Page 13 of The Blood Rites

I make myself walk.

The Overseers drift ahead of us through the mist, and the crowd stays silent as we pass, holding its breath like we are already ghosts.

Four

The bridge towards the Mother Shard is made of nothing human hands could grasp.

It looks like rose-coloured light made solid, stretched across the sea in a glowing ribbon that hurts to look at for too long. The surface pulses faintly beneath our feet, as though something alive is buried deep within it.

The Overseers drift ahead of us through the mist as we step onto the bridge barefoot, the three of us falling naturally into line behind them. The moment my skin touches the surface, heat shoots through me hard enough that I nearly stumble.

The light beneath my feet is warm for half a breath, then painfully hot, before the sensation abruptly turns numb and begins climbing through my legs in slow waves that settle deep in my bones.

Marissa gasps beside me.

“It’s moving,” she whispers.

The bridge pulses again beneath us, rose and gold light rippling outwards from every step we take.

“It isn’t,” I say automatically, though it certainly feels like it is.

Far below us, the sea curls endlessly. I keep expecting the bridge to vanish beneath our feet, for the light to fracture and send us plunging into the lightless water below, but it never wavers. Every step lands solid and sure despite the impossible glow beneath us.

Behind us, the Light Dominion grows smaller with every passing minute. The white walls blur first, then the towers, until even the Alabaster Vein looks thin and distant against the sky.

I look back only once.

I have no family there. No one waiting for me. No one who will mourn when I don’t return.

So, I force myself to turn away.

Marissa walks to my left, close enough that our shoulders almost touch. Her lips move constantly as we walk, repeating something under her breath that I can’t quite hear. A prayer, maybe. Or just panic given rhythm. Every few steps she glances back towards the Dominion as if part of her still expects someone to come after us.

Callen never looks back at all.

He walks slightly ahead of us with his head lowered, scarred hands flexing every few steps like he’s still adjusting to the absence of the bands. I understand the feeling more than I want to. My own wrists still ache where the metal sat, and every pulse of heat beneath the bridge makes the skin there throb harder.

The further we walk, the more aware I become of the humming beneath us. At first, I think it’s coming from the Overseers, but slowly I realise it isn’t.

It’s the Mother Shard.

The sound vibrates through the air in long, low pulses that settle somewhere beneath my skin. Heat gathers in my chest, beneath my ribs, crawling down my arms until I have to curl my hands into fists to stop them from shaking—to bury the feeling.

Marissa stumbles slightly beside me and catches herself with a sharp breath.

“Hey,” I say quietly. “Are you alright?”

The question feels ridiculous the moment it leaves my mouth. She lets out a thin, shaky laugh. “Do I look alright?”

“No,” I admit.

For a moment, that almost makes her smile.

“I’m afraid of heights,” she says after a few seconds, her voice barely audible over the hum beneath us.

We are surrounded by endless sky and open sea. I honestly don’t know what to say to that.

“I’m afraid of everything right now,” she adds more quietly.