A savage sound saws up my throat, and I quicken my pace, moving so fast the craggy, gray stone around me blurs. There’s only more heartbreak to be found here, in this place. More twists of the talon already hilt-deep in a rotting wound.
The sloped path chops into stairs so steep one misplaced step would send me plummeting, but I take them two at a time, powering myself up and up and up—
I spill upon the volcano’s crown, a flat band of rubbled terrain that wraps around the caldera, supporting a clutch of stone monoliths—their piercing tips lost through the swirl of clouds. Stairs curl around the massive shards of gray rock, creating perilous paths that scale the individual spires, giving access to inky words chipped into the surface.
Thetap-tap-tapof Maars’s chisel echoes down from above, chipping at my bones as I search my surroundings in desperate sweeps.
Can’t see her.
That wildness inside meroars.
Charging right, I sprint past stone after stone until I come to the one foretelling the elements of Rai’s unraveling—right at the base. One of the first ribbons of script to be plucked from the bowl and carved upon this stone.
I have to crouch to run my hand along the words that are chiseled just as deep through the folds of my brain:
A fresh smear of crimson is swiped across the stone, and I rub it between my fingers, smelling it.
“Fuck.”
The ground shakes, like some beast beneath my feet just took a breath and grumbled.
Like something disturbed itssleep.
I charge toward the edge of the bowl. Sliding to a stop, I look down the slope that plummets to the large crater lake, still ruffled by the echo of Mount Ether’s moan. Ribbons of black scripture frolic beneath the dull-gray surface, flicking at it, as though begging to be snapped up and inspected.
Chipped into the stones by Maars’s gnarly hands.
My gaze snags on the tapered outcrop jutting toward the center. On the woman standing near the end, her black dress blowing about her small, frail form, the torn strips dragged by the handsy wind.
Long, silver tresses swirl around her in tangled scribbles, her right hand smothered in blood that drips from the tip of the talon clenched in her white-knuckled fist.
My heart dives.
Her wrath will spill from a bloody hand.
I leap and slide down the craggy slope with a volley of loose rocks and shards of stone that tumble into the water, disturbing the steam wafting off the surface. Another restless rumble rattles the ground, the entire world seeming to shake.I stagger, taking tentative steps toward the frail outcrop.
“Rai!” I boom, and she spins, striking me with her bold black eyes set within the canvas of her fierce, regal beauty.
Her features are sharp, her cheekbones matching the bladed angles of her shoulders, arms, and legs; her pale complexion a stark contrast to her lips—the deep red of spilled blood.
Even gaunt and half starved, she’s unparalleled.
Everything that’sgoodin this world, steeped in the sourness ofloss.
I step onto the ledge, swirling, sulfuric steam dampening my skin. She throws her hand toward me, and the clouds ignite with a fork of lightning that carves down from the sky.
“Stop.” Her ripped voice hacks through the empty space between us.
I hold her gaze and take another slow, steady step.
“Don’t youdare.”
She speaks softly now, her tone gentle like the bedtime songs Mother used to sing to us when we were small. My responding snarl is as hard and coarse as Father’s stony regard.
I hunt the unhinged glint in her ebony eyes—the darkness bleeding into the surrounding skin like dusky veins pushed to the surface. I hunt that severed talon hanging from her hand like the lingering threat it is, chewing on my compulsion to lurch forward and rip it from her bony grasp.
Another step. Another.
