Page 57 of Awakened Ash and Alchemy

No, it couldn’t be. Not when she had never believed that magic was real. And yet, some inner wall of disbelief shattered inside, as if it had been hit with a fire poker.

Her fingers found the medallion again. “Why am I here, Zarek?”

There was a long pause.

But when he spoke, his voice had a mean edge to it. “Because when a Black Cloak is destroyed in your presence, it doesn’t return to Katarra.”

“That means nothing to me.” When her freedom meant more.

“It’s Katarra,” he said through gritted teeth, as that name slid through the air like poisoned oil.

It made her step away from the door, scooping up the poker, she let its tip drag along the ridges of the slate flooring, creating a metallic ring that echoed off the tiled walls like a blade being drawn slowly across a whetstone.

“Who is Katarra?”

“The dark lord who creates and controls the collective of Black Cloaks,” Zarek explained. “The Black Cloaks were once human, but now they’re vessels powered by Katarra.”

“Are you saying I killed a human last night!” The disbelief cracked, multiplied, and blurred as her words bounced off the tiled walls until she was surrounded by the ghost of her own panic.

“No.” The solidified shadow under the door momentarily spilled into a razor-thin halo of light across the tile as he moved. “Listen to me, Angela.”

She took a step back from the door. Once again, she got ready to swing the fire poker.

“They are not human, not anymore. I told you, it was not murder. Humans do not turn to stone, then crumble to ash. And when we destroy those Black Cloaks, they return to Katarra. They. Do. Not. Die. They are resurrected by Katarra, who sends them back into the fight. But they didn’t this time.”

Her pulse throbbed in her ears, making it harder to listen, as her fingers curled tighter around the poker.

She remembered the Black Cloak’s turning to gray stone and then to ash. And the putrid smell. All of it inhuman.

The weight of the poker suddenly became too much; its tip hit the floor to clang like a gong in a Chinese temple. Her knees weakened so fast that she slapped her palm against the door, her head hanging heavily between her shoulders, shutting her eyes tight to stop herself from falling.

She surrendered to the weight, sliding her back against the hard wooden door to the floor, dragging the fire poker into her lap like an iron dog.

“I—” She gripped the medallion, her thumb tracing its now-familiar ridges desperate for a foothold, to steady the world while the truth unfolded into shapes and sounds so abnormal from the black-and-white simplicity of what she knew. She squeezed the medallion’s metal edges so tight it promised to bruise, using the pain to stay in the moment and not lose herself inside this panic attack.

How was any of this real? “I thought I’d killed someone. Burned them with salt and then… With that athame…”

“You did not murder anyone, Angela.” Again, leather shifted and buckles clinked as Zarek sat on the other side, where his voice curled through the wooden door panel as if shoulder to shoulder. “What you destroyed was a vessel. A shell animated by Katarra’s magick. The human soul that once inhabited it is long gone, and what’s left is nothing but a puppet of dark magic.”

Suddenly, every panicked thought consumed with chaos crashed with relief. She wasn’t a killer, who could finally breathe.

“But what happened to those four members of the Black Cloak Collective who perished to ash while near you, none of them returned to Katarra for resurrection. There were three from the night we met. And certainly not the one you burned with salt last night. They were just gone.”

Her skin prickled at the memory. And that scream. “Are you sure it’s me?” Because she’d done nothing.

Zarek’s silence held more than words.

“What does this mean?”

“It makes you valuable to us, yes. But also to him. Katarra. And that is where it gets deadly.”

Angela’s ribcage tightened as an icy chill prickled over her scalp; she hugged her knees. “How bad is he?”

Zarek started with a heavy sigh. She could feel a warmth through the wood, but also his weariness, as if he’d been fighting a long time. How could she feel him like this, when he sat on the other side of this closed door?

“Katarra is a thousand times worse than the Black Cloaks. He steals magick to grow stronger and has ended civilizations in realms that no longer exist, destroying everything in his thirst for power.”

“I didn’t ask for any of this.” She pressed her spine harder against the hardwood while gripping her medallion tighter.