Caged by Damnation (Caged #2)(83)
Ash and Isis shouted at me to stop as I tried to throw the door open to race towards the mêlée. I couldn't hide like a coward and allow my friends and family to pay the price.
Faces and memories flashed across my mind. The day I met Ash and Maye, Willow's surprise when I started talking to her, Izzy teasing me while shopping because she knew how much I despised it. Then I thought of Griffin, still in the tunnels with no way out, Isis... Liam... I remembered Ash holding me when I cried after a nightmare, his insistence on knowing everything in my life and the way he would hold my hand when I was nervous.
No, I couldn't go there. My mind needed to be present, not in the past. These people were my life and would stay that way, if I had a say in the matter. Prophecy or no prophecy, I couldn't stand by. I could be the end of the world or its savior, but I wouldn't know unless I took charge.
Everyone had been so busy trying to protect me that they seemed to have forgotten that I am the key. I have a choice and I could never choose to be on the sidelines while everyone else lay in a sea of red.
I faced Ash, pulling him closely. "You need to get Griffin out of the tunnels. He's trapped there."
"Really? What do you think you're going to do while I'm saving him?" His voice was filled with annoyance, but worry was rampant in the way he held his shoulders, and the lilt of his voice.
Grasping Ash's bicep, I pleaded with him. "Please... I need you to do this. I can't do what I need to do, if I know someone else is trapped."
Ash shook his head. "What is it that you need to do?" His gaze softened. "Let me guess, this is one of those moments when you ask me to do something, but I don't really have a say in the matter?"
His hands clenched into fists as he stared at the ceiling and mumbled something about my knack for getting myself in trouble, before gaining composure and looking at me once more. He took a deep breath and spoke carefully. "I'd demand that you come with, but you are the most stubborn woman I know, and I know you well enough to see that this is one of those things you just need to do." He groaned, pulling at his shirt, as if forcing himself to refrain from picking me up and forcefully taking me with him.
"Thank you," I whispered while his palm moved to cup my cheek, cradling me, as his thumb massaged the corner of my mouth.
Meaning to join the battle, I moved away from Ash once more, but he grabbed my hand and swung me around to face him. "I will never forgive you if you get yourself killed."
Before I could reply, his lips caught mine in a searing kiss that outshone all others. For the space of a few seconds, I lost all thought to where we were and the events happening around us.
My nerves grew taut, electrified with stimulation. A combination of adrenaline and passion deafened the world around me. I not only felt Ash consuming my lips, but as if in an out-of-body experience, I saw it happening from an outsider’s perspective.
We seemed to spin while everything else remained level. We were lost in time, unfazed by the hurried nature that the sounds of reality represented. Suspended without a care if we perished due to our stolen kiss, I allowed myself to be enveloped by the promise our flesh was creating, while everything else lost momentum and we remained suspended in time. I basked in the silken strokes of his tongue, lingering in the story of everything we had been through together. My soul cried as our connection fused together and I could feel Ash's essence once more. I had been denied any semblance of bond with him for so long, that this pulled every ounce of yearning that had lain stagnant within me.
"That is what will be waiting for you, assuming you don't play the hero and get yourself killed." Ash smiled, pulling away to reveal Isis with a gigantic grin on her face.
The momentary bliss was all the more sharp in contrast to the chaos that I fell back into. Reality was cruel as we emerged from the time we had allowed ourselves. Sound shuddered through my bones, splintering against them like swarms of wasps. I wanted to hide from the pain, as I often had, but Nicolai had removed that option when he destroyed my cage. Instead, I drew from the pain.
My sight zeroed in on the door that lay between me and Hell’s vengeance. A war was what the demons wanted, and I was finally ready to give it to them. After all, I was my mother's daughter. These decrepit beings were threatening everyone I held dear.
Shaping my hands into fists, my nails dug into my palms, drawing blood. The Seraphinite ring gouged a deeper still, bathing in my mixed blood, but still I tightened my grip. I became one with the pain, allowing it to penetrate the self-control I had worked hard to achieve, until a single motive was left: death.
I screamed in absolute anger. In response, the door blasted open, spraying debris throughout the hall. My fingers tingled and sparked, sending a current of power to my core. I shook while electricity took the shape of rose vines and climbed across my hands and up my arms. Finally, the visible power stretched around my neck, branching towards other links of power and creating a web.
Encompassed in unadulterated power, I became a weapon. I walked from my friends towards the fire, knowing I was a puppet no longer. A typhoon radiated in a crescent shape before me, incinerating the enemies in my path.
CHAPTER 19
WILLOW
I followed Death into the library, where he revealed another secret room. I was beginning to think that everyone had them, and wondered if I had a secret chamber of my own. The bookcase slid aside, displaying a small room lined with cabinets. The center one didn't appear to have an opening until Death pricked his finger with the blade from his pocket. He dripped some of his blood onto the textured wood and recited something in language I didn't understand.