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At the next shudder, half the tunnel caved in and my heart stopped.

“Ari!” Gently, I guarded Mira at my back and dug through the dirt half-covering the opening. Ari had pressed his body against the side of the wall to avoid the spill. His skin was coated in damp soil, his body trembled from exertion. Those beautiful, soft, golden eyes held mine in the dark.

“Don’t you dare,” I said through clenched teeth.

“We’re out of time. This earth is going to give in and you need to take her from here, Saga,” he said softly.

“We fight these fights together, don’t you dare give up on me.” I reached my arms into the tunnel, no thought for the cracks in the soil, the snapping of trees. No thought but having my husband’s hand in mine, his arms around me.

“Together. You promised me, Ari Sekundär.” I sank deeper. Once again, Gorm gripped my legs. “This is not where our story ends. Now climb your ass out of this tunnel.”

Constant shudders sent more stones, more debris into the troll burrow, but soon Ari tightened his jaw. He began his climb, careful as he went. All around him soil was breaking. The strength and sturdiness of the burrow was failing.

“Saga,” he gritted out when it felt as though the whole of the isles were flipping upside down. “Go,gods. Go.”

“Give. Me. Your hand.” I was bathed in dirt. Clumps of it hung on my lashes, blurring my sight, but he was mere paces away. A few more movements and I’d have him.

He cursed, but reached for a jutting root. In a swell of shuddering soil, the burrow split in half.

“Ari!” I screamed. The crack was taking him in. “Take my hand. Jump!”

With no options left, Ari released his hold on the dirt wall and jumped across the crack, arm outstretched. I let out a cry of agony when his hand clasped my palm, yanking my shoulder painfully with his weight. In an instant, I grasped his wrist with my other hand.

“Climb,” I whispered, voice rough. “Help me.”

Ari was hanging over an open pit, all the walls caving in. He swung his body until his feet found purchase in what was left of the wall. Over my body, a thicker, broader form reached into the tunnel.

“Hold tight, My King,” Gorm’s gravelly voice followed. “I’m vastly stronger than the queen, and I will be taking hold of your tunic. It must be done.”

Gorm didn’t wait for a word before he reached over me, close enough now to grip the back of Ari’s top. Together, we heaved. The extra tug was enough to draw Ari to the edge, where he could hook a leg on the ledge and roll out of the tunnel.

His tunic was half-peeled off his back, his face coated in dirt, but he was bleeding free. In two breaths he had my body pressed to his.

“Foolish woman,” he gasped against my throat. “You could’ve been trapped or hurt or—”

“Stop talking.” I choked my arms around his neck, breathing him in. “Don’t you ever again tell me to leave you, understand me? It will not happen, you damn fool.”

Ari kissed my throat, then let out a shuddering breath once Mira nuzzled her way between us. He held us both, kissing our heads, my cheeks, Mira’s forehead.

“All gods.” Gorm shook us from the moment of relief. The blood lord did not gasp, not in such a way. He was rarely taken by surprise. But he was stunned now.

I lifted my gaze and cried out in fear. Ari positioned me behind him; I covered Mira with my body. The forest floor snapped and bent, great bursts of dirt and rock shot into the air like the bursting geysers in the Court of Blood.

But beyond them was a cloak of night. Shadows like clotted ink devoured trees, ferns, anything in its path was devoured. The darkness was speeding our way, too swift to outrun. We’d be taken.

This was the moment I’d always feared.

The moment our stories ended.

“I love you,” Ari said, holding his arms around me and Mira. He ducked his head. “To the Otherworld, I love you.”

His words were the last thing I heard before our world was swallowed up in cruel darkness.

Beginning of the End

Chapter26

The Phantom