Page 142 of Soulgazer

“She proved you were,” Faolan rasps, bent over on the ground with his bloody lips drawn into a snarl. “Twice.Now let go of my wife, you sick son of a—”

Maccus is going to kill him. I don’t need magic to see it.

White spots dance across my vision like snow, mocking me as I reach out toward the Stone King, seeking any part of him uncovered by cloth. His focus lies on Faolan, so fiercely he doesn’t notice my hand until it scrapes against his cheek.

For a moment, we lock eyes and I seenothingin the depths of his own. The king is a living ghost—no, not quite alive. But not dead either. Something…other.

Maccus releases my throat and shoves me to the ground, breaking the spell. “You seek to drive out my mind, same as your father’s.”

“N-no! I’m only trying to—”

“I’ve heard enough.”

I cry out as he reaches for his sword just as the moonlight brightens, then seems to grab at the air around me. It urges the magic’s hum into a roar—soft and then so loud it seems to want to split my mind.

Maccus stops. Stares openmouthed. The others are watching, too—I feel their eyes like fingers as I collapse to the ground, grateful and horrified at once to see the moon is nearly aligned with the stars, which means I wasrightand Faolan won’t die.

But maybe I will.

Because power demands sacrifice, especially when wielded by the gods, and when Muireal plantedthispower in my bloodline, it was never meant to lie dormant. Yet five generations of my family have ignored it, allowing its roots to grow bitter andhungryin our souls. I was a fool to think only a few drops would suffice as payment.

This magic wants to devour me to the bone.

Daughter of the knowing sea…Captive soul, your blood shall free…

I should have cast you into the sea the moment you opened those eyes.

I feel nothing. I want nothing. I am nothing.

It’syou.

Memories and magic crowd my mind until I scream, nails breaking where my fingers curl into the earth. I’m bleeding again from three different places, but still nothing happens. My whole body shakes as I turn my shrieks toward the sky, where the moon hangs a hairsbreadth from Muireal’s palms. “Release him! Release his bargain and take my soul instead—I’m here, damn you. I’mhere!”

“Shut up!” Maccus fists my hair in his hand, ripping me around to face him again. This time, with a sword pressed to my throat. “Shut up, you insignificant little wretch. You speak of bargains and souls as though you’ve ever had to reap them—as though you’ve held life in your hands as it slipped through your fingers like water. You know nothing—you arenothing.”

“I am everything!” A sob breaks from my throat as the bladebites into my skin. But I do not flinch. Not this time. “I am Faolan, our wolves, the soldiers—you. I am all your damage and all your desire—every morsel of pain or scrap of joy; all of it dwells inme. You cannot hide from me, Rí Maccus, even with your heart of stone. Iseeyou.”

Maccus’s fingers go slack and I tear myself free, backing off before he can reach for me again. Blood runs down my neck, and I welcome its hot kiss. My rage is boundless, even as the boundaries of who I am blur. Yet as the moonlight grows rich and all of them regard me with a mixture of pity, horror, and awe, there is only one person who tethers me to this world.

One person who will be lost for good if I don’t see this through.

“Faolan—”

“Enough.”

The world stops with the swing of Maccus’s sword.

I fall back with a cry—but it’s not me he strikes. It’s the ropes binding Faolan’s wrists behind his back.

“Arm yourself.” Maccus tosses a blade at Faolan’s feet and I watch as my husband assembles himself upright like a wooden doll, wincing with every movement. Too godsdamned stubborn not to take the bait.

Gods. This is it, isn’t it? The ruin I saw for us both at the start—the scars Faolan will never heal from, tearing through the world like arrows, blood shed across the beach.

Maccus’s sword sings as it slices through the air. “I won’t kick a dog while he’s down.”

“Didn’t seem to be a problem before,” Faolan says, darting me a desperate glance, and I understand at once what he’s doing, distracting the Stone King’s ire from me. I want to strike his smart mouth—kiss it until we’re both bloody.

Except I already am.

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