Biiiig Lightning

And he did. There was nothing asura hated more than pain. It was enough to force a miscalculation—the last one he’d ever make. With a cry for release, Saxby split his essence again. His flesh rippled, spirit pushing through every drop of his erupting blood. The flesh foamed like the sea, burst, and transformed into insects, scorpions, and serpents. To her immortal eye, it happened slowly—and she leapt through the wriggling epicenter.
With her kanaf as armor to shield herself from stings, she snapped a single snake from the swarm, tucking it close.
Landing on the other side of the buzzing cloud, she reached again to the clouds above and pulled the sky down upon both their heads. The snowy earth lit with not just a few bolts—she brought them all down.
As she’d promised, she made him drink her power. To the dregs.

~*~

Naomi gasped as the sky opened up. She’d never seen lightning so bright, so vicious. It came from every part of the dark ring of clouds, a flurry of bolts that bent inward to the same central patch of ground. They struck a distant place she couldn’t quite see. Shielding her eyes, she watched as thunder shook the stones and trees, trembling through her.
I kissed the thing that’s doing this. Nameless feelings gripped her, too varied to comprehend, though her hands trembled, her heart pounded, and she wanted to hide from Ryn’s eyes at the same time she wanted to… kiss her again. But carefully.
“That— That isn’t— I don’t…” Denise stared at the same sky, along with Elli. “What’s happening?” She swallowed. “Is it the end of the world?”
“I don’t know,” Naomi confessed. No one could speak louder than a whisper. “We have to get back. Come on.”
They bent to drag Patrick, who was groaning and probably concussed from Denise’s branch.
Still, the lightning struck. It had not yet stopped pouring from the clouds, battering a single piece of ground as though artillery from Heaven. She said the weather obeys her feelings, Naomi remembered. That’s… a lot of feelings.

~*~

Again and again, Ryn spent her anger in blinding neon strokes from the sky. She beat him like an anvil until her head rang, until her eardrums bled, until all she saw was blue and all she tasted was ozone.
When she stopped, she unfurled the kanaf from around her shoulders and stood alone on a singed patch of earth. When enough of her vision returned to make out shapes, she could tell nothing stood within fifty feet of her in any direction. It was only charred stumps, black ground, and boiling pits of vapor where once there had been water. A stink filled her nostrils: that of the ten million dead life-forms Saxby’s essence had split into.


Chapter 22, Page 339-341