Page 19 of Above (Darkness Reigns #1)

He moved with all the grace and stealth of a pampered prince.

In our world, he essentially was. Which only made his taunting and venom all the more aggravating.

He didn’t need to single me out. He simply chose to.

No matter how much of a threat I was to his purity plight, I still wasn’t a barrier to his cushy life.

Would he kill me simply for being other?

Would his family? The other cores? Could I survive this if they wished to see me fail?

Shaking my head, I tried my best to focus. My head was pounding, and I had begun tearing the skin off my lips without realizing. I switched to twirling my necklace instead.

Before he reached the parchment, it began to float upwards, landing in his palm as he turned to face us all with a crooked smile. A few people seemed to hum in appreciation, and I wondered if gagging would wound his ego enough that it would be worth his heightened fury.

“Our great ancestors who were first gifted magic often said that only the strongest can persevere. This sentiment has echoed across generations as our kind have grown stronger and more pure,” Altair read, his voice a raspy hush.

Forcing us to listen intently. For only a moment, he lifted his gaze, eyes locking with mine.

“To begin the grey phase, you each must walk the path the original twenty elites did. Upon their back they carried the weight of our future, and upon yours you will carry the weight of our past.”

Path. What path had they taken? The original twenty were the core family founders. Back when they had gotten the shadows, it was because they had been extraordinary killing machines. They had left destruction in their wake, decimating the entire planet. That was their path.

My hands found my bag, tugging it off my back. Return home. Go to my lab. Return. Return. Return. Re—

The weight in my hands disappeared, and I was left with only the leathers upon my skin. It would take quite a bit of focus to bring the bag back, but it was necessary. By the sound of that note, we were going to ruk.

Trying my best to melt out of the crowd, I slowly slunk to the back, separating myself from them. If I could be first, that would give me an advantage. I could see what our next steps were and think ahead. Whatever weaknesses I possessed could be made up for if I had a plan.

“Nova?” Stars above, this idiot. Looking over, I locked eyes with Talon Zade.

“What?” I hissed, grabbing his arm and tugging him down lower. Might as well come with me, little core leach.

“Where are we going?” he asked in a poor excuse for a whisper. I dared to peek behind him, groaning when I realized that Altair had spotted us.

“Well I am finding the path. You are getting in my way. Less than twenty-four hours of knowing you and I can already tell that you aren’t the smart one of your little clique.

” I let go of his arm, not wanting to take the chance of him trying to snap my wrist for the insult.

But instead he just chuckled and matched my pace.

Ignoring him, I scanned the nearby area, looking for any type of disturbance. This was our physical phase, but they would still be testing us in other ways. Were we strong enough to handle the weight of being an elite? No better time to see than day one.

Captain Zade, like the core family members before her, had been bloody.

She had killed those of us who didn’t make it in time, hunting them down.

She probably didn’t even find all of them.

Or maybe she had us all tracked and there really were only twelve?

Could she have killed for the sport of it?

No, she definitely would have killed me just to get rid of me if that were the case.

But either way, where were the bodies? She hadn’t brought them to the academy, but she had said they served as a warning to us.

That was when I realized what I was looking for. Corpses.

It was easy then to spot the flattened leaves and the trail of blood glinting beneath the lights at the entrance of the forest just beyond the towering gate. Things that showed what path we would take. What path the original elites had taken and what they had truly done.

Slaughtered.

Talon didn’t miss a step as I began heading for the gate. Scrunching my eyes, I tried my hardest to silence the storm in my mind, begging the magic to take me to the trees beyond the tall black poles. And, for once, I got it on my first try.

My shadows burned, hissed, and boiled inside of me, swarming my body as they moved me from where I stood beside Talon to the edge of the dark and silent forest. I wasted no time waiting for the core boy. He was not my problem.

It was nearly pitch black beyond the first few feet, but I could just make out a large group of what had to be packs ahead.

Yes!

Though I knew both Zade and Altair had seen me, I still tried to be quiet and stealthy as I rushed forward and grabbed the closest strap. When I attempted to lift it, I was instead tugged forward. Stars, this thing was heavy.

Bending down, I worked to tug the straps over my shoulders, having to contort myself to do so. When they were on, I secured the buckle, tightened the straps, and took in a deep breath.

Before I had learned how to put the weightless charm on my own bag, I had lugged it around dutifully. This was no different. I was capable of more than anyone knew—even myself.

“On three,” I mumbled, trying to will myself into compliance. Bending my knees and straightening my back, I readied to stand. “One.” I could do it. “Two.” This was going to hurt like a bitch. “Three.”

Sharp stabs of pain pierced my knees and back, the pack trying to pull me backwards as I stood. But after a few seconds, I was up, and I wasted no time from there.

Loose roots and overgrown weeds tangled around my ankles as I pressed forward.

Light would be necessary, especially when I didn’t know if there were predators—shaytan or animal—nearby.

My mind thought of the beautiful bursts of stars I often made, and then there they were, glowing around me like my own personal galaxy.

There was comfort to them beyond having my sight back.

It felt like I was carrying a part of myself.

The same part that Celeste thought I was losing.

My innocence and humanity, wrapped into twinkling lights that shone along the path.

Not the core family’s path, but my own. The one I was forging that would allow me to keep my family safe and finally be happy.

A particularly large tree root caught my foot, and I nearly tumbled to the ground. Grunting, I looked down and saw that the thing I tripped over was not a root, but a leg .

As I suspected, Captain Zade had left us a trail of bodies to follow.

This one was a rather petite girl, her long blonde hair tangled and matted with dirt and blood. She had a small, button nose and thin lips. Her cheeks were high and her teeth white. A look of pure terror was etched on her still face, the beauty stolen by the fear.

“You can’t help her, just keep moving,” came a familiar voice at my back.

“Not you again,” I grumbled, continuing on the dirt path instead of facing Talon.

“Clearly you don’t like me, but I do think your obvious distaste for the core families is blinding you to what I can offer.” His voice was husky, low, and almost…seductive? Was the pervert propositioning me as we were surrounded by dead trainees and who knew what else?

“I see no benefit in speaking to you at all, actually.” I was annoyed, but my mind still worked out the puzzle before us.

Twelve bodies could stretch only so far.

We passed over another, this one a boy with deathly pale skin and dark hair.

How would we figure out where to go when their weak and frankly pathetic excuse for a message was done?

They wouldn’t only have us ruk a few hundred feet. Which meant there would need to be another sign.

“I was raised by one of the combat colonels. That means something seeing as we are going through what my mother deemed the physical stage.” Ah yes, his oh-so wonderful parents who would kill me and anyone else they deemed a mistake without a second thought.

What a convincing argument. “I can help you, if you’re also willing to help me. ”

“What makes you think I have any help to offer?” I asked, stepping over another body. The forest was beginning to thin, the trees opening up ahead. Behind us, the others could be heard, just as a wolf howled in the distance.

“I think you know much more than any of us. There’s something about you—a look in your eyes that tells me you were born to be underestimated and are desperate to prove the world wrong.

” Sincerity bled from the breathy words, and I wanted nothing more than to scream.

How dare he analyze me? I wasn’t some character in a book he could assess and dissect.

“Well I think you overvalue your own worth.” Just then, we stepped through the final cluster of towering trees. I had been right about signs. One final body lay upon the dead grass, her hand pointing towards the mountain before us.

Talon glanced behind us, a groan of displeasure emanating from him. Then he reached out, snatched some of my twinkling lights, and tossed them in front of us. The bright silver dots morphed, shaping into the mountain.

“Twelve thousand feet high, give or take,” he said. “We will likely need to get to the top with whatever is in these fucking bags safe and sound. I don’t think there is necessarily a time constraint, but I do imagine that being first will benefit us.”

“How did you do that?” I asked in awe. His finger guided the depiction of the mountain, small statistics appearing in the air next to it. How tall it was. How far away the top was from our position. It’s volcanic state. Even what life existed on it. Tech. Talon was using tech.

“My mother was a cartographer before she married my father and became a combatant. They both taught me and my sister, Dove, everything they know.” He shrugged as he spoke, but I could tell that he was giving up valuable information by the way his jaw flexed.

Would this alliance of sorts actually benefit me? He could always kill me on the way up. Maybe this was a trick where he caught me off guard and attacked me. Or maybe his plan was to use me until I was no longer of value.

Well, I could always use him too.

“Fine. We can work together. But we’re not friends,” I said through clenched teeth. My finger went to his chest, poking him as hard as I could right where his heart supposedly was. “And the second you say one stupid, purist thing or try to claim I’m a mistake that needs to be corrected, I’m done.”

A smirk tilted the right side of his mouth up, his hand reaching out towards me. Sighing, I took it in mine and shook. “Deal.”