CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
VESPER
Vesper’s erratic heartbeat matched the wild pulse of his vestige. As the knives at his friends' necks glinted in the low lantern light, panic climbed his throat. How had they gotten into this shitstorm of a situation? He clutched his sword, his knuckles white.
Could he summon his magic before the Gravers dragged the blades across their throats? He blinked rapidly, his attention torn between them all.
They all wore their horror uniquely: Thorrin’s eyes bled terror yet his face remained calm, Nef’s flushed cheeks harboured enough rage to burn down an entire city, and Gaelen and Dimitri may as well have had ‘shitting my pants’ painted on their foreheads.
Then his eyes met Kyrith’s and Vesper’s heart constricted.
Her eyes drowned, not with panic, but with anticipation, ready for this fight. Ready to give these monsters the lashing they deserved. But he would rather throw himself into one of those bloody cages and tap into his vein than allow anything to harm her.
Vesper sneered at the arm snaking her waist and the dirt-crusted skeletal fingers. He would snap every one for daring to touch her.
“Move and they perish,” the Graver spat, the tinge of Vesper’s blood still on its teeth.
It ripped the skin from its face to reveal bone, a thing composed of nightmares, features carved by fear itself.
Its empty eye sockets scrutinized him, perhaps to see what foolish move he would make next.
“Lay your sword at your feet and step away,” the Graver hissed. Blood gurgled in his throat.
The seven other Gravers remained quiet, their crimson hoods still drawn.
A trickle of blood spilled from the nick at Kyrith’s throat and a vicious roar began in Vesper’s head as he watched it pool in her collarbone.
Her fingers slowly inched towards her sword.
The blade shined, ready to slice through the cavernous darkness.
And as her eyes met his, they said only one thing.
They would not submit. They would fight, even if it was their last.
And Izzy’s words flitted through his head as a reminder.
He was a Merikh.
He was a wolf.
And he was fucking ready to draw blood.
But one of the Graver’s cocked its head at him. Maybe saw Vesper’s intentions written across his face. It grinned.
Then dragged its knife across Dimitri’s throat. His flesh peeled open, a ribbon of red bloomed, and the blood just kept … spilling.
The cave erupted into chaos.
Nef screamed like her throat tore open with Dimitri’s.
As her heel connected with the Graver’s leg, the snapping of bone echoed.
The Graver’s jaws spread wide. She spun away and drew the sword from her belt, the one Dimitri had shown her how to use.
The Graver lunged for her, but she slashed it with a two-handed spin.
The monster’s head thumped to the ground and inky blood spurted from the stump of its neck as its body collapsed, twitching with the last movements of life.
Wet coughs rattled from Nef as she doubled over.
As Kyrith grasped the blade at her throat, the Graver wrenched the dagger from her grip.
The blade sliced through her hand, and she bared her teeth in pain, but she stole that moment to reach for her sword.
She arced it through the air like a shooting star as it sang a righteous tune and glowed the same turquoise as her vestige.
The blade connected with the monster’s arm, cutting clean through the sinew and bone.
The dagger tumbled to the dirt along with the lifeless limb.
Kyrith twirled her sword in her hand with expert precision, while she waited for the Graver’s next move. Her other hand dripped crimson onto the ground as she braced it in front of her.
Unfazed by its missing limb, the Graver locked its eyeless sockets on her and retrieved the dagger.
Then it unfurled its spine, stood, unhinged its jaw, and screeched a fucking terrifying sound of nightmares and things that lurk in the darkness.
Spittle and clots of blood flew from its gaping mouth.
Kyrith didn't hesitate. Didn't flinch. Didn't even blink.
Dagger clashed with sword as she swung at the Graver.
Vesper glimpsed Nef crumpled on the ground with Dimitri, a hand clasped over his neck as he gasped and choked. Deimos’s mausoleum flashed through Vesper’s mind, and, for a moment, he lost himself in that memory as Demitri bled out, but he shook it free and dove back into the battle.
He couldn’t summon Kaida with those people behind him. She could hurt them with her untamed flame, even if—
His attention snapped to Gaelen as he roared and blood ran in heavy rivulets from the dagger embedded in his shoulder.
The Graver lay several paces away, ready to rise, and strike again.
A groan slipped between Gaelen’s gritted teeth as he wrenched the blade free, but before he could turn, the Graver leapt.
Vesper shot a gust of wind to knock the Graver off path, but he was too far away. Its boned claws caught Gaelen’s arm and seized the dagger. Gaelen cried out as it tore through skin and muscle, but Vesper sprinted toward them.
He ate the distance, and swung his curved sword. The creature moved lightning fast, and parried Vesper’ sword with its dagger.
It shrugged the robe off to reveal its bony body covered in sinewy skin. The stench of death radiated off it, reminiscent of rotting fruit, and putrescent meat.
The Graver’s unmatched strength deflected Vesper’s heavy swings. Each clang sent a pang of pain through his arm, and though he tried to use his wind, and searched for a single second to exploit, the Graver moved too fast.
Fuck it.
There was no room for civil combat here. Not with what the Gravers had done to these helpless people and Dimitri bleeding out only paces away. He would play dirty and would fucking enjoy it.
He caught the Graver by surprise, when his foot collided with the center of its abdomen.
It doubled in on itself as its rib cage crunched.
He cut his sword in an upward arc and knocked the creature's head back.
His blade sliced through the lower jaw. He shot a gust of his wind and sent the Graver tumbling to the ground. The dagger flew from its hand.
About bloody time.
The creature scrambled backward through the acidic soil, but it had nowhere to run.
Vesper stomped on the Graver’s chest and pinned it to the ground.
Its shriek, like a feral possum, rang in Vesper’s ears as he bore all his weight down and plunged his sword through its chest. He roared back to drown out the blood and battle around him.
His yell embodied pure rage as he dragged the blade up and sliced through its skull.
Black blood reeking of putrid rot spurted from the body cleaved in two and splattered his face.
He proved his father’s sword wrong. He was not a coward.
In the corner of Vesper’s vision, two Gravers closed in on Thorrin.
And somehow, dozens of Gravers had appeared from some depth of the cavern. They now sprinted toward them at an unearthly speed. No one else seemed to notice but him, and it left Vesper no other choice.
This shit had to end. Now.
Vesper surged his magic and sought any and all death in the cavern, but some spell barricaded him from feeling the corpses.
So he sighed and scrubbed a hand down his face, before he ripped off his glove and dragged the dagger Kyrith had made him along his palm. His blood flowed and as he arched his back, Kaida’s reptilian hide slithered free from his chest—all gleaming shadowy scales and bright crimson eyes.
Ready for a fight and blood, Kaida’s roar shook the cavern. She reared back and black flame spewed from her mouth.
But what he feared would happen unfolded in front of his eyes.
Too many lingered in the crossfire of her flame.
Vesper yelled Thorrin’s name. The rider’s head snapped up and his eyes widened before he dashed to the side to launch himself out of the flame’s path. The heels of his boots singed, but he was otherwise unharmed.
Kyrith cried out from behind Vesper as her sword lodged in a graver's jawbone. She attempted to yank it free but only hauled the creature towards her. With a feral yell, she wrenched it out and Vesper blasted a gust of wind to knock the Graver off balance. Kyrith shot him a wicked grin before she lopped the Graver’s head from its body.
It toppled to the ground with a thud, and the Graver’s eyeless sockets stared unendingly at the cavern ceiling.
Too busy smiling like a fool at Kyrith across the way, Vesper didn’t hear someone approach from behind. Something blunt struck the back of his head. Stars burst across his vision and he fell to his knees. He gritted his teeth against the pain and spun—
Another blow landed.
This time the Graver’s claw sliced up his side, tearing through his tunic, his abdomen, bone meeting bone, plucking his ribs like harp strings.
He screamed. Or at least it sounded like him, but he left his body, his soul stretched from his flesh, as his world swirled in darkness and the corners of his vision blurred.
He couldn’t breathe. His chest convulsed.
Even with his hand braced over his ribs, hot blood seeped between his fingers. Needle-sharp teeth sank into his neck, bit down, and his blood spilled into its mouth.
His lips parted, but no sound came. He squeezed his eyes shut and blindly reached for a dagger, a knife—fuck, anything.
Anything.
His body weakened as the Graver slurped his blood, reduced him to a fucking sippy cup, as its teeth and cold, wet tongue scraped against his skin.
He fumbled for the hilt of his dagger. Despite his hand slickened with blood, he finally seized it. Praise all the gods and fates and every fucking good thing that had ever happened to him.
Vesper struck.
The dagger embedded in the Graver’s fleshless skull. Bone crunched beneath his fingers, and it stilled. Fell limp against him. He threw the body off him, but as he did, its teeth tore his neck like peeling skin from an apple.
Vesper hissed at the searing pain and clamped a hand over the wound. Blood saturated his glove and dripped onto the ground.
The images burst through and transported him.
Cold tile floor, warm blood surrounding him, the bolt in his chest, and blood bubbling from the wound in his neck.
Emmery’s trembling hands gripping his throat, trying to thrust the blood back into his body.
Her tears. The pain, his chest spasming, and then he was ice cold and he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t fucking breathe—
A hand on his shoulder yanked him from the vision. Nef’s puffy eyes met his, her face pale, gold hair splattered with blood, and face painted in fingerprints of dirt and tear tracks. She helped him sit up, though his head swam.
“Dimitri,” she sobbed and smeared the dirt. She nodded at his still body on the ground. Unmoving.
Then she doubled over and coughed so hard, she nearly collapsed. Vesper clambered to his feet and wrapped his arms around her to hold her upright, while his eyes darted around the cave. Kaida’s flame engulfed the cavern.
Gaelan kneeled at his brother’s side, Dimitri’s hand clutched in two of his. His shoulders shook but he made no sound. As if he could shield him from this inevitability, from this fate, he folded over his brother's body.
With Nef in tow, Vesper stumbled to Dimitri before he fell to his knees. Death had already whisked the rider away.
Vesper shut Dimitri’s eyes before he whispered a prayer to Deimos to take him gently to the Hollow. Nef’s golden hair lifted in the swell of shadow fire as she sank to Dimitri’s side beside Gaelen as chaos rained around them.
Vesper hauled himself up, and gripped his neck harder, though it still bled like a bitch. Kaida bellowed fire, stronger than ever before, and drained blood from the wounds to his neck and ribs.
Too fast. The world spun and Vesper staggered.
The entire cavern lit in an obsidian blaze, the air practically boiling. At some point, Thorrin had released the prisoners, too.
Vesper’s head whipped in search of Kyrith. Black flames licked at the skin houses as they shrivelled and crumpled to the ground, everything aflame, but only one thought screamed through his head.
Where is she, where is she, where is she—
Chaos and heat and panic enveloped him as he staggered through the smoky haze.
“Kyrith!” he tried to yell, but his voice cracked, stone on stone.
He beckoned Kaida, and the dragon’s red eyes snapped to him. She faded to shadow as she disappeared back inside him. In one hand he clutched his battered ribs, and his neck in the other. A sigh of relief rushed out of him when he caught sight of that luscious burgundy hair.
A man with reddish-purple hair like hers and a tear-stained face lay in her arms. Streaks of dirt coated them both. And she just stared down at him with a gut-wrenching helplessness, much like Gaelen with Dimitri. The man’s closed eyes and still chest meant only one thing.
In fact, all the bodies in the cages had grown rigid, falling back to the peacefulness the Graver’s had taken from them. They no longer remained captive, refusing the frigid sigh of death, though their lives had been stolen.
Vesper caught sight of the man’s bare chest. He glanced at the other bodies, and his world stilled. A deep, dark reality needled him.
Hollows. Every one of them, marked with a cavae.
Vesper dragged himself to Kyrith and released his ribs to place a tentative hand on her shoulder. Her eyes remained locked on the man in her arms, his face serene in death.
“We need to bury them,” she choked. “One final time.”
She shed no tears, but when she finally glanced up at him, pure agony lingered there. And it did something to him. Splintered something inside his chest. Something vital. Irretrievable.
As the flames died down, and Vesper ensured Kaida irreversibly burned the enchanted grave plot, one by one, he, Kyrith, and Thorrin carried their bodies outside the cave clouded in death and decay. They found a peaceful strip of land shaded by a copse of trees to bury these weary souls.
Vesper numbed to his wounds as they gave a final goodbye to these poor souls. He burned each of their faces into his memory so he wouldn’t forget, not that he could forget what he’d seen here. What he needed to put an end to.
For some time, Kyrith sat by the man’s grave and piled rocks in an arch. A rainbow, maybe.
And when the graves were finally covered, and the moonlight came to take their souls to Deimos, they dragged their weary bones back to Rensburrow, Dimitri’s broken body in Gaelen’s arms.