The darkness releases its hold.
I collapse to the ground, coughing and spluttering as Jude crouches beside me.
Seraphina watches with idle amusement. Then she smiles venomously. “I think it’s time for your friends to meet one of my darlings.”
She lifts the onyx again, high above her head.
From the chasm behind her, something stirs.
A wet, slithering sound slurps across stone.
I watch in frozen horror as a tentacle emerges, slick and glistening, as thick as a man’s torso. A second tentacle follows. Then a third. The creature unfurls from the mouth of the tomb like a snake uncoiling from hell itself. Seraphina raises her hand in a graceful arc, as if commanding a symphony. And the beast responds. With another flick of her wrist, it strikes.
A tentacle lashes through the veil.
It grabs a girl in a fairy costume.
The tentacle wraps around her waist and with a yank, she’s pulled through the rift.
For one horrifying second, her eyes lock with mine.
I recognize her.
She’s in my AP Lit class.
Her body distorts. Her scream warbles. And with a violent convulsion, she erupts in fire, then bursts into ash.
My mouth opens in a silent scream as Seraphina lifts her hand again, and the second tentacle strikes.
Another girl is snatched.
Lainey Sikes.
Twig lunges for her. With his good arm, he grabs her by the wrist. With his broken arm, he fires one of the rods. It sails through the rift as he loses his grip on Lainey. She’s yanked through, her costume a horrible irony. Dressed like a fallen angel, her mouth twists in a horrifying cry as she, too, combusts in a burst of ghostly flame. And just as my body catches up with the horror, Twig is grabbed by the ankle.
A scream tears up my throat. I snatch Rafe’s knife from the ground and charge as Twig claws at the dirt, kicking wildly. But he has nothing to grab. His foot is dragged through the opening. With a war cry, I drive the blade into the creature’s slimy tentacle. At the same time, Jude seizes the copper rod and plunges it deep into the tentacle’s base.
With a horrific and high-pitched shriek, it flings Twig across the ground and withdraws, slithering back into the shadows from which it came.
My heart pounds as Twig scrambles to safety and Seraphina plucks the ruby from the archway, like she’s ready for a new toy to play with.
The ember rises. It lifts from the stone and pulses in the air.
She gives her head a sadistic tilt.
Jude gasps.
He sinks to his knees, clutching his chest, his face bone-white. I drop beside him and beg her to stop. “Stop! Please, stop!”
The ember returns to the stone.
Jude sucks in a breath.
“See how weak love makes them?” Seraphina purrs, turning her attention to Rafe, who has remained on one knee, watching the events unfold. She glides to Jude, stops in front of him, and gazes deep into his eyes as though searching for devotion or desire.
They only glow with defiance and disgust.
She pouts. “Same as Ezra, I see. Immune to my charm. A trick of Dante’s I did not foresee. I believe every firstborn of his line carries the immunity. To keep them safe, I suppose. Retain the upper hand.”
