Page 21

Sweat and blood.

That was all this miserable bastard had given us, and I was tired of both.

“Why don’t we start carving,” Bastian said, as he flipped a dagger between his fingers. “See what spills out?”

We circled him, closing in.

The smell of ashroot was thick on his skin.

He’d tell us where she was, or Bastian would paint the walls with his blood.

“You gave him too much,” Valen said. “It’s potent—”

“You should have diluted it,” Bastian shot back.

Valen’s expression was blank. “If I’d diluted it, he’d already be dead.”

Bastian rolled his eyes. “We’re wasting our time.” He kicked a rusty chair across the room. “This bastard can’t even remember his own name.”

Power coiled in my hand and the Sage’s eyes widened, but he didn’t move.

He was slumped against the stone wall, more shadow than man, all sunken eyes and yellow skin.

“Got no... nothing... to say,” he mumbled. His body twitched involuntarily, and a shudder ran through him.

Weak.

I glanced at Valen. “Your call.”

“Try not to kill him.”

My power unraveled and the tentacles of smoke streaked toward the prisoner. The pathetic Sage let out a choked gasp and his limbs jerked as the pale green tendrils wrapped around him. Ashroot did wonders for shutting down fear, but my magic dug deeper, snaking through flesh and bone to find the places where horror still lived. His expression twisted and his mouth fell open. Shuddering.

Bastian leaned in, a dangerous smirk on his lips. “Where is she?”

The Sage said nothing, and I tightened my hold.

“Why don’t we make him bleed— The grimoire would give us what we want, even if he doesn’t want to.” Bastian stared into the man’s frightened eyes.

The silence stretched, then broke all at once. “Wait!” the prisoner shrieked, the word a raw, panicked breath. “Wait, please, I—”

“You what?” Valen snapped.

The prisoner’s body arched as I clenched my fist.

“I don’t know...” he wheezed.

“Guess we’re killing him, then.” Bastian pulled the dagger from the sheath at his hip and spun it in his hand. “Slow or fast?”

Valen gave me a look. He wasn’t giving up yet.

We had been at it for hours and had gotten nowhere. The drug, the magic. It had all worn him to a husk.

He’d crack eventually.

He had to.

Valen dragged his fingers through the sweat that ran down the Sage’s cheek. “Who are you protecting?” he asked.

Bastian laughed, and even I could taste the cruelty in it. “What’s left to protect? Lucian won’t leave any of you fucks alive after this.”

He was right, but I also knew that my brothers and I wouldn’t stop until everyone involved had paid the price for what had been done.

Avril was ours .

Valen’s pale blue magic coiled around the Sage’s throat and crept over his face before winding into his flared nostrils.

“Make it easy on yourself,” he said. “Give us what we want and you’ll set you free— No more pain. No more fear—”

He turned away and threw his hands in the air. “You’re so boring,” Bastian groaned. He turned away and threw his hands in the air.

Valen didn’t pay attention to Bastian’s outburst. His fingers flexed in the air as his magic probed deeper into the Sage’s skull.

“I’ll get it out of you, the hard way—or the easy way.”

The Sage’s eyes rolled back in his head and a tendril of pale blue smoke from Valen’s magic curled up from the man’s tear duct.

He let out a strangled groan, a shuddering, awful sound that echoed off the stone walls.

“The... Spire,” he said, and the words broke apart in his mouth. “Let me—”

A slow grin spread across my face and I opened my hand. The tentacles of green smoke that had held him suspended in the air dissipated, and the man collapsed to the floor in a groaning heap.

“Free— Set me—”

Valen’s chin lifted. He twisted his hand in a sharp motion and let his power break what was left of the fallen Sage.

Fast and final.

We stood there, staring down at the corpse.

Valen spoke first. “We need to move.”

I looked at him, then at Bastian.

They both had the same gleam in their eyes.

Vengeance.

Ignoring the crumpled body on the stone floor, we gathered weapons from the cases at the wall.

I tossed a small dagger to Bastian. “Think you can keep hold of this one?”

He caught it with a flick of his wrist. “What’s your plan? I didn’t think anyone used the Spire anymore— It should be condemned.”

Valen slung a bag over his shoulder and looked at us. “It was,” he replied and glanced back at the body. “He wasn’t lying. I would have known.”

Bastian shrugged. “This won’t be easy.”

My smile was grim. “Worried?”

“Maybe we should ask our dead friend back there,” he said. He wasn’t worried at all. The only expression in his eyes was something wild and unhinged. “We’ll hit hard, we hit fast,” he said and I couldn’t mistake the way his voice was edged with the thrill of it. “No one will see us coming.”

I nodded.

They’d be waiting for us to strike, I knew that for sure, but there was nothing they could do to stop us.

Fingers of darkness spreading down through the clouds refused to touch the Hollowed Spire, as if the night itself feared to linger too near. Storm clouds loomed, and I wondered if Lucian had sent them over the city.

I wouldn’t be surprised.

Magic wrapped around the derelict building like smoke, coiling and uncoiling in sickly hues.

Bastian laughed, but there was no humor in it. “So much for shutting it down,” he said.

Valen’s eyes were sharp, fixed on the fortress. “It’s a trap.”

“Anything else you’d like to point out?” Bastian said wryly. “It might rain? There aren’t any lights around the perimeter? That the people inside that building are all fucking traitors?”

“We knew it would be like this,” I said through gritted teeth. “Don’t pretend to be surprised.”

Bastian shook his head. “What is Lucian going to do when he finds out they’ve been using this place behind his back?”

A storm of nightbirds in search of a roost for the coming dark took flight from the trees and scattered into the air.

“Do we have a plan?” Bastian said.

“Break down the door, kill anyone in our path, find Avril,” I replied stiffly.

Bastian snorted. “That’s not a plan.”

I didn’t look at him. “Do you have a better one?”

“No,” he laughed. “That works for me.”

We moved fast. There was no time for subtlety.

The front entrance was a mess of shifting colors and light, but it fell away with little resistance—Bastian barely had to tap it with his magic to push through.

I didn’t like it.

Not one bit.

We barreled through, expecting the worst. But there was nothing.

My brothers were on edge. I could feel it radiating off them.

Anxiety and anger in equal measure.

We followed a long corridor made of stones that echoed with old magic.

Atrocities had been done in this place.

Long before we were born.

When the Sages wielded their power like the Necromi.

But they were afraid of that power now.

The worst thing about all of this?

I had no idea if Avril was alive or dead.

I couldn’t feel her.

Since she’d placed the blood bond on us, I’d been aware of her every heartbeat—even her moods.

But since she’d been taken… there was nothing.

I hadn’t known I could experience that kind of loss—or that it was possible.

But Avril had made it possible.

No.

It wasn’t real.

It was the bond.

Magic.

Nothing more.

“Can you feel her?” Valen asked.

Irritation slithered up my spine at the neediness in his voice.

“No,” Bastian answered for me.

Valen’s boots were loud on the stone. “That’s what I was worried about.”

I spun around and slammed my forearm into Valen’s chest as I pushed him back against the wall.

His dark blue eyes were wide with surprise and his jaw clenched as his back hit the wall. “Hey!”

“You don’t get to be worried,” I growled. “It’s your fault she was taken. Your. Fault .”

Bastian grabbed at my shoulder to pull me back, but I didn’t move. “Titus, calm the fuck—”

“Don’t you fucking dare tell me to calm down,” I snapped, but I kept my eyes on Valen. “If you hadn’t gone behind my back—”

“That’s not what happened,” Valen protested. “She begged me—”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Bastian’s hand tightened on my shoulder. “Titus— we don’t have time for this!”

He was right.

Fuck.

“You’re not the only one who feels her absence,” Valen said evenly. “You can punch me in the face later. When she’s safe.”

Bastian tugged at my shoulder. “I don’t want to say he’s right, but he’s right.”

I pressed my forearm into Valen’s throat, but my brother didn’t flinch. “Fine,” I growled. “But when I knock you on your ass, know that you deserve it.”

I waited a moment longer before I released him and pushed Bastian’s hand off my shoulder.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” I hissed.

“Whatever you say,” Bastian chuckled. “You’re the one coming apart at the seams—”

“Don’t push your luck.”

I looked at the corridor ahead of us and the darkness beyond. “Where do we go next?”

Bastian shrugged. “Up?”

As good a direction as any.

Valen adjusted his jacked and rolled his shoulder. “We’ll work our way down.”

My younger brothers in agreement—I thought I’d never see the day.

We approached the stairs together and a sense of dread fell over my shoulders.

Every step felt like it should be our last—

The Sages, the Necromi— All of them had fallen before us with so little resistance that it felt almost too easy.

We were all thinking it.

We were all too stubborn to say it.

The stairs wound upwards, endless and bleak, and for a moment I wondered if she was even here.

What if we’d come all this way only for this cursed tower to tumble down on top of us?

But there was nothing.

No whisper of anything.

Then the magic hit.

It started as a ripple, a pulse, and we all stumbled back.

Bastian’s face was pale, shocked. “This... what is this?”

He doubled over, as if something in him broke, and Valen fell to his knees beside him, clutching his head in his hands.

“Get up!” I shouted.

They didn’t move.

Then I felt it, like claws tearing into my mind. I staggered back, caught off guard, and the world spun in slow, dizzying turns.

When it settled, he was there.

Lucian.

A mockery of a smile curled his lips. “You’ve been plotting against me, my son,” he said. “I can… feel it.”

His presence wrapped around me, tight as a noose.

His face was close, too close, and I felt the rush of a thousand old memories, like knives turning inside me.

I knew it wasn’t real. It couldn’t be.

But the dread that twisted in my chest was like a living thing.

“You’re going soft,” he said as he moved closer. Lucian’s voice dripped with derision. “I would never have expected you to give up control so quickly… and for what? A witch with pale magic— The daughter of a traitor?” His sharp chin lifted, but his pale eyes burned into mine. “She belongs to me . I will be the one to break her.”

I watched him, jaw clenched, searching for a crack in the magic, a way to tear through it.

His laughter was sharp and cruel.

“You were always a coward, Titus.”

The rebuke cut through me.

“Too afraid to take what’s yours. Too afraid of me.” He paused and his smile widened—stretched into a terrifying mockery of a grin. “When did you get so afraid, boy ?”

The ground tilted beneath my feet, but I braced my hand against the stone wall.

“I’m not a coward,” I growled. “I’m stronger than you— We all are. And we’re not afraid of you. Not anymore.” I glared back at the wretched ghoul that rose in front of me. “Avril will never belong to you—”

He wasn’t real. He wouldn’t be here lecturing us.

He wanted Avril back—

The air around me shimmered, alive and dangerous. But there was a crack in the illusion.

I fought against it and closed my eyes to focus on drawing my magic forward. Lucian’s expression twisted as the pale green smoke of my magic wound around the illusion, forcing it to bend and twist.

“ You’re the ones who are afraid,” I said, speaking now to whoever was controlling the wraith with my father’s face. “You’re the ones who will pay for your treachery with your wretched lives—”

I pushed against the pressure of the magic behind the mirage. Felt it bend...

“Your mother,” the image of Lucian gasped. “She wanted to kill you—”

“You’re full of shit ,” I hissed. “If you’re going to try to fuck with someone’s head, you’ll have to do better than that.”

And then it broke. The illusion unraveled thread by thread, until Lucian’s face twisted into a grotesque mask. A howl filled my ears and I pushed my magic harder into the cracks of the spell. The howl became a scream of pain, and a smile spread across my face as the phantom of Lucian fractured and fell away.

The world snapped back, harsh and clear.

I stumbled and then found my footing. I swallowed hard as my pulse pounded in my throat.

I looked around, searching for the others.

They were still there, caught in the same trap.

Valen was crouched on the stairs, his eyes wide, staring at something that only he could see. I moved closer and saw the flicker of recognition, of horror, in his expression.

The outline of his spectre was faint at first, and then it cleared.

A woman stood over him and her mouth moved with ghostly whispers.

Valen was frozen, every line of him tense and unbelieving.

I reached out with my magic and the illusion’s voice cleared and echoed in my ears.

“Why didn’t you try to find me? Why didn’t you look—”

Her voice was soft and mournful and I struggled to place her image in my mind—she was familiar, but why?

Valen shook his head, as if denying her words.

“You don’t belong here, Valen,” she said. Her image flickered like a dying flame as she reached for him. “You’re not like him— You’re not like them.”

I watched him, watched the torment in his eyes.

“You should have done something,” she said. “Avenged me— But you didn’t. You were too weak.”

His shoulders sagged, and I saw him waver, like he might shatter into nothing.

Lucian’s illusion had been hard enough to break, but this— this one was hitting Valen harder.

I grabbed him by the arm and hauled him to his feet. He fought against me, but only for a moment.

“It’s a trick,” I said through gritted teeth. “An illusion— Look through it. Force it back. Find the crack in the spell. There’s a traitor on the other side of it.”

He looked at me, dazed, unsure, then nodded as anger crept into his expression.

“Whoever that is… it’s not real,” I said.

Valen’s eyes narrowed, and then the pale blue threads of his magic wrapped around his forearms and snaked across the stones toward the spectre. The illusion appeared not to notice at first, and then its sweetness evaporated as the woman’s mouth opened to scream.

“You dare to stand against me? With the spawn of my murderer! A betrayer— Just like your father—”

Valen’s jaw tightened. “Find the crack,” I said firmly. “Focus on the caster—they’re weak. Frightened. Desperate. They know we’re coming and that they won’t survive.”

The woman’s form shimmered and her anger became a scream of pain as Valen’s magic tightened around her. A moment later, the illusion collapsed and dissipated. Valen staggered, but caught himself.

“What the fuck—”

“Shake it off,” I said. “Where’s Bastian—”

Valen pointed.

“There.”

He was on his knees, alone, at the top of the stairs.

He hadn’t seen us yet, hadn’t felt the world outside the trap.

I left Valen and went to him, ready to pull him out of it.

But then I stopped.

He was talking, his words were quick and sharp in the quiet. “Get out of my head,” he snarled.

There was no answer. No reply. Nothing but his own voice thrown back at him.

And then I understood.

He was seeing himself.

The illusion had him cornered, taunting him.

I stayed back, letting him fight it.

“Shut the fuck up!” Bastian shouted. Black smoke wreathed his fingers and writhed like snakes seeking somewhere to strike. He was ready to fight it. He had to know it wasn’t real.

He trembled, then stilled. The silence stretched.

Then I saw it, the snap of will in his eyes. His magic coiled around him, fierce and reckless. It surged, a raw flood of power, and a harsh scream echoed off the stone walls.

He stood, breathing hard, and his pale eyes were wild.

“You okay?” Valen asked, coming up behind me.

Bastian glared at us both, then nodded. “Never better.”

“What the fuck was that?”

“A trap,” I said with a shrug.

“What did you see?” Bastian asked.

Valen shook his head. “My mother. I—”

“It was a lie,” I said. “None of it was real. Whoever is casting these spells doesn’t know us.”

Valen nodded to Bastian. “Who did you see?”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Titus is right. It’s a cheap trick to make us falter. They’re going to pay for it.”

I raised an eyebrow. “So?”

Valen wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“Let’s keep moving,” Bastian said, and I could hear the anger creeping back into his voice. “I want to kill something.”

Valen frowned. “You think she’s here?”

“She has to be,” I said. “They wouldn’t do this for nothing.”

We moved quickly, careful and lethal, pushing deeper, winding through corridors that seemed to tighten around us, as if the building itself was alive, as if it knew what we were after.

As if it wouldn’t let us go.

I saw the tension in Valen’s posture, felt it in my own. Bastian was behind me, moving too quietly for him, too carefully. He’d been spooked by whatever he’d seen, but if he wasn’t going to talk about it, I wasn’t going to press him.

We turned a corner, expecting the worst, but saw nothing but more endless corridors stretching in every direction. It was too silent—the kind of silence that meant something was about to die.

“How far do you think?” Valen hissed.

I was about to answer when they hit us.

Three of them.

They came out of nowhere, more shadow than flesh.

They moved fast, faster than I’d expected, but we were faster.

My knife was out, sharp and ready, and I felt the surge of magic through me, brutal and unstoppable.

Even shadows could bleed.

Bastian led with a burst of magic, blinding them as my blade slipped into flesh, warm and slick as it cut through, hitting and twisting through bone.

Valen’s magic wrapped around one like a noose, suffocating. Bastian’s smoke lashed out like chains, constricting and crushing. The guards clawed against it, gurgling, gasping.

They never stood a chance.

We left them in a pool of blood, glassy-eyed and slack-jawed, limbs broken, chests caved in.

Bastian looked down at them, and I noticed the dangerous light in his eyes. “Too easy,” he said, but there was a fierce edge to his voice, like he was just getting started.

We kept moving.

We took another set of stairs two at a time, reaching another long corridor. Long shadows spilled out like blood.

More guards. This time, they were waiting.

There was a moment of hesitation, of shock, then we were on them.

Magic flared, a wild flash of blue light, and I saw one of them drop with Valen’s knife in his throat.

Bastian's laughter was reckless and sharp as he burned through them with a searing wave of magic.

It was over quickly. Too quickly.

We were ready for more.

We wanted more.

A sharp left, a narrow hall, and the air vibrated with more magic, a brutal wall of force that knocked the breath out of us.

“Push through it,” Valen said through gritted teeth. “It’s thinner than it should be—”

I shoved my way past the magic, felt it tear at me, felt the raw burn of it.

Another group of cloaked guards. They didn’t wait for us to find them.

We hit them head on.

One grabbed Valen, but Valen turned his magic on him, a pale blue flare that dropped the man where he stood.

Another rushed me. I sank a knife deep into his gut. A hard twist made hot blood gush over my hands and he fell to the stone floor in a groaning heap.

Bastian was a force of chaos, all vicious movement and sharp edges.

I watched him pull a dagger from one man’s chest and drive it into another’s throat without even blinking.

We left a trail of bodies in our wake.

There would be none of them left when we were done.

A blast of black fire lit up the corridor, and Bastian grinned as the fallen men screamed and then were silent.

“More like it,” he said. The words were a thin sneer of triumph as the light from the dark flames flickered over his features.

Ghoul.

The next stretch of hall was a blur, and the Spire’s defenses seemed to grow weaker as we got closer.

Maybe they’d finally realized that defeat was inevitable.

They’d fucked up.

Taking Avril might have seemed like a good idea at the time—but they’d made a mistake that would put them all in their graves.

“Wait—”

Valen leaned against the wall and pressed his palm against the stone. “I can— She’s here. She’s close— Can you feel her? She’s reaching for us?”

“Yes,” Bastian said slowly. “I— Yes.”

I could feel it now.

It was a thin thread, but it was there, growing stronger with every stride.

“Let’s finish this,” I said.

We moved with lethal precision, knowing the end was near.

There were too many doors, but only one stood between us and seeing her face.

A door that wasn’t a door.

A seam in the stone.

“There—” Valen pointed, but I already knew.

My magic shattered the rock and mortar puffed in pale clouds as we strode through the rubble and into the room.

The traitors inside didn’t even have time to scream.

Bastian was on them first, spilling blood across the rough stone floor.

Valen paused and then frowned briefly in confusion before pulling out his knives to follow Bastian’s lead.

The traitors fell so easily.

This hadn’t gone as they’d hoped it would.

“Avril—”

She was slumped against the far wall, bound by a dark chain bolted to the floor. It shimmered with an enchantment and the soft glow of spells set into the uneven stone floor reflected off her pale skin.

My heart lurched, and I pushed forward, ignoring the remaining guards as they dropped around us.

“Avril—”

Her name burned in my throat.

“Get— Get it off of her,” Valen shouted.

“Wait—” I called out as Bastian lunged forward. “Keylines—”

That’s why we couldn’t sense her. That’s why she couldn’t call out to us, or defend herself.

Bastards.

As we stood just outside the barrier, the chain wrapped around her wrists came alive.

It writhed and slithered around her, trying to choke the life from her.

I felt the fury rise in my chest as her eyes opened—confusion crossed her face, then fear, then terror as it tightened.

Magic shredded through me as I jumped into the trap, and the keyline snared my power and cut it off as I landed on top of her.

“Break it!” I bellowed. A strangled gasp escaped Avril’s lips as I grabbed hold of the chain and tried to wrestle it away from her throat.

Bastian pushed forward, but Valen grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back from the enchantment.

“Don’t be an idiot— You have to do it from outside the trap,” he said. “Or you’ll end up like Titus—”

“Shut up and break it,” I growled. The chain coiled tighter, and Avril’s eyes rolled back in her head.

Bastian scowled. “You can’t do it alone.”

Valen’s expression was hard as he nodded and I saw the pale blue threads of his magic snake out and combine with Bastian’s dark smoke as they worked together from outside the trap to break the spells that had been laid.

The chain vibrated as its enchantment resisted them, then it loosened and fell away.

Avril sucked in a shuddering breath.

My magic flared as the chain released its hold and the keyline snapped, sending Valen and Bastian stumbling back.

Avril’s eyes flew open, and she stared at me, as if she couldn’t believe I was really there.

“Titus—” she gasped.

I pulled the chain from her wrists and gathered her into my arms.

Her heartbeat was ragged, her limbs limp, but she was alive.

She was alive.

She hadn’t expected us. Hadn’t expected to see anyone again.

I held her tight against my chest as I stood.

I passed Avril to Valen, and he took her carefully, his eyes wide, too wide, softening as she looked at him. She was weak, but even as she sagged against him, I saw the hint of a smile on her lips. The bond between the four of us was back, and it hummed through my veins. I felt her hope. Her disbelief. Her pain. Her fear.

She was beautiful.

She was ours.

“We need to get her out of here.”

Valen’s voice was tight. “Let’s go.”

We sprinted down the corridor and I watched for any movement, any sign that the traitors had regrouped.

But there was nothing.

We moved through the halls, swift and unchallenged, and the stench of blood and death hung in the air.

They deserved every single death.

And they deserved so much more.