“I’m here, Azzy. Hide and seek, just like we used to. Come find me, won’t you?”
I had to grind my boots into the pavement to keep from moving forward.
“Don’t listen,” croaked Cirian in my arms, the palm of his hand resting against my cheek. “Whatever it’s telling you. Don’t listen to it.”
“Rudderkin!”
Benji’s voice sounded leagues away.
I tried to turn. To complete our retreat. But it called to me again. Beneath us, the ground quaked. Windows vibrated, rippling like pondwater struck with a stone.
“You’re so close now. Don’t you want me, Azzy?”
Bursting from the front entrance of the cathedral, a surge of darkness poured into the street, moving like a wave racing towards the shore.
I strained with all of my might against the pull of the oncoming wave, but it was as if the pavement beneath me had turned to mire, and the harder I pulled against it, the faster the darkness came.
“It’s going to be alright,” Cirian said, his voice still hoarse.
I tore my gaze from the approaching swell, looking down at the man I cradled in my arms. His hand was still warm against my cheek, his dark eyes holding me steady.
“I’ll find you again,” he said. “Just remember that none of it is real.”
“What isn’t real?”
A small smile was his only answer as a wall of darkness crashed down, washing away all traces of light.
Cold. It seeped into my bones, sinking further and further till I was sure that it had penetrated my very soul. My lungs burned, and I realized that I was holding my breath. Panic swelled in my chest as I clawed heavy limbs through what felt like the thickest mud. I couldn’t even tell which was up as I flailed, the agony in my lungs flaring with each movement.
Something grabbed at the nape of my neck, gripping it with a painful force and heaving me in one direction. My head broke through first, sputtering earthen bile from my mouth as I gasped for air. Sound came back all at once as my ears unstuck themselves from the top of my head.
“Were you planning on taking a nap down there, Azrael?”
I pawed at my eyes, wiping the muck from them and blinking away the residue. Sunlight nearly blinded me, a silhouette towering over me with a commanding presence. A head of dark blonde hair and a pair of lupine ears like my own. His arms were folded across his chest in a familiar stance that stabbed at my heart like a needle.
I must be dead. That was the only explanation.
“Rudderkin?” I managed to coax the name over mud-stained teeth.
The man sniffed a half laugh. “Gods, how hard did Kaine hit you? If he’s knocked you silly, then I should put you back in the muck.”
My mind reeled, trying to catch up. Rudderkin was alive? That couldn’t be true. I’d put an end to him myself. Yet, there he stood, sneering down at me like a disappointed father.
“How are you?—”
“Come on, Azrael!” another voice called. I tore my gaze from Rudderkin just long enough to spot another figure standing at the edge of the mud pit. “You’re not going to let one little bump on the noggin do you in, are you?”
The cold in my veins sank deeper, freezing me in place as I stared at the boy. Hewasstill a boy. The roundness of his face was evidence enough. And the soft yellow shock of hair that stood between his pointed ears fell into his eyes, just as it had always done.
Now I knew for certain I was dead, because I was seeing a ghost.
“Sam?”
Pain exploded across my cheek as a blow sent me sputtering back into the mud. I quickly righted myself, pulling my arms loose before I could sink below the surface again. The same rough hand gripped me by the scruff of my neck, hoisting me into the air with far more ease than should have been possible.
“Samael, you’re wasting your time on this brat,” Rudderkin’s deep voice rumbled as I sputtered to clear my mouth of the muck once more. “He’ll never make something of himself. I should do him the kindness of snapping his neck right here.”
I clawed at him, but my arms weren’t long enough to reach his face. I blinked again, clearing the mud from my eyes. Thoseweren’t my arms. They were rail-thin and bruised. I hadn’t had arms that small since….
