Page 23 of Blood Sings (Beyond the Gloom #1)

“Like shooting fish in a barrel, huh?” Harbinger quipped, mimicking Terraknight’s voice.

Moonlit hair fell onto his forehead as he wiped his blade against his thigh. His unexpected grin made my breath hitch. Moonbeams glinted off his sweat-slicked skin, highlighting every ripple of muscle. If only he weren’t so infuriating, I’d freeze this image for later study. But, Derzelas, he was driving me insane.

Terraknight barked a laugh, his vision shaking with mirth. In his periphery, Harbinger’s citron irises blazed with unquenchable fire, staring straight at me. A muscle twitched in his jaw, making my pulse skitter.

He narrowed his eyes, then fixated on a shadow in the street. “Harbinger to Black Guild. Let’s wrap things up.”

Hummingbird’s response made me jump. “Roger that. Captain… make them suffer.”

“Kill them all,” Quakelord interjected, followed by Gale’s softer, “Be careful.”

Similar replies flooded in, but none clued me in on Harbinger’s plan. My teeth hurt as I grunted, “Set Harmonization target, Outlier Harbinger.”

The familiar pressure in my skull returned as I restored our link. “Harbinger, wait for—”

“Projector Tepes!” he growled, whirling to face Terraknight. Adrenaline surged through him, that same rush from his earlier rampage. “From this point forward, I need you to stay silent. You’ve done enough.”

Asshole .

Oh, he and I were definitely going to have words. Loud, violent words.

The ground shook, walls groaning as another lava wall rose, dimming the stars. Fear coiled in my intestines like a thorny vine.

Harbinger looked up, the blazing glow illuminating his features. Good God… was he smiling?

“If you won’t punch him, I will,” Selena muttered in my head.

I shifted Transpection to check on her and met half a dozen Stalkers staring blankly at me. Dark blood sprayed everywhere while Hummingbird and Gale sliced the immobilized creatures with invisible air blades.

Wrinkling my nose, I shifted focus back to Terraknight just as a blue fireball streaked past and intercepted a barrage of ice shards meant for him and Harbinger. The fire sizzled, then died out.

Harbinger leaped into the open, zigzagging between lines of fire. Alone. Again.

Worry and frustration battled for dominance.

Five Nebulas closed in, trapping him. Harbinger blurred, ducking and spinning to evade their leprous arms. Instead of killing them or fleeing like any rational outlier, he circled back, toying with them.

“Anytime now, Terraknight,” he bellowed, skirting a blow aimed at his face.

My boots pounded against the broken pavement, but I heard nothing over the high-pitched shrill ringing in my ears. A legion of Glacies soared at the captain, their matted gray hair gleaming like tarnished silver. Breathing raggedly, I halted and hurled my magic at them. Blank minds fell apart, winged bodies falling limp like broken dolls.

Terraknight groaned, thrusting his fists downward. The earth responded, erupting in jagged spikes and massive boulders, obliterating every Stalker in range. But more were coming, their savage, bloodthirsty shrieks tearing through the darkness. More always came.

“Black Guild, take cover!” Terraknight commanded, joining his palms. The earth quaked and rolled, sending shockwaves that reduced his creations to fragments.

The outliers obeyed, but I was too late. An explosion of miniature shards hovered for a second, then slashed through the incoming hordes like a flock of razor-sharp birds. A searing cut sliced my cheek, healing on the spot. Dozens more stung my right side, ripping through my suit. I shielded my face, my arm absorbing most of the impact as the remaining fabric of my suit soaked up blood from already-healed cuts.

My pulse throbbed, syncing with Terraknight’s heavy breaths. He looped the debris in a wide circle and settled it on the ground, the scrape of stone against stone hurting my eardrums.

Across Harmony Street—the irony!—a ten-foot Ignis extended its limb, tracking Harbinger. A hiss forewarned the eruption of lava beneath the captain’s feet.

No!

I braced for his death, the pungent smell of struck matches burning my nostrils. But just before the inferno could touch him, Harbinger… vanished.

He reappeared like a glitch, hurling a portal like a frisbee, cleaving the Ignis in half. The steaming torso flickered and disappeared. A fountain of black, rotten blood showered over Harbinger, darkening his moon-white hair. The stench of putrefaction stung my eyes.

The bottom half swayed and slammed down. Guts spilled from the stump. My stomach spasmed, and I retched, almost soiling my boots.

Harbinger wasn’t just portalling at speeds I could never hope to penetrate his mind—he was butchering Stalkers and sending their parts Derzelas-knew-where. Another heave wrung my insides. How am I going to survive him?

The earth buckled, nearly sending me sprawling. A seven-foot stone wall ground upward and forced me to stagger back. Only then did I register the savage claws raking the other side and the bone-chilling howls.

I’d been so lost in my thoughts, I’d missed the Limuses charging at me. Dark Father, help me. Lead filled my bones, rooting me to the spot. A spike of adrenaline made my insides curl, wither, and die.

Terraknight materialized inches from my face, his narrowed gaze assessing me like he was sizing me up for a coffin. His grip on my arm was iron clad.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he snarled, giving me a brutal shake. “You either help or get the hell out of here. I can’t keep you alive and do my damn job!”

“But Harbinger…” I protested weakly, my voice sounding pathetic even to my own ears, “he’s—”

“He knows what he’s doing,” Terraknight cut me off with a shove. “You clearly don’t!”

He vanished between the buildings, leaving me alone in my shame. It seared within me, consumed me. I’d been so desperate to prove myself, I’d lost sight of the mission: defeat the Stalkers, save the Tenth Ward. Harbinger was more than capable without my interference.

I… I was a liability.

Jasmine bloomed among the choking smoke and spilled guts. Selena blurred at my side, a mean scowl twisting her brows. Her wide eyes locked onto Harbinger.

“What’d I miss?”

I followed her gaze to where Harbinger was warping in and out of existence, leaving a trail of smoldering, incomplete bodies in his wake. I counted the Ignises surrounding him. One lingered close, while six others circled at a distance, likely pooling their power for a Magma Lance. His presence had distracted me from the goal. His well-being had clouded all judgment. Why did I care? Why did his mortality plague me, above even my own safety?

“My pride getting kicked in the gut,” I muttered, though I doubted she heard me.

Harbinger raised his hands, grasping the air with curled fingers. Veins bulged in his arms as the space before him shimmered, then tore open with a crackling hiss. He molded the smoky rip into a crescent shape, sharp on both ends, spun, and jammed it into the Ignis sneaking up behind him. The Stalker vanished as the ‘weapon’ expanded into a vertical portal.

Selena’s jaw went slack. “Holy fuck, is he—”

“Yep.”

“How… how did he manage to trick the system?” Her voice trembled, thick with fear I’d never heard from her before.

“I don’t know. Maybe he concealed his magic in the camps, or he came into it after deployment. But this…” I gestured helplessly at the carnage before us, “taking down multiple Ignises on his own? It’s unheard of.”

“A,” she gripped my hand, “what does this mean for us?”

It physically hurt to admit. “It means he’s right. We’re in way over our heads.”

The Sparrow’s battles had never reached this level of complexity. If only he’d briefed us properly—

“Pearl, create a thirty-foot tide to push the Stalkers south,” Harbinger’s voice resounded in my head. “Make it dense enough to withstand their heat.”

“Roger that,” Pearl replied swiftly.

He tore through another Ignis, kicking its remains aside. “Quakelord, raise a mud wall to the north. Nebulas can’t penetrate it. The rest of you, herd the Stalkers toward me and secure the flanks. Box them in.”

Pearl and Quakelord emerged from the wreckage, eyes aglow with power. Her opalescent scales shimmered as she drew water from every source, even from the air itself, feeding the colossal liquid barrier. Opposite her, Quakelord’s hands sank into the earth, conjuring a thick mud rampart to meet her tsunami.

A high-pitched wail froze the blood in my veins.

Selena yelped, and we both spun around as dozens of Stalkers poured out from the shadows between buildings. Some took flight, leathery wings stretching out before Ember’s fiery anvil reduced them to ash. Others snarled and snapped at each other.

On the flanks, Gale and Hummingbird corralled them with invisible walls, herding them like sheep to the slaughterhouse.

Terraknight joined Quakelord and Pearl, his stone barrier rising as Phoenix’s wall of fire completed the cage, trapping the Stalkers inside. He crouched atop the wall, gaze fixed on the writhing mass of bodies below.

Through our link, I felt his focus, sharp as a knife. Above, the ieles hovered like vengeful angels, while Ember perched on a nearby roof, scanning for threats.

Harbinger portalled atop Quakelord’s mud bulwark, his feet planted wide, hands drawing circles in measured, large loops. His movements held a magnetic grace that belied the untamed power coming off him. He was a deity of pure violence. His citrine eyes were luminous as a rising sun, no longer appearing mortal.

The air flooded with his scent.

My stomach revolted, not in repulsion, but with a primal craving for blood—his blood. The weight of his growing magic consumed my reserves, his presence dominating my mind. I slid to the ground, leaning against a crushed boulder, each breath a struggle.

Between Harbinger’s hands, a dark cloud writhed like a miniature storm, flashing with golden lightning.

Terraknight looked down, and I gasped.

“Do I even want to know what you see?” Sel asked.

“No.”

Midway down the cage, a colossal pitch-black portal descended at a slow pace, grinding against the elemental walls with a sound like tearing metal. I held my breath, my head throbbing as if my brain was a balloon about to burst.

Howls screeched, bones cracked, and the earth absorbed every single cry. I felt them reverberating in my bones to my core.

The portal imploded with a thunderous crack, and I remembered to exhale. Moonlight glistened on the carnage like onyx gemstones. Viscous blood flowed freely from butchered carcasses. Every single one of them destroyed. Put down in the blink of an eye by his immense power.

I gagged, tasting rot, and switched to mouth-breathing as I shut off the Visor.

Today had been a nightmare. I’d discovered my guild captain was a varcolac—the Republic’s worst enemy. I’d died for five minutes, survived Selena’s rage, failed at blood magic, and witnessed Harbinger’s city-leveling rampage. The pain of our severed mental link still burned. If I could, I’d punch today right in its smug face.

Phoenix’s fire wall dissolved into a disk of wildfire and plunged us into darkness. Pearl’s water tide burst into rainfall, washing away the gore. The other two barriers sank back into the earth with a rumble.

And then silence.

I struggled to my feet, recalling my blood magic. The remaining Stalkers retreated north, back to their territory, their losses too great to continue fighting.

Harbinger portalled a hundred feet away, eyes still blazing gold. His gaze locked onto me, hot and pointed as an arrow, making my spine tingle. He stalked toward me, all lethal grace and simmering power. Every step promised instant violence if provoked, and I had not an inch of a doubt he’d deliver.

I knew I deserved it, but I wouldn’t take it quietly.

“You,” he snarled, and the sheer amount of pure contempt nearly knocked me over.