Three million…people?

  I pressed my hand to my churning stomach, my gaze landing on a brown-skinned woman with honey-colored hair cut close to the skull. She wasn’t speaking as she eyed a device in her hand, but the male’s voice became louder as she drew closer.

  “…with the limited warning to allow for effective evacuation, we’re looking at tens of thousands—possibly over a hundred thousand—casualties.”

  Pressure clamped down on my chest. Over a hundred thousand deaths? That had to be what I’d felt. But that event clearly wasn’t here. So, why had I been drawn here?

  The woman looked up, her brows rising the moment she saw me. Thick, dark lashes fluttered once and then twice as she stared.

  I glanced down at myself, realizing I wore only the gown I’d been sleeping in. It was highly inappropriate to be seen in public dressed as I was—even in Atlantia, where the attire wasn’t as modest as it was in Solis.

  But I could see the belly of a woman running past us—though I had no idea what she was running from—including her navel and a good portion of her breasts. So, why did this one look at me so strangely?

  The woman pressed something on what she held, and the male voice cut off as her steps slowed. I felt her concern before I tasted it, which caught me off guard. I couldn’t even say exactly how I knew. I just looked at her and knew she was worried.

  “Are you all right?” she asked in that strange, clipped manner that made ‘all right’ sound like the l and r were missing.

  I nodded as a breeze lifted the shorter strands of my hair, tossing them across my face. My gaze was drawn to the golden hoops dangling from her ears.

  She frowned slightly. “You sure?” she asked, unease radiating from her. I didn’t think it was my scars that made her uncomfortable. “Do you need help—?” She gasped, looking down at the exact moment I felt the tremor beneath us. “What in the hell?”

  The essence suddenly pulsed, causing my heart to lurch as I did the same as she had and looked down. The land felt like it vibrated. I could feel something…stirring.

  “You felt that?” she asked, and I nodded. Looking up, she glanced behind me. “Maybe it’s a truck. A very large one. They do that sometimes.”

  Having no idea what a truck was, I scanned the park. Others had stopped, too. They stared at the river.

  I walked forward, the sun breaking free from behind a cloud. Despite it warming my skin, tiny bumps erupted over my flesh. Those strange ships in the river swayed, emitting that trumpeting sound again as the dark water rippled and sloshed. Unease flowed from those gathered by the river.

  “Oh, my god,” the woman rasped from behind me. “It’s an—”

  “Earthquake,” someone shrieked.

  What happened next was pure chaos. People in the park scattered, running in opposite directions and then veering back as the low rumble built. The jarring sounds of metal clanking and creaking reverberated around us as the towering, imposing structures started to sway.

  I felt the fear before I tasted its bitterness. It was that strong. I stumbled back as terror came at me in waves.

  As tumultuous water rocked the vessels, lifting their bows, people began screaming. The sounds of screeching and snapping tore through the air as the metal boxes with wheels slipped free and plunged into the water. My gaze flew to the people on the top level. They clamored toward the railings, holding on.

  I had to do something.

  I wasn’t sure exactly what as I walked forward. I hadn’t used the eather in this manner before, but if I could tear down stone walls with it, I could surely use it to stop a ship from capsizing.

  “Where you going?” The woman whirled, grabbing for my arm. “Come on, we need to get—”

  A deafening series of screeches and squawks whipped our heads up in alarm. A massive flock of birds erupted from the roofs of nearby structures, filling the sky with a frenzy of frantic flapping and piercing cries.

  A deep, ominous rumbling quickly grew into a thunderous roar as a section of the ground to our left rolled and buckled, leaving a trail of unsettled earth and plumes of dirt and rock in its path.

  This was no earthquake.

  The moment whatever was in that ground hit the river, the water rose sharply and then sank with a loud groan and splash as it carved a path toward the statue and out beyond it. In the distance, a large segment of earth rose from the riverbed, sealing off our section. Water spilled over the uneven edges and then rushed back. Air blasted from the water, propelling chunks of earth and jagged rock into the sky as a wide stream of water shot up. Dust billowed out in thick clouds, and for a brief moment, the debris hung suspended, silhouetted against the sky. Terror surged from those around me, coating my skin in its icy heat. For several heartbeats, I couldn’t move—couldn’t even think.

  High-pitched screams jolted me. The massive pieces of land and rubble that had shot into the sky returned, falling in every direction. Rock slammed into the structures’ steel sides and crashed through windows, pushing desks, chairs, and—

  Oh, my gods.

  People.

  Tingling heat gathered in my arms and hands, and my chest pulsed with sharp, quick bursts of agony again and again—so many times I couldn’t even begin to keep track as they hit the hard ground below. I knew I wasn’t just feeling their pain. I was sensing their deaths, feeling the very moment their souls left their bodies. Without conscious thought, I started toward the buildings, knowing I could—

  A large shard of rock sliced through the arm of the statue that had held the torch high. It, too, fell, the impact sending a wave of water shooting upward right before something blotted out the sun.

  The woman beside me screamed and dropped to her knees. She threw her arms up, shielding her head as a chunk of land, larger than the park I stood in, plummeted toward us.

  A rush of icy-hot power flooded my veins, and it felt old. Endless. All-consuming. A metallic taste gathered in my mouth as the essence pouring through me took over, shutting off my connection to the frenzied emotions around me. The essence responded at the very moment my will formed in my mind. There was no delay. Not even a second. Silver strands of eather appeared along the slab of earth, creating a web instead of spreading from my fingers. But it wasn’t just silver. Like what I’d seen beneath my skin earlier, it was a twisting kaleidoscope of gold and silver laced with shadows. The rock shattered into a fine, glittering dust.

  My gaze quickly swept the sky, finding the remaining fragments that had yet to strike. The essence pulsed inside me, and those pieces, too, evaporated.

  “Holy shit,” the woman gasped, drawing my attention to her. She peeked through her bent arms, her brown eyes wide. “Are you, like, a superhero or something?”

  I lowered my hand. “Superhero?” I asked. I thought I’d spoken the word normally, but it didn’t sound that way to my ears.

  Or to hers.

  Because she fell back on her ass, her arms dropping. She stared up at me in shock, and I knew she’d heard the eather in my voice. It sounded like shadows, ice, and fire—

  A shiver of awareness tiptoed up my spine, sending a wave of tingles across the nape of my neck. My skin prickled as eather suddenly rushed to my skin. The corners of my vision filled with silver, and the air around me charged. Shadows pressed against my skin, swirling with traces of gold and silver.

  Something was coming.

  And it was her.

  I felt her in every fiber of my being—warm and summery. The One who was born of Blood and Ash, the Light in the Fire, and the Brightest Moon. The true Primal of Life. The Queen.

  And my…grandmother.

  I inhaled sharply, catching a scent that reminded me of spring—renewal.

  Then, as quickly as I sensed her, something seemed to pull her presence back, taking the warmth with it.

  But the presence of another intensified as the entire river started to writhe in a frantic dance. Suddenly, the water level dropped as if the river’s floor had vanished. I jerked back as the force of its descent created a loud, hollow sound, and the water and everything in it was pulled downward.

  As the awareness of another grew stronger, I turned my attention to the ships now spinning sideways; one of them quickly pulled down as the entire river seemed to fall away. The sound of screams being cut off, swallowed by the water, would haunt me until my last breath. I should’ve saved them. That was why I’d come. But I’d wasted time. Only one ship remained, and anger at myself rose. I latched onto the fury, stalking forward as my will formed. A surge of eather left me, causing the air to crackle and fill with the scent of burnt ozone.

  Strands of silver twined with gold burst forth from my outstretched hands, swirling over the ruined ground and the sinking water. As tendrils of essence wrapped around the ship, I drew my arms up and back in one swift motion, lifting the vessel from the water and returning it to solid ground. It crashed onto the land with a resounding thud, causing dirt and grass to fly up in every direction. The ship mowed down a row of what appeared to be lampposts as it stopped atop a stretch of yellow-streaked gray cement.

  I turned back to the river, summoning the eather again. A shiver of awareness swept across my body, raising the tiny hairs on my arms as the ship started to topple sideways.

  “It’s too late.”

  CHAPTER 13

  POPPY

  As I willed the essence to capture the ship, air lodged in my throat at the sound of an unfamiliar voice that seemed to drip power with each word. Warning bells rang in my head. That something I’d sensed moments ago was here. The eather pulsed, responding to what was inside him, just as it had with Casteel when I first woke. But this was different. And those warning bells were telling me that I didn’t want to engage with this stranger, that I should step back because the kind of power I sensed in him was something I’d never experienced before. It was infinite and old. I focused on the ship—the terrified screams—my chest throbbing wildly. An innate sense of knowing was birthed then, one that recognized the significance of each pulse. Each scream silenced forever.

  “It’s too late for them.”

  “I have no idea who you are,” I ground out.

  “But I know you.”

  That statement sent a shiver down my spine. “That sounded entirely too creepy.” I pulled the ship back from the abyss. “But if you’re not going to help me, can you shut the fuck up?”

  A low, long sigh answered, sending another chill dancing across my skin as I brought the ship back to land. I tried not to think about how only half the people remained on the platform. Sending the vessel in the other direction, I was relieved to see those on the ground scatter, fleeing its path.

  “You’ve only accomplished delaying the inevitable. Prolonging their suffering.”

  I spun toward the sound of the voice, gathering the eather in me.

  A tall man dressed in gray stood a few feet behind me where the woman had been crouched moments before. His dark hair was cropped close to his head, and some kind of design had been inked onto the skin along the sides of his face—a few shades darker than his brown complexion. It was a pattern I’d seen in the shadows as they climbed up the sides of Casteel’s face.

  My gaze lifted to his, and my breath caught. His irises were a collage of silver-pierced blue, brown, and green.

  They looked like mine. Like—

  I remembered.

  I’d dreamed while in stasis, but it was more than just a dream. It had been more like a vision that showed me everything. The beginning of the realms. The creation of the Primals. The first mortal. The fall of those with the same eyes as the stranger before me—eyes that mirrored the beginning of everything.

  And I knew what it meant for him to have those eyes. It didn’t make sense because my eyes were similar.

  I resisted the urge to take another step back as I quickly glanced around. No one paid attention to us. Most were helping the people on the ships get down and dealing with those in the buildings—the injured I could, despite what he’d said, help.

  My gaze snapped back to him. “I know what you are.”

  “You do.” He smiled, flashing straight, white teeth. “But you don’t.”

  Well, that made next to no sense.

  “But you don’t really know me. I can help them—”

  “I know what you are capable of,” he cut in. “You could restore life to all those who perished, but they will not live to see tomorrow. You know this. You saw what happens if the balance is so gravely disrupted.”

  I had.

  Gods, I had seen this in my dreams.

  “You cannot help them,” he said, his voice thick with sadness.

  Eather throbbed, and I clenched my fists. “I can—”

  The ground started to shake violently again, sending me staggering to the side. I turned back to the river just as the bank collapsed.

  “It’s too late,” he repeated, his voice somehow louder than the chaos. “And you shouldn’t be here.”

  My hands fisted tightly at my sides as I registered the sound of…were those sirens? They were different than what I was familiar with. This sound was jarring and relentless, a piercing, high-pitched wail that cut through the air. Another unfamiliar noise drew my gaze to the sky. It was a constant roar, similar to the beating of a draken’s wings but faster and stronger.

  Above, a strange, fast-moving object with spinning…blades created a dizzying blur against the sky as it flew over the river. It was no beast, but other than that, I had no idea what it was.

  I stared wide-eyed. “What the…?”

  Another joined the oblong-shaped thing in the sky as the rumbling in the ground intensified, making it difficult for me to stand still.

  The last of the water spilled down a massive, ragged opening in the riverbed. Deep and wide rifts opened in the wet soil, spreading rapidly toward the banks.

  A voice boomed from the object in the sky, shouting instructions to those on the bridge. People rushed from the metal boxes and raced in both directions as ruptures in the pillars appeared, sending stone and thick plumes of dust into the air. Metal creaking, the bridge swayed. The first web-like cable snapped with a crack as loud as thunder, whipping through the air with a reverberating twang.

  I shot forward, summoning the essence as another cable popped. And another. The rifts in the pillars split wider, and the entire bridge seemed to rise and then buckle.

  “Stop.”

  One word.

  That was all it took.

  Every muscle in my body locked up. I was frozen with one leg half-bent in mid-step. My will collapsed, and the essence recoiled like the cable slicing through the air.

  “There is nothing you can do for them,” he said.

  My lips wouldn’t even move, nor would my tongue curl around the words building in my throat.

  “This entire city and everyone in it will be gone by the time the sun sets.”

  No.

  I didn’t care what he said or what I saw while in stasis. I refused to believe there was nothing I could do. There had to be something. Why else had I been drawn here?

  Concentrating on the essence, I felt it press against my skin. The air crackled and hissed, but I couldn’t summon it forward. It was like my connection to it had been severed.

  My gods. He had that kind of power?

  Panic crept through me as sweat broke out on my forehead. I was utterly helpless. Anything could happen, and I wouldn’t be able to stop it or defend myself. And no one was here to help me. Casteel was back home, in our realm, and—

  “There is no reason to fear me,” he said. I would’ve laughed had I been able to make the sound.

  His words weren’t at all reassuring.

  As I could do nothing but wait for the inevitable pain and terror to reach me, my gaze rose to the sweeping structures east of the bridge.

  But the pain never came.

  My breath thinned. I couldn’t sense anything—not the fear or pain, nor the pulse of death from those desperately fleeing the bridge as the middle collapsed. Things began to plummet to the ground—

  No. No. No.

  I pushed against the invisible restraints, screaming without sound for the essence to break free as the terrible noises of grating steel and metal blasted from across the sunken river.

  White clouds rose from the ground, filling the air. The structures along the coast swayed, their reflective sides warping under the sunlight.

  “They are what you should fear,” the stranger spoke, sadness clinging to each word he uttered. “Now, they rise. Not from the blood and ash, but from the ruin and wrath of all they created.”

  My head turned without conscious effort toward the island with the statue. It was…gods, the island was falling apart. Trees snapped, the bark of their trunks cracking like brittle, cold bones as the ground that grew them fell away. The statue trembled, the metal quivering with a metallic groan that shook my body. Fissures appeared in her carved skirts and raced up the length of her body, the surface cracking like brittle parchment as the vibrations sent a hollow, ringing tremor through the air.

  The statue shattered, sending a volley of shards into the atmosphere. I could do nothing but watch in horror as several sharp pieces pierced the metal objects hovering above, sending them spiraling wildly to the ground as smoke billowed from them. One crashed into what remained of the bridge, erupting into flames. The other disappeared into the dust clouds of the fallen structures.

  A hand broke through the surface of the sunken river before us, sending mud and rock flying—one little more than bone and fragments of sinew.

  The screams and chaos faded as it pulled itself free from the ground. Tendrils of eather erupted from the bony hand, crackling over the shape of a head and shoulders, shifting colors—blue, silver, gold, and crimson. Dirt fell from it in sheets as it planted a foot down.

  The ground shook.

  And buildings fell.

  The being rose to its full height, and it had to be nearly seven feet tall. Maybe even taller. Muscle formed and thickened, wrapping over bone. It lifted its fully formed hands as if studying them. Flesh appeared beneath the sparking eather and dirt, changing from the palest white to the darkest brown. The eather dimmed, and I noticed it was entirely nude. I could safely say the being was…uh, definitely of the male sex.