Page 32 of Steeling Light (Shadowed Debts #3)

Destiny is a strange thing. I have experimented with the powers of Saelira too many times to count, and even so, I do not grasp them.

Calyr’s powers, though, those are understood even though we still do not have access to them.

Following the lines of cause and effect and estimating the future is a worthy pursuit. This is not destiny, though…

~Rhaskar Thorne, The Fifth Book of the Priests

Ainslee

Rhion spent an hour questioning Vellith about Morvael, and she seemed to expect it, having more answers than I’d thought she would.

It turns out that the silkies and weavers know a significant amount about Morvael.

He’s made of darkness, and when in the light, he will disappear.

That doesn’t mean that he’s dead, though.

He just shifts to another bit of darkness.

You can’t injure him with a blade, yet he can and will fight with tooth and claw.

The Old Ones trapped him by removing every dark place for miles, something we can’t do.

Even then, they couldn’t manage to kill him.

He just hid under the rocks and within the trees.

It forced him to give up enough power that they could contain him in mist. It has something to do with the refractive qualities of the mist preventing him from moving through it.

He was so drained of power for eons that he couldn’t even walk the roads of dreams, but as more and more people happened upon him and were devoured by him, he regained enough of the power he once had.

Then we found the most surprising bit. He’s right here in Selithar. At the center of the Labyrinth.

We’re supposed to navigate the maze, find Morvael, and drain the last bit of his energy. Then, with the power of Light, we must burn him to nothing.

At least that’s what Rhion thinks. I have my reservations. I cannot imagine gods dying quite as easily as that.

But here we are, my very unsure mother standing beside me in fighting attire for the first time, itching at every seam, and Rhion wearing what can only be described as the most expensive gambeson I’ve ever seen.

“Are you sure you want to wear that?” I ask for the fifth time. “It seems… fancy.”

He shakes his head, and my mother watches our bickering with a look of absolute terror on her face.

“I had it made right after we left the Keep of Webs yesterday. It’s perfect.

I even have space for a few enchanting tools since I have no idea what we’re going to be dealing with.

” He opens a pocket, and I see strange blades and baubles inside.

“Plenty of room to move in. Slots for wings and a tail to grow from. Enough space in the arms and legs if I need to be stronger. As perfect as I’ve ever seen.

You have to hand it to the tailors in Selithar. They’re quick and do quality work.”

At that, my mother smiles. “We have more social events than any other place in Nyth, and excellent tailors are respected nearly as much as the nobility. When we get back…”

Her face goes pale again, and I hold her hand. “Mother, you don’t have to do this. I know you’ve never done any fighting. No one would look down on you if you…”

She shakes her head and stands a little taller.

“I am the Countess of Light, Lee. And Light is what you say we need. I may be afraid, but for once in my life, I can do something to help people. Not just talk and politic. Today, maybe I might even make you proud, and I won’t give up that chance just because I’m terrified. ”

And of course, Rhion chimes in. “Half the soldiers I’ve trained have pissed themselves before their first battle, so it looks like you’re doing well enough.”

She chuckles. “Ask me again after this is done.”

Rhion’s smile is wide, and he puts his hand on my mother’s shoulder, giving it a soft squeeze. “You’ll do fine. Just point the shiny parts at the big, bad, terrifying thing, and we’ll do the rest.”

She nods, trusting him as much as she would trust anyone. He looks down at me and winks. I sigh and say, “Well, I guess it’s now or never. Time to figure out how to get to the middle of this thing.”

Wings grow from both mine and Rhion’s backs. He walks behind my mother and scoops her up in his arms like he’s carrying a child who fell asleep at the dinner table. Then we spring into the air.

Light explodes from me as I smile. Cheer fills me up as I think about the stories we’re going to tell after this. Darian will laugh, and Cole will be shocked. I bet his jaw will actually drop when he hears about this.

My mother’s Light shines even brighter than mine, and while the mist is thick, it doesn’t turn into a blinding reflection like normal fog would. Everywhere the brightness touches seems to give way, letting us see through it.

I can see everything in the Labyrinth under us, the stone overhangs that have stopped so many Steel soldiers from trying to get to the center.

Without the Light we’re projecting, we would have to approach so slowly, and we’d never know if we were on the right or wrong path.

There are so many branches, so many places to lose our way.

The Labyrinth is enormous, the size of a large human village, but from our vantage point, all the paths seem to lead toward the center even though some start and stop abruptly. All of them still point toward the darkness still hidden from us.

Already, I can feel a sense of dread washing over me.

Morvael’s influence. Vellith had talked about how his enemies would fall to the ground, dead purely from fear.

She said that his influence wouldn’t be that strong now, but that we should be sure that we didn’t let that fear take hold because it was his most dangerous weapon.

“I can see him,” Rhion says quietly, and I know he feels the same fear rising inside him I do. He always has a smile or a joke, even in the most serious situations. Now, though, he seems nervous.

There’s a flicker of darkness moving in the circle of stone a quarter mile in front of us. Our wings don’t slow, but I hesitate at the sight of him. He’s huge. At least four times as tall as a man. Larger than Darian has ever grown.

At first, I want to say he’s made of shadows, but that’s not right. Shadows have shades of darkness. There’s almost a bit of substance to them. This god seems to absorb the light that shines his way. He’s not so much something as a lack of something.

“Dragons take me,” my mother whimpers from below Rhion, and I know exactly how she feels.

“What’s the plan?” I ask.

“I… I don’t know,” Rhion says. “I don’t think I can fight it. I’ll try. I have a Nightforged sword, so maybe it will do something. I can probably stall it if nothing else.”

No, that won’t work. Not at all. “Is there some kind of enchanting you can do? Do you have anything…”

His eyes light up, and he stares at me with what seems like hope in his eyes. “I know exactly how we fight it.”

We stand just outside the doorway to the center of the Labyrinth. The fog is so viscous you have to work to move through it. Like a cold soup that has thickened. Rhion lays out the twenty empty spellstones he has and passes five to me and five to my mother. Then he picks up ten for himself.

“These spellstones will draw in power. It won’t be enough to hold something that large at first, but if Vellith was explaining correctly, we need to get him to hide from your Light.

He’ll be forced to shed his power to do so.

Once that happens, we need to find him and arrange the spellstones around him.

Then, we keep doing that until he’s not strong enough to hold his power away from them. ”

I frown. “There’s no way it’ll be that easy. This isn’t a High Fae, Rhion. This is a literal god who could destroy the world if he ever broke out of his cage. Not even Calyr could fight him. I think we’re going to need to do more than shine a light and suck him into spellstones.”

Rhion grins at me. “He’s not able to be around light, so just… shine really brightly. Cole basically destroyed the entire House of Shadows doing exactly that. And Morvael is only that dangerous if he’s at full power. He’s not. He’s… wounded.”

A sense of dread runs through me as more of the God of Nightmare’s influence seems to take hold of me. “Rhion, we need more of a plan than that.”

“So what are you thinking?”

I can’t think clearly. The fear that’s doing everything in its power to boil up and take hold inside me is making me foggy. “I don’t know…”

I squint. “Wait. Can enchanting hold power in something? Can you make something glow even for an hour?”

Rhion pauses, his head cocking to the side as he thinks.

“Not my sword. I’d need Grimnar to help if I were even going to try that.

” He’s not talking to me. He’s working through his thoughts.

“I could probably do a quick binding of your power to something like a stick. It would be a terrible enchantment that’d break down by the end of the day, but it might be useful. ”

He looks past me to the stone wall and says, “Yes, that’d work just fine.

” He moves to the wall and rips off a gnarled piece of vine that’s longer than his arm.

Long dead without a touch of green, he seems pleased.

Without saying another word, he digs into his little enchanting pouch and draws out what looks like a needle.

Then he sits down and says, “When I tell you to, I need you to make this glow as brightly as you can.” I sit down beside him and get ready.

He holds the needle between his index finger and thumb just like he was about to stitch up a pair of holey socks.

“Now,” he says, and I pour light into the vine.

It shines so brightly that I have a hard time looking at it.

Rhion doesn’t seem to notice. Just like he was stitching a sock, he slides the needle over the vine.

Then he whispers, and the scent of freshly forged metal leaves a metallic tang in the air.

There’s no hint of wildflowers like when he kissed me.

It’s the purest House of Steel scent I’ve ever experienced.

And I feel a loss of control. I try to make the light brighter, but it doesn’t act like it should. Instead, it stays constant. It’s not my light anymore. Minutes pass, and Rhion continues to whisper to the vine and stitch the air above it. Each stitch pulls the power further from me.

“You can stop now,” he says as he looks up, and the light coming from the stick creates a halo effect around him.

I stop trying to create light, and the stick stays exactly as it is, a gleaming torch.

A roar sounds from inside the center chamber of the Labyrinth, and I shudder.

Rhion stands up and says, “I’ve never fought with a vine before, but I haven’t fought a god before either. It’s quite a month for firsts.”

I chuckle, and as his words wash over me, I feel stronger, less influenced by the darkness we’re about to fight. “This feels better,” I say, and Rhion nods. Then I turn to my mother, who looks like she’s barely hanging onto her sanity.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

She nods, but I can see her shaking. “I’m terrified, Ainslee, but I’m not letting it win. I want you to be proud of me. I want to…”

She shakes her head, and I can see the tears sparkling in the light of the enchanted vine.

I wrap my arms around her and pull her in for a hug.

“I am proud of you, Mother. You saved me. You stood at a crossroads when I was six, and you took the hard path for me and Darian. You gave me a chance at life, and I will forever be grateful to you.”

She looks at me, and the shivers stop. She nods her head and says, “If we don’t survive this, Lee, I want you to know that I love you. More than anything else in my life, you and your brother are the pieces I wouldn’t trade for anything.”

I give her a smile and say, “You know, your court is going to have a field day gossiping about how their Countess killed a god.”

She can’t hide the grin that runs from ear to ear. “Oh, I doubt they’d even believe it, but the gossip will be everywhere. It will be quite an interesting next few weeks.”

I chuckle and turn to Rhion. “Are you ready?” He just nods, a very serious expression on his face as he holds the vine in his left hand and his sword in his right. I pull the two daggers from their sheaths at my side and nod to him.

Then he steps through the doorway.