Chapter 144 - The Void/Fear Creature Thing

Chapter 144 - The Void/Fear Creature Thing
Chapter 42 - The Void/Fear Creature Thing

Raelith & The Fear/Void Entity POV

I was furious.

No...furious was too small a word. I was...in the words of mortals, epicly pissed the fuck off.

Insulted really. Spitting, slicing, screaming, and shrieking mad.

They escaped me.

My pretty wolf vamps. My pretty water dragons. My pretty twins with all their delicious magic. Gone.

Slipped through my fingers like spilled blood across marble.

I paced the jagged ridge of the In-Between Realm, dragging my nails along my own arms, splitting the skin so I could watch the red trickle down in thin lines.

Blood always calmed me. Usually. Not today.

A snarl ripped from my throat, too sharp for mortal ears. “They escaped me. Powerful enough to break my cage. My cage. My perfect little recreation. I spent years perfecting that design. And they unmade it like it was nothing...like I am nothing.”

A dark whisper curled through me. Not my voice. Not entirely.

“They tasted of Chaos magic,” the ancient thing inside me murmured. “We want what they are made of.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” I hissed aloud, slashing my own palm. The blood steamed as it hit the fractured ground. “You want everything. Blood, magic, flesh, fear, sex...an endless pit of hunger.”

“We want Chaos.”

The whisper rattled my bones. Chaos.

The only thing older than the Void.
The only thing strong enough to feed it.
The only thing that could free it.

And Chaos belonged to her. Elowen.

A laugh bubbled up in my throat. “You’ll have Chaos soon enough. The mother always comes for her babies. That’s why I took the twins and the dragon-girls. They were my little bait.”

Another laugh, mine, and not mine, echoed.

The fear entity inside me writhed, hungry, and delighted. It loved when I touched violent thoughts. It loved when I pictured dragging Rhaen across my altar. It loved when I envisioned feeding on Lyrielle’s dragon heart. It loved when I remembered Lucen’s blood against my tongue.

So needy. So ravenous. So perfectly in tune with my original nature.

I closed my eyes. And I remembered dying.

Elowen and her mates had stood over the power tree I spent centuries building and growing, drenched in blood and rage. They were glowing like six burning suns. I had tried to devour their magic. I had tried to drain the roots of the world itself.

But they destroyed me.

They shattered my power tree. Burned it. Broke it.
Left it a stump dripping with my own power.

And yet…A piece of me held on. Just a sliver.

A fraction that clung stubbornly beneath the earth, fused to the roots, fused to Lucien’s obsession, fused to the last dying embers of my cult’s desperate prayers.

That sliver survived long enough for the crack in the world to open.

Long enough for something ancient to slither in.

The fear-entity had crawled through the breach Elowen accidentally created. A creature older than language. Older than the gods. A thing made of hunger and emptiness and nothingness that wanted only one thing.

To devour all magic. To end everything. To return the world to uncreation.

Naturally, I welcomed it. We were perfect for each other.

It was hunger; I was indulgence. It was void; I was blood. It was death; I was sex. Together, we were ruin disguised in beautiful body of the late Vaela Stormclaw. She had been magnificent. I wonder if I could bring her back. Mmm.

The entity murmured again inside me, purring like a beast that had found a lover.

“They unmade your cage. They hurt us.”

My jaw clenched. “Yes. And I am going to gut every last person who helped them.”

I stalked toward the edge of the In-Between Realm, and the ground cracked under my bare feet. The place smelled of dead stars and rotting memories, and the sky was a twisting ribbon of black, red, and violent violet.

A perfect home for us.

“They’ll be celebrating,” I spat. “Elowen’s brats rescued. Her little heirs reunited. While I...while we...are forced to wait.”

“We want them.”

“We will get them.”

My smile sharpened, with way too many teeth showing.

“We always have our pet,” I mused. “Lucien still loves me. Even now. Even with terror in his veins. He still wants to save me. Pathetic. Deliciously pathetic.”

The entity rumbled in approval.

“And the girls,” I cooed. “Violet hair and water-dragon scales. The Void likes them. So do I. I want to peel their magic from their bones. I want their screams threaded with pleasure and terror. I want...”

The fear-entity hissed sharply. “Chaos approaches.”

Heat skittered down my spine. Chaos. Mother of Magic. Breaker of Gods. The only being the Void feared, and wanted to possess more than anything.

Suddenly the In-Between Realm trembled. The divine barrier shivered like a wounded animal.

And then I felt it. Elowen’s delicious magic.

Radiant. Violent. Divine. Pure chaos-light tearing through the veil. My lips parted. It was like inhaling the first breath after drowning.

“She’s here,” I whispered reverently. “She’s finally here.”

“FEED US,” the fear entity screamed, shaking inside my ribs.

I spread my arms wide, letting my corrupted goddess-light flow through the Realm. Red veins split across the sky. Thunder rolled. The Void inside me howled for release.

“Elowen Skye Thorne!” I shrieked, my throat cracking with joy and fury. “Come face me, little Chaos Queen!”

And she did. A rift ripped open above me, and chaos streamed through it in a river of violet fire. Elowen stepped through with all five of her mates, blazing with enough magic to level worlds.

My heart pounded. My hunger roared. She was magnificent. Chaos incarnate.

I moaned. “Give yourself to me.”

She didn’t speak. She didn’t blink. She simply raised her hand. Chaos detonated in a tidal wave of violet force. It slammed into me like a star imploding.

My body flew backward, tumbling through the In-Between Realm, crashing into the Aetheros grasslands with a sound like a crater forming.

The earth shook. The air screamed. The fear-entity inside me cackled in ecstasy. I lay on my back and laughed breathlessly at the sky.

“Oh… she’s stronger now.”

The Void shuddered. “We want her.”

I grinned with cracked lips and blood smeared teeth.

“And we will have her,” I whispered. “And her children. And her realm. And everything she ever loved.”

My fingers curled into the dirt.

“Chaos… is ours.”
________________________

Elowen POV

I felt Chaos clawing at the inside of my ribs.

She thrashed, snarled, and slammed herself against my bones like a caged star trying to escape its own gravity. It hurt. It burned. I couldn’t fucking breathe.

The entire divine realm pulsed around me, bright and trembling, as if even this perfect place felt the tremor of what we had just seen.

The void-twisted Raelith had fallen out of the in-between realm. It wasn’t Raelith. Not fully. Not even mostly. And that was what made my throat close.

I had killed Raelith. I was sure of it. I had destroyed her tree. I had shattered her roots. I had burned her lifeforce.

But a sliver must have survived. A sliver small enough for something older to cling to.

The gods surrounded me now. Selene’s silver hair floated like a river of moonlight. Verenya’s golden eyes shimmered. Elanithra pressed her hand to her chest. And Soltharion’s aura flickered, a rare show of fear.

Fear. A god who embodied the sun was afraid.

Selene spoke first, her voice barely above a whisper. “Elowen, child… that thing was not Raelith.”

“No shit,” I croaked, my voice ragged. Chaos slammed inside me again and I staggered back. Daxon grabbed my elbow, steadying me, but even his touch trembled. “That was something else. Something… older.”

“It is,” Verenya said softly. “Older than all of us.”

The air went dead silent.

“What?” I rasped. “What do you mean older than you?”

Elanithra’s voice cracked. “At the beginning of time, before the realms formed… there was Void. A thing that devoured everything it touched. A force we barely managed to bind. All of us. Every god. Every immortal. Every primordial.”

My mouth dried.

Soltharion looked away, too ashamed to meet my eyes. “And we sealed it. At a terrible cost. We believed it was gone forever.”

“But it wasn’t,” Selene whispered. “A crack must have opened when you defeated Raelith. A small one, but enough… enough for one tendril of the Void to slip through. It must have merged with what was left of her. A fragment of Raelith and something infinitely worse fused into one.”

Chaos shrieked in my chest, "She wants us. She wants YOU. She wants our children. She wants to END EVERYTHING."

My knees buckled. Vaelrix caught me. His dragon growl vibrated against my spine. “Love, please breathe.”

“I am breathing,” I hissed. “Barely.”

Selene stepped forward, cupping my face in her cool, moonlit hands. “Elowen… listen to me. You may now be the only being powerful enough to stop her. The only being the Void fears.”

She took a small step back with a puzzled expression. "However, it seems the void wants to devour Chaos. It may take all of us to defeat her this time."

A laugh tore out of me, wet and broken. “I never asked to be a goddess.”

“No one ever asks,” Verenya murmured. “But fate chooses anyways.”

Chaos slammed my ribs again desperately.
"We must kill her. We must stop her. We must protect the children. We must.."

“I know!” I screamed, my voice cracking, and my hair lifting around me with uncontrolled magic. “I KNOW. Stop shouting at me!”

The room vibrated. The castle walls groaned. The magic lights flickered as if the realm itself feared my power.

Lachlan stepped forward then, calm and steady, putting a hand to my back. That warm elemental hum grounded me. “Mo ghrá, ye’re burnin’ yerself alive. Set it down. Just for a moment.”

“I can’t,” I whispered. “If I let go..”

“Ye willnae lose control,” he said firmly. “Not with us here.”

Selene stepped back, watching me with a softness that broke every remaining piece of me. “Elowen… you are not alone. But you must understand, if this thing fully awakens, not even the divine will be safe.”

I stopped breathing.

Soltharion bowed his head. “You may be the realms’ last hope.”

My vision blurred. Last hope. Only hope. Just like 18 years ago.

No way back to the mortal realm. Chaos screaming. My babies getting attacked twice. Fear rising again after millennia. Elowen… the last hope.

I couldn’t fucking do it. Not right now. Not like this.

“I need to go,” I choked out.

And I ran.

Through the corridors of Selene’s enchanted castle. Past glowing waterfalls and floating staircases and divine mirrors that didn’t dare reflect my face. I burst through the doorway of my chambers and slammed the door behind me.

The moment the latch clicked, I collapsed.

My legs gave out. My hands shook violently. Chaos keened inside me, no longer furious, just scared.

Lysirra whined softly, nudging me with her snout inside my mind.

“I wasn’t ready…” I whispered as tears hit the glowing marble floor. “I wasn’t ready to leave them. I wasn’t ready to lose them. I wasn’t ready for… that thing.”

I wanted to scream. I wanted to tear this entire realm apart. I wanted to sit on the floor and sob until the universe rewound itself by eighteen years, back to when my babies were small and my biggest problem was calming tantrums, and spilled magical breast milk.

Back to snuggles and kissing boo boos.

It went too fast. My kids were now grown. Preparing to rule the realm, and doing it without their mother.

Lysirra purred softly in my mind, "You are the best mother in this realm. You more than prepared them for this, my little star. They are ready. I know it's difficult....but it's time to let them fly."