Chapter 74
Xyliria’s fingers drew her sabre out of nowhere, knuckles white, her body coiled in a stance that screamed readiness. But I could see the doubt, the way her weight shifted, the momentary hesitation.
I grinned.
Sharp. Wicked.
And then I moved.
I dove for the fallen blade at my feet, plucking it up with ease, twin daggers now spinning in my hands, the familiar weight solid, comforting.
The instant my fingers wrapped around the second hilt, the shadows surged, reacting to me, responding to my intent, twisting and coiling around my arms like living tendrils.
Xyliria’s lips curled.
She lunged.
Her sabre sang through the air, a deadly arc of silver and crimson light, her magic pulsing outward in thick, swirling clouds of blood.
I met her.
Shadows peeled from my skin, wrapping around my legs, dragging me through the thick fog of her power with impossible speed. Her blade came down in a brutal cleave, aimed to split me from clavicle to hip—but I twisted out of reach in a blur of motion that left the sabre kissing nothing but air.
My left dagger snapped out, low and angled, its curved edge slicing in toward the vulnerable seam beneath her ribs.
She spun before it could land.
Her sabre ripped through the air in a perfect wheel of red and silver, fast enough to scream. The sheer velocity of it dispersed the magic between us, sending clouds of blood-smoke spiralling out.
And then—collision.
Her power met mine, crimson against shadow, ancient against ancient.
The blast was deafening. Not a sound, but a force. The floor cracked beneath us. The walls behind me buckled, and I felt her power slam into mine with the fury of a hurricane that wanted to peel flesh from bone.
But my shadows answered. They surged outward, formless and endless, devouring the blood-mist and filling every gap her magic left behind. Where she tore the air open, I filled it with void. Where she screamed her wrath, I whispered annihilation.
Her face twisted. Not with rage—with fear.
But she didn’t stop.
Her sabre snapped forward again, faster now, wild lashes that forced me back on instinct alone. Each strike not just fast but perfect, as if it had already seen my death and was simply working its way there.
But I had never been faster. Never been this clear.
I dropped low, shadows hurling me into a spin beneath her next swing. My right dagger slashed upward, catching the underside of her arm and tearing through the fabric with a hiss of steel and flesh.
Blood sprayed—thick and dark—and her magic shattered for a heartbeat. The mist faltered. Her sabre dipped.
I didn’t hesitate.
My right hand was already rising. My left slammed into hers to throw her guard off-line. And then my blade, slick with shadow, carved a clean, arcing line straight for her throat—
But she vanished.
A burst of red mist, her body dissolving, reappearing behind me with a flicker of warped air.
I spun—too late.
Pain exploded across my back.
Her blade sunk in deep, right beneath the shoulder, the edge raking across muscle and bone in a diagonal scream of heat and blood. I staggered forward, vision swimming. But I used the momentum, dragging my body through the arc of pain.
And struck.
My dagger tore across her ribs, carving a vicious diagonal from hip to sternum. Cloth shredded. Flesh parted. Blood gushed, black-red and hot, splashing down the front of her silver-stitched gown.
She recoiled.
Her fingers curled against her side, pressing into the wetness. When she pulled them back, they dripped crimson, the tips trembling. She stared at them, stunned.
Not accustomed to bleeding.
“You’re afraid,” I rasped.
Her gaze snapped to mine, eyes burning with fury. But I could see it. The fear that whispered beneath the rage.
Xyliria snarled. And her sabre ignited in her grip, runed crimson flaring across the blade’s length. The very air around us seemed to hold its breath.
She struck.
A two-handed slice, a final act of fury meant to end me—meant to take my head and crown herself with the wreckage.
But I had already moved.
Shadows surged up my spine, and I dropped low—sliding beneath her swing, the heat of it searing inches above my skull. My back screamed, muscles torn and bleeding, but I moved anyway, teeth gritted.
I came up under her guard like a blade through water.
My shoulder slammed into her ribs—
She staggered.
A second blow, elbow to the gut. Her breath left her in a gasp that was more betrayal than pain.
One foot hooked behind her ankle. My hand gripped her wrist. I twisted. Dropped. Dragged.
She hit the ground hard, her sabre clattering away into the blood-slick stone. Her body pinned beneath mine, my knees braced on either side of her hips, one dagger pressed to her throat, the other at her chest, above her rotted heart. Both blades hummed with shadow and fury.
Her fingers twitched, reaching for her blade.
No. Not this time.
My shadows struck.
They lashed, snapping hungrily, wrapping around her throat, wrists, ankles, pinning her to the stone.
She gasped, struggling, but the more she did, the tighter they wound. Darkness crawled over her, creeping into the cracks of her magic, devouring the power she had wielded so cruelly for so long. She choked as the shadows constricted, her body thrashing desperately.
A war was unfolding around me.
The others had risen.
Shaelith moved like vengeance incarnate.
Not the controlled, elegant killer I’d known, this was something else entirely.
Her white hair was soaked crimson now, plastered to her skull with blood that wasn’t hers.
Her pale violet eyes had gone completely flat—not empty, but focused with the terrible clarity that came from having nothing left to lose.
She looked like a wraith, like something that had crawled out of the deepest circle of hell with one singular purpose.
To make them all pay for what they’d taken from her.
Varyth, gods, Varyth was a force of destruction, his rage so feral it sent shockwaves through the chamber with every brutal strike. He was tearing soldiers apart with his bare hands, a High Lord reborn in vengeance and fury.
Darian was wild, a storm of unpredictability as he carved a path of death through the enemy. And Cindrissian cut down guards with a deadly grace that sent them collapsing before they could even blink.
Linc was standing over Fenric’s crumpled form like some avenging angel carved from desperation and rage.
Blood streamed from his nose, from the corners of his mouth—Xyliria’s magic had torn him apart from the inside, left him shaking and barely upright.
By all rights, he should have been the one on the ground, gasping for breath.
But he wasn’t.
Every time a guard got within reach of Fenric, Linc became something utterly wild. He moved like death itself. With violence that came from watching the person you loved more than breath itself nearly die. A throat opened here. A heart pierced there.
My focus snapped back to Xyliria.
I leaned in, dagger poised above her heart.
Her breath came faster, harder. I could smell her fear now. I could taste it in the air.
“Beg.”
She snarled, lips curling over bared teeth. “I will tear you apart—”
I tightened my grip on the shadows.
She choked, her words cut off, the coils around her throat squeezing, her body arching as she fought for breath.
“Try again.”
Her nails dug into the stone, her body writhing, her legs kicking uselessly against the bindings.
I waited.
Her power was dwindling, being swallowed whole by the abyss I had become.
But she was proud.
Arrogant.
Her throat bobbed as she fought against it, as the truth choked her more than the shadows did.
“Please,” she finally gasped, a broken plea. “Please, I—”
My power roared in my blood, in my bones.
I didn’t let her finish.
Didn’t let her utter another fucking sound.
I drove the blade into her chest.
The steel sank deep, cutting through flesh, through bone, piercing her heart with a sickening, wet sound.
Her body arched, a strangled gasp escaping her lips. The blood came fast, hot and thick, spilling over my hands, onto my clothes, pooling beneath her.
I twisted the dagger.
Her breath hitched, her fingers twitching, clawing weakly at the shadows holding her pinned to the ground.
The shadows surged at my call.
They wrapped around the blade, thick and alive, as if they’d been waiting for this moment—thirsting for it. They didn’t just seep into the wound.
They devoured it.
I felt them pour into her chest, a tide of cold fury laced with my own rage. They moved like blades themselves, sliding through flesh and bone. I felt the moment they reached her heart.
And shredded it.
Xyliria’s body convulsed.
Her scream didn’t come from her throat.
It came from the rot in her soul.
Her magic lashed out, a flare of blinding crimson light erupting from her fingertips. But it was too late. Too slow. The shadows were already inside her.
Already unmaking her.
They tore through her chest, ripped into her core, pulled every last breath from her lungs, and then stilled.
Silence fell.
Her body collapsed back onto the stone.
Lifeless. For one perfect, terrible moment I didn’t move. Just savoured the warmth of her blood on my hands.
It shouldn’t have felt good. But it did.
My shadows receded, curling back into me, retreating into the void that now lived inside me.
The grand hall was silent. My chest rose and fell, slow and steady.
The power that had surged through me was still there, humming beneath my skin, no longer bound, no longer silenced. It was waiting.
It had always been waiting.