Page 191 of Curse of Darkness
And he squeezes my hand. “Are you ready?”
With him by my side? “Always.”
Thiago gives my fingers one last squeeze, before he steps between us, his feet planted in a defensive position. “You have no power over us. You want to fight?” Darkyn steel smolders to life in his hand. “Then let us fight.”
Lightning flashes, forging into a flickering blade of static in the Horned One’s hand. “You poor, pathetic fool. I will kill you, and flay the skin from your body with my lightning.” A hideous smile appears. “Perhaps as a gift for your wife.”
Lightning crackles as he brings his sword down. Thiago meets it, and a shattering shower of sparks flashes over us.
He’s the best bladesman I’ve ever seen, but it takes three seconds to realize he’s barely holding his own against that furious attack.
“Bring me forth, Iskvien. Summon me,” the Mother’s voice is urgent in my head. “You must set me free, right now!”
Every Hallow is connected.
I reach for the Mistmere Hallow, channeling the power of Eidyn beneath my feet.There. Mistmere lights up in a beacon in my mind, pulsing with the power that the Mother has been siphoning into that Hallow for months, waiting for this moment.
Drawing my knife across my palm, I slam it down on the Hallow stones. “I release you!”
My blood reacts with the stone, the Eidyn Hallow shuddering beneath us. Claiming the power of the Hallow, I send it spearing toward Mistmere.
The Horned One glances down at his feet as if realizing I’m not raising the Hallow against him.
And then he looks up, violence dancing through those storm-dark eyes. “You dare bring that bitch to this world?”
“Where were you when I needed help?” I retort, pushing slowly to my feet. “Because she’s been there for me all along.”
Thiago vanishes into a cloud of darkness, then reappears at my side, hauling me out of the way as the Horned One sends a lash of lightning streaking right toward me.
The ground shudders as if it’s tearing itself apart.
“What the fuck?” he snarls.
I don’t know if it’s the Mother of Night being set free or the Horned One who is causing this. I grip his arms, trying to ride the flow of power.
The entire split down the middle of the Hallow wrenches wider.
The crevice deepens, and I go down, cracking my knees on the stone. “Thiago!” I yell as our hands are wrenched apart.
“FOOLS!” the Horned One bellows, lightning lashing the Hallow again and again.
The stone breaks away beneath me as if it’s crumbling into that gaping slash full of raw power. I scream and reach out desperately, snatching for the edge, trying not to plummet inside the Hallow’s molten core—
A hand catches mine.
A body materializes.
And the Mother of Night appears, her face pale and wan within her hood. “Thank you,” she whispers.
Thiago slides next to her, reaching over the edge and grabbing hold of my forearm. “I’ve got her!”
Behind him, the Horned One laughs, reaching for the skies and summoning an astronomical amount of lightning.
“Watch out!”
Lifting her hand, the Mother of Night cups my cheek, and the faintest hint of a smile touches her lips. The Horned One seems to freeze. Thiago goes still. Or maybe it’s time itself, as silence cocoons the pair of us.
“When I first dreamed of you, Iskvien, you were nothing more than a pawn. The child I conjured into being with my magic and my plotting. The child who could one day destroy the Horned One and set us free. I sang to you at night when you were a babe because I wanted you to know our songs, our legends, our stories. But what I did not understand is that my heart—long-since turned to stone—would soften when you looked at me with such trust.”
