I lifted the clasp, and it moved with ease, as if it were freshly oiled. The lid of the chest was heavier, and it took some effort to lift. Once it locked open, I looked down, and it took a moment for my brain to process what I was seeing.
There it was, the final shard of celestine, glowing softly from the side of the chest. There were also two feathers, gleaming and long, the golden tips wispy and curved against the ancient wood of the box. Beneath it all… was ash.
Soft gray and dull, it lined the entire bottom, and I felt sick to my stomach.
The lore said that phoenixes burned up when they died, and then regenerated from those ashes. But these hadn’t.
Whatever had happened, these ashes had stayed dead.
I leaned down carefully to lift the last stone shard our pack needed, moving slowly so as not to touch or disturb the ash beneath it. A single tear rolled off my cheek and landed in the ash as I lifted the piece free.
When I turned and showed Lucien the fragment, his eyes lit with a smile, until he saw my face. “What’s wrong? We found it! We can get out of here and finally put this rock back together.” He wrapped me up in a hug, and I accepted the comfort but couldn’t shake the sadness.
“There are ashes in that box.”
He froze, not letting me go. When he slowly pulled back, his expression was thoughtful. “They might not be gone, not forever. Things are changing by the minute. Magic is nuanced, and balance shifts over time. Maybe when the rest of the supernatural world comes back into balance, they will too.”
Lucien wiped my tears away with his thumbs, holding me, giving me the time I needed to grieve all that was lost from the decline of this magnificent species.
When the tears stopped, I wiped my eyes, pocketed the omega stone shard, and looked out over the nesting grounds. And when my gaze landed on the ruby nest, I nearly burst into tears all over again.
There’s an egg inside.
Golden and delicate, I could see a hint of flame, as if the pattern was etched into the shell. One tiny, fragile egg.
But there was still hope for the phoenixes.
Maybe, just maybe, there was hope for us all.
Lucien
It took the rest of the day and half the night to figure out how to get out of the temple. Partly because it was a fuck ton of stairs, and even werewolf muscles were burning by the time we made it back to solid ground, but more than that, the inside of the temple was one big maze.
When we finally stumbled out into the desert night air to our waiting pack mates, we were all exhausted.
We spent another night in the sanctuary, where it was cooler and there was water, grateful to be aboveground, no matter how beautiful the underground sanctuary had been.
The next morning, we stepped back into the waiting desert sands, and our phones magically began working again by the time we’d hiked for two hours. As soon as we had a signal, I called Kane.
“Speak.”
“Alpha, it’s us. We found the shard.”
“Lucien. Everyone is safe?”
“Yes, we’re all fine. A few bumps and bruises, but those have mostly healed.” I rubbed idly at the knot that had shrunk significantly but still lingered on the back of my head. My healing still wasn’t back to full speed, probably another effect of my damaged bond.
“Excellent. Reed and his party retrieved the goblin piece as well. We’re all on the jet, flying back toward the enclave. Priestess Marciana confirmed it was still clear, and we all agreed that the enclave was the best place to try to reassemble the stone.”
I nodded, glancing around at everyone. “Do you want us to meet you there?”
“Yes. Meet us at the airstrip, and we’ll make a plan of approach. I want to be cautious, just in case Varga’s watchers are still in the area.”
“Will do.”
We disconnected the call, and I filled everyone in on what Kane had shared.
“So, back to Romania. Can’t say I’ll miss the sand,” Dirge said, his sarcasm thick enough to survive a chain saw as he lifted a booted foot and sand rained down from it like a miniature waterfall.
“Me either,” Olivia agreed, though she hadn’t voiced a word of complaint this entire trip. She was tougher than I’d given her credit for early on. She didn’t let fear stop her, and she loved deeply, no matter the cost to herself.
She was a worthy mate. And I was damn lucky to have her.
I wrapped an arm around her shoulders and kissed her on the head. She looked up at me quizzically but didn’t comment.
“All right. Who’s ready to go now?”
I repressed a groan. Flashing sucked, but hiking all day through the desert wasn’t exactly fun either. “Let’s get it over with.”
Shay grinned, sticking out her arm for everyone to hold on.
“Three… two… one.”
The desert warped around us, bleeding out of existence.
The landing in Romania was a little easier than the first time. Olivia was green around the gills but didn’t get sick, at least.
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