Page 73 of Blade of the Nightking

I frowned. “What?”

“I said...” His voice turned deadly serious. “I wasn't in the library.”

“But…” I stammered. “But the bond…”

The words died on my tongue.

The strength of that pull. It had practically dragged me toward the dark pit at the center of the library. And that footprint in the dust…

My blood went cold.

A sick certainty slammed through our bond, followed by a crushing swell of dread and desperate urgency.

My hand flew to my mouth.

“He's here.” His words struck like a blade.

Rìan was here. Rìan was here…

How was that possible? How had he breached Levinica’s wards? Unless… A horrifying realization took hold.

She’d betrayed Aedric. Betrayed her own people.

Just like Hyperia—she’d let a monster into her city.

Aedric swept a robe hurriedly around my shoulders and guided my arms through the sleeves, knotting it at my waist. “We’ve got to skeld. Now.”

I shoved my bare feet into my boots.

“Why would she risk it? Why would she risk Dannis?” I demanded, the question tumbling out of me.

The image of Levinica flashed through my mind again—her despair, her sobbing, the broken keening that had filled the burned library. Had she been mourning in advance, bracing herself for what she knew might come? Then it hit, sudden and cold.

“She was in the library,” I said breathlessly.

He understood what I was saying. “She went to see him.” His eyes flashed. “Rìan is down there.”

Terror flooded through me, my heart pounding.

His fingers closed around mine, pulling me toward the door, but just as he reached for the handle⁠—

Someone knocked.

In an instant, his knife was in his hand, sparks dancing along the hilt and down the blade before being swallowed by the dark iron. He wrenched the door open.

Layne barely had time to gasp before he seized her by the collar and hauled her inside, Hamish’s shout echoing from the corridor behind her. Aedric slammed her against the wall, the blade angled at her throat with deadly precision.

“P-please,” she whimpered, her eyes wide with fear.

“Is he here?” Aedric hissed.

“Wh-who?” Layne cried.

The tip of the iron blade grazed her skin, and she gasped in pain.

“Is he here?” he demanded again, his voice tightening with menace.

“I-I don’t know!” she said frantically, tears spilling freely down her cheeks.