Page 63 of Branded By Shadow
The void’s calm shattered and it let out a hiss of disbelief. “Orpheus’s bloodline,” it spat. “Still defiant. Why won’t you die?”
The darkness parted, not for a monster, but for its master. Damon emerged from the gloom, and the sight of him stole the breath from my lungs.
He was not the consumed and broken man I had last seen. This was something else. A creature of shadow and will, his eyes burning with an ancient light that held the abyss at bay. The overwhelming, impossible relief sent a wave of warmth through me, and my dying shield flared back to life.
His attention was locked on the Shadow Realm, a singular, predatory focus. But his next thought was a current directed at me. “It’s all right, Cora. You’re safe now. I’m here.”
The sheer, absolute power in that statement anchored me in a way I hadn’t deemed possible. But the Shadow Realm was not a creature to be cowed. “Presumptuous worm. The river should have silenced you!”
“The Styx doesn’t answer to you,” Damon replied. “It has a single master. And it turns out, he still wants me around.”
The void’s fury turned on both of us. “Hades can’t protect you here,” it snarled. “I will unmake you both! I will render you down to whispers and regrets!”
But the fear was gone. The aching emptiness in my chest was now filled with a cold, hard resolve. I was not a victim in this place. I was a trespasser. And I had come here to reclaim what was mine.
“No,” I said steadily, glancing toward Damon. “We will unmake you.”
Damon understood what I wanted, like he always did. In a single silent motion, he closed the distance between us. He wrapped his arms around me, pulling me flush against him in a possessive embrace. And then, his mouth crashed down on mine.
The kiss wasn’t tender. It was a frantic claiming. I felt his darkness meet my light, and the power between us erupted.
My House Demeter magic had grown feeble, slowly dying under the void's attack. The connection to Damon changed everything. My power surged, uncontrolled and intoxicating. It was a dizzying torrent of pure life, glowing flowers blooming and dissolving in an instant, their scent a drug that saturated the very fabric of the Shadow Realm.
The void’s furious snarl dissolved into a sound of raw, drunken ecstasy. The wave of life force hit it, and its focus shattered. I could feel its immense, ancient consciousness reel, its intent lost in a sudden, gluttonous stupor.
“Yesss...” it hissed, its voice now slurred and indistinct. “The feast... So much...” It was paralyzed, desperate to gorge itself on my light.
This had happened before, at the Olympian Council. This weakness had damned Damon, allowing the Artemis archer to strike. But it was also our best weapon, one that couldn’t fail.
Damon saw his chance. Power erupted from him in focused waves of abyssal, solidified shadow. He tore into the substance of the intoxicated, weakened entity around us, not justdefending, but ripping and shredding. His ferocity was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.
The Shadow Realm began to fracture. The fabric of this place could not contain the force of our combined power. I felt a violent, wrenching sensation, as if the very ground beneath us was being ripped away.
And then we were falling. Still locked in each other’s arms, we tumbled through the collapsing, screaming darkness. The world we had just broken came crashing down around us. But we were free.
24
Truth
Cora
Not here. Anywhere but here.
The realization echoed through me in tremors of pure, primal terror. I’d thought we’d escaped the monster when Damon had clawed us free of the void. But now we were in the Shadow Chamber.
The moment we’d hit the ground, I knew it. The cold here radiated the same hungry energy, a parasitic presence that sought to consume us all over again. I had fallen from one hell into the heart of another.
The low, dissonant hum of the chamber’s magic vibrated through the floor. The same sound I remembered from itsattempt to poison me, to drain my life-force away. I was not safe. Or so I thought.
A solid, living warmth wrapped around me, the only thing keeping my soul from flying apart.
Stone. Air. Gravity.Him.
My hand trembled as I lifted it, my muscles screaming in protest. The rasp of his stubble created a grounding friction against my palm, a rough texture that proved he was real. Solid. Alive.
I forced his name past my lips, a raw sound in the crushing silence. “Damon? You’re… here.”
He was the one thing in this room that was not a threat. But oddly enough, I couldn’t focus on that. Only one truth mattered. He was back. With me. No longer at the mercy of that… thing.
