She points at a man sitting in the opposite corner at a table all by himself, shadows coiling around him as he slowly sips a cup of wine. Even from across the room, it feels like he’s staring into my soul. Then he’s gone.
“Uncle Darian and Rhion,” a smooth voice says from behind me. “It’s been so long since I saw you off the battlefield.”
I turn to look at the man I robbed, the man I nearly killed myself to get away from. Shadows swirl around him just as I remember. He’s wearing a similar black riding coat with silver embroidery along the edges rather than crimson. I immediately note the similarity between his father and himself. The way he stands. The jet-black hair. The unrivaled confidence. But unlike his father, everything about him terrifies and draws me to him. Like a moth knowing exactly what will happen when it reaches the fire.
It’s his seduction working on you again.I grit my teeth and do my best not to move toward him. My eyes move to those crimson nails that he’d run over my cheek. The shadows that he’d bound me in place with. I’ve dreamed of them. Ever since he touched me, I’ve had nights where I woke up in a cold sweat and could swear I still felt them.
And those eyes. I’ll never forget the way they burn as if there’s a fire behind them. They tempt me still, and I dig my nails into my palms with the hope that pain will break the spell he’s placed on me.
“Azric,” Rhion says with a smile. “Those maneuvers against Echo were brilliant. It’s not often a shadow walker can’t escape.”
He doesn’t even seem to accept that the comment was a compliment. “She needed to die. It was necessary. Otherwise, she’d still be here, and all this wouldn’t be happening. It’s too bad. Echo was an excellent friend when I was younger.”
He knew her. Not like Darian knows Finley. No, Maeve, Cole, Rhion, and Echo were the rulers of the world immediately after thegods were awoken. They ruled before the wars started. Echo was someone he’d grown up with, and he killed her.
“Why did you kill her rather than allow her to escape?” Maeve asks.
At this, a bitter smile passes over Azric’s lips. “It was necessary, Mother. Sometimes, the best end for someone is death. You should know all about that.”
Maeve’s body tenses, and she doesn’t respond to him. “Well, it was wonderful seeing you all, but I need to make my way around the room. Not very many people come to Draenyth as of late, and I haven’t seen many of these people in several years. It was nice to meet you, Fiona. May Veris watch over you in the trials.”
She walks away with Cole in tow, and Azric turns to Darian and Rhion. “Finally. You’d think she’d have stayed in Draenyth like normal. She and my father have been given nearly complete control over the city, so the least she could do is stay out of the rest of Nyth. How have you two been? I saw you at the battle. It’s good that you stayed far away from it.”
“You shouldn’t be so hard on her,” Darian says. “You don’t know what it’s like to lose…”
“Don’t start with me, Uncle. If she was so damned miserable, she should have killed herself like any responsible person would. Not burn the world and her son so she could have what she wanted. Regardless, let’s not muddy the water by talking about my parents. How is Sidon?” he asks Rhion. “I noticed a recent wound across his belly.”
Rhion curses. “Damned Stormbringer caught him as we were leaving the battlefield. Luckily, he was wearing a bit of armor I’ve been working on, so it was only a wound instead of something worse. I don’t know why they give two shits about us saving a few villages of humans.”
“Inni always gets a little nervous when we deal with Marek’s troops as well. She always tells me how dragons fear little other than lightning and the Hunters. I’m surprised he even flew you into a battle with Stormbringers. Inni’s told me to fly myself more than a few times.”
It’s strange watching them talk about their dragons like this, like they aren’t the most terrifying things on Nyth. It’s even stranger how personable Azric seems to be around Rhion and Darian. I’m a little concerned he may recognize me, but he’s said nothing about our first meeting yet, so maybe I’m safe?
Then he turns to me and smiles. “Now, who is this lovely young woman? You don’t have nearly enough years on you to be entering something like this, darling.”
Darian says, “This is Fiona. Ainslee put out a call for volunteers in Selithar for people who’d compete in the trials on her behalf and she’s the only one who agreed to come.”
The Prince of Bones arches an eyebrow and smiles just enough that I know he recognizes me. “Interesting. My dear Aunt Ainslee has always had unusual acquaintances, so I guess it’s not all that surprising.”
Burn it all.I used two Marks in front of him, so he knows I have the powers of a Priest. No human could do what I’d doneotherwise. He knows I stole from him. If he tells anyone about me, I won’t have to wait for the trials to kill me. They’ll drag me out of Draenyth, and there’ll be nothing I can do save use the Mark of Peace to take my own life.
I do my best not to let on, but I can’t keep my hands from shaking. I don’t know what to do.
A long tense moment passes, and then he puts on a mask of a smile before turning back to Darian. “May Veris watch over you, Uncle. I’ll be cheering for you when you win. Enjoy your evening.”
Then he disappears in a cloud of shadows, and it’s like Rhion and Darian can finally breathe again. “We’re going to talk about that later,” Darian whispers intensely to me. I don’t have a chance to say anything in response as the next moment, everyone’s attention is drawn to the center of the room.
A man floats several feet above the ground, but I know instinctively that this is no man. Like smoke being pulled up a chimney flue, everyone is drawn to him. He’s no larger than any other man, but everything in me knows this is Nyxthos himself.
He has pale, flawless skin with thin black eyebrows. The rest of his body is wreathed in a cloak made of what can only be shadows. At his sides are daggers which glow with a black light, similar to how the Mark of the Cloak glows when it’s activated, only magnified a thousand times as bright.
It’s not his appearance that draws my attention, though. It’s the feeling of being in front of true divinity. I don’t know what to do, whether I should kneel or go to him just to be closer to him. In the end, like nearly everyone else in the room, I stand rooted in place.
“Welcome to my trials, competitors,” a dark, almost serpentine voice echoes through the room, and yet it sounds as though he’s speaking only to me. “Over the next two months, you will compete to become the next Champion of Darkness and Secrets. There are but two rules you must abide by while here. You may not leave Castle Lachlan, and there will be no violence in the Great Hall to protect our illustrious guests who aren’t taking part in the trials. Otherwise, I will leave you to sort things out yourselves. The first trial you will experience starts tonight at the stroke of midnight. Prepare yourself, for whatever you have on your person will be taken to the trial along with you.”
He slowly spins, his eyes seeming to meet each of our gazes. “May the Darkness embrace each of you.” He continues to spin, his eyes moving amongst the crowd, and he slowly changes, his cloak made of shadows covering more and more of him until only the black glow of his eyes and daggers are visible. Then they’re not, and the shadows dissipate.
“Horse shit,” Rhion mumbles. “You need to get to a room now, Fiona. If you have a way to do it without anyone noticing you, that’d be for the best. People are about to realize they can thin out the competition by murdering each other in the hallways. Darian, how about the two of us create a bit of a distraction before anyone’s noticed Fiona’s here?”
