Chapter 26 #2
It brushes against mine. No, presses into it, lustful and greedy, and for a single, horrifying second, I suffer his addiction.
I feel his hunger.
Not for me.
For the thing inside me.
For souls that are wrong.
His pupils dilate, his lips parting like he’s tasting a change in the air.
Falcen blinks out of it.
“Stay with me,” he snarls.
I try. Gods, I try.
The ember expands at his contact, a self-defense that surges, wrapping around my ribs, my lungs, my spine, tightening like a noose. My body arches against Falcen’s, a violent, unnatural jolt. He spits out a curse, but I can barely hear him over the roar inside my skull.
I gasp, choking on it, but there’s no air, no reprieve, just the blistering crack of my insides shattering.
I turn my face into his neck, breathing in his scent.
It’s grounding, the only familiarity in an increasingly foreign landscape ever since I left Belgrave. He has been the sole stability in this so-called adventure. My sole protector.
“That’s it,” he says into my ear. “Stay with me.”
He shifts, bracing his forearms on either side of my head, creating a shelter of flesh and bone that blocks out the world. Nothing exists but him and me, our tattered breathing and chronically sick souls entwining.
“You are Verily Holbrook,” he says, each word a lash. “You are a Soulren of the Resonance Academy. You are strong, and brave, and as stubborn as a gods-damned tick burrowing under my skin.”
I cling to his voice, to the ironclad conviction ringing in every word.
“Remember who you are,” he orders. “Remember what you’ve survived. The Void, the catacombs, rogue Soulren, me.”
I am Verily Holbrook. I am more than a vessel for dark magick. I am the mistress of my own fate.
With a monumental effort, I shove against the ember’s onslaught. I imagine walls slamming down, partitioning my mind, my very essence. Barricades to keep the gluttonous flames at bay.
The ember shrieks, battering against my hastily erected defenses. Each blow reverberates through my skull.
No, no, NO! You cannot deny me!
“Watch me,” I snarl through gritted teeth.
A violent whip of magick erupts from my chest, crashing into Falcen like a wave. He shouts, his weight redistributing, but he doesn’t let me go.
Falcen’s breath ghosts the side of my face. “That’s it. Good girl. Just keep your eyes on me.”
The low, gravelly timbre of his voice sends a frisson down my center, momentarily displacing the pain.
His hands slide down my arms. “You’re doing so well. Don’t let it win.”
And beneath that, a terrible hunger lurks. A yearning. Falcen’s gaze keeps flicking to my bare skin, drawn to the shadows and soul-fire dancing across my skin.
I remember what I felt when our souls brushed. The twisted craving inside him, the addiction he’s been fighting for so long. An addiction to deviant souls. To the power they hold.
Falcen’s eyes snap back to mine, and I know he senses my thoughts.
The ember’s screams reach a high pitch, a discordant symphony of fury and desperation.
And then … silence. For one terrible, blissful second, the world is still.
“You have no idea how tempting you are like this,” Falcen admits hoarsely.
His tattoos flare, the soul-glyphs writhing across his cheeks, straining toward me as if drawn by an invisible tether. His upper lip curls as he fights for control.
My ember takes the opening, slamming against the barricades of my mind with renewed fury. I cry out, contorting as she tries to take more of me again.
Falcen makes a low, desperate sound, his fingers flexing on my arms.
“Form your weapon,” he grits out painfully. “Form your gods-damned weapon right fucking now, because I can’t promise what I’ll do if you don’t.”
“I think I’m dying.”
“Verily!” Falcen’s warning pierces through.
I wrench my eyes open, blinking against the scorching light. Falcen’s face hovers above mine, his features etched with restraint.
“Look at your hand,” he urges.
I follow his line of sight. My right hand is wreathed in a nimbus of shadows, but my palm glows from within like I’ve caught a star. Tendrils of dark energy dance between my fingers, arcing and sizzling.
The scourge hits one second later.
Another agonizing incision that knifes through my palm. I shriek, my back bowing off the floor with such strength, Falcen’s body rises with me.
It feels like the weapon is carving its way out of me, some archaic object burrowing through muscle and sinew, fighting to be reborn.
“Let it come,” he soothes over my wails.
The pain builds and builds until I’m sure my skin will peel off from the force of it.
It shreds its way out of me, tearing through flesh. An unholy birth, drenched in blood and souls.
Edon. Noxie. The rogue. Lira. Falcen.
Shreds of essence I’ve collected and thrown into the ember’s chamber of fire.
A strangled gasp leaves from my throat as a quarterstaff appears, with a curved, deadly blade on top.
My entire being is branded into this weapon, locked in place as it fuses to my soul. Any soft spot left withers under its might as soul-magick floods my system. It’s agony and ecstasy, destruction and creation. I’m unmade and reforged in the stillness between heartbeats.
I stare at it, transfixed by the way the edges seem to emit thin streams of light and smoke that dance along the blade’s surface.
Falcen’s eyes are riveted on the halberd.
Slowly, almost reverently, he reaches out and traces a finger along the razor-sharp edge. The soul-metal hisses at his touch, ebony wisps curling around his hand like a baby’s grasping fingers.
Falcen’s lips quirk at the contact, dark satisfaction glinting in his eyes, like he’s reading a cipher he didn’t expect to find here.
Then it’s gone, shuttered behind that infuriating mask of his.
“Magnificent,” he murmurs. “A soul-weapon is a reflection of its wielder’s true nature. And yours, Verily...”
“… is evil,” I finish for him, then promptly lose consciousness.