My chest tightens at the look of Auren’s waning aura, at the gold that starts to flicker. The magic is riding her hard—too hard. It’s draining her faster than I can blink. Though based on the volatile look on her face, I don’t think she even realizes the toll this is taking.
The gold room lives and breathes by her hand, and she’s controlling so very much of it—too much of it.
She starts striding toward the exit, so I make my way across the room, the soles of my shoes sticking to the floor like I’m walking on syrup. Gold laps at my ankles, the subtle waves of a tide washing up on the shore.
I don’t break my pace until I slide in front of her, blocking the archway.
Auren jerks to a stop, a massive crest of gold at her back casting her in a shadow, the wave of a tsunami ready to hit.
She watches me, but it’s not just her looking out of her eyes. Something else lurks there too.
I can feel her hunger, her need for revenge, and I have no qualms with her meting it out. I would gladly step aside and let her cast her reckoning on this whole damn kingdom. I’m not blocking her for them.
It’s her sapping strength that roots me in place. It’s fear that has me gently coaxing her, because I can feel the power feeding on her, draining her, killing her.
“Goldfinch, can you hear me?” I say softly.
Her head tilts, like she’s trying to place me, and my own expression turns grim, my chest going tight.
The magic has taken over.
“Auren,” I coax, taking a step forward. “You can let go now.”
A frown mars her beautiful face, resistance tightening in the gold behind her. The magic is sparking, making her skin gleam like beams of light reflecting off her skin even as sweat drips from her brow and her breathing grows labored.
Too much. It’s taking too fucking much.
I eat up the distance between us, ignoring the floor that pricks through my boots, my sole focus on her, on keeping the panic from my eyes so I can try to calm her down. “You need to let go, baby. You’re draining yourself.”
“Draining?” she asks, though her voice sounds strangely hollow.
I nod. “Yes. You need to drop the magic before you hurt yourself.”
The room seems to pulse.
“My gold won’t hurt me,” she hisses, something almost animalistic bearing down on me through her eyes.
“It already is. Your aura is fading. You can’t see it, but I can. I need you to breathe and let go of your power.” There’s a plea in my voice.
“No.” The floor shifts in an angry wave.
My teeth grit when her aura dims, and I know I have to fucking stop this. “You’re alright now. You don’t need it,” I say, trying to assuage her magic.
But then she goes and breaks my damned heart.
“I want everyone to hurt like I hurt.”
My lips press together in a hard line, fingers itching to reach out and touch her. “You punished the one who mattered,” I promise her.
You punished him.
Giving in to the need riding me, I take another step forward and reach out to caress her cheek. “Come back, Goldfinch,” I murmur, her bright eyes making mine burn, though I don’t look away.
Something shudders through her at my touch, her waning aura trembling, and then she blinks, the strange glow of her eyes receding.
“Slade?”
Hope leaps in my chest. “That’s right, baby. Let the magic go.”
Just when I think I have my Goldfinch back, Auren’s eyes flare with panic as she curses the gods. “I can’t. I don’t know how to let it go!”
Fuck.
I grab her trembling arms, trying to steady her while my own power beats at me, reacting to her terror. “Breathe, Auren.”
The room quakes, gold jumping and jerking in an erratic fit. “I can’t control it, I can’t—”
“You can,” I tell her, because I won’t accept anything else. She didn’t defeat Midas just for her own power to turn on her. “Try, Auren. It’s your power, it answers to you.”
She winces, her skin gone hot to the touch as she tries, but when the floor ripples again, her anxiety surges back full force.
“It’s going to hurt you!” she cries, shoving at me. “Go, Slade, I can’t…I can’t hold it back much longer, and I don’t know how to stop it!”
Refusing to let her push me away, I grab both of her cheeks and say, “Look at me.”
Her fearful eyes well up with tears. “You have to leave.”
And let her drain herself to death? Never.