It didn’t take long to find McCain. All I had to do was follow the bellows of rage.
But for the first time, the pitch of those bellows changed, and I heard a note of unmistakable surprise shake through McCain’s voice.
Max would have appeared, then.
I could hear the two of them just up the rise of a hill. Throwing myself up it was absolute murder. The junk twisted around me like a frigging cyclone. I brought my arms up, protected my face, and plowed forward, not caring as metal and plastic snagged my clothes and hands and arms, tearing at fabric and flesh.
I felt the ground below me shake as something heavy slammed into it. It felt like I’d been transported to some Japanese Mecha movie, and giant robots were fighting. Well, Max and McCain weren’t robots, but they were unquestionably powerful. A fact that was proven as I finally crested the hill and saw the carnage of the two men fighting.
McCain spread his arms wide and sent a massive bolt of charged magic flying toward Max.
Max dodged to the side, skidding on his boot as he reached down and grabbed up a massive sheet of metal, using it as a shield to rebuff the attack.
My heart went out to Max, begging him to fight back, for a single sheet of metal could not best a sorcerer king.
Then I realized something. Max probably didn’t have any magic anymore. The contract had been destroyed, after all.
Sure enough, as the seconds wound on, it became obvious that Max was powerless to fight back save for with his mere brawn.
I had to do something.
I threw myself at them, clutching the dagger as hard as I could.
Plunge it into his chest. All I had to do was plunge it into McCain’s chest, then all of this would end.
Max caught sight of me. “Get back!”
I ignored him. “You’ve got no chance, McCain. I’ve already destroyed the contract, both here and in the past. Give up.” As far as bravado went, it wouldn’t get me far.
McCain, it seemed, was now beyond my attempts to taunt him.
He whirled, drawing up his hands and spreading them toward me.
I jolted back, but I wasn’t quick enough. A massive charge of magic spread from his outstretched hands and plowed into the center of my chest, knocking me backward as I spun through the dirt.
My body exploded in pain, in fear.
And then it fell still.
Max screamed my name.
I fought with all my strength to open my eyes, to pull myself up, to sit as I watched McCain turn his attention back to Max.
When I’d been struck by McCain’s blow, I’d dropped the sacred dagger. It now lay at McCain’s feet.
He pushed forward and plucked it up, a truly nasty smile spreading over his lips and cracking his mouth open wide. “With this, I can now end you once and for all, Max.”
He was going to kill Max. Oh God, McCain was going to kill Max.
Though everyone had told me that McCain couldn’t live without Max, and vise versa, obviously things had changed now the curse had been lifted. Obviously, the sacred dagger, which had once been imbued with Max’s soul, could now kill Max without harming McCain.
That, or McCain had lost all reason.
This was it. The most important moment of my life, the most important fight I’d ever had. And I already had lost. For there was nothing I could do.
I remained there where McCain had dumped me, my body a loose, weak mess. It felt like I’d never get my coordination back, like I’d never heal. Even if there was a miracle, and this fight ended without me dying or becoming McCain’s slave forevermore, I would never be a functioning human being again. I was just so freaking weak. And yet, despite the crippling power of that fatigue, it couldn’t obliterate the fear jolting through my chest and shaking my heart. For certainty told me that Max had no chance.
Sure enough, McCain rounded on Max, and such a cruel look of victory flickered through McCain’s gaze, it was obvious what he intended to do. He brought up my dagger and switched it quickly from one hand to the other, so many sparks spilling off the blade they cascaded along his palm, sparked down his body, and crackled through the gravel.
Blood dripped down Max’s brow from a fresh wound, and the gash was so deep, the blood oozed like oil leaking from a broken engine.
That didn’t stop Max from letting out a sharp bellow of rage and bolting forward, his camel-leather boots skidding over the electrified gravel.
I had half a second to appreciate just how cruel and yet victorious McCain’s expression was until he launched forward, meeting Max’s attack.
There was no way Max could survive this. He was injured, and unlike McCain, he didn’t have a weapon.
So there was only one way this would end. It was inevitable. Set in stone. Nothing on earth or in heaven would be able to change the conclusion of this fight.
It was predestined.
This whole situation had been pushing me to find a new understanding of my powers, but I’d been too lazy, too slow. I hadn’t taken the opportunities when they’d been provided to me. And now, when it mattered most, there was nothing I could do to help the only man who would ever matter to me.
That sense of inevitability welled inside my heart. It felt like some gravity well that was sucking me toward something – that single, awful, fated future. The one I’d never been able to turn from. The one that had always consumed me. For every act of defiance I had managed. For every ounce of courage I’d
