Page 198 of The Primal of Blood and Bone (Blood and Ash #6)

CASTEEL

My heart stuttered again.

“Something happened to Poppy.” I scrambled to my feet, slightly unsteady.

“What?” Kieran rose quickly.

“I don’t know. But I know it did. I can feel it in my bones.” I took a step back. “It’s something bad enough that it affected me.”

“Casteel.” My father was slower to rise. “We felt the quake. Attes told me we would feel that once Kolis was killed. Which means…” He braced himself. “You may be feeling Poppy in stasis.”

“No,” I interrupted. “This doesn’t feel like that.”

“Cas,” Kieran said, stepping in front of me. “I know what you’re thinking, but Poppy’s fine. Neither you nor I would be here if not.”

“ Look ,” I snarled, lifting my hand. “Look at the imprint. Does it seem different to you?”

Kieran’s warm fingers encircled my wrist. His brow furrowed as he stared. I tasted his icy shock before it skittered across his features. His eyes snapped to mine.

“Fuck,” he whispered hoarsely.

“What?” Panic crept into the single word Delano spoke.

“I need to go to her.” Tearing my hand free, I summoned the essence and focused on an image of Poppy, waiting until I caught her jasmine scent—sweet, earthy, warm, and all her.

I couldn’t find it.

This wasn’t like when I tried to shadowstep earlier and learned I couldn’t. I could feel her then. I just couldn’t open the realm to Pensdurth.

This was different.

My chest turned cold as I lifted my gaze to Kieran’s. “I can’t find her mark.” My voice sounded strange. Guttural. Thin. “I can’t find her, Kieran. I can’t feel her.”

Panic flashed across his features. “Does that mean she’s not in this realm?”

“I don’t know.” I thrust my hand through my hair. “Why would she leave?”

“Did you feel her absence the last time she left?” Kieran demanded as Delano took several steps back. “When she went to the Continents?”

“I don’t think so. But the Fate—Aydun—was here. His presence could’ve messed with things.” Turning from him, I closed my eyes again, refocused on Poppy, and found…nothing. “Fuck!”

“Okay. We need to stay calm,” my father started.

“Fuck calm.” I spun on him—on them. “I fucking knew I should’ve gone!” My heart slammed into my ribs. “That this was the wrong decision. That we were stronger together. I fucking knew it!”

“Cas.” Kieran stepped forward.

The ground beneath us started to shake, and plumes of dust fell from above. I fisted my hands. If this was like when Rhahar had died, a god—a Primal god—had fallen. One that ruled over a Court.

Fuck.

I couldn’t think of that right now.

“If something happened to her,” I seethed, “if a single hair on her head was touched, I won’t forgive—”

The presence bore down on me at the exact moment Kieran stiffened. Soul-deep, unending coldness settled on my shoulders, stirring the embers of eather. The presence felt heavy and thick, coarse and wrong against my flesh, like cold fingers trailing down my spine. It left a slick feeling behind.

Delano seemed to notice it next, his body tensing.

A shadow crept over the Great Hall, drawing our stares upward. The clouds thickened and spun, their edges tinted in…crimson.

“Kolis,” I growled.

The sky turned ink-black in a heartbeat. Crimson bolts pierced the darkness, and in the distance, I heard Nithe’s staggering call end abruptly.

Then I heard something else.

A humming sound that rose and fell. “Do you hear that?”

“The…the humming?” my father said.

“Yeah. But it’s not just a hum.” I lowered my gaze. The sound seemed to come from above and below. “It’s singing. It’s a song…”

And it was haunting. Melancholic.

Hisa gasped at the same moment something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye.

“What was that?” my father demanded.

Hisa strode toward one of the many windows. “Something just fell. I think it was…”

Another thing came down, just a blur of black plummeting through the open air to the ground beyond the window. I heard the impact then. It was…fleshy.

“Oh, my gods,” Hisa breathed as another fell and another as she raced to the second floor of the alcove and turned to look back at the domed ceiling.

From her view, she could probably see some of the higher floors.

“They’re falling from the balconies.” Her face paled to a shade of white as she looked down at us with her palm pressed to her chest. “They’re jumping . ”

They’re jumping…

The singing .

“Watch out,” Hisa shouted.

My father’s head cranked back as Hisa launched over the railing.

A body fell, their arms spread wide. They hit the glass, punching a hole straight through it.

I couldn’t look away as they fell into the hall, smacking into the stone.

Blood immediately stained the light-brown uniform.

It was a mortal, responding to the…call of Death.

To Kolis’s will. What had Poppy said? My father jumped as another crashed through the dome. It affected mortals and those of—

Another fell toward the dome.

Hisa’s scream darkened my soul as the body hit the floor with a sickening thud.

It shifted, still limbs replaced by brown and white fur.

That kind of fall…not even a wolven would survive that, no matter what form they were in.

The scream echoed what I already knew. What I had seen in the brief moments as she fell silently.

Short blond hair. Skin reflecting the scars of battles fought and won.

My father staggered to where the wolven lay, and Hisa darted across the hall, falling beside my father.

Her hands trembled as she reached for her.

“No, no,” she whispered. “No. Oh, my gods, no.”

My father looked up, and I would never forget the horror on his face. The disbelief.

Seeing it snapped me into motion.

“It’s Kolis! He’s calling them to their deaths!” I shouted as I spun, locking my gaze on Kieran first and then Delano.

They were still, their faces blank as the haunting song grew closer. Another body came through the dome, landing on the dais.

I saw both wolven reach for a weapon. Kieran went for the one strapped to his chest, and Delano’s eerily steady hand lowered to his hip and the bloodstone dagger.

I heard Poppy’s voice. If he’s the cause by hand or will, the Joining won’t protect either of you.

I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t think. I shot forward as I shouted for my father, knowing I could only make it to one of them. Knowing I was making a choice .

I slammed into Kieran and took him to the floor again.

I shouted at him as the bodies kept falling like leaves in the northern parts of Atlantia, one after another after another—some mortal, others wolven.

I grabbed his wrist and wrenched his arm back as my father raced past me.

Kieran fought. The fucker was strong. He pulled against my hold, trying to lift the dagger to his chest. Driving my knee into his stomach, I twisted his arm as I saw Delano turn the bloodstone blade inward, his hands gripping the bone hilt.

“No!” I shouted, putting pressure on Kieran’s wrist as my father collided with Delano, ripping the wolven’s dagger from his grip.

There was no time to feel relief. “Sorry,” I grunted, snapping Kieran’s wrist. “It’ll heal.”

He didn’t make a sound as the dagger fell from his fingers, didn’t even flinch as he reached for the second dagger, unsheathing it with startling quickness.

“Motherfucker.” I shifted over him, grabbing that arm—

The glass dome shattered, drawing my gaze upward as Kieran yanked at my grip. Crimson-laced eather streaked through the clouds, and the presence poured into the Great Hall.

Kolis was here.

My gaze shot to my father. He was still fighting with Delano, who was trying to get to one of his swords. I looked over my shoulder to see that Hisa held her cloak.

“Hisa!” I yelled at her. “He’s here!”

“There’s no honor,” she whispered, but I heard her as I saw the cloak become a death shroud. “There’s no honor in this.”

I felt my grip slip.

My head swung back to Kieran. He had the blade at his chest, piercing his tunic.

Fuck.

I didn’t have time for this.

Not holding back, I jerked Kieran’s arm back and snapped that bone, too.

As the dagger clattered off the floor, I didn’t have time to root out all his weapons or fight him like my father did with Delano.

I gripped Kieran’s head and slammed it into the floor.

The crack of his skull off the stone was lost in the shock of the gilded doors swinging open and slamming into the wall.

Kieran’s body went limp as a mass of midnight and crimson whirling mist entered.

The singing stopped.

The Primal mist unfurled, revealing Kolis. His face was more bone than flesh, his eyes burning like hot coals. And he was a fucking mess.

His throat had been torn open, leaving strips of flesh hanging from fresh, pink skin.

A chunk of it was missing from his shoulder.

His chest was ripped open, exposing fractured ribs, and his stomach hadn’t fared much better.

Something had clawed at him. Blood and clumps of tissue stained the front of his white pants.

Please, gods. Tell me Poppy had done that to him.

Kolis’s head lowered, and the mist contracted as I rose.

It happened so fast, yet it felt like time slowed to a crawl as his blood-red gaze flicked to Hisa.

Bone cracked as her neck twisted sharply to the side and kept cracking.

She jerked as blood leaked from her nose and mouth and then didn’t make a sound as she tipped forward, her body falling across Lizeth’s.

Kolis’s head turned to my right.

Delano stiffened, then shuddered. Crimson poured from his eyes and nose. His mouth opened, and blood—gods, blood gushed from it as his knees collapsed and his head fell back.

My father caught him as he shouted. I staggered back.

“What did I tell you?” Kolis’s voice boomed.

My father’s head jerked up, his eyes locked with mine and widening.

I halted.

Everything came to a stop inside me. My heart. My lungs.

“What did I promise?” Kolis’s voice slithered through the Great Hall.