Chapter 38
The tomb's interior is so dark my eyes strain to discern anything solid. Water drops from somewhere above like an incessant reminder that the clock’s ticking. The eclipse will start soon, and I want to be miles from this place before our moon crosses into the umbra.
“My mother’s grave is down in the catacombs. Keep up, starling, you don’t want to be left in the dark here.” Jace glances over his shoulder, now a blur in the shadows ahead of me.
Our boots thud down the corridor as we pass narrow slits in the stone walls, offering glimpses into the tombs of various honorable officials and emissaries. A single torch burns beside yet another door etched with runes, its flame a warning beacon to any stupid enough to cross the threshold.
“A creepy door carved with cosmic runes…awesome.” Roe scowls, withdrawing her dagger.
Jace turns the knob and pulls the door open to reveal a set of steps descending into the mountain’s core.
Unlit sconces ignite as if his presence alone calls them to life.
Their flames bristle as we pass, down and down and down into the bilges of the stone-laden earth.
Cobwebs and dust stripe the walls in dense, undisturbed blankets, and when we finally reach the lowest level I, too, am caked in ancient grime.
The air down here is damp, mossy, but somehow warmer than I expected, like the earth’s breath lingers in this place.
As we walk through slim corridors and snaking tunnels, a wave of dread crashes through me.
How many miles have we sunken underground?
If one of these support beams were to collapse, we’d be crushed by hundreds of pounds of sediment.
I’ve never felt all that connected to the sky, nor the cosmos, for that matter, but even if she were to answer my pleas, could Astora find me?
This is Morvayne’s realm, dark and decrepit.
Maybe I’m praying to the wrong god.
We pass another round of doorways, each opening into a solitary cavern. A single candle illuminates every casket, draped in silken black burial cloth. “These are all riders?” I ask, inspecting an alcove as I pass.
“Some are. Others are Shadow nobility. House Ashborne carries our signet into death in hopes Morvayne might have mercy on us,” Jace replies. “All the spilled blood, the theft of innocence, it all rests here.”
He turns a sharp corner and disappears into a crypt.
Not one but three candles light the space, elongating our shadows as we file in behind him.
There, in the room's center is a casket still clean and new.
The shroud covering its smooth lid, sparkles in the warm light, like its thread was loomed from stardust. Jace runs a careful hand over the fabric and withdraws the covering to reveal a crystal casket, carved from the purest of onyx.
“We can give you some privacy if you’d prefer, brother,” Isra suggests.
With a clenched jaw, Jace nods. My heartbeat thrums as I watch him, standing stiffly over his mother’s resting place. Only once had he mentioned his relationship with her, but now, the silence curtaining his features is one of utter grief.
Isra places a hand on my shoulder and guides us out. “He and his mother were very close. This probably isn’t easy for him.”
Roe leans opposite us, her eyes darting from shadow to shadow.
“This place makes me feel weird,” she murmurs.
She’s not the only one. My palms are damp with a nervous sweat.
Being this close to death feels wrong. I’m no stranger to Morvayne, having been raised around violence my entire life, but to see such wealth…
there are hundreds, maybe thousands of lowborn bodies scorched and piled up beyond the borders.
Prisoners of war, slaves, and those dealt an unlucky hand, now fade into the earth.
Their remains are nothing more than rotting heaps where one body isn’t discernible from another.
“You alright?” Isra asks, tossing me from the thoughts I’m failing to swallow.
“Fine,” I reply. He scrutinizes my shaken gaze, but I offer a quick smile of assurance. “I’m fine Is, I promise.”
“Alright, let’s go.” Jace appears from the tomb’s entrance, clutching a velvet satchel with both hands. “We have only moments before the eclipse is in full. My connection to Tenebris is starting to wane.”
The four of us retrace our steps back through the tomb, climbing the endless stairwell until the air cools. With Roe and Isra in tow, Jace turns the corner and disappears.
A silvery light, glowing through the cracks of an empty tomb, stops me in my tracks.
What the fuck?
Maybe the ceiling has caved in, allowing moonlight to fill the chamber. A shallow whisper, easily mistaken for a whistling draft, slithers around me, and goose flesh puckers on my arms. I risk a glance into the tomb. A sigh of relief escapes me when I find it silent and sleeping.
The glow—as suspected—is from a crack in the ceiling. Starlight washes the black satin in an eerie light, almost like a beacon, marking safe passage back to land.
I glance down the hall. The others have already disappeared out of sight, and I know I should run to catch up. There isn’t much time before this place turns deadly.
But something about this chamber keeps me still. It’s not unlike any of the others I’ve seen tonight—stone-carved walls, low ceiling, and a single candle. But the moonlight shining in paints a landscape of something ethereal. Something cosmic.
Before I can even register the motion, my boots sneak through the entrance, and I approach the casket. My palms tremble as I brush a thumb along the funeral shroud, cold and smooth to the touch. A delicate breeze brushes the hairs on my neck.
Then a voice, low and liquified, whispers against my ear. “Nova Lindwen,” it says. “I’ve waited a lifetime for you.”
Unsheathing my blade, I spin to face the imposter, but I’m greeted only by fallen dust and a dim vacancy.
“Show yourself.”
“I am nothing more than a voice, nothing more than a whisper of wind and starlight,” it says, now from behind me. The tickle of breath on my neck spikes my pulse, and I whirl around again. Still, only the empty tomb awaits.
“Tell me who you are,” I demand, my voice quivering like the candle beside the casket.
“I have no body, no soul, I am no one. Not yet.”
The words caress my arms, my shoulders, my cheeks, with a reassurance of safety. Something in it assures me I’m safe. It means me no harm, and unlike so many before who’ve feigned the same sentiment, I believe it.
“Find me. Find me in the stars. Walk the plane. I wait for you there.”
“What? I don’t understand. Are you a spirit of a fallen Ashborne? Of a rider?”
The candle spikes until its flame licks the cold stone above us. I shield my eyes from the heat. Fuck, any closer and my damned eyebrows could’ve singed off.
Then, there’s nothing. Nothing but blood-stained light, once silver, gleaming in from the caved in ceiling. Oh shit.
Shaken from whatever gravity I’ve fallen into, I turn on my heels and plummet down the corridor.
“I can’t hold this much longer, rider! Go! Get the silver haired human!” Tenebris’s strained voice echoes through the passage as I barrel toward the door.
Gone are the shadows, and darkness.
Gone is the silence.
Now the walls bleed and the stone quakes with deafening howls of the dead. They cry and growl and roar with glee as transparent bodies appear shoulder to shoulder at the entrance.
I’m suddenly in a sea of spirits, wriggling and writhing like a building storm. My pulse booms in my ears, but I focus on the exit, barely glancing at the nightmarish souls clarifying in my periphery.
“Nova! What the fuck?” Jace booms through the closed door. The crowd of translucent figures builds like the tide, solidifying and swarming.
All snap their heads toward me.
All have glowing red eyes.
“Seal the tomb!” I cry, diving under an oncoming attack.
My boots squeal on stone, as someone—or something—laces its fingers through my braid and tugs. My soles lose traction, and the ground rips away as I’m flung backward.
“Let us feast!” a voice, half human half demon cries as the crown of my skull cracks against rock. Pain erupts through me, starring my vision with blurry specks.
“Let us feast!” another cries, this one almost feminine. Cold, wet fingers grip my wrist as I’m dragged along the floor, thrusted back toward the tomb’s depths. I claw and scratch at my invisible captor, but hands multiply until every inch of my arms are locked.
I gasp for breath, but the bodies keep piling up, some more solid than others. An elbow cracks against my cheek bone, welling tears in my eyes. A fist slams into my ribs, spilling the air I’ve managed to suck down. Teeth, dagger-sharp and vicious, bite into my thigh. “Let us feast!”
Fuck, these aren’t just vengeful spirits. They’re riders, and like Jace, bonded to long departed Blightfangs. They’re soulless creatures, thirsty for blood.
A cry spills from me as another set of jaws clamps down on my wrist. Then another around my neck. I’m pinned by fangs piercing every major vein and artery.
Blood flows from the puncture wounds. My skin whitens a shade fit for Morvayne. No matter how hard I try to rip away from these fuckers, I can’t. They’re gaining strength with the blood moon while mine depletes.
I’m dying, I realize.
I’m dying and I can’t fight my way out.
A hand wraps around my neck, coiling tight enough to hold me secure without cutting off my air. I’m pulled from the wriggling masses and tucked into a solid chest.
“I’m here, starling. I’ve got you.” Jace’s voice shields me in midnight as he pulls my head to the crook of his neck.
He cradles me in closer, and I cling to him with desperate relief.
Air rushes back down my lungs and I draw in greedy breaths.
Jace’s tunic is shredded, like he battled his way to me, and the skin to skin feels like a blast of energy right to my straining heart.