Chapter 23 #3
From the vaulted ceiling hung cages too small for standing, their iron bars streaked with rust and filth.
Their doors gaped open, as though the bodies that once filled them had spilled out and vanished into the silks of the bed below.
Along the far wall, half-concealed behind drapes heavy with dust and perfume, stood cabinets fitted with narrow drawers.
Some were left ajar, revealing glimpses of what they’d kept—folds of black silk, coils of leather, blades gleaming like teeth in the low light.
It wasn’t merely a chamber of torment. It was indulgence turned to desecration—pleasure sharpened into a weapon—every surface smelled of him. Every object reeked of the same hunger that had built this room.
This was no bedroom.
It was a temple.
A shrine to Severen’s corruption.
I tore through it like a storm. Chests overturned.
Drawers ripped open. Cabinets flung wide, their contents spilling out—silks, bone charms, silver hooks, and chains.
The relics of his madness clattered and rolled across the floor.
Dust and incense thickened the air, clinging to my lungs until I could barely breathe.
Still, the flower wasn’t here.
And the longer I searched, the louder the whispers became.
They slithered through the cracks in my skull, soft, coaxing, almost gentle at first—then pressing closer, threading through the sound of my heartbeat.
“Open us. Ask. We will tell you.”
I froze.
The tome burned hot in my grip, pulsing. Its leather throbbed beneath my fingers, whispering against my skin.
“Open us, Lazarus. Ask, and we will give you what you seek.”
My knuckles whitened around the tome. My breath came in short, ragged bursts.
“No.”
The word tore out of me like a wound.
“You are running out of time,” the shadows hissed, their voices coiling through my mind like a thousand serpents. “Severen may return at any moment. Every breath you waste is a step closer to your unmaking. Open us. Ask. We will show you.”
I shook my head violently, the word grinding between my teeth. “No.”
“Open us.”
Their voices pressed harder, pounding against my bones, filling my skull until it felt like they were inside the rhythm of my heart. My chest heaved. My hands shook. My will splintered under the weight of their hunger.
Finally, with a guttural curse, I gave in. I fell to my knees, clutching the tome as though it were a living thing, its pulse thrumming against my palms.
“Show me,” I whispered, the words scraping my throat raw. “Show me where the Noctyss flower is.”
The shadows purred, triumphant, their laughter soft and venom-sweet.
“Payment must be made. Nothing comes freely. Feed us, and we will answer.”
My blood went cold. “Payment?”
“Yes.”
Their chorus deepened, vibrating through my ribs.
“Pain. Desire. Agony. Fear. We feast on all of it. Give us something, and we will show you.”
My stomach twisted. “On who?”
“Amara is right there.”
The words slid through me like a blade of ice.
She was moving quickly, searching—pulling open drawers, pushing through silks, her face set with determination even as her hands shook.
The shadows’ voices grew louder, closer, whispering directly into my ear, curling through my thoughts like smoke.
“Use her as you kissed her. As you touched her. Feed us through her pain, through her fear, through her desire. Give us something, Lazarus—and we will give you everything.”
Bile scorched my throat. I stumbled backward, the tome trembling in my hands. The marks beneath my skin pulsed violently, alive.
“Feed us,” they hissed, a hundred mouths speaking as one. “Feed us, and the world will open to you.”
I shook my head, gripping the book so tightly my nails split against the leather. Blood smeared across its surface, dark against darker.
“No…” I rasped. “Not her. Never her.”
Their laughter came—low, merciless, rippling through the chamber like the rattle of a thousand throats.
“You will. You must. Or you will have nothing.”
My pulse hammered. The whispers pressed closer, swelling until my skull felt ready to crack. The noise wasn’t just in my head anymore; it was in my blood, in my breath, in the rhythm of my heart.
Amara turned.
Her eyes found mine, and for a moment, the rest of the world ceased to exist. The sight of her—alive, breathing, trembling beside me—shattered what was left of my restraint.
Before I could think, before I could stop myself, I crossed the space between us. My hands seized her shoulders, dragging her sharply against me. She gasped—a startled sound, half-breath, half-prayer—but I crushed my mouth to hers before she could speak it.
Her lips trembled beneath mine, then parted. The first breath we shared was desperate, and shuddering. The shadows inside me reared up, howling in pleasure.
My skin lit from within. The tattoos pulsed, black fire coiling beneath the surface, crawling along my arms in living spirals. Each mark glowed, serpents waking from slumber, writhing to life.
The shadows hissed with delight, their voices a chorus of ecstasy in my skull. They fed greedily, gorging themselves on the heat of her mouth, the frantic rhythm of her pulse, the fragile human thrum of her life pressed into mine.
And gods forgive me—
I let them.
I felt their hunger slither through me, a thousand dark tongues drinking from the space between her heartbeat and mine. The air around us shimmered as the room seemed to close in, mirrors flickering with warped reflections of us—shapes entwined, halos of black flame licking across our skin.
Amara didn’t see it.
She couldn’t.
Her hands scratched my chest, pulling me closer, her body trembling with need and fear. She was lost in the kiss, desperate, clinging as if she feared I might vanish if she stopped.
She didn’t see the marks crawling higher across my skin.
She didn’t hear the shadows purring inside me, whispering her name as they fed on everything we were.
“I love you,” I murmured, the words searing as they left me. “Not just in this life, but in every one I’ll ever live and every one I’ll be damned to. You are the pulse that keeps me from falling into the dark.”
The words tore out of me like blood—because they were all I had left.
The pit had stripped me bare, carved me hollow, devoured everything that once made me human.
I felt nothing anymore.
No joy. No kindness. No shame. No fear.
All of it burned to ash.
Except her.
The one thing the shadows couldn’t devour.
True love.
She moaned softly against my lips, tears streaking down her cheeks as she clung to me. Her body hummed with fear and longing, but her mouth answered mine, desperate, alive. For a moment, she was the only pulse I knew.
The shadows hissed with delight inside me, purring like beasts that had been fed. They had what they wanted.
I tore my mouth from hers before she could see the truth burning beneath my skin. My chest heaved, lungs scraping raw. The shadows writhed in me, coiling through my ribs, drunk on her kiss.
Amara’s eyes were wide, dazed, glimmering with tears. She reached for me again, but I caught her wrists gently, forcing my voice steady through the chaos inside me.
“Keep searching,” I said. “There has to be something here. A clue. A trace.”
She nodded, shaky and flushed, her breath uneven. Still trembling, she turned back to the shelves, rifling through jars and chests.
I staggered back, clutching the tome against my ribs. My knuckles whitened. The shadows inside me surged, triumphant.
“Beneath the bed. In the stone. Press your hand, and it will open.”
The whisper coiled through me, silk over blades.
My breath caught. I didn’t hesitate.
Crossing the chamber, I dropped to my knees beside the bed—massive, draped in black silks that whispered like dead leaves.
Shackles hung from its carved posts, the velvet sheets pooling thick across the floor.
The air here was heavy, suffocating, ripe with incense and sweat, the stench of what he’d done.
At first, the stone beneath me looked unbroken. Smooth. Untouched. But as the shadows pressed in, the truth revealed itself—a shimmer, faint and subtle, a seam only the darkness could see.
I laid my palm flat against it.
The slab throbbed beneath my touch like living flesh.
With a deep, grinding groan, it shifted. Dust fell in sheets. The floor split open, yawning wide, hot air rolling out like the breath of something waking.
And there—in the cradle of the dark—the torchlight found it.
The Noctyss flower.
Its petals were as black as night, veins of silver pulsing beneath their surface. It glowed from within, alive and defiant, its light burning against the shadows that recoiled from its presence.
The shadows surged, their voices driving through my skull like hooks dragged through flesh.
“The Noctyss must not touch you, Lazarus. Do not open it. Do not breathe it. Do not let it graze your skin. You will be undone. Give it to Amara. She must take the petals. Pluck only a few. Steep them quickly. A brew will be enough. Make him drink. Spill it on him. However, it reaches his flesh—it will neutralize his power.”
My breath came shallow, ragged. My hands trembled as I lifted the glass dome. Even through the barrier, the flower pulsed—alive, sentient, breathing in time with the room. The air around it shimmered, thick with quiet dread.
And it wasn’t alone.
Dozens of vials ringed its pedestal, their contents glimmering in the torchlight—oils, powders, and fluids sealed in crystal and wax.
Each one pulsed, faint and rhythmic, like captured heartbeats.
Gold, black, and silver writhed together behind the glass, trapped and hungry. The sight churned my stomach.
“What are these?” I breathed, unable to stop staring.
The shadows hissed back, their voices low and dripping with disgust.