I step back before he can make contact, refusing to let him touch me. He may have expressed remorse about hurting me, but that doesn’t erase the harm.
His hands hover in the air before he drops his arms.
None of what he told me could be true.
Nothing except…that the darkness around the hammer is a threat. Of that, I’m certain.
“It’s a risk I have to take.” But now Hadrian is blocking the walkway again. “Will you let me leave as you promised?”
He backs slowly to the side of the corridor before plastering himself up against the wall.
“I will, even though I think it’s too dangerous.” His brown eyes flash to mine. “I’mtruly sorry I hurt you, Thyra.”
I’m not certain I believe him.
Lies and liars.
But I won’t allow him to take up another moment of my time.
Impossible now to control my thudding heart as I step toward the dark void and reach into the chamber with my right hand, my most protected hand. I shudder at the empty cold that near-freezes my flesh before I wrap my fingers around the metal object contained in the darkness.
A terrible conviction fills my mind, a confirmation of my fears.
This hammer is destructive.
So dangerous, I should question why the blade’s power allowed me to open this chamber at all. If this hammer can destroy the blade…
Oh, but the darkness and pain this hammer could cause matches precisely the pain the curse has caused.
The False Queen’s vengeance has churned for generations, layer upon layer of pain and torment.
I will do everything I can to bring it to an end.
As I wrench the hammer from the chamber, dark light flashes from it, a blast so strong that I nearly let go before I’m knocked backward.
I have only a heartbeat to consider the object I’m now holding.
A white hammer, bleached like bone, etched with charcoal runes and pulsing with light so inky black that my blood chills. My heart stops. And my mind…
I fight back against the darkness, battling to remain lucid as dark light seeps like liquid through the air around me, pitch-black fingers extending past Hadrian, who shouts, “Run, Thyra!”
My legs pumping, I sprint past him, bleeding darknessahead of me, behind me, above me, across the floor…
Past the room that reeks of iron. Up the winding staircase. Through the vast hall and out into the open, where Azul screeches and rears up wildly before the dark light closes around him, and all I can see are his glowing, red eyes.
“Azul!” My scream is strangled as I call him to me, the rush of air telling me he’s darting in my direction before his feathers meet my free hand.
“To the bloodlands,” I whisper, clambering desperately onto his back, nearly unable to make it all the way up.
All around me, the darkness extends.
South toward the guard towers. North toward the Frost Kingdom. East up the slope behind me. And west, streaming toward the bloodlands.
I can’t stop to consider how far it’s spreading or how fast. I have to believe its darkness has a boundary and that I can take it far into the bloodlands, removing the danger it brings.
In the distance, the sun’s rays finally disappear.
Night falls.
