let’s give her what she wants. Free her. Let her go home and take her madness with her.”

“Menessos.” I drew a breath. My words came back to haunt me. When have I not accepted the responsibility thrust upon me? When have I drawn the line and said “No, this is too much”? “No. No. Here, at this, I’m drawing the line,” I said. “ This is too much.”

“You are my master, Persephone. I accept what that means. The good and the bad.” He stood straighter. “For you, I will experience death.” He opened his shirt and bared his chest.

I beheld Arthur. My hero and king.

I thought of Seven. She’d chosen love over destiny. Seven believed herself a failure for her choice. Johnny might be dead already. And Menessos was telling me to kill him, as well. Destiny sucked.

“Take pity, Persephone, do not draw this out.”

I nodded, once.

But I couldn’t do it.

I grabbed him into my arms and I pressed my lips to his.

A rush of heat blossomed around me. Was it Menessos’s heat or the charm redirecting something dangerous?

The charm.

Screams erupted to my right. I broke the kiss to see two witches taken by the beam, reduced to nothing in an instant. They were trying to stop Fax Torris, drawing the beam away. But she was back on target.

Menessos whispered, “ In signum amoris. ”

Staring into his eyes, I drew on our bond, just enough. I held him in my mind because I could not hold him in my arms.

“By your hand, let it be done.”

My heart thudded once and my world slowed as battle-heightened senses went dull. I heard only my own tardy heartbeat in my ears, the shift of fabric as I drew back my arm.

Johnny. And now Menessos.

Seven was right. There was no romance in war.

I accept the good and the bad.

I staked Menessos.

I didn’t look away from his eyes, even to see his crimson life leaking away. The drops splattered warm across my hand, and spilled down his chest in a gush that should not have been possible. I felt the life leaving him, fleeing him almost as if his heart had seized up, forcing all his blood out at once to make a quick end. He made no sound. He drew no breath, let none escape. But his set jaw slackened.

I knew a choking thick darkness was swallowing him.

His knees gave. But his gray eyes never left mine.

All the threads that held us were taut; stretching, threatening to snap. I felt the cords grow thin, frayed with his dying. The friction of my will against this inevitable death grew white hot. All at once it snapped.

My hands shot out, fisting in his shirt, clutching his body. I went down on my knees, too . . . and still he was slowly slumping away from me. I pulled him back into my arms. I will not let go . His head fell forward to rest on my shoulder. Clinging to him, I wept.

I will not let go .

Wiping my hand across my face, my tears mixed with the blood on my fingertips. I drew the five-pointed star on his forehead. A witch’s symbol. “You are mine.”

Even with my lids shut tight, I could not dam the flow of more tears.

“Element of Earth! I call you to my circle.” My voice cracked and I choked. “Element of Air! I call you to my circle. Element of Fire! I call you to my circle. Element of Water! I call you to my circle.” My words were bitter, mumbled sobs, as I gave in to the grief and cradled Menessos to me.

Such a long, long life, and so devastating that it should end this way, over fairies he had only sought in desperation to find the end of his curse. A curse that made him all he now was. I was bringing to fruition the ending Ezreniel intended from the start.

Eyes still shut—I could not look at him—I raised my head high and cried out, “Goddess! Hear me!” My voice was clear and defiant.

This guarantee, sealed by me,

by your blood and by my tears.

This guarantee, sealed by me,

the promise of many more years!

I yanked the wand from his chest. On my end of our severed bond, frayed edges became taloned claws. Mine. The claws surged into the receding dark, grasping for the threads. Mine. I willed more strength down the line, to coil about the cords and refasten them, stronger than before. Mine!

And my second hex filled Menessos.

“As I will, so mote it be!” I whispered.

A quartet of odd sounds answered. My eyelids parted a crack. Blinking away tears, I peered around me. A tremulous sigh escaped as I assured myself what I was seeing was real.

Around my circle, what remained of the elementals stood poised and regal, watching me. They had come at my call, stood at my circle.

The unicorn nickered, bowed, then craned his graceful neck toward the shore as if to say, Can we finish this now?

The gateway!

Slipping from under Menessos’s body, I assured myself that Mountain had Johnny. The big man was on his knees still, dragging the inert body of the Domn Lup farther onshore. He gave no indication that Johnny was alive. With all that was going on, all I’d just done, my senses and emotions were overloaded. I did not dare try using our bond to confirm my fears. I had to finish this.Someone was running down the shoreline from the lighthouse. Kirk.

I tore off my blazer and hoodie, covering Menessos against the rising sun.

Vilna-Daluca and a handful of other witches continued to battle Fax Torris.

The bonds were broken. The fairy was free and she had to know it. Still, she made no effort to fly away, no attempt to flee. She wanted to fight.

Vilna-Daluca had said they could handle this, but at what cost? Even as I watched, that beam claimed another witch’s life.

Let her take her madness home with her.

No. She wasn’t going to get away. This was one fairy who wasn’t going to go home and live happily ever after.