The Midnight Kingdom, page 59
She had a sense of déjà vu, of standing at the barrier after crossing the necropolis and traversing the unruly pathway of the void. Now she was on the other side, begging once more to be let through.
The blood touched her chest, thick and tacky. Risha tilted her face up, straining to reach as many spirits as she could. They all reached back, grieving and lost like her, responding to Samhara’s lure.
The barrier cracked. Split. Began to ease open.
Blood washed over her head and pulled her under. Still she held on to Samhara, to the spark that was Jas, to the struggling spirits. Her lungs burned as she fought not to open her mouth, the pressure radiating from the stepwell grinding her bones together.
And then—the spirits surged free, and the barrier broke.
Thana’s yell was a dull thunderclap under the roaring of the portal. The blood pool spun like a cyclone with her trapped inside it, the same delirious vertigo as when Angelica had pushed her into Mortri.
Only now she was falling into another strange land, one that smelled of cloves and midnights, with her ancestor’s weapon in her hands and the lingering echo of her god’s wrath in her ears.
XVI
The portal spun lazily, hypnotizing in its dark depths. Dante couldn’t help but lean toward it.
Hands grabbed his shoulders.
“Is this what it means, then, for the portals to be reopened?” Azideh purred against his ear.
Dante shuddered. “No. This portal is temporary. Only when the portals are permanently opened, like they were before, can you…”
Only then can you take my life.
Azideh wound his fingers around Dante’s collar, pulling his back against the demon’s front. “Pity,” Azideh rumbled, and he could feel it in his own chest. His other hand reached around to settle over Dante’s racing heart. “I would have liked to consume you now.”
A flash of heat followed by a flash of cold. Dante kept his eyes on the portal, trying in vain to not think about consequences. Trying not to glance in the direction where the dead were beginning to flag, their vengeance complete, the newest of their number lying in a pool of her own blood.
Azideh returned to his cloud form, laughing softly.
What did I tell you? the demon whispered. You lust for control in all its forms.
“I had to kill the baron and his demon. I did a good thing.”
One could argue he, too, was doing good. Keeping his city safe by administering sacrifice.
His stomach twisted.
“Dante.”
He came back to himself as Brailee laid a hand on his knee.
“It’s taking them too long,” Brailee said. “I’m going through.”
“Wh— Absolutely not. We don’t know what’s happening over there. They—”
“Rian knows me,” his sister stressed. “I know he’s fighting against Phos. I can help.”
Dante opened his mouth, but all his arguments were weak, amounted to little more than I can’t lose you, too.
“I’ll come back.” She took his hand, eyes bright with determination. His throat ached with how much she had grown without him realizing it. “I’ll bring them back.”
Dante hugged her tight, fighting the urge to use his compulsion on her again.
He couldn’t. He would not turn into the baron.
Brailee hugged Saya, then contemplated the portal before her. With one last glance at Dante, she stepped into the unknown.
Under Taesia’s feet came a heady vibration. It reminded her of standing in the Vitae stepwell, an expansive longing, carrying the faint hint of grass and water and smoke. It traveled up the walls of the Sanctuary of Nyx and shook the roof, made Kalen cling harder to Marcellus.
Lilia stared down at the courtyard, where Julian had dropped. He had tied one of the nightmare gems to his arrow before he’d fired it, and now Rian—or Phos, or both—was falling under its influence.
The princess’s whip crackled with starfire. Before she could unleash it, Taesia grabbed her arm despite the throbbing heat that passed between them.
“Don’t,” Taesia said. “You have to give Julian a chance to save him. Please.”
Lilia’s eyes were brimming with silver mercury, her black hair turning white at the roots. The fangs poking out along the curve of her collarbone glinted like an ivory necklace.
“If we attack him now, then the god will die,” Lilia said.
“That won’t stop what’s coming.” Taesia glanced up at the brightening maelstrom, her bones aching at its wrongness.
“Highness,” Kalen whispered. “The barrier.”
The princess hesitated. Then, with a flick of her hand, she dismissed her whip and peered up to better focus on the other threat looming over the city.
Another rumble came from the Sanctuary just as the form of a petite girl stumbled out of the entrance. Taesia first thought she was hallucinating, that the air was beginning to intoxicate her.
Brailee.
Panic caught her in a grip so strong she couldn’t even call out as her sister ran toward Rian. Once she reached him, Brailee took his head between her hands.
Taesia was about to leap down when Lilia made a pained noise. Her aides immediately flanked her.
“It’s all right, Highness.” Kalen’s face seemed so much younger in his fright. He and Marcellus each held one of Lilia’s arms. “You’re a Lunari. You were meant for this.”
“We’re here with you,” Marcellus added, face dotted with sweat.
Silver tears spilled down Lilia’s face as the rest of her hair gradually whitened, the same blinding effect as sunlight on just-fallen snow.
Something stirred beyond Phos’s barrier. Starfell burned brighter and the astralam fangs on Lilia’s body glowed. Along the edges of Astrum came the first rising tide of the barrier, silver and splendid, like a sheet of moonlight.
Once the barrier was complete, it would take all of Lilia’s strength to withstand Phos’s attack.
It would kill her.
It was within this very building that Lilia had told Taesia the story of Noria Lunari, a hero and a martyr. To Lilia, it was a story full of meaning, something to aspire to. To Taesia, it was a warning.
She had come back to Astrum with a dangerously cobbled-together plan. Holding Starfell closer, she now felt it settle in her with an almost comforting weight.
She was not going to let anyone become a martyr today.
As soon as Julian fired the arrow into Rian’s shoulder, he sensed the confused tumult of his thoughts. Boy and god, god and boy, the blood of Vitae and Solara and—something else. Faraway and familiar, the same twisting threads as those unraveling in Julian’s veins.
The piece of Orsus that Phos had consumed. Whatever magic it had bestowed to him, it was growing within Rian as Phos’s hold on him strengthened.
There is no point in this exertion, came the low, spectral voice he had been dreading. In his pocket, the piece of Orsus’s bone felt like an extra limb, one that prickled with pins and needles. If you separate them, then Phos yet lives. He must be ended.
Julian glanced at Nikolas, who watched warily from a distance, holding an injured Fin close.
Nikolas had brought this piece of Orsus to him. He knew, after what Julian had done to free his own mind, that this was likely the only way to get his brother back.
Julian would do what he could to not fail him this time.
Instead of tapping into the enigmatic threads of quintessence, he fell back on what was most familiar: his beastspeaking. He sharpened it into a fine point and unleashed it to pierce Rian between his brows.
A spiral of calamitous thoughts threatened to engulf him. His knees nearly buckled at the onslaught, unable to separate god and boy, screams from whispers, laughter from sobs.
With a beast, it was so much simpler—animal aggression, instinctual persistence, the need to hunt and keep warm and survive. But though tapping into Nikolas’s mind had been like trying to undo a tangled lock, what he found now was a twisting labyrinth, full of dead ends and upside-down corridors and ghosts.
Julian breathed through the assault as his head throbbed. The bone sent a numbing cold through his hip that spread down his leg.
The god was upset, was doing everything they could to force Julian to use their power. Julian gripped his bow tighter, tight enough to cut off bloodflow to his fingers. A reminder to be Julian Luca and nothing else.
There was a shout, and suddenly a girl was running toward Rian. Julian reached for an arrow before he recognized her: Brailee Lastrider, the one who had first been possessed by Nyx at Godsnight. Taesia’s sister.
When she reached Rian, she stood behind him and grabbed his head. Her eyes rolled into the back of her skull with a bitten-off scream, as if his nightmare were being transferred to her.
And then Julian was wrenched out of the courtyard and into Rian’s mind.
Into the labyrinth.
Enough
I was unhappy.
There. I can say it now.
That isn’t to say there weren’t things that made me happy. There were quite a few. But there is a difference between momentary delight and contentment as a fixture, like a chandelier hanging in your home, beautiful and bright.
My home wasn’t very beautiful. Some would say otherwise, but I hated it. So gaudy. A gilded coffin.
(If you detest these memories so much, then let them go. You will find eternal peace. You will be safe, with me.)
I don’t think that’s true.
It’s never really been about choice, has it? I didn’t choose to be born, or to have all my father’s expectations put upon me. I didn’t choose to be the one he named heir while my brother stood forgotten in the corner, withering without sunlight. I didn’t choose to fall asleep, to enter the house of my god and have him in turn take residence within me.
I didn’t want any of it. I don’t want any of it.
I don’t want you.
I want—
I just—
I’m so fucking hungry and—
Was this corridor always here?
(You will be able to rest soon. Just a little more, a moment more, and your hunger will be satisfied.)
Shut up.
You…
I know you.
The girl from my dreams, the one who I used to do cartwheels for, the one who was always softspoken. She stands in front of me, but now her eyes are fire and there’s a bellows in her chest, and she’s beautiful, beautiful, and lighting the way.
“Rian,” she says, holding out her hand. “It’s all right. Follow me.”
Down the corridors, twisting, turning, where sharp things are waiting to bite and attack and drag him me us back to where this all started.
“No,” she says, so sincere, her hand still outstretched. “I’ll guide you.”
(She is lying. This will only bring you more pain.)
Her hand is warm. I let it tug me forward, down the corridor, into another. In the distance comes a wild howl that plunges me into ice, a howl like the wolves that stalk the countryside, the ones that gave me nightmares after—
She squeezes my hand harder.
“Don’t look,” she tells me. “Keep your gaze on me. Don’t give them any attention, and they won’t hurt you.”
I do as she says. With every corner there is a new well of fear, the bark of my father’s voice and the thrill of drowning, the likenesses of those I know—knew—lying facedown all around me.
My shoulders prickle and I almost turn. There is another here, a presence I don’t like, curious and strange, eyes bleeding green through the dark.
“What is he doing?” I whisper, and am shocked to find I can speak at all.
“He’s helping. I think it’s because of him I can speak to you now. We…” She glances at where those eyes burn. Somewhere far and far and far away from here comes the roar of an approaching storm. “We don’t have much time.”
We walk quicker. To the heart of the maze, my mind, my—do I even have a mind anymore? A heart? A body? These new fears loom over me, so tall and large, and I am insignificant in their shadow.
“Focus on me,” she reminds me.
Her hand is soft. Darker than mine. Her eyes, too—dark like ink, like the canopy of night, like the place where I go when he is in control.
(I will always be in control.)
A ripple and a tear. I yank my hand away, fight against something I cannot see or comprehend. There is a stinging at my neck and it is driving me mad, I cannot see, I cannot feel anything, I can’t—
“Rian!” she cries. “It’s not real! You can fight this!”
But I couldn’t stop the fever, the descent toward death, toward the entity that cradled me against burning wings and hid me away from everyone and everything.
He is me and I am him and we are—
XVII
There was a terrible, ongoing howl Angelica couldn’t escape. If the others screamed, she couldn’t hear them.
But she had the fulcrum under her hand, warm, alive, powerful. She leaned against it and heaved them all through, following the fault line to their destination.
She collapsed onto rough, grassy terrain. Angelica gasped for air, worried her lungs had been compressed in the journey. Like all of her had been condensed and now she had the horrific job of piecing herself back together into a fully human form.
“Angelica!”
She turned her head to stare at Dante Lastrider across yet another fucking portal. This one was dark and shadowed, a doorway into some cosmic horror she impulsively shied away from.
Saya Vakara was at his side, both of their mouths wide open.
“Is that a wyvern?” Saya squeaked.
“Yes,” Angelica said. “And Deia’s fulcrum. Any more questions and I’ll make him eat you.”
I do not eat humans, Yvri argued. They taste foul.
Angelica helped Cosima and Eiko off the ground. The peak of Deia’s Heart rose above them, a twin to Mount Netsai. Angelica quickly assessed it to make sure it wouldn’t erupt as well.
Magic thrummed across her body. She was jittery with it, knowing she would pay the price when the eye on her forehead closed and took away the final scraps of control.
“Why are you just sitting here?” Angelica demanded of Dante, who looked like he did, in fact, want to ask more questions.
He tore his gaze away from the wyvern with considerable effort. “We’re waiting for the others to get through, but they’re— Shit.” He leaned forward. “The portal’s closing!”
The edges of the shadows were indeed shrinking inward. Saya voiced a steady chant of “No, no, no!” while Eiko met Angelica’s gaze, unsure what to do.
Deia’s eye was narrowing. She didn’t have much time left with its teeming power.
Before, she might have simply let the portal close and let the others fend for themselves. Now, Angelica reached into herself, into the core that represented aether. She held out her hands and grasped onto the portal’s edges, forcing it to stay open.
“Angelica,” Cosima said warningly as Angelica’s arms began to shake.
Come on, Lastrider, she thought. Don’t make me regret this.
Taesia stood on the spot where Julian had perched moments ago, face turned up to the Malum Star.
The bones that made up Starfell and the fangs that made up the coronal had come from the same astralam, once a part of the same constellation as the dying star. Taesia lifted her sword in both hands and sensed the connection between them—the frantic hum, the distant scream.
The implosion of a star collapsing in on itself. The death of light, the birth of misfortune.
The creation of a gaping, hungry maw, so much like a portal.
“It’s happening,” Kalen panted. “We can’t… we can’t stop it. If I’d just predicted it correctly—”
Marcellus reached across Lilia and took Kalen’s hand in his. Kalen quieted, eyes welling with tears.
Taesia turned back to the forming black hole. Already she felt the devastating pull of it, the way its proximity to the other warped the sky and sent shockwaves across the realm. At the same time, the Solarian light burned brighter, ready to be unleashed. They were in a race to destruction.
She poured everything she had into Starfell. All her might, all her strength—down to the dregs, scraping at raw muscle and bone. The shadows swept around her in violence and in love, whispering and whimpering, at her beck and call.
In the bone dealer’s shop, after she had met Julian, she had flooded herself just like this. It had momentarily destroyed and then remade her, but instead of leaving cracks it had built her back stronger than before. And it had been so easy, so glorious, to simply snap a man’s neck with that power, to live and breathe it, to want to never part with it.
The firmament above was scarring. The night sky mirrored in her blood, the light causing the shadows to lengthen and deepen.
Between her and Lilia they made up a star. They were both washed in its silver fire, but only Taesia reached out to another, calling with no answer.
Her chest strained for breath. Along every synapse was a static shock, and even though the shadows fortified her, turned her to something more than human but less than a god, she knew.
It was not enough.
“Please,” she begged. To herself, to Starfell, to the unfeeling sky. “Please…”
I warned you, Nyx said, midnight and alabaster. And you did not listen.
“I can… I can…”
Behind her, Lilia groaned in pain as her barrier rose higher around the city.
Below her, Phos struggled in Brailee and Julian’s grip.
Within her, power brewed and stormed with nowhere to go.
I don’t live at fate’s whim, she had told Nyx. She had been so confident, so sure of herself and her ability to expose destiny as a sham. It was her life, and she had never wanted it to belong to another.
But she had neglected to acknowledge all the other lives tied to hers. The ones that had changed her, and the ones she had changed, for better or worse.
