Page 65 of Courting War
The effect of the poison was instantaneous. Emmett’s head lulled to the side, and he passed out. The goddess sped up the process once again.
The branch manacles snapped in half, releasing Emmett, and he fell to the ground, convulsing. Dying. Kellyn knelt and supported his friend’s body, fury burning in his bones. He tried to calm himself down, but he couldn’t.
Kellyn’s death was forgivable. He could accept that, but one of his friends dying was not, and for the first time in all the games, Kellyn let his composure slide and let his anger consume him instead of fear or apathy.
The games had changed. Now they were personal.
The gods were forged from the rivers of destruction. They drank in the death of mortals; after all, a god received power from two sources: worship and sacrifice. The games were designed to trigger both, and the gods reveled in the cruelty of it. They liked pushing mortals until they cracked.
In a game between divinity and mortality, divinity always came out on top.
Always.
The gods wanted Kellyn to bend, break, and die to make them stronger. But Kellyn wouldn’t.
He’d had enough.
Holding his best friend’s limp body, he vowed he wouldn’t break. The vow coursed through him, hardening into resolve. Kellyn hated the gods for this, and he would do all in his power not only to live but to best the gods—seek vengeance. He’d do all within his power to save Emmett and Cecile, and all three would walk out of the Sacrifice alive. Not because Kellyn believed he was good enough to live.
He knew he wasn’t.
He was pathetic and always would be, but he was angry, and anger was a brilliant motivator.
The gods tried to kill the wrong person today. And it would backfire on them. Kellyn wouldn’t allow them to hurt the two people he loved most—histrue family.
Poison hurt Emmett. She might even steal his life.
But Kellyn was fury personified.
The gods would learn a lesson today. They would learn never to provoke Kellyn’s protective nature—for that nature would burn mountains to the ground. It would consume continents. It would kill.
They would pay for this, and the only way to hurt the gods—the only way to get vengeance for what Poison did to Emmett—was tosurvive. Steal the one thing the gods wanted most.
Power.
Kellyn was done being a pawn.
He was done letting the games play him. He would play the games, and he would win.
In the distance, the portal opened in the void. Not wasting any time—if Emmett was going to live, he needed the intervention of Andromache immediately—Kellyn easily lifted his friend and walked to the exit, Cecile at his side.
She stepped through first, and Kellyn gently placed Emmett’s feet on the floor and awkwardly handed him toCecile. He thought she might struggle, but she was surprisingly—inhumanly—strong.
Putting weight back on the foot inside the mirror, Kellyn considered leaving without returning for his priestess. She’d sabotaged him. She deserved to rot in here. He wanted to lash out because he hated her just as much as the gods for this, but his honor dictated his actions.
Morrigan needed help, and he couldn’t find it in his soul to condemn her, even if she deserved it. And there was no doubt that she deserved it. She’d destroyed the only nontoxic plant in the game and forced him to pick deadly nightshade. The only other option was unimaginable. Batrachotoxin had no antidote. It caused paralysis and death within ten minutes.
Belladonna was a better gamble.
Kellyn let his weight shift, and he fell back into the mirror.
Morrigan had her knees pulled into her chest and her head resting on the marble. Miserable moans echoed off the white plane, and the smell of bile permeated everything. It was caked in her hair, clothing, and next to her head, but she was so ill that she didn’t notice.
He knelt beside her and tucked an errant lock behind her ear. Dark circles laced her eyes, and her skin was pallid and warm. She looked terrible and probably felt worse. Kellyn was furious, his heart thrumming in his veins, but he couldn’t turn off his concern. He scooped her into his arms and hiked through the portal and back to the infirmary. He gently placed her into a bed before turning all his attention to his friend.
Emmett was unconscious, still convulsing, but no one was with him. On the mirrors stationed throughout the room, Kellyn saw that Cecile was forced into her Tribunal.
As if summoned by his thoughts, two gruff nymphs appeared at the bedside. One was an earth nymph, and the other of the sea. The earth nymph resembled the one from the library. It very well could be the same creature. The other was formed from beauty itself. Her eyelashes were carved from black seashells, her eyes were the color of coral, hair the color of seaweed.
