The sound wavered through the room like a heartbeat faltering.
The jars pulsed once, their colors shifting to the hue of dying embers.
The shadows rustled, whispering in a language that felt like breath and prophecy at once.
And for the first time, I feared that when the sky went black, they wouldn’t bring salvation—only destruction.
The wind howled through the open windows, carrying with it the scent of ash and the sound of distant thunder, and I knew—when the sun and moon finally met, the world would either be reborn…or burn with us.
Chapter29
Salvatore
The sky was the color of blood when the end came.
Smoke rose from the harbor like black serpents, winding through the alleys, devouring the rooftops. The smell of salt and burning pitch hung thick in the air. The Sea People had breached the gates at dawn, their war cries echoing through the city like the roar of beasts. The soldiers of Ugarit fell one by one, their bronze shields gleaming dully beneath the dying light.
Three days had passed since the king and queen last came to us. Three days of silence, of the shadows growing restless, of the sky darkening bit by bit as the moon climbed to devour the sun.
Lazarus stood by the hearth, the last light of the dying sun falling across his face.
“It’s time,” he said.
He moved to the chest at the base of the altar—an old cedar box banded with bronze and sealed with wax and salt. The sigils on its lid glimmered in the half-dark. He drew a knife and cut the wax, the smell of cedar and iron filling the room as the lock broke.
When he lifted the lid, I saw it.
My Tome of Shadows.
Fifteen years without it, fifteen years of silence. The air changed the instant its cover met the open light. The runes along the spine burned, as if recognizing the hand that had once carried them. I could almost hear the pages breathing.
He held it out.
“You’ll need this.”
My fingers brushed the leather, and every shadow in the room seemed to bow. Power flooded through me, thick and cold, coiling up my arms like smoke. The sound of the sea outside dimmed to nothing. The pulse within the tome matched my own.
For a moment, I forgot the war, the famine, the dying city below. All that existed was the weight of the book in my hands—the proof that I was whole again. A Shadow Lord was nothing without his tome; it was the marrow of his power, the tongue through which the darkness spoke.
I opened it. The first page glowed like a coal fanned back to life. The voice of the shadows rippled through me, a whisper that felt like worship. Lazarus placed his own tome beside mine, the twin sigils on their covers flaring gold and black.
“The eclipse has come,” he said. “The shadows will speak now. They have to.”
We laid our palms on the covers. The runes crawled beneath our skin, binding us to the books, to the words that would decide everything.
“Shadows,” Lazarus said, his tone commanding but raw, “the sun and moon are one. The time has come. Show us how to create the traveler.”
The room quaked. Both tomes burst open. Pages whipped violently as smoke and light poured into the air. The shadows’ voices rose together, a thousand overlapping whispers that filled the chamber like a storm.
“At last,”they said.“The heavens align. The circle opens. You will build the gate between what is and what was.”
Words burned into the parchment before us.
Clear the ground. Draw the circle in white. Place within it the twelve jars—the laughter, the sorrow, the agony, the envy, the longing. Join hands. Speak as one. Let your blood seal the offering.
We obeyed. We cleared the room down to bare limestone. The air smelled of chalk and sweat and the sea’s decay. Lazarus ground the chalk to dust between his palms, marking the circle by hand. Its edge shimmered with a light that wasn’t light at all.
We set the jars inside—twelve hearts pulsing with color. The room seemed to breathe with them, each pulse answering the next.
