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"Take the risk or lose the chance."
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BLADES HAD been strapped all over me. Hidden in my boots, inside my pockets, at my sides, all accessible places. Twin Illyrian blades strapped across my back in a perfect 'x'. A weight so familiar and normal I barely registered it at all.
Fear and worry and suspense hung low in the air, twisting through each of our veins as we all stared. Our eyes meeting as our breaths held in our chests. On pause. Frozen.
We would risk everything today. Would travel within the walls of our enemies and attempt to save the remaining shambles of the world. Attempt to mend the damage that had been reaped by the King.
They had planned everything—Cassian and Azriel— had thought through every scenario, every possible hiccup or problem—with a few begrudging critiques from me, obviously. There was nothing we were not prepared for. Nothing that was not calculated from every angle and possibility.
Just a few hours ago I'd known such overwhelming happiness, after such horror and sorrow. Just a few hours ago, I had sworn myself to an infinite future with Rhys. Just a few hours ago, I'd been in his arms while he'd made love to me. A perfect moment broken by only this danger and demand to protect these people.
And now Rhysand, my mate and High Lord and partner, stood beside me in the foyer, his hand snaked around my waist as he drew me impossibly close. A reminder. That we are both still here and will be by the end.
Across from us, Mor and Azriel and Cassian were armed and ready in their scale-like armor, all of us too quiet. Too fearful.
There were times when I believed not knowing was better than being in the known. That maybe, for a few small times, being cast in darkness was better than seeing the horrors of the light.
In this moment, I wished I did not know.
I wished I did not know I could lose everything if this were to go wrong. I wished I did not know that it was up to me to nullify the Cauldron. I wished I was huddled up in a bed with Rhys while he made me laugh and chased all my shadows away. I wished I did not know Hybern was a threat.
Amren was the first to cut through the silence, "The King of Hybern is old, Rhys—very old. Do not linger."
As if in an instinctive answer, a voice near my chest whispered, Hello lovely, wicked liar, Lady of the Light, ruler of shadows.
Two halves of the Book of Breathings, tucked close in two different pockets of my jacket. Each of them screaming at me. Calling an ancient cry I couldn't seem to understand.
"We'll be in and out before you miss us." Rhysand assured with a dip of his head, "Guard Velaris well."
Amren nodded, her eyes then drifting to me. She gave me a look I could have mistaken as something like minuscule concern. Strength. She studied my black-gloved hands and numerous weapons, "The Cauldron," she began, "Makes the Book seem harmless. If you fail to nullify it, or if you cannot move it, then leave."
We'll see. I refused to leave the Cauldron in Hybern's hands. Refused to take the risk of the mortal realm demolished. All those lives lost. No matter the cost, the price, I wouldn't let innocents be caught in the crossfire of a war they had no part in creating.
Amren surveyed us all again. "Fly well."
I turned to Mor as I sucked in a soft breath, whose arms were out, waiting for me. To winnow us into hell. Cassian and Rhys would winnow with Azriel—who would drop Rhys off a few miles from the coast before the Illyrians met up Mor and I seconds later.
I moved toward her, but Rhys stepped in front of me, his face tense. His entire body was tense, really. As though it was taking everything in him to let me do this without him.
Truth be told, I didn't want to do this without him. Having him near would serve as an assurance—a way to keep me grounded. Not having to worry as to whether he had been compromised or in danger.
Rhys could handle himself. I knew that despite my incessant teasing. Yet my mate worried about me nearly as much as I worried about him.
It was stupid. Idiotic. Both of us had fought our way through the world, had seen things those around us might not even be able to stomach. Both of us had proved again and again that we could handle whatever had been tossed our way. And yet...
So much loss. So much pain. I had lost too much. He had lost too much.
It had taken its toll.
And so—to remind myself just as much to remind him—I rose up on the tips of my toes lightly placing a hand on my shoulder before I kissed him, "It'll be fine." I whispered, "We'll all be fine." when I broke away his eyes stayed on me for a moment. Guaging, studying just as he always did—then he turned to Cassian. And without so much as a word the general knew what he was asking. What his eyes spoke of.
The general bowed, "With my life, High Lord. I'll protect her with my life."
The gesture was kind. And I knew Rhys would not let me go without their word. But...truly, I didn't need protecting. I didn't want protecting. Not if it meant they risked themselves for me.
If anything...I would rather I die than them. Would rather no one ever got hurt for me ever again.
But I wisely refrain from speaking those sentencing words.
These were my family now. My people. And that...that was everything. A lesson I had learned that in the hardest of ways. Didn't realize it until it was too late. Had not fought hard enough to protect that light that shined within my friends and within this circle.
I wouldn't repeat the same mistake again. Not ever.
Rhys looked to Azriel and the shadowsinger nodded, bowing, and said, "With both of our lives."
It was satisfactory enough to my mate—who finally looked to Mor.
She nodded once but said, but said, "I know my orders."
What would those be? And why hadn't I been told?
Without warning Mor gripped my hand. And then we were gone.
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I didn't need to focus on the tracks of the Cauldron to find its hiding place within the castle. Didn't need to even try to find it as a rope practically tugged at my chest toward the infinite structure. Pulling me as though a lead had been wrapped around my neck.
We had snuck into the large palace swiftly, moving in when the guards' shift was up. Foolish guards, one of the wors actually. They had left themselves blind for a mere moment. A small second. We had leapt. And now we roamed, silent as the wind.
The Cauldron wrenched on me with every breath. Calling like an old friend. Blood of my blood, it seemed to say, Come find me. Come sing to me.
I listened.
Any time we reached a crossroads, the three of us would branch out in different directions—much to Cassian and Azriel's dismay. The first time we had come across a blind spot, the two had near demanded I stay behind while they went ahead. To wait for them while they dealt with the danger. To which I'd replied, Screw off. I'm not helpless. I wont be kept from a fight.
The two were wise enough not to oppose.
Both Cassian and Azriel had been working these weeks, through whatever sources Azriel had, to get this encounter down to an exact schedule. An exact time frame that kept us moving rushedly through the halls. If I needed more time than they'd allotted, if the Cauldron couldn't be moved...it might all be for nothing. But not these deaths. These deaths I did not mind at all. Not that I truly minded any at this point in my life.
These people—they had hurt Rhys. They'd brough tools with them to incapacitate them. They had sent that legion to wreck and butcher my city. These people deserved a whole lot worse than the deaths I dealt them.
Fighting, and killing our way through the castle the call of the Cauldron began to grow louder. More urgent. And I found my steps hurrying to heed it.
Blood of my blood, it now screamed.
We descended through an ancient dungeon, the stones dark and stained. Mor kept at my side, monitoring our surroundings since the moment the female had met us on the outskirts of the castle. She stuck to my side like glue, going on alert at even the slightest bit of a threat to me. Only me.
It had me clenching my jaw. Realizing what Rhys's damn 'orders' were. And I was going to give him hell for it the moment I saw him.
If Cassian and Azriel were hurt, if there was a danger so great that the two Illyrians had been taken down, then Mor was to make sure I got out by any means. Then return.
But if Cassian or Azriel got hurt, I would not be going anywhere. I would not leave them. Would fight as hard as I could because I owed them that. Because I owed that to myself.
I would fight harder this time. Fight as hard as I should have when Astrid and Flynn stood before me with knives to their throats. This time...this time we would all make it out.
There was no one in the dungeon. Not even as we found another stairwell going down and down and down—
I pointed with a softly whispered, "Down there."
Cassian took to the stairs, the rest of us following in tow, each of our blades stained with dark red blood from those we had cut down in the process. Dripping onto the steps we now descended and leaving a morbid trail in our wake. Those who had stood in our way. Those who had threatened us.
We made an example out of them.
Down and down and down we spiraled, losing track of time and light and space.
And when we had finally reaching the ever looming bottom that seemed to be full of such infinite and dark magic. The only thing illuminating the space being the ball of faelight that floated above us.
Revealing what we had been looking for.
Revealing the Cauldron where it rested atop a small dais.
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The Cauldron was absence and presence. All and none. Night and light. So, so familiar and yet I could not remember what I was recalling. This darkness...this darkness had come from wherever the shadows were made. Wherever the haunted spirals of the world had been forged.
There was no life. No joy. No hope.
It was perhaps the size of a bathtub, forged from dark and dusted iron, sitting atop its three legs—the legs the King's had raided temples to find. Had slaughtered lives to retrieve. I doubted they had left any of those Priestesses alive...I doubted they had left without taking what they wanted.
Males, men, they could be kind and loving. Everything and all.
And then they could be ruthless and unyielding. Deadly and cruel. Hailing from a place like this...a place that created monsters. I loathed to think of all that may have happened in those temples.
The Cauldron was a sick and twisted temptation that sent your mind roiling with trouble. Just as the books born from it did.
Mor's face had drained of color, "Hurry," she said to me, "We've got a few minutes."
Azriel scanned the room, studied the stairs we'd strode down as if they were some ancient mystery. The Cauldron, its legs, he scanned them all. And I scanned him. "Listen." he commanded.
So we did.
Not words. But a throbbing.
Like blood pulsing through veins. Waves crashing against the shore. Wind flowing through a valley. As though the Cauldron had a living, breathing heartbeat.
Blood of my blood, it seemed to call again. More urgently this time, as if it was ushering me toward it.
Slowly, hesitantly, I took a step toward it. Then another. Mor was at my back, guarding me as I stepped up to the dais. My breath hitched as I grew closer as it began screaming at me. Begging. Closer. Closer!
I stepped upon the dais. Staring down into the depths of the Cauldron. Feeling as though they stared back. Inside the Cauldron was nothing other than inky, swirling black. Void.
They said the entire universe had come from the Cauldron. Spilled into existence by the Mother herself. Life created from only that.
And looking into those waters...I believed it. I believed all of it.
Azriel and Cassian tensed as I laid a ginger hand on the lip of the nipping, cold iron. Pain—pain and ecstasy and power flowed into me. Everything that was and wasn't, fire and ice, light and dark, deluge and drought. I felt it all. Bringing me to life. Shocking my veins as if urging me to do something. To know something.
Familiar. Familiar. Familiar.
Blood of my blood, the chant shook my thoughts.
Reeling back into myself, snipping the ties that had my mind turning and twisting, I readied to begin.
My other hand came up to my side, intending to place it against the Cauldron with the other. But...my hand brushed half of the Book.
Hello sweet tongued liar, destroyer of realities—
It's voice soothed the edges the Cauldron had roughed. As though balancing out the roaring voice of the inky well, as though the Book of madness had become the Book of reason.
One hand on the Book, the other on the Cauldron, I felt as though I was outside myself. Jolted into a state of clarity and cloudiness. A shock passed through my blood as though I were no more than a lightning rod.
Yes, you see now, princess of carrion—you see what you must do.
The decaying piece of rationality left inside me screamed. Protested. Yelled. Pleading not to listen to the voice, to the Cauldron. But control was far away and out of my grasp.
I had become mindless. A drone built to heed the Cauldron and the Book.
The other one, the Book hissed, Bring the other one...let us be joined, let us be free.
I slid the book out of my pocket as I tugged the other half free. My limbs moved of their own accord. "Stop me." I breathed, to those around me, "One of you needs to stop me now."
Together together together together.
"Danika." Mor said, panic now lacing her voice as she stepped forward.
"Do it, Mor." I said, clenching my jaw as I used the last of my willpower not to unite the halves. "Hurry."
Realizing what I was about to do, the blonde lunged for me with a curse. Her body moving swiftly, so swiftly to get to me before it was too late. Before I did something that would damn us all.
Too slow.
I laid the second half of the Book atop the other.
A silent ripple of power hollowed out my ears. Buckled my bones. Shook the world.
Then nothing.
From far away, Mor said, "We can't risk—"
"Give her a minute." Cassian cut her off.
I was the Book and the Cauldron and sound and Silence. One and both. As though in joining the Book I had become joined with them.
I was a living river from which one flowed into the other, eddying and ebbing, over and over, a tide with no end or beginning. Ending and beginning. I felt like I was splattered across consciousness, raw and shattered.
I was not a tool, I was not a pawn, I would not be a conduit, not be the lackey of these things—
I fought like hell.
Fighting against something like water. All around me and flowing in every corner as I thrashed against it. Tried and tried to rid myself of this surrounding mass.
But then I thought to drain it. Suck it up like a sponge as I absorbed all that flowed around me.
I pummeled the Cauldron with my power. Feeding it as though I was drowning it with all I had. I would destroy this damn thing. I would save those around me.
And so I gave it all. Fracturing myself in the process. Feeding and feeding. Giving and giving. I felt the power that lay deep within me begin to drain. Falling away and into the Cauldron.
It did not just need a drop of my power to nullify it, the Cauldron needed everything. All I had. All I could give.
And I would do it. For them. For Rhys. For the Mortal Lands. For my sisters. I would give it all for them.
Then I would fight like hell to live.
I'd do that for them too.
I was on fire. I had become fire. Or maybe that was simply my muscles becoming magma, burning me from the inside as my power drained from my body like pouring a pitcher of water into a cup.
It felt like the very blood was being sucked from my veins. I think I may have been screaming—
Strong hands tugged me back, wrenching me away.
Murky light and moldy stone poured into me, the room spinning as I gasped down breath, finding Azriel shaking me, eyes so wide I could see the white in them.
I panted, scrambling upwards without a second thought as the world invaded my senses. On instinct my eyes went to the metal structure I had just been yanked away from, "Gods," I whispered, gulping down breath after breath.
Steps sounded from above, and I was knocked back into reality as though someone had taken a sledgehammer to my head. Azriel instantly shoved me behind him, bloodied blade lifted.
No. I could fight. I could do it.
I felt a drop of something wet trickle down my upper lip and mouth. I bought a hand up, wiping it away only to find red staining my fingers. Blood—my nose had been bleeding.
The steps grew louder and I rushed to my feet, dizziness greeting me as I did. I shook it away, forcing—willing myself to focus. I drew one of my daggers, not trusting myself to handle a sword at the moment.
A handsome, brown haired male swaggered down the steps. Human—his ears were round, but his eyes...
I knew the color of those eyes. I'd stared at one, encased in a crystal.
"Stupid fool," he said to me.
Jurian.
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Raising my chin in defiance, I gauged the distance away from Jurian. Whether I could strike without him retaliating against my friends first.
Cassian took a step toward the descending warrior and snarled, "You."
Jurian snickered, "Worked your way up the ranks, did you? Congratulations."
I felt him sweep toward us with that hyper-awareness I seemed to possess when he was near. Like a ripple of night and wrath, Rhys appeared at my side. The Book was instantly gone, his movement slick as he took it from me and tucked it into his own jacket.
Thank the Mother. I couldn't handle another second in that damn thing's presence.
"You look good, Jurian," Rhys said, strolling to Cassian's side—casually positioning himself in front of me. Moron. Such an idiot. "For a corpse."
"Last time I saw you," Jurian sneered, "You were warming Amarantha's sheets."
"So you remember," Rhysand mused, even as my rage flared. "Interesting."
Jurian's eyes sliced to Mor, "Where is Miryam?"
"She's dead," the blonde said flatly. The lie that had been told for five hundred years. "She and Drakon drowned in the Erythrian sea."
"Liar," Jurian crooned, "You were always such a liar, Morrigan."
Azriel growled, the sound unlike anything I'd heard from the shadowsinger before. I think I may have snickered had we not been in such a dire situation.
Jurian ignored him, chest starting to heave, "Where did you take Miryam?"
"Away from you," Mor breathed, "I took her to Prince Drakon. They were mated and married the Night you slaughtered Clythia. And she never thought of you again."
Wrath twisted his tan face. He seemed like a problem. I hated problems.
Rhys reached back to grab my hand. We'd seen enough. Hesitantly—maybe a tad fearfully—I gripped the lip of the Cauldron, willing it to obey, to come with us.
But the wind and darkness never came.
Mor gripped Cassian and Azriel's hands—and stayed still. Stayed here.
Jurian smiled.
Rhys drawled, hand tightening in mine as I stepped up to his side, "New trick?"
Jurian shrugged, "I was sent to distract you—while he worked his spell." his smile turned lupine. "You won't leave this castle unless he allows you to. Or in pieces."
Wrath washed through my veins, replacing any previous emotions. Cassian and Azriel crouched into fighting stances, but Rhys cocked his head while I simply studied the human with cruel and unflinching eyes.
I felt Rhys's dark power rise and rise, as if he'd splatter Jurian then and there.
Nothing happened. Not even lick of power in the room.
I tried next, drawing up a fraction of my power that was now replenishing after all the Cauldron had took. I dredged the fraction of magic up. Only to slam into a wall. Unable to form my power. Unable to use it.
"Then there's that," Jurian said, "Didn't you remember? Perhaps you forgot. It was a good thing I was there, awake for every moment, Rhysand. She stole his book of spells—to take your powers."
Inside me—just beyond that wall blocking my magic—it was almost as though a key was clicking into a lock, that molten core of power just...halted. Whatever tether to it between my mind and soul snipped—no, squeezed so tight by some invisible hand that nothing could flow.
I reached for Rhysand's mind, for the bond—
I slammed into another hard wall. Not of adamant, but of foreign, unfeeling stone.
"He made sure," Jurian went on as I banged against that internal wall with hot fury, "that particular book was returned to him. She didn't know how to use half of the nastier spells. Do you know what it is like to be unable to sleep, to drink or eat or breathe or feel for five hundred years? Do you understand what it is like to be constantly awake, forced to watch everything she did?"
It had made him insane—tortured his soul until he went insane. Yet...not. Peculiar.
"Sounds delightful," Rhys said, now turning from the room. For us to run.
But someone appeared atop the stairs.
I knew him—in my bones. The shoulder-length black hair, the ruddy skin, the clothes that edged more toward practicality than finery. He was of surprisingly average height, but muscled like a young man.
But his face—which looked perhaps like a human man in his forties...blandly handsome. To hide the depthless, hateful black eyes that burned there.
The King of Hybern said, "The trap was so easy, I'm honestly a bit disappointed you didn't see it coming."
Faster than any of us could see, Jurian fired a hidden ashbolt through Azriel's chest.
Mor screamed.
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We had no choice but to go with the king.
The ashbolt was coated in bloodbane that the King of Hybern claimed flowed where he willed it. If we fought, if we did not come with him upstairs, the poison would shoot to his heart. And with our magic locked down, without the ability to winnow.
Cassian and Rhys hauled Azriel between them, his blood splattering on the floor behind us as we went up the twisting stairways of the kings castle.
I tried not to step in it as Mor and I followed behind, Jurian at our backs. Easily. So easily I could take the man down...but to do that I'd have to gamble with Azriel's life. And that, I was not willing to risk.
Mor was shaking—trying hard not to, but shaking as she stared at the protruding end of that arrow. Visible between the gap in Azriel's wings.
None of us dared to strike the King of Hybern where he stalked ahead, leading the way. He'd taken the Cauldron with him, vanishing it with a snap of his fingers and a wry look at me.
We all knew the king wasn't bluffing. It'd take one move on our part for Azriel to die.
The guards were out now. And courtiers. High Fae and creatures who smiled like we were their next meal. Let them try. I'd rip their throats out with my teeth if I had to. All their eyes were dead. Empty.
No furniture. No art. As though this castle were a skeleton of some mighty creature.
The throne room doors were thrown open. A throne room—the throne room that had honed Amarantha's penchant for public displays of cruelty. Fae light slithered along the bone white walls, the windows looking out to the crashing sea far below.
The king mounted a dais carved of a single block of dark emerald—his throne assembled from the bones of...gods. Human bones. Brown and smooth with age.
We stopped before it, Jurian leering at our backs. The throne room doors shut.
The King said to no one in particular. "Now that I've upheld my end of the bargain, I expect you to uphold yours." from the shadows near the side door, two figures emerged.
I could not move. Frozen in place and wide eyed—hoping I could unsee what I now beheld as Tamlin and Lucien stepped into the light.
A/N: things are about to get even worse. And when you think they can't get any worse, I'm going to warn you—they will get worse. Prepare yourselves, soldiers.
Ngl, when it said "Not words. But a throbbing." I had the urge to put in instead, "Not words. But a throbbing (that's what she said)."