side in an instant. “Elene?”
She pushed Curoch into his hands. “Quickly, quickly. I can’t stop her. She’s recovering.”
“What are you talking about?” Kylar asked. “Honey?”
Tears were rolling down Elene’s face. “Wasn’t Vi magnificent? I’m so proud of her. I knew she could do it. You take care of her, all right?”
“I’m not letting you go.”
Her eyes filled with sudden pain and her jaw tightened as a convulsion passed through her. “You know how I used to think I’d never be important like you are? I found it, Kylar. I found something I can do that no one else can. The God told me. Khali could only possess someone who let her, but she didn’t know I can hold her in. You can kill her once and for all. You can kill the vir.”
“But I can’t kill them without killing you,” he said.
She took his hand and smiled gently, acknowledging it. She was more beautiful than anything he’d ever imagined.
“No!” he shouted.
The ground shook. Kylar looked through the clear walls and saw one of the Titans pick up an entire building and hurl it at the allies. It crushed hundreds. There was no time. He looked back to Elene just as another spasm passed through her frame.
“But . . . Curoch,” he said. “It can kill me. If it does, the spell that makes people die for me will be broken. I can still save you.”
Kylar heard Durzo curse behind him, but he ignored him.
“Kylar,” Elene said, “when Roth Ursuul killed you, that first time before we knew you were immortal, I prayed that I could trade my life to save yours. I thought the God said yes. I was so sure of it that I dragged you out of that castle. Later, I told myself that it was just a coincidence, but God did say yes. Yes in his time, not mine. My death then would have accomplished nothing. Now I can do something no one else can. Please, Kylar, don’t be too proud to accept my sacrifice.”
He clutched her hand convulsively. He was crying. He couldn’t stop. “You’re pregnant.”
Tears coursed down her cheeks. “Kylar . . . there are so many people we love here. I’d give our son for them. Won’t you?”
“No! No.”
Elene held his face in her hands and kissed him gently. “I love you. I’m not afraid. Quickly now.”
The ground shook again, and outside, choruses of magic rose into the sky. Whatever krul had been raised, some of the newer ones had Talent. But inside, no one moved, they all knew that their fates and the fates off all Midcyru’s nations were balanced on Curoch’s edge.
Kylar pulled Elene into his arms and hugged her fiercely. Sobs burst from him. He drew back Curoch, and slid it into her side. She gasped, squeezing him.
As Curoch pierced Khali, light exploded, engulfing him in fire. It was clean and hot and purifying. Kylar thought he might be dead. He hoped he was.
97
A voice in the darkness: “I thought it was finished. He killed Khali. Why are they still coming?”
“She lied,” another voice said, Dorian’s voice. “She wasn’t the queen of the Strangers, only an ally. Our work isn’t done yet. Not by half. We need Curoch.”
Kylar opened his eyes as someone touched him. Sister Ariel stood over him, and he was curled on the floor with Elene. “We need the sword, child.” Her voice was gentle, but firm. “Now. Khali’s dead, Kylar, but Elene’s not, not yet, but her wound can’t be Healed. Nothing can mend what Curoch cuts,” Sister Ariel said. “We need you. Both of you. Or we’ll never stop the krul.”
Curoch was buried almost to the hilt in Elene’s side. Her eyelids fluttered briefly but didn’t stay open. “I can’t,” Kylar said.
Sister Ariel put a thick hand on the hilt and drew it out swiftly. Elene grunted weakly and a wash of blood poured from her ribs.
“Open the doors!” Dorian shouted. “Both sides!”
“Do it!” Logan shouted. “Do everything he says.”
The two hundred Vürdmeisters lay in concentric rings, all dead, all bleached white. The vir itself was dead.
But the krul hadn’t been affected. They still surrounded the Hall of Winds in a vast, churning black ocean. And even now, some of the most frightful of them were winning their way to the front of their lines. Shoulder to shoulder, Ceurans and Lae’knaught and Cenarians and Sethi and Khalidoran soldiers fought the horde. Kylar had somehow thought that killing Khali would mean a total victory, but the krul