16
We descended upon Citadel Evernight in a fury.
The Weavers and I used our united magic to part the Nocturne’s blackened waves, opening seven deep channels like the spokes of a great wheel.
This allowed us to fly in low and largely unseen, gliding deep below the water’s surface.
I kept my eyes forward—on the narrow tunnel that would lead us straight into the heart of the Dream Realm. To Evernight.
To look anywhere else would be our downfall.
“Whatever you do, wherever you choose to place your gaze, do not look into the water. You will not forget what you see,” Xander had warned us. “Do not heed the dream sea’s call. It is malevolent.”
The Nocturne I’d witnessed in past dreams was bright and unfathomably splendid, a living orchestra of humanity’s dreams. Spontaneous, untamed, and magnificently layered. It had once called to me as if it knew my fate and wished to endow me with wisdom and life.
If only—if only—I’d accepted its embrace.
But now the Nocturne was dead. Its pull was lethal, its call a deep, rumbling howl.
I flew through the center channel, one-seventh of the Shadow Legion flying just ahead of me.
Somnus’s legionnaires, powerful apparitions of his own mind, led the charge in this channel, ready to coax Evernight’s demons into battle.
Our plan was deceptively simple: Lure the demons into the seven open channels and fight them with the Weavers’ apparition legionnaires.
Once the demons were adequately divided, the Weavers would unite their magic to return the Nocturne to its resting state.
The channels would immediately flood with its stained waters, creating an inescapable seal over the demons.
And while the apparition legionnaires fought the demons, the Shadow Legion alone would encroach on Evernight, attacking from all seven channels.
Sorren and Ceveon would help me lead our legionnaires into battle, fighting Raelion—and perhaps Mithras, too—with our combined might.
And when Raelion was either subdued or killed and Evernight reclaimed, we’d begin our restoration of the Nocturne back to its former glory.
Into what it was created to be: humanity’s Maker-given sea of dreams.
And with that, the Dream Realm would be healed.
Corruption would at last be ended, drawn out by the united powers of the Weavers and the threads of darkness that only Erebus and I—as well as our Shadow Legion—could manipulate.
Erebus.
Without another thought, I slammed his name back into the depths of my chest. I needed to stick with the lie I’d told the Weavers: Erebus remained behind to guard our domain as a safeguard. I couldn’t dwell on reality. Couldn’t linger on the sorrow that would surely drown me. Not now.
I must feel nothing but power and rage.
“Keep your eyes ahead!” I roared, willing my voice to reach every legionnaire. “Ignore the Nocturne’s pull! Eyes forward!”
The Nocturne, as if it could feel our growing unease, stretched higher around us, looming overhead like a sentient wall of dirt intent on burying us alive.
A quick glance made me physically recoil—there were things in the water.
Dark, writhing shapes. Bright eyes. Impossibly large limbs.
But the most terrifying thing was the vast rumble of its hunger.
“Eerie, is it not?” Somnus asked, gliding next to me with skeletal wings. I wasn’t sure how they helped him fly, exactly, but they suited him. His long black hair flowed behind him in an elegant line, somehow not getting tangled despite the pace of our movements. “Such an unnatural phenomenon.”
“It’s a monstrosity,” I agreed, shuddering as phantom fingers hooked underneath my jaw. “We’ll find a way to cure it.”
I’m watching you, the Nocturne seemed to rumble. Won’t you watch me back?
“We don’t have a choice. If we lose the Nocturne, we lose everything.
” Somnus flexed his pale hands, gritted his teeth.
I’d never seen him so ruffled. Perhaps the Nocturne was taunting him, too.
“This moment is what you were born for, Esmer. To transform the most tenebrous corners of our Realm into something worthy of beholding. To take what is fractured and give it new life.”
The Nocturne pressed in, narrowing the channel.
What had once been a route the width of a large river was now scarcely wider than a narrow dirt path.
I tucked my wings in, flinching when some feathers scraped the edge of the murky water.
Touching the Nocturne felt like touching death, a cold corpse eager to grab hold with long, flesh-eaten fingers.
“Infernal”—Somnus made a sound of discomfort, a single bead of sweat dripping down his nose—“nuisance.”
With his effort, the channel widened again. It took the Weavers nearly all their combined strength to manipulate the Nocturne. My power, on the other hand, would remain concealed until the Shadow Legion was ready to strike.
“If only Erebus were here. A pity he would miss a pivotal orchestration such as this.”
“You already know why he stayed behind,” I said, frustration creeping into my voice. The Weavers had heard my explanation before we departed, and none had questioned it then. So why was he bringing it up now? “If I don’t return—if I somehow die—he will still have a chance. We can’t both go down.”
“Your web of half-truths does not ensnare me,” Somnus said coolly, rolling to deftly avoid a tendril of poisonous water as it spewed from the wall to our right.
“Erebus is hardly a gentleman, but he is not one to leave you to the wolves in his stead. Though the other Weavers were quick to believe it.”
A hard lump formed in my throat, but I shoved it down. Of course Erebus would never have left me to the wolves in his stead.
“I can sense him slumbering,” Somnus continued, flying so that he was just in front of me.
If I reached out, I would be able to touch his silky hair.
Or grab one of the bones encasing his garments.
He wore a viciously beautiful set of bone armor, appearing every bit an immortal dream god heading to war.
“I do not know what causes him to sleep, but he is not dead,” he added gently, giving me a meaningful look. “In case you were concerned, that is.”
A weight shifted from my chest.
“Thank you,” I said quietly. “I was. Concerned, that is.”
Somnus’s gaunt face, elegant in its sharp angles and uncanny beauty, twisted into the softest smile I’d ever seen him give.
The lump in my throat dissolved, healed by Somnus’s show of support.
“You needn’t thank me. I should be thanking you.
I knew from the moment I met you that you and Erebus would change the world.
I only hope that one day you can see the Dream Realm as it was designed to be. ”
Citadel Evernight, encased in a roiling cloud of bitter darkness, began to rise like a mountain from the horizon.
Within minutes, it was looming over us, impossibly vast. The darkness that surrounded it was like a brutal storm coming to life, taller and wider than what should have been conceivable.
I was an insect staring up at a tree; a mouse beneath a hawk as it circled the skies.
Evernight’s spires broke free from the darkness at sporadic intervals, and it was clear the citadel was no longer the grand, fantastical structure I remembered from my dreams. Its spires looked like a malady of horns, its glass gleaming a bloody red.
Demons could be heard screeching from its grounds, their cries echoing across the channel in a haunting chorus.
Ahead of me, Somnus’s legionnaires did not so much as flinch.
His phantom legionnaires numbered one thousand—his very will come to life.
They would not falter. My group of legionnaires, one hundred strong and flying just behind Somnus’s, were emboldened by their unwavering courage.
My dreamers didn’t know Somnus’s warriors were mere apparitions; I didn’t have the heart to tell them.
Let them have courage. Let them have strength.
Maker, they’d need them.
Because if what happened back in our domain was any indication, a death by demon meant a death forever. I only hoped it also meant their soul immediately ascended to be with the Maker and was not trapped in the Beyond. The latter was an unimaginable fate, and one I couldn’t linger on.
Suddenly, through all seven channels, I sensed a few dreamers hesitating.
It was like a crack in the foundation of a fortress. I couldn’t allow it. Not now.
Desperately, I sent a collective message through to their minds, speaking to them directly as I’d done before.
“You are dreamers. You wield the impossible. You stand in the face of nightmares and do not yield. Do not fear the dark—it is ours to command. It is ours to become.”
I scrambled to think of something else that would rally them.
A quote, a story, a declaration.
I remembered the haunting melody sung by the Light Legion.
Beware, the Shadow Bringer comes. I had felt alone, terribly alone, while I shivered by their fire on the way to the Tomb of the Devourer.
It was a song meant to tell of the Shadow Bringer’s darkness, encouraging listeners to be unafraid.
But now we were the shadows to be feared.
And if we were the shadows—if we had waded in the darkness and emerged victorious—then we had no reason to fear the evil ahead.
And it seemed only fitting to repurpose this song as a warning against the true enemies we faced.
Raelion and Mithras.
I urged the final words forth, screaming with a conviction they couldn’t deny.
“We fear not shadow nor the night!”
One voice answered, then another. Soon, the words spread like wildfire, roaring through our ranks.
“We fear not shadow nor the night! We fear not shadow nor the night!”
The chant became a war cry, surging forward as magic crackled in the air.
And then the battle began.
“Demons,” Somnus snarled, pulling his blade from its invisible sheath within his hair.