Page 91 of Stars in Aura

Ki’Remi sensed something cold settle in his stomach. ‘So what did you do?’

She exhaled. ‘I attempted to barter the remaining souls in the jar for his freedom.’

‘Sulfiqar refused,’ Ki’Remi concluded.

She released an acute breath, something like grief flickering across her face. ‘Indeed. He sent a messenger instead.’

‘To negotiate?’

‘To punish me.’

Ki’Remi’s body went still.

She lifted a hand, pressing two fingers to her pulse point. ‘I had turned mySsignakhtpotency into good, healing patients at a clinic in New Savartin. He came disguised as a patient. When I leaned in to heal him, he used Sacran sorcery on me that delivered a new malediction.’

Ki’Remi’s gut clenched. ‘The everlovin?’

Issa’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘A divination that reacts with my innate Ssignakht power. I’m able to propel, blast, and generate explosions with the ability also to empower anything touched or used. I’m a pure weapon of energy. I can create and project photon pillars, spikes, vortexes, beams, and lasers that obliterate matter at a subatomic level. I was and still am one ofthe most potent warriors in the Ssigis war machinery. My father was even more formidable than I. This curse, however, ratcheted up my powers, and now, if I can’t drain the power build, it’ll kill me within 73 hours.’

She tapped the chrono again.

The numbers kept counting down.

‘If I don’t use the healing aspect of mySsignakhtlife force every seventy-three hours,’ she said, voice razor-thin, ‘I implode.’

The words sent a cold shock through him.

‘A cruel execution,’ he murmured, realization hitting hard.

She nodded. ‘It’s one way to compel me to hand over what they want: the jar of souls. However, I refuse to surrender to them without my father’s full release from the freakish soul stone. That’s why I fled to Eden II and took a Pegasi medical certification, which I aced given my experience. I then worked at a local clinic before applying as a surgeon on the Perseus Prime. By moving around a lot, the Ssigis hunters can’t find me while I buy my father time and work on navigating this nightmare.’

Ki’Remi inhaled a deep, measured breath as he processed the impossible.

She was a fallen celestial being who defied the gods.

She stole what was never meant to be taken.

Yet she wasn’t done fighting.

‘You’ve been playing a dangerous game, Elaris,’ he rasped, edged with a dark sentiment.

She exhaled with a humorless laugh. ‘Oh, trust me. I’m well aware.’

His eyes locked onto hers. ‘You think you can keep this up forever?’

Her fingers curled against the table. ‘I have no other choice. I have to force them to stop the agony the stone is inflicting on my father. I will prevail.’

He huffed. ‘By the sounds of it, your Divine Immortal Ruler is a sadist who probably enjoys what he’s doing to your father.’

His voice was quiet, but the truth of his words was crushing.

Her throat tightened. ‘He does, but if I stop now,babadies.’

Ki’Remi’s jaw ticked. ‘If you keep going, you’ll die.’

She held his gaze, her expression unyielding.

‘I know.’

---