11 #2
Ceveon shrugged. “I’ve dealt with worse. Such as hearing Erebus’s snores through his open balcony. Maker, those were awful days. Awful centuries. I’d try to yell at him, but my voice didn’t come out right until you first set foot in his domain, Esmer.”
Erebus looked scandalized. “I don’t snore.” Then, almost betraying himself, he cut a glance toward me, his melodic voice dipping low. “Do I?”
“You don’t,” I answered. “But you do make other noises.”
Ceveon and Sorren erupted into surprised laughter.
Erebus muttered something unintelligible behind his hand, clearly trying—and failing—to hide the blush rising to his pale cheeks.
For a moment, the tension among us softened, easy and golden.
But the weight of what I’d admitted earlier pressed into my shoulders, refusing to be forgotten.
I shook my head, the smile slipping from my lips.
“The voice feels sentient,” I told Ceveon and Sorren, steering us back to what mattered. “Like a demon wanting to break in. How do you shut it out?”
“What a fitting comparison.” Sorren chuckled. “I suppose my cynical thoughts do feel like a metaphoric demon breaking in. I should try locking the door next time.”
“I’ll try that, too,” Ceveon added with a grin. “Maybe if we pretend it’s not there, it’ll just go away.”
Oh. They thought it was merely doubt—my inner voice preying on my fear. They didn’t know the true depths of my burden. The way the voice dug in like claws, promising power but threatening to take away all I held dear. I fell silent, skin growing cold.
“I don’t think she’s speaking metaphorically,” Erebus said slowly, much to Sorren’s and Ceveon’s dawning horror.
“Ah,” Sorren noted, brow furrowing. “Well, then, that is deeply concerning.”
“Does it feel like Corruption?” Ceveon asked in earnest.
I shuddered. “Could that even happen? I’m a Weaver. There’s no demon hunting me.”
Erebus caught my eye. He knew that wasn’t true.
There was a demon hunting both of us, and his name was Raelion.
“A voice was my first symptom of Corruption,” Ceveon said, his tone pensive.
“I heard it in my dreams—a demon’s voice, twisted and layered like a thousand dying men.
It whispered from the shadows and promised me glory.
” He closed his eyes, as if he was in physical pain.
“By the time Mithras killed us, Corruption was already winding its way into my heart. And then I became trapped in this domain until you freed us. I used to think it was a shame that Mithras never purified us. But I’m thankful now it led me to this moment. That I’m able to help, even in death.”
Sorren nodded gravely. “It was my first sign, too. My demon’s voice had a chime to it. Like music.”
“But she’s a Weaver,” Ceveon pondered. “Corruption doesn’t happen to Weavers.”
“Are we so sure?” Sorren inquired, shooting a pensive look across the Nocturne. Citadel Evernight was out there, waiting. “Anything is possible. We’re up against the king of demons and his army—”
“And we will kill them all,” Erebus interrupted with a snarl.
I felt his hand reach for me, fingers curling around mine with a reassurance that sent a thrill up my spine.
“Whatever this is,” he said fiercely, eyes burning into mine as he helped me stand, “we’ll face it together.
The voice has no dominion here. Not when you’re surrounded by those who see you. Who know you.”
My throat tightened, a mix of gratitude and something deeper.
“Thank you for believing in me,” I whispered, squeezing his hand.
I felt a little stronger. Maybe I could embrace their confidence and wear it as my own.
“I swear I won’t let this voice sway me.
Raelion or not, I’ll never submit to its whims.”
But even as the words left my mouth, a chill skated down my spine, piercing deeper than the cold night air. The shadows around us pressed in, as if the night itself was listening, judging, waiting. Erebus’s hand tightened around mine, fingers pressing into my wrist.
Ceveon spun in a circle, trying to discern something.
“Do you hear it?” he asked. “The faint whisper?”
I froze. The air around us had thickened, dense with a low, insistent hum. And just at the edge of my hearing, beneath Ceveon’s question, something else stirred, a murmur threading through the shadows like a rancid breath against my skin.
Sorren’s eyes narrowed as he glanced around. “Maker. We aren’t alone.”
The voice that plagued me now drifted through the air, weaving among us. It was hardly more than a sigh, a slithering whisper in the dark, yet it was enough to twist the shadows into terrifying shapes that shouldn’t exist.
“Together?” the voice taunted, the single word dripping with mockery. The shadows pulsed with it, like a heartbeat pressing into my skin and coiling tight around my soul.
Ceveon’s face paled, fingers twitching as he jumped to his feet. A longsword and shield, crafted from the finest shadows, appeared in his large hands. “What is that?”
“A demon,” Sorren snarled, leaping up. He manifested his own blades, twin rapiers that reminded me of needles. “Raelion?”
Erebus took a step forward, curling me protectively into his side.
“Show yourself,” Erebus commanded, his own blade already poised to strike.
But nothing emerged from the darkness. No form, no face, no corporeal body. Only the voice, laughing as if we were a joke only it understood.
“Run, stay, it matters not,” it whispered, winding its way around us like smoke. “I am already inside her. And she will call on my power before long. It is only a matter of time.”
Memories stirred of the voice’s earlier promises.
Its murmurs of power and desire, of secret wants I didn’t know I held.
Fear pressed down like a vise on my chest. Still, I lifted my chin high, feeling a spark of determination flare to life.
Though the darkness might haunt me, the voice might unsettle me, I couldn’t be broken.
Not with Erebus and a legion of dreamers by my side.
Not with Elliot still out there.
Not with a world to save.
“You’re not welcome here!” I screamed angrily, brandishing my own sword. Shadows surged from our quintet of blades, racing through the night as they sought the voice’s origin. “Get out of our domain!”
The domain quaked like a bell being tolled.
Then the voice reverberated in our heads with a deep, vile laugh, retreating like a snake stomped back into its hole.
I shuddered, nearly dropping to my knees.
Whatever the voice was, whatever darkness had sunk its claws into me, I knew, with a terrible, consuming certainty, that it was only the beginning.
And I’d need to fight harder than ever. For my future, for the kingdom, for the dreamers, for Elliot—and for a beautiful, powerful man I wasn’t sure I deserved.