Page 9 of Grim and Oro (Lightlark)

CALCIFIED

Dreks shoot out of the scar, one after the other, filling the sky with their screeches. One of my warriors is torn in half, his blood blanketing the dirt. Another is gutted.

I fling my arm out, shadows thinning into slivers sharp enough to decapitate one after another, after another.

I grind my teeth with the effort. These are no normal creatures; they are cursed warriors, beasts that were made , and their hides are nearly impenetrable. Only the strongest of my shadows affects them at all, and lately the process has drained me.

I need to close that scar.

There is only one metal that can pierce them, and we have little of it left. One of my warriors begins shooting metal-plated arrows, and I watch a drek go down. Another.

There are dozens more.

I portal right next to the scar, narrowly missing a razor-sharp talon.

The metal barriers that kept the length of this tear closed are now shredded.

Fuck .

The only surefire way to stitch the ground back together is with calcified shadows, which are difficult and painful to create.

The very throne I sit on was created over years. I don’t have years. It’s possible I have mere moments , since my strongest warrior—the one with the arrows—is now in pieces at my feet.

I sigh. I didn’t want to do this. I never want to do this . But now, there’s no avoiding it. I surround myself with a barrier of shadows and close my eyes.

Pain is power .

Those are the words my father spoke to me centuries before, and they’re true. They’re useful .

I don’t usually need pain to release my power. It’s strong enough on its own. I’ve been able to rule with the fortress locked around my feelings and memories. For centuries, I did. But not anymore. Not now that these creatures threaten to turn everything I’ve sacrificed for to dust.

With a shaking breath, I release the snare around my emotions and memories and let them all come rushing out.

Agony , at watching Laila’s eyes lose their light. At realizing my own powers, and lack of control, killed her. I killed her .

Suffering , as the cruel guardians cut my skin, layer by layer. So much pain that even killing them, one by one, when I assumed the throne, did not relieve any of the anguish.

Sadness , at not being allowed to know my mother. At learning that I never would, because my father sentenced all the Covets to death after they bore his children.

He killed them all. He killed anyone I ever had a chance to care about.

Then—loneliness. Perhaps the most agonizing feeling of all. It’s a pain deep like a well, dark and endless, a night without stars. And it’s worse now that I’ve tasted paradise.

I stab at this pain, bleed it all out, claw to the very bottom of my power.

And it all comes rushing out.

My bellow splits the sky in half as shadows explode out of me—spreading across the gap in the scar, then hardening with a sickening wail.

My arms shake with the effort, my chest constricts with the pain, more mental than physical.

Every rack of agony through my body is a stitch that finally closes the chaos.

The dreks stop. I watch as they try to crash through my barrier and fail.

The creatures still in the sky shoot down at me like throwing stars. My power unfurls, itching to do something with the remnants of this pain, with the hatred that has surged in its aftermath. My shadows rise, coating my hands and arms, dripping all the way to the ground.

I look up at the creatures and smile.

Power explodes out of me, unleashes, over and over, until the dreks are in pieces. Until the fortress around my feelings is locked once more.

Until my heart hardens again, just like those calcified shadows.

My efforts could have killed me.

Using pain as power is effective ... but dangerous. It’s easy to let it run through your fingers, until it’s gone completely.

I should know better, I should have more control, but for some reason all my emotions feel rawer than usual. Exposed.

A knock sounds on my bedroom door. I sense the shade of feeling outside of it. Astria .

“Come in.”

She opens the door and stills when she sees the state I’m in.

“You almost died, didn’t you?”

I don’t deign to respond.

She shakes her head, and begins to pace. “You need more help on the scar. Let me send another legion. We can move the forces at—”

I wave the suggestion away. “You’ll just be giving more food to the dreks.”

It’s true. Still, Astria’s expression hardens.

She cares about the warriors she oversees, not just as forces for our purposes, but as people .

Her feelings are her failing, but she’s done a better job to strategically employ our forces across the island than I ever could, and she’s never betrayed me. Unlike my former general, apparently.

“Then allow me to go with you next time.”

“Perhaps,” I say, knowing I likely won’t. Astria is one of the few people on my council I actually trust. She’s not after anything others are. Not money, not acclaim. She works quietly and efficiently, and I admire her for it.

“What are we going to do about this?” she says. “First the dreks. Then, storm season will be starting.”

She’s right. It’s been years without them. The deadly storms are bound to start up again.

Every year, there is another problem. Another obstacle.

I’m tired. So very tired of all of it.

“I’ll figure something out,” I say.

Her belief in me has never wavered. But for the first time, I feel something new ... fear . She’s afraid for our lands. For our people.

I am too.

Astria leaves, and my eyes close once more. There’s some comfort, I think, to the darkness. In it, I can almost imagine our problems have vanished.

But seeing Astria has reminded me of her cousin. My previous general.

The Wildling’s father .

He was loyal to a fault. It’s why I never questioned his disappearance. I figured he died. It’s still difficult to consider another possibility.

He was more powerful than all my men combined. He had impenetrable armor. He was as cold and unfeeling as I was, and that made me trust him. He didn’t suffer from the whims of my other warriors.

Side by side, we battled the dreks. He saved my life more than once.

Without him, I wouldn’t have been able to keep them at bay for so long.

He was the one that helped me implement the metal barriers that have held for decades, the ones that are now starting to give way.

If it wasn’t for the fact that I could feel his emotions—feel his lack of emotion—I might have even been threatened by his abilities.

I might have believed he planned to overthrow me.

Then, we discovered a way to stop the creatures forever.

Cronan’s sword: a blade that controlled them, a weapon that had been lost for centuries.

Together, we worked to find it. We followed countless leads.

I made him the relic to make searching for it easier.

I’ll never forget that look as I set it in his hand—a look of gratitude .

I hadn’t dug into it. I had assumed he was grateful for the honor of having been gifted something from his ruler.

Now ...

Perhaps he wanted to leave. Perhaps it’s what he always wanted.

When he didn’t return from that last quest to find the sword, I didn’t look for him. The only way he would turn his back on his duty was death. I believed that with every shred of my being.

With him lost, the search for the sword dwindled. And now, here I am. Decades later, still dealing with the same problems.

I feel my nostrils flare as I consider his choices. If he hadn’t betrayed me, we might have found the sword. We might have ended the dreks once and for all.

If he hadn’t betrayed me—

She wouldn’t exist.

Along with the realization comes a mix of happiness and fury.