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Bria

W atching him crumple to the ground in the flash of white that bursts from Olaphina’s staff is agonizing, but I remain standing, not yielding to the urge to help him. It appears to be the same occurrence as yesterday—the blinding light the priests used to knock him out cold.

Yesterday, however, he was taking the rite. This time makes no sense. He may have been protecting me, but the Olaphina I knew would not attack her own son like that. Why didn’t he tell me she was still alive? That she was the high priestess?

He lied to me. Just like his father lied to my family.

I’m livid, so angry I think the heat in my eyes could sear him from where I stand.

And my body is in complete and utter chaos.

A storm of emotions brews throughout: my heart crushing from the weight of betrayal from the man I love; fear coursing through my veins with the knowledge that I am alone with these monsters; anguish at seeing him hurt like this.

Not moving. He’s not moving.

From where I stand, it’s impossible for me to tell if he’s still breathing and I don’t dare go check on him.

There’s no option for me to leave myself vulnerable around these two, and there’s the matter of vengeance to deal with.

Both of them deserve to die for hurting my family, Evander, and all of the innocents across the years.

The desire to inflict the same pain upon them, the same torture, far outweighs the other emotions warring inside me.

My palms itch, and without looking, I’m aware the shadows are creeping around my fingers.

I loose the grip I have on them just a bit, letting fire surge through my veins, heating my body from the inside out.

From the corner of my vision, I observe the curling tendrils whipping out from my arms and hands. But my eyes remain on Olaphina.

How Evander, the man I love, could have come from these two baffles me.

Olaphina was a wonderful mother, but now?

Now I cannot stand the sight of her, knowing who she has become.

And Aamon has always been a horrible excuse for human life.

Neither of them deserves to have a son like him.

Shadows lick my palms as the anger rises, and both sets of eyes on me widen.

Not in fear, but eagerness. Eager to see my display of power.

“You need to relax, Bria. It will be easier this way,” she coos. They’re words that are meant to soothe but instead turn to kindling for the blaze, making it rage even higher.

Her lip quirks, the slightest hint of a smile before she closes her eyes.

And there it is.

Like hands closing around my head, fingers prying into my skull. I feel a pull from deep within my core, tugging upward like there’s a string tied around my middle, connected to those invisible fingers on my brain.

She’s trying to take my magic, to pull my energy. To drain me. It’s the feeling from my visions. This is what she did to Nimai. The fire turns wild inside me now, stoked by fury and ire and blazing out of control.

The fingers tighten on the invisible thread and yank, sending a shooting pain straight through my spine and feeling like a heavy punch to the gut.

From top to toe it aches, and I would not be surprised to see real, visceral wounds sprouting up along my abdomen and straight up through my chest. I cry out in agony, the sensation shocking me and bringing me to my knees.

This wasn’t what happened with Silas. I never hurt him like this.This is different. Dark and wretched and awful.

My hands slam into the dirt floor beneath me, fingernails clawing into the soft ground.

I try to ease my breathing around the pain and a shudder breaks across my skin, goosebumps sprouting up and beads of sweat forming at my brow as I fight through the anguish.

The dark, shadowy mist swirls further around me, and the dirt stirs beneath my fingers.

Stirs. Why is it stirring?

For just a moment, I turn inward, away from the pain and to that odd and familiar sensation. Because there’s something here. Something that is teasing my magic, calling it out to play.

Bones .

“You had better rein it in, girl,” Aamon warns from beside the priestess, but I ignore him.

They feel my power and they see it. Aamon’s eyes are dark, his hand on the hilt of his sword, ready to kill me if he needs to.

“They were fools thinking you could be tamed. You’ve always been a wild card, even as a child. Your power is the only way to keep Azudora safe, girl. There are threats beyond your imagination. Back. Down.” He’s nervous now, making up excuses to keep me in line.

There are no threats to Azudora. Azudora is the world.

A smile pulls the corners of my lips up, a deadly smirk that I hope is the cause for the fear I see in Aamon’s eyes. He looks scared and he fucking should be.

Because this dungeon is a place of death. And I am born of the god of life and death.

Beyond the shadowy figure in the corner who hovers between the realms, there lay others who met similar fates and crossed over. I’ve found my way out. And it seems only fitting that these monsters in front of me end up slain by those they’ve murdered, brought back to life if only for a moment.

A moment to seek vengeance.

I keep my mind open and call to the bones, just as Cato taught me. I urge them to move, sewing them together until the bones stack on top of one another, quickly forming into a lurking figure behind Aamon. Whoever they killed was big, taller than Aamon. The skeleton looms above him.

Those fingers are still digging in my mind the whole time, trying desperately to get a solid grip on my gifts.

Searing pain splits through my skull and I’m vaguely aware of the garbled scream that tears from me, but I fight for focus.

I fight to keep the shadows swirling, not just around my body, but in my mind.

I force my power to slip through her fingers again and again, so she is unable to grasp the darkness, unable to pull and suck my power out.

Quiet. It’s so quiet.

Honestly, I’m in awe of that part. As my dead companion rises, straightening his spine behind Aamon, there is no sound.

No creak of joints or clack of bones hitting together.

Just the fire roaring in my ears, drowning out the world around me.

No one will ever hear my shadows or bones coming for them. Not until it’s too late.

I concentrate nearly all of my energy into the skeletal figure, allowing the dark shadows to spiral through the room. They pick up dirt from the floor and whirl it around as if a storm is forming right here, just in this one cell, a confined tornado that whispers the promise of death.

The deep mist swarms, making it difficult to see.

I can barely make out the glowing blue orb through the sheen of darkness.

So when her staff comes for me through the shroud, I almost don’t see her.

Olaphina is quick on her feet, but unfortunately for her, I’m quicker.

Ebony tendrils surge from my hands, entangling her arms and staff in vines.

They snatch the weapon of pain and destruction and send it clattering to the ground.

The thud reverberates through the room, but the orb remains glowing, the crystal staying strong and withstanding the impact.

At the same time, Aamon must have made a move, but I cannot see him through the cloud.

The only indication is the skeletal warrior readying.

I can feel it bend its joints before I get sucked in.

Suddenly, I’m able to see through its eyes as it watches him.

Aamon draws his sword, lunging, likely readying to deal a deadly blow. To me.

We dive for him, digging the fingers of jagged bones deep into his neck.

A sickening symphony of popping rings out as each finger shoots through the skin into the hollow near his collarbone, to his vocal cords.

Blood bursts from each hole, showering through the mist and splattering in a hot spray across my face, a copper tang flooding my mouth.

Aamon claws at his throat, a wordless scream trying to escape as he’s strangled by his own blood pouring out.

His eyes dart around wildly as he catches mine.

No. Not mine.

His own gaze catches empty sockets of the dead I summoned.

The satisfaction I feel at finally seeing the man who betrayed my father, the man who had him killed, meet his own demise…

It is unlike anything I have ever felt—a mix of elation and sickness forces bile up the back of my throat.

My stomach clenches and tenses, feeling like it’s somersaulting in my body and threatening to betray me.

Aamon goes down in seconds and the bones collapse to the ground beside him. My vision snaps back to my own body, sending me reeling back onto my ass. The slam to the dirt floor is jarring but I manage to maintain the shadows. It’s too difficult, too draining to keep the dead moving without Silas.

Olaphina remains tangled in the web of obsidian that twists around her arms and legs. My vision blurs—from rage, or the mist surrounding me, or possibly the magic pulsing through my veins, it doesn’t matter. My eyes are on her.

Trained on the real mistress of nightmares.

She isn’t fighting the vines, even with the thorns and spikes that drive into her flesh with every flick of my fingers.

Olaphina keeps her composure, her lids heavy as if the shadows are draining her, causing her to fatigue quicker.

It’s good, but not good enough. I lift my hand to move the vines.

She clearly is not in enough pain. And I can change that.