The two of them devolved into bickering as another shockwave radiated from the chamber. If harmony was the goal, we couldn’t have been further away. The threat in the other room loomed too large for us to focus on what needed to happen.
There had to be a way to ground ourselves in that moment. My mind drifted back to the first time I felt the presence of that tether, with Tobias on a bench overlooking an empty train station back in Brierwood. It took more than just his connection to make the tether visible to me. It took….
“—swear to the Source, Bast, would you just consider someone else’s feelings for like two seconds?”
I stepped between the bickering men, facing Cirian, who blinked in confusion. Reaching for him, I cupped my hands on either side of his face, confusion blooming into full-on bewilderment.
“Sorry,” I muttered, then leaned forward, pressing my lips into his. His posture went rigid as I lingered, his lips parting slightly from what I could only assume was surprise. But after a moment, his hands found the crooks of my hips, grasping them to steady himself. His breath mixed with mine, our kiss deepening. Ignition of the magic in my chest fired, the tether between us bursting into existence and coiling around us with shimmering brilliance.
When I broke away from Cirian, his breath came in pants, his eyes heavy-lidded as he looked down at me.
“Fastest way,” I explained, my own chest heaving. I then turned to Bastien, who eyed me with less confusion but more curiosity. “Did you have a different idea?”
He shook his head, and I stepped closer, moving with intention. Bastien shuddered at my touch along his cheek, his eyes falling closed before our lips even met. This kiss was gentler than the first had been, the softness of his lips parting after a moment, and his hands fisting the material of my tattered jacket as he pulled me closer. Once again, magic ignited in my chest, the tether materializing around us, coiling up into the space above our heads.
When Bastien and I broke apart, Cirian was there in a second, embracing Bastien and kissing him with a frenzied exuberance that spoke to their familiarity with one another. Bastien melted into that kiss, his arms wrapping around Cirian’s neck to hold himself upright. I watched the two of them fold into one another, expecting to feel those same licks of envy that I’d felt all those years ago staring across a campfire. But all I could feel was a surge of joy that bubbled over in my chest that only intensified as they broke apart, both extending an arm to beckon me to them. I wasn’t on the outside any longer, wasn’t overwhelmed with the desire to belong. Here they were, inviting me in. And as they wrapped their arms around me, and my lips found theirs in a flurry of breath and fang, of teeth and tongue, one certainty sank into the very core of me:
I was where I belonged.
The tethers tangled betwixt our bodies weaved together with each collision of passion, and moments later, when we’d resurfaced to catch our collective breaths, it waited there above our heads, braided into a cord of brilliance that rivaled even the light of the Source coming from the chamber.
“That was certainly easier,” Cirian said, pulling away from Bastien’s and my grasp and reaching up to pull the cord down to him.
Bastien cleared his throat, untangling himself from me as well. “Hold on, Cirian. We have to be careful?—”
“I can’t wait another moment,” he retorted, already backing his way toward the entrance of the chamber. “Come with me or don’t, but I must save her.”
“We want the same thing,” I explained. “But if the Umbral sees us coming, then there’s no telling what it will do to her?—”
Cirian turned his back, bolting into the chamber, the braided tether zipping alongside him.
“Come,” I ordered Bastien, layering my magic over the two of us in an instant. Our bodies shimmered for a brief moment before disappearing entirely. “Stay close.”
Bastien did as instructed, the brush of his fingers on my arm reassurance that he was still nearby. We hurried after Cirian as he blazed a path through the center of the chamber, on a direct course for the Cardinal.
He wrapped the cord around his arm as he approached, looping it till a lasso formed dangling in front of him. He was almost close enough to cast it out when the shadows intercepted him. A wall of darkness slammed into Cirian so quickly that he didn’t even have an opportunity to change direction. His head smacked against the floor with a sickening crack, and he let out a groan of pain. I sprang forward, magic peeling away from Bastien as I did so, and struck at a figure that emerged from the wall of shadow. Bone crunched at the strike, the shadows receding long enough for me to catch a glimpse at the pale face of an elderly man before it covered it again, absorbing the body back into the teeming mass.
Shock rooted me in place. Is this what happened to those who were inside the Cradle? The mass of shadows moved again,latching onto Cirian’s leg and dragging him along the ground. I moved to strike again, but a second shadowy limb exploded from the mass, colliding with me and forcing me to retreat several paces.
“Take it!” Cirian shouted, tossing the cord back to me before loosing a bolt of lightning into the shadow mass. A horrible screeching sound filled the chamber as the teeming mass shuddered.
I caught the cord, pulling it taut and wrapping it around my arm like Cirian had done. I moved to free him again, but the shadows were faster, blocking my advance again and again.
“I’ll be fine, just go!” Cirian shouted in frustration, letting another bolt free.
Bastien raced past me, shouting an incantation as he went. A sheet of translucent ice soared through the air in front of him, severing the limb that clung to Cirian and allowing him to scramble to his feet as a pool of black ichor poured onto the floor.
“We’ve got this handled!” Bastien yelled back at me. “You’re the only one strong enough to pull that thing out of her by yourself. Go!”
I wanted to argue, but this was our one chance, and Sancha hadn’t moved from where she knelt. I gripped the tether tighter, taking off at a sprint toward the crystalline structure and the Cardinal. She was motionless, her arms reaching out toward the structure in frozen extension. As I drew closer, the true horror of her appearance came into focus. The shadowy ichor that had coated my body when I first awoke in the Cradle proper covered portions of her body, blotting out her features and latching onto points like strings attached to a marionette. As I watched, some of these tendrils pulled taut, manipulating her arms into another position, and a flash of light emanated from the towering structure.
Was the Umbral simply manipulating her body? Had it not been able to convince the Cardinal to surrender herself as it had with Bastien?
Either way, I knew what I had to do.
Pulling a length of the cord loose from my arm, I tossed it over Sancha, the tether quickly attaching itself to her chest. Her left eye—the one not obscured by the horrid ichor—snapped open, the dark iris darting like a rodent trapped in a cage till it landed on me.
With trembling strength, Sancha moved an arm away from whatever ritual was being performed and latched onto the corded thread, as if clinging to a lifeline cast. The ichor slowly began to spread along the glowing cord.
