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Rycon nodded, “Don’t have to tell me twice,” he muttered, before stalking down the hall. We all waited, holding a collective breath. Finally, Rycon gave me the signal.
‘Clear,’ He whispered into my mind. I steeled myself and nodded.
“Let’s go,” I gestured for the team to move. Amon gave me one last concerned look, before leading us down the hall, to see my father, The Origin.
The throne room was massive, and largely empty. The thrones themselves were sculpted into rough slates of obsidian set back against the far side of the room. In the center of the expansive space stood two statues. The statues I had heard so much about.
Cautiously, I stepped forward to examine them and felt my breath catch in my throat. The all-powerful Origin, creator of worlds, daemons, and the true ruler of the Dominion of Sin, was just a regular looking male daemon. His stone features resembled those of a human man, and he did not look a day older than twenty-five.
His hands were thrown before him with a vicious expression painted on his face, as if he had been petrified in the middle of an attack. I had been told time and time again that I was The Origin’s daughter. Somehow, it had not prepared me for just how much I looked like him. We had the same eyes and nose. Even our jawlines were similar. Looking up at him now, I couldn’t help but wonder how different my life would have been, if I had truly been born here and raised by him and Elvira.
Elvira. She was frozen for eternity with her arms out, presumably to ward off the spell that inevitably hit her. She too looked like me. I had her mouth, and her hair was long and straight like mine. The part that chilled me was the damage the statue had taken at the waist, where Amon had been forced to cut me from her womb. I suddenly worried that Elvira wouldn’t survive if we successfully freed them from their stony prisons. She was human, after all. I didn’t think Aleites would be thrilled to wake up in a world where his mate had been killed. Amon came up to me, his expression was tight.
“Let’s get this done,” he said quietly, as he looked up into the face of Aleites. I could almost feel his anxiety. The palace was much too quiet. With shaking hands, I pulled out The Flute and put it to my lips. It vibrated with power, and my fingers hummed against the wooden instrument. This was it. If this worked, the mission would be complete. We would have awakened The Origin.
I set my fingers up against the holes of The Flute, looking up at the statues before me. What would he be like? I was suddenly nervous. The Origin had always been this abstract concept for me. I realized I was about to meet my biological father. Some small part of me wondered if he would like me.
I blew into The Flute, and the first note rang out clearly across the echoing expanse of the throne room. The sound was haunting and ethereal. It was not a sound that felt like it belonged to this world or the one beyond The Veil. My skin pebbled at the sound, and my fingers shook as I prepared to execute the second note.
Before my breath could escape my lungs, a loud, slow clapping interrupted me. I glanced up, shocked to see Kieran and The Siren had manifested in front of the obsidian thrones. Kieran’s exaggerated; slow clapping reverberated across the stone walls. Each ‘clap’ made me wince.
“You’re quite a bit later than we expected.” He sneered at us, and my aura rippled.
78
“Hello, Prince Amon. Hello Raven,” Kieran drawled, stepping forward and holding out his hand toward us. “Why don’t you make things easy on yourself, and hand over The Flute now? If you make this easy for us, maybe everyone will have a chance to make it out of here alive.”
I frowned, confused. How did he know about The Flute? How had he known we would be here?
“Now, Raven. I will not ask again.” He demanded, as if I were a child and he was scolding me for something innocuous. The familiar flames of rage licked through my veins at his tone. How dare he. Who did he think he was? We outnumbered him and we had The Flute. Kasha exchanged a look with me, raising an eyebrow. What was Kieran thinking? They didn’t stand a chance.
Rycon snarled from behind me, and I glanced over my shoulder to look at him. He was tense, bristling in his armor by the door, where he had been stationed as a look out.
‘Let me kill him,’ he hissed into my mind, and the tiny burning home that his parents had died in flashed across his mind. I was about to nod and give him the go ahead when Amon’s voice tore through both of our minds.
‘No. He is mine.’ His voice was dangerously cold. Ice began to coat the floors. For a moment, I thought it was Amon’s magick that slicked the floors in frost, but the energy was unfamiliar. My head whipped around, and I saw Nytara gathering a wintery sphere of ice in her palms. A tiny snowstorm raged and she fired it at our team without blinking. I was about to react when suddenly, Conrad was in front of me.
He caught the snowy blast in his hands and melted the magick into water, firing it right back at Nytara. Her eyes widened and I could tell she had not expected to have her own magick thrown back at her. She caught the water, and it twisted around her. Dossidian lunged forward, drawing his twin sabers, but Nytara dodged and blocked him with her rapier, rolling nimbly away. She glanced back and forth between Conrad and Dossidian, her expression calculated. With each lunge from Dossidian, The Siren was forced to dodge, all the while fielding Conrad’s watery attacks.
Back and forth the water flowed. It changed from ice to snow to liquid and back again. Both Nytara and Conrad stared each other down. Neither of them said a word as their auras thrashed and raged against one another. Dossidian continued to slowly advance, pressing her farther back. She was outmatched.
Amon didn’t hesitate, the second Nytara had moved, he had called the shadows from the objects that cast them. With one glance, they slid across the floor and devoured Kieran. Kieran tried to evade them and swarm away, but Amon’s shadows tangled with his buzzing energy and tore him back to the floor. I watched, my breath froze in my chest as Amon took a deadly step forward, his shadows pressing Kieran closer and closer to the ground. The dark wizard began to cough, and Amon sneered down at him. I watched, holding my breath as Amon approached Kieran, a terrifying smile playing on my mate’s lips.
“So much talk from you, Kieran,” his voice was low, almost a whisper. “You were so interested to see what was inside my mate. I can’t help but wonder… what do your insides look like?” Amon asked. He raised an arm, and the look on his face sent a chill through me.
I realized he was going to enjoy this. He wanted Kieran to hurt, almost as much as I did. This wizard was not only responsible for my torture, but he indirectly killed my mother, his own daughter. He certainly had something to do with the murder of Rycon’s parents. I hated him, with every fibre of my being, and my heart rate sped up at the thought of watching Amon kill him.
I meant what I said that day on the docks, Raven’ Amon had said to me, so many weeks ago. ‘We will avenge Clair’s death. That is a promise I intend to keep.’
I waited, my heart hammering, to see what he would do to the wizard who was responsible for so much of my pain.
“Something is wrong,” Meredith said softly. I frowned, then immediately realized she was right. Kieran did not look afraid. Despite the crushing pressure I knew Amon’s shadows were subjecting him too, the dark wizard looked up at him with unrestrained glee.
“Shit,” Kasha cursed under her breath. She was staring directly at Kieran, her face pale.
“Amon…” I breathed, suddenly terrified. Amon hesitated, and there was a deafening crack.
Everybody froze, as Ash Nevra herself, manifested in the throne room. It took me a moment to recognize the figure that she had with her, bound and gagged. My heart stopped, and my breath caught.
