Absurdly, Riordan’s first thought was that Phenalope should have taken notes on how to properly kill someone. That slice had been professional in its smoothness and lethality. Hell, he had fucked people up professionally for several decades and even at his best, Riordan had never been that effortless. That attack definitely inspired respect.

His second thought was best summarized as “oh shit” because the order controlling the power from and around them shattered.

The swamp of magic had been flowing into a funnel formed by the fog, condensing down into a living soul and the body that housed her. The capacity of those vessels could handle the power, if layered into it correctly. A ghost clearly lacked the same capacity, or was shaped differently as a vessel or something, because Phenalope was still standing there, still trying to draw in the power of the ritual with mad hunger, but each drop tore at her gray ghost like water on tissue paper.

“Let it go!” Riordan yelled at her, surprising himself that he even cared after everything she had done. “It’s destroying you. Let it go!”

Grief and fury warped her normally charming face into a rictus, lips curled back and teeth bared. “Never,” she screamed, even as the ritual poured into her, bloating and distorting her ghost body.

The image of the physical world had vanished with the death of her body, her soul no longer anchored to that realm. She existed in the spirit realm because of the bridge she had stood upon, but the spirit realm wasn’t truly the realm of the ghosts. Behind her, a fissure appeared in the air, felt as much as seen, black upon black. It grew, becoming a tear in the fabric between realms.

No, a tear in the Veil. Unlike the rest of the ghosts present here, Phenalope’s ghost wasn’t tied to this side of the afterlife. Riordan didn’t know much about the Veil or the realm of the ghosts, except that they existed, but there was no doubt about what he was looking at. That growing slit in the reality of this place felt like eternity and oblivion, cold and inviting. The gates were opening to welcome her soul to the great beyond. All she had to do was let go of the ritual and her attachments here.

Instead, Phenalope stretched out her hands and clung to the ritual, digging her nails in deeper and deeper even as her fingers dissolved.

The ropes of the ritual binding Riordan slackened, granting both his body and his magic the freedom to act, and suddenly Riordan understood. He was waiting for this moment. The tree spirit had faith in Riordan to resolve this, calm and rooted even as its branches trembled in the increasingly chaotic storm. The whirl of power must be losing its structure without a living soul holding the ritual.

Actually, he realized it was worse than that. A whirlpool formed around the tear in the Veil. It pulled at the surrounding magic as it tried to draw in the wayward ghost, rapidly destabilizing an already distorted situation.

“What’s happening?” Daniel asked, his own ropes allowing him the leeway to join Riordan on his branch, braced against the trunk of the tree of light.

“Phenalope is dead. The ritual looks ready to explode. And that is a portal to the afterlife.” Riordan said shortly, trying to get himself to act. To decide what acting would look like.

“The afterlife?” Daniel asked, staring at that dubious gateway that definitely looked more hellmouth than pearly gates, “Do you think we could make it there? The ritual couldn’t reach us there, right?”

Everything seemed to slot into place and Riordan started talking before he consciously knew what he was going to say. “That. Get the rest of our people together and get them through the Veil. I know that the pack just wants to be done with being a ghost and move on. That’s how we can do that. I’m going to buy time for the evacuation.”

Riordan paused long enough to be sure Daniel acknowledged his orders and then jumped down off the tree. His ropes trailed after him like a cloak and the winds of the storm combined with his intention to slow his fall. Riordan touched down lightly upon the void-like soil at the roots of the tree. Before him, Phenalope struggled under a burden she couldn’t handle. He held out his hand to her.

“Give it to me, Phenalope,” he commanded, his voice brooking no argument, “You had your chance. You failed. It’s over.”

“No!” she cried, black tears running down her face. No, not tears. Her face was melting. “It’s mine. I shall become a god of death and vengeance. You can’t stop me!”

“I don’t need to stop you,” Riordan said sadly, his hand still held out in front of him. “You have already been stopped. This isn’t a choice between godhood and death. It’s a choice between absolute destruction or having an afterlife.”

Her form had large holes in it now, her edges frayed and flickering, but her eyes still pierced him with stubborn fury. “It’s mine. I will never let go!”

“Then you made your choice,” Riordan replied.

Standing by and watching someone’s soul get destroyed took a different sort of fortitude than trying to murder them in the first place. Riordan would have been satisfied with dying to properly end Phenalope earlier, though it would have gone against the orders he was under, but he never wished this on her. Just as he hated Jimmy with a passion but did not regret pulling his tortured ghost out of the ritual, Riordan wasn’t going to just stand there.

If she wouldn’t give him control of the ritual, Riordan would simply have to take it.

She was just a ghost now, no longer a death mage in full glory. He was a shaman in the spirit realm. With a flex of thought, Riordan dressed himself in his spirit mantle, his badger’s fierceness and disregard for the impossible filling him. The fur and leather outfit, decorated with embroidery and charms and evoking the impression of a honey badger, grabbed him from head to foot, his face disappearing behind a badger head mask.

Riordan extended his other hand as well and stepped forward, filling his mind with intention and steeling his will. He suspected that he was going to regret this on multiple levels. He was about to be in contact with a whole hell of a lot of death magic. He’d been wading through that shit for a while now without any noticeable side effects. Wading through stagnant energy reserved and contained in a ritual was quantitatively different than becoming the focus and vessel for that same power. Whatever the costs, Riordan merely hoped he could stay strong long enough to figure out how to safely stabilize and defuse the exploding bomb the killing tree ritual had become.

As soon as he stepped into the center of the conduit, Riordan felt a connection form, guided by his intention. Instantly, his perception ripped away from him, leaving Riordan in darkness, choking on filth. Direction ceased to exist. He tumbled through nothingness, battered by waves of pain and decay. Viscous fluid filled his mouth. The liquid pushed against his lips, fighting his attempts to spit it out. It tasted of rotten meat and smelled like a corpse left to rot for days in summer heat.

He had called for it, opened to it, and yet he refused it. The energy rolled over him, threatening to dissolve his soul as surely as Phenalope’s ghost. His armor held back the rot for the moment, but Riordan had to get himself in control fast or he had no doubt he would suffer a similarly nasty fate. He spread his senses, swallowing back the urge to vomit at the smell and taste and touch of this magic. Such foulness could easily drive someone mad. Every part of him thrummed with power just from proximity to the center of the ritual. Instead of tempting Riordan, it sickened him. Because he knew this magic, no matter how potent, was tainted with indigestible suffering.

He would not let it possess him. There might be no escaping the taint and corruption of swimming in this stuff, but Riordan refused to give over his mind and his will to it, not until he had accomplished what was required. If he needed to be put down like a rapid dog after this was done, so be it. Riordan would control this ritual.

His intention seeped out from him and the power drew back, no longer swamping him but quivering under a tenuous restraint. The magic felt like a pile of loose dirt, pebbles rolling down the sides and threatening to start an avalanche. How could Riordan find the center to something like that, especially without the guidance of the ritual that Phenalope had used? And who knew what effect her fading ghost was having on his attempts to take control.

A new sensation threaded through the death magic to reach Riordan’s clouded perception. A breeze brushed his skin, warm and gentle as sunshine through leaves and a stark contrast to the howl of the ritual storm. Peace followed that touch. Riordan let it through his armor and his edges overlapped with its edges. With the tree spirit.

Let me, it said with impressions and not words, with surety instead of thoughts. Like this, it called. And Riordan followed.

His feet walked along a blanket of fallen leaves. His unseeing eyes stared ahead unflinching and his steps were resolute. Around him, the magic ordered itself with his motion, falling into his train and moving with his intention. Darkness cloaked him in chill swirls. Shadow crowned him in ice. His tongue tasted fresh blood and it flowed from his lips as he breathed like the finest wine. An unholy chorus wailed a lament to his honor and the world trembled as he passed it by.

Riordan reached a place that was not a place. He knew that he had not moved in truth. He remained where he had begun. Tied to a tree in the woods of Michigan, bleeding his life away. Wrapped in black ropes, standing before a tree of light in a swamp of death. Inside a void inside himself that went nowhere except to loop back around, yet containing multitudes.

Before him, Phenalope stood. She was naked and shaking, nervous little cries and hiccuped laughs falling from her ravaged lips. All color had been drained from her with her death. Her sanity had been stripped by the corruption. Her body looked threadbare and fragile, unable to bear the well of power from which she had tried to drink.

Riordan felt… odd. A dark chill tugged at his edges, draining something essential to him. It wasn’t the devouring hunger of the ritual, feasting from his damaged body and soul. It was something more insidious. It didn’t want to devour him. It wanted to be him. A hundred whispered regrets and he swallowed them all down to get here and now they were his and they were going to make him theirs. It was only a matter of time.

That was alright. Riordan would make that time count.