The heat was unmistakable. Buffeting my exposed skin like a summer sirocco cresting desert dunes, the warmth of the Sin's body passing near my own was as recognizable as his voice or his face or the stiff set of his shoulders. It was all-consuming, a fire that defied logic, considering that the ice layering the walls and dripping from the low rafters belonged to the same creature as the sweltering warmth biting my flesh.
He tore through the Realm as if it were a translucent screen separating a tiger from its prey. A grating rumble precipitated the Sin's appearance like the first jarring earthquakes before a volcanic eruption. Darius hadn't even fully divested himself of the Realm's tendrils before he placed his hand between my shoulders and shoved with considerable force.
I landed sprawled on the chaise next to the Cassandra, my breath whooshing from my lungs as my back struck the seat. Stars blurred my vision and I heard Darius strike the Vytian, the low thwap of flesh hitting flesh sliding through my ears like a blade.
For one terrible second, I was convinced Darius had killed him. I had seen the Sin break the necks of men twice Anzel's size with minimal effort. He could kill the Vytian exile without blinking, without a single thought of regret or remorse probing his consciousness.
Then I heard Anzel shout in a strange, guttural language and Darius quipped a retort in the same tongue. I blinked the stars from my eyes just as Darius wrapped his fingers around the Vytian's throat and slammed him into the floor.
"Well?" the Cassandra said, lengthening the syllable. I whipped my head to the side to see her observing me. At this proximity, her visage was more unearthly than it had initially appeared. Her skin was unblemished but almost transparent, the dark lines of her blue veins visible if her countenance was scrutinized. Her eyelashes were long and black, angling jagged shadows over her thin cheeks. The bones of the elf's face seemed as fragile as a bird's ribcage. "Are you going to stare at me? Or stop him?"
Her snide comment reoriented my attention. I jumped to my feet and reached for Darius, laying my hand against one of his quivering shoulders. The tough, uneven lines of scar tissue spelling the word "betrayer" across his back were like rugged trenches beneath my fingertips and the heat of his skin lanced through my arm.
"Pride!"
Darius was crouched over Anzel with his hands on the Vytian's thin neck. He squeezed, and the veins in his wrist bulged with the effort to restrain his overwhelming strength. I knew the ease with which Darius could kill, so I also knew the struggle he was undergoing in his mind. The lives of others meant little to the Sin of Pride. As far as I knew, the small and immaterial heartbeat of another being was inconsequential in the Sin's ancient hands.
"Pride—stop!"
I glanced at Anzel, expecting him to fight Darius's punishing grip—but the Vytian held his arms prone at his side, his posture suspiciously relaxed considering the irate creature choking the life from him. An unaffected mood tipped his lips into a cruel smirk.
Why wasn't he fighting back?
"Don't—!" I pulled on Darius's arm, throwing my weight into the action. I hung off the creature and he ignored my presence as if he couldn't feel it. When Darius shifted, my shoes screeched on the floor as I tried to hold my ground and I fell onto my backside.
Anzel laughed, the sound choked and mirthless as his face grew redder. "Go on—," he grated as he met Darius's black stare. "Go on, beast. Kill me. I see how you yearn to. Go on and do it. Do it, and immortalize forever your monstrous status in her eyes. Then, she'll have a chance of getting out of this alive."
"Anzel!" I gasped, disbelieving the words coming out of his mouth. Was he goading Darius?!
"I am a monster, boy," Darius hissed as he leaned toward Anzel's. The Vytian's expression remained passively schooled but for a single bead of perspiration crossing his temple. There was a large bruise forming on his lower jaw where Darius must have struck him. "Whether or not she sees me as one is irrelevant to the truth."
"Stop this!" I demanded as I hovered by them both, wrapping my fingers around Darius's trembling wrist. The heat radiating off his skin was nearly scalding.
Putting myself in his line of sight was a mistake. Darius craned his neck until we were face-to-face, the alien nature of his gaze stealing my bravado. The shined, flat blackness of his eyes held no recognition or pity. "And you," he whispered as the low tremor of his fury entered his breath and broke upon my cheeks. It was anger meant only for me. "You need to remember what I am."
The ragged but steady rhythm of Anzel's breathing was cut short as Darius tightened his grip. The visible muscles in Anzel's neck and arms tightened, but still he didn't struggle. Jesus, Pride really was going to kill him!
Panicked, I yelled, "Darius, no—!"
In a slight, jaded motion, the Cassandra lifted her arm to lay her hand upon the head of the larger Dreaming man, her thin fingers sliding into the strands of his platinum hair. "Requiem, I tire of this."
In response, the elf man uttered a silent statement. His lips formed around the letters in rapid succession, and somehow I heard the words come together into a low sibilance like a well-tuned engine turning over. The quiet malaise layered over the lounge was dispelled as the ambient energies realigned and reacted to the man's unobtrusive voice.
Conceivably, he should have attacked Darius—or Anzel. At the moment, I wasn't feeling particularly charitable toward the Vytian and thought he deserved a smack upside the head for purposefully egging the demon on. But the Elven man didn't speak his Song for Anzel, or for Darius.
The air stirred and folded round my face as soon as I realized something was amiss. Darius and Anzel had both turned to look at the man named Requiem—and when my breath caught, the Sin was the first to realize the spell had passed over the two of them in favor of me.
An invisible force formed a noose about my middle and cinched shut. The bond jerked me upward, ripping my hand free of Darius's shirt as my feet left the floor. Then, just as suddenly as it began, the noose writhed like a whip recoiling and flung me down with a loud, startling bang.
"Ow!"
Dazed, I threw my hair out of my face as I got my hands underneath my body and lifted myself. The elf's diversion had successfully torn the Sin off the Vytian. Darius stood between the elves and me now, and Anzel was still on the floor, coughing as he sucked in air and the florid flush left his face.
"World-burner," the Cassandra said, her voice low and soft like the subtle murmur of a church choir. Requiem and his brother had risen to their feet, bemused expressions on their faces—and yet Darius hadn't looked from the prophetess.
The Sin recognized where the true danger originated.
"World-burner, how does it feel to cherish something ephemeral and know it cannot—will not—last?" She plucked the wood pipe from the chaise and pressed it to her mouth. The succulent scent of the smoke returned as the white plume issued between her lips. "How does it feel to read your doom spelled upon such a pretty face? To know your purpose is synonymous with your end?"
Thin rivulets of red flame were igniting the Sin's clenched fists. "Shut up."
"The endless torment of your existence, the disgusting beat of your heart poisoning my King's Song; how I will revel in its termination. How the world will adore the silence of your soul."
"I said shut up!"
The woman didn't shut up. She kept talking as if she couldn't hear Darius—as if she couldn't see the ice forming over the walls, or smell the fire licking his flesh, or feel the tremors wracking the manor's floors as the shadows bubbled and pulsed in the cracks. Frost formed upon their bronzed flesh and clung in white clumps to the Cassandra's thick lashes. I could only imagine how ferocious the cold encasing their lithe bodies was—and yet the Dreaming Children were utterly unaffected.
"How did it feel to tear apart your own soul for her?"
What?
"I should have burnt you along with your damn temple," Darius threatened as the last of the lights died. The other room of the lounge had fallen utterly silent, the Aos Sí having vacated after Darius appeared. The pulsing lambency emanating from beneath his flesh was a clear indicator of the Sin's diminishing lack of control.
"You should have." The Cassandra sank onto her chaise, crossing one thin leg over the other as Requiem and his brother remained standing. Requiem still had the blade in his scarred hand. "But you've lost your chance."
Darius marched forward with fire dripping from his hands and I knew he certainly wanted his second chance to burn the woman alive. I tried to stop him—but I was blocked by an out thrown arm. It was difficult to see in the dark, but I could discern Anzel's profile touched by the wan glow thrown by Darius's flames.
"Don't," he whispered. When I tried to shove past him, Anzel wrapped an arm around my torso and wouldn't let go. "Stop, you silly thing. Listen to me. You cannot put yourself between—."
"I swear to God, Anzel, if you don't let me go—!"
"Hate me if you must, love, but I won't let you go. I won't let you throw yourself into danger for him, or for anyone."
Though Anzel's words gave me pause, I tried again to rise and the Vytian lowered his arm to hold me tight about the middle. His grip pressed into my side wound and I sucked a pained breath through my teeth.
Noticing the sound, Anzel's brow lowered over his shadowed eyes.
Darius was only a foot from the Cassandra's chaise, leaving the Vytian and me shivering in the frost crawling in the darkness displaced by the Sin's power. Embers falling from Darius's hands left black scorch marks on the rug. The Cassandra appeared unconcerned, though Requiem and his brother were both still as stone, waiting for Pride to move.
When Darius spoke, I didn't recognize his voice. All emotion had been bled from his words, leaving his statement frigid and heavy like portentous lead weights being laid upon my shoulders. The creature was so furious his ire had folded in upon itself, leaving the unstable, broken Sin before us.
"You think your immortality a gift, girl," Pride said as his smoldering hand rose between them. "When I know it is not but a curse laid upon the Dreaming by your shit King. Test me, elf-witch. Push me. I will show you why the inability to die is a curse. I will show you exactly why my body spills fire."
The Cassandra's face contorted when Darius called her an elf. Requiem and his brother both spat some fierce, vulgar word in their language and formed a rapid hand gesture reminiscent of a Christian benediction as if warding off a vile evil.
The prophetess drew upon her pipe and exhaled sickly smoke as if she were about to breathe fire. Her white eyes shimmered in the firelight.
"Only one of you will survive. Only one. One monster will stand when he descends." She smiled, baring too many teeth. "Would you like to know who?"
Darius faltered. The flames quailed and, despite the rage still bubbling in his expression, the Sin retreated from the ring of equally furious elves.
"Sara," he said with his voice still flat and shallow. "Leave your Vytian toy here. We're leaving."
"Get out, then," the Cassandra mocked. "Run, coward, before I lay your fate bare."
Anzel rumbled about being address as "toy," but I lacked the patience and the nerve to deal with his ego. When Darius turned and strode from the icy lounge, I extracted myself from the anxious Vytian's grasp and quickly followed the creature.
We walked in silence down the stairs and through the rotted halls. When I lagged behind, the demon wordlessly took hold of my wrist in his sooty fist and we continued on. Darius and I had nearly returned to the foyer by the time I mustered the courage to speak.
"Darius, I—."
The Sin spun, covering my mouth with his healing hand. The scent of burnt flesh and bitter, acrid brimstone was overpowering. Darius loomed over me, his fingers digging into my skin as he clasped my jaw and kept my objections silent.
"You will not speak of what just happened to me again. You will not return to this place—you will not seek out that blasted woman ever again!"
The Tongue of the Realm poured into my thoughts like quicksand. The most devious aspect of the Sin's ability was the warmth it divulged, the velvet restraints twining through my mind with ease. Surrendering one's will was a strange, contradictory pleasure. Darius stole my choices but in doing so liberated me of responsibility's burden. The sensation was freeing.
I hated him for it.
Darius grinned with anger remaining in the hard lines of his face, his hand still containing my building outburst as I glared with tears burning my eyes. There wasn't an ounce of softness or humanity in the expression; only the harsh, brutal edge of a sadistic, pissed off creature who crawled into this world from the black depths of the Pit.
The Sin leaned nearer. "I almost prefer you silent," Darius drawled as he passed his lips by my ear. "Silent. Obedient."
I kicked him in the shin with all my might. I grunted when pain arched through my sore toes.
Darius's eyelids flickered but otherwise he gave no indication of feeling the blow.
"You think I'm being unfair," he muttered as his free hand caught a strand of my hair and tucked it behind my ear. "But it is you, Sara, who is being unfair. You took away my choice. When you followed that Vytian fool and walked into her den, you stole my options. You forced me to follow you into danger—into an unnecessary danger I didn't want to confront. You walked straight into a deadly situation and didn't recognize the threat. This is simply a consequence of your actions."
I sank my teeth into Darius's hand and he pulled back, wincing at the teeth marks marring his palm.
"You didn't need to follow me," I snapped, conscious of my voice's volume. "I was perfectly fine. I wasn't in any danger from—!"
The words were caught by Darius's command. My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth as my jaw locked in place. I let out a short exclamation of frustration.
"You don't understand," Darius retorted as he threw a hand in the direction of the hall we had just departed. "Every word she speaks is poison, you fool. The more you listen, the deeper her poison seeps, digging its treacherous barbs into your mind until she rips it from you. She hasn't the sense of morality or dignity to behave differently. She weaves the story of your fate and you buy into it, word by word, strand by strand, and she takes you bit by bit—until it's too late. Until you're addicted to the tale. Dependent upon the future she holds above you.
"Why do you think Crow's End is like this? Why do you think its halls and rooms and exterior are all so distorted and perverse? It's because of her. Because Peroth bought into her lies and bullshit, and with a single crooned line, that woman laid him low. She tore his mind apart and thrust the entire manor into a spiraling descent of madness. That he regained even a modicum of his mental faculties is a miracle."
We stared at one another as our irritation simmered and Darius's words plinked through my thoughts. Addicted, he had said. I had wanted to hear more of what the woman had to say. I had wanted her to be more direct with me, to state plainly what I needed to know. But, wasn't that exactly how an addiction began? It began as a quest for riches, a quest for a better high—a quest for knowledge?
Without Darius's intervention, would I have continued to return to the Cassandra in search of the truth, only for her to never divulge what I wanted? For the truth to remain as elusive as the green dragon?
Would I have succumbed to the prophetess's addiction only for her to rip my hopes and goals apart like a dog tearing meat from a bone, leaving me mad and tortured by indecision?
I lowered my gaze. The Cassandra's repugnance for the Sins had been a perceptible entity, like an unruly ghost of hatred ruling far above the woman's demure stature. Her hatred for Darius had been particularly fierce. Had I done the wrong thing by approaching her? Had I strolled right into a situation that could have gotten me killed? Had I pushed Darius into danger when I only sought to free him of such peril?
"I'll say it again, you didn't have to follow me." I bit down on the remark until the muscles in my jaw burned. He should have let me make my mistake and suffer the blowback alone.
The Sin pressed a finger beneath my chin and lifted my head. I blinked, wary, and discovered color once more permeating the haunting blackness of his eyes. "I'll follow you wherever I wish, idiot girl. That is my prerogative."
He turned, drawing his fingertip across my jaw for a second before pulling away. I stared after the soot-covered Sin, still angry and yet somewhat perplexed by his contradictory behavior. He berated me for bumbling into turmoil—and yet he asserted he would follow me regardless, probably to yank me out of trouble by the scruff of my neck like an errant cat.
Why couldn't I ever understand Darius or the choices he made?
I'll follow you wherever I wish.
What did that mean?
I chased him into the foyer in a bid to demand answers—but that was when the screaming began.