Bastian’s eyes fixed on me, steady and unwavering despite the blade at his throat. His head twitched the tiniest bit—barely a shake of his head—but his message was clear enough.
Don’t listen to him. Don’t let him control you.
“We managed to torture enough useful information out of several of your servants.” Severin’s gaze swept toward the sealed chamber doors. “So we know the pieces are here. We know they’ve been locked away, and we were in the process of helping ourselves to them, as guests of your fine palace. But then we were rudely interrupted.” He tapped the knife against my brother’s throat.
My pulse skipped several beats, but I kept my face impassive.
Don’t let him control you.
“It’s just as well, though, because it seems this door is sealed with an impressive amount of Vaeloran magic. Given enough time, we could probably figure out its secrets. But why do that, when you’re here to do it for us?”
“So you’ve come here to take them, have you?” I made my voice as calm as his, despite feeling like my heart might pound its way out of my chest at any moment.
“Yes,” he replied, simply. “And we appreciate you finding them for us, by the way, as we now finally have the means todestroy them—something we didn’t have when our dear Calista first made the powerful but questionable decision to spare Lorien’s life and create those shards. It’s taken some time, but now we have a questionably powerful tool of our own, don’t we?” His eyes were on Aleks as he spoke those last, chilling words.
Aleks, who remained several feet behind me. He was kneeling, his sword braced against the ground, his head bowed. I felt my composure crumpling a bit as I took in the sight.
I tried to take a deep breath.
Don’t let him control you.
I jerked my head back toward Severin. Too quickly. My mask slipping, only for an instant—but he noticed it.
He smiled like a gambler who’d just won a bet. “Surrender the pieces to us, and maybe we can work something out. And, if he does as we ask, maybe he survives this ordeal. Maybe you all do.” With a casually cruel shrug, he added, “Or maybe you don’t.”
I swallowed hard, my throat tight.
Every choice before me seemed impossible.
“Don’t listen to him,” came a voice from behind me—from Aleks, though I didn’t recognize it at first. It sounded strange. Close to breaking, clearly strained from fighting whatever the shards’ proximity was doing to him. I didn’t meet his gaze, but I could feel his eyes burning into the back of my head.
Pleading with me.
“Nova. Don’t do this.”
When I finally glanced back, I saw more Order members flooding in, blocking the only path that led out of this dead-end corridor.
He couldn’t escape this.
Wecouldn’t escape this.
“If you open that door, I don’t know what happens next.” His voice remained quiet, strained—yet it was the only thing I wasaware of for a long moment. Louder than the frantic pounding of my heart. More painful than the shallow rasp of my breath. More powerful than the cold caress of my shadows.
“But if youdon’topen it, you already know what will happen,” Severin chimed in, as though I needed the reminder.
Clenching tighter to Grimnor and my makeshift blade of shadows, I moved closer to the door. Close enough that I could have reached out and touched it. I could feel the soul shards on the other side waking up. Their essence was somehow slipping through the thick metal, wave after wave washing toward me and seeping into my skin like poison, or like power...it was hard to decide what it felt like. Grimnor hummed in eager response, the black blade practically vibrating in my grip.
“Go on, then,” said Severin.
I didn’t move.
My brother lunged forward, suddenly, struggling against his bindings and nearly managing to drag several of his captors with him before they regained their balance. He was far too outnumbered, though; they wrestled him back into submission. Severin’s knife slipped across Bastian’s face during the scuffle, leaving a deep cut that stretched from his chin up to the corner of his eye.
I stared at the blood dripping from the wound, thinking of the guards I’d found outside my room. Their scarlet-stained throats and dead, vacant stares.
I shook the hand holding my makeshift blade, causing the shadows to separate and rejoin the ones circling protectively around me.
Then I reached out and braced my hand against the cold metal door.
