Page 154 of Daughter of the Dark Sea

Raiden’s power exploded—and Kora had never experienced anything like it. It dwarfed her own. The skies thundered, lightning bolting through clear blue sky, crackling across the ship. The air cleaved in two, split apart as a cyclone tore up into the heavens, hurtling their way.

The soldiers rushed across the deck, and Raiden faltered as his magicbouncedoff them. Aryn fired arrows at the soldiers, but his arrows snapped in half upon impact. They were outnumbered, and they were all going to die, because of her—again.

Raiden turned to face Blake and Kora, and he held out his hand, squeezing an invisible force. Blake stumbled, choking, releasing her. She fell to her knees as Blake coughed and choked, clawing at his neck, gasping for air.

“Run, baby. Run to me!” Raiden yelled over the torrents of his power. She was no one’sbaby, but now wasn’t the time for that discussion.

Aerion stumbled onto the railing, his flight suit expanded. Skylar’s unconscious body hovered in the air beside him, blood dripping from her skull.

Kora pelted forwards as Barron howled with a thunderous might. This was it. She had a chance. That tiny kernel of hope exploded in her chest, threatening to blindly consume her as the thundering neared behind her. Desperate. She wasso desperate.Or was that Raiden?

“Hurry!”he screamed in her mind.

A wave of cold flashed through the atmosphere, and her back arched painfully, sharp metal slicing down her spine. Her right arm stretched out, reaching for Raiden as he frantically tried to grab hold of her. He was panicked, and it echoed deep in the recesses of her mind, his fear matching her own.

She wasn’t going to make it.No, no, no!

“Raiden, I can’t—”

Her other arm flung back, pressing into the side of her face as her scar flared with a deadly coldness that spread. It snaked down her jaw, curling under the metal collar, like frostbite clenching her windpipe, cutting off her air supply. Her body went rigid, her power fading. Raiden’s grasp was mere inches away, his warmth and presence crying out to her.

“No!”

Raiden’s cry was the last thing Kora heard as her mind and body were ripped back forcefully, dragging her into the cold clutches of death.

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Bring her back.”

“I’m trying, it’s like she’s holding on.”

“Just do it—but not too much. We don’t want her at full power.”

The cold receded. Voices faded in and out. A glimmer of light bled through the crack of silent darkness, and Kora retreated.

It was all too much.

She wasn’t ready to face the world—her world.

But here, she could be free. The silence was comforting, and the darkness soothed her. She floated through empty nothingness. No one telling her what to do, no one telling her what she couldn’t do. No one lying to her.

No one breaking her heart.

“Are your powers waning? Bring her backnow.”

The light cracked and she hissed, scarpering further into the depths of death. Small, intricate glowing vines spread from the crack. They were lush and green, with secondary smallerblack vines twirling around them. They searched the void, probing . . . hunting.

She kicked out at one and a voice jeered.“She’s fighting me. I’ve never experienced this before.”

As she descended, death’s cold grip becametangible.

Multitudes of hands clawed at her body, dragging her down, down, down.

“No! She’s . . . she’s going to Umbra.”

Ice bloomed in her lungs, her eyes, her hair turning to icicles. Her skin shone blue with death.

“What?”A loud bang thundered through the void. “Must I do everything!”