Burned (House of Night #7)(96)

No! Oh, Goddess! Please make him be quiet. Please make him run back to me.

But Stark seemed to like taunting Kalona. He wouldn't shut up; he didn't run. Horror filled me as Kalona plucked the spear from the sky. His wings cut a hole in the ground and then he and Stark disappeared into its blackness.

It was then I realized that Stark was also going to die because of me.

"No! " The soundless scream tore from deep inside me, where everything felt empty and hopeless and restless. I needed to run - to keep moving - to escape from what was happening here.

I couldn't handle it. There wasn't enough of me left to handle it.

But if I didn't handle it, Stark would die.

"No." This time the word wasn't a ghostly, soundless scream. It was my voice -  my voice, and not that awful not-here crap that had been babbling out of my mouth.

"Stark. Can. Not. Die." I tasted the words and followed their form and familiarity, listening for myself, as I stepped from the grove and headed to the black hole in the ground inside of which my Warrior had disappeared.

When the hole opened at my feet, I looked down to see Stark and Kalona facing each other in the middle of it. Stark was holding a gleaming sword in both of his hands against Kalona's dark spear.

I realized then that it wasn't just a hole in the ground. It was an arena. Kalona had created an arena with high walls, unbroken and slick. Walls that couldn't be climbed.

Kalona had Stark trapped. Now he couldn't run, even if he would listen to me. He couldn't escape. He also couldn't possibly win. And Kalona wouldn't be happy with beating Stark up a little - or even a lot.

Kalona meant to kill Stark.

The restless numbness started to smother me again as Stark faced Kalona. I let my feet move but forced myself to stay where I could see the adversaries, walking the circumference of the arena as, unbelievably, Stark attacked the fallen immortal.

Laughing cruelly, Kalona deflected the sword with a flick of the spear, and with a movement so blindingly fast there was no way Stark could have seen it coming, Kalona smashed his open hand into Stark's face with ferocious, sneering disdain. Stark's forward momentum carried him awkwardly past the immortal, and he fell to the ground, holding his hands over his ears like he was trying to ease the pain in his head.

"A Guardian claymore - that's amusing. So you think you can stand with them?" Kalona spoke while Stark regained his balance and turned to face him again, his sword held up before him.

Blood trickled from Stark's ears, nose, and lips, making thin scarlet threads down his chin and neck. "I don't think I'm a Guardian. I am a Guardian."

"You can't be. I know your past, boy. I've seen you embrace Darkness. Tell the Guardians about that and then see if they still want you."

"The only other person who can make, or unmake, me a Guardian is my queen, and she knows about me and my past ."

I watched Stark lunge again. With a disdainful sneer, Kalona used the spear to brush aside the blade.

This time when he hit Stark, it was with his closed fist, and the force of it broke his nose and bloodied his cheekbones, knocking my Warrior to his back.

I held my breath, watching helplessly for what I knew would be Kalona's killing blow.

But the immortal didn't do anything except laugh while Stark struggled painfully to his feet. "Zoey isn't a queen. She isn't strong enough. She's just a weak girl who let herself be shattered by the death of one human boy," Kalona said.

"You're wrong. Zoey isn't weak; she cares! And about that human boy? That's part of the reason I'm here. I need to collect the life debt you owe for killing him."

"Fool! It's only Zoey who can collect that debt!"

With those words, it was as if Kalona had taken his spear and sliced through the fog of guilt that had been blanketing me since I'd watched him twist Heath's neck, allowing everything to become very clear to me.

I might not see myself as a queen - or as much of anything sometimes - but Stark believed in me. Heath believed in me. Stevie Rae believed in me. Even Aphrodite believed in me.

And, as Stevie Rae would have said, Kalona was as wrong as manboobs.

Caring about others didn't make me weak. It was the choices that I'd made because of that caring that defined me.

I'd let love shatter me once, and as I watched Kalona play with my Warrior, my Guardian, I chose to let honor heal me.

And that, finally, made my decision.

I turned my back on the arena and moved quickly to the edge of the Goddess's grove. Blocking out the sense of restlessness that threatened to pull me ever forward without really taking me anywhere, I made myself stand still. Spreading my arms wide I focused first on the last spirit who had spoken to me.

"Brighid! I need my strength back!"

The redhead materialized before me. She looked like a Goddess herself, all fiery and tall, full of power and confidence that I didn't have.

"No," I corrected myself out loud. "The power and confidence are mine. I just lost them for a while."

"Ready to accept them back?" she said, familiar eyes meeting mine.

"I am."

"Well, it's about time." She stepped forward and put her arms around me, pulling me close to her in an embrace that was as strong as it was intimate. My arms closed around her, and with that acceptance she dissolved against my skin, and I was filled with a surge of heat that was power - pure power.