The world ended in a crash of marble and a final, defeated curse.
Caelan's body, which had been a solid, unyielding wall of muscle and cold, protective strength, went utterly limp. He pitched forward, a puppet with its strings cut, and Isadora was carried down with him, her small cry of terror lost in the sudden, shocked silence of the great, brightly-lit hall.
She sprawled across him, his unnatural cold already beginning to fade, eclipsed by the terrifying, searing heat radiating from his back. The smell of his burning flesh, of melted leather and charred silk, filled her nostrils, a grotesque, sacrificial perfume.
For a single, paralyzed moment, no one moved. The entire, terrible tableau was frozen: the assembled Council, a jury of ancient, judging predators; the smug, triumphant face of Valerius; the wide, horrified violet eyes of Seraphyne; and Lucien, his own face pale and slick with blood, his usual carefree grin replaced by a mask of raw, naked panic.
Then the spell broke.
