The Dark is Descending (Nytefall Trilogy #3)

Chapter 1 Astraea—Past

Astraea—Past

Astraea Lightborne descended from the skies like a shooting star, a blinding arc of light and silver feathered wings slicing through the darkened clouds above the city of Vesitire.

The key in her hand pulsed with a fierce, radiant energy, mirroring the markings that snaked across her skin—ancient symbols glowing like embers over her flesh, their intensity heightening with each second.

She could feel the weight of her purpose thrumming within her, grounding her even as she landed with a soft, lethal grace on a humble dwelling’s rooftop.

The city loomed around her, an intricate web of bridges and towering spires.

Tonight the vampires had attacked. Astraea took in the savagery of red eyes and leathery wings, but the nightcrawlers cursed to roam after dark weren’t the only vampire race among those fighting against the celestials—her kind.

Some didn’t cast a shadow as they sank their fangs into the scrambling humans, consuming their blood.

Others didn’t have a reflection in the nearby shop windows as they held innocent prey in their arms, draining their victims with a kiss of death.

It hadn’t always been like this. The vampires were once as peaceful as the fae, coexisting with the humans.

Until someone entered her world who was never supposed to be here and sought to overthrow her reign as the star-maiden, ruler of Solanis, by poisoning the minds of her people and the celestials who governed against her.

Nyte’s father was the leader and instigator of that brutal uprising, but everyone knew he was nothing without Nyte—Nightsdeath—known as the realm’s nightmare.

Astraea swooped down off the roof, and with a flick of her wrist she held the key aloft, watching it blaze brighter in response to her awakening magick, a beacon in the gloom.

The vampires surged forward to the target she made of herself.

Swift and deadly they came at her, their fangs bared and claws outstretched.

She took a breath, the air sharp and cold, and then sprang into action.

“We can handle this,” Auster called over to her, sending bolts of blue lightning to take out several foes at a time.

He always tried to send her away, but she could never stand by idle.

Auster and the other three High Celestials wanted to encase her in glass for protection while they led the frontlines of this war.

Though each time he suggested she stay out of the fighting irked her, she understood his concern.

Astraea’s chest pounded with fear for his safety too in the thick of their enemies.

They were lifelong friends and he was her Bonded.

Astraea was reminded of the immense guilt that had festered inside her when she hadn’t yet told him that they would never be able to forge their true bond now. For she’d tied herself to another: the realm’s nightmare, and Auster’s greatest enemy.

Nyte should be her enemy too, but at some point along the dangerous alliance she’d made with him to discover why their lands were shaking and the stars were dying out, the line between desire and hate had blurred, burned, then ceased to exist.

Now, as she sent a flare of light to cut through a swarm of nightcrawlers, she knew Nyte was watching.

His presence lived within her, both a pleasant assurance and a nagging hindrance to her focus.

He couldn’t interfere with this fight, though his tangible wrath at sitting on the sidelines rattled through her.

“You’re far more capable than he is,” Nyte grumbled through her mind in response to Auster’s concern for her. “Behind you.”

She spun, shifting the key to a blade that sank through the chest of a shadowless.

Even though they were her foes right now, she hated to spill the blood of those she didn’t know the stories of.

How desperate did this man have to be to side with Nyte’s father and believe this was the only way his kind could achieve equality?

Astraea was determined to bring back the peace she’d dedicated her life to. Her Golden Age was shaking, and she was running out of time to keep it from collapse.

“I’d focus better without your input,” she sent back to Nyte.

“I’d focus better by your side.”

“You’re not needed here.”

“You wound me.”

She didn’t reply, though contrary to what she told him, talking to Nyte while she fought oddly kept her hyper-focused on slaying enemies.

“Did you know about this attack?” she asked, wanting to find exactly where Nyte was, but these vampires were unrelenting.

“No, actually,” he replied with a note of disturbance.

“Then if you want to be helpful, you could find out.”

“I can’t leave while you’re in danger.”

“Like you said, I’m the most capable here. And I’ve survived much worse without you.”

“You’re having all the fun without me.”

“I’ll make it up to you later.”

She shivered as Nyte stroked her senses. It was highly inappropriate given the circumstances. She dislodged her blade from a vampire’s back.

“How so?” he coaxed.

“It might involve a bath, given we were interrupted.”

Two vampires came running for her at parallel sides. Astraea took a second to flick a look over her shoulder and cast a smirk toward the shadows next to a high chimney. Nyte was very well hidden, but not to her.

“Arrogant,” Nyte mused in delight.

He was referring to the fact she’d taken that moment to pin him, letting the vampires get dangerously close.

She threw her stormstone dagger at the last second, precisely into the heart of one before ducking under the other’s arms as they lashed out to grab her, simultaneously cutting clean through his knees with her key blade.

Twisting as she stood, her next swipe cut through his neck and his body fell as a heap of limbs.

“You are an absolutely exquisite vampire slayer.”

“Show is about to be over,” she said. “If you could please find out your father’s motives before I’m forced to.”

“Since you begged.”

“You can make that up to me later.”

“I’ll beg for you, Starlight. Only to make you scream for me in return.”

Those were his parting words, and as Astraea retrieved her stormstone blade from the chest of the vampire, she cast her sight up anyway, disappointed he was no longer a spectator. Her mood dampened now that he was gone even though she’d pushed for it.

That she had fallen for the enemy was a secret that would shake the continent, but she wanted it to be free.

Wanted the world to know, and in her fairytale mind they would accept it; one day they might even rejoice about it.

One thing she treasured most about Nyte, though many would never understand, was how he didn’t pretend to be anything he wasn’t.

Every dark and bloody confession he owned, and she believed he wasn’t beyond redemption.

Astraea was the world’s goddess of justice, thrust into this role to govern people in peace, amity, and equality. She only hoped they wouldn’t question her judgment when it came to him.

Their bonding might have been forced as there was no other way to save her from a fatal wound, but part of her was glad for it.

Knowing her attachment to him, her desire for him, had been a root growing deeper over the many years they’d spent together.

Nyte had nestled into her mind, body, and soul.

So slowly she didn’t think either of them realized, or wanted to admit, what had been entangling them together from the start.

Astraea was snapped from her thoughts when a vampire dropped down from the sky, and she cursed Nyte now for distracting her from detecting it.

She was thrown onto her back while vicious teeth snapped at her face.

Holding him off by his shoulders, she was about to burn him inside out with her magick.

She was saved from the bother when blue lightning seized the vampire and Astraea pushed him off.

Seconds later, Auster’s mighty stormstone sword plunged through the nightcrawler’s chest.

As she caught her breath, Auster towered above her with a frown of disapproval and concern.

“I was daydreaming,” she said sheepishly.

“Unlike you while in battle,” he said skeptically, holding a hand down to her.

Astraea smiled sweetly, accepting the aid up and brushing herself off.

Surveying their surroundings, the other High Celestials—Notus, Aquilo, and Zephyr—finished off the last of the attack.

“I wonder what they hoped to achieve,” Zephyr pondered, wiping the blood off his blade on a fallen nightcrawler.

Nyte would find out, then Astraea would know.

“Abominations,” Notus spat.

She didn’t like that term. How he could so easily condemn an entire species for the heinous acts of some of them.

Three of Astraea’s six guardians—each chosen from all races by her creators, Dusk and Dawn—were vampires.

They had all raised her to be a fair and unbiased ruler.

Her guardians passed on to their blissful Aetherworld decades ago with their sacred duty fulfilled.

Astraea had to lead and discover herself now.

When more celestial soldiers approached, Astraea ordered them, “Start checking for wounded and clear the streets.”

She stepped over bodies, heading for some nearby homes to account for innocents.

“You should go back to the castle,” Auster said, following her.

“Why should I do that?”

“It’s safer. Leave it to us to discover what might have brought on this attack and scout outside the city for others.”

He always tried to shield her behind high walls. She’d never outright admitted this to him, but a lot of the reason why she’d stayed to govern in Vesitire rather than Althenia was to be free of Auster’s and his brothers’ suffocating measures for her safety.

Auster’s sigh was audible as she disregarded his suggestion and knocked at the first home. When there was no answer, she entered gently, only to see immediately that the residents were all slaughtered. Four humans.