The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (read an ebook week .TXT) 📕

gasped, his lungs pulling in air and his eyes fluttering open, the stormy gray of his irises still unfocused.

“Destroy Thoth, as you’ve promised,” Seshat whispered. It sounded like the goddess was there in the flesh. Esta could practically feel Seshat’s warm breath close to her ear, but when Esta turned to look, she saw nothing but Jack lying on the floor nearby, his body still smoldering. “Fail and I will not be so merciful again.”

“Esta?” Harte’s voice rasped when he spoke, and his hands came to the bruised skin of his neck.

“I’m here,” she said, her throat closing with an emotion she was not ready to face. And then she released him, leaving him back in the stillness of time.

The arena hung in silence around her as Esta stood, taking a moment to steady herself—to look at Harte, his eyes filled with a heartbreaking softness—and then she walked to where Jack lay on the ground, frozen in time.

Jack’s eyes were wide, and his face was contorted in rage. The lapels of his jacket had flopped open, and the top edge of the Book was visibly peeking from its inside pocket. She knew that the second she touched the Book, Thoth would awaken—unless she took care of him first. She needed to act, before Thoth had a chance to understand what was happening. She would have to kill them both before Jack could fight back.

Esta’s hands were surprisingly steady as she picked up the dagger from where it had fallen to the floor. Its weight was familiar, and when she held it in her hand, she thought she felt the answering call of the stones in the cuff and the necklace she wore beneath her clothes. But whether the echo of their power was a warning or encouragement, she didn’t know. She ignored their warmth against her skin and took the dagger to where Jack lay.

He’d hurt so many, Esta reminded herself, even as her hands shook. Jack had taken life after life, and worse, he’d inspired the hate of so many. He hadn’t created that hate—neither had Thoth—but together they had urged it on, given it purchase and light to grow, and because of him, so many had suffered. So many would suffer still.

Jack Grew was a vapid, insecure little man, and his death wouldn’t be a loss for the world… not really.

It would be worth it—the dark stain she would claim for her own soul—to take his life. To save so many more. It was a weight Esta knew she could carry, one that she would happily bear, just as her father, Dolph, must have borne so many of his own sins.… And it didn’t matter whether Harte would do the same for her. It did not.

Esta lifted the dagger and felt the power of the Pharaoh’s Heart coursing through the air as she knelt by Jack, and then, before she could second-guess herself, she brought the dagger down, straight toward his heart.

The tip of the dagger hit bone, but then Esta felt the energy of the Pharaoh’s Heart flare, and the dagger sank to the hilt in Jack’s chest. Almost immediately, she felt Thoth’s power rise up, awful and absolute, as it reached for her. But she held tight to the hilt of the dagger and pushed all of her affinity, all of herself toward Thoth.

She could feel Jack beneath her, but she could also feel something more pulling at the net of time—something less clear and less distinct lurking within him. Esta pushed her affinity toward Jack again, searching for the spaces between where he ended and Thoth began, and when she found the demigod, she used everything she was and everything she would ever be to tear at the shape of Thoth. To rip him from Jack, to tear him from that moment in time, until the darkness in the spaces between the world flooded through him.

A scream echoed from Jack’s mouth—part human and part something that might once have been human long ago. As he screamed, a shadowy flood of dark energy poured out of his mouth and began to swarm in weaving tendrils through the room. It came together above them, a thick coil of inky black, and then all at once it burst open into a shower of ash like a terrible firework exploding above.

The power reverberating through the Aether knocked Esta back, and when she hit the floor, she lost her hold on the seconds. The world slammed back into motion, and the noise of the arena assaulted her as she watched the bits of darkness fall, descending onto the people in the arena. When they landed upon her skin, they felt like shards of ice that had the same cold energy and power as the Brink.

Esta brushed them away as she climbed to her feet and lunged for Jack. He was still writhing in agony as she took the Book from the inside of his coat, and when she looked into his eyes, she saw only watery blue. And fear.

She felt no victory as she took the Book from the pocket of his jacket. He’d hurt so many people, but that didn’t seem to matter as she watched him, weak and pathetic, with blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth. His hand was grasping for the knife that now protruded from his chest, but his fingers couldn’t seem to take hold of it. Jack looked up at her again, pleading, and Esta felt an overwhelming sense of revulsion as the truth of what she’d done washed over her.

“Please…” Jack reached for her, his voice no more than a whisper as his eyes found the Book she held in her hand.

There wasn’t time, though. Even if Esta had wanted to help him, police were already on their way through the frenzied crowd, which had finally managed to pry open the arena doors and was pushing to escape. She scrambled to her feet and reached for the hilt of the dagger. There