I couldn't. My body wouldn’t work.
"Ten," Erethis quipped in that amused tone.
I'd failed.
The mist dissipated instantly, pulled back into the creature as if it had never existed. But the incessant burning was a reminder that it happened.
I lay on the cold stone, gasping, shaking.
Erethis held up a small glass vial. With a maddening smile, he muttered some words in a language that sounded evil and closed his fist around the vial.
Something tore inside me.
Not pain. Not exactly. Buthollowness.Different from the hollow I spoke of when it came to my feelings. It felt like something essential had been ripped away, leaving me …without. Simply without.
I gasped, clutching at my chest, but there was nothing there to hold on to.
On the dais, the nightmarish demon held the vial higher, and inside it, a light switched on like a candle coming to life. He examined it with clinical interest. "Wow, look at the vitality in one sliver of your soul,"he remarked. "I wonder what the rest will look like."
My soul… he was starting to collect pieces of my soul.
“You… bastard,” I choked out.
Erethis tucked the vial into his cloak and sat back comfortably.
"Let trial two begin," he chanted, his voice so loud our surroundings shook.
The creature vanished, and in its place, a knight materialized from thin air.
He was fully armored from head to toe in blackened steel that absorbed the dim light rather than reflecting it. There wasno crest on his chest. No sigil. No indication of allegiance or identity.
Just function.
The knight stood perfectly still, weapon already drawn—a longsword. And unlike me, he held with practiced ease.
"Graceless Gods, mage. Are you seriously just going to lie there?" Erethis's voice drifted down to me, hitting home.
He was taunting me for being weak. And I couldn’t even rebut him.
Still, I gave myself credit for trying to reach for my sword.
My fingers merely brushed over the hilt. That was it. The pain that wracked my body just for doing that was indescribable.
And then, the knight began to move. Closing the distance one deliberate step at a time.
Then he struck fast and precise, stabbing his blade right into my stomach.
The scream that tore from my throat was that of the dying. The sound of raw anguish and undiluted suffering.
White-hot, searing pain exploded in my abdomen then cascaded over my body. I looked down to see steel protruding from my stomach, and blood, so,soooomuch blood pouring out of me.
The knight pulled the sword free, and I could feel my guts spilling out.
Then he stabbed me again.
The world blurred at the edges. I was slipping away. Soon, I’d be back to the Land of the Dead. And I wouldn’t be able to leave.
"Ten," Erethis said, his tone unchanged. I didn’t know if he’d counted like he did before. I was slipping in and out of awareness.
