Page 16 of Wicked Vows (Cursed Darkness (DarkHallow Academy) #1)
Lysithea
T he scream isn’t mine anymore. It’s a living thing, a storm that rips through the stone and steel of this pit, attempting to tear the world apart. Power, raw and absolute, floods every cell of my body. It tastes of ozone and blood and a freedom so violent it feels like another kind of death.
The cuts on my back are a nexus of agony and ecstasy.
They have healed, but the brand is still there.
I can feel it like it’s part of my soul.
The wards in the Blood Pit have cracked, but they aren’t broken.
They are still protecting the rest of the academy, and at any moment, my scream will bounce back and rip us all to shreds, me included.
The ground rumbles under my feet, and I turn to take in the damage as the scream dies in my throat.
Verik is thrown across the room under a pile of weapons.
Dathan is in another corner, wiping blood from his mouth with a look that I want to punch off his face.
Evren is the least damaged, but somehow, I knew that would be the case after the test in the gardens. They are staring at me, wordlessly.
I swallow, wincing at the pain in my throat. The air vibrates around me, a wind whips up, lashing my hair into my face, and my torn dress flaps around me. I pull it together, knitting the fabric with a quick blast of magic that doesn’t feel like it will withstand the whip of the wind.
And then a scream that sounds like death pierces the air.
Slamming my hands to my ears, I drop to the ground as the pressure of the scream is unbreakable.
“Ah!” I cry out as it feels like every cell in my body is being compressed.
Blood trickles from my nose and eyes, and I wonder vaguely if this is what it feels like to be on the receiving end of my power.
“Fuck!” Verik roars, his bellow barely heard over the screech of pure power. Pure triumph. He scrabbles over to me and slams his hand over my mouth, but I look at him with wide eyes and shake my head.
“It’s not me!” I yell behind his hand.
He frowns and peels his hand away. “Who?” he mouths.
I shrug, something akin to terror racing through my veins.
It stops as suddenly as it started.
The silence that rushes in is a wave that takes my breath away. My ears ring with the ghost of the scream. I taste my own blood. My back is a web of fire and ice, a living map of agony that connects me to them. I can feel it.
“What. The fuck. Was that?” Verik growls, staggering to his feet. He’s not looking at me. His gaze is fixed on the high, vaulted ceiling, as if expecting something to crash through it.
Dathan crawls over panting, a low, ragged sound. “A response. Something answered you.”
Answered me? What the hell answered me? What the hell did I ask?
“What did you do to me?” My voice is a tattered tear in the quiet.
“We bound you,” Verik says, his voice rough with disbelief as he stares at his new mark.
“No,” Dathan corrects, his gaze locked on me, full of a terrifying reverence. “We bound ourselves.”
“To what?”
“Each other.”
“Rude!” I growl, my snakey familiar appearing out of thin air to hiss and spit at them. “I did not give you permission to do anything to me.”
“No,” Verik says, a strange, almost impressed smile playing on his lips. “You didn’t.”
My serpent lunges at the architect of this violation. Its fangs of pure void snap at his throat.
A shield of hellfire flares into existence, but my serpent isn’t physical. It’s a creature of my will, and my will is absolute right now. It dissolves through the flames like smoke and reforms on the other side, its shadowy form coiling tight around Verik’s arm.
He grunts, staggering back. The brand on his skin flares, a mirror of the fire on my own back. I feel the jolt of his pain through the connection, a sharp, satisfying feedback loop. My rage is his agony.
“What answered me?” I ask, my voice clipped, pissed off more than afraid, right now.
“The better question,” Dathan says, a slow smile spreading across his blood-stained face, “is what did you call?”
A low rumble echoes from the other side of the veil. Not a sound, but a vibration in the stone, a pressure against the air. “Something that is going to make me wet myself,” I mutter.
Verik’s gaze shoots to me, and the snake vanishes as we lock gazes. He knows this has gone beyond whatever shit they just pulled. This hazing, this whatever the fuck it was, has taken a more sinister turn than any of them anticipated.
“Tell me now what this brand is,” I say slowly. I should be full of rage at what they did. They held me down, an act that triggers a very vivid response in me, cut into me, bound themselves to me and me to them, and yet I’m not tearing their throats out.
Why?
“The Midnight Soul Scar,” Verik says.
The words hang in the air, heavy and old. It’s not just a brand; it’s a name. A title. A curse. I feel it thrumming on my skin, a cold fire that echoes on theirs.
Another rumble shakes the very foundations of the pit. Dust rains from the ceiling, and a long, jagged crack spiders across the far wall. The air grows thick, heavy with the scent of dark magic and something ancient, something that has been sleeping for a very, very long time.
“We need to go,” Verik says, his eyes wide as he stares at the fracturing stone. “Now.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” I spit, my serpent reforming at my feet, a silent promise of violence.
“You don’t have a choice,” Dathan says, his smile a savage slash. “It’s coming for you.”
The brand on my back flares with a heat so intense it steals my breath. I look at Evren. He has a hand pressed to the Scar on his own arm, his ice-blue eyes locked on mine.
The stone wall groans, the sound of a world breaking. Whatever answered my scream is no longer content to wait on the other side. It wants in.
And I’m the one who knocked on its door.
Whatever it is.
“What did you hope to gain from this?” I whisper, getting to my feet. “Why me? Why now?”
“Immeasurable power,” Verik says simply as if I’m stupid for asking.
“Really?” I say with such a scathing tone, he actually flinches.
It gives me encouragement to keep going.
“That was your grand fucking plan? To get more power? You are already powerful creatures. Everyone is shit scared of you! Why did you have to terrify me, bind me, hold me down , while you mutilated me?”
“We knew you wouldn’t do it willingly,” Dathan says, taking my wrist and pulling me towards the door. “We need to leave this place.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you!” I spit out.
“Stay here then and be devoured,” Verik says, flinging the doors open with his magic.
“You still haven’t answered me!” I grit out as Dathan drags me towards the door.
“Later, princess,” he growls back, as serious as I’ve ever seen him.
It makes me shut my mouth as we hurry out of the combat training area. I hope tomorrow’s class isn’t going to be to fight whatever we unleashed.
The door slams shut behind us, but the three monsters who just tied me to them don’t stop. They hurry along until we are standing outside my bedroom.
“Open up,” Dathan says, looking over his shoulder.
“Not a fucking chance. This is my bedroom!”
Verik shoves Dathan aside, his patience shredded. “This isn’t a negotiation.”
He presses his palm flat against the wall next to the door. The stone ripples like water, and a door forms where one wasn’t seconds ago. My sanctuary. Violated. Again. But it explains how he got in to steal my underwear. Fucker.
Dathan doesn’t wait for an invitation. He shoves me inside, the force sending me stumbling over the threshold. They follow, a tide of darkness and arrogance flooding my small space. The doorway seals shut behind them.
Three apex predators. In my room.
The brand on my back pulses with heat, agony and power.
“Why me?” I demand, my voice a raw rasp. “Why now?”
Verik turns to stare at me. “Why you? Because you are the most powerful creature here. Why now? Because you’re a bomb about to go off. We just decided when to ignite the explosion.”
His arrogance is disgusting. A wall of heat fills my small room.
“You don’t get to make that choice for me,” I hiss.
The Scar on my skin burns, hot and angry.
“We didn’t just make a choice,” Dathan says, stepping closer. His silver eyes drink me in. “We made a connection. Now we get to feel every delicious spike of your power, and you get to feel ours.”
“Why?” I whisper.
“So we can become gods,” Verik says.
And that’s the first honest thing I think he’s said to me tonight.