Chapter 26 Bound
BOUND
The tear between realms snapped shut behind Lark with a thunderous clap.
The four metal ingots burned against her chest with newfound urgency upon being thrust into this new reality.
For a heartbeat, she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see, couldn’t hear as her senses were bombarded with the violent transition from the fae realm to Sataran.
I can’t breathe, she began to panic, her focus tunneling down to only the most basic instincts.
Then Nix’s flame flared into being beside her. The fire fae’s pinwheel of sparks transformed into a beacon of light that glowed amidst a scene of pure chaos.
The sanctuary beneath the Vermillion Keep was coming apart. Massive cracks spider-webbed across the domed ceiling, raining debris onto the mosaic floor. Lark inhaled deeply as a burst of air swelled her lungs.
Hovering over the center of the chaotic chamber loomed a figure that made her blood run cold.
“Ash,” Lark exhaled.
King Agadorn was gone. In his place floated a being of living darkness, its form constantly shifting like smoke in the wind. Silver starlight flecked its body, concentrated in swirling vortices where eyes should have been. The Void Drinker in its true form.
“Lark!” a voice called from her left.
She turned to see Venrick sprawled against a fractured column, his face drawn with pain.
Around him, the stone floor was stained with a darkness that matched the corruption spreading across his exposed skin and racing up his neck toward his face.
The blue brismil sword in his hand pulsed with visible draconic energy, as if the magic within the blade was fighting the advance of the Void Drinker’s corruption.
“Venrick,” she paled, her instincts to protect him taking over.
Before she could reach him, though, a wave of force rippled through the chamber. Reality buckled, the walls briefly turned transparent to reveal other worldly vistas. She saw golden courts, midnight palaces, icy citadels that couldn’t exist within this chamber.
“The Flashover quickens,” the Void Drinker’s voice scraped across her mind like frost on glass. It turned those terrible star-filled eyes toward her. “The dragonrider returns, bearing gifts from courts that should know better.”
The four metals pressed against her chest became alive with power, each responding differently to the Entity’s presence.
The Solarium grew warmer, the Umbrium colder, the Verdium lighter, the Glacium heavier.
Together, they created a conflicting symphony of magical energies that made her skin crawl.
“Too bad you’re too late,” the Entity continued, spreading smoking arms that stretched unnaturally long.
“The barriers weaken. The Realmstone awakens.” It gestured to a rectangular object embedded in its chest that pulsed with gray light.
“Soon, all realms will be one. Their power will be mine to consume.”
Lark’s hand dropped to Nightfang, the brismil blade sliding free with a whispering promise of death. The dark blade caught Nix’s firelight, reflecting it in ripples of black energy.
“You know as well as I do that I’m precisely on time,” she replied, her voice steadier than she felt. “The Flashover hasn’t peaked. The ritual will be completed.”
The Void Drinker’s wicked laugh filled the chamber.
“With what? Half-formed Vaerdium? Incomplete knowledge of the binding?” The Void Drinker gestured to where dwarven smiths lay unconscious around a forge bearing an unnatural blue flame.
“Your allies have failed. Your ritual has failed. Your world has failed.”
Movement from behind the Void Drinker caught Lark’s eye.
Hardin was crouched behind an overturned table.
He was already at work drawing moisture from the dank chamber around them, preparing to cast an attack spell.
Lark spotted Sasja alongside him. She was pulling herself upright, blood trickling from a gash at her temple.
Yarla stood near the glowing runes along the wall, her eyes focused with determination as she struggled to coax her power to help the group.
And behind them all, carefully edging toward the dwarven forge—
“Barrik,” she whispered.
Her uncle, the man who had mentored her as a youth, the dragonrider who’d taught her how to be a ruthless killer for her country, who killed organized her father’s death and put his own son on the throne…
her throne. His face was stern. He wore a calculated expression, intensely surveying the scene from behind the Void Drinker.
When their eyes met, he offered a thin smile that revealed nothing of his intentions.
“It is right that you’re here, Ella,” he called, his voice carrying despite the cacophony of the collapsing sanctuary. “I’d hate if you weren’t able to bear witness to my triumph.”
Another tremor shook the chamber, more violent than the last. The mosaic floor cracked along the seams, entire sections dropping into darkness below. Above, through the fracturing dome, Lark caught glimpses of dragons wheeling through an unimaginable sky where auroras writhed like living things.
She felt White Eye before she saw him. His awesome rage, his overwhelming relief, his desperate need to reach her surging through their bond like a flood breaking through a dam. The connection that had been stretched so thin in the fae realm now roared back to life, nearly overwhelming her senses.
I’m here, she projected to him. I’m alive.
With that reassurance sent, Lark turned her full attention to reaching Venrick.
She sprinted across the unstable floor, leaping over a widening fissure as sections of mosaic disappeared into the abyss.
The Void Drinker noticed her movement and sent a tendril of darkness to intercept her, but Nix flared brighter, her flame forming a barrier that the corruption couldn’t penetrate.
“Venrick,” Lark gasped, sliding to her knees beside him. “Hold on.”
His eyes focused on her with difficulty, the green irises now flecked with the same silver starlight that filled the Void Drinker’s form. “You came back,” he managed, his voice rough with pain.
“Of course I did.” She cupped his face with her free hand, her heart breaking at the corruption spreading visibly beneath his skin. “I promised, didn’t I?”
His hand found hers, squeezing with surprising strength. “The ritual,” he said urgently. “It needs a vessel. Someone who bridges realms naturally.”
“I know,” she replied, helping him to his feet. “The Winter Court revealed the truth. That’s why King Agadorn wanted you. You’re half-elf, one foot in each world.”
Venrick nodded slowly. “The corruption did something to me, Lark. It’s made me more susceptible to the spaces between. I can feel it.” He lifted his sword, the brismil blue fighting against the corruption’s darkness. “I can be the vessel.”
“No,” she said fiercely, even as her mind raced through the implications. “There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t,” he insisted. “And we’re out of time.”
As if to emphasize his point, the Void Drinker unleashed another wave of power. The very air split open, revealing glimpses of the fae realm Lark had just left. The tear widened, reality straining against the Void Drinker’s will.
“The barriers fall,” the Entity proclaimed, its form growing larger and more substantial as it fed on the energies escaping through the tear. “All realms will be one, and I shall feast on the essence of countless worlds.”
Barrik suddenly appeared beside them, moving with an unnatural speed brought on by his brismil armor. “Touching reunion,” he said dryly, “but this isn’t the time. Those metals you’re carrying. Are they what we need to forge true Vaerdium?”
“Yes,” Lark replied, reluctantly turning from Venrick. “The four essences of the fae courts: Solarium, Umbrium, Verdium, and Glacium.”
Barrik’s eyebrows rose slightly. “You did it,” his expression becoming one she recognized from her training. He beamed with pride. “I knew you would.”
He gestured to the forge where the dwarven smiths lay unconscious. “The craftsmen are indisposed, and the forge won’t last much longer with the Void Drinker’s destruction. We need a new plan.”
“You,” Lark said, gaping at her uncle, “want to stop this? I thought you started all of this?”
Before Barrik could respond, the chamber shuddered violently.
Another enormous section of the ceiling collapsed inward, revealing the sky above the Vermillion Keep.
Through the gap, she saw dragons engaged in aerial combat, White Eye and Quinthara fighting alongside other dragons against the Keep’s riders.
And then she saw him: Ingamar, his golden scales catching the unnatural light as he dove through the opening. The dragon landed with earth-shaking impact in the center of the chamber, wings folding tight against his body, roaring a challenge that made the remaining stone tremble.
“Ingamar?” Lark asked in confusion.
Venrick straightened, his expression clearing momentarily. “He came,” he said with something like wonder. “I called, and he came.”
“Called? You don’t have a bond—” Lark began but stopped as she saw the way Ingamar looked at Venrick. Not with the casual dismissal she remembered, but with focused intensity.
Something’s changed between them.
“It’s because of this,” Venrick gestured to the black lines creeping up his neck. “Whatever the King did to me triggered a new ability within me. Ingamar and I are connected now. It’s not a true bond, in the sense of sharing the magic of a Hyalite, but it’s a bond.”
The Void Drinker laughed again, instantly forcing Lark to cringe. “How convenient,” it mused. “The vessel summons his mount, like a Knight of the Keeps. Yet neither of you understand what you face.”