He exhaled sharply, bitterly accepting my resolve. “Just read what’s left of that tome. You owe her and us that much.”
I did. Shifting my focus to the last paragraph, I read it aloud while Tristan and the Ghoul Reapers listened. “This is my story,” the World Crusher wrote. “It is not my ending, however. I’m hoping you’ll let me craft my own finale. An eternity inside this seal is not something I would wish upon anyone, not even Death, my worst and only enemy. She threw me aside like a useless doll. She brought me out of the nothingness and made me feel like I was the center of the universe, then when I stopped playing by her rules, she threw me in here. Do you think it’s fair?”
No. I would’ve liked to say no, but as I finished reading, a peculiar rumble filled the room, immediately accompanied by the raucous laughter of the Ghoul Reapers. They sprang to their feet, grins slitting their faces, and it was clear something that wasn’t supposed to happen was about to happen.
The color fled from Tristan’s face as he gawked at the black marble lectern where I was still standing. “Babe… you might want to come down from there,” he managed, motioning for me to get off.
I stepped onto the floor and whirled around just in time to see the lectern crack in two, splitting down the middle in precise halves, light beaming from within. The main crack then splintered into spidering crackles across the black marble, the light swelling and spreading and virtually spilling out. “Oh, no…” The rumble got louder, and the temple began to shake.
Grabbing Tristan’s wrist, I teleported us out of the Temple of Roses. It looked even weirder from the outside. The light expanded and broke the entire building down. The sculptural friezes, the columns and the stone walls, the white marble plaques and the expansive roof… It all crumbled and broke into little bits and pieces. It collapsed before us, spewing clouds of dust and dirt in every direction until the morning sky was obscured.
“No… no, no, no!” I shouted as it became clear to me what was happening.
“Is she… is she?” Tristan croaked, equally terrified.
I had been the key all along. Eneas and his Ghoul Reaper brothers appeared beside us, still grinning and deeply satisfied. “The second shall free the first,” he said. “The second shall free the first, and the words of the first on the lips of the second shall be the key.”
“That was the curse’s undoing,” I replied, my soul riddled with shame and raw fury. They’d played me. They’d played me like a fiddle, and I’d danced to their secret tune without even knowing it. “I had to read the book she was locked in…”
“Exactly!” Filicore exclaimed, throwing his head back as he laughed.
The Temple of Roses was gone. A massive pile of white powdery dust and rubble remained, with the occasional glimmer of black or gold enamel that had decorated the World Crusher’s interior friezes. She emerged from the middle of that pile, clad in a dress made of flowing, white-diamond dust that was somehow held together in the form of fabric. It flowed off her like a dream. Her hair was liquid gold, her eyes held the stars, and she was free.
The World Crusher was free, and I’d been the fool to do it.
Unending
I had a hard time processing a single coherent thought.
The World Crusher stood before us and… oddly enough, the anger that had stabbed me this whole time was gone. Removed from the confines of that ancient seal, she was remarkably calm. Almost serene.
Her beauty was unparalleled. I’d always thought of Death as a wondrous vision—and I had often been compared to her—but the World Crusher was something else entirely. Her oval face was the epitome of delicacy. Her lips plump and pink. Her eyebrows the color of liquid gold like her hair, slim and elegantly arched over her galaxy eyes. Her skin carried the faint sheen of mother-of-pearl, and the diamond-fiber dress poured off her broad shoulders in mesmerizing waves that rippled over the ruins on which she stood.
A single black thread snaked its way down from one shoulder to the tip of her pinkie finger, where the sleeve ended in a glove. She brought that hand up and tucked a lock of liquid gold behind her ear, smiling at me. “I can breathe again. It’s been so long,” she said.
The World Crusher was free, and no matter how many times I settled on the concept, it refused to stick. The reality was right here in front of us, yet I barely registered the truth. The awful truth. I was responsible. Without any knowledge, of course, but I had done this.
“You played me,” I murmured, briefly looking at the Ghoul Reapers.
Eneas gave me a shrug. “I do what I can. No hard feelings, I hope. You’ve been wonderful company, but we just had to get out of here.”
“Do not fault them for this,” the World Crusher gently intervened. “I’m the one who told them how to break the seal. I took pity on their misery. Imagine being locked up for so long… Wait…” she paused as if to read my mind, and I could almost feel her wiggling through my head. “You know exactly what it’s like.”
“This isn’t right,” I said, my voice trembling. “None of this is right. Death locked you up for a good reason. You were—”
“Out of control? Unhinged?” she cut me off. “Obviously. I was young and foolish and tempestuous, I agree. But to keep me down here for millions and millions of years… No, Unending, that is a monstrous thing to do. I did not deserve it.”
“You killed living people to gain access into Purgatory,” Tristan replied, his brow furrowed as he stared at her. He was just as stunned, but somehow he mustered more strength than
