Chapter 11 #2
The corridor ahead seemed to stretch into absolute darkness, and from somewhere in that black void came a sound that made my blood freeze—a low, rhythmic pounding, like something massive striking stone.
Other patients we had passed were now cowering in their cells, some weeping, others pressing themselves against the far walls as if trying to get as far as possible from whatever lay ahead.
"What's down there?" I whispered.Patir swallowed, trying not to follow my gaze. "That's... that's Sayven. One of the most powerful shadow mages who ever lived."
The pounding stopped abruptly, replaced by a voice that seemed to echo from everywhere and nowhere at once. "Fresh meat walks the corridors. Sweet, uncorrupted flesh that hasn't yet learned to scream properly."
I felt ice forming in my veins. The voice was cultured, articulate, but carried undertones that spoke of horrors beyond imagining.
"We should go," Patir said urgently. "We shouldn't have come this far."
But I found myself drawn forward, horrified fascination overriding common sense.
The darkness ahead seemed to pulse with its own malevolent life, and despite every instinct screaming at me to turn back, I took another step forward.
The voice that had spoken carried an intelligence that was somehow worse than the mad ravings of the other patients—this was not madness born of confusion, but something deliberate and calculating.
"What did he do?" I asked Patir, my voice barely above a whisper.
"Please, my lady, we need to leave," Patir begged, tugging at my sleeve. "Sayven hasn't had visitors in months. The last person who got too close..." He shuddered. "We don't speak of what happened."
But I couldn't stop myself. Something about that cultured, terrifying voice called to me—not with attraction, but with the same morbid curiosity that had driven me to watch executions in the arena.
I needed to understand what Taveth might become, what fate awaited the man whose darkness I was supposed to anchor.
The cell at the end of the corridor was different from the others.
Where the previous chambers had simple wooden doors with barred windows, this one was sealed with what looked like solid stone, covered in symbols that seemed to writhe and shift when I wasn't looking directly at them.
The only opening was a narrow slot at eye level, barely wide enough for a hand.
"Ah," came that honeyed voice from within. "She comes closer despite her keeper's warnings. How delicious. How wonderfully foolish."
I approached the viewing slot, ignoring Patir's strangled protests, and put my eye to the narrow opening.
It took a few moments to adjust to the darkness inside, but I saw that the chamber was circular, carved from black stone, its walls covered in scratches and gouges that looked like they had been made by claws.
In the centre sat a figure that might once have been human, chained to the floor with bonds that glowed with their own pale light.
Sayven had been beautiful once—I could see the ghost of it in his bone structure, the elegant line of his jaw.
But whatever he had become was a mockery of that former self.
His midnight skin was translucent, shot through with veins of silver that pulsed with their own light, and his white eyes glowed in the darkness like beacons as they swung around to fix on the door.
"Ah, the shadow prince's little pet has come to visit. How delicious. Tell me, sweet morsel, does he whisper pretty lies when he takes you? Does he promise he'll never become like us?"
I felt my skin crawl, but I forced myself to speak. "What are you?"
A laugh echoed from the depths, rich and warm and absolutely terrifying.
"I am what your beloved will become, given time.
I am the future written in shadow and madness.
I was once the High Shadow, you know, before the current pretender took my place.
Before I learned the truth about our precious magic. "
"The truth?" The words left my lips before I could stop them.
"That it was never meant to protect us," the voice continued, and I could hear something shifting in the darkness ahead, something large. "It was meant to consume us. To feed on our souls until nothing remains but hollow shells dancing to its will."
I pressed closer to the slot, my heart hammering against my ribs. The chains rattled as he moved, and I caught a glimpse of something that made my stomach lurch. Where his hands should have been were writhing masses of shadow, constantly shifting and reaching toward the walls like living things.
"That's impossible. The shadow magic protects your people—"
"Does it?" Another laugh, darker this time. "The shadows aren't magic, little dove. They're parasites. Ancient, hungry things that found their way into our bloodline centuries ago and convinced us we were special, chosen. But we're just food. Cattle being fattened for slaughter.
How many of us die screaming in these cells? How many lose themselves to whispers that grow stronger with each passing year? The magic doesn't protect us from the Empire—it devours us from within while we fight their wars."
I pressed closer to the slot, unable to help myself despite the terror clawing at my chest. "If that's true, why hasn't anyone—"
"Because the truth is too terrible to accept," Sayven interrupted, his voice dropping to a whisper that somehow carried more menace than his earlier shouts.
"Because admitting we've been feeding our children to monsters for centuries would destroy what little hope we have left.
Better to call us martyrs than acknowledge we're victims."
The chains rattled as something moved in the darkness, and I caught a glimpse of what might have been an arm—too long, too thin, with fingers that ended in points rather than nails.
"Your shadow prince fights so hard to keep you because he knows," the voice continued, closer now, as if he had moved toward the door.
"Deep in his bones, he understands that when the darkness finally claims him, there will be nothing left worth saving.
You're his anchor to humanity, but he will pull you down with him…”
"Stop," I whispered, but I couldn't pull away from the viewing slot.
"I can smell him on you," Sayven continued, his voice dropping to a purr. "His scent, his claim. But underneath that, I smell something else. Something that makes my mouth water. You're not just his mate, are you? You belong to others. Dragons, if I'm not mistaken. How fascinating."
Ice flooded my veins. "How could you possibly—"
"Because I can taste their marks through the stone, sweet thing. Dragon fire leaves such a distinctive flavour on the soul.”
My blood turned to ice. The marks on my throat and collarbone—the ones I kept hidden beneath layers of beads and jewellery—suddenly felt like they were burning against my skin. How could this thing, this corrupted shadow of what Taveth might become, possibly know about Sirrax and Tarshi?
"Impossible," I breathed, but even as I spoke, I felt the truth of his words settling into my bones like poison.
"Oh, but it is very possible, little flame.
" I could hear the smile in his voice, predatory and knowing.
"The shadows tell me everything. They whisper of your dragon lovers, of the bonds that still tie your soul to theirs despite your shadow prince's best efforts to sever them.
They're here, you know. In the cells below. Came looking for their lost mate."
My heart stopped beating entirely. "You're lying."
"Am I? Tell me, sweet thing, have you felt empty these past weeks?
Like something vital has been torn away?
That's not distance weakening your bonds—that's your precious prince trying to cut you off from them entirely.
But dragon bonds are older than shadow magic, burn deeper than darkness can reach.
Deeper than his pretty lies. They endure. "
The corridor seemed to spin around me as his words sank in. The emptiness I'd felt, the aching void where my connection to Sirrax and Tarshi used to burn bright and warm—it wasn't because they were dead or too far away. It was because Taveth had been actively working to sever them.
The revelation hit me like a physical blow, and I stumbled backward from the viewing slot, my legs suddenly unable to support my weight. The stone wall caught me as I sagged against it, my mind reeling with the implications of what Sayven had just revealed.
"No," I whispered, but even as I spoke the denial, pieces began falling into place with sickening clarity.
The way Taveth's shadows had writhed with particular violence whenever I mentioned my other mates.
The careful way he'd avoided direct questions about whether the bonds could be severed.
The strange emptiness I'd felt growing stronger each day, like something vital was being slowly drained from my soul.
"My lady, please," Patir begged, pulling at my arm. "We need to leave. Now. Before—"
"He's been lying to you," Sayven continued, his voice following me down the corridor like smoke.
"About the bonds, about your mates, about what he truly is.
The shadows haven't chosen him as their vessel, sweet thing—they've already consumed him.
What you've been kissing, what you've been letting between your thighs, that's not a man anymore.
That's a puppet made of meat and darkness. "
"Stop," I whispered, pressing my hands against my ears, but his words wormed their way through anyway.
From the darkness ahead came the sound of laughter, rich and warm and completely insane.
"Oh, this is delicious. Love blooming in the shadow of madness.
Tell me, sweet child, will you still claim to love him when he's carving pretty patterns in your skin?
Will you whisper endearments when he's feeding your screams to the hungry dark? "