Dark Passions at Death's Door

41 - Do What You Need To...

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Silence pervaded the mansion except for the casual rumbles of the pumas. Regin had already nicknamed them dumas.

The rest of Nїx’s closest allies were nursing themselves. Her proximity to the Vertas leadership had left many of them feeling the strain. Half the females were now sipping tea and using spells to relax their minds after feeling a brush with death.

Mariketa was the first to break the stillness. “Byron? What was that?”

“That.” He worked his jaw a couple times. “Was the first hit of her ascension.”

“I… felt it.” Sabine shivered.

He glanced at the red-haired dominatrix. “I know you did.”

From what he’d heard of late, the Queen of Illusions was one of those who knew intimately how it felt to die. Many different times, and many different ways.

A better way of putting it... she'd been chased and murdered by Loreans and humans from the time she was a little girl of less than 12, all through her adulthood.

She'd felt the impending brush with death.

Nїx’s ascension had caused multiple repercussions across the planet. A Richter-scale 7.3 earthquake had struck between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and several powerful aftershocks had split open several gas and water mains.

Freak thunderstorms had shattered across the Midwest and the East Coast.

Three tornadoes classed as Fujita level 4 strength had touched down in Oklahoma, leveling three outlying small towns. The tornadoes had been on track for the suburbs of Lawton. Then they'd dissipated.

Thousands were now homeless.

New Orleans had experienced an oceanic surge that almost collapsed the levees. Two tropical storms had blown into the Caribbean, capsizing three dozen sailing vessels.

The mortal meteorologists were trying to make sense of what happened.

Reports of heart attacks and strokes had spiked nationwide. He closed his eyes.

The worst part of being a reaper, he could instantly know how many were fatal. The number was currently seven hundred and fifty-three, and counting. Across the Caribbean, Mexico, the U.S. and Canada combined.

Then there were the deaths from the traffic accidents and the toppled buildings on the West Coast.

It was not a standard ascension at all.

He’d been lucky that she had decided to wear the cloak so he could trace to her. Nїx had been lucky, too, in her own way. On the grand deity scale, these freak incidents were considered minor.

But the nearby Lorean population had felt something happening. He slowly breathed in the mixture of teas and vitamin waters the other females were drinking with their regimen. Even the Valkyries were sipping water.

He went over what he knew.

If a deity ascended swiftly, without proper preparation, they could end up killing or maddening themselves.