Page 154 of Merciless Is My Crown

Raziel’s glittering magic twined with my stars and Cosimo’s blue light flared overhead, like the entire universe was contained within this ordinary city street, the smell of ozone burning my nose.

I didn’t dare make a sound, didn’t dare ask where Zephryn had disappeared to, only kept my eyes firmly trained on this…thing slithering in the darkness like liquid night, heading straight toward us.

63

ANARIA

This was wrong, wrong, wrong.

The temperature plummeted as the shadow creature drew closer, cold night air suddenly tainted with a bitter, evil scent that left a stain in my mouth I couldn’t quite identify…but was familiar enough I wanted to vomit.

Down to my bones I knew this odd, sweet scent, recognizing the creature’s smooth as water movement, darkness writhing against darkness, shadows deeper than night.

Dangerous. Unpredictable. Unkillable.

Older than time itself, something not of this world but of another.

Something that shouldn’t even be in this realm.

The rippling dark slithered behind Trubahn, still lurching down the street toward us, his face contorted in terror or pain or both, hands clawing at the air.

Tavion snarled at that gaping, devouring darkness, Raziel crushing my hand as he held me still, a knife gripped in his other, while I scanned the street for Zephryn, and the roofline for any sign of Tristan or Simon.

“Get Anaria the fuck out of here,” Zorander hissed as Trubahn jerked to a stop flanked by two of Zeph’s flaming footsteps.

“Please.” Trubahn’s mouth worked not in time with the word, as if his body was struggling to keep up with whatever force controlled him. “Please, help me.” His face was stained with tears and blood, furrows dug into his…into his…

I began panting, chest heaving, unable to look away.

“Fuck. Don’t look, Anaria, don’t look.” Zor grabbed my shoulders and dragged me backward, Raziel and Tavion closing the gap.

But not fast enough. A crack of magic, fast and sure, and Trubahn collapsed like a puppet, his ruined, eyeless face still turned toward us, mouth open as if even if death he was pleading for us to end his suffering.

“Let me up there, Zor. There’s something moving behind the mage, something I couldn’t quite see.” But I was too late.

Darkness crashed into our makeshift wall, likely the only thing that saved us as molten, liquid midnight pulled back, regrouped, then lunged again, fast as an adder.

I sent starry shadows spiraling out to meet that darkness, a spear of pure power sharper than the point of a sword, and when the two collided, my entire world shifted.

One moment, I was in a filthy Southwell street.

The next, I stood in a ghostly shadowland, where stone spires rose from the mist like sentinels and the air stank of brimstone. The Oracle waited with a faint smile on her face, her body cloaked in magic, black hair floating around her, buoyed on an invisible wind.

Fear licked up my spine, the air stung my eyes, and when I blinked away the tears, I lost my breath.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Her eyes softened as she surveyed our surroundings, as if they were, indeed, the loveliest thing she’d ever seen. “This is where we came from. A land of mist and shadow. Of peace and silence.”

Something touched my arm, and I looked down to see a deep gash carved into my arm, the glint of white bone through red flesh as she stepped away, a shard of black gripped between her fingers. I ran my forefinger along the wound and didn’t feel a thing.

“There is no pain here. No suffering. It was a perfect existence.”

“If it was so perfect, why did you leave?”

Her smile faltered. “Because of you. You wanted something…better.” She surveyed the spikey stones with a kind of sadness I’d never seen from her before, and somehow, I knew this moment wasn’t feigned. She was having feelings right now, and something sprang to attention inside me.

Told me to watch. To listen.

Her gaze lovingly trailed over the spiked stones with something akin to reverence. “So we came to the world you now call home. But we couldn’t come back.”

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