Page 40 of Ashen Wings

It leans into my space, our brows meeting, skin to leathery skin. I beg my body one last time, but it’s captive under the lurker's voracious stare. The fleshy fold over its eye sockets stretches and bile floods my throat as the sound of ripping, dead skin echoes around me. I throw my gaze away if only for a moment.

The others simply stand in the haze like shadows and outlines. All pin straight. All stiller than death.

They watch.

They wait.

The creature on top of me looses a breathy groan. A scream claws at my vocal cords like a demon in the night.

Only shredded flesh and black, oozing voids remain where the layer of greyish skin once stretched over its eye sockets. Gods, and in those depths…those dark pits of pure nightmares…

Every fiber of my body burns. My skin, down to each miniscule hair, is wildfire in a droughted brush.

Yet I can’t look away. The darkness takes me, draws me in, and keeps me. There in the lurker’s gaze is the truth of time, of the cosmos, of the gods, and I can’t unsee it. I can’t close my eyes or rip them away no matter how much I plead.

Astora, Morvayne, Obdiris, Neressa. I reach out to any one of the gods, but fuck, even Scorath’s gone silent. Perhaps they can’t reach me here, as I sink into the lurker’s voids. Its jaw retracts wider until that flesh, too, shreds into scraps. Teeth—like bone-carved daggers—glisten in the same black sludge pouring from its eyes, and it leans into me, settling its bite around the soft part of my neck.

The creatures all groan and whimper like starved animals about to witness a feast. Whatever independent thoughts are still my own, now whisper pleas to the all too silent gods.

The lurker’s jaws clamp around my skin. Blood trails down my neck, but I’ve lost myself in these scorching flames. My life siphons from the exposed vein, spurting down the creature's throat.

I’m dying.

I’ve seen the truth of the cosmos, and perhaps this fate is one of mercy. My eyes flutter as consciousness dances on the brink of collapse.

Just before I fade, there’s a flash of black scales and midnight.

A lurker shrieks a pained, shrill cry.

The ground rumbles around my limp body.

Then there’s nothing but emptiness. Nothing but darkness. Nothing but death.

17

“Nova!” A voice thrums through me, riling my thoughts until everything catches fire. Am I dead? Is this darkness Morvayne’s doing? Everything is weightless, breathless. Has my soul left my body?

“Nova, fuck, wake up!” it says again. The deep tone suggests its owner is male, but my hearing is still muffled by the weight of unconsciousness.

A palm brushes over my skin, grounding me back in my body. I try lifting my hand, but only my finger twitches in response. So, I’m not dead, at least.

“Fuck, Tenebris, she isn’t waking up,” the voice cries. Each drop of desperation in his tone beads to my skin like sweat. I’m here, I want to say, but where is here? The air is too thick to be of the natural world—the darkness all too encumbering.

“It’s the toxin. We might be too late,” another voice, deeper than the first replies. I recognize their words without landing their meaning.

“No, it barely bit into her. We weren’t too late,” the first voice says. My eyes remain closed no matter how much I fight them. Perhaps I’m not dead…but paralyzed? Frozen? Fuck, have I lost control of my own damned body? Tenebris and Jace come back to me in glimpses.

“Just a drop is enough to shut down the mind, Jace. You know just as well as I what these things can do,” Tenebris says. Footsteps crunch over rubble and the hairs on my arm pricks. Chilled, midnight frost caresses my lips. I recognize the scent almost instantly, and even in my near-catatonic state curse myself for it. Jace Ashborne is a breath away from my lips. A lock of his hair tickles my skin.

“I feel breath, which means she’s still alive. It hasn’t reached her heart yet, thank the gods. Help me lower her.”

“Don’t do something stupid that’ll get both you and I killed. I will not die today, human,” Tenebris growls.

Rough hands grip behind my neck and I’m lifted with a rush of air.

“Tenebris. She will not die today,” Jace says. Fingers curl around my thighs and the world sways under wide steps. A groan rumbles at the back of my throat.

“Help me or I swear to Morvayne…” Jace’s words cut deeper than steel.