“Right. Because of our abomination statuses.”
“Our greatness and uniqueness that others misread and fear. It is nothing but ignorance, the inability to comprehend all that we are, my deathborn darling.”
Shut up! Shut the fuck up!
Shut. Up!
“Their loss, hmm?”
His eyes shone at me. “Precisely.”
I batted his hand away, off my cheek. Off his frown of dejection, I told him, “I need to concentrate for what’s coming. Don’t want to mess this up.”
As if I would.
“Impossible,” Ruxnoth stated. “You will not fail me.” He gave me a twisted smile that was deeply loaded. “I simply won’t allow it,Transmortalis.”
So we were back to him calling me that.
Thebeyond deathof it all that he’d creepily hissed at me, and in my head, when he’d first made himself known to me.
For most others, it would be taken as a full-circle moment.
With him, though, it was an indication of something much more.
A warning.
Well, good luck with that.
We reached the open arched stone door of the Core Chamber, and he beckoned me inside with him.
I steeled myself as we walked in, all twenty necromancers in midnight-blue hooded robes positioned rigidly against the dark stone walls.
Thick gray smoke, a magical fog of corrupted necromantic power, floated above the rough floor, almost to knee height. It was only Rex’s coral that added a little bit of color in amongst the rest. None of it impacted me. I couldn’t even feel it, as in its current function it was both just ambience and a safeguard always linked to Ruxnoth’s power.
At the center of the square room was a low, two-tiered platform.
A six-foot-wide column of midnight-blue magic roared straight up from it and bled into the rest of the realm above. A constant low hum resonated through the area, reverberating off the walls.
Looking straight on at it was near-blinding, the power so potent.
And as we drew closer with Ruxnoth leading the way and looking out expectantly at the necromancers, where they then knelt to him in a really creepy way, I felt the rumble of that potency prickle at my skin—yeah, through the fabric of my hoodie.
“You won’t be needing that,” Ruxnoth spoke as he stepped onto the first tier of the platform, then gestured for me to approach with him directly opposite. He was eyeing my zipped up hoodie.
“What?”
“Strip. No shirts. Down to your waist. This will be easier with as much physical contact as possible. It’s a full transference, Winter.”
I ground my jaw.
As his attention was briefly taken with slipping off his ornate coat, I caught Felix’s eye and he looked disgusted for me, trying to force a reassuring smile.
He was two down from Wesley who mouthed something to me.
Delay.
Yeah, I could definitely do that.
