Page 17 of Infernal Crown (Cursed Darkness (DarkHallow Academy) #3)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

LYSITHEA

Waking up from a deep, dreamless sleep feels different when you’re a god.

I close my eyes again, but that only makes it worse. Divine perception doesn’t need sight to function.

“You’re glowing again,” Dathan says from across the room, his voice carefully neutral.

I look down at my hands, watching silver fire trace patterns beneath my skin like luminous veins. The Crown’s power flows through me constantly now, transforming my body into something that can channel forces meant to reshape reality.

“I can’t turn it off. It’s like trying not to have a heartbeat.”

Verik moves to the window, studying the false realm we created through the dimensional portal. “Two more days. You need to be ready.”

Two more days to perfect the performance that will either save existence or damn us all. Two more days to pretend I want to unmake everything I love in service of absolute truth.

The terrifying part is how easy that pretence becomes.

“We should go to classes today,” I say, standing carefully to avoid cracking the floor. “Maintain the illusion of normalcy.”

“Is that wise?” Evren asks, watching me with the same expression he’d use for an unexploded magical bomb.

“I’ll be careful,” I promise, though we all know how empty that sounds.

I retrieve the Infernal Crown from its box, the metal warm against my palms despite the protective wards.

The moment it touches my head, divine authority settles around me like a mantle.

The silver markings on my skin pulse brighter, and my perception expands to encompass layers of reality I’d rather not see.

Then I remove it again, tucking it safely away. Wearing it to class would be the height of stupidity, but I need to practice channelling its power without the physical connection. The transformation it triggered flows through me, whether the Crown touches my head or not.

Leaving my room, we walk together toward the academic wings, though I can see my men’s tension like a shroud. They’re watching for signs that the divine influence is overwhelming my attachments, ready to intervene if I drift too far from the person they fell in love with.

The corridors feel smaller than they used to, as if my expanded awareness makes the physical space seem cramped and insufficient.

Students pass without giving us more than casual glances, unaware that a god walks among them.

The Crown’s power remains hidden beneath my skin, visible only to those who know what to look for.

“Advanced Theoretical Sorcery this morning,” I say as we approach the lecture hall. “Professor Malthorn is covering dimensional boundaries today.”

The irony isn’t lost on any of us. Two days before I’m supposed to “help” the grimoire breach every dimensional barrier that exists, I’ll be sitting in a lecture about why such breaches are theoretically impossible.

The guys leave me to attend their own lectures; this mundane activity is something that needs to be done, despite the anticipation and nerves that are running through us.

Malthorn discusses the theoretical limits of reality manipulation, the safeguards that prevent sorcerers from accidentally unmaking existence itself.

I bite my lip to keep from laughing as he lectures about the impossible—while I sit here with the power to accomplish it humming beneath my skin.

“The fundamental principle,” he explains, chalk scratching across the blackboard, “is that reality resists change. The greater the alteration attempted, the more power required to overcome that resistance. This is why universal transformation remains impossible despite centuries of research.”

If only he knew how wrong he is. With the Crown’s power, reality doesn’t resist at all. It reshapes itself eagerly, desperate to conform to my will. The grimoire’s vision of universal truth feels achievable, inevitable, righteous.

That’s the thought that terrifies me most.

The power whispers constantly, showing me how easy it would be to fix everything.

To reach across dimensional barriers and burn away every lie, every deception, every comfortable fiction that lets people avoid confronting harsh truths.

No more broken hearts from false promises.

No more wars fought over competing mythologies.

No more suffering caused by the gap between what is real and what people want to believe.

Just a clean, honest existence where everyone knows exactly where they stand.

“The temptation of absolute power,” Malthorn continues, as if he can read my thoughts, “lies not in its corruption, but in its apparent reasonableness. When you possess the ability to solve every problem, the refusal to act feels like moral cowardice.”

Divine power pulses through me in response, recognising the logic in his argument. Why should I preserve a flawed existence when I have the power to create a perfect one? Why should I value the freedom to lie when truth would eliminate so much unnecessary pain?

A student raises her hand. “But Professor, doesn’t free will require the option to choose wrongly?”

“An excellent question, Miss Harriet. The philosophical debate continues to rage whether imposed perfection constitutes genuine improvement or merely sophisticated tyranny.”

I grip the edge of the desk, feeling the wood warm under my touch. Divine influence makes the answer obvious: tyranny is when power serves itself rather than truth. What I’m being offered isn’t domination but stewardship, the burden of guiding existence toward its highest potential.

The rational part of my mind recognises this reasoning as exactly what the grimoire wants me to think.

But divine power carries its own perspective, vast and patient and utterly convinced of its own righteousness.

From that elevated viewpoint, the concerns of finite beings feel petty and short-sighted.

My hands move to my throat, fingers tracing the black collar. The marks glow warm under my touch with each heartbeat, reminding me that I chose this transformation to save the people I love. Not to perfect them, but to preserve their right to remain beautifully, frustratingly imperfect.

The lecture ends, and students file out with their usual chatter about assignments and examinations.

None of them realise they’ve just witnessed a philosophical debate about the exact choice I’ll face in two days.

I leave the lecture hall carefully, my feet touching stone that immediately shows stress fractures from proximity to so much contained power, and find my men waiting in the corridor, their expressions carefully neutral.

Their concern is like ice water against my divine warmth.

“How did it go?” Dathan asks.

“Educational,” I reply, then catch myself at the echo in my voice that makes the hallway’s stones resonate slightly. “I need to practice controlling this better.”

We make our way to the library, seeking a quiet space where I can work on containing the divine power that wants to reshape everything around me.

But with each passing hour, the Crown’s influence grows stronger. The vision of universal truth feels less like madness and more like inevitable necessity. The part of me that recoils from remaking existence grows smaller, quieter, easier to ignore.

“You’re talking to yourself,” Verik’s voice cuts through my philosophical musings.

I realise I’ve been murmuring arguments about the beauty of absolute truth, testing how the words taste when spoken aloud. The phrases feel natural, even compelling.

“I was practising,” I explain, though the words feel inadequate.

“Practising what?” he asks, his hellfire heritage recognising the divine power radiating from me. “How to sound like you’ve actually embraced the grimoire’s madness?”

His accusation stings because it contains an uncomfortable truth. The line between performance and genuine conviction blurs when you’re channelling the power meant to enforce that conviction. Every moment I spend thinking like a god makes it harder to remember why I chose to remain something else.

“I’m still me,” I insist, but even I can hear the uncertainty in my voice.

“Are you?” Evren’s question cuts deep. “Because from where we’re standing, you look like someone who’s starting to believe her own performance.”

Divine power flares at the challenge, authority bristling at the suggestion that my judgement might be compromised.

These finite beings, however beloved, cannot comprehend the scope of what I’ve been called to accomplish.

Their attachment to flawed existence blinds them to the beauty of absolute truth.

I catch myself thinking those thoughts and recoil in horror. The Crown’s influence is stronger than I realised, more insidious in its reasonableness. It doesn’t corrupt through obvious temptation but through logical argument, making tyranny feel like duty and destruction feel like mercy.

“Help me,” I whisper, the words tearing from my throat like shards of glass.

They surround me immediately, their combined presence grounding me in relationships that existed before godhood, before crowns, before the terrible weight of universal responsibility. Imperfect creatures who chose to love someone equally flawed.

“We’re here,” Dathan murmurs, his hand finding mine despite the heat radiating from my skin. “We’re not going anywhere.”

The contact helps, their presence and faith in me serving as an anchor against divine drift. But I can feel the Crown’s influence already reasserting itself, patient and persistent and utterly convinced of its own necessity.

In two days, I face the grimoire with a performance that grows more convincing by the hour.

The terrifying question is whether I’ll still be acting when the moment comes to choose.