“How does it feel?” he asks again.
“Like an overflowing river…”
A long, slow inhale. His jaw flexes. “Then dam it.” Not a suggestion. A demand.
I stammer, struggling to form words, but his voice cuts me off. “Imagine a whirlpool at your core, drawing that river inward.”
I try. I fail.
His exhale is sharp, edged with impatience. “You’re wasting time.”
There are too many streams, too many currents pulling in different directions. The force is too wild, too vast. A cry of frustration escapes me.
The man’s voice is suddenly closer, brushing against my skin like a whisper of ice. “Tighten it.” His tone hardens. “Coil it. Wind it at yourcore, like twisting thread around a spindle.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and pull. At first, it’s like grabbing smoke, like trying to cup water in my palms. But then… something shifts. The power, once a raging storm, begins to coil. Not perfectly, not completely, but enough.
“Finally. Open your eyes,” he commands.
I obey. I wish I hadn’t.
The shadows begin to retreat, revealing the scene beyond.
The screams are gone. Not because the terror has ended, but because the dread etched into their faces has crossed the threshold where screams become pointless.
Silence smothers the air, thick and unnatural, broken only by the distant crackle of torches and the quiet drip of something wet hitting the floor. My breath stutters as I take in the devastation.
Bodies lie collapsed across the marble—blackened, porous, half-melted into the floor. The Chastity Warden and guards who had stood closest are nothing more than heaps of decaying flesh, their red wigs, armor and uniforms eaten through, their features bloated and unrecognizable.
On two benches, nobles slump in grotesque forms—limbs warped, mouths frozen open.
The decay hasn’t spread evenly. It hasn’t swallowed the temple whole. It lingers only in a single horrific radius around me, pulsing through the carpet like a heartbeat, creeping over spilled goblets, trampled flowers, discarded shoes.
But it stops where the carpet ends. The stone remains untouched, as if the magic can’t—or won’t—cross it.
Mael. Zyrel. The Sibyls.
They stood just far enough. Out of reach. Safe.
As if the magic had drawn a boundary, and only those inside were marked to suffer.
A ragged inhale scrapes my throat. Some of these people had been only too happy to watch me fall, laughing and cheering as I writhed in pain. Others were friends, people I grew up with at court, who probably wanted to help, but could do little. None of them deserved to die.
A sickening, wet crack sounds as one of the corpses shifts, collapsing further into itself. A strangled noise catches in my throat and I stumble backward.
Somewhere nearby a sharp wail cracks through the silence, as if the crowd is only now beginning to comprehend what lies before them, what I’ve done.
Beyond the decay, clusters of survivors cling to the edges of the room, huddled near doorways and windows. Some help the fallen to their feet, dragging them away, their eyes wide as they glance back at me.
But I barely see them. I barely see anything through the haze of my own horror.
A thought slashes through my panic. Eva. Did I hurt her?
My gaze jerks upward, locking onto the balcony. Eva’s bright brown eyes peek from behind the parapet, wide with fear.
She’s untouched. The rot hasn’t climbed the stone walls either. Her skin is a shade paler, her hands gripping the ledge tightly, but she’s alive.
Our eyes meet. Her lips part, but she hesitates—uncertain, afraid. I wonder what she sees. Am I still human? Am I a monster? And then she leans forward, her expression softening.
