Zach Brenner's Arc

Chapter 59 of 86

The beast rose from the ash and breathed. Green fire poured from its jaws and washed across the floor. The black stone caught and burned. Zach staggered back. The heat climbed his legs. Where he stood, the tiles cracked and sagged. There was no solid ground to plant his feet. "Move!" Garrok roared. He swung his axe at the flames, but the fire only spread. Talon leapt between two fissures, katanas out, and found no place to land a strike. Raven fired a bolt that vanished in the green blaze. Lyra pushed cold at the floor. The frost hissed and died. The dragon-thing laughed, that voice of many. "This world burns for me," it said. "Rowan's blood cannot stop it." Zach lifted the sword. He thought of the circle, of the six of them driving the blade home. But the beast was flesh and fire both now. Cutting it only fed the flames. His arms shook. His boots slid on melting stone. He had no footing and no answer. Then he heard her. Not in the chamber. In his head, clear as the spring where she had spoken before. Geneva's power lived in him now, and through it came another voice. "Zach." It was old and steady. Geneva. "Rowan gave his life. This time, give your power. Let go of the sword. Destroy Darkthorne and the blade both, forever." Zach's grip tightened out of habit. The sword was everything. It was his path home. It was the only weapon that had ever touched this thing. To drop it was to stand empty before a god. But he understood. He had learned it fighting alone and failing. The power had never been the point. He had chased the blade's strength like a man clinging to a rope over a pit. Now Geneva asked him to let go of the rope. "Zach, what are you doing?" Raven shouted. The fire climbed toward her boots. He looked at her. At Ayla, staff raised. At Lyra, at Talon, at Garrok. He did not need the sword to know where he belonged. He had found that already. "Trust me," Zach said. He opened his hand. The sword did not fall. It hung in the air, then blazed white, brighter than the green fire, brighter than anything. The light was not his to hold anymore. It answered no wielder. It flew. The blade drove through the beast's chest and out its back. Malachar Darkthorne screamed with a thousand mouths. The green fire pulled inward, sucked into the wound. The scales cracked. The horns crumbled. Light burst from every seam. Then the sword itself shattered. Steel and light broke into a thousand shards that scattered like sparks and went dark. The beast caved in on itself and was gone. No ash this time. Nothing. The floor stopped burning. Zach stood on cold, whole stone. His hand was empty. The weapon that had crossed worlds to find him was gone forever. "It's over," Ayla whispered. Zach looked at his empty hand. His path home was gone. And he was still here.