The mound split. A cloud of revolting stench washed over me and dispersed.
Giant tentacles surged up in front of me and opened like the petals of a flower. A glowing man stood at their center, a giant with the body of a god made with white metal and radiant flowers, perfect and astonishingly beautiful.
I looked at his face. Nothing in the world could compare. His eyes glowed with blue light. I wanted to weep and prostrate myself, but then I would have to stop looking at him, and it was beyond me to turn away. I had never seen anything so mesmerizing. I had to keep looking at him. I could spend a lifetime staring.
Our minds touched and I saw myself standing next to him with a body that matched his. He would remake me. I would be Eve to his Adam. The Pit would be our Eden, no one would cast us out of it, and humanity would serve us forever.
He smiled. Magic radiated from him and washed over me.
My body trembled, every nerve on fire.
He was made of pure power and will. Every node he possessed was in that body. There weren’t enough adjectives in any human language to describe him.
He opened his arms. His mind brushed against mine. Join me.
I waved my hand. The circle around me died. I sang to him, a sweet song, filled with love and longing.
Alessandro screamed my name.
The Abyss held out his hand.
In my memories, Alessandro kissed me and whispered, “I love you.” It was the happiest I had ever been.
I stepped out of the circle, picked up Linus’ sword, and rested my hand in the Abyss’ perfect fingers.
He smiled.
I hammered a spike of magic into the sword and plunged my blade into his chest, where the once-human mind burned with magic. The null space carved through the armored body and pierced the fragile brain.
The titan fell to his knees.
I dropped my sword.
His magic blinked, pulsed with bright white, and died. He had melded all of his nodes to make this body for me. Unified into one, they were no longer capable of survival. I felt them dying one by one. The last one winked out.
The awe-inspiring body at my feet fell apart. The beautiful, murderous god of the Pit was dead, and I had killed him. The full enormity of it hit me and I screamed my grief and pain into the sky before it tore me apart, because I had murdered something indescribably beautiful and it would never exist again. The magic turned my scream into a song and once the last notes of it died, I had nothing left.
My legs gave out. I crashed onto the roof.
Alessandro would live. Everyone would live.
Behind me a loud hum announced incoming helicopters.
Chapter 17
Alessandro came for me, covered in blood, picked me up, and we jumped off the roof while Bug screamed through his drone. I closed my eyes and clung to him, shell-shocked, my mind reeling. It felt like everything was happening to someone else.
Alessandro loaded me into a helicopter. I held on to him, afraid that he would leave, but he stayed on the seat next to me, his arm around me.
“It’s over,” he murmured. “It’s all over.”
All around us, soldiers moved with purpose, but there was nobody to kill. Alessandro had reaped a bloody harvest. None of Arkan’s people survived.
Linus appeared by the helicopter and studied me, his face concerned.
“Do you know who I am?”
I stared at him, blank. Making words was too hard.
He glanced at Alessandro. “Has she spoken?”
“No.”
Linus turned to me, his face tense. His eyes looked . . . afraid.
“Catalina, say something. Anything at all. It’s very important. Make a sound, but don’t sing. Say a word.”
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.
“Just one word. You can do it. Say no. You say no so well. You’ve had a lot of practice.”
I struggled to push words out.
“Come on,” Linus prompted, his voice gentle. “Just one word. Remember, don’t sing.”
“ . . .”
“You can do it.”
Something clicked in my brain. “I told my family that I’m the Deputy.”
Linus exhaled and slumped against the side of the chopper. For a moment he looked old.
“Don’t kill my family.”
“That’s fine. Don’t worry. The Baylors are safe. Quite frankly, I’m surprised that it took so long. I thought you would tell them months ago. It’s unrealistic to expect a Deputy Warden’s family to not know their position.”
It was another one of his tests. Bastard.
I looked at Alessandro. “Please hurt him for me.”
“Good job,” Linus said. “Carry on.”
He went away. I closed my eyes and stuck my face into Alessandro’s shoulder and let the world go.
I had no idea how much time had passed. At some point we were in the air and then I fell asleep again.
I woke up because the helicopter landed on a roof. Alessandro gently sat me upright.
“Where are we?” I asked.
He smiled. “Come on, there is someone who wants to meet you.”
We got out and entered the building. He held my hand and we walked down a hallway, took an elevator down, walked down another hallway . . . I was just walking next to him. I didn’t want to be away from him. I loved him so much, and a part of me still couldn’t believe that the Abyss was dead and that this wasn’t a dream. I needed convincing that I was actually here and not sitting in the bubble of the Abyss’ magic, deep inside his mound.
We stopped at a nurse’s station. Someone put a cap and gown on me. Someone poured sanitizer on my hands and wiped my face with some kind of wipe. It smelled like rubbing alcohol and stung. A nurse told me to follow her. I tried to stay with Alessandro, but she told me he was too bloody. I followed her down the hallway through a door with four guards outside of it.
In a large comfortable room, Nevada sat on the bed. Connor sat next to her in a chair. I saw Mom and Grandma Frida, Arabella and my cousins. Nevada was holding a bundle of blankets. I came closer, and she offered it to me.
“Congratulations. You’re an aunt.”
I looked at my tiny, red-faced nephew, reached out, and touched his little fist.
Everything hit me at once. I wrapped my arms around the baby, sat down on the floor, and cried.
The next morning, I sat in a plush chair in the America Tower, waiting for the start of the special session of the Texas Assembly. Cheryl had somehow escaped the Pit and thrown herself on the mercy of the Texas Houses. She must’ve run the moment Alessandro jumped off the roof, otherwise he would’ve killed her. Instead she ended up at the House of one of her well-respected friends. All of her charitable work and connections bought her a lot of goodwill and she intended to use every drop of it to shield herself from Lander’s vengeance.
She still thought this was about Felix’s murder.
Alessandro sat in a chair next to me. I had brought him in as my guest. He was in his full Count Sagredo persona, beautiful suit, beautiful hair, beautiful smile. You would never know that less than twenty-four hours ago he’d killed sixteen of Arkan’s professional soldiers. I still remembered him smeared with soot and blood. I also remembered waking up next to him this morning. Covered with soot and blood or clean and in my bed, I didn’t care. I would be with him no matter what he did.
Alessandro saw me looking, reached over, took my hand, and squeezed it.
Around us the massive chamber was slowly filling up with Primes in jet-black robes, each wearing a green stole draped over their shoulders. We were in the Upper Chamber, where only the Heads of various Texas Houses could vote. Cheryl had demanded the judgment of her peers and only the Heads of Houses qualified.