Page 61 of Moonlit Desires
Chapter twenty-two
Riven’s Sacrifice
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The walls of the Thorn Queen's stronghold breathe with malevolent life, expanding and contracting in rhythmic pulses that send tremors through the stone beneath Lyra's feet.
Thorns protrude from every surface, their tips glistening with something too viscous to be dew, too luminescent to be poison alone.
The mark between her shoulder blades throbs in response, a cold fire that spreads outward with each step deeper into this nightmare labyrinth.
"We should have stayed together," she whispers, the words hanging visible in the chill air before dissipating into mist. The corridor narrows ahead, thorns reaching farther inward like grasping fingers.
Riven moves beside her with predatory grace, his formal Court attire incongruously elegant against the grotesque backdrop of living thorns. His shadows extend before them like liquid night, flowing along the ground and walls, probing for dangers hidden beyond ordinary sight.
"Four paths, four guardians," he replies, mercury eyes scanning the darkness ahead.
"Besides, I'm better company than Kael's insufferable nobility or Thorne's barely contained aggression, wouldn't you agree?
" His voice carries its usual sardonic edge, but something softer lurks beneath—concern, perhaps, or fear carefully masked as indifference.
The decision to split up had come after reaching a junction where the stronghold divided into four distinct paths.
Ashen's trembling hands had sketched what his prophetic sight revealed: separate routes eventually converging at the heart of the Queen's power.
Time was their enemy more than the thorns themselves.
"I still don't like it," Lyra admits, stepping carefully over a cluster of barbs erupting from the floor. The air grows thicker with each breath, carrying the metallic tang of blood mixed with the sickly-sweet scent of rot. "It feels like exactly what she wants."
Riven's shadows return to him, curling around his ankles like affectionate serpents before stretching outward again. "The Queen of Thorns always gets what she wants," he says, the scars on his forearms glowing faintly beneath his sleeves. "That's rather the problem we're here to address."
His attempt at levity falls flat in the oppressive atmosphere.
Lyra's mark pulses sharply in response to his words, sending a jolt of silver pain down her spine.
She gasps, one hand flying to the wall for support before she remembers the thorns.
Riven catches her arm before she makes contact, his grip firm but gentle.
"She knows we're here," Lyra says unnecessarily, the statement obvious in the way the corridor seems to contract around them, in how the thorns angle inward like sentinels tracking their movement.
"She's always known," Riven confirms, his shadows growing darker, more substantial as they approach what must be the heart of the fortress. "The question is whether she knows what you've become."
What she's become. The words echo in Lyra's mind as they continue forward.
Since escaping the dream-trap, her power has evolved, the silver light beneath her skin no longer merely responsive but active, seeking.
The mark that once caused only pain now serves as conduit for energy that feels increasingly her own rather than merely channeled from elsewhere.
The corridor widens suddenly, the ceiling soaring upward until it vanishes in darkness too absolute to penetrate.
Even Riven's shadows cannot reach its heights, returning to him with no information.
The walls here pulsate more vigorously, thorns growing and retracting in patterns that seem almost deliberate, as if spelling messages in a language of pain and puncture.
"It's feeding," Riven observes, his voice dropping to barely above a whisper.
"The entire structure—it consumes energy from those it captures.
" His mercury eyes dart to a recess where something that might once have been fae lies desiccated, thorns penetrating what remains of its body at precise intervals. "We should move faster."
Lyra nods, unable to speak as her mark responds to the grisly sight with renewed intensity.
The silver light now bleeds visibly through her clothing, illuminating their path with inconsistent pulses that match her accelerated heartbeat.
Riven's shadows dance in the silver glow, stretching and contracting as if tasting its quality.
They walk in tense silence, the only sounds their measured breathing and the soft whisper of thorns shifting position as they pass.
Riven's shoulders tighten incrementally with each step, the casual grace of his movements giving way to combat readiness.
His shadows extend farther ahead, becoming more substantial, forming shapes with teeth and claws that dissipate almost immediately upon creation.
"You're afraid," Lyra realizes, the observation slipping out before she can reconsider it.
Riven doesn't look at her, his profile sharp against the gloom. "I'm cautious," he corrects, but the slight tremor in his left hand betrays him. "There's a difference."
Before she can press further, they arrive at an archway formed from interlaced thorns, their surfaces coated with a substance that drips slowly onto the threshold.
Beyond lies a vast chamber, its dimensions impossible to determine in the inconsistent light.
The ceiling, if one exists, remains hidden in shadow, while the floor stretches out in concentric circles of alternating stone and living growth.
"This is it," Riven murmurs, his shadows pooling at his feet as if reluctant to proceed. "The heart of her power."
Lyra's mark burns with cold fire, the sensation no longer merely between her shoulder blades but spreading through her entire body.
Silver light traces her veins from within, momentarily visible through her skin before subsiding again.
"She's here," she whispers, certainty flowing through her alongside the strange power. "Not physically, but her essence."
They step through the archway together, Riven's hand brushing against hers in a gesture too brief to be accidental, too gentle to be merely protective. His shadows surge forward once more, sweeping the perimeter of the chamber while they advance cautiously toward its center.
The attack comes without warning.
A section of wall that appeared identical to all others suddenly pulses outward, thorns rearranging themselves with impossible speed to form a humanoid shape.
The sentinel materializes fully in the space between one heartbeat and the next—a creature of twisted barbs and animate shadow, its approximation of a face featuring only a gash-like mouth lined with needle-sharp thorns.
It lunges directly for Lyra, moving with speed that belies its seemingly rigid construction. One arm elongates mid-motion, transforming into a barbed spear aimed directly at her heart with devastating precision.
"Lyra!" Riven shouts, his body already in motion.
Time slows to excruciating detail. Lyra sees the sentinel's barbed appendage approaching, sees Riven's shadows surge toward it too late, sees his body inserting itself between her and certain death with fluid grace that speaks of choice rather than mere reflex.
The impact sounds like wet cloth tearing.
The barbed spear punctures through Riven's elegant clothing, through skin and muscle and beyond, emerging partially from his back in a spray of blood too dark to be entirely natural.
His shadows convulse around him, their usual fluid movement becoming erratic, fragmented.
His mercury eyes widen in shock, meeting Lyra's for one perfect, terrible moment of complete openness.
No walls, no sardonic distance, no careful calculation—just raw vulnerability as the poison enters his system.
His lips part as if to speak, but only blood emerges, black threads of corruption already visible beneath his skin where the barbs remain embedded in his chest.
Riven collapses to his knees, then pitches forward onto the stone floor. His shadows, once so vital and responsive, flatten into ordinary darkness beneath him as his blood—shot through with ribbons of black poison—pools outward in a steadily expanding circle.
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Lyra drops to her knees beside Riven, the impact sending sharp pain through her legs that she barely registers.
Horror floods her system, turning her blood to ice as she watches his normally vibrant shadows grow dull and sluggish around his body.
They stretch toward her weakly, like dying things seeking one last touch of warmth before oblivion claims them.
Blood—far too dark to be natural—seeps through his elegant clothing, the fabric drinking it in greedily until it can hold no more, releasing the excess to pool on the stone beneath him.
The sentinel retreats, a grotesque sliding motion that carries it back toward the wall from which it emerged.
Its mission accomplished—the Queen's herald has delivered its message in the most visceral way possible.
It observes with eyeless malice, thorns rearranging themselves in what might be satisfaction before it melts back into the living architecture of the chamber, becoming indistinguishable from the other protrusions that line the walls.
"Riven," Lyra whispers, her voice breaking on his name.
Her hands hover above his chest, uncertain where to touch that won't cause more damage.
The barbed appendage has left a jagged constellation of punctures across his torso, each wound pulsing with unnatural darkness.
The poison spreads in visible tendrils beneath his skin, following the paths of veins and arteries in a ghastly parody of his own shadow magic.