To ruin an Omega - Chapter 441: Seeing Red 1

Chapter 441: Seeing Red 1

FIA

My vision swam.

Everything blurred at the edges, shapes bleeding into each other like watercolors left in the rain. I tried to blink it away, tried to focus, but the world kept tilting sideways. My body felt heavy and disconnected, like I was piloting it from somewhere far away.

Then I felt something warm and wet.

It spread across my skin, soaking through what was left of my clothes, and I thought maybe it was mine. Maybe the remaining burns had started bleeding again, or maybe Valentine had cut deeper than I realized. But when I finally managed to force my eyes open, really open, I saw the truth.

Blood poured down onto me in thick rivulets.

It was however not mine.

It was Cian’s.

My gaze traveled up slowly, following the source, and that was when I saw it. A blade jutted from his chest, strange and wrong in every way. It looked like someone had taken the air itself and sharpened it into something lethal, something that shouldn’t exist. The edges shimmered faintly, catching light that wasn’t there, and blood ran down its length in slow, deliberate streams.

His blood.

“Cian.”

His name barely made it past my lips. My throat felt raw, scraped clean, and the sound came out weak and broken.

He looked down at me. His arms were still around me, still holding me against him, but I could see the strain in his face now. The way his jaw locked. The way his breathing had turned shallow and uneven.

Then he jerked.

His whole body went rigid, and another blade appeared to pass though him. Then another. They punched through him from behind, one after another, each one driving deeper than the last. I watched them emerge through his chest, slick and dripping, and the world seemed to slow down around us.

No.

No, no, no.

Cian’s grip on me faltered. His arms loosened, and I started to slip, my body sliding down even as I tried to reach for him. He caught me once more. Barely. His hands were shaking now. But what scared me the most was the fact that I could see it in his eyes. He was losing.

“Cian!”

Garrett’s roar tore through the air.

I turned my head just enough to see him launch himself forward, his wolf form massive and violent. All you could see and feel was his teeth and his fury. He slammed into something I couldn’t see, something invisible that sent him flying backward with a sickening crack. He hit the ground hard, yelping, and skidded across the broken stone before going still.

Magic rippled through the space between us, visible now, coiling in the air like smoke.

Valentine’s voice drifted through the chaos in a manner that said he was so pleased with himself.

“Would you look at that? My mana is slowly returning.”

I forced myself upright, my legs trembling beneath me, and grabbed onto the nearest chunk of debris to keep from collapsing again. My vision was clearing now, sharpening, and I could see him standing behind Cian.

Valentine.

The one Cian attacked must have been a fake. Since he still looked whole, unharmed and was even smiling.

Cian dropped to his knees.

The sound his body made when it hit the ground echoed louder than it should have. He swayed there for a moment, one hand pressed against his chest, and when he spoke, blood bubbled from his mouth.

“Run.” The word came out wet and broken. “Please run.”

His wounds started to close.

I could see it happening, the flesh knitting itself back together, skin crawling over the holes those blades had left behind. Alpha werewolf healing was fast, as it was brutal, trying to save him even as he bled out.

Valentine drove another of the blade fashioned from air into him.

This one went straight through his shoulder, angling down toward his heart, and Cian’s body jerked forward from the impact. He caught himself on one hand, gasping, and more blood spilled from his lips.

Valentine crouched beside him, tilting his head like he was examining something curious.

“The head or the heart is what needs to go to end this. Right?”

“Stop.”

The word ripped out of me before I could think.

Valentine glanced up, his expression shifting into something almost thoughtful, and that was when I noticed them.

Eyes.

Golden and glowing, scattered all around us in the semi-darkness. Dozens of them. Maybe more. They gleamed from the shadows, from the rubble, from the gaping hole in the ceiling where the floor had given way.

They were both watching and waiting.

Skollrend sentinels were here and ready for some bloodshed.

Valentine followed my gaze, and his smile widened.

“Would you look at that? The sentinels want blood for what I did to their Alpha.”

He straightened, raising his voice so it carried through the ruins.

“I would warn you all not to make rash decisions. Your Alpha gets this blade in his heart if I feel even remotely threatened.”

The eyes didn’t move, nor did it blink. They just stayed there, fixed and burning, radiating a hunger I could feel from where I stood.

“Please.” I took a step toward Valentine with my hands raised. “Don’t hurt him.”

“I cannot promise that.”

Valentine’s gaze settled on me, studying me with the same expression someone might use when trying to solve a puzzle they found particularly irritating.

“I do not understand you,” he said slowly. “Your mother must have done something. She had to have. You are not afflicted in any way like the rest. If anything, I would even call you blessed beyond imagination.”

I curled my hands into fists.

Valentine’s eyes flicked down to the motion, then back up to my face.

“Before you throw those things, think about him. Can he survive this?”

I hesitated.

Let the war play out on my face, let my hands shake like I was fighting myself, like I was trying to decide if Cian’s life was worth more than my revenge. Valentine watched me, waiting, and I saw the satisfaction creep into his expression.

He thought I would back down and the second he let his stupid guard down, I threw my gift at him.

The force slammed into both of them at once, invisible and crushing. Valentine’s eyes went wide, and he conjured a shield behind himself just in time. The impact sent him hurling backward, and he hit the barrier hard enough to shatter it. Glass-like fragments exploded outward, glittering as they fell, and Valentine crashed into the debris.

His grip on Cian broke.

I didn’t wait.

The second his eyes found mine again, I was already moving. My legs burned, my body screaming at me to stop, but I pushed through it and closed the distance between us in seconds. Valentine scrambled backward, his hands up, and I swung.

He dodged.

Barely.

My fist grazed his cheek instead of connecting with his jaw, and he twisted away, putting space between us. I followed, relentless, and he kept moving, kept slipping just out of reach.

“Is this still a puppet?”

I caught his wrist mid-dodge and pulled.

The gift surged through me, raw and uncontrolled, and I felt it wrap around his bones. I even felt the resistance. I felt the moment I stopped caring about resistance and just ripped.

His hand tore away from the bone with a wet, grinding sound.

Valentine screamed.

The noise was high and jagged, cut through with genuine pain, and he staggered back, clutching the mangled remains of his arm. Blood poured between his fingers, soaking into his sleeve, and when he looked up at me, his face was twisted with something between fury and disbelief.

“I guess not,” I said.

He laughed.

The sound started low, almost breathless, then grew louder and wilder until it filled the space around us. His good hand lifted, crackling with energy, and lightning began to form in his palm. The light turned super bright and the sight of it felt almost violent. The air itself seemed to hum with it.

Then he moved his other hand, the ruined one, and somehow a barrier sprang up around us.

It was circular and seamless in how it trapped both of us inside.

I understood immediately.

He had done it to protect himself from the sentinels, to keep them from tearing him apart while he finished me. The barrier would also trap the lightning when he finally released it, bouncing it back and forth between the walls until there was nowhere left for me to run.

Smart.

I braced myself, pulling the gift close, ready to throw up my own shield the second he fired. The makeshift barrier wouldn’t hold for long, but it would be enough. It had to be.

Valentine didn’t throw it.

He just stood there, watching me, his hand still crackling with power. Waiting.

My stomach dropped.

He saw the shock cross my face, saw the exact moment I realized what he was doing, and that was when he fired.

The lightning exploded toward me.

Everything slowed down. I could see each individual arc of electricity, branching and twisting as it tore through the air.

I could see the way it lit up the barrier walls, casting jagged shadows across Valentine’s grinning face.

I threw my hand up and tried to summon the shield, tried to pull the gift into something solid and protective, but I was too slow and a little too late.

The lightning was already there.

Then I heard it.

A whisper, soft and close, brushing against my ear like a secret.

…The Red.

My hand glowed.

A sickly crimson light spread across my palm in an instant, brilliant and searing, and the red bled outward. It touched the lightning the moment the electricity made contact with my skin, and instead of burning me to hell, I watched it crawl up the arcs, devouring the lightning. The brightness swallowed everything, turning the world into nothing but color and heat.

Then it died.

The lightning vanished. The red faded. My hand stopped glowing, and I stood there, whole and untouched, staring at my own skin like it belonged to someone else.

Valentine’s voice cut through the silence.

“How the fuck did you do that?”