Page 266 of Blade of the Nightking

I stepped closer to the wall, drawn toward the enormous painted star. That eighth arm—that extra downward stroke that didn’t belong—made something cold stir in my gut. It was wrong. Ominous. An arrow straight into the depths of the well itself.

"Rìan," I called.

There was a distant splash as he hurled the bucket into the well, and then a distracted grunt.

Frowning, I reached out, brushing my fingertips lightly over the paint. Tiny brown flakes came away beneath my touch. I rolled them between my thumb and forefinger, studying them more closely.

"That's not paint," Rìan warned from somewhere behind me. "It's blood."

Blood... blood... blood…

His words echoed around the cavern, mocking me.

I recoiled, scrubbing my hand against my trousers.

"What is this place?" I murmured, turning slowly as I searched the chamber, uneasy. The magic hung so heavily in the air it felt like a hand pressing me down into the sand, its pervasive wrongness seeping into my lungs with every breath like a sickness.

Whose blood had stained this stone?

Aedric insisted the gods didn't exist, that mortals had mistaken the Firstborn for gods, and that each arm of the star represented one of the seven.

But this star had eight.

The extra point filled me with an instinctive revulsion I couldn't explain. Who would dare pervert a holy symbol?

Unless…

Unless there had once been an eighth Firstborn.

The thought caught on something deep inside me, lodging there like a shard of glass.

Was it possible? Had there once been another—a people erased so completely that even memory had surrendered them? Over the centuries, had the symbol itself been forgotten too, eight points slowly becoming seven?

But then how old was this symbol? Why was it carved into the hilt of my bone knife? Why did it appear at both wells? Why was it present in The Book of Old Tales?

I shivered.

Each Gate demanded a blood offering beneath the gaze of the eight-pointed star, a corrupted symbol presiding over an act that defied the natural order. If a bond between souls was meant to be unbreakable, what terrible magic was this that could unravel it?

For the first time, it occurred to me that perhaps those were questions we should have asked before we'd come searching for them.

“Eidra.” I turned my head toward him at the sound of his voice.

He was waiting for me.

The pale light caught only one side of him, leaving the other veiled in shadow, as though he were made of equal parts light and darkness. He stood perfectly still, and even so there was something immense about him, a presence and power that was undeniable. The sight of him eased something inside me, and before I even realized it, my feet were carrying me forward.

I stopped in front of him, and the moment I met his gaze, my heart began pounding furiously in my chest, my magic stirring inevitably at the feel of his nearness.

My enemy and my protector. My villain and my mate. The monster I trusted with my life.

I found him at the center of every path I took. Every road, every choice, every twist of fate, for better or worse, led me inexorably back to him.

Soon, the thread binding us would snap completely. The bond would be severed, and I would be free of him. The thought should have brought relief. Instead, every part of me strained against it like a tethered animal.

Guilt splintered through me.

Aedric.