So, gritting my teeth, I hauled myself to my feet. My blurry vision latched on to the balloon—and then drifted down. . . .
Sixteen figures galloped over the sand, their spears erect and helmets glinting in the rising sun. Their inhuman strides kept pace with the balloon.
Movement flashed to the north, and when I twisted my head, I found even more guards streaming over the sand. They must have come from the other pyramids, answering the call of the clappers. Marcus had himself an army—one that our magic could not stop.
My breath sawed between my teeth. He cannot win. I will not let him win.
I dragged my gaze right to Daniel’s airship, still hovering over the Sphinx. It swayed in the breeze, seemingly unharmed.
But there was blood all over the sand beneath it. And deep, dragging footprints as if someone had limped away—seeping blood with each step.
For a bleak, vicious moment, I hoped it was Allison’s blood. She cannot win. And neither can Marcus.
In a rush of desire, I finally gave in to all the hunger and want that had writhed inside me since Paris.
This magic was who I was, and when I called to it, it came. Like a door burst wide, the power inside me came. The more I inhaled and tugged at the magic, the more it pulsed through me. To me. I gathered it in my chest. More, more, more.
A wind picked up. It twined around my legs and through my hair, as if the world itself were offering me its soul. . . .
Then I realized that it was. I was taking magic from the stones and the air and the sand. I was feasting off the living world around me.
I straightened. Magic rolled up my spine, and the wind kicked harder.
A shout came from behind me; I ignored it. The balloon was fading too fast.
My hands reached out; my fingers flexed. I would throw everything I had at that balloon. I would rip it from the sky. I would beat down Allison.
And I would destroy Marcus.
“Eleanor!” Oliver’s voice snaked into my ears. “Stop!”
I did not stop. I narrowed my eyes to slits, focusing everything I had—everything I was—on that distant balloon. I had no spell in mind, but I did not need one. Death and power were close cousins—and I had plenty of power. More than I’d ever had inside me before. It surged in from the world. It breathed and squirmed like a living thing, and I gulped it in as if I were drowning.
“El!” Oliver’s voice again, nagging like an insect. “You’re hurting us—stop!” Hands grabbed my shoulders. “STOP!”
The command shuddered through me, reverberated in my skull. The demon I controlled was telling me what to do. His desperation poured through our bond—but with it came magic. I latched on to it like a lamprey.
And then his power gushed into me. Where his hands squeezed my shoulders, the skin boiled. Where his breath laced over my neck, the hair stood on end. He was so powerful—even weakened as he was, Oliver was made of soul.
And I would take it. I would take and I would crush Marcus—
Stop. Oliver’s voice pierced my brain. You will kill yourself.
“I don’t care,” I tried to say, but the voice that came out was not my own. This voice was layered and charged like the rumble of heat lightning. “I would rather die,” I went on, “than let him get away.”
But what about me? he pressed, and there was an undercurrent of panic. It chafed against my skull. You will kill me too if you do not stop. You will kill Joseph and Jie. You will kill Daniel. You will push us away forever. Stop, Eleanor. Stop and come back to us.
“Marcus will get away.”
And we will go after him, but you cannot stop him like this. I will not let you.
I almost laughed at that, for there was nothing Oliver could do to me—not when I was this strong. Not when I had his power coursing into me. “How will you stop me?”
Like this. He slid his arms around my waist, rested his cheek against the back of my head, and opened himself up.
My legs turned to water. My body collapsed beneath the tide of his magic.
But it was not only magic that weighed me down. It was him, and in a roar of sound and light, I crumbled beneath his being.
I am in a world of darkness and stars. It is a resting place before the final afterlife. I exist when moments before I did not—and this puzzles me. But I soon forget, for as I watch the stars drift by, I realize they are actually other beings. Some are pinpricks of light that swirl with power too intense to look upon. Some are weaker, like me. And floating amid us are wispy, fragile things.
The souls of the Dead.