“Yes, better for us that they’re not already dead!” Anna bellowed, clambering over the edge before the rest. She was a slim girl near Elliot’s age. If Norhavellis had the luxury of a schoolhouse, they’d be in the same year. Tears wet her cheeks, reflecting in the torchlight, and she headed straight for us, eyes aflame. “You ruined us.”
“That’s not true,” Elliot insisted. “We always tried to help.”
“Traitor!” Anna screamed, lunging with a snarl and throwing herself at Elliot before I could react.
Mila sprang from behind, flipping the girl to the roof with a practiced sweep of her boot. Anna leapt back up—far too quickly—and rolled under Mila’s foot, diving for Elliot again. But Mila was quick, too. She knotted a fist in the girl’s cloak and flung her away in one fluid, forceful movement, leaving her sprawled on her spine and sliding backward down the roof. Edgar and Muriel grabbed for Anna’s flailing limbs, still struggling to worm their own bodies over the edge.
“Let go a’ me! Let go!” Anna shrieked.
But the more they grabbed, the more Anna lurched backward. She slid off the edge, dragging Edgar and Muriel with her. After they hit the ground, they did not move.
“Th-they sounded almost—almostthemselves,” Elliot sobbed.
“We need to get to the Light Bringer,” Mila said, grasping us by the elbows and ushering us back to our open window. “We’re not safe up here.”
Reluctantly, I let her guide me. There was nothing else we could do. Elliot and I didn’t have a chance, not against the red rage of the Corrupt or the cold precision of the Light Legion. We moved quickly throughour home, pausing only to step over the fallen Corrupt at the foot of our stairs, and followed Silas and Mila as they took us outside again.
The Light Bringer, along with a few of his more ornamented followers, stood apart from the fray. He held a large scepter in his armored hand, and he wove it through the air, chanting as smoke billowed from its crevices. Undulating smoke coiled against my tired skin, freely drifting, rippling, encircling.
The purification ritual.
It was the scent of fertile earth, of mud soft from a rainstorm. It was dried, sweet leaves on a warm forest floor. It was security and comfort and dreams. The feel of limitless promise and ancient secrets.
Music thrummed out with the smoke as it spread, led by the Light Bringer and the people around him. Voices blended with the low hum of accompanying flutes, and the melody rose in strength with the smoke, growing stronger and more brilliant with every passing moment. Corrupt began to fall, dropping their weapons and going silent. The smoke and the music seeped through cracks in my skin, and I exhaled, scarcely conscious.
Then I collapsed backward into the mist-drenched grass.
I crashed into bone-numbing water.
It rushed over my head in a wave, burying me, and for a moment, I was stunned into stillness, suspended and floating.
Incredible.
Light and darkness mingled around me, casting an endless array of luminous shapes across my arms, and the gleam of something iridescent floated through it all, rotating and spinning like a thousand moving stars. It swept over my skin and danced along the lines of my dress, nearly making me forget who I was and where I was supposed to be. A familiar melody hummed in the distance, drifting faintly, ever so faintly, through the water. It repeated twice before threading into nothingness.
And as the sound faded, so did the light.
I clawed to the surface, crying out for breath the moment my mouth met air.
“You,” a familiar voice snarled.
The Shadow Bringer stood at the edge of the water, hatred radiating from every inch of his tall, shadow-wrapped frame. He was wearing the same attire from the previous dream; intricate black armor covered him from foot to throat, and a horned helm with a caged lower jaw hid allhis features except for his mouth, eyes, and silver-white hair. A dark cape was affixed to his shoulders, sometimes appearing corporeal, sometimes appearing as though its threads were hewn from shadow. Above us, stained glass windows arched into an unfathomably tall ceiling, twining with vines, crumbling stone, and an expansive collection of candelabras.
“Why am I back here?” I cried, more to myself than to him.
I couldn’t decide if I should swim to the edge—where he was—or remain where I was, suspended in a bottomless pit of icy water. I was also wearing the same attire from the previous dream, and while the dress was beautiful, it was painfully difficult to swim in. Realistically, I’d probably drown before I made it to the edge.
If dreamerscoulddrown, that is.
“A foolish question, considering you’re the one trespassing. A second time, no less,” the Shadow Bringer said, fixing me with a stare as frigid as the water. He clasped his metal-encased hands together, drawing a stream of billowing, inky darkness from somewhere within himself. It draped across his shoulders in a languid pile, likely waiting for his orders to capture me or maim me in some way.
“I won’t let you escape so easily this time. Your unconscious mind is prone to wandering into forbidden places, and I intend to find outwhy.” His silver eyes narrowed.
The shadows rushed from his shoulders, rampaging in fierce, erratic loops over my head. A few separated, springing out from the cloud like a swarm of serpents, and rustled around in my hair, prodding and pulling. I screamed, clawing at them, but they fell against my neck regardless, pricking at the skin with a depraved eagerness. Dark, smokelike blood appeared from the injury they caused, rising in the air to mingle with the rest of the shadows.
The Shadow Bringer crossed his arms, looking oddly perplexed.
“Strange. I’d expected to draw his hideous stain, but there is still only darkness in your blood.”
