THE SKY BURNED RED. Not just the red of fire, but the red of a wound, raw and bleeding. Clouds dripped fire like lava, and the once-picturesque mountain landscape now looked like the fangs of some broken beast. Flames roared on the hillside, weaving trails of smoke up into the air as lightning forked back and forth with strobe-like speed. Everything was heat and fury. Every hair on Tenn’s body stood on end, his Spheres echoing the destruction around him. And yet, in spite of the havoc that wove like madness through the countryside, the town below was strangely untouched. Only a few fires leaped between buildings, snaring the dark shadows that raced through the streets. Tenn knew Devon was trying to avoid the innocent lives that swarmed near the outer wall. Trying, and probably failing. There were just too many to save.
Dreya paused in the doorway and turned to him. Her breath was still erratic, and she looked paler than usual, as though her skin was becoming translucent. She reached out a shaky hand and took Tenn’s arm.
“I must go help my brother,” she said.
“Is Jarrett...?”
“Alive. With Devon. Though we will speak of what happened later. You must finish this.” She took a deep breath. Swayed. “I am no help. I should not have killed the Breathless One like that. Anger overtook...”
Tenn reached out, steadied her.
She shook him off. When she looked at him, her eyes were fierce, even if the rest of her seemed uncertain.
“Leanna cannot make it out alive,” she said. “End this.”
His legs were lead. He’d already run in here alone. But to be left amid the destruction?
“I can’t—”
She shook her head.
“Your pain gives you strength,” she said. Another chill swept through him. Did she know she was repeating Tomás’s words? “And that will help you win this fight. Just don’t let your pain consume you.”
Air flickered in Dreya’s throat. It was faint, barely a trace of its normal strength, but the wind still whipped around her and sent her white coat fluttering. She lifted herself up, hovered a few inches above the ground. “Good luck,” she said. “We will see you on the other side.”
And with that, she shot through the air like an arrow, speeding toward her brother.
It wasn’t until he turned to find the Kin that he realized her parting words were far from comforting.
* * *
Tomás was near, that much was certain—the incubus’s tracking rune glowed in Tenn’s mind, a red lace against the fibers of the Howl’s heart. Tenn ran around to the back of the house. His body screamed with protest, but he shut it down, deep in the recesses he usually reserved for silencing Water’s screams. Those, he let loose. If ever there was a time to drown in the wrongs he had suffered, in the rage he wanted so badly to unleash on the world, it was now. He had Jarrett back, sure. But he was done with being used. It was time to use his power.
He found Tomás in the courtyard. The house formed a horseshoe around a cleared space that had, at one time, been beautiful. Now it was the scene of an eerily silent apocalypse.
Every window facing the yard was blown out and gaping, shards of glass sticking from the churned mud like incisors. Chunks of concrete jutted from the soil, along with toppled trees and statuary. The earth itself rippled like static waves in a black sea. In the center of it all was Tomás, standing on a dais of black marble.
And there, at his feet, lying in a circle of frost and snapped icicles, was Leanna. Tenn thought she was dead. He stopped in his tracks and stared at them. Tomás glared down at his sister, his chest heaving, his whole body shaking. For a moment, he thought the man was mourning. Then the sound of thunder faded, and he realized Tomás was laughing.
“Worthless, she said.” His voice made Tenn take a step back. He’d seen Tomás upset. Now he seemed unhinged. “Who is worthless now? Dear, dear sister, how sweet you look like this.” He knelt down, one knee crushing into her chest. She gasped, and Tenn felt his lungs expand. “Now who is helpless, sister dear? Now whose heart is made of ice?”
Tomás’s hand snapped forward, quicker than lightning, and Leanna spasmed. His wrist sunk deep into her chest. She didn’t bleed. Just arched against his hand, a soft cry escaping her lips. Another snap motion, and he pulled his arm back in a spray of broken bone and old blood. He held something up in the red twilight.
Her heart.
Tenn watched in horror as Tomás’s fingers clenched the red muscle. It didn’t beat, not like in the movies. Instead, the crimson flesh turned black under his fingertips. It was only when it began to crush in his grip, falling to the ground in sand-fine wisps, that Tenn realized Tomás had frozen it. Tomás let the last of the shards filter through his fingers before standing. He looked down at his sister, still writhing on her bed of ice. Then he turned his head, ever so slowly, and stared straight at Tenn.
“I had hoped,” he said, hopping off the dais and taking a limping step toward him, “that you would arrive in time to see that.” He snickered and his whole body convulsed. The air around him shivered red.
“She fought well, my sister. So very well. But she is not used to killing anymore. No, no, that never was her joy. She let others do it for her. That was her mistake. Her big mistake.”
Tenn took a half step back. The roar in his head faltered, his heart thudding in his chest. With every step closer, the air around Tenn grew both colder and hotter, sending sweat and chills down his skin. He was weaponless, exhausted.
He was no match against Tomás.
“She’s not dead, of course. I couldn’t do that. What would they say? Tomás, Tomás, youngest brother, what have you done? Hah!” He did a little jump, and Tenn jumped back. “I saved the rest for you, little mouse. I saved you the best part.”
Tenn looked past Tomás, to where Leanna lay frozen on the ground. How was she still alive? Could the Kin even be killed?
“Ah, he wonders now.” Tomás’s voice was singsong. He paused a few feet away and cocked his head to the side. Tenn’s heart raged with fear and revulsion and desire. The damn incubus was still toying with him. “He wonders why. Why why why me? Why must I be the one who kills the beast? And how?”
Tomás shuddered, and his next words were terrifyingly sane.
“Thou art the reaper,” he said grimly, “and the world shall bleed at thy hands.”
“I’m sick of playing your games,” Tenn hissed.
“But we’ve only just started to play,” Tomás replied. His grin widened.
The next moment, he was on Tenn, forcing him to the ground and pinning his arms to his sides. The ground was cold and wet, but Tenn’s skin burned at Tomás’s touch. The Howl’s face loomed just inches from his own, only a few, delectable inches. Tenn gritted his teeth and looked to the side, to where Leanna was sprawled much like he was. In spite of the heat roaring off the incubus, the ground around them cracked with cold.
“Now he sees,” Tomás said, half to himself. “Now he sees my power. Now they all will see my power!”
“You’re insane,” Tenn said.
“Those who hear not the music,” Tomás replied, singsong. Another roar filled the sky and he chuckled, sitting back on Tenn’s chest to look to the heavens. Somewhere out there, Tenn heard the unmistakable sound of tornadoes. At least Dreya had made it to her brother safely.
“If you’re going to kill me, just do it,” Tenn said. He forced himself to look Tomás in the face, forced down the whirl of emotions that the damned incubus stirred in his chest. Oh, how he wanted to rip the man apart, just as much as he wanted to rip off his few clothes and make him scream in other ways. Tenn’s heart hurt as Tomás’s empty Sphere tugged.
“Kill you?” Tomás said. His head tilted to the other side. “Why would I kill the man who will rule beside me as king?” His words were smooth, remarkably sane in spite of the madness in his glowing copper eyes. He reached down and gently placed his hand against Tenn’s jaw. The movement was so intimate Tenn wanted to vomit. He wanted it to go further.
“We will be gods,” Tomás said. “Can’t you see? Consider this the day of your ascension.”
Then, before Tenn could grasp what he was saying, Tomás bent down and kissed him.
The Howl’s lips were cinnamon and fire, the bite of brimstone and ice. It sent ice through Tenn’s skin, traced waves of blinding heat down his spine. He wanted to resist. Wanted to hate the monster that had torn his whole world apart. He wanted to, for what Tomás had done—to him, to the twins, to Jarrett. He told himself he wanted to hate Tomás. He told himself...
But under the magic of the incubus, his resolve gave way. Every pulse was a roar in his veins, every second a floating eternity. His back arched against his will, his whole body desiring to be closer, to lose itself in an embrace that tore everything else away. The world around them faded, everything distilled to their lips, to Tomás’s burning hand on his face. The world was red and black and frosted like hell, and Tenn melted. The fear. The anger. The desire for revenge. All of it burned to ash.
When Tomás pulled back, he smiled down at Tenn with a smoldering light in his eyes. Tenn’s head swam. His lips tingled. His chest burned and heart fluttered. Tomás stood in one smooth motion and reached down, helped Tenn to his feet. Tenn didn’t resist. He floated in a world of static and heat. The ground beneath his feet was light as clouds. He let Tomás guide him over to where Leanna rested on her bed of ice. Her dark hair stuck to the ground, frosted around her head like dead veins. There was a hole in her rib cage, but it didn’t bleed. It didn’t repulse him. Her dull eyes flickered. They were skimmed over, cloudy, but they fixed on Tenn and widened.
“Do it,” Tomás whispered, his lips brushing promises against Tenn’s ear. Tenn’s heart soared. “Her broken Sphere is the only thing keeping her alive. Rip it out.”
Tenn knelt at Leanna’s side, Tomás’s hands on his shoulders. Leanna tried to open her mouth, but her lips were frosted shut. Her skin was dusted with white.
He could feel her twisted Sphere. Air still hungered in her throat, still tried to steal the breath from his lungs. He reached down in a haze. Her flesh was colder than ice beneath his grip, but he barely felt it, not with Tomás so near. The incubus burned like a sun, and Tenn floated in the heat.
Leanna didn’t scream when Tenn dug his fingers into her throat. She couldn’t.
Her flesh gave way as easily as burned paper, crisping and collapsing. He jerked his hands, and her throat caved in on itself as ash. Leanna’s eyes fluttered wide. Then they rolled back in her head, and her body paled to ivory white.
“You have done well, my prince,” Tomás whispered into his ear. The man knelt beside him, wrapping his arms around Tenn’s chest and stomach, holding him tight to the inferno. Tenn burned in bliss. “Now, to take care of your other half.”
The monster kissed the back of Tenn’s neck, made fire swell across his skin. Tenn shivered with sudden cold. His eyes shut on their own accord. Other half? Jarrett’s face fluttered through his mind, along with the boy he’d seen in the vision.
His heart panicked as Tomás drained his heat with the press of his lips. But it was mild, distant. None of it mattered, not so long as Tomás was there. So long as he had the heat. The heat and the life and the power. Then his heart slowed. Stopped.
Before he could wonder if it would ever beat again, the world went dark and numb.