Forty-Seven
OceanofPDF.com
Samkiel. A Few Hours Later.
A flock of birds sang, heralding the day. The sun was bright as it rose,
casting the world in a mirage of colors. It kissed the mountain tops
and gilded the trees, waking animals and beasts alike.
Rashearim pulsed with life, laughter, and music as everyone prepared for their day. The city celebrated another victory, having again fought back the encroaching darkness.
I heard the castle staff begin to stir and leaned against the balcony railing, the tips of my hair tickling the sides of my arms, my bloody armor discarded at my feet. I stared at the three-headed lion, and the symbol of Unir and his power, our power, glared back at me.
Unir’s heavy, armored boots pounded the floor, several guards trailing him. He didn’t need them. He didn’t need anyone, but they stayed and obeyed like always.
“I am surprised. Usually, you would be down there, celebrating with your friends. Are you ill?”
I shook my head and straightened to my full height.
He towered at my side, taller even than me. The gold and gems braided into his hair sparkled in the sun. I saw the stag, my mother’s symbol, the one she had made for him, still resided amongst several others. That one was special and always would be, no matter if it tarnished.
“I remember the jewels you wore, like the back of my hand. I remember you never let hers tarnish, and I remember how you used to fidget with it when stressed. Just as I remember, this is only a dream, and you but a memory.”
The shadow of my father smiled. “Wise, far wiser than you have ever been.”
“Why am I dreaming about the day after the battle of Hovuungard?”
The guards behind him shimmered and disappeared. The darkness on the walls nearest us grew thicker, waiting patiently to pounce. He ignored them and pointed toward the horizon.
“A thousand plus worlds, Samkiel, and I have seen them all. You are now at the center. Your name is a war song now. The World Ender, they call you, but you are so much more than that.”
I shifted and stepped away from him. “I am a king built of fear, not love
or respect. You made sure of that.”
“I helped you.”
I scoffed. “I believed that at first, but Mother died, and you grew distant and cold. You pushed too hard, but I bent, and I killed. Now my dreams consist of nothing but battles, death, and chaos.”
“And of her.”
The darkness grew closer.
“Why do you haunt me now, King of Gods?”
“We have sent warning signs. You have not listened.”
My brows knitted together, and I faced the shadow of my father fully.
The darkness grew an inch closer.
“About her? Dianna?”
He shook his head. “It’s not enough. Not to stop her.”
My heart thudded in my chest. “Dianna?”
“She is too strong now, too powerful. She will eat worlds and burn through them, and you alone are not enough.”
I concentrated, trying to control the dream, my jaw clenching with the effort. The memory turned to premonition, and the darkness crept closer.
Shadowy tendrils shaped like hands crept higher, closer to Unir, closer to me, reaching and grabbing, but none of us moved. We couldn’t.
“What you have? What you are, it’s not enough. Not alone.”
“What are you—”
His arm shot out, a blade made of gold ramming through my midsection. Pain, blistering and hot, raced across every part of me. I looked up at my father. His face changed, but a single flash of familiarity flickered through my subconscious as he yanked the blade back.
“You are alone. You will die alone.”
I grasped at my stomach, silver blood pooling and leaking past my fingers. My back bent, and a bright silver light erupted from my chest, my eyes, and my very soul. It shot up and hit the atmosphere. The sky cracked and burst, an ancient beast clawing toward the open gate. I felt them, heard their song of damnation, and the promises of death mixed with the screams of those begging to be saved. Beneath it all, a laugh, dark, feminine, and purely lethal.
My body bent, every bit of energy drained from me, and my skin stained with my own blood.
“You are not my father,” I croaked. The shimmering image of my father
knelt before me.
“I am not.”
The darkness finally reached me, but it was too late. I was already gone.
I felt the pull of Asteraoth and knew death would be a kindness to me but not to the world left behind. Hands wrapped around me, pulling me down, down, down. The shimmering face of my father just watched and grinned.
I took a last look at the world around me as gates of swirling light opened. Shadowed forms stepped out dressed in armor, thick and sharp.
Weapons and beasts snarled at their heels while others shot into the sky. I wanted to stay and help. I had to for my family, friends, and the world, but it was too late, and the void smothered me. It was such a strange feeling to be covered in darkness but warm at the same time.
“Stay with me.”
M y body jerked , forcibly waking me from my nightmare . I lifted my head from the desk and brushed away a piece of paper stuck to my face.
When had I fallen asleep? I had left the party the first chance I got, excusing myself and coming upstairs.
I’d stared at that map, thinking I could look there, maybe follow a trail, but I had no idea where to start. Unable to shake the unease of the dream, I leaned back, my hands sliding over my midsection. I lifted the white shirt I’d worn to the party, but my flesh was still whole with no new wounds,
only scars from battles long past. I closed my eyes and took one shuddering breath, then another. Sweat drenched me, and I shook. It was a nightmare, but so much more. Another vision, only it felt so real.
She is too strong now, too powerful. She will eat worlds.
He meant Dianna, and I did not know how to reach her now. But I knew I couldn’t stay here and do nothing, pretending the world wasn’t at stake while the mortals asked for parties and reassurance.
“Samkiel, forgive me.”
A voice whispered in the wind with a message only I heard. I was on
my feet the next instant.
Logan.
I portalled and appeared in his room between one breath and the next.
My body formed with tendrils of electricity sparking beneath my skin. His room was empty, his bed made, and his bags untouched. I left and reformed in Vincent’s room. He shot up out of a dead sleep, the lights flickering. The female ambassador in bed beside him grabbed the sheet and slid farther
beneath the covers.
“What is it?”
“Logan.” That was all I said before I left the room and went to wake the others.
“W as it the dying chant ?” X avier asked as I paced in front of the abandoned mine entrance. We had searched from Nochari to Kashuenia and well into the following day but found nothing. Nothing but empty mines, the same as before, but I knew he had been revisiting these places, looking
for Neverra.
“No.”
He sighed, brushing the dirt from his sleeves. I thought there had been something at the last place. I had felt this wave of energy hit my gut as if something roared inside me for a split second. It felt like a portal opening or an alert, a sense of awareness telling me I was close, but it vanished as soon
as it happened. So we left and went in search of Imogen and Cameron. They exited the mine covered in grime, calling back their ablazed weapons.
“Nothing,” Imogen said, stopping and looking behind her. “I don’t feel or sense anything remotely celestial.”
A sharp ring cut through the silence, and every eye turned toward me.
“What?”
Cameron nodded toward my pocket. “Are you going to get that?”
I glanced down, realizing the sharp ring was coming from the phone in my pocket. Logan had forced me to get it so I could communicate with everyone. What if he was gone, too? What if I couldn’t get him back or save him like her, like my father? My chest burned, but I pulled the phone out.
Vincent’s name flashed across the screen. I answered and demanded without greeting, “Did you find Logan?”
The line was silent for a second, then Vincent said, “No, but we have a
bigger issue, I think.”
“What?”
“Just get back to Silver City. Now.”
C ameron , X avier , I mogen , and I reformed in the main guild hall in Boel. Voices murmured from behind the thick wooden doors. I stalked forward, my feet barely touching the ground. My power thrust before me, pushing the doors open so forcefully that they cracked.
“How can you not know where she is?” Vincent demanded. He turned to look at us, and shock forced me to a stop, the others slamming into my back. They recovered quickly and fanned out on each side of me. I blinked, unable to believe what I was seeing. What was Roccurem doing here?
“God king, you have returned from your wasted adventure, it seems,”
Roccurem said.
I snapped. Call it lack of sleep, burning nerves, or that I was close to losing another person I cared for deeply. The lights above me burst one by one as I stalked toward Roccurem.
“Abandoning your realm. Treason. Aiding and abetting a known fugitive. Treason. Disregarding your king’s orders and commands.
Treason.” I stopped, towering over him. “All punishable by death under the Council of Hadrameil.”
“Yes, under your father’s rule. I do not follow your father any longer.”
“No, you follow me.”
“No, I follow her.”
My control snapped, and my hand whipped out. Runes appeared beneath him, binding him to this room. He could no longer leave until I allowed it, and if he had anything to do with Logan’s disappearance, I would lock him away for eons. The lights flickered, drawing everyone’s attention to me, but my rage echoed in the sky. Not in this room.
“I promise, my liege, I am merely here to help,” Roccurem said. He stepped closer, but not by much.
“Help?” I scoffed, a bitter laugh escaping me. “Similar to what you did when I had her, and you unleashed the dream eaters on us? That sort of help? You are a traitor and liar, and I will not tolerate it.” I rubbed a hand across my face wearily. “Why have you ignored me? I tried to summon you after the dream eaters, and you blocked me. You keep secrets that could help me save her. You—”
“Your judgment of me and my intentions are not misguided, but the chemical imbalance in your brain when it comes to her overrides your logic, god king. Anyone in this room can feel the waves of power wafting off of you, begging to claim what’s yours. She is an integral element for what is to come, as are you. I am merely a vessel from the ones far older and far larger
than you.”
“Where is she?”
“I cannot speak of that.”
All the windows burst simultaneously, allowing the wailing wind to enter. It raged, tossing the contents of the room. Papers and small objects spun into miniature tornadoes. Thick clouds rolled outside, lightning flashing and thunder cracking the sky.
Energy pulsed, shooting through me, and lightning flared in the room, tickling my hands, arms, and soul.
“Samkiel,” Vincent warned. But it was too late.
Tendrils of electricity licked across my face and coalesced in my eyes right before darkness blanketed the city, every light for miles bursting.
“Where is she?” I thundered, my voice matching the pitch of the
growing storm outside.
“I cannot say.”
The ground shook, a quake forming deep within Onuna—a fissure in the world. The floor burned beneath my feet, turning the carpet black. Car alarms blared outside, and buildings swayed. I didn’t remember moving, but my hand gripped his throat, and I lifted him high into the air. The runes on the floor faded, and Roccurem’s form wavered, smoky stardust dancing off his body in tendrils.
“Godsdammit, Roccurem, tell me!” I did not care that my voice shook or that the tornadoes that spun from my power forced everyone to seek shelter. A natural disaster, a force of nature, was what my father’s guards would whisper of me, and now I understood why. Electricity jumped from my knuckles to his skin, blisters forming where it touched. They healed, but I knew they hurt all the same.
All six of his eyes opened, white and staring at me. “I cannot. No matter what you threaten or how you torture me. It must happen this way, or there will be no future for you or anyone. I forewarned you. Her choice must be her own. The path she determines shapes the world, and you nor I can intervene.”
“Why?” I bit out. “Because fate dictates it?”
“You are right where you need to be, god king. I only apologize for what else you will lose.”
Blind rage hit my gut at his threat, and the world shook. I adjusted to keep my balance and finally noticed what I was doing. I willed my power back, afraid I had caused a natural disaster that I could not fix, but Onuna still spun. The tornadoes died, and the shaking stopped. The silence that followed was nearly deafening. I took one breath, then another, pulling every bit of my destructive nature back into myself. The clouds dissipated, and the rising sun burnished the room. Everyone stood, looking at me with
wide eyes.
I released Roccurem.
“Roccurem, if she dies….” I swallowed the growing lump in my throat and tried not to sound quite as foreboding as I felt.
Roccurem’s head jerked back as if something far away from this world had screamed his name. His form bent, his body melting into a swirling
mass of energy and stardust. He stepped back, the darkness pulsing and his voice resonating all around us. “And the world will shudder.”
My chest heaved, and my hands shook, his words hovering in the air. I reached for his retreating form but stopped when my instincts flared in alarm. Something was coming. A current anchored in my skin like a thread in the universe snapped taught. It yanked, and I looked up in the direction of the pull. The beginning vortex of a portal formed in the ceiling, flames defining the circumference. Screeches raged above, resonating through space and time. Adrenaline surged into my system, and I had a split second to realize what was happening before the Irvikuva exploded from the portal.
They poured into the room in a flurry of red eyes, wings, and claws.
The Hand summoned ablazed weapons as one, bright lines flaring to life on their skin. After centuries of working together, they did not need a command from me. Cameron cut the head off the Irvikuva stupid enough to target him with one powerful swipe. Imogen leaped and flew through the air to cut two of the beasts in half. Xavier threw the circular blades he carried, gore showering us like rain before they returned to his hands.
I summoned my blade amidst the chaos, but Logan fell at my feet before I could enter the fray. My heart skipped a beat as Neverra landed on top of his bloodied and bruised body with a grunt. Neither looked at me, their eyes wide and transfixed, locked on the portal. I looked up, feeling her
before I saw her.
Dianna.
I dropped my sword and rushed forward, catching her falling form. Her body jerked at the landing, her hair spilling across her shocked face. She was filthy, covered in bruises and cuts, some still open and bleeding. The scent of her blood made me feral. She was battered, dirty, and pale, so pale.
“You caught me?”
It was a whispered question as if she couldn’t believe it.
“Always.”
I looked up at the closing portal, aching to get through and finish this.
Only the weight of her in my arms kept me grounded. Crimson eyes stared back, focused on her with wrathful hunger.
Kaden.
Seeing where she had landed, no more Irvikuva dared venture through.
They stayed by their master, their wings tucked tight and jaws snapping.
Kaden didn’t move. He remained still, staring at her until, with a snarl and a twist of his lips, the portal closed.
I inhaled deeply and glanced at Dianna, tightening my grip when I realized she clung to me. Relief washed over me, the feel of her in my arms a soothing balm to the ragged wounds formed by thinking she was gone. I went to one knee, supporting her legs against my thigh so I could brush back the strands of hair clinging to her face.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she said, her gaze still focused on where the portal had been. Pain twisted her features right before her eyes rolled back, and she fell slack in my arms.
OceanofPDF.com
