Page 97 of Sanctuary of the Shadow
The instant it touched her skin, the metal turned red-hot, softened, and then melted into a molten goo. He dropped it instinctively when the hilt started to melt his hands with it.
Furie didn’t move immediately. For a second longer, she stared into the fire as if loath to leave the memories within. But the images faded as she withdrew her magic and seemed to shake herself back to the present. Drawing her skirts about her feet, she rose gracefully and turned around. For the first time in half a century, their eyes met.
She was, like all the Queens, impossibly beautiful. Her skin was a perfect alabaster, as flawless as porcelain. Her hair was deepest red, falling in glossy curls over full breasts. Her eyes were the blue of the center of a flame, her lips luscious red.
All that beauty disguised a volatile beast.
Raith could do nothing but stand there, awaiting his fate. He knew well what her magic could do and didn’t delude himself into thinking he could escape her now. No, he’d had his chance already.
The assassin had taken his strike and failed. Now, he faced retribution.
Furie’s blue eyes widened with recognition. “You.”
Raith just stared at her. He wasn’t fool enough not to be afraid. His heart thundered in his chest, and he flexed his claws to keep his hands from shaking.
He was afraid, but he wasn’t a coward. He stared his death in the face, looking right into her eyes. Whatever happened, he would keep his eyes forward and his chin lifted. He would meet his death knowing it was the only noble path for a creature like him.
“You came back to kill me,” Furie said.
Raith nodded. He would never speak in her presence unless she forced the words from his throat. And she couldn’t now, he realized. The Water magic that helped create his physical form negated her absolute control.
“When I heard what Darya had managed to do, I could scarcely believe it. Yet here you stand. A brand-new Elemental. A perfect fusion of Fire and Water.”
She stared at him like she was looking at a finely crafted object she desired to possess, the glint of covetousness in her eyes.
“You’re so beautiful,” she whispered.
Hearing those words on her lips moments after she’d said them to the dead man in the flames sickened him, but he allowed no outward reaction.
Then she sighed. “What a shame I have to destroy you.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Almost instantly, Raith started to burn.
It was all so familiar. He’d been stolen and transformed into another being, had his mind erased and his existence reborn…only to end up exactly where he’d started.
Burning alive at the Fire Queen’s mercy.
But the pain’s familiarity didn’t make it any less intense. A cry was torn from his lips, and his knees buckled beneath him. The wound in his side became the equivalent of a tiny sliver as searing agony incinerated every inch of his being. It felt as though his skin was being flayed from his body while his internal organs were stabbed repeatedly with hot pokers. It felt as though his very soul was being boiled alive.
Through the haze, he saw Furie’s beautiful, blank face staring down at him. Her head cocked slightly, and her bright blue gaze was inquisitive, like she was wondering with scientific curiosity what his suffering felt like.
“You were always one of my favorites, Thirteen.”
Thirteen. That was his real name, his real legacy.
She laughed distantly. “My lucky number Thirteen.”
That was all he’d ever been. The thirteenth wraith. The favored assassin.
His hopes of having a new life and identity were nothing but a cosmic joke. The truth had been there all along, plain as day—even in the name he’d chosen.Raith. From the beginning, he’d simply labeled himself as what he was, and he hadn’t even known it.
“Your body isn’t nearly as impervious to harm in your new condition.” Furie’s voice seemed to come from farther and farther away. Or maybe he was the one drifting? “A weakness rather easily exploited, don’t you think? Ghostly wraiths are much stronger than flesh-embodied ones.”
Raith had tuned her out after the first sentence, for it was then he realized…that feeling of being boiled alive while his skin was flayed off? It wasn’t just a feeling any longer.
It was really happening.
