CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I didn't think I was going to die by a fucking Burrowwyrm.
Apparently, the Burrowwyrm had other plans.
My body screamed in protest as the wyrm's jagged, mineral-crusted hide scraped my skin, its violet crystals pulsing with a sickly, rhythmic light. Below me, the maw—a spinning grinder of endless, glinting teeth—lurched upward with a mechanical screech that shattered the silence of the woods.
Then, I saw a glint of steel.
A dagger flew with impossible speed, embedding itself deep into the side of the wyrm's skull. It howled, a shriek like stone grinding stone, and whipped its massive body in a blind fury. My head cracked against a tree trunk, white stars exploding behind my eyes as the world tilted.
Through the haze, I caught a flicker—silver eyes gleaming through the mist. Shadow tendrils burst from Asher, wrapping around the wyrm in a tightening, suffocating web of darkness.
Aether and Zya descended like twin storms. They landed on the wyrm's back, their claws digging deep into the crystalline hide.
It roared again, twisting violently beneath their assault.
Fire curled from Aether's ears, his celestial fur standing on end, while Zya's shadows flared wide, her predatory snarl echoing through our shared bond.
The wyrm turned its horrid, spinning maw toward Asher. Its throat bulged where the dagger was lodged—until the skin literally split.
Something smaller burst free.
A second wyrm—serpent-thin and lightning-fast, with violet scales and dagger-like teeth—launched from the main wyrm's throat and sank its fangs into Asher's shoulder.
His hiss of pain hit me before I even saw him stagger.
The bond flared.
Agony—not mine, but his—rushed through me. It was hot, sharp, and unbearable. My magic snapped free, instinctive and wild. Fire exploded from my skin, searing the air in every direction and lighting up the silver mist.
Thank the gods my fire worked. I'd been terrified my magic would be too unstable out here, dampened by the poison of the Veylaith, but it had answered my call with a roar.
Maybe we were still close enough to the Ring for the Monoliths to anchor me.
Or maybe, looking at the blood on Asher's shirt, the bond simply didn't care about the rules of the forest.
The main wyrm shrieked as the heat scorched its sensory slits and finally released its grip on my ankle.
I fell—fast.
Ten feet of empty air. But the shadows caught me. A blanket of cool night cradled my fall, and suddenly I was in Asher's arms. His breathing was ragged, his chest heaving against mine.
His shoulder bled where the viper-thing had struck, the dark stain spreading across his clothes. My vision swam and the earth tilted, but I was safe.
I watched, barely conscious, as the injured wyrm thrashed and burrowed back into the soil, vanishing with a sickening crack of stone and dirt.
"Darling." Asher's voice was hoarse in my ear. His hand found mine, guiding it to the center of his chest. His silver eyes—bright, intense, and clouded with worry—searched mine.
Through the bond, his pain was blistering, a raw thrumming in my own shoulder. But he pushed it down—forced it into the depths for me.
"I'm fine," I whispered. It was a lie. My body trembled uncontrollably in his arms.
"Are you okay, Flame One?" Aether's voice thrummed through the bond, sharp with a protective concern that made my heart ache.
"I'm fine," I told them all, my voice stronger this time. "Just seeing stars."
Asher's arms didn't leave me, not right away. He studied every inch of my face, his thumb tracing my jaw until I managed a small, reassuring nod. He smiled then—not a smirk, but something genuine and soft.
Gods, that smile did something to my heart that the Burrowwyrm couldn't.
Then, a sharp, piercing caw fractured the clearing. Solstice.
"She found something," Zya hissed, her form flickering as she paced the area where the hawk circled.
Asher's arms tightened briefly, a final possessive squeeze, before he lowered me to the forest floor. My legs wobbled beneath me, the ground feeling like it was made of water.
"Ava—" he began, his voice tight.
"No. I'm fine," I interrupted, straightening my spine. "We need to find Ryven."
His jaw ticked, the soldier in him battling the man who wanted to pull me back into the shadows, but finally he nodded.
He reached for my hand, and when our fingers touched, something shifted.
Electricity hummed beneath my skin. His magic brushed against mine, intertwining in a way that felt deeper, more permanent than before.
I blinked, startled by the sensation. He let go.
No time.
We pushed through a curtain of falling water—a hidden waterfall fountain that acted as the final veil to the forest's deepest secret. As the mist cleared, I gasped.
The other side was magnificent, a paradise of rot. Eclipsa flowers grew in a riot of vibrant pinks and deep, velvet purples, their petals glowing with a bioluminescent shimmer.
They were in full, deadly bloom, their sweet, cloying scent thick enough to taste. But the beauty was a lie. Where the flowers touched the trees, the bark was shriveled, and the air felt like it was being siphoned of all its oxygen.
Solstice cawed sharply ahead, a sound of pure distress.
We found him slumped against the base of a massive, ancient oak that looked like it had been struck by a blight.
The tree was bone-dry and dead, its branches skeletal against the pinkish glow of the glade. Black, oily streaks bled out from beneath Ryven's body, staining the earth where he sat.
His face was a terrifying shade of ivory, his skin so translucent I could see the skip of his pulse. Under his nose, the telltale shimmer of Eclipsa powder remained, and his lips moved in a feverish, silent mumble.
"Ryven," I breathed, dropping to my knees. Asher reached out to catch my shoulder, his fingers digging in as if to pull me back from a cliff, but I was already crawling toward him.
His eyelids fluttered, revealing slivers of eyes that were no longer human. They weren't just purple anymore—they were a bruised, electric pink, engulfed in a glowing haze.
"Ava?" His voice was a dry rasp, a sound that shouldn't have come from someone so young. "It's coming... the shadows... they're watching..."
My heart lurched into my throat, hammering a frantic rhythm. "Ryven, stay with me! Look at me, dammit!"
Asher crouched beside me, his expression unreadable, his jaw locked tight. He gently tapped Ryven's cheek, his movements clinical but urgent. "Ryven—hey. Snap out of it. We're getting you out of this hole."
Asher scooped him into his arms with a grunt of effort. Ryven felt terrifyingly light, like a bird made of hollow bones. The moment we stepped out of the shadows of the dead tree and into the bioluminescent light of the Eclipsa field, I saw the full extent of the damage.
I stumbled back, my hand flying to my mouth to stifle a cry. "No," I choked out. "Gods—"
Asher looked down, and for the first time since I'd met him, I saw him go completely still with genuine horror.
The veins.
They weren't just dark; they were raised, twisting like obsidian roots beneath his skin. They spidered across his collarbone and corded up his neck, pulsing with a faint, rhythmic violet light that flickered like a dying heartbeat.
They were moving.
Crawling. Spreading toward his temples like a living, hungry parasite.
"Gods," I whispered, tears pricking my eyes. "It's worse than I thought. It's the Eclipsa... it's taking root."
Zya growled, a low, mournful sound, her shadows prickling at her paws as if she could sense the Void within him.
Asher laid Ryven down on a patch of relatively clean moss, his fingers trembling slightly as he checked the male's pulse.
"I've seen what this drug does to the desperate in the lower rings of the Shadow Kingdom," he said, his voice terrifyingly quiet, devoid of its usual cockiness.
"This is the final stage. This is what happens when the body can no longer contain the Void."
Ryven groaned, his lips cracking and bleeding as he mumbled into the air, his eyes tracking things I couldn't see. "Inside me... so hungry... it wants out..."
My chest squeezed until it hurt to breathe. "What's happening to him, Asher? Tell me!"
Asher didn't answer immediately.
He looked at the violet veins, then up at the suffocating canopy of the Forbidden Forest. In his eyes, I saw a flicker of something that chilled me to the bone.
It wasn't the fear of a soldier; it was the fear of a man watching a soul dissolve into nothingness.
"The drug has stopped being a high," he said, his voice rough as gravel. "It's becoming a gateway. The Void isn't just in his head anymore; it's rewriting his blood. We need to get him to the healers—now—before it takes him completely. Before there's nothing left of Ryven to save."
We moved as fast as we could, a desperate, silent blur through the undergrowth.
Ryven's body jerked intermittently in Asher's arms, those horrific black veins slithering up his neck like nesting vipers before fading into the pale skin, then snapping back again.
It was as if his very soul was flickering like a dying candle, caught in a tug-of-war between life and the Void.
The moment we reached the hidden tunnel entrance, Zander was waiting, a dark sentinel against the stone. He took one look at Ryven's gray face and the rhythmic pulse of the Eclipsa-veins and simply nodded to Asher.
A silent, grim understanding passed between the two men—a recognition of a shadow they had both seen before. No words were needed. He stepped aside, his violet eyes shadowed with pity, and let us vanish into the earth.
We moved with a lethal combination of stealth and speed. We bypassed the security camp on the hill without a single pebble out of place, pushing for miles until the familiar, jagged silhouette of the Academy's southern entrance loomed ahead.
Above us, Solstice was a golden streak against the moon, her sharp mind linked to Aether's.