"Everyone alright?" Malrik calls, his voice tight. I notice him press a hand to his chest, just for a moment.
Before anyone can answer, my blood ignites. The fire rune on my chest blazes like it's trying to consume me from the inside—but beneath the burn is a new kind of ache, hollow and magnetic, like gravity bent around Kaia. Beside me, Aspen staggers, his water rune flaring bright enough to cast eerie blue shadows across the jagged landscape.
"What's happening?" he grits out, frost spreading from his feet in patterns like lightning. The burning spreads through my veins like molten metal, my muscles straining against my clothes. Everything sharpens—sounds, smells, the pulse of wrongness in the air.
I glance at Aspen and see the change taking him too. His lean frame expanding, shoulders broadening as ice crystals dance across his skin. My shirt tears as another wave hits, power flooding my system. The fire in my blood roars for release, for battle.
"Berserkers," Malrik breathes, his silver eyes wide. "Impossible. They were meant to be extinct."
I try to respond but my voice comes out as a growl, deeper and rougher than before. Through our twin-bond, I feel Aspen's own transformation. Ice where I'm fire, but the same primal force reshaping us both.
The ache in my chest intensifies, and I find myself taking an unconscious step toward Kaia. Each movement away from her feels wrong somehow. I notice Aspen drifting closer too, like we're caught in her orbit. Even Finn and Malrik seem to be circling nearer, though they might not realize it.
"Fascinating," Finn says, but his usual humor sounds strained. He's rubbing his chest absently. "I'm guessing this isn't part of the normal realm-hopping experience?"
The corruption of Absentia presses in, thick and wrong. But beneath it, something deeper stirs—a calling that thrums through blood and bond alike. And Kaia… Kaia is the center of it all.
Chapter 9
Kaia
Kaia
I should be panicking.
We just crossed into a corrupted death realm. The sky is bleeding colors I don’t have names for. And the twins? They’ve morphed into actual berserkers—giants wreathed in fire and frost like something out of a half-remembered nightmare.
But instead of panicking, I’m… staring.
Torric’s entire body radiates heat, his skin glowing like forged steel. Aspen’s covered in frost that doesn’t melt, his eyes edged in ice and fixed on me like I’m the only thing tethering him to reality. Every part of me knows I should look away. I don’t.
“So,” I say, because silence is worse and my brain is fried. “This is new.”
“Berserkers,” Malrik says, his voice tight with disbelief. “My father spoke of them, but they were supposed to be extinct. Warriors touched by primal magic, bound to—” He cuts off abruptly, pressing a hand to his chest.
I feel it too, a strange ache that pulses in time with my heartbeat. My shadows coil closer, responding to my unease. Bob takes up a defensive position while Patricia frantically documents the twins’ transformation in her swirling script.
“We need to move,” Malrik says, already starting forward. “My ancestral home is east. The wards there might still hold, give us somewhere safe to figure this out.”
We fall into step behind him, picking our way across terrain that looks like black glass shattered and poorly pieced back together. The sky, if you can call it that, writhes with colors that shouldn’t exist, casting sickly light across the jagged landscape. Every surface pulses with corruption, a tangible wrongness that makes my shadows shudder.
“Anyone else feel like their heart’s trying to learn interpretive dance?” Finn asks as we walk, grimacing and rubbing his chest.
A growl that might be agreement rumbles from Torric. The sound sends vibrations through the ground, making my wings spread instinctively. Both twins’ attention snaps to me immediately, their transformed faces turning with unsettling synchronization.
I try not to stare as we walk, but it’s impossible. Torric’s transformation slowly recedes, flames sinking beneath his skin but leaving him… different. His eyes still burn gold, his movements more predatory. He’s like a living forge, contained but still blazing hot.
And Aspen… God, Aspen with frost still glittering in his hair, blue eyes rimmed with ice. His skin catches light differently, like there’s something crystalline beneath the surface. Every time he looks at me, my stomach drops like I’m in freefall.
“Your face is doing the thing again,” Finn stage-whispers beside me.
“What thing?” I hiss back, grateful for the distraction.
“The ‘I’m totally not checking out the twins’ thing. Don’t worry, it’s adorable.”
Heat crawls up my neck. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I mutter, which only makes his grin widen.
Before I can defend myself, something screams in the distance, a sound that should not exist in any realm. My shadows snap to attention, Bob herding the others into defensive formations while Patricia’s notes become increasingly urgent.
