Chapter 267

Agnes

Consciousness came in flashes.

My head throbbed. A high-pitched ringing filled my ears, drowning out most other sounds. I tried to open my eyes, but even the dim lights pierced my vision painfully, forcing them shut again.

Something was trembling against me. Thea. She was alive. “Mommy…”

More shouting. Footsteps. The sound of boots on stone.

Then warm hands on my face. I forced my eyes open again to see Elijah dropping to his knees beside me, his face streaked with dirt and blood. His mouth was moving, but I could barely hear him over the ringing.

“Agnes! Agnes, are you alright?” His voice sounded far away.

I tried to respond, but darkness swept over me again. The pain in my head intensified, and now I was aware of another agony—my palm. It felt as if I’d plunged my hand into molten lava, the skin seared away to expose raw nerves beneath.

More flashes of awareness. Being lifted. Thea crying. Elijah’s voice. Other voices.

Just before I slipped away completely, I felt something else—a ripple in the air around us, like the last exhale of a dying creature. The final remnants of the stone’s power ebbing away into nothingness.

And with it, the faintest whisper.

Thank you...

Then nothing but darkness.

…

I don’t know how long I was out, but when I woke again, the ringing in my ears had dulled to a faint hum. I was lying on something soft—a stretcher, I realized as my vision cleared. A thin blanket covered my body, and my injured hand had been wrapped in thick white bandages.

Elijah was sitting beside me, his head bowed and his hand clutching mine. When he felt me stir, his head snapped up, relief flooding his face.

“Agnes,” he breathed. “Thank the Goddess. You scared the hell out of me.”

“Thea?” My voice was hoarse.

“She’s fine,” he reassured me quickly. “Not even a scratch. She’s with Richard’s medic right now, getting checked over, but she’s perfectly fine.”

I tried to sit up, wincing as pain shot through my skull. Elijah gently pushed me back down.

“Easy. You hit your head pretty hard. The doctor said you might have a concussion.”

“What happened?” I asked. “The stone—”

“Gone. Completely destroyed.” Elijah’s face split into a weary smile. “You did it, Agnes. You and Lena. The plan worked.”

Relief washed over me. We’d actually done it. The stone was gone, shattered beyond repair. My stepmother’s plans for world domination had been thwarted.

“And my stepmother?”

“In custody. Richard’s men took her down right after the explosion. She’s heavily restrained and under constant guard. She won’t be hurting anyone ever again.”

I glanced around, taking in our surroundings for the first time. We were still in the cavern, but it had been transformed into a makeshift field hospital. Stretchers lined the floor, most of them already occupied while medical personnel moved between them. Some of the medical personnel was wearing lab coats with the Elemental Enterprises insignia on them; likely people who weren’t loyal to my stepmother and were relieved to now be free of her threats.

It hit me, then, that the elementals likely weren’t the only ones being held here against their will.

“The elementals—” I started.

“Being released as we speak,” Elijah said. “Richard’s men are going through the facility systematically, freeing everyone they find. There are so many, Agnes. Far more than we expected.”

My gaze drifted across the cavern, settling on a pair of familiar figures huddled under blankets, talking to Richard. My breath hitched.

“Is that—”

“Henry and Krystal,” Elijah confirmed. “They were being held in the lower levels. They’re a bit malnourished and traumatized, but they’ll survive.”

I couldn’t believe it. After all this time, they were alive. My stepmother had been keeping them prisoner. And they weren’t the only ones.

“How many?” I asked quietly. “How many elementals did she have?”

Elijah’s expression darkened. “Thousands, judging from the looks of things. Richard’s men are still counting, but they’ve found cells upon cells filled with elementals of all types. Adults, children, even infants. Some were bred here, Agnes. Born into captivity. And she planned to breed more; there are a lot of pregnant women.”

The scale of it was staggering. If we hadn’t stopped her, if the stone hadn’t been destroyed, my stepmother would have had an army of thralls at her disposal. Thousands of powerful elementals, stripped of their free will, forced to obey her every command. The world as we knew it would have been over with the snap of a finger.

Elijah said then, a bit more quietly, “Lena is gone. No one knows exactly what happened to her. One moment she was standing there, and the next... she vanished in the explosion. Do you think she made a run for it?”

“No,” I said firmly. I had seen her final moments, watched as her body dissolved into a red mist. Lena had given everything—her powers, her blood, her life—to destroy the stone. To save us all.

Despite everything she had done, all the pain she had caused, the thought of her sacrifice made my chest tighten painfully. I didn’t think I would grieve for the woman who had briefly been my friend, then enemy, then friend again. But I was.

Just then, movement caught my eye—a commotion near one of the stretchers on the far side of the cavern. I lifted my head to see a familiar form laying there, hardly moving, red blood seeping through his white shirt. My father.

Ignoring the pain that shot through my skull, I pushed myself up from the stretcher. Elijah tried to stop me, but I shoved his hands away and stumbled over to my father. The doctors moved aside as I approached, their grim faces telling me everything I needed to know. It was too late. The damage was too severe.

My father appeared to have been stabbed multiple times. I tried not to look, but there was no mistaking the deep wounds, the intestines peeking out from within. Had my stepmother stabbed him repeatedly during the scuffle? Either way, he wasn’t going to survive this.

I took his hand in my uninjured one, squeezing gently. “Father.”

He tried to smile, but it turned into a grimace of pain. “Agnes. You did it. You stopped her.”

“We stopped her,” I corrected him. “You helped. You held her back long enough for us to destroy the stone.”

A tear slipped down his cheek. “I only ever wanted to protect you...” he choked out, blood bubbling at the corners of his mouth. “In the way I couldn’t protect your mother... But all I ever did was make you suffer more. I’m sorry.”

Before I could respond, his hand went limp in mine, his eyes glazing over as the last breath rattled from his lungs. And just like that, he was gone. My father, the man who had raised me, loved me, failed me, and in the end, saved me, was dead.

I didn’t cry. I couldn’t. There was nothing left inside of me except for a hollow emptiness where grief should have been. Gently, I reached out and closed his eyes with my fingertips, my bandaged hand still clutching his.

“Goodbye, Father.”