The Majors, Cold Fury (Book 2)

Chapter 82: The Ruins of Rivendale

***Ignore the fact I totally didn't steal Scott's finale title because I'm so amazingly original.***

TW: Gore

~Scott~

It was practically impossible to fly due to the haze hanging in the air, stifling and unbearably warm. I could hardly see, everything gaining an orange hue as I tried my best to fly below the rising smoke.

I attempted to choke down several coughs from the contaminated air, trying to glide lower than the cloud of pollution without getting too close to the fires raging beneath me within the forests.

Erin was near dead silent from beside me, clearly not as affected as I was. Maybe the Grimlands' pollution made her lungs strong to smoke. 

I almost dreaded arriving in Rivendale. Me and my sister had already witnessed several ravines open up from beneath us as the land split, like two large hands were dragging the earth in different directions. 

Despite being in the sky, every time the earth shook it gave the illusion that we were getting shook with it. Like ping pong balls getting tossed around through the air. 

My anxiety rose the higher I did in the sky, the closer we got to my city. I didn't want to think of the horrors that might be taking place there like everywhere else... But if this were the end of the world, I'd be very surprised by the fact it wasn't Erin who caused it. Or me. Very surprised.

"Eh, Scott?" Erin called, swerving through the sky to get closer to me. "I um, don't mean to alarm you but the smoke is getting darker the closer we get to Rivendale–"

My head snapped up from the ground, where I had been watching the landscape blur beneath us. Sure enough, dark, nearly black clouds of shadow-like smoke was swirling above the mountains, right over where the city lay. "Oh Aeor, please no..." I murmured under my breath, putting on another burst of speed.

With Erin trailing just behind, my heart pounding rapidly against my chest, I swung myself through the air around the mountain, holding my breath as my eyes landed on the city... Oh I wished I could just turn around and pretend I had never seen it, that it wasn't my problem. That I could ignore it like all my other issues. But this here was too big to shove down and never think about again.

Despite being deemed the city of winter and kingdom of frost, even before my magic's dramatic entrance, the place looked as barren as the Grimlands, all the greenery shriveled to dust from the fire that rampaged the cliffsides. 

The heat that I thought couldn't get any worse nearly tripled in intensity. The entire city seemed to be one raging ball of flames, the snow melting from the mountain tops and rushing down in violent waterfalls, only to evaporate as soon as it came in contact with the heated haze encasing Rivendale and the valley. Streams of lava flowed alongside, tearing through the city like blades, digging into the land before spilling over the edge of the ravine to clog and pollute the river below.

But what really caught my attention, what really made my heart drop, giving the illusion it had fallen into my stomach, were the red tendrils curling around the destruction. Twisting eerily, like snakes waiting to strike, they seemed to sliver in sharp contrast against the once pure white of the buildings, now dusted with ash and debris.

With one incredibly panicked exchanged look with Erin, I dove towards the ground. The corruption from Xornoth's reign was still branded into my head, old memories from the past years swirling. I prayed I had seen something wrong, and that maybe, just maybe, I couldn't really be seeing it return.

Xornoth couldn't have escaped. Not again.

I hit the ground running, my feet skidding in the dirt for a few seconds and raking up a plume of dust. I nearly fell face first from my momentum, but I managed to steady myself with the quick sprint and halt.