The Phoinix: Age of Demigods (50 page)

“I will never remove that spell,”
Elpis yelled, but her features softened as tears of pity fell from
her blue eyes.

Grinding her jaw, Bre
sighed impatiently. “Give me the dagger. This is your final chance
before I send your innocent parents back to the underworld with the
tortures
you
let
them carry.”

Elpis had no other
choice;
her powers were
limited by half and she could not stand seeing her parents
tortured. She threw the dagger on the ground and backed
away.

Bre loosened her grip on
the stone, healing Tyreneas and Arelia. Bre bent over to grab the
dagger
,
but Elpis
was quick and kneed Bre in the ribs. The rock slipped from Bre’s
hand as she collapsed to the ground. She rolled over in time to see
Cnaimh and her parents’ fade away into white smoke.

As the battle unfroze, the screeching
of eagles and the thuds of bows once again filled their
ears.

Elpis
ran
over to Bre and kicked her in
the face, splitting her lip open. Before Elpis landed a second
kick, something caught the late morning sun and
blinded
her. Around Bre’s neck,
shimmering in the sunlight
,
was Remus’ half of the wolf pendent. Elpis bent
down, ripped it off, and tossed it aside.

Elpis repeatedly kicked Bre in the
stomach until she lay face down in the dirt, spitting out blood.
When the beatings unexpectedly stopped, Bre struggled to glance
upward and see Elpis flash her evil smile. Suddenly, a sharp pain
pierced Bre’s back. Bre whimpered but refused to scream.

Tears filled Bre’s
eyes
;
not because
of the familiar pain in her back
,
but because of what the pain meant. She glanced
around the battlefield at everyone she loved, crying because their
danger increased tenfold. This time, she was the threat.

Chapter 38

Fire in the Sky

A
n eagle swooped down
and
dug its talons into Bre’s back, causing her to
yelp in pain. The bird tried to lift Bre
,
but she put all of her
strength
into
staying on the ground. She would not let the bird take
control of her, not like last time.

Bre dug her nails into the
dirt
,
hoping a
physical connection with the elements would cause a magical lock in
her mind and prevent her from being possessed again.

The bird had other ideas.
The eagle dug its talons deeper into her back and flapped its
wings, causing Bre to hover inches above the ground,
the earth
just out of
reach. Bre hung her head in defeat as the warmth of her blood
dripped down her back.

“To the cave,” ordered
Elpis.

“Bre!
” multiple voices shouted.

Breanna heard the voices
calling her name
,
but hope flooded out of her body with the blood as it dripped
from her back. With what little mental strength she had left, Bre
sent a message to Brian,
There is nothing
more you can do. You are safer away from me. Gather Cailean and
Lysandros and let me go
.

“No
,”
Brian screamed
as
he raced towards Bre.
A clone stepped in his path and smashed his fist into the side of
Brian’s cheek. Brian crashed to the ground as Eversor jumped on top
of him and held his sword to
Brian’s
throat.

Before Eversor
could
cut into Brian’s
throat, the tip of
a
blade poked out from his chest and the clone disintegrated
into black smoke. Romulus stood over Brian with a dagger in his
hand. He nodded at Brian and ran over to help another soldier
pinned down by a clone.

Leave. You need to be
safe
, Breanna begged.

Brian did not have time to
respond
.
He heard
his brother call out for help
and saw
that
Eversor
had
magically bound him to the
wall
and formed
an energy
ball
in
his
hand. Torn between helping Bre
or
Cailean, Brian
froze
,
looking
back and forth between
them
, unable to leave either until
Bre confidently whispered in his mind,
It’s alright. Save Cail, I can handle this.

The eagle flapped its
wings again and Bre whimpered. Its talons wiggled beneath her skin
as
it
flew to the
nearest cave. Once inside the damp cave, the eagle released
Bre
and
then flew
to the highest point
,
carefully
watching
her.

A flash of green light
flew past Bre and into the cave wall. The green mass slumped to the
ground and did not move. Bre
winced
from the wounds on her back
as she sat up to get a better look.
Anath
lay
on the ground, wrapped in glowing green chains.

“You are strong,
Princess,” Elpis conceded
,
seeming mildly impressed. “It would be an honor
to take you as an apprentice
.
If I
wasn’t
about to kill you
,
that is.”

“Then do it. Why sit here and discuss
it?” Bre inched closer to Anath.

“Because it is not enough
to kill you anymore, dearest Breanna. I want to drive every ounce
of pride and strength you have out of your body. I want to shred
every emotion you have
,
so the fibers of your being throb with agony. I
want you to beg for death. You crossed a line
when you tortured
my parents back
there. Now
,
all
of their suffering will be yours. You will watch as my husband
slays your friends
,
and that pathetic group of farmers you call an army.” Elpis
walked over to Bre and lifted her chin to look into her eyes. “I
want to see the light of hope fade from your eyes.”

Bre’s eyes were defiant as she glared
back. “I will kill you, Elpis. I will shred you and your ungodly
husband apart with my bare hands.”

Bre glanced
at
Anath out of the
corner of her eye for a mere second, but long enough for Elpis to
notice.

“Oh, no,
Princess
.
There
is no hope for her. My Grandmother sealed her fate many centuries
ago. I...” Elpis stopped talking and smiled brightly down at Bre.
Elpis was truly a beautiful woman, but ill intent turned what
should be a sweet smile into malevolence. “I won’t have to do a
thing. You will.”

Elpis snapped her fingers and the gold
eagle perched itself on her shoulder. The bird stared Bre in her
eyes as Elpis commanded, “Take her.”

The eagle spread its
massive wings and released a bone-chilling screech. Bre closed her
eyes
,
trying to
remain in control of her mind
,
but every nerve urged her to
return
the eagle’s
hypnotic gaze.
Dizzy and
drowsy,
her
mind
started to slip
into
the
dark
abyss of the eagle’s eyes.

Desperately trying to
maintain control, Bre focused on the stinging wounds in her
back
.
Her body
went numb
, and she was overtaken
with a sensation of floating. She had nothing
physical to focus on
,
until her powers burned in her chest. Her powers unnaturally
raged in her veins as
they
flowed through her arms and legs, turning
numbness into fiery agony. Instead of a safe extension of her body,
her powers boiled beneath her skin, burning her alive.

Bre screamed and clawed at her
skin.

“The more you resist the more it will
hurt!” Elpis laughed.

Bre
burned as if
she was
tied down to a bed of red-hot coals.
She
curled into a ball
on the ground and shook.

The same voice from the
last time Elpis possessed Bre entered her head.
Let it happen. I promise you will feel much better once you
do. Let me in, I can help you. Collapse into my power, I can care
for you, better than anyone else. I know what you need…what you
crave…

“Noooooo,” Bre said through gritted
teeth in defiance.

“Breanna, you can fight this! You are
the granddaughter of War. You can’t get more stubborn than that,”
cheered Anath.

“I won’t fail…I can’t
fail
.”
Bre closed
her eyes and a tear pinched out from between her lashes, sizzling
and evaporating on her cheek.

Giving
in to
The Power is not failing,
Breanna
.
It is
accepting who you are
, the voice
whispered.

Bre desperately fought
against her rising fever. Beads of sweat covered her body
as she clung
to dirt
from the floor
in an attempt
to drag her body closer to Anath. Another wave of
power burned her veins; she tasted the charred flavor of singed
meat from her throat.

“Fight it, Breanna. I need you.
Everyone outside needs you,” Anath begged and pointed to the
battle.

Unaware of how hard she
had been fighting, Bre opened her eyes and was
surprised
to find herself on her
hands and knees. Her nails bled from digging into the ground, her
back muscles
were
rigid, and the veins popped out of her neck. Unable to breath
from the heat pressure in her chest, she collapsed, succumbing to
the soothing black-abyss.

“No,” Anath whimpered, hanging her
head in defeat.

Elpis laughed at
Anath’s
heartbroken
shock of losing Bre. “I now control
your
last line of defense. Are you
scared now, Grandmother?”

When Bre woke again, she
wore a black strapless dress with white rope wrapped around her
waist. Bre appeared tranquil
,
but The Power inside rushed through her veins
like vengeful river rapids, itching to claim a life.

“You are a queen, Breanna.
You should start acting like one, or at the very
least
,
start
dressing like one.” Elpis rolled her eyes and drew
a
circle in the air
around Bre’s head. A crown made of silver twigs that matched Elpis’
gold one appeared on top of Bre’s hair.

Elpis walked around
Breanna
,
watching
her carefully in case the possession did not work. With her back to
the entrance of the cave, Bre sensed the war outside. She squeezed
her fists together and rocks tumbled from the highest points of the
pass down onto the battlefield, killing several Roman
soldiers.

“There
.
Now that is how our power is to be
experienced. Not controlled, but unleashed with the fury of the
elements as its
weapon
. It’s bewitching, isn’t it?” Elpis gloated.

“Yes
,
it is,” Bre smiled wickedly, drunk
with power.

Anath shuttered at the
evil on Bre’s
face
. She wore a smile more devious than Elpis’. For the first in
millennia, someone scared her more than Elpis.

Bre inhaled deeply and
turned to leave the cave
,
but Elpis barred her exit.

“Not
yet
.
I will let
you kill them later. It is the gods’ time to be punished for their
crimes.” Elpis lightly touched Bre’s elbow, guiding her back to her
restrained grandmother. “Start with her, and then we will storm the
gates of Mount Olympus together. We will destroy the pantheons,
bloody and beaten.”

Elpis’ eyes narrowed as
she focused on Anath. “You are a sorry excuse
for
a war goddess. Or is it love
goddess? I mean
,
you did make my parents fall in love with each
other
, and
then
forced them to conceive a child you would
try
to manipulate.”

“Your parents did not need
my powers to love one another. They fell in love on their own. All
we did was provide direction
.
Although, we should have known a child born in
the House of Ares would turn out to be the destruction of mankind.”
Anath rolled her eyes at Elpis.