Page 36 of Fated In Ruin

Ravok turned slightly, speaking to someone behind him. For a heartbeat, I thought he’d given the order to attack and we’d be swarmed, but then his voice cut through the stillness like a blade.

“Bring him.”

Scuffling issued from the darkness behind him, and a bound male dressed in familiar black was dragged before the Ancient and forced to his knees. His dark blond hair was matted with blood, his familiar face tear streaked as he looked between Silas and Alistair.

As if he expected mercy.

“Oh fuck,” I muttered as Dante emerged from the shadows, his face a mask of emptiness, that distinctive red glowing from his gaze as he looked down at his own nephew. Not Virgil, thank God, but one of Alistair’s sons, and they were serving him up like dinner on a silver platter.

My cousin fought as Ravok gripped his throat and dragged him upright, and I forced myself not to look away when the monster tore out his throat, blood splattering everywhere as he put every bit of his vicious brutality on display.

Ravok’s intent was clear. He knew we were watching.

When he was finished, he tossed my cousin at Alistair’s feet, and I searched my uncle’s face for any sign of regret or grief, but there was nothing.

Nothing at all.

Ravok stepped over the body, not bothering to look down as my cousin convulsed on the floor. Ravok’s face was still gaunt, but even that amount of blood had filled out his cheeks, his eyes burning brighter. Magic coiled around him, and I yearned to cross the space between us, to taste that crushing power for myself.

“Evangeline,” the monster murmured, and though the words were quiet, they resounded inside me like thunder. “This could all be yours,” he continued, dark, shadowy tendrils reaching through the doorway, writhing like dying snakes in the sunlight. “Your destiny. All you have to do is come and claim it.”

Malachi tensed, his fingers gripping my wrist. “Vicious, we have to leave.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen enough,” I whispered. But as we slipped away, I couldn’t shake the feeling that no matter what we did next, we were already too late.

* * *

A painfully slowsonata played as I stared in awe at the restored sitting room, the gleaming black piano without a single speck of dust, the green velvet sofa with its perfectly fluffed squishy pillows.

Everything back in place, not a speck of damage anywhere.

Beyond the soaring windows, under a violently blue sky, the gardens bloomed in perfect harmony, black-red roses nestled between glorious waves of colorful flowers crammed into neat, orderly beds.

“What…how is this even possible?”

“By having the most skilled abjurist in the world owing me a favor, that’s how,” Malachi quipped, though his tone lacked its usual casual arrogance. I couldn’t stop staring.That wall had been split by a crack wide enough to drive a car through and there…the roof had nearly collapsed.

Even the pool of dried blood was gone, the marble floor pristinely clean.

“I don’t understand. A few hours ago, this castle was destroyed. Like, total destruction to the point of no return, and now,” I waved my hands at the impossible scene before me, “it’s back to normal. This is not possible.”

“It is when you have a team of abjurists working for a solid two hours to repair the damage. This room is not the problem, Vicious, Ravok is the problem.”

“Okay, I’ll bite. What’s an abjurist?”

“A specially trained mage with the ability to reshape the physical world into whatever they wish.”

Huh. Now that sounded handy as fuck.

They’d even gotten the smell right, a mix of ancient stone and candle wax, tinged with the slightest touch of recently-spent magic, like a thunderstorm had just passed through. The very walls seemed to hum, as though they were talking.

“This, too, shall pass.” Malachi waved his hand at the humming walls before he dropped heavily into a chair on the other side of the room. “Lasts a week or so, then settles, annoying but harmless.”

“So you called in a favor to themost skilled mage in the world—nice name drop, by the way—before we did our reconnaissance mission? That’s a lot of multi-tasking, even for you. I thought you were still recovering?”

“I’m perfectly recovered, Vicious. I drank from you, remember?” But his hands tightened on the chair arms, his eyes not meeting mine as I wondered what he was hiding. Sunlight filtered through the windows, dancing across his handsome features, casting his guilty expression in shifting shades of shadow and gold.

“We have to talk about Ravok,” he said, instead. “What you just saw was nothing more than him taunting you.”

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