Page 70 of Daughter of No Worlds

And the viper — Max — listened.

The wild path of flames raged through the winding halls, roaring past doors, around corners, scalding tapestries and paintings. And I inhaled it.Becameit. Smoke filled my lungs. My stomach. My eyes.

I guided Max with seamless, wordless direction. His power was mine, and I could feel it thrash forward. I realized his muscles had been trembling not because he was pushing so hard, but because he was holding himself back. With every confident turn, every furious surge, it grew wilder.

Careful, he murmured in my ear. I could feel him tasting shadows of past memories, recoiling. Every heartbeat danced on a blade’s edge between intoxicated power and agonizing fear.

We’re fine.

Stop.

Not yet,I soothed.A little further.

Blood pounded in my ears. The lights grew closer, the smoke thicker. Door after door shuttered past my view.

Max’s tension grew tighter, like a bowstring pulling further and further back. Control threatened to slip away. But he waited, his tentative trust still cradled in my hands.

Not yet,I whispered.

Doors. Smoke.

Now. Up!

The fire obeyed, the serpent roaring through every crevice of the floor, rising through the doors and windows and between stones.

And there they were: a handful of huddled, well dressed figures. They jumped, terrified, as the fire tore through the room, encircling them within a ring of flames.

A spell snapped in two.

And then—

A ragged gasp. My face against stone. Eyes snapped open into darkness, weak and dark and dull. My own eyes. Back on the bridge, back in my body.

Black boots and golden sparks flew by my blurry vision. Then a flash of white.

Dark hands pulled me upright. My shaky vision settled on Sammerin, then Max, slowly pushing himself up from the ground. And then the open brass door, flickering in firelight.

Open.

Nura and the Syrizen were running down the hall. Or perhaps flying would be a better term, the Syrizen’s lithe bodies soaring into those leaps, flickering and disappearing and reappearing further and further and further like stones skipping across the surface of a pond.

Behind me I felt the warmth of flames. I glanced only briefly over my shoulder to see the city on fire before running after them, delving into those dim passageways and scaling the tower steps.

Didn’t have to think. Didn’t have to breathe. I knew exactly where to go.

Pathyr Savoi and his companion were at the very top of the tower, in a room surrounded by windows. The first thing I saw was Nura’s back, stark and white. Despite the bright sky and open windows, the room was growing steadily darker, like she was calling shadows to her. A young man stood before her, his hands outstretched, shielding a small cluster of people behind him — including two Valtain.

“Your Queen murdered an innocent man,” he snarled. “My father was no traitor. She is a tyrant.”

The darkness leeched from the corners, clouding the windows, misting the air, forming an inky cape around Nura’s shoulders. My breaths came quicker.

When I blinked, I could have sworn I saw Esmaris’s blood spattered face. Saw Vos’s body dangling from gallows.

“I have no concern for your father.” Nura’s voice moved like ink dissolving into water.

The shadows grew thicker. My heart beat faster, slipping from my control.

Distantly, I recognized that this was not natural. That the darkness that crawled from the shadows and writhed around us was no trick of the light. That the sudden panic surging in my veins was not entirely my own. That some terrible magic curling around Nura’s fingertips was drawing it all to the surface.

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