24
Erebus scoffed, looking righteously offended.
“What a fool. We are absolutely leaving this room.” He leaned against the wall, his tall frame shrouded in the deep folds of his cloak. The candelabras caught the sharp angles of his face, casting shadows across his pale skin. “I’ve broken out of doors twice this size.”
The bravado in his tone only stoked my frustration. “So, what do you propose we do? Waltz out of here and take on the entire Light Legion by ourselves?”
Erebus pushed away from the wall, his movements slow and deliberate like a predator biding its time. His presence filled the room, shadows deepening around him as he stepped closer to me.
“No. We start with what’s missing.”
I frowned, my frustration giving way to confusion. “And what’s that?”
“The Weaver tombs. You heard Silas—and you’ve seen this place.
Every inch of it screams overindulgence and excess.
And yet they keep their sacred dead locked away.
Sealed. Forgotten.” He crossed his arms. “I lived in this citadel when I was the king’s chosen dream interpreter. We can use that to our advantage.”
“Do you still remember where the tombs are?” I asked, my earlier frustration tempered by the gravity of his words.
Erebus inclined his head slightly. “I think I remember the way. It’s been centuries and the paths may not be the same, but it’s worth the search if we can find the other Weavers.”
“What happens when we wake them?”
My stomach twisted. The last time I’d seen the Seven, they were cursing my name.
“I don’t know,” he answered seriously. “They might not even wake. There’s a very real possibility they are already dead.
” For a moment, something like sorrow flitted over his features.
“I used to hate the Weavers more than I hated being imprisoned in my own castle. I wanted them to die for what they did to me.” He looked out the nearest window, reminiscing on a centuries-old memory. “But so much has changed since then.”
I joined him at the window, marveling at what I saw.
The sea.
Water stretched beyond the castle walls as far as the eye could see, glimmering faintly as the sun dipped low in the west. The landscape was a velvety blend of shadows and deep blue hues, the last remnants of daylight scarcely touching the water’s surface.
In the distance, the sea appeared to merge with the sky, an unbroken line where the two vanished into something unknowable. Something new.
It felt like an omen.
A good one, just for us.
“Then let’s go and save them. Or try, at least,” I said, tears biting at the corners of my eyes. This was it. This was the final push before the end. “I—”
The claws around my neck suddenly tightened, sharp and unrelenting.
I hissed in distress, knees buckling. It wasn’t just physical pain; it was a reminder that Raelion was watching.
That I was his. My fingers grasped at my throat out of instinct, even though I knew there was nothing I could tear free.
“Breathe,” Erebus urged, not a command but a helpless plea. He placed his hands over the marks, as if he could pull them from my skin by sheer force of will. “Breathe, Esmer.”
“It’s Raelion,” I choked out, the words scraping my throat. “He’s—”
In another breath, the pressure was gone.
I collapsed into Erebus’s arms, gasping.
To be marked as Corrupt after everything I’d been through was a twisted joke.
How long before I turned into one of the creatures we’d battled at the village?
How long before it twisted inside me, tempting my cruelest instincts?
Before I looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize what stared back?
Panic rippled through me, sharp and fierce. Eden had thieved; she had eaten a rat. Our village blacksmith had bludgeoned his friend to death. Mother had shoved a blanket into Elliot’s mouth, trying to suffocate him. My father had conspired against his king. What atrocities would I be capable of?
Erebus urged me to look at him, but I couldn’t bear it.
“I won’t let him take you.” His words trembled with anger, spoken like a vow. His fingers lingered near my collarbone, as he palmed Raelion’s mark. “When we destroy Raelion, this will be destroyed, too. I swear it.”
I laughed, tears welling in my eyes. “People don’t get cured from Corruption, Erebus. They die.”
Erebus’s eyes met mine, blazing with an intensity that stole my breath.
“You’re not lost, Esmer.” Softly, so tenderly it hurt, his fingers brushed back my hair.
I leaned into his touch, desperate to believe him.
“Not now. Not ever. The shadows yield to you; the stars fall short of your light. You are the force that darkness cannot break—the hope Mithras and Raelion never saw coming. We will find a way.”
Somewhere in the depths of my despair, his words reached the part of me still desperate to fight, still desperate to hope. But Raelion was there, too, whispering his promises, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was already too late for me.
The citadel was a labyrinth at night, its halls twisting and turning like the coils of some great serpent.
The embellishments that adorned every surface seemed to glow faintly in the dim light, but there was something unnerving about their sheen.
The gold’s radiance pulsated faintly, as if the walls were breathing.
Odd.
I followed close behind Erebus, my hand never straying far from the hilt of my dagger. Every creak, every footfall, and every murmur from distant corridors set my nerves on edge.
The final hallway felt different from the rest of the citadel.
Golden decor gave way to stone walls slick with condensation.
The hall looked forgotten, untouched by the gaudy splendor behind us.
Even the torches here were fewer and farther between, flames weak and sputtering as they cast feeble light against the rough stone.
At the end of the corridor stood a heavy curtain, its surface dull and ragged.
Erebus drew his sword.
“This is it,” he said, voice low. “The entrance to the tombs.”
“The curtain?” I asked, my voice breaking the uneasy silence. “Why is no one guarding it?”
Erebus approached the wall of fabric, yanking it aside. A thick cloud of dust immediately plumed around us, making us cough. When the dust finally settled, twin iron doors were revealed. They were carved with seven animals: a wolf, a dragon, a stag, a bear, a hawk, and two serpents.
“I don’t know why it’s not being guarded. Or why it’s so dusty,” he murmured, fingers ghosting across the carvings. “When I lived here, the Weaver tombs were always heavily protected. And this…” He trailed off, fingers pausing on a deep groove in the stone. “Was deliberately sealed.”
“Can you open it?”
Erebus crouched, inspecting the base of the doors. I knelt beside him, my hands running over the iron. There were seven beasts in total; perhaps they each symbolized a Weaver.
“Here,” Erebus said, resting his hand on a faint indentation. “This is the locking mechanism. Some force should break it.”
We worked to unseal the door, our combined efforts causing the apparatus to shift.
The stone groaned loudly as it moved, the sound reverberating through the narrow hallway like a warning.
My arms ached from the effort, but finally, the door slid aside with a grinding roar that seemed loud enough to wake the dead.
Pulling the curtain back in place, we swiftly stepped inside.
The narrow staircase beyond was darker than the hallway behind us.
The shadows here were deeper, almost teeming with life.
Still, they would not heed my call. Erebus led the way, his movements cautious and deliberate, and I followed close behind, my hand brushing the damp stone wall for balance.
The air grew even colder as we descended the staircase, the chill seeping through my clothes and biting into my skin.
The faint sound of dripping water echoed somewhere in the distance, but otherwise, the silence was absolute.
When we reached the bottom, the passage opened into what should have been a cavernous chamber.
Instead, the path ahead was blocked by a massive cave-in, jagged rocks piled high and dust coating every surface.
I gasped as my toe knocked into something metal: a helmet.
When I looked more carefully at the rocks, my breath snagged, shallow and uneven. Bones.
There were bones everywhere.
Skeletons and the remnants of armor lay scattered across the floor.
Erebus approached the rubble, picking up a metal circlet that had been wedged among a rock, a skeletal arm, and a cracked pauldron. The item was ancient and damaged, but its base still shone a brilliant gold. Erebus dusted it off, peering at an inscription in the metal.
“What does it say?” I asked, growing more uneasy by the second.
“It says, ‘eternal as the dream, enduring as the crown,’” he said slowly. “It’s a crown.”
Suddenly, as if it had bitten him, Erebus dropped it. The crown clanged against the ground, rolling into the shadows. Deep within me, somewhere in the back of my skull, I thought I heard Raelion laugh.
I shuddered, squeezing my arms to my chest.
“It’s King Gabriel’s. Mithras’s father,” Erebus said incredulously, raking his fingers through his hair.
Bits of Corrupt blood was still clinging to it.
“My parents and I once interpreted his dreams.” He knelt by King Gabriel’s broken pauldron, examining the lion and sun emblazoned into the golden metal.
His thumb tentatively traced the sun’s numerous rays.
“I wonder if Mithras even knows he’s down here. ”