Page 92 of So Let Them Burn

Iya chuckled, his thumb digging against her throat, making it hard to breathe. “Every power you had is one I perfected before you were ever born. Every power you still have is one I taught you. I am everything you could be, Faron, and you are nothing more than the heart I can’t seem to destroy.” Faron choked as the rest of his fingers tightened. “Do not fool yourself into thinking I won’t try.”

“Try this,” said Elara, blasting Iya across the garden with a wave of divine magic.

Faron sucked air back into her lungs with a gasp, rolling onto her feet and stumbling over to her sister. Elara was glowing lightly, her fraying braids waving in a breeze only she could feel, and Faron knew without having to ask that she was channeling a god. She would have recognized that light anywhere, even if she couldn’t tell which god in particular had given Elara’s skin that unnatural glow. She reached up to rub her throat, where she could feel bruises in the shape of Iya’s fingertips already forming, and scanned the garden for any sign of him.

She saw fire before she saw Iya.

He burned through a line of falling trees. Elara and Faron leaped in different directions to avoid them. Faron stopped short as Iya appeared in front of her. Fire danced between his fingers, curved around his hands and up his forearm.

“You were a distraction,” he growled. “How clever.”

“Fuck off,” said Faron, throwing a punch.

He blocked her easily, but she threw another and another. Hisflames didn’t burn her. Instead, they enclosed her wrists, as well, like a string that tied them together. He caught her fist and yanked her up against his chest before whirling her to face her sister and hooking an arm around her neck.

“I know you won’t hurt her,” he called across the garden. “So how about we settle this like civilized people?”

“You mean like cowards?” Elara asked, landing before them. Her Langlish clothing must have been fireproof, because Faron couldn’t see so much as a scorch mark on her. Faron coughed, choking on the smoke that covered the garden as the fires spread. But no matter how hard she struggled, Iya’s arms were like steel, and she couldn’t break free. “Let her go and release her from her bond with you. Or I’ll lock you up in the Empty where you belong.”

“You’d lock Reeve up in the Empty? Your sister?” Iya scoffed. “Somehow, I don’t believe you.”

Elara stretched out a hand. Her eyes glowed. Faron felt something brush against her feet, but she couldn’t look down to see what it was. Iya’s curse was the only warning she got before they sank inches into the ground. Somewhere above, she heard a dragon screech, a guttural sound that went deeper than pain.

It was fear.

“Let her go now,” Elara repeated, and her voice sounded like it was coming from all sides. “I am the Maiden Empyrean. I walk with the power and the blessings of the gods. I can save my sister and Reeve from the Empty and leave you there. Don’t fool yourself into thinking I can’t.”

“Please,” he said, and he sounded so much like Reeve again that Faron stopped struggling against him. “Don’t lock me in there with him. Don’t trap me in that place again.Please.”

Elara faltered, too. Whatever was dragging them down into the earth stopped, and the glow in Elara’s eyes started to fade. For all her threats, Faron knew her sister. The last thing she wanted was to lock away Faron and Reeve just to stop Iya. It would save San Irie, but it would break her. Faron couldn’t let her make that choice.

She’d ruined so much. She’d hurt so many people, even the one she’d wanted to save. She didn’t want to be that person anymore.

“Leave her alone,” Faron begged. “I know what you’re doing, and you need to stop. I’ll do anything.”

“Anything?” Iya’s word caressed her ear. “Come with me, then.”

Before she could ask where, a strong gust of wind threw Elara off her feet. Iya and Faron were unaffected, so she wasn’t surprised to look up and see Lightbringer hovering over them. The god who was once a boy released her and jumped, higher than any normal person could, landing easily on the back of his dragon. Then Lightbringer lowered his body just enough for Faron to see that Iya was reaching out a hand for her.

“Come with me.”

Faron’s heart clenched. She didn’t hear Iya, the god of a dying world, in those words. She heard Gael Soto, the knight of the realm whose mind had been broken by the creature he’d tried to kill. She heard Reeve Warwick, the boy who had turned his back on his country to save her own. She heard two teens whose lives had been ruined by power they should never have wielded, and she felt so sad for them that she couldn’t even speak.

“Faron!” Elara was back on her feet and racing toward her. “Faron, get out of the way!”

“Faron.” Above her, Iya’s upturned palm beckoned. “It’s time to go.”

She stood paralyzed, crying softly as Elara ran across the garden. Crying because Elara would not reach them in time. Crying because they would be separated again, and this time, it was her choice.

But San Irie had a new saint, a better saint. Faron had done nothing but cause everyone pain, and now two lives were in her hands. Despite everything that had happened, she and Iya had a bond, and not just the bond between them and Lightbringer. She understood him, and he trusted her. There was only one way to stop an enemy who wore the face of a friend, and locking him away was not the answer.

She looked at that face, at Reeve’s face, and saw the potential of what could have been if she hadn’t been so stubborn, if she’d been more self-aware, if the timing had been right. But she looked in those eyes, Gael’s eyes, and saw a boy who had doomed the world trying to do the right thing. Perhaps he was the only person in the world who understood what she was going through. If she could save them both, maybe she could redeem herself. Lightbringer had to have a weakness. Faron could find it, trick it out.

She’d been a liar longer than she’d been a saint, after all.

Faron jumped, Iya’s hand catching hers before she could fall. He swung her onto the dragon behind him, and then they took off. She made the mistake of finding her sister in the sea of grass and flowers, hoping that Elara would understand why she was doing this. Hoping that Elara would trust her, even though she hadn’t earned it lately.

Instead, all Faron saw on Elara’s face was open heartbreak before the clouds swallowed them up.