End Game (The Foundling Series) Read online

  Damn it.

  We should have let that tree finish him off when we had the chance.

  “This is not good.” Portia dropped the weapon and pulled a sword. “Hope you’ve got a Plan B.”

  “Do you not see the flying cat brigade?” Santiago growled. “That’s our Plan B.”

  Shock painted her face with comical surprise. “But Luce said —”

  “She says a lot of things I ignore,” he scoffed. “That’s how I’ve managed to keep her alive this long.”

  Warming up her arm, blade glistening, she said, “Plan C it is then.”

  “Luce.”

  Dragon brain rejected the name until I heard it called again and spotted Death wading into the water. Arms reaching over her head, she called for me again.

  Here goes nothing.

  With a nod, I blazed a path toward her — and Wu.

  Wings, don’t fail me now.

  I dipped low and managed to wrap her upper body with my tail. She held on tight and started to climb up my body. The added weight wasn’t the issue. The problem was I was still new enough to flying to require my tail’s assistance. Add to that she was climbing up my back, causing my wings to brush against her, throwing off my rhythm, and costing me precious altitude.

  The water shone, mirrorlike beneath me, the waves flecking my belly with crimson foam. We were going to hit the water. I couldn’t see any way to correct myself.

  Then Cole was there, lifting me, positioning me to finish the climb alone. Once I topped out, I breathed a sigh of relief that Death echoed as she settled between my shoulder blades.

  Thank God, Wu hadn’t sunk me when he had the chance.

  Talk about missing a prime opportunity. He could have captured me there and then, and I couldn’t have done a thing about it.

  An itty, bitty part of me processed that apparent stroke of luck, and an even ittier, bittier part of me wondered at my fortune.

  “We have one chance,” she yelled over the noise. “Take me to Ezra.”

  Wu was the closer target, but she must be thinking the same thing that kept running on a loop through my head.

  Kill him, I die.

  Kill me, he dies.

  What the actual hell was he thinking, standing between his father and me? Before I had to risk my luck or fortune or — dare I think his conscience — a second time, Cole barreled into Wu and sent him spinning aside, clearing us a path. Without looking back, I took it. We shot straight down the gauntlet formed by our allies beating back the Malakhim.

  Rising onto her feet, Death dug her toes into my spine. She flung out her arms, and power radiated from her in a creeping wave. Malakhim dropped around us like flies to the cheers of the feline contingent. There was no outrunning Death. Before she had required contact. Now she had transcended, throwing her will at our enemies, battering them out of the sky.

  Ahead of us, the impossibly bright center of their army shone upon us. I was outrunning my terror, but it was catching up to me.

  I zipped past Ezra, close enough to feel the beat of his wings stir my mane, and Death leapt from my back.

  No, no, no.

  A scream ripped from my throat, coming out as an agonized roar as she struck him. Leaning in, she gave him a kiss, and his power dimmed a fraction. Ezra wiped his mouth and spat, his glow dialing higher. He struck her across the face for the impertinence, and she plummeted.

  Clumsy in this body, I couldn’t cut a tight enough circle to beat the nearest Malakhim to her. They caught her between them and pierced her body with their blades. Five, six. Seven of them. Skewering her. Over and over. Malice in their eyes and hate in their hearts. Then they dropped her like garbage.

  I dove after her, caught her by some miracle, and spun us away from Ezra. Clutching her in my talons, I sped for land. I shifted when my feet touched dirt, a scream for Thom lodged in my throat, and he came running. I laid her on the ground and took her hand, holding on tight.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I kept repeating. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Janardan emerged from the shallows and ran for us. He dropped to his knees beside Death, and she smiled at him, her teeth bloody.

  “It was worth it, my love.” He kissed her softly. “To fight on the right side for once.”

  Her eyes closed, and Thom swore, redoubling his efforts, but nothing he tried brought her around again.

  Janardan fell backward a heartbeat later, his eyes wide and unseeing.

  Whipping my head toward the Sound, I watched the bodies of her children bob to the surface.

  Death was gone, and she had taken her coterie with her.

  The dead she had brought to life dropped where they stood. Corpses littered the island, washed up on the shore. Our advantage had been lost. The numbers tipped back in their favor. I had no choice but to leave her with Thom and take to the skies to knock as many Malakhim into the water as possible before they overtook us.

  That burst of power must have used up all her reserves. Death had pitched her might against Ezra and failed. How could I hope to best him?

  Wild panic fluttered in my breast, a frenzied storm of emotion hammering out a single message.

  Run, run, run.

  We had kicked a hornet’s nest, and the enemy swarmed us.

  Run, run, run.

  There was nowhere to go.

  Run, run, run.

  There was nowhere left to hide.

  Run, run, run.

  I always thought the world — my corner of it at least — would end in Canton, but I saw now that was the best-case scenario. The one where we beat Ezra then Wu and I went on to seal this terrene.

  This was as far from the best-case as it got. This was beyond worst-case. This was total failure. This was … the end.

  I was the last cadre member standing, and I had conveniently placed my entire coterie on an island to make it easier for the Malakhim to pick them off at Ezra’s discretion.

  After all this, I had failed. I wasn’t breaking any cycles. The cycle was breaking me.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Adam kept his face impassive as Death and her coterie passed from this world. Luce hunched over her sister, her heart breaking for a woman she had barely known, and Adam hated himself that much more. He had allowed this to happen. He had known Death would end here, and he had done nothing to stop it. The inaction was critical to his plan. Had he attempted to save her, his father would have known his contrition was an act, and he had come too far to throw it all away for one life. Even one life animating many.

  Luce wouldn’t forgive him for her sister. She had grown attached to Death, and her mate was a good friend to Cole. They would mourn them, but grieving meant they were still alive, at least for a while longer.

  The pretentious light glaring on his periphery dimmed as another body joined the other guards who hovered between him and Ezra.

  Once his father would have welcomed him with open arms, now he kept precautions in place.

  Father relaxed as the numbers shifted in his favor again, but not enough. As pleased as he was to rub yet another failed coup in Adam’s face, he remained on edge. Luce was the wild card in this scenario, and he watched her with an intensity that bordered on obsession, a fixation Adam wished he didn’t share.

  Father wanted her dead so badly Adam could taste it, and it was sweet.

  A smile tickled his lips, but he couldn’t allow it to surface.

  His father was afraid. Of Luce. Of what she represented.

  Change.

  The sands of his rule were slipping through his manicured fingers, and he could no more catch each grain than he could prevent this final reckoning. The bill for all his sins had come due, and he would pay it here, now.

  “Finish her.”

  The order broke through Adam’s reverie. “Yes, Father.”

  “Bring me her head.” He turned as if to go. “Do this, son, and all is forgiven.”

  Ezra was that certain he had kicked this dog until he had no bite l
eft. That convinced he had nothing to fear from his offspring. He gave an order, and he expected it to be followed for no greater reason than he wished it done.

  He. Turned. His. Back.

  The simple act compounded centuries of abuse until the veneer of the dutiful son crackled, fissures spreading across Adam’s face until the submissive expression he had arranged on his features before crawling back to his father shattered into fragments too small to ever be realigned.

  Adam barked an order in Otillian, the common tongue, and movement stirred on the island.

  Father had never lowered himself to master the language, and few of his Malakhim had an ear for it since they were trained to believe the fabrications Ezra spun like silk from a spinneret.

  So unconcerned was he, so confident in his victory over Adam, and Luce, he didn’t look back.

  A missile of black feathers and horns bowled through the regrouping Malakhim in the rearguard and struck Ezra in the spine. Kapoor was wrath incarnate as he wrapped his legs around Ezra’s waist and howled with all the anguish of the tortures that had been inflicted upon him.

  Faster than even Adam could track, Kapoor produced twin daggers, pressed them to the topmost wing joints fused to Ezra’s shoulders, and began to cut.

  Ezra screamed when Kapoor sheared his uppermost wings.

  Adam closed his eyes and listened to the singular note, the most beautiful sound he had ever heard.

  Victory.

  The Malakhim froze as one at the cry, pivoting in the air to race to their master’s rescue.

  Much to Adam’s regret, he had no time to watch Kapoor exact his vengeance. If he wanted it complete, he had to defend Kapoor before backup reached them. Adam fought off the winged masses for as long as he could, until his arms burned, and his wings labored to keep him aloft. He heard nothing from behind him, but he couldn’t afford to turn and check.

  The magnitude of Ezra’s charm might have smashed through the command Adam gave Kapoor. He wasn’t sure which of their wills would prevail when pitting father against son, and it made him sick to picture the battle waging behind him, to know he had thrown Kapoor into the fire again and abandoned him to burn alone. Yards might separate them, but it might as well have been miles for all the good it did him.

  The worst mistake Kapoor ever made was deciding Adam was his friend. It was an honor he wasn’t worthy of, a claim he should have rebuked, a death sentence for the other man. But Adam saw the value in Kapoor, nurtured that relationship, and turned him toward his own goals.

  Luce was right. He was a bastard.

  But he wouldn’t be one for much longer.

  A loud splash jerked Adam toward the water.

  Kapoor was down. Blood smeared his face. His wings twisted behind him. A slash opened his abdomen.

  Three of Ezra’s wings drifted on the current around Kapoor, all of them uppermost wings, the strongest ones, the largest ones, the ones that kept charun like them airborne. Ezra was gravely wounded, but ego and pride kept him from grasping the full extent of the damage.

  Or, he thought again as his father barreled toward him, it was rage that blinded him to everything but the thirst for retribution.

  At last his father understood how parched the throat grew when one thing alone could quench you. He wished his father was less dangerous, less capable. He wished he could rip the final wings from his back and toss him to the earth to wander as a man. But that was idiocy. Left to his own devices, Ezra would find new ways to enthrall the weak-minded until he amassed another army of blindly loyal followers. That was his gift.

  No, he had to die. That was the only way for them to be certain.

  Adam might have set up the dominos, but his father had knocked them down, setting off a chain reaction that had been centuries in the making. He could have prevented this reckoning, so many times in so many ways, but mercy — like Otillian — wasn’t a language his father understood.

  What Adam had helped Ezra forget over the long centuries was the nature of the magic in the blades he had entrusted to the janitor to aid him in his duties. Their power, the reason they killed charun, was they turned their victims mortal. Not for long. A few minutes or hours, depending on their strength. Just long enough to mortally wound them and then hunt them to ground.

  Adam knew this because he had forged the blades himself from the precious metal he harvested from several previous incarnations of Death. Each time he killed one, he collected the metal from her rukav and bided his time until he had enough, until he had learned enough, to create the twin daggers.

  As gifts.

  For his father.

  And then, after his father was done being amused by them, Adam let enough time pass before he proposed allowing a trusted charun to wield them.

  The miracle was not that his father allowed it. He viewed himself as invulnerable, after all. The true miracle was that Kapoor hadn’t stabbed Adam through the heart decades ago. He should have. Adam deserved that and more.

  Ezra slammed into Adam, the force clacked his teeth together, and he tasted copper. But he didn’t have to squint. The light had drained from his father like a switch flipped. Only rage made him incandescent now.

  “You dare?” Crimson spittle flew from his lips. “You would choose this whore over your own blood?”

  There was no point in taking offense. All women were whores to his father. Including his own mother. Adam had wondered, for a time, if he begrudged the fairer sex their ability to reproduce, to create life. Ezra might be able to control who and what they birthed into the world, but he was reliant on them to give him Malakhim, and that contrasted sharply with the legend he had woven around himself.

  “I’m choosing my blood.” Adam unsheathed a short dagger from his hip. “With you dead, my descendants will know peace. Finally. They will thrive.” He spun it on his palm. “They will never know the woman who birthed their line, because you killed her out of spite, but I remember. I will never forget her.” He slid the blade between Ezra’s ribs and wished he relished the moment of shock, but he mostly felt the bruises forming from Cole shoving him out of Luce’s path and the aches and pains that came from battle. “Her death sealed our fates.”

  “I can’t,” Ezra murmured, confusion tightening his features. “Die.”

  Wu twisted the blade, and blood poured over his hand. The light went out of his father’s eyes, and he didn’t recognize the man without his charm. In death, he was rendered ordinary. Ezra would have hated that.

  “Yes.” He let go of his father’s body. “You can.”

  Ezra plummeted, but the Malakhim didn’t let him hit the water. They swarmed him, attempting to protect him, but it was too late. He was dead and gone.

  Adam had been wrong. Revenge didn’t taste sweet. It tasted like the copper in his mouth and the bile in his throat. It didn’t heal him, mend him, or otherwise repair his tattered spirit. It gave him … relief. But the well of his soul had gone dry too long ago to dredge up more than that.

  No wonder Luce’s eyes held pity when she looked at him. She had seen the truth of him, the frayed edges hidden beneath the slick veneer, and known on an instinctive level there was nothing left in him to give.

  Adam was burnt out, a cinder, while Cole had roared his defiance and fought her every step of the way until she won him over with the raging tempest of her soul. He almost hoped their mate bond was strong enough to end Cole’s life after the terrenes were sealed. He wouldn’t want to live on without her. Adam knew from personal experience.

  He searched for Kapoor, but he couldn’t find a body among the hundreds already chumming the waters.

  When he was spent, he returned to the shore to face his judgement.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Good thing the enemy was retreating, our allies in hot pursuit. I hadn’t budged since Ezra dropped like a rock from the sky, a comet extinguishing as it landed in the arms of its fellows. I couldn’t seem to get my arms or legs to work. I couldn’t get my brain to work either.
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br />   Shock.

  This was shock.

  I had grown so numb that I was just as stunned to find myself dumbfounded as by what I had witnessed.

  Ezra was dead.

  Dead.

  Wu would have gone after him if that wasn’t the case. He had come this far. He would have finished it.

  Guess this meant he wasn’t a traitor, depending whose side you were on.

  God, I was so tired of questioning his loyalties. I couldn’t keep up with his switchback maneuvering.

  After all the talk and prep work, all the months of recruiting, all the cutting of ties, I didn’t have to lift a finger. I never even met Ezra. He would forever be a glint on a horizon, a figure spied across a battlefield, a person unknown.

  For all that I had fought and bled and cried to reach this point, victory rang hollow. I hadn’t fulfilled some epic destiny. Ezra’s blood didn’t coat my hands. More than ever, I felt like the tool Wu had fashioned me to be. This must have been his plan all along. He wanted top billing, claiming his father’s final moments for himself. It’s not that I was eager to kill anyone, but I had done nothing any cadre member couldn’t have done before or after me. At least not yet.

  The reason for cultivating me had never been clearer.

  Killing his father hadn’t been the issue. He just proved that. With the enclave’s help, he could have rallied enough charun to defeat the Malakhim or at least cripple them until he was ready to make his move.

  My sole purpose in this war was to play martyr. No wonder Wu hadn’t fessed up to my role sooner. If Kapoor hadn’t told me, I’m not sure Wu would have until the last possible second. How he would have explained it then, I have no clue, and it didn’t matter anyway. Not now.

  I was breaking Cole’s heart. He just didn’t feel the cracks spreading yet.

  The coterie would be furious, their hearts dented too, but they would live.

  They would all live.

  The temporary reprieve bogged me down until I couldn’t have budged even if my limbs had been feeling cooperative. Guilt hit hard and fast soon after.