All Chapters of Shadows of the General: Chapter 51
- Chapter 60
98 chapters
Chapter Fifty-One – Shattered Echoes
Her silhouette hovered before him, radiant and terrible. Chains threaded her like a marionette, every movement sharp, precise, wrong. Her white eyes glowed, hollow of recognition.“Selene…” His voice scraped raw.She raised her hand again. Another sphere of white fire pulsed between her fingers.The Eye’s laughter reverberated through the void. Strike him down, lock. Tear apart the last of his defiance. Prove to me you are mine.Adrian forced himself upright, blood dripping down his chin. His legs shook, but he planted them firm, fists clenched.“You can twist her body. You can chain her voice. But you’ll never own her soul.”The phantom tilted her head, and for a heartbeat, just one, the fire in her gaze flickered.Adrian saw her then. Not the Eye’s weapon, but Selene, his Selene, struggling beneath the chains.He staggered forward, breath ragged. “Do you remember, Selene? The night your father called me worthless? You slipped me a piece of bread when you thought I hadn’t eaten. You
Chapter Fifty-Two – Fractured Glass
Darkness pressed against Selene’s lungs like water, She clawed at nothing, thrashing, her body caught in invisible chains that dragged her deeper. No breath. No sound. Only the echo of the Eye’s laughter slithering through her skull.You are mine, little star. Every scar, every tear, every betrayal, they are the mortar of your cage. You built this prison yourself.“No!” Her voice ripped raw. “I am not yours!”But the darkness cracked like a mirror, showing her reflection, not her own, but the phantom her body had become.She saw herself standing before Adrian, hands raised, white fire burning at her fingertips. His chest was open, vulnerable. He didn’t raise his fists. He didn’t run.He will not stop you, the Eye crooned. Because he cannot. He loves you too much to fight you. Which makes his death the sweetest sacrifice of all.Selene screamed, pounding against the glass walls of her mind. “Stop! Don’t make me do this!”The Eye hissed. You are already doing it. You are the lock. The f
Chapter Fifty-Three – Inferno’s Edge
The void erupted, Selene’s phantom convulsed, her body bending unnaturally as white fire and molten gold tore through her veins. Chains snapped and reformed around her like frantic serpents, struggling to contain her.Adrian staggered backward, shielding his eyes against the blinding surge. But nothing could shield him from the sound, the scream that was both hers and not hers, echoing through his marrow.“Selene!” His throat tore on the shout.The phantom’s body arched, her mouth open in a cry of agony. Fire burst from her chest, searing cracks through the void itself.Each pulse flung Adrian into the air, smashing him into walls that didn’t exist. His bones broke, healed, and broke again under the storm, but he forced himself to his feet, again and again, staggering toward her light.“You’re not alone! You hear me? Not now, not ever!”The Eye’s voice thundered, distorted, furious. Fool! She is unmaking herself! She will take you with her!Adrian spat blood, his knees buckling under
Chapter Fifty-Four – The Shattered Mirror
The storm was not outside her anymore. It was inside, a fire that blistered her veins, a hunger gnawing at her bones.Selene tried to scream, but no sound came, only a flood of white-gold light tearing through her throat. The chains the Eye had wrapped around her were gone, but freedom felt worse than imprisonment. She wasn’t standing on solid ground, she wasn’t even flesh anymore.She was a thousand splinters of herself scattered across a burning sky, and in that shattering, something entered.Adrian, She felt him before she saw him, a pulse that wasn’t her own, a heartbeat slamming against hers. It should have been impossible, his warmth inside her storm, his voice threading through the cacophony.Selene… I’m here. The words struck harder than fire.“Get out,” she whispered, her fractured voice trembling. “You’ll burn. I can’t stop it.”Then I’ll burn with you.Her chest constricted. She tried to push him away, but there was no “away” anymore. Every attempt at distance only bound hi
Chapter Fifty-Five – The Anchor and the Flame
Adrian’s chest felt like it was being ripped apart from the inside. Every breath came ragged, every nerve burned, and every heartbeat wasn’t just his anymore. Selene’s pulse thundered through his veins, too fast, too raw, drowning him, but worse than the pain was the look on her face.She wasn’t fire and fury now. She wasn’t the phantom storm. She was Selene, eyes wide, trembling, her hands reaching for him and pulling away at the same time. Like touching him would shatter them both.She’s breaking, The thought came clear through the haze of agony. He felt it, her storm fracturing, the Eye tightening its claws, and her desperate terror that she would consume him.“Selene,” he rasped, forcing his voice into the void. “Look at me.”Her gaze flickered, shards of light cutting through the storm.“I can’t hold you without destroying you,” she whispered, her voice trembling across their shared essence. “If I anchor you, you’ll burn out. If I let go, I lose you forever. I can’t”Adrian force
Chapter Fifty-Six – One Storm, Two Shadows
The fire was everywhere, It was Adrian’s heartbeat hammering in her chest. It was Selene’s tears burning in his eyes.It was their breath, shared and stolen, filling the same lungs. There was no dividing line anymore, no his, no hers, only them, tangled in flame and shadow, clinging to the last splinters of who they had been.Hold on to me, Selene whispered, but the thought was also Adrian’s, echoing in both minds, I am holding you, he answered, and she spoke it with his mouth.The fusion blurred everything. Memories bled together, his nights under a barrack sky, her childhood hiding tears beneath silk sheets, the divorce table where their hands brushed before parting.The past folded like paper until neither knew which scars belonged to whom, and in the center of it all, the Eye’s voice thundered. You are one storm now. One flame. You are no longer Kane. No longer Carter. You are mine.Chains of shadow and fire wove tighter, binding not just their bodies but their souls, Selene screa
Chapter Fifty-Seven – The Fractured Horizon
Fire, white, gold, and bleeding red, spiraled with shadow so deep it devoured starlight. The vortex stretched across the heavens, swallowing clouds, bending the very air until the horizon bent inward like a fractured mirror, and at its heart… Adrian and Selene.Or what had once been them. Vivienne’s breath caught as she stared into the maelstrom. Their figures were barely visible now, fused in light so blinding it burned her eyes. Their storm pulsed like a heartbeat, cracking the ground beneath her boots.“They’re… destroying everything,” Damon Locke said beside her, his usual arrogance stripped raw. He had always moved through the world like it belonged to him, smirking, taunting, untouchable. But now, his jaw was tight, his eyes fixed on the storm with something dangerously close to fear.Vivienne didn’t answer. Her throat locked. Because she knew what that storm was. She had felt it once, brushing against her,when Adrian pushed too far. It wasn’t just power, it was love twisted in
Chapter Fifty-Eight – The Severing
The storm curled inward, suffocating, Selene’s fire lashed at itself, burning too bright, tearing too deep. Every breath was Adrian’s. Every heartbeat was hers. Their souls pulsed together in a rhythm that felt endless, and unbearable.She could feel him slipping, fading into her, losing the line that made him Adrian Kane, and she couldn’t let that happen. This ends with me, she thought, though the words echoed in both their voices.“No.” His answer came instantly, sharp, furious, as if he’d felt her thought the moment it sparked.Her storm convulsed, sending shards of fire ricocheting through the void. “I won’t let you vanish because of me. I won’t drag you under.”“You’re not dragging me anywhere,” Adrian growled. His figure flickered inside her blaze, his eyes burning like twin embers. “I walked into this storm. I chose it. I chose you.”Selene shook her head, fire spilling from her hair in ribbons. “You don’t understand. You’re already disappearing. I can feel it. Your name, your
Chapter Fifty-Nine – The Breaking
Adrian felt it like a blade slipping between his ribs. Her words, I’m sorry, weren’t just sound. They were a severing knife, a final crack in the storm that was holding them together.“No!” The roar ripped out of his chest, but the void swallowed it, as if mocking his desperation. His grip on her wrists faltered as Selene’s fire surged inward, curling not toward him but toward herself.She was turning her power against her own essence, and it was working.He saw her form begin to fracture, light splintering into shards that bled away into the abyss. Each fragment was her smile, her laugh, her anger, her love, and each piece left him emptier, hollower.“Stop it!” he shouted, lunging, clinging to her wrists. “Selene, don’t you dare”Her eyes, tear-bright flames, lifted to meet his. And for a heartbeat, he thought he’d broken through.“I can’t watch you disappear, Adrian,” she whispered, her storm trembling. “This way, you’ll live.”“I don’t want to live without you!” His words cracked.
Chapter Sixty – The Splintering
Above, the sky twisted into impossible colors, reds that bled into obsidian, whites that seared into void-black. The storm was no longer just light and shadow. It was unmaking, and at its heart, two flames tangled so violently the air screamed with every surge.Vivienne’s chest tightened, her throat burning as if she were swallowing fire herself. She knew who burned at the center. She could feel it. Adrian. Selene, and they were tearing reality apart.Beside her, Damon staggered, his usually unshakable composure unraveling. His eyes, sharp, cold, calculating,were wide with something Vivienne had never seen in him before. Not fear. Not anger. Something worse, Recognition.“She’s severing,” Damon muttered, his voice low, broken, barely audible over the roaring void.Vivienne snapped her gaze to him. “What do you mean?”He clenched his fists until his knuckles bled. “Selene. She’s trying to cut herself away. She thinks it’ll save him.”Vivienne’s heart lurched. Her nails bit into her pal