Page 39

“I’m going to find her.” Hugo sprints for the hall outside the cell.

“Hugo, wait!” I shout, but he ignores me. I race after him, Lonan and the others fast on my heels. Hugo has disappeared down the dark hall of the dungeons.

Lonan catches me, grabbing my arm. “Fontaine, don’t.”

I jerk myself out of his grip. I’d rather die together than survive this knowing I let my friends perish.

My scythe illuminates a small circle in the darkness around me. And finally, as I reach the end of the hall, I find Hugo. He’s crouched on the floor, arms around his knees. His spear lies lifeless on the floor beside him. His eyes are wide and staring with abject horror at the open air, at nothing at all.

Orla runs up beside me and grabs him by his hair, forcing him to look her in the eye. “Larose, what’s wrong?”

He doesn’t react.

“Hugo,” Ollinde shouts. But he makes no indication that he can hear them.

“We were gone for a second. What’s happened to him?” I ask.

Hugo starts to crumple, and in a pathetic, whimpering voice, he whispers, “Please, please . . .”

Something shifts in the corner of my eye. I grip my scythe in both hands and spin around, but there is nothing.

“We need to get out of here,” Lonan says.

A sound like a soft exhale, a brush against stone, has me whirling in the other direction. The four of us left standing back toward the wall.

“Look out.”

We twist behind us, toward the voice, and there, at the top of the wall where it meets the ceiling, Poppy is perched like a spider.

She smiles, wide and wolfish.

And she jumps.

Darkness bursts around us as her body collides with mine. She grips my hair as we fall to the floor. I fight, swiping my scythe at her, but it is a poor weapon for close combat. She claws frantically at my face. I can see nothing—the glow of every anchor is extinguished. Lonan. These are his shadows, wielded against her.

Poppy shrieks as the shadows twist around her. The sound is so animalistic, so inhuman, that it pours ice down my veins. I shove her, trying to tear her arms away from me, but her strength is as inhuman as her scream. She hisses, and then I feel the scrape of teeth against my jaw.

Something heavy collides with her, and she rolls off me. There is a shriek, and Lonan’s Darkness peels back as quickly as it came, and the glow of our anchors illuminates Hugo. He stands over Poppy, his eyes wild and lost and furious. His spear is buried in her abdomen. Her eyes are wide and covered in white. Her body lies still as death.

Silence. And then the moment is too much, the feelings rising in me too overwhelming for a heart that won’t tick. I roll and retch onto the floor.

Orla bends down, pulling my hair back from my face. In the corner of my eye, I see Hugo back away from Poppy’s body, his back colliding with the wall. He’s staring at her, pure panic written on his face. His breaths are coming short and fast. Lonan steps over Poppy to press a palm to Hugo’s chest.

“Breathe, Larose,” he says firmly, gently. “Breathe. Close your damn eyes and breathe.”

Hugo leans his head back, closing his eyes and swallowing. “She’ s—I—I don’t—I killed—oh Saints—”

“Quiet,” Lonan says. “Just breathe.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, feeling every ounce of the horror I see on Hugo’s face. Poppy. Poppy. I’d rather die myself.

“You’re a Dark meiga,” Ollinde barks. They’re staring at Lonan, hands clenched into fists. “That was Dark magic. You—you’re a traitor . . . You’re the reason all this is happening. You’re the Dark the Ridding is trying to weed out.”

They take one step toward Lonan, but Orla puts herself between her captain and her sibling. “Don’t touch him.”

Ollinde’s eyes widen with confusion and the hurt of betrayal. “You saw it, sister. You saw . . .”

“Just wait. Just think.”