Page 63

Chapter 58

Prince

S omehow, hearing the words was worse than what they represented. The soft echo, followed by the unnerving silence as everyone held their breath, trying to decide if their ears had made some terrible mistake. No one even moved .

Because it wasn't Osiris, Rex interfectorem, that had called the Challenge.

It wasn't me.

Aaliyah stood with that driven confidence that could only come from years of facing monsters . I took her in slowly, her eyes wide but unrelenting, her focus forward on where the Sage sat just as quiet as the rest.

She stood in front of us, like a guard, keeping Sebek at bay with the steely look in her lavender eyes.

"I, Aaliyah Ra Imperial , Challenge Sebek for the title of Vampire Eternal," she said again, and hearing it a second time did nothing to help me understand the words.

Aaliyah Challenged Sebek.

Aaliyah. My Aaliyah.

A swirling of magic started under her feet, the will of the Sage sending a wave of discomfort down my spine as Aaliyah disappeared, just to flash into position in the middle of the room. Next to the bowl that had been conjured up, the liquid in it a silvery white again. I couldn't catch her eye, as Sebek appeared in front of her, looking like a beast himself, his face an impassible mask of rage.

She was so close yet so far away, too far. The need to be by her side was a fucking drive in my brain, but I couldn't move. My feet anchored to the floor as the Eternium locked us all in place.

She'd Challenged Sebek. The battles ahead, the obstacles … They would be ruthless. Savage. I'd seen events that had torn down so many men and women that I'd lost count . Only their names lived on now.

She'd taken that on without flinching. What was supposed to be my burden. Why, why ?

Eirik snarled viciously, Osiris's magic touching the air with the soft scent of fire. Even our allies watched with barely contained shock. It had all been a mess, Xander's betrayal, Sebek's show …

Now this.

"No," Sebek snarled, the first to break that unholy silence, his eyes flashing a dangerous red, his mouth nearly foaming as he leaned over the bowl. His hands slammed to the sides, the liquid inside sloshing. "Impossible. You're a Reaper, and a babe. You cannot Challenge me."

Aaliyah shivered, shaking her head as she clenched her hands tightly against her sides.

"I'm half Vampire. I was born in the Void nearly three thousand years ago," she said, unwavering. More whispers wrapped around us from the filled stands, no one willing to get any louder, like it might incur the wrath of the Butcher .

Or the Reaper.

"I am fit to Challenge," she said, not backing down even as he snarled in her face.

Un. Fucking. Relenting.

Whatever was left of Sebek's composure fractured, and his eyes went red as his fangs fell. They sliced his lip, and blood splattered across the Sage's pool.

"I won't allow it!" he screamed, managing a step forward.

His power, even put on a leash by the Eternium, swallowed the room, trying to force her to bow to it. Those same rules tied me down, even standing a chore as I tried to force myself to move. Osiris was by my side, his face sweating as he did the same.

There was a moment when I thought Sebek might try to attack, and I was disgusted with the way hatred rotted out what was left of the man behind his eyes. His hand twitched, his face contorted in pain and rage.

"That is quite enough," a voice echoed, and the room that I hadn't realized had fallen into complete bedlam fell silent again.

The Eternals were outraged, their heavy fearful breaths the only thing that could be heard now. Osiris grabbed my arm, the sharp chill of his exposed hand making me curse as I snapped my attention to him. I was fully ready to give him a piece of my mind until I saw his fucking face. Pallid, a fear that felt bone deep, as he looked toward that center stage.

Suddenly, the hair on the back of my neck stood, my blood pulsing so hard it was all I could hear. Saliva flooded my mouth, my vision tunneling. Eirik cowered, his eyes the clearest blue I'd ever seen. Adrian sank to the ground like so many others, his face so ashen I thought he might pass out. Fallon stood, barely, just enough to keep himself from falling as sweat slid down his gray-lined skin.

And I shook, too afraid to breathe, as I turned back to look at whoever had spoken.

"You have caused quite the stir, tiny death," another voice called. The gravelly tone carried something that shot me with a primal fear, forcing my heart to speed up. Power coated the room. Bathed it, swallowed it whole and spit it out.

"Is that …" Adrian whispered, swallowing several times as he tried to force himself to speak. Like he was calling the boogeyman forward. "Jesus Christ, they're here."

They were three of the most imposing creatures I'd ever had the misfortune of seeing. They stood on that center ground, in front of the Sage, looking down at Aaliyah. They towered above her and Sebek, so still they could have been mistaken for statues. The one that had spoken last resonated something in me, singing with my blood. He was a monster, with grotesque horns sprouting from his head, curling up and away from a wicked animal skull that sat where his face was. White eyes stared back at us. His skin was inky black, everything but his skull and eyes looking like it was dipped in midnight. His legs were long, double-jointed with ghastly clawed feet at the ends. Behind him sat a twisting thin tail that slashed through the air, making an audible whip sound. Loud enough that Eirik flinched.

This man, this beast … he was the Hallowed of Death .

Jesus fucking Christ, Adrian was right. They were here. The Hallowed Three were in front of us.

In front of Aaliyah.

"Quite the interesting turn of events. I wonder, how will they play out?" The next to speak was an opposing force to the first. Seeming to be the light in the darkness. He was almost human shaped, with the exception of his four arms and the wings that sprouted from his back that housed more eyes than I could count. He was missing a face, something that he made up for with wicked horns that sprouted up around his head, circling it like a corrupted crown. His bottom hands held something made of glittering gold that seemed so small in his deft fingers, an hourglass.

The Hallowed of Time.

"Davi. Than," Aaliyah said, breaking the silence in the way only she could. She didn't back down as she turned to them, the same way she had anyone she spoke to. Completely unbothered by their appearance, at least at first glance.

I let out a breath, so desperate to be by her side for this. Aaliyah had never been fearless … but she never backed down.

"This was what you wanted, wasn't it?" she asked, and I held my breath, watching as the two goliaths dipped their heads, the third and final chuckling.

The sound crackled in the air, like lightning about to strike.

"Clever is the beast that hides in the shadows," he said, to the right of Death. He was less a person and more a shapeless being. Every time he moved, the pieces that made up his body shifted oddly with him, like he could move them independently. His skin looked like it was painted with stars, almost fake with how oily it appeared … but the closer I watched, the more I realized the stars were moving . His eyes were black voids, no trace of light to be found. "Aaliyah, The Hallowed accept your right to Challenge."

The Hallowed of Space.

You could have heard a fucking pin drop, not even the likes of Darius making a mockery of themselves as we all just watched. Some neanderthal parts of our brains told us we shouldn't speak, shouldn't move, shouldn't breathe out of line. That if we wanted to live, we needed to wait for the danger to leave .

So, none of us did.

Aaliyah shivered, but she didn't hold that same fear. The shadows on the ground seemed to pull closer to her, breathing the same way she was. She'd said their names; I assumed ones they'd given her.

She saw them; she knew them.

And this had been their plan all along.

"Impossible," Osiris whispered beside me, his hand clenched so tightly I caught the faint hint of blood in the air.

"She meets the criteria set by the Eternals. This is final," Death called, almost daring someone to deny it.

His head dipped low, the hollow sockets that held his eyes flashing red as he bared rows and rows of dagger-like teeth. I wouldn't have been brave enough to flip him off behind his back …

"No, no! I won't allow it!" Sebek screamed, somehow not cowed like the rest of us were, something knocked loose in that brain of his, as if he could deny the will of the gods, our gods.

The ones we were born from, the Original Naturals. The fucking Hallowed .

They had come forward to allow this. Aaliyah was going to have to fight Sebek … One way or another. A battle of Wits, a battle of Endurance, or a battle of Strength.

She looked to the floor, then to the frothing mass that was Sebek. I would admit, it was nice to see him dragged through the dirt a bit. She lifted her hand, cutting her thumb on one of her fangs before extending it over the pool that the Sage had summoned. The Hallowed looked on, silent again like the crowd around us.

Her blood hit the water with a splash, Sebek's snarls lost behind the surge of magic that filled the air, a binding sliding over her open palm. The mark of a Challe, two triangles, points opposing . Sebek fought it all he could, his own blood already in the pool. The mark of the Challenged surging against his hand, burning.

The Sage marked their long scroll, the Hallowed dipping their heads, before Sebek and Aaliyah faded from the Sage. They appeared again in the crowd, Aaliyah next to us with a graceful sway, and Sebek just several feet from us in a furious heap that I couldn't find the will to worry about.

"Aaliyah … why?" I asked, ashamed by the brokenness in my voice.

I wanted to protect her. It was all I wanted. I spent so long having to watch her suffer, having to fight my guilt to smile for her when she did the same for me. I didn't want to be useless anymore.

This was supposed to be my fight.

Aaliyah smiled as she turned her head to look at me, as if taking the world on her shoulders didn't bother her. The sadness in her eyes was drowned out by the love there as she lifted her hand. The marks on her wrist glowed, and she glanced among us.

Her eyes lingered, settling on each of the men that she'd caught in her tender web.

"Because you can't fight him," she said with a steadfast certainty that made me damned well believe her.

"What do you mean?" Osiris asked, that same cracking in his voice.

"He's not scared, not at all. Because you can't fight him," she said, and Sebek froze.

There was a methodical calculation in her eyes when she said it, the way she watched him turn to her. His face twisted, a mix between pride and rage.

"I don't think Turned can hurt their Makers. He wouldn't be treating you so offhandedly if you stood a chance. Why else would he keep you all alive when he'd already killed the rest?"

Her words were a smoking gun that was set off by the way Sebek tried to rush at us, caught in the ties of the Eternium. He strained against them, his eyes red, blood slipping down his nose and over his top lip as he fought a magic that outweighed even him.

"Because we'd never be a threat to him," Osiris added, shaking his head.

"Exactly," she said, nodding one more time. "If you fight him, you die. He doesn't want to kill me. That gives us more time."

"Time. Always time, " Mags whispered, butting in and silencing the conversation, looking more wrecked than ever as they came to my side. Their hair, now that inky black, was frayed, waving chaotically around their head, matching the sunken gray under their eyes. "One soul mirrors the other, and another piece of you to be made whole lives again. Oh, what fun we'll have."

They sucked in a hard breath, head snapping to the center, eyes landing on the Three, though none of them paid the fevered Sorceri any mind.

Always so helpful, really. What would we do without them?

"Mags—" I started, exasperated, only to be cut off by a devastating crack .

A deep groan filled the air, one that came from the body that had been lying prone on the ground. The one that had been conveniently forgotten about after Sebek's little magic trick failed … or that we'd thought failed.

Everyone's attention snapped to him as he writhed, spewing groans like he was dying all over again as he stood, almost like a zombie. Just as soon as it started, all sound from him stopped, his body twitching as if trying to figure out how to move.

Whoever the fuck this was, wasn't the man that had sacrificed himself for Sebek's glorious foolproof plan or whatever. His hair was charcoal black, skin so white it was nearly transparent, covered in a fine layer of blood that he seemed all too happy to spread across his face. But it was his eyes that really drew me in, made me pause. They were a wispy white, with a haze that came off them, fluttering around his head like smoke. When he smiled at us, he flashed fangs.

Fucking hell, I was going to be sick at the thought of Aaliyah's soul being tied to someone so fucking savage.

"Xiang," Sebek muttered, seeming as caught off guard as he had been when he'd first seen me again.

The man stumbled forward, and the Eternals gasped around us, staring on like onlookers to a slaughter in what was to be my new Colosseum.

"My sweet little one," Xiang purred, in broken English that seemed like it was tied together by loose string, pretending to be words. As though he'd never actually spoken the language, just heard it, and did his best to copy it.

He didn't look at Sebek, the man who seemed like he might be seeing a ghost, his eyes on the one fucking thing they shouldn't be on.

He was looking directly at Aaliyah.