At what he held against his hip.
How it glinted in the torchlight.
A syringe—and its needled point.
“There’s a problem, you can see. With me. With us all.” Corvin gaze swept his brother’s form. “I cannot achieve all that I want. I cannot become all that I should be. It’s your fault.”
Alix laughed, low and humorless and a perfect mirror of his brother. Still, he didn’t bother to stand. Like he was perfectly content to remain where he’d been for over a century. “Hasn’t it always been?”
“Don’t mock me,” growled Corvin, and he hovered nearer. “We were never meant to be two.”
“Take that up with fate, Brother. I didn’t split from you purposefully.”
“Trust me that I have.” He loomed so that they all were better able to see his face. And in the strange light, Lux thought she really didn’t recognize him. A sinister force glowed from his eyes.
He was as wicked as they came. He was the devil on the door. She pushed herself to stand.
“When you died,” Corvin said. “I was supposed to be free of your torment. But even in death, you didn’t relent. I realized too late that you took what I needed with you to the Beyond.”
Alix scoffed. “I took nothing besides my own soul.”
“Precisely.”
Alix’s grip softened. He folded his hands into his lap. His eyes, however, were as dark and hard as the stone around him. “What would you do with it? I think I’ve given you—all of you—enough.”
Corvin’s thumb ran the length of the syringe. “A pity you didn’t know of our project before your death. Powerful gifts, Alix, are meant for powerful minds. I’ve been doing what was once an impossible task in your absence, and the collectors have surpassed every expectation. Educating the masses just as you wanted. And bringing peace to the world. All by granting the vaststrength of brilliance to those loyal to a common goal. If that isn’t worthy of Sainthood, why, I wouldn’t know what is.”
“Peace—Corvin. You’re decaying before my eyes!” The horror on Alix’s face matched Lux’s own. “This is blasphemy. They couldn’t have all been in agreement?”
The dark laugh returned. “Do not speak to me of blasphemy—you, a weak believer and maybe even a heretic. This pathway wouldn’t have been created if it wasn’t meant to be used. Your mission was noble, Brother. But it was a mission rife with faults. People were furthering their brilliances, yes. But it was open to interpretation. It was being put into practice in dangerous ways! Weak, volatile spirits cannot be trusted. I don’t understand how you’re unable to see that.”
“You’ve lost your mind,” Alix whispered.
“That is not myfault. You’ve cursed me in your death; I cannot sleep. All I think of, all I wish for, is to becomemore. Once, I thought that meant you had to be gone. Your soul departed to the Beyond and no longer in my way. But now—”
“Stop.You’ve become something wretched, Brother. I’ve met no Saints in death, but I can say this, I have felt them. And they do not feel as you do. You’ve twisted their purpose and will achieve nothing of what you want. If ever a person suffered fromMania Malus,it is you!”
That sinister light in Corvin’s eyes brightened. Lux was sure there was no blue left now in his irises. He sneered. “Youare what’s wretched. If it weren’t for your very existence, I would have been whole from the start. I would not have to do what I now need. And I need your dreams, Alix. Don’t worry over me.”
“Drain my lifeblood all you like and leave me to the void, but you will never own my dreams.”
Corvin laughed outright. “Soon, I will have more than even that.”
Lux screamed when the needle plunged into Alix’s eye.
Alix twitched, but otherwise did not move. Maybe he couldn’t. Corvin held onto the syringe and, carefully, began to draw backward. A liquid like starlight filled the glass chamber.
Lux’s shaking grew violent. Her revulsion nearly sent her again to the floor.To remove lifeblood this way…on a living, breathing—
When Corvin pulled away from his brother’s eye, Alix groaned. But the society’s overlord didn’t pause. He plunged the needle again.
After that, Alix made no sound at all. Lux didn’t think she’d ever feel well again. She would have rather wished him dead. But as sensitive as she’d become to Death now, she sensed nothing. He lived still.
When Corvin was through and Alix lay slumped and discarded on the table, his silver gaze met hers. “Don’t look at me like that.” He tapped the starlit glass. “We cannot extract it any other way. I’ve tried.”
As if that were the only part to be horrified over.
Corvin handed the filled syringe to Artemis before making his way to the basin. He knelt. Turning away from the pedestal, he laid his head back and fitted his neck to the groove of the basin’s lip. “We must keep them alive, Lux. I know you understand extracting the lifeblood from the dead will sever their ties from this world permanently, their soul unable to return. That drinking it afterward will grant you healing, an additional lifetime. But what we’ve discovered here—”
