Page 96 of What Hunts Inside the Shadows

I bent down as I ran, grabbing a sword from one of the fallen corpses. My skin sizzled against the iron, burning my flesh. “Estrella!” Caelum growled, the warning of his deep voice sinking inside me.

I shook my head, warding off the thoughts that plagued me. The instinct to turn back to the safety of the circle of the dead, a command that pulsed down the bond between us.

I severed the thought, picturing my bedroom window slamming shut in his face. I glanced over to watch as he stumbled back as if he’d been struck, nearly taking a sword to the chest. He turned at the last moment, narrowly avoiding the blow as the iron blade cut through the flesh of his arm. Blood flowed freely from the wound, spraying into the air and mixing with the rain pelting down around us.

Closing myself off from the stabbing wound of guilt that threatened to consume me, I strode forward toward the edge of the Veil. I ignored the burning of my palm, and the way that I didn’t think I’d be able to remove my hand from the sword intact. My skin melted against the iron in a way that would peel the flesh from my bones when I tried to let it go. The growl of the wolves and hounds sounded behind me, mixing with the sounds of the battle. I knew Fenrir had to be occupied for him to not come to my side, and my heart throbbed with the realization that I’d left Fallon behind. I didn’t know if she had any ability to defend herself, but I couldn’t turn back to find out.

Something slithered along through the grass beneath my feet as I forced myself to move forward with steady steps. The ebony lines of serpents traveling through the snow emerged from the woods behind me to follow as I walked, and I swallowed back the impending sense of doom I felt with every pace that brought me closer to the boundary between Nothrek and Alfheimr.

The magic of Mab coursed through my veins.

I approached the witches, ignoring my mother’s wide-eyed stare as she twisted the best she could to look at me over her shoulder. One of the witches stepped forward, deep blue hair hanging down to her waist in loose waves. Her hand glowed with a blue swirl of magic, a ripple of energy radiating from her as she narrowed her glowing sea green stare on me.

She flung the magic at me, a leading wave of sea water tearing through the air between us as I thrust the sword in my hand up to block the attack. It struck the iron of the blade, making it vibrate in my grip painfully, but the magic broke, the wave bursting into droplets of water that parted around me and further soaked the ground.

I glared at her from behind my iron blade, wishing I didn’t have to choose between the power in myViniculumand the comfort of a weapon in my hand. The snakes slithered forward, closing the distance between the sea witch and I. She screamed as they approached and wrapped around her ankles, pulling her down to the ground along with them.

I dropped the tip of the sword to the ground beside me as I watched in horror, the twisting, writhing shapes of their mass covering her as she struggled. Pinning her arms to her sides, they encased her in a tomb of serpents andsqueezed.

Her eyes bulged in her face, the sea green light of them fading slowly as she fought for breath.

My sword moved at my side, one of the midsize serpents winding around the blade itself until the scales of its face touched the tips of my fingers. A forked tongue slithered out of its mouth, licking my hand and the blood that dripped free from my melted skin. It wound around my hand, up over my wrist and twirled its body around my forearm and bicep.

Finally, it draped the heavy weight of its body over my shoulders, its face pressed against my cheek. I swallowed back the surge of fear, closing my eyes as the sea-witch died and breathing in the comfort of the presence of the snake resting on me.

Its tail wound around my sword arm, thrumming as one of the others sank its fangs into the sea witch’s corpse. As if it had devoured her soul itself, it transferred her life energy through them and into me. The skin of my hand healed enough that I was able to pry my fingers free, burning red flesh sticking to the hilt of the blade as new skin formed to cover my bones. The snake wound its tail around the hilt, wrapping it in its entirety and giving me something to grip that wasn’t poisonous.

At least not to me.

His scaled flesh formed a barrier for me to grip onto as I hefted the heavy blade once more and strode forward. I passed by Holt on my way, striding right by him and the Mist Guards he fought with. “Gods,” he muttered, his shocked eyes meeting mine for a moment as I walked by.

By the time the serpents abandoned their previous meal and slithered on ahead of me, the other two witches were ready for them, casting water toward them. I left the witches to their battle with the snakes, narrowing my eyes on where Lord Byron waited beside my mother with two Guards at his side. One of them pressed the tip of his sword to my mother’s throat, his act the only thing that kept me from attacking outright.

“Drop the sword, Estrella,” Lord Byron ordered, glancing out the corner of his eye to where one of the sea witches approached. Her body was drenched from the rain, her navy hair plastered against her face as she flung the body of one of the snakes off her arm.

“Do not deceive yourself into thinking we are on a first-name basis just because I have seen you fuck women who looked like me,” I snapped back, raising my sword to point it at him. “You haven’t got the first clue who I am now, but there is one thing you can know with absolute certainty. Any chance you had of walking away alive vanished the moment your men put their hands on her. Now you can spend your last moments knowing that my face will be the last thing you see before I send you to The Father for final judgment.”

“You think you can fight two Guards before they kill your pathetic motherandyou? They’ve instilled you with an inflated sense of self-worth. You are nothing but a Fae male’s whore,” Lord Byron spat, the ground absorbing the spittle that sprayed from his mouth.

In spite of the iron humming beneath the snake in my hand, myViniculumdarkened, the swirling lines of shadows writhing around as I stroked the fuzzy golden threads around me. They shuddered, acting as if they too would reject my call before they finally allowed me to wrap them around my fingers and pull. Behind me, the magic touched the closest body. It rose from the ground, its presence behind me noticed as the dead sea witch rose from what would have become her very wet, watery grave. “You would be wise to be careful how you speak to me. The God of the Dead is not fond of people insulting his mate,” I said.

The sea witch’s body stepped forward, feeling far too familiar as some twisted part of me danced within her. It replaced the soul that had moved on, the part of her that lingered in the air around us, waiting for burial or burning.

Waiting for the ferryman to take her to the Void.

There was a hole where her heart should have been, devoured by the snakes that had claimed her. Even a witch couldn’t survive the loss of a heart. I felt the emptiness and I filled it with myself instead—with my purpose and my determination. She stepped forward slowly, approaching her sister witches with sluggish steps as they stared at her in horror. Killing someone we loved, even while knowing they were already gone, was not a task most were familiar with.

It was a dilemma that threatened to impair anyone who did not spend time with the dead. Those moments of doubt, of questioning their instincts, were the moments that would lead to the end of all they loved.

Because the dead cared not for the living, reanimated woman only served my demand for blood. For vengeance.

She served my desire to watch the world burn.

She attacked the one witch who remained standing, the other still grappling with the remaining snakes in what had once been the gardens I’d toiled in for the entirety of my life. I took a step forward toward Lord Byron, knowing the witches were handled for the moment.

“Drop the sword, or I’ll slit her throat,” the Mist Guard said, pressing the blade deeper into my mother’s neck. Blood welled at the tip, staining the iron blade with the viscous fluid. I uncurled my fingers from the hilt of the sword, feeling the serpent around my shoulders unwind her body from the weapon until it dropped to the ground at my side with a heavy thud.

The magic of Alfheimr rolled through the boundary, dancing across my skin. It awakened the part of me lingering beneath the mark, the darkness that stained my soul. My fingers burned with ice, my eyes bled to black as I tilted my head to the side. “Step away from her. We both know you need something far stronger than a human woman to reform the Veil.” I glanced toward where the witch fought against her dead sister. The body dropped to the ground with a twist of my hand, crumpling into a pile of flesh. The remaining witch breathed deeply, leaning forward to place her hands on her knees as she glared at me. Her fingers twitched at her sides, ripples of water forming as she began to chant beneath her breath. “Use me instead,” I said, turning my attention back to Lord Byron.

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