The battle was over. Suspended over the city, buoyed by a power I barely understood, I could clearly trace the still smoldering path Behemoth took from Long Island through Queens to Manhattan. Had it been after the Chrysler Building? Grand central? Not Rockefeller or the Empire State—its unstoppable, unwavering march had been in a near perfectly straight line. Whatever its aim, Brooklyn had come through nearly unscathed.

But not us.

I had to be thousands of feet in the air, but I could see it all with impossible clarity. The grocery and our little apartment block had been reduced to shattered brick and smoking, broken boards, identifiable only by its proximity to Cypress, the large cemetery a few blocks away. People had begun to leave the shelters, horror and terror on every face as they searched for loved ones.

All I could think of was blood and bone and the light erasing them.

A noise clawed its way up out of my throat, one I hadn’t known I could make—that I feared I shouldn’t be able to make. There, on the far side of Queens, I could see Far Rockaway. I traced the streets effortlessly, my eyes sliding over the survivors flooding the sidewalks and the street signs suspended over them. Not some strange facet of a power I didn’t understand, but a far more mundane familiarity born of living here for years. There. The apartment we had shared with Elena.

Untouched.

“William Klaus Anderson.” Could Elena hear me up here? See the pure light I had become? See the woman who had betrayed her to save our child… only to put him directly in the line of fire? “June 1st, 1995… November 6, 1996.”

A name and a date.

I lifted the sliver of steel my light had cut from a car. I lifted it and set its edge against my throat. Wasn’t it supposed to be harder? One little cut, and I’d become a name and a date. Maybe that was why that force of nature had marched through New York. To remind us how easily we die.

I’m sorry, William. I slit my throat.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

…

… what…? No. No! I felt it! I felt it, goddammit!

My free hand groped my throat, blood smearing as my fingers blindly traced over every inch of it. No cut.

I jabbed the steel through. Left it there for good measure. The protrusions fell away, and my breathing began to grow erratic, as I fumbled for a solution. I just— I just needed to turn it off, right? Right! That was all! There—I could feel it inside myself, a switch set to on. I flipped it, and the light suffusing me vanished.

I plummeted.

I survived. The light returned, stopping me just above the pavement. I tried again, screaming at the light to leave me alone and let me die, but it kept coming back. Eyes were on me, people stopping to stare, all those eyes watching me never leaving staring won’t stop won’t let me die won’t won’t won’t—

I moved. I hadn’t meant to. I didn’t recall doing it either. Had I lost time? One moment I was hovering over the streets of Cypress Hills, the next I was at the park by the lighthouse. The park where the Butcher had attacked us. Where Klaus had killed him.

Untouched by the destruction, the tower loomed imperiously over the East River. The lighthouse’s lantern was out.

I couldn’t die. I had killed my son, but I couldn’t kill myself. Could I drown myself? Or would the light drag me out, purge the water from my lungs? Would this curse ever be done with me?

I lifted into the air and over the river, carried by the light and its warmth, and came to a stop before the lighthouse. The power was out, I realized. Of course it was. And without it, there was no light. I reached out to touch the glass surrounding the lantern, tracing my fingers over the pane. The light in me began to swell. Would I run out? Could I give the city everything and just… stop?

The sun set. I didn’t.

All night, I lit the waters of the river and the shores beyond them. No one came to investigate. I could only presume they had bigger problems to solve. The water ebbed and flowed beneath my rays, and with it, my breathing began to calm. Slowly. So, so slowly. But the more I gave and the longer I watched the river, clarity settled in.

I had killed my son. But so had Behemoth. The battle was a blur, my memories murky, but I remembered helping. I remembered struggling with what I could and couldn’t do. I remembered striking that wretched beast until it fled.

I would kill it. I would use my power. Become better—stronger. Enough that someday I could hunt that monster down and kill it.

And when that day came… maybe I could finally die.

The sun rose, and with it the power returned. Behind the glass, the lantern flared to life, and my duty done, I rose into the sky.

My gaze lingered on the lighthouse below, and so did my thoughts. A half forgotten history lecture came to mind, and with it a name.

The Lighthouse of Alexandria.

I watched the lighthouse, and it watched me.