And Raleigh killed him for it.
My muscles quiver. Heat flushes through me.
Raleigh licks his lips. “Oh, he was playing me all right. Your darling brother thought he could help you. Thought he’d be clever. He switched the grade of my physical alteration augmenters so you’d know it was me. He exposed me, and he thought he could get away with it.”
I stare at him. I hear Corin shout something, and the dog’s growling, and the wind’s howling. My lips flatten against each other. Something pulses in my forehead.
He did that. Three did that?
No. My mother must’ve made him…she was getting him to do things and—
But if my mother knew it was really Raleigh, she’d have told me directly that it wasn’t Corin, projected to me. Found a way. My eyes widen. She didn’t know, can’t have. It was…it was Three. The Untamed part of him. Trying to help me. Finding a way to show me the truth.
And killed—killed because of it.
Raleigh shakes his head savagely. “He thought he could play me. Pretended to be on our side, when, really, he was helping you. And he let you get away. He unlocked the compound doors that day as well. He left them unlocked. He made it easy for you to escape, even if you wanted a more dramatic exit.”
My breath slows. And I left him there.
I should’ve taken him with me when I escaped. Should’ve realized he was on my side.
Raleigh looks up at me, and a sly smile spreads across his face. His top lip flares, shows me his teeth. “I’m still in control, Shania, regardless of what you think. I chose to have your brother saved before, when he was on the brink of death. But my killing powers are final. This is final. That memory I showed you—your brother is dead.” His voice is too calm. Atrociously calm, and it wraps around me like toffee. Sticky. “See, Shania, I am a Seer of Life, and I can end life in a heartbeat. You’d do well to remember that.”
I stare at him. He’s still in control. He did that—killed my brother—to prove his control over me.
He killed my brother to make a point.
Something clicks in my head. A latch. Loud. Certain.
A door opens.
No! My voice.
No! Taras’s voice.
No! My mother’s voice.
No! Other voices.
“Do you understand?” Raleigh whispers. “I am going to win, and I’m going to make sure my people survive, that we live. That six billion people live. You’re a Seer of Death. You’re Untamed. Don’t you see? That means your race has to die out. Unless, of course, you become a mass-murderer, and kill the majority of people in this world. Innocent people. But, then again, you are bad. Even Death himself chose you.” He laughs. “Don’t you see, really? You’re misguided. You can’t see it clearly. I can. And it’s my responsibility—as a logical and rational thinker—to do the right thing. You’re coming back with me, Shania. And you’re going to connect to the other Untamed. I may not have command of your soul now, but I’ll still make you do it. I know the frequency of your powers. It will be harder without owning you—but possible. And we’re going to save everyone.”
Raleigh grabs me and…and—
Three’s body lies lifeless on the floor.
I scream as it sets in—as it really sets in. Something in me buckles, and then there’s only heat. Heat that soars.
And things happen.
So many things, all at once.
Corin screams.
My mother screams.
Taras screams.
The blue-eyed Seer screams.
My terrier screams.
Everyone screams.
Raleigh yanks me toward him, and something burns the side of my face, eating me and—
Mirror. Mirror. Mirror. Corin. Esther. My mother. Mirror. Mirror. Mirror.
No.
The well of darkness inside me opens.
It is a volcano.
I am a volcano.
And I am erupting.
Red tongues lick and orange flames—they fly out from me, from my hands, hot and—
Energy floods me. So much. Too much. It fills my body, pushes at everything, until it flies out of me. A continuous stream and—
Power.
Power.
Power.
I see faces. Faces all around me. Glimpses. Viktoriya. Dominika. Marina. Elf. Other Untamed I don’t know.
Snap.
“Seven!”
That voice—my mother’s voice, and then—
Then I see her. She’s here.
“Stop it!” she yells.
But I can’t stop. I can’t. The flames are getting bigger, bigger, they’re pushing out and—
He’s dead! Raleigh killed my brother. Killed him.
I shriek. Sparks fly across the sky. Orange tears and yellow tears and—
The ground rumbles, shakes. Sand flies up—abrasive sand that hits me, scratches me, claws me and—
He’s dead.
Raleigh killed him.
Red fills my vision.
I look for Raleigh.
He has to die.
He has to die now.
And I see him. I see Raleigh.
Nothing else matters. Not what Corin’s screaming at me. Not what my mother is. Nothing.
I’m a Seer of Death.
And Raleigh knows that.
I know that.
We all know that.
And he is going to die.
I lunge for him, screaming. Send fire toward him—send it along the ground, and it does what I want it to do because it’s mine. It’s all mine, and it makes a circle around him. Flames shoot up in the sky. A wall he cannot pass.
The ground’s shaking gets stronger, stronger. Rocks are moving, far to my left, rolling and—
“Sev!”
I let the fire grow. The sky above shimmers. Voices fill the land. Hundreds and hundreds of voices. A piercing wail pulls through me.
Something snatches at me, and I turn.
I am in the heart of the fire.
I stare at the flames. An orange basket around me, friendly, enticing.
Burn with us!
Burn with us!
“Stop it!” My mother’s voice is louder, louder than the others. “Seven, stop it! Look what’s happening!”
And she grabs me, pushes me back.
I trip, fall into the fire, but it doesn’t burn me. It’s my fire. It can’t hurt me.
“Stop it! Stop the fire!” she yells. “It’s tearing the—”
Something snaps—something loud.
I look up, my shoulders tighten painfully.
And I’m so small.
I am a speck of dirt in a universe so wide, a collection of worlds and planes and lands, and they’re coming together around me, spinning and pulling, tugging and pushing.
I turn—a hand on my shoulder.
Ice and—
“No!” My mother screams, and everything crashes.
I step up, into the magic.
It shimmers around me.
The bison roars.
Glass shatters.
I reach it—I get there. My decision for the first time.
And Raleigh grins as he follows me into the one place no Enhanced is allowed to go: the Dream Land.
Raleigh marches into the Dream Land, and, for a second, he looks shocked. He takes a step back, looks around. Then his eyes get bigger and a wide grin unfurls across his face.
“Destroy it!” he commands. “Come in! Destroy it all!”
And there’s fire and flames—but it’s not my fire, it’s—
I scream as the edge of a flaming cone passes over me, singes me—
They crawl in, the Enhanced Seers. They crawl in like ants. So many of them. So many Enhanced Seers. Ones I’ve never seen, and they’re from all over the world. All these Seers—all these Seers who used to be Untamed.
The ones we lost.
The ones who turned against us.
My mother yells at me, and she’s
here too, following Raleigh and his army of Enhanced Seers—following them, but then she breaks off, runs toward me, and her lips are pulling as she shouts, looking too thin, far too thin, like they’re going to stretch to breaking point.
She reaches me, and—
And then the Untamed Seers are pulled here. Flashes of light, screeches, avenging figures. Power. So much power.
Five…ten…twenty….
And the Enhanced Seers—so many!
“Get them out!” a shrill voice cries. “They’ll destroy the Dream Land, destroy our only advantage…there’ll be no more Seers, no more—”
A Zharat Seer—the one who was part of mine and Corin’s welcoming ceremonies—pushes past me. He screams, and he runs toward the Gods and Goddesses as they group together, far to the right—the Gods and Goddesses are here, shrieking, shouting, fuming—but they’re shouting at him too. At the Zharat Seer.
“Get back!”
“Traitor!”
And then—and then every Seer—every single Seer, Enhanced and Untamed—is in the Dream Land. It all just…happens.
Seers.
Hundreds of us. A tide of energy, of power, of will.
The hot and angry air pulses around me. And there’s tearing—something’s still tearing, tearing because the walls are melting…melting because…because of me. And—
I feel the click as I shift into Esther’s body—Esther’s—down far, far below.
She screams a reverberating scream that draws a knife through the world—as she’s….
I lose the connection, and then I’m in Dominika, in Elf, in an unfamiliar Untamed woman—one after another. Snap. Snap. Snap.
Elf? Alive?
“Seven!”
My mother’s cry anchors me to the Dream Land, pulls me back, and I look and—
The land is bleeding. The sky is bleeding. Everything is—
A sickening crack.
White light shoots over me, in an arc. My mother pulls me to the ground. I taste the blood, the blood oozing from the land, and—
“I told you to run, to hide!” my mother screams.
“Seven!”
I look up at Taras’s shout, duck just as a streak of white light hurtles toward me. I turn, follow it with my eyes and—
I see the Goddess at the last second. See her step into the comet’s path, blocking it from an Untamed Seer. I see the look on the Goddess’s face as the white comet hits her. See the way her body fractures into thousands of fragments, like a rock exploding, hear her shrieks and—
I scream as the pain takes over me, as—
Can’t see.
I fall, can’t breathe.
My lungs.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see my mother on the ground too—shaking, writhing, and everyone I can see is….
Another Goddess is dying…and the pain, it’s too….
I turn my head, breathing hard. Feel saliva pooling in my mouth. But it’s like syrup, thick syrup and—
“Come here!” Raleigh thunders.
And I see him. See him standing—he’s shaking, the pain is etched on his face, the pain from the Goddess’s death—but his arms are spread wide and then—then there’s blackness behind him. And it emphasizes him. Makes him look bigger, and he’s all there is.
“A Seer of Life versus a Seer of Death!” Raleigh throws a bolt of white light at me. I duck, and it flies over my shoulder. “But we’ve always known which of us—which of our people—is going to survive! And this is it!” he roars. “Come on, Shania—draw all your people here, call back up—make it more of a fair fight at least. Give yourself a chance! Bring all the Untamed here!”
My people….
“No!” my mother roars. “Don’t connect to anyone!”
White light flashes in front of me, and the blackness behind Raleigh deepens. And it can’t have been blackness before, because it is now. Because there’s nothing there.
A hole in the Dream Land and—
Raleigh screams.
Fear washes over me, a blanket.
And I see them. The Enhanced. His people. Loads of them. An army, all coming for us and—
And they’re here. They’re just pulled here. By Raleigh. They’re not Seers, but they’re here. The Dream Land and—
Oh Gods.
He’s strong.
So strong.
Hundreds of them. Thousands.
Mirror eyes, everywhere.
“Destroy the Dream Land!” he cries. “Destroy this Untamed abomination!”
I struggle to my feet, manage it. My heart pounds, my body feels like it’s on fire, like something’s eating me. I cry out, raise my hand. Send white light toward Raleigh.
It misses him, but it reaches one of the Enhanced. One of the Enhanced who isn’t a Seer and—
“They outnumber us!” an Untamed Seer yells. And she’s by my side in an instant, reddish-blond hair catching me, wrapping around me as she pulls me back. And—
Blue eyes. She’s the blue-eyed seer. Younger than I thought.
She seizes my hand, then we’re running.
“We need more of us—more of us to fight them!” the blue-eyed Seer yells, and people race past us, around us, behind us. Deafening sounds echo through the land, and we blanch.
“But the Gods are on our side!” another voice yells, and then another Untamed Seer joins us. A middle-aged man with a pot belly.
To my far right, I see Taras wielding white light, shooting it at a group of Enhanced as they near him.
The land shakes and dust flies up.
I turn, skidding to a stop and—
Dust whirls tightly around, giving substance to a figure.
Death has arrived.
He pushes back his hood.
Blinding light bites the world.
I scream as heat burns me, as I fall to the ground. The blue-eyed Seer falls with me, but the middle-aged man grabs us, hauls us up.
“Run!”
A gun goes off. And then several more shots follow.
I turn, heart pounding even faster. What the hell? They’ve brought their guns into the Dream Land? And they’re—
“Destroy it! Destroy it! Destroy it!”
Something splinters. I scream, turning—see…see something fall. A mass of darkness. It crashes down, down onto the people, the Enhanced and the Untamed and the—
I feel the death of another God or Goddess. Or several. I don’t know. But I feel the holes it makes in me. The man next to me gasps, and I turn, see the fear on his face and—
I don’t see the gun, don’t see the Enhanced. Don’t even hear the actual gunshot or see the bullet hurtling toward him.
Just see him fall. See the blood appearing, the way it spurts in slow motion from his chest. How it rises in an arc, and splatters down in a pattern, like beautiful red raindrops.
I grab the blue-eyed Seer and run.
“We need more people!” she cries. “They’ve bringing more and more—we can’t let them destroy the Dream Land!”
And she’s right. They’re everywhere. Millions and millions of them. Closing in… The Enhanced are everywhere.
A wave of Enhanced rises in front of us. They move in unison, as if they’re one body.
We scream, hold onto each other as we turn, and—
But we’re surrounded by them.
White light bolts from my hands, and then the blue-eyed Seer’s doing it too. We hit as many as we can, but there are so many of them. The pounding in my head gets louder. War cries fill the air.
Another Goddess is hit—I see her fall in my peripheral vision—and brace myself for the pain. More pain than ever, and I’m out of breath. Can’t breathe. Everything’s…rugged.
“We need to bring the Untamed here, even up the numbers!” the blue-eyed Seer pants.
“But it won’t even it up!” I cry, my mother’s words in my head. She told me not to connect to anyone. “There are too many of them, only a few hundred of us—”
“But—�
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“Don’t bring any here!” Taras yells at me, and he’s running for us, running with speed and strength. “That’s what they want! They’re destroying the Dream Land! You’re the only one who can bring the rest of our people here, and, if you do, they’ll trap us, destroy us all. We’d all die. The war would end today. No, we’ve got to get out before they destroy the Dream Land—we can’t leave our groups without Seers!”
Without Seers?
My mind reels.
Get out. Get out. Get out.
I turn and—but I don’t know how to get out.
The blue-eyed Seer shoots a bolt of white light from her hands at another gang of Enhanced. Frazzling and sizzling sounds fill my ears.
Somewhere, my mother screams.
Her scream turns my blood into ice. It eats me.
I let go of the blue-eyed Seer’s hand, yank away from her, and then I’m running, ducking under bullets and bolts of white light, skidding and slipping on the blood and—
Something splashes over me. My vision fogs red and—
Blisters rise on my skin. Fire.
I’m on fire.
I yell, throw myself down, try to—
Raleigh looms over me, smiling.
I send white light at him, but he sends his at me. I roll over, hear fizzling, somehow see my light hitting his, and his hitting mine, and they burst together, spray out over us. Over us both. Darkness and pain, but only for a second. I look up, see his eyes. His on mine. Mine on his.
Two feet exists between us.
“Come on, Shania. Bring your people here! Bring all of them here! Connect to them all now! Make it a fairer fight!”
“So you can kill us all, trap us all here as you destroy the Dream Land?” My ears pound, and I raise my hands, get another bolt of white light out. But it misses him, and I curse. “You’d die too! You and your people.”
Raleigh grins. “It would still end the war. We’d be heroes, ridding the mortal world of evil and suffering. Leaving the world pure for the Chosen Ones still in it. Just bring them all here, bring the Untamed here, Shania!”
The land rumbles, and I can’t move. My body’s locking up—fresh pain and—
Raleigh screams.
I scream.
All the Seers scream.
Another God is dead.
And—
“No!” my mother screams.
Hands grab me, wrench me back. My mother. I know it’s her, even though I can’t see her. She drags me backward. And everything goes on around me.
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