Rowe’s face twisted in rage at my words, turning his whole body to face me. He raised his sword and came at me. I countered him, and his sword clashed with mine again and again, the impact sending sparks flying around him. We were both desperate, but Rowe was also afraid of something, which made him sloppy. Dodging a blow meant to remove my head, I punched him in the face, knocking him back a few steps. To my surprise, he fell backward over a piece of broken rock and didn’t get back up.

Chaos surrounded me. Dropping the short sword, I reached inside of myself and tapped my own abilities. I was ready to summon up all the fires of Hell. No one would leave the ruins alive. The sacrifices had to be stopped. The seal had to be protected.

With the first flicker of fire, the energy came rushing into me, alive and crackling. For the first time in my life, I was fully in touch with the powers of the earth. There was no calm, sweet peace. No sound of babbling brooks or whispering winds. There was only crackling rage and the fury of a power long unused. Mother Earth was fucking pissed and I was now her outlet.

Each naturi that approached me burst into flames instantly, but it wasn’t enough to relieve the pressure building in my body. The torches became engulfed in flames while giant basketball-size balls of fire hovered in the air, lighting the courtyard so it appeared as if daybreak had finally arrived. I located Danaus and James and quickly encircled them in a protective wall of fire. I did the same with Jabari, but it wasn’t enough.

The power was building. It was going to destroy me, and I couldn’t find the gray female Rowe had been so intent on protecting. The power was going to kill me before I could stop her.

Danaus. I reached out. My voice in my head seemed like a small whisper compared to the roar of power within me. I couldn’t concentrate anymore. The fires were getting larger, brighter, stronger. I was going to kill the very people I was trying to protect.

I’m here. His voice in my brain was a cool balm against the burning inside me.

Can’t concentrate. Can’t find her. Don’t know which sacrifice she’s going after.

She’s here.

“No!” I screamed. James!

Pain exploded within me. I didn’t even have a chance to react. My whole body was thrown backward. I flew what felt like yards through the air in a terrifying blur of motion before my spine slammed into the hard stone ground. An incoherent scream of pain erupted from my throat as I writhed. Something was being torn deep within me, as if someone or something was attacking the fragile shreds of my soul, trying to pull them from my body. I curled into the fetal position, desperate to hold my soul within my battered frame. The pain burned within me. Nerve endings trembled and twisted. Organs sizzled. Agonizing pain ripped through my brain until there wasn’t a single thought.

And then the blackness seeped in. It consumed everything, the pain, the tearing sensation in my chest, the outside world. The blackness blotted out everything and then it stole me away.

I jerked upright and gasped, which sent razor blades down my throat and through my lungs before the first clear thought rang through my brain. I didn’t need to breathe, but there were some instincts that even death couldn’t kill. When I awoke each night from a nightmare, my first reaction was always to gasp for air. But this wasn’t a nightmare.

Blinking as I tried to clear my blurred vision, I felt a hand at my back and on my shoulder as someone eased me back to the ground. I coughed and tried to roll back onto my side as I pushed the unnecessary air out of my body. Something inside of me ached. My thoughts were fuzzy as I tried to remember what had happened. No one had touched me, but pain had exploded inside of me, frying every organ and brain cell.

“Rest, Mira.” Jabari’s deep voice swept over me from my right. I lay on my back and unclenched my eyes. Ryan was kneeling beside me on my left, one of his hands holding mine. Jabari was kneeling too. His clothes were torn and he was covered in blood, but a soft smile hovered on his lips. He had won. I was on the Coven, which only benefited him because he was able to control me.

“James?” I asked, fearing the answer when I looked up at Ryan. The warlock nodded over past Jabari. Twisting, I saw the young man seated against the wall, bloodied, bruised, and swollen, but still breathing.

“But Danaus—” I started, then slowly shook my head as I tried to clear the fog from my thoughts. “He said the naturi was by him. Is the seal still safe?”

“The seal was broken,” Jabari confirmed, his smile falling into a dark frown.

“How?” I demanded in a raspy voice.

“The human male I freed. He jumped through the ring of fire you created and into the waiting arms of the naturi. It took them only a second to subdue him and complete the task.”

“And the child?” I whispered.

“He sleeps,” Ryan said. “He’ll be returned to town tonight and will remember none of this.”

I pressed my right hand to the center of my chest. Was the seal breaking what I had felt? Had the seal been tied to my soul? The pain had been excruciating, as if something were being torn from me. Even now there was a hollow, ragged sensation throbbing within me.

“I…felt…pain,” I said. My voice wavered and sounded rough to my own ears.

Jabari nodded. His large hand swept over my forehead and down as he moved some hair from my face in a surprisingly comforting gesture. “You created the seal. It’s natural that you felt its destruction.”

Ryan’s hand tightened at Jabari’s words. “You created the original seal?”

I pulled my hand out of his grasp and rolled away from him. I couldn’t look at the warlock. Getting my knees beneath me, I slowly sat up. However, all thoughts of standing left me when I looked around the area. The carnage was gut-wrenching. Blood and bodies were strewn everywhere, bringing back images of the battle at the Themis Compound less than a week earlier. There was nowhere I could go. Destruction seemed to hound my every step. Chaos followed in my wake.

And now the seal was broken. The naturi would soon determine a time to open the door between our two worlds, and the war would officially begin. What lay before me was simply a minor skirmish.

“I’m a monster,” I whispered, shaking my head as tears slipped unchecked down my scratched and dirty face. Burned corpses filled the area, with smoke still rising from their bodies. “I’m a monster with this kind of power and yet still I fail.”

“The bargain has been broken. Our Liege is safe,” Jabari patiently reminded me. “We succeeded.”

“No, the seal was broken,” I moaned.

Kneeling before me, he placed his hands on either side of my face and forced me to meet his dark gaze. “We failed because we didn’t work together. We separated when our greatest strength is to work together through you. This will be for the best. This is the only way to end this permanently. We will kill Aurora and destroy the naturi for all time. No more seals and no more gateways to other worlds. We end it for all time.”

“But—”

“To protect our way of life, to protect the humans, we have to destroy the naturi. And the only way to do that is to destroy their queen.”

I wanted to believe Jabari. I couldn’t remember ever wanting anything more. And he might have been right—the only way to destroy the naturi could be through Aurora. But all I could see was this black shadow of death stretching across the earth. To get to Aurora, so many would have to die; vampire, lycanthrope, and human.

But at least now we had some time. We had time to plan. We had time to hunt.

I pulled back, removing my face from his grasp. “You had better be right.”