Some were missing limbs, faces clawed off, intestines curling from their stomachs. While others lay on the floor, snapping with their blood-stained teeth. Az stomped skulls with brute, demonic strength.
"Graves took her." Bastian’s temples were throbbing from overuse of his Mind magic. "She was supposed to be safe."
Az said nothing.
Outside looked worse than the gory throne room.
Fires lit up the distance. Rain fell in heavy sheets, making it hard to see. Thick puddles of water sloshed under their boots.
Her fear was muted by distance.
Sweat glistened on the skin revealed by Az’s torn shirt. "Can you speak to her?"
"I can try." Bastian held the demon’s amber gaze. Unlike the others, Bastian had no trouble asking for help when needed. "Cover me."
Az cracked his knuckles, prowling.
Fire arced above. Screams echoed. The fire was contained to the Queen’s Island and further, where the prison island lay. Thankfully, all others were untouched—but not by the Umbra. They could fly, they could swim, they could take boats. No one on the Isles would be saved.
Bastian closed his eyes, diving into the link between him and Luella. It was a chasm, colored in scarlet terror.
Luella, he tried.
Nothing.
He pressed harder.
Luella, what happened?
He tried to follow the thread between them, to dive into her mind—but it was an uncrossable chasm.
But there, a flicker of something. Of her. He gripped it like a lifeline.
Luella, hold on—we’re coming.
He was not one for prayer, but at that moment, he prayed she could somehow hear him through the distance.
Bastian had never struggled to reach her mind, even with kingdoms between them.
It was as if something shadowy had wrapped around their link and distorted it.
Bastian?He heard her voice faintly, frantic and thin.Bastian? Please. Hurry!
The sound slipped away.
Bastian’s eyes snapped open. "We have to go, Az—now. She needs us."
61
FOR HER
THAREN
Thunder cracked overhead as Tharen ran in the night.
Rain covered him in sheets. It soothed the burn of his muscles, the cuts on his flesh.
Luella’s fear was so sharp that he’d nearly faltered in his fight with an Umbra. At the last moment, his grip on his swords had loosened, and the Umbra had charged. Tharen had been shoved against a rock, the back of his skull cracking against it.
