Chapter 57
Alistair Raven
“Run, Rhoswen!”
She needed to flee. I needed her to live another day. Nothing mattered about secrets or lies—not with her. The cryptic promises and broken truths were constant, always. Always aching, always hurting, and always leading me back to her.
I needed her to dawn tomorrow. I needed her.
“Run!” I shouted again, the word tearing up my throat, but it fell on the deaf.
Rhoswen didn’t listen, didn’t move. No, she couldn’t. Not as this damn Bloodletter swung his warhammer in calls for blood.
A growl, and the Bloodletter charged at her like a beast.
My blood was battering in my ears. There were two points here—the Bloodletter and Rhoswen, divided by nothing. Carnage was closing in with a hammer already slick with the kill. Anger scorched my chest, but there was something darker beneath it—fear. Fear that Rhoswen might fall.
I ripped my feet from the ground and ran. The Bloodletter was advancing to my right, Rhoswen was before me, and I sprinted to stand between the two points. To be a barrier between Carnage’s beast and the white rose.
This Bloodletter would not strike her. He would not lay a hand on her. Not while I still lived. But, gods, I knew—a man surrendered to Carnage was not one to stand against.
The Bloodletter snarled like an animal. Distance was closing. Time was a violent current, screaming at me. I landed the final step, my feet hitting the ground before Rhoswen, and I lifted her face.
Our eyes met—those rich eyes that held the strangest collision of burning conviction and unending reserves. Rhoswen hadn’t let me in. She hadn’t trusted me. As we stood at the precipice, I wanted to grab her, tear us into the past, and reshape it. I wanted to tell her everything I hadn’t.
“Rhoswen, leave.” I searched her eyes and held her face tighter—tried to break her paralysis—but she didn’t move. “Now!”
I shoved her back. Dammit, anything to get her away.
Nothing.
I shoved her again. Still, nothing. Her gaze pulled towards Carnage. Steps gained, the heavy feet struck behind. Every second, he was three steps closer. I ripped my eyes from Rhoswen to face the beast. Even turning from her clawed at me inside. Rhoswen was my torment—the buried pain that reminded me we lived in the darkest of days, but there was still a light to grasp.
For her, I wanted to be that light.
“Alistair—” Rhoswen drowned me in her voice, suffocating me with my own name.
“Leave, Rhoswen.” I hardened my stance with a drawn blade.
The Bloodletter was closing in, his heavy build getting larger by the second. His feet tore at the ground. His hammer was just shy of my height.
Three of the king’s men charged into view. The fools raised arms against death itself.
It was a sick show—the Bloodletter shattering and tearing limbs. They were dead in an instant. Even the one who laid down arms and ran like a coward had met his grave. This courtyard was a gravesite.
The Bloodletter pressed his bloodied palm against his forehead, staining his skin and marking himself victorious.
I did not let any trepidations stake a claim in me. I had to think. Strength was on the side of the Bloodletter, I had no doubt. I’d seen him rip apart countless others without a moment of weakness. That was the magic of Carnage—spilled blood meant ample vitality, and wisdom was the price. It was evident in this damn Bloodletter. He was uncontrolled. A wild dog without a leash.
Sands, I didn’t know how much more magic I could use without notice. I was teasing fate, using these gifts in King Paden’s house.
“It seems your lord will die this day, Rhoswen,” the Bloodletter taunted.
“Do you forget? His fate has been sealed in the tomes of the gods. You cannot save him.”
Save me?
Forget me, Alistair, Rhoswen had said this night. I was not sure what hid beneath her eyes, her words, in that moment, but it led us to this place—where the tense grip around my hilt would need to be enough against the God of Carnage.
The Bloodletter swung his hammer and raced to us. I was going to kill him. I—
“I-I’m sorry, I—” Her voice… The sound of it gave me my first easy breath.
The god server shouted, but I shut him out.
I listened for Rhoswen’s voice one last time. And, it came.
“I was only trying to protect you,” she hushed, and her words were strength in me.
The Bloodletter gained speed—eyes on Rhoswen.
“Rhoswen,” I said to my back.
“Please. Leave.”
I swallowed the impulse that begged me to turn to her. To see the depths in her eyes of amber and dusk, darkened by secrets. To memorize her soft lips, deceiving me into believing she was gentle in her bite. And, as my blade’s hilt sored my grasp, I hungered for her smooth skin beneath my hands. I wanted to rid us of this place and locked ourselves away while the realm burned around us. We would remain untouched, divided by a single door.
Shadows and gods forgotten, Rhoswen and I would share our haven.
Even if only for a night.
At my back, Rhoswen remained still, perhaps speaking her goodbyes on a still tongue. I couldn’t blame her. A man against Carnage, the odds were desperate, but Rhoswen had yet to know—
I was not only of man.
Stones scraped at my back. Finally, paralysis broke. Rhoswen ran, giving me a shred of relief despite the beast stalking ahead. Feet planted on the cobblestones, I looked over my shoulder to see her go. To see her to safety. And she looked back at me.
Time edged slowly, watching her take flight. Rich hair draped her back, tangling into a beautiful mess. Her gown painted the battle in a shred of pure ivory, covering her in blood and grace. I never looked at her and saw a fallen white rose. She was something pure—a pureness, suffering in the dark arts of Andrael.
I dragged my sight towards Carnage.
The Bloodletter’s eyes darted between me and Rhoswen’s retreating form. I did not hesitate. Heaving a ragged breath, I tasted the iron of my own adrenaline and launched myself to him. I sprinted with rage coiling my fists. Every muscle screamed.
Feet thrashing the ground, palms throbbing at the hilt, I summoned the strength, the magic, of those who came before me.
The courtyard became sparks of silver embers in my eyes, one path of light following another. The magic stung my veins, igniting my blood and hardening my strength. Vision as clear as glass, I saw all. Not only the carnage ensuing, but also the bodies deprived of breath. The light was weak on them, nearly gone. But the Bloodletter—the life he wielded, the magic he bore—was blinding.
The distance between us was closing.
My black eyes had lit in magic, I knew, but the Bloodletter either did not care or did not notice. He lifted his hammer and gnashed. Nothing shined against the steel of his hammer, and nothing could. Not when it had reaped so much death, harvesting souls, coated in blood.
I held to my blade. He expected me to attack head-on—his swing was aimed straight—so I pivoted right. Dammit, he was strong. He roared a breath, angled his hammer at me, and shot it down towards my skull. I bent backwards until my shins and back met the ground, grazing stones. I slid beneath his strike.
Before the hammer could make my head a mess of red, I came out the other side, shot up, and carved my blade up the Bloodletter’s back. My sword against this beast, it was as though the steel had gone dull.
Blood leached where my blade cut, but it wasn’t enough.
The Bloodletter wailed to his god, and his hammer struck the air. Veins near bursting, the Bloodletter flexed each muscle that covered him. Protected him.
My strike had only deepened Carnage’s wrath.
In a vicious battle cry, the Bloodletter’s red eyes marked me.
“Fuck.”
The hammer chased my voice, coming downward.
I stripped from my shadow, hurling to my side, and the hammer grazed the current of air I left behind. I slung back my arm, shoulders and back tensing, and threw my sword at his chest. The Bloodletter lunged back, his feet jarring the courtyard, and raised his hammer towards the bloodmoon.
I could not stop. If I did, I’d be dead.
The hammer came down.
Carnage did not waver. Not for a second, not for a breath. Again and again, the Bloodletter’s hammer hounded me, chomped at me. Forged in steel from head to end, I could not break the handle. Anytime my sword caught his hammer, the impact only rang in my body and ears.
The Bloodletter swung diagonally. I leaped back and hollowed my chest. He missed, roared, and drove one skull-crushing hand towards my arm.
He was unpredictable. My thoughts snagged against my bones, leaving me practically still. I dropped down and scooped my spine, my sword following. He almost got me. I almost became like the rest who stood against Carnage.
I stayed low. The Bloodletter left himself exposed, with his arms raised. My sword cut along his stomach, leaving behind the aftermath of steel on skin. Finally. Blood. When I began to straighten, as I turned to face him, knuckles struck my back. It was like his gauntlet had been sharpened at the fist, rigid and piercing.
Air was struck from my lungs.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
The hammer’s handle followed his knuckles, colliding with my spine, knocking me to the ground. Hand hitting the stone, my sword fell from my grip. Blood splattered onto the stones. I tasted the blood from the corners of my mouth and coughed it out before it could choke me.
“All you lords are the same.” The curse resounded above me. A curse I had been told my whole life.
“You all act the same and scheme the same while worshiping your Shadows.” The Bloodletter paused as I coughed up more blood.
I looked out past the gate.
Rhoswen was a silhouette in the dying torchlight. She escaped past the final clearing. I felt her absence, the distant, in that moment. I wanted to hold her as I did last night and let us forget these plagued lands. But she was gone. Gone from me and closer to safety. I was relieved.
If she saw my grin now, her eyes would be drawn to my dimple—they always were. Soft red would touch her cheeks, and her eyes would soften to me—they always did.
“And guess what, Raven.” Carnage’s boot pressed against my spine, my ribs crushing against the stones.
“You all fucking grovel the same, bleed the same, and die the same.”
Perhaps all lords believed they were matchless and rare, and perhaps I was like all the rest in believing I was not the same. Though the Bloodletter was right. We all bled the same, but I would not die the same. I would not die. Not today.
As I summoned the string of light within, I knew—
I was matchless.
I bade the powers of my people, and the blood of my ancestors burned in me.
In my eyes, all the debris kindled around me. Sparks were like lightning, channeling from the trees to the dead to the breaths that still wafted into the night. Arrows cut through the air, their paths illuminated by threads of light. The same shifted in the ground and seeped into my palms.
The energy, the vitality, the magic, crept into me.
The Bloodletter lifted arms, his muscles creaking.
“Your death might not quench my thirst for blood,” he hushed.
“But I will relish this. And then, Rhoswen is next.”
Ire was my fuel.
My palms burned.
The Bloodletter’s boot was hard against my back, so I stole Carnage’s strength. It was mighty, far more than any other man I’d stood against. This strength was built in retribution.
The hammer came down.
In a thrash, my arms were bound in faithful strength. I rose, elbows straightening, and the crazed man at my back was thrown from his pedestal. I claimed my blade and speared it at the Bloodletter.
Mouth slacked, eyes dumbfounded, the Bloodletter marked me.
He gazed at the flare—the light in my eyes.
Furry was in his yell.
“You will die!”
The Bloodletter charged for me. I held myself steady and counted down the time until he’d break me in two. Four, three, two—
I scraped past his hammer and sliced his shoulder. His blood spilled. Sharing space, I followed to his back, my blade racing to his neck.
Carnage had foreseen this.
The Bloodletter wailed his elbow back, clouting my ribs, cracking my bones. I grabbed his arm before he could pivot and ripped it farther than natural. With a crack, the bone dislocated. The Bloodletter cried, near shattering my ears. He wound to face me, veins pounding above his brow, and set distance.
A growl rumbled in him. His hammer swung loosely from his dangling arm.
My smirk was intentional.
Lifting his hand, the Bloodletter clasped his lax arm, rolled his shoulder, and cracked it into place with a grunt.
We stood opposed.
I had staggered him—heavy breaths, furrowed brow, white knuckles. He measured me with flaring nostrils, but no amount of appraising could help him understand. This magic was not practiced in Andrael—King Paden had made sure of that.
This time, I charged.
Rather than the hammerhead, the Bloodletter flung the handle’s end towards my chest. I dodged and swung my sword, but my blade only snagged the tears of his shirt.
“You cannot win this!” There was an edge of worry in his voice. Wisdom was still absent. If he were wise, he’d walk away.
“You will die, and you can find your damn dame in Oldurem.”
I swung again, steel colliding with steel. He fumbled back, rattled by the impact. My feet scraped against the ground, and I lunged forward before he could hold himself steady.
Strike after strike, we were two blurring figures. As I continued to lay marks in his skin and evade his death-strikes, his eyes were widening like the bloodmoon above us. The trench of his brows was heightened, and sweat was beading down his face.
The Bloodletter lunged backward with heavy breaths.
“What is this?” He hissed.
“What work of the Shadows bears light?”
“You do not know what you do not understand.” I licked the blood from my lips.
“Your eyes are blinded by blood, while I see through the darkness. You will fail, Bloodletter.”
In our shared rage, the Bloodletter’s laughter coiled from his chest.
“You stand before Carnage and Wisdom for her? Did you know Rhoswen serves the gods, Raven? At least she did.” He shrugged.
“I do not know what will become of her now that she has betrayed her god.” He taunted, “And did you know she was sent to kill you, or were you too blinded by the Shadows to notice?”
I knew, but… I also knew she wouldn’t.
“You are damned, Alistair Raven. You cannot change your fate. You will find yourself drowning in the sands.”
My jaw barred tight.
I had grown tired through the years. Everyone telling me what fate I belonged to, what burden I was to uphold. This anger was mature, and it festered when others spoke of my destiny. I hadn’t asked to be marked by Shadows. I hadn’t asked to be the son of my father. And Andrael believed I had accepted this, too—the blood of man and darkness.
Click, click, click.
It echoed inside myself—that damn clicking, resurrected. I silenced it with a steady breath, tightening the casing I had trapped it in, and honed my attention to the Bloodletter. I wanted to snap his neck. To break my fist on his face.
The ends of his mouth twisted. He got under my skin, and we both knew it.
The Bloodletter pointed his hammer towards me.
“When I’m done bashing your fucking head into mush—” He redirected his hammer towards the gate.
“I’m going after Rhoswen, and you too can live your ever-after in Oldurem.”
My jaw locked.
“You will not touch her.”
His hammer whirled in the air and settled on his shoulder.
“Willing to bet your life on it?”
A fire shot through me. This wasn’t about me. This wasn’t about the Shadows or gods or the war between. It was about her. This was about Rhoswen living beyond the crimson moon.
His eyes narrowed.
“Make your move, Raven.”
Carnage crawled beneath my skin—the Bloodletter was there, and I took the bait.
My eyes and blood burned in the blaze of magic.
Shadows dissolved. I charged forward.
With speed, I struck, evaded, and sliced. This Bloodletter was influenced by Carnage for years, but I… I was the consequence of centuries. I was houses and families rising up from raids and conquest, Light and Sentient. Victory was attached to my people, and it would not end here.
Lacerations covered the Bloodletter. I crashed my pummel into his face. His jaw cracked, and his mouth slacked. His eyes grew wider.
The Bloodletter lifted his arm, and I lifted mine. I cut my blade along his ribs. The Bloodletter winced and hunched forward, and I rammed my boot into his stomach. He fell back, colliding with the ground. He set his hands on the stones beneath and heaved himself up. Before he could stand, I kneed his face, and he toppled again.
The Bloodletter held his bleeding ribs, watching the blood drip to the ground.
“What are you?” He asked.
“Your death.” I pulled back my sword, ready to taste victory.
The Bloodletter laughed again, blood spattering with his spit. His bruised knuckles lifted to his mouth, smearing away the blood.
“No, Raven.” He raised his red eyes to me.
“Not this day.”
The Bloodletter lunged to his feet and tore me from the ground at the chest. Air left me, and the stones were hard on my back. It was agonizing, my head, spine, and ribs colliding with the ground. I fought my spiraling head and looked out to see him—perhaps to see my last sight before the sands, but—
He was gone.
Wait, where is he? I stood to my feet and ignored the internal clicking. Where is—No.
He ran past the gate, charging into the city. Following Rhoswen’s shadow.
“Bloodletter!” I yelled for him, the depths of myself ripping in two. I ran with all I was, not looking back.
Rhoswen was out there.
Carnage was at her back.
…
The market stalls were thrown into shambles. At Sariem’s gate, bodies were torn limb from limb—the tell that a Bloodletter had been by. And, through all of this, I did not see Rhoswen, which meant there was still hope.
The gates were open.
Guards merely stood on the battlement. Arrows had rained from above and punctured the ground. But now, there was an odd stillness over this place.
The air smelled sour.
Men and women fled the City of the King, and the guards did nothing. A city in confinement, Paden’s men simply let them leave.
If Rhoswen was wise—and she was—she’d have left, but I couldn’t gamble on hope. I sprinted towards the stables, only able to hear my pounding heart. I threw a man from his horse and vaulted his steed. He yelled curses over me, but I was already gone.
I was thrown into the valley with panic and speed.
Hold on, Rhoswen. Hold on.
The valleys opened up from all directions. I did not know which way to turn. The hills were a wash of faint crimson, and the wood beyond was a myriad of black stalks. I yanked on the reins, turning circles, wondering if I should go back into the city. Search taverns, follow the streets.
Then, I stopped.
There was something. Something unlike anything I’d experienced before. A pull. It was not the magic I knew, nor the Shadow. The Shadow writhed inside, trying to get out, as though it sensed the draw as well.
This lure was distant. But as I continued to listen, it became harsh, like claws trying to scrape into my skull. My eyes were drawn to the edge of the woods, and my heart’s purpose followed. Without other direction, I listened to the unknown string that urged me on.
Nearer to the wood, blurs became shapes—two horses and their riders. The string tightened, my chest nearly heaving me forward. I went to turned, to see anyone else near, but I couldn’t. My eyes were fixed.
A dagger caught the bloodmoon’s reflection and slid against the other’s neck.
My chest tightened. I didn’t know why I was compelled to this place, but there was only one I searched for. I feared that who I sought and where I was being called to were one and the same.
The rider, cut by steel, fell off the saddle.
A river of hair flowed in the air, and she collided with the ground.
Rhoswen.
“No.” It couldn’t be. I couldn’t have failed.
“Go!” I yelled at the steed with a hard kick, and it neighed and obeyed my commands.
As I neared, what was unveiled before me, I was not expecting.
It was me.
Click, click, click. It tapped at my unease and nearly got out.
This person—this person with my face—they tensed at the sight of me. Four long cuts carved from cheekbone to jaw, this being the only distinction between us.
Then, I looked at the ground. I looked at the fallen. There, in the dirt and blood, was the rose of white.
Her name ripped up my throat. I leaped from the horse.
On my knees, I cradled her face, so soft and warm. Her eyes were closed and her lips loose. I brought her to me, held her in my arms, and searched her face for signs of life. My hands… they were covered in blood. Her blood.
I set my hand before her lips to feel her breath. The weakest air met my skin, and relief could only go so far. Each second, she was losing more blood. Her breaths were thin.
“Rhoswen?” I hunched over her and wiped the hair from her face. Everywhere I touched, her fair skin was coated with her blood on my hands.
“You did this to her, Alistair,” my own voice said from behind me.
“Stay with me,” I pleaded.
“Do not leave me.” There was nothing else—only me and Rhoswen and the blood pooling beneath us. My throat tightened until it hurt. I choked, as though dark hands of battle strangled my heart.
“Raven,” another said, but it was not a voice I owned, nor one that had been stolen from me.
It came from Rhoswen. Something crept from behind her. Ten fingers, wrapped in dead skin, reached out from beneath her hair and tightened around her throat. I leaned back—not from her, but from the old hands materializing from nothing.
“I will keep her alive,” it said, sounding as though it sulked from the darkest depths. Rhoswen’s lips moved with each word.
I was struck with confusion. Andrael was devastated by mysteries, but this… This was strange.
“What—?”
“Do not question me!” It broke my words.
“Take care of the man who attempts to take her life. I will keep her alive.”
I had no reason to believe it and yet, I did. I set Rhoswen down gently, letting the ground and arcane hands keep her.
Before I stood, my sheathed blade rang in my ears, but not at my summons. The sharp point tapped my back exactly where the Bloodletter struck me with hammer and fist.
“You weren’t supposed to find her like this.” It was still my voice coming from their mouth.
Click, click, click.
I rose slowly, showing empty hands. I uttered to the masked.
“And I suppose I wasn’t supposed to find you like this either—wearing my face?”
“There are many things you do not see, Alistair. This was to be one of them.”
I turned to face them. To face the person who cut Rhoswen’s throat while wearing my skin. My anger was deep and sweltering. Heat burned beneath my eyes.
“And who is it I do not see now?” I asked, but I did not need to.
Their face was changing, their skin boiling. A fear stung their eyes, tightening the corners. I clenched the blade at my chest, my palm and fingers cutting in the sharp, and forced it away. They tried to move the blade, but I held it tight. As I stepped towards my own reflection, my blood was left on the steel, my hand gliding over the edges.
“Let go!” They choked.
I patiently ran my hand up the blade. When I came to the hilt, I showed them the darkness in my eyes—the enemy they created. A crack in form, a flaw of temper, they trembled and broke eye contact.
I knocked my elbow against their nose and twisted their wrist as I twisted the blade. Their grip weakened. They grunted, stumbled, and I tore my sword from their hand.
Face changing and boiling, they scowled. It was a scowl I’d known since childhood. His nose rounded, his hair grew, and his form shrank beneath me. Suddenly, I did not stand against myself. I stood against a monster hidden behind his mercenaries, contracts, and schemes.
“Lucien Brine.”
He cowered before me.
“What have you done?” I yelled, my blade carving against his neck, threatening the thinning line between life and death. I looked back at Rhoswen.
The hands held her neck. The blood loss had lessened.
My sword shifted at the other end. I threw my eyes back to Lucien, struck his stomach with my fist, and made him squirm where he stood.
“Why?” I clenched his hair and yanked back, so he was forced to look into my eyes.
“Why have you done this?” He did not speak, so I set my blade back against his neck. “Tell me now.”
Lucien’s wide eyes and quivering mouth turned into a glare, ruling his face, and his reserves fell.
“You were not destined to take claim over the western lands.” Again, man spoke of my fate, as though I had no say in it.
“Your father promised it to me! And you ruined the contract.”
A damn contract for Rhoswen’s life? Lucien Brine was going to die.
I cut a thin line at his neck. Blood dripped down.
The wrath in my inquisition echoed past the trees.
“Do you forget what days we live in? Do you forget that man is trapped within the war of their own doing? We stand in our tombs as Shadows poison our hearts!” Beneath the bloodmoon, rage was my master, and all I saw was red.
“This is inescapable, this war that threatens all of Andrael.” I sucked a breath. “And you seek land?”
“Did you know she serves the gods, Alistair? Did you know she is the reason your friend, Percival Calhourn, is dead? It is her damn people that tore down Lord Morrigan’s home!”
“Do you think I am a fool?” I gnashed.
He scoffed.
“You mean to tell me you knew?”
“You believe I would not know what happens in my lands? What happens in my allies’ homes?” I tightened my hand around the hilt.
“You believe there are many things I do not see, but you are wrong. I am the greatest lord in these lands, and I see far more than you could know.”
“You are no lord! You are a child.”
My teeth showed. Towering above him, I stalked closer.
“Most men grovel when they are against a blade.”
“I will not die today, Alistair. But you will.”
Steel sounded. Lucien’s dagger came for me.
I threw myself back, severing from Lucien, and I did to him what he did to Rhoswen—only, he had a dagger. I had a sword.
It was quick, painless, and far more forgiving than what he deserved.
One strike of silver steel, and Lucien froze, still as stone, except for the rush of blood from his neck.
I listened to him gargle. Life traded for defeat in his eyes.
Contracts, enforced and annulled. Mercenaries for hire. Limitless wealth. Webbs of schemes. None of it mattered. In the end, there was only one thing promised—the abundance of the Everlaides or the sands of Oldurem.
One could not have both, and one could take nothing with.
With a dying face, Lucien Brine’s head slipped from his neck. The sound of flesh and blood puddled and gurgled where his spine surrendered to steel. A wet slap hit the ground, and, with a last twitch of limbs, Lucien Brine collapsed to the ground, never to arise again.
“Raven,” the unknown voice called to me.
“She still crawls past the veil. You must save her.”
I turned to Rhoswen.
“The castle—”
“She cannot go back!” It exclaimed.
“I agree,” I uttered, trying to keep my patience intact with the thing keeping her alive.
“Rhoswen needs healing, and the potionmakers at the castle are inept. I need my potions at the estate.”
Her colorless lips resumed possession as it spoke.
“She will see the afterlife before we make it back to the estate. What magic do you wield?” The twisted hands tightened, and Rhoswen gasped a wet breath. She was slipping.
“Use your magic!”
My magic would not work. It was drawn from light, not life.
Click, click, click. The noise became violent. Listen, it said. As I looked at Rhoswen and the dark hand around her throat, I couldn’t keep the Shadow at bay. Lord of Ravens. I can save her.
Dammit, Shadow, silence! Crawl back into your hole.
So you will let her die? Poor, Alistair, always so helpless. Weak. Groveling for strength. But you needn’t. You have me.
“Raven,” Rhoswen’s pale lips flexed.
“What can you do?” The voice cracked, and I knew she was near her last breath.
What can you do? I dared ask the dark. It churned in its hole and crawled out. I let it crawl out, and my veins turned cold.
It slithered in my blood. What I can do, I cannot do alone. I require something.
I will not barter with dark magic.
Lord Alistair of the Ravens, I cannot save her without something I need.
Rhoswen choked another wet breath.
I had no choice. What is it you need, Shadow?
I require a thread of light.
Its words were a stake in my chest. The light, this light, was all I could hold onto. Everything else was taken from me.
The Shadow continued, With a dark charm, with a taste of what magic I own, we can save her. Together. It whispered, Come now, Alistair. You have not lost all. The Shadows have marked you, waiting for you to accept your fate. Meet your fate. Save her.
I had to save her.
In my dark blood, I cast a thin shard of silver light to the Shadow. The light was untouched, unspoiled, but the moment the shadow snagged it, the light corroded. Like a fire doused by rain, the light darkened in its hands, and I cannot say this gave me hope. It was sickening, but I was far more sickened seeing Rhoswen lay there.
The Shadow urged me forward, and I knelt beside her.
Reach out your hand, Lord of Ravens, it said, so I did.
The old, arcane hands released their grip from Rhoswen’s throat, giving me space. Black veins twisted on my wrist and on my palm. The strand of darklight was sharp beneath my skin, casting a black glow. My hand before Rhoswen, the darklight punctured from my palm and cracked in the distance between us. The Shadow gave a breath of pleasure, and its hand stretched into mine.
I had never let the dark touch the light—it never could. It would always flee, but now I gave it willingly. My hand was possessed, and the Shadow used this darklight to sew Rhoswen’s neck.
“That is not your magic, Raven!” Rhoswen cried with the unknown’s voice.
“What have you done? Where is the silver light?”
I bit.
“Do you want her alive, creature?”
It hissed at me, and the darkened thread punctured and pulled through Rhoswen’s skin, closing the wound. When the last of darklight wove into her neck, the Shadow laughed.
Well done, Raven, it said.
Dark magic abruptly slid out of Rhoswen’s neck, leaving her skin sewn, and pierced back into my hand. It was like a needle stabbing my palm and scraping beneath my skin. I knew what magic felt like, that of Shadows and light, and this was something else. The thread burrowed into me, swarming in the dark, and cradled next to the Shadow. I tried to take the dark strand back, but the Shadow held it tight.
No, no, Raven. This was my price.
But I did not know what this price would cost me.
“She still requires healing,” the voice said.
“Take her back to your estate.”
I looked at the ancient trees before me, surrounded by the dark. Rhoswen still bled, though far less.
“You will be sure to keep her alive through the night?” I asked.
She will live, the Shadow swore.
“You are not to question me, Raven!” The voice shouted.
“Whatever you are.” I crouched before Rhoswen, wiping the dark hairs from her pale face. The strange hands reemerged from beneath her hair and clasped around her neck.
“You will come to learn soon enough, Alistair Raven,” the voice promised.
“All secrets are revealed in time, and I believe I now know yours.” It forced a breath into her lungs—her chest rose. “Hurry.”
I could not name what this thing was—beast or creature or perhaps a spirit. But it guarded her. Protected her. We were not bound in trust, but we were bound in the shared purpose of keeping her safe.
I held Rhoswen in my arms. Setting her on the steed, I sat behind her, resting her against my chest. My feet kicked against the horse’s sides, and hooves trotted in the soil.
“Stay with me, Rhoswen,” I whispered in her ear. And, though the gods had not known me since the Shadows came to this realm, I prayed to them that she heard me.
The horse charged, and the three of us were swallowed by the dark of the wood.
Click, click, click. The Shadow lurked back into its hole with a portion of my magic in its hold. Your fate will unfold, Lord of Ravens. Lord of Shadows.