Page 70 of Necromance
“Stop it!” I shouted, voice echoing wildly off the stone. “Damn you, Serena! I’m not playing your game!”
The walls groaned in answer, warping, closing in on me like a tightening throat. The air grew thick with the scent of damp earth and old magic. And then the stone cracked.
Dark, thorny vines burst through the walls, snaking out in sharp, violent jerks, reaching for me with needle-tipped fingers.
I spun, drawing my magic just in time as one lashed out toward my throat. The enchanted blue light met the vine mid-strike, slicing clean through it. The severed end writhed, curling in on itself before dissolving into a puff of shimmering hazy black smoke.
Another vine snapped toward my ankle. I leapt back, gritting my teeth, and drove my hand down, pushing my magic into it. More vines. More magic. More smoke.More shrieking groans from the walls.
They came faster after that. A dozen writhing limbs clawing through the stone, lunging, snapping, slithering. I carved my way through them, each strike of my magic turning their monstrous forms to vapor. My breath came in hard bursts, sweat dampening my brow as I fought, back to the wall, heart pounding against my ribs. Exhaustion ate at my body. I was using too much magic, but what choice did I have?
“I’m not afraid of you,” I hissed between clenched teeth, sending more magic through another wave. “You’re not going to stop me. I will find him. I will break the curse. And you can rot in your twisted little tomb.”
I ran and ran some more. Heart pounding, breath ragged, blood still roaring in my ears. Every muscle in my body ached and a deep, throbbing headache surfaced in my temples.
It was too much. My magic was eating away at my energy.
My vision began to blur and a wave of dizziness swept over me.
The castle twisted and warped around me like a living nightmare… walls pulsing, archways closing behind me, corridors stretching impossibly long before snapping back in the blink of an eye.
I turned a corner, legs burning with exhaustion, and crashed hard into something solid. Something cold. Something dark.
I stumbled back, gasping—and froze.
A wraith loomed before me, taller than any creature I’d faced, its body cloaked in shifting shadows, black wings unfurling with a hiss of smoke. They spread wide, impossibly wide, touching both sides of the narrow corridor, blotting out every sliver of light. Its face was a horror, sunken, skeletal, with glowing ember eyes and jagged teeth like shattered glass.
Before I could react, it struck. A clawed hand clamped around my throat, lifting me off the ground. I choked, kicking wildly. Its face pressed close to mine, and a forked tongue slithered across my cheek, tasting me, taunting me. Its teeth scraped against my skin, leaving shallow cuts that burned like fire.
I gasped, panic rising, and with the last ounce of strength I had, I reached for my magic and slammed it into the creature’s chest.
Nothing happened.
The light sank in, but there was no shimmer of blue smoke, no shriek of pain. The wraith didn’t even flinch.
My magic was too weak. I was too exhausted.
A choked sob escaped my throat. I struggled, kicking, clawing, gasping for air, but it slammed me against the wall like a doll. My head cracked hard against the stone. A hot gush of blood spilled down my scalp,into my eyes, my mouth. The world spun.
Still, I tried to fight. I couldn’t stop. I wouldn’t stop. But my limbs betrayed me, trembling, weakening, failing.
The wraith’s shadow swallowed me whole.
And then—Darkness.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The void, the previous night
The world shuddered. The ballroom cracked at its edges like glass. The music died with a groan, the chandeliers above crumbling into smoke. The air folded inward.
Lucien’s eyes met mine, one second of fury and regret, and then Serena and the entire ballroom vanished into ash.
We were left in silence. Pitch black. And I was falling.
Strong, warm arms wrapped around me before I could hit the stone floor as the vines that had been twisted around my body suddenly vanished along with Serena.
I clung to Lucien as he pulled us into the void, the world tilting and bending with a speed that made my breathcatch. And then, just like always, it stopped suddenly, our bodies frozen in time in the space where Lucien resided most of the time.
