Page 39 of The Fallen and the Kiss of Dusk (Crowns of Nyaxia #4)

MISCHE

A sar, Luce, and I were no longer trying to be subtle.

We flat-out ran through hallways, staircases, tunnels.

The collision of the past and the present was now over, only a sliver remaining.

The ghosts of the palace this had once been now were barely visible against the rippling chiffon.

Yet I still felt so far from life. The ghosts that had once occupied these halls still watched me as we ran by.

These ones were still only faint shadows, but once that wall of wraiths got through the broken gate we had torn open, things were about to get much more dangerous.

As we spiraled up another set of stairs, shouts and running footsteps pounded from above. Steel clattered. It was hard to make out the exact sounds, but it certainly wasn’t the boisterous commotion of a ball, that was for sure.

“Egrette’s guards?” I rasped out. Even though I didn’t exactly breathe anymore, I still felt like I couldn’t catch my breath.

Asar winced. “Probably.”

His gait, typically so graceful, was choppy.

One hand pressed to the wound on his torso.

I had my sword ready, but it seemed comically useless.

At least I supposed I could grab onto one of Egrette’s soldiers and suck the life out of them with my wraith touch if I really had to.

The thought struck me with an unpleasantly visceral delight that instantly made me feel dirty.

The idea of touching skin, using that warmth to drag myself closer to the mortal world, felt more tempting than blood after starvation.

When we had nearly reached the ballroom, Asar flung out his hand to stop me before we rounded a corner.

Sheets of silk enveloped us as a cool ocean breeze slithered through open doors.

He pressed his finger to his lips, listening to the sounds beyond.

His shoulders rose and fell heavily. The scent of his blood was distracting.

I found myself staring at the thin, bloody fabric clinging to his torso.

The urge to reach out and touch the wound, and the muscular flesh beneath it, was so overwhelming I found it difficult to think about anything else.

Asar glanced at the hall. Then me. Then the hall. I could see him making a mental calculation.

“We double back to the back entrance,” he whispered at last. “I can’t count the guards, but there are too many, and they’re getting closer.”

Luce let out a whine of protest. I agreed. This was a risky plan. We would need to cross the entire castle again, and then loop around the grounds to make it to the shore.

I eyed his bloody shirt. “It’s too far. And they’ll find us before we make it out, anyway. Look at yourself, Warden.”

“What exactly are our alternatives, Dawndrinker?”

Another clatter echoed down the hall. They were definitely getting closer, and quickly. Gods, what the hell was going on down there? It sounded like the entire party had devolved into chaos.

The thought of Raihn flitted through my mind and I felt sick.

Gods fucking damn it.

Asar’s hand hovered at his pack—just above the mask within it.

“No,” I said.

“What?”

“You aren’t using that.”

He gave me a wry smirk. “Some might say it’s rightfully mine, anyway.”

But I was not in the mood to joke. The call of the mask reminded me of what I’d seen in the House of Night, when Septimus and Simon tampered with weapons made from Alarus’s teeth. The memory of Simon, twisted beyond recognition, terrified me. It was too easy to imagine Asar in his place.

“No,” I said firmly. “You don’t use it. I’ve got—” I wiggled my fingers.

Asar stared flatly at me. “What?”

“Death touch! Magical death touch!”

He looked unimpressed. “Forgive me if I’m not exactly eager to throw you out there to go tickle the Shadowborn military to death.”

I opened my mouth to argue, but another wave of shouts echoed from down the hall. Closer now.

I stopped, brow furrowing. Asar’s did, too. Because we both now realized that this was not just the sound of a military mobilizing. This was the sound of actual battle.

“Wait,” I said. “If we’re here?.?.?.”

My voice trailed off. But I saw the question in Asar’s face, too: Then who are they fighting?

We pressed ourselves to the wall and shuffled closer to the sounds—and to our freedom—under the cover of billowing black chiffon.

“Maybe it’s the Bloodborn,” I whispered. “Maybe they turned on Egrette. Maybe?—”

“Shh,” Asar hissed.

I realized it was now silent.

Suddenly, utterly silent.

Now, the only sounds were clashes that echoed much farther away—perhaps from the ballroom?

I barely stopped myself from whispering, What the hell? How could that be? Seconds ago, it had sounded like a flat-out battle was happening around this corner. That couldn’t just disappear.

Asar pressed his finger to his lips, then, before I could stop him, he slipped around the corner.

“Wait—” I started.

But instantly, he straightened. He stared down the hallway, no longer bothering to hide himself.

When I joined him, my mouth fell open.

As we’d suspected, we had indeed been hearing the Shadowborn military. Apparently Egrette thought highly of Asar and me, because there were easily more than a dozen guards here.

At least, I thought so. It was hard to count, because so many of them weren’t in one piece anymore.

Limbs and torsos and a few stray heads littered the ground, scattered from wall to wall like broken, discarded dolls in the wake of a child’s tantrum. Black blood pooled on the marble tile. The corpses were fresh. They still smelled painfully of life.

Luce let out a growl as she sniffed the encroaching tide of blood.

My first thought was that the Bloodborn had turned on the House of Shadow. The Bloodborn were as skilled at killing as the Shadowborn were at spy craft. They were certainly capable of this degree of bloodshed.

But something about that possibility didn’t add up.

An uncanny scent hung in the air, like the faintest trace of a campfire’s smoke, or the warm afterglow of a sun that had just set.

It made the hair prickle on my arms even across the chasm of death.

The strikes that had taken apart the soldiers were clean, but vicious.

Someone had kept going long after these men were dead.

That seemed incongruous to the Bloodborn, who were too efficient to waste that kind of time.

“I suppose we got lucky,” Asar muttered. But I heard the trace of sarcasm in his voice. Nothing seemed lucky about this.

We stepped gingerly through the pile of bodies. A disgusting jolt of pleasure ran through me when the blood touched my toes, exposed in my now-pitifully-unhelpful dress shoes.

We darted down one hall, then another.

Freedom was so damned close.

We were almost to the final hall. At the last branch, we started down one path, then stopped short when we heard incoming voices. Shit. Other way.

I whirled to the other direction.

But the Shadowborn were masters of stealth and manipulation, and the guards that Egrette surrounded herself with would be the most skilled the House had to offer.

We sensed them far too late.

As we were about to round the last corner between us and the ballroom, Asar stopped short. Grabbed my wrist.

Too slow. They already heard us.

The guards stood before us in a wall of green and black. They stared at us, as if shocked that we had actually stepped right into their path. I couldn’t blame them. It shocked me, too.

Then the captain thrust a long finger at us. “In the name of the queen, we order you to surrender yourselves.”

But of course, they were already lunging for us by the time the words left his lips. The next seconds unfolded in slow motion. I saw Asar’s eyes dart from the soldiers to me. Luce crouched as she coiled to lunge.

And then blood spattered across my face.

That was all I felt at first—the blood, distractingly hot and sweet and wonderful on my life-starved skin.

Then—

CRASH.

Broken glass rained down over us.

A streak of gold plummeted from above. My skin prickled. The scent of fresh-kindled fire filled my nostrils.

CRASH. Another streak.

Asar pushed me forward with a wordless command: run.

We had only one path available to us, leading us straight back into the ballroom.

And before I could choke out a what the fuck was that , my question was answered.

Another window shattered in front of us. My arms flew up to shield my face. And when I lowered them, a figure in pristine white robes and brilliant gold armor stood before me.

A Sentinel.