When it’s close enough I move my head to the side quickly, and stick my fangs into its throat. I suppose one could say the Wraith impales itself onto my canines, its essence flooding my mouth. My eyes blaze full of fire at the taste, it’s absolutely divine.
I know I should keep working on pulling out the Firestone, but I can’t bring myself to stop taking in the delicious sap of the Wraith. When its shadowy form dissipates in the air and I lick my lips, its essence still flowing down my chin, I can sense the others’ awe. They don’t have features that can express their feelings, and yet one can read their awe better than in any human face. I grin.
“Delicioussss.”
But even though I turned out to be a dangerous predator to them, they’re still many, and once I’ve gotten the Firestone out, there will be even more. An infinite source bubbles under the Firestone.
More Wraiths attack, but they all soon turn into thin air after I’ve drunk their essence. Still, they keep coming. The more I take, the more vicious their attacks, but I can’t afford to lose this battle. Cerys is waiting for me up there, ready to give herself to me. I apply more strength, and finally free the Firestone from its roots.
All right, it’s now or never.
I look up towards the top of the well, going over my plan one last time. I can’t fly back up to the surface, but the Wraiths can, and I think I know how to get them to do it. I push the Firestone into the air with a lot of strength. It flies up high, so high that in a matter of seconds all that’s left of it is a red little ball. With the Wraiths’ attention trained on it, I bend my knees for momentum and push myself up like a rocket.
The air whips past me as I shoot high, but I start to lose momentum, and I have to ram my claws into the rocky wall to keep from plummeting back down. My claws dig into it, the weight of my body dragging me down, but I stop myself by fixing my booted feet into the wall. It stops the fall. I throw myself upward, basically leaping up the wall, going faster and faster until I almost reach the Firestone.
That’s when one of the Wraiths catches up with me, wrapping itself like a whip around my ankle and tearing me down. I do the first thing that I can—I ram my claws into the Firestone itself. And yet I acknowledge the terrible truth—I’m not going to make it.
I can already see the opening of the well, Cerys’ terrified face in the middle of the circle, surrounded by light, her braided ponytail hanging into the well like the hair of Rapunzel.
At least I will die with my eyes on her. More Wraiths wrap around my legs, crawling up my waist and then up my upper body like lashes of cosmic chaos. This is a lost battle. No, a lost war. My plan had been to get on top of the Firestone, and the Wraiths would have chased it to the surface without even realizing that they were carrying the both of us.
It was a long shot, but I’d put all of my bets on it. Now I’m tearing down the Firestone along with me, into the embrace of cosmic chaos.
The King of Fire dies here.
I embrace my fate, my eyes hanging on the only woman I ever loved—for that is the truth. I love her. Even now, as I’m being dragged down the Well of Doom to my death, I realize just how much, and how magnificent this feeling truly is.
But just as I accept my death, I see Cerys climbing onto the wall that I had cracked before I jumped in.
She wants to die with me.
“Cerys, no!”
But my cry can do nothing to save her. She flies down, her hair fluttering as she speeds down the well, her arms outstretched.
If she lands on the Firestone, the impact is going to shatter her bones and rip her flesh, she won’t survive it. We’re still close to the opening even though we’re descending, but still the Firestone is too far for a parahuman to survive such a fall. I let out a war cry, my muscles tensing to the maximum as I make one last effort to pull myself up the Firestone. I land on its surface in time to catch her in my arms.
Our eyes lock as I cradle her, Wraiths now surrounding us in a whirl around the Firestone. But for me, everything stops when I stare into her magical honey eyes that seem to hold the meaning of all the worlds. I might as well admit it, in this last minute of our lives—she is everything to me.
She opens her mouth to say something, her shiny blue-black hair flapping around her beautiful face, but I don’t let her. Nothing she might say can be more important than this.
I press my lips on hers, taking in the sweetness of her kiss. I moan in her mouth, pleasure pooling on my tongue. What better way to die than this?
The first chunks of the stone wall flies by us, and then the next. Sensing danger, the magic well starts to close above us, sealing this pit forever. Both Cerys and I knew this would happen, ever since I punched the wall, and since she and Nazarean sensed the protective nature of its magic.
But then I feel something prickling in my veins. Something strangely familiar, something that has coursed through me before. It takes only a second to identify the memory—the first time Cerys Dark replenished my powers. Only that now she is using the Firestone, I can feel its unmistakable magic. I sense that she has easier access to its energy through the slashes I left in the stone, therefore opening its ‘flesh’. I see the red essence of the stone streaming upward from its lower half where I slashed it, and pouring into me.
The sensation is so good I could be standing on top of the world right now instead of falling into the abyss. I want to spread out my arms and enjoy the bliss of it flooding me, rebuilding my core.
Finally, giving me back my power. Making me the King of Flames again.
But if I do that, it’s the last thing I will do. I have to wait until the process is finished, but I must be ready to push myself off the blackening corpse of the Firestone with all my strength, and shoot both Cerys and me out of here. I look deep into her loving eyes, trying to convey all of the gratitude I feel.
The Wraiths wail and thrash around us, aware they’ve lost. I sense them wanting to coil around us and drag us down faster, but they know better than to touch a recharging King of Flames. We’re so far down that we can no longer see the top of the well, but the second I feel I’m fully recharged, my legs push down the blackened, drained stone. It rockets down while we rocket up just as the well closes. If the edges meet, not even I will be able to break my way through it. Nothing can break that kind of magic, not even Hades himself.
We’re close enough now that Nazarean’s face appears through the circle. I can only hope it’s wide enough so that I can make it through cradling Cerys in my arms. She nestles her face against my chest, her hair rippling in the air as we speed towards the exit, her arms locked around my neck.
I can see it in Nazarean’s slit green eyes. We’re not going to make it, the hole is too small.
My whole body tenses, the muscles in my arms becoming ropes of steel.
“Cerys, let go. Trust me.”
And she does. She disengages.
“Straighten up,” I call, and throw her up towards the circle of light.
Nazarean moves out of the way, and Cerys grabs on to the edge. She clambers up incredibly fast due to the adrenaline in her veins, fast enough that she makes room for me just in time. I grab the edges, but as I pull myself up, the well closes tightly at my waist.
“Xerxes!” Cerys desperately tries to help me.
I raise my leg and put one foot on the edge, and then the other. I land on the floor a split second before the well closes completely, and for all times.