I pause in the sky, beating my wings as I hover above the spreading darkness.
My breath catches.
Black frost stretches below in every direction, creeping over the landscape like a living thing. It devours the vibrant ussha-blessed vegetation, leaving only death in its wake. Trees blacken and crystallize, and the snow itself darkens. Even the distant mountains are touched by it.
No. No, no, no. Not here.
Not beyond the fading Winter Court.
My pulse pounds. Panic seizes me.
Below us, the frost continues spreading across the land, flowing over hills and forests and frozen streams and lakes as far as the eye can see.
Too far. Gods... it stretches too far.
Fear slams into me with such force that Gwen gasps in my arms.
Merak?she asks through the bond, alarm making her thoughts feel cold and frantic.
But I barely hear her… and I don’t have time to respond.
Because suddenly, I sense it.
A cold presence that is wrong… something that doesn’t belong here among the living. Something older and unnatural. My body goes rigid when I become aware of a shadow at the corner of my vision.
Slowly, I turn my head.
And for the first time in my life, I finally see it.
The shadow figure from my dreams hovers only a short distance away, with wisps of black clinging to its wraithlike body.
My blood turns to ice.
Darkness continues writhing around its body. No wings hold it aloft, yet it hangs effortlessly in the air. Its form almost appears human or fae... almost.
But its eyes…
Gods.
The creature’s eyes are white, deathly pale and gleaming against the shadows of its form.
It’s watching me.
For a moment, neither of us moves.
Then the shadow figure tilts its head and smiles, revealing a gaping hole for its mouth with white points that could be teeth yet aren’t quite solid.
“At last, Merak,” it says softly, as though we are old friends. “At last, we finally meet outside the realm of your dreams.”
CHAPTER 19
GWEN
The momentI glimpse the terrible creature, I intuitively reach for the key hanging from my necklace. I clutch it tightly in my hand, trembling in Merak’s arms as he hovers in the sky. He turns to face the creature, and I sense his panic through the bond. Also… fear.
But I quickly realize the fear is for me.
He is worried that harm might come to me, and he’s trying not to let me feel the full extent of his terror through the bond. Yes, he’s trying, but gods, I still feel it. It startles me to my core. I have never sensed fear coming from Merak before. Worry, yes, but never fear. Not like this.
