a-ámej's fog was nothing more than scraps and whispers as he collided with the wall. Not a song. Not a memory. Nothing but faltering, curling grey smoke that swirled around him as though a breaking barrier. Bones groaned as he hit ground, what remained of his rotting flesh burning and flaking as Dearcious held him by the throat.

I could smell it from the alley, the stink of the decaying muscles and fabric catching fire. Could almost taste it beneath my tongue.

The Unknown Prince's frail body was thrown across the widely open cell again, a few phalanges snapping from his hand as he scrapped to get up. He failed miserably. The next thing I could notice was the sweep of darkness that wrapped around him—wrists and knees and ankles—tightening, squeezing, suffocating. More breaking sounds echoed in the dim, cramped space, some of them so loud I wondered how Ha-ámej still clang to life.

Hours—it had been hours since Blake had brought us down here, since he'd gotten in that prison. And Ha-ámej hadn't broken down once, hadn't slipped a single answer, not even with the claws and the talons and the merciless, stifling waves of sheer darkness. But again, he'd been fighting him for centuries and lifetimes, as the Armedes king had told me as we got through the gate. Centuries, many ones, of torture and prisons and pain.

The fog hissed, a long, dragging sound that filled every hole and crack as he was pushed back, head forced down on the brick floor. No blood came out, but the impact had been harsh, and even from my position I saw the bit of torn skin, the crack in his skull, the liquids that seeped out.

And amid all the beating, all the lashing of powers, I sensed how his fog swayed—stared at me. Even the empty sockets he had for eyes, I could swear I felt them locking on me, observing. I remained silent, arms wrapped against my chest, not able to lift a finger to help, not even knowing if I should intervene or not.

Blake hadn't bothered with questions when he'd melted the bars away, stepped in, and had claws spouting from the other side of the Prince's shoulders. They must have gone over the verbal scenario far more than enough.

A pained groan. A muffled scream. Another crack.

I knew what the pain coursing through Ha-ámej was, I knew what the darkness and fire that chained him, wrecked him tasted like. I lived through it, the same horrors. And I knew what the hand Ha-ámej tried to extend, what the fog that fought to approach me meant. Begging, pleading.

It took centuries, and perhaps even more, to drain him this much.

For a long moment, I only saw the motionless body, the twisted ankle, the slightly curling of his bone-fingers. And the claws that came down on him like barreling Death.

For the first time in a long while, my magic flared in my blood, despite Dearcious's presence. Flared and—

I grabbed Blake's hand, feeling the twitching of his muscles, the blind, bitter madness rising up, filling the space like the thick scent of burning oil.

"He'll speak,'' I breathed into his ear as he tilted his head back, hair brushing against my cheek, a low, feral breath curling out of him. "I will make him.''

A heartbeat passed without him moving an inch, then another until he finally pulled himself up, claws slowly shrinking back, the powers swirling around us slipping back into him.

Ha-ámej remained on the floor, not a twitch of a finger to suggest he was still there. But his fog still swayed, still wrapped around him as I crouched, my fingers digging into his temples, old, dead skin piling beneath my fingernails.

A harrowing and sharp scream filled everything—air and muscles and bones—as I dove into his mind. The fog, his own body…he quivered so well I would have been fooled that the powers that snaked out of me truly ruined him. Bones trembled, magic wavered as I poured more into him, as I roamed around the towers he had for defense. Mighty. Impenetrable. Unending.

Dearcious had been looking for many answers: the details needed to awaken Apocalys, the torc that now lay with me, and many forgotten secrets lost to time. And I knew I couldn't give them to him, knew I couldn't scheme far and hard enough to get ourselves out of this.

"His mental shields are high.'' A hiss. ''Unscratched.'' A growl. More magic went within him, coursing in his dried capillaries. I couldn't tell if the arching of his back was real or if he was still playing along.

I turned my attention to the king, leaning, waiting. Powers throbbed beneath my skin, pouring out, not objecting, not rebelling, as though unbothered with those ancient, dormant strengths hidden deep in Ha-ámej's soul. His presence never truly alarmed me, actually.

"It will take a few days to crack them.''

Another scream.

I rose, leaving a withering, shaking man sprawled on the floor.

"It is quite a long time for someone so weakened.''

I merely blinked, unbothered as I scrapped my nails, the dead skin falling like cinders, sticking to my clothes and boots. "He is a mind, not a body.'' A long shared glance. ''He guards his walls well.'' I stared over my shoulder, sparing the Unknown Prince one last glance before I stepped out of his cell, eyes meeting Dearcious's, unwavering. "Keeps them changing in shape.''

The bars reformed the moment I stepped out of the cramped prison, their iridescence casting a thin, feeble light that brushed over Blake's features. He almost didn't look like himself, here in the pitch dark.

I didn’t blink as he grabbed me by the arm, a firm, clear hold to keep me in place.

"You will get through him.'' Not a question but a damn order.

I let my stares linger on the hand he had on me, slowly going up, until I found his face, his black eyes. And laughed. It was enough response as my voice echoed between us, and yet I still added, "I have brought armies down with my mind.'' I stepped closer, killing the distance between us, head tilting higher. I breathed out of my mouth. "I conquered cities with nothing more than thoughts.'' Closer. ''Don't you dare underestimate what I can do. You, out of all, have seen how ugly it gets to those who do.''

Not even his grasp held as I took another step, walking to the unfurling gate he'd created. He remained silent as he moved along, silent and utterly clueless to what was happening, to the words Ha-ámej slipped into my consciousness.

'Come for me.' The darkness built up around us. 'I shall come for you.'

The magic sealed, half a heartbeat of sheer, cold emptiness before I felt the brush of icy breezes against my skin.

Blue fires writhed in the skull-shaped sconces, ending in a lick of hot amber that spread their thin lights over the gloom sleeping here, somewhere far and below any known tunnels and passages.

Statues stood mighty and proud, each at least seven feet of heavy gold, one accompanying every sarcophagus.

A tomb room.

Spiraling pillars were built as a circle, the reflecting firelights filling the carved lines in the white marble. Those lines, they told the stories of these lands, of the ruling family, of the god that conquered them all. They told the stories of those buried here, of the sculpted faces that could only be mirrors to those dead and buried. So many of them, men and women alike.

The men were by far more numerous, all of them bearing the same Greek nose and square jaw line, the sharp, cunning eyes captured so perfectly as though frozen in time. Blake fell in that line, and it said enough that all of them were Dearcious in past lives. The one woman with many statues said enough, too. Perhaps far more than that.

Elayda.

Her, who was never reincarnated in a body of her bloodline, who never needed a host. Her, who burned to ashes at death only to come back years after in her own flesh and bones.

It was that loop that I was still missing, that bit of explanation about how Dearcious reincarnated. It haunted my thoughts, now more than ever after what had happened earlier this morning.

Amber.

I blinked the thought away, fingers grazing the cold surface of one of Elayda's empty sarcophagus, the winds seeming to hum with each etched rune I brushed. More stories of the coldblooded queen, of the first she-demon who leveled cities, who brought down armies.

From Elayda's to Dearcious's, my fingertips grazed the smooth carvings, my eyes witnessed the flicker of memories that surged at the contact.

A red washed sun. A dark, cold world. And Death. Glorious, invincible Death that razed like endless swarms of ravaging locusts.

They all carried common etchings, the pillars and tombs, the baseboards, the vaulted ceiling—

The Empire of Möehriyád. The Empire of Death and Dark. The Empire of the Victorious God.

So much history, so many things to take at once.

Blake didn’t bother with all the writing, all the stories, the faint whispers of the winds birthing from the heart of the room. He'd found the pillar he needed in a heartbeat's matter, the one next to the oldest statue, carved in a language older than what was known to the world. A language dialed far before the whispers of war and bloodshed, a language that sounded like nothing our tongues could pronounce.

But some of the scattered runic letters, their curves and edges, I'd seen them before somewhere. I just couldn’t remember where.

Blake crouched, hands brushing over the symbols, deciphering them bit by bit as I approached him, the iciness of the marble floor biting my bones as I kneeled, both hands caressing the rough, cold surface. Feeling the dents, the sharp ends, the hollowness and rigidness of it.

Some words, I could decipher, string at a time. Some others remained an utter mystery.

A long, silent breath curled out of my mouth as I closed my eyes, relaying on touch and instincts, hands trembling, muscles tensing. So many words, so many steps to go through, so many ways to bring Apocalys back.

I felt my head slowly tipping back with each breath I took, my hands so slowly moving lower, brushing over spells older than time itself.

Drahayá, the black mirror back in his rooms. A gate and window to...nowhere. To the Dark.

Lower.

An ancient curving and a drawing I could not word, but there had been a brown bird and a sharp…blade. No, not a blade. A beak.

The sparrow's beak—from the prophecy I'd given to Blake the day we first arrived.

Lower.

A body. A soul. Death. A cycle, never-ending. Fire and blood. A corpse—a tomb.

My hands froze here, and I peered at the king who had long since moved to another pillar, not finding yet the end of the thread he was seeking.

I traced the words beneath my touch again and again and again. A host. A guest. A king. Again—a babe. A sarcophagus. A knife. A womb and blood.

The cycle of reincarnation. The barely forming embryo ripped out of his mother's womb and into the golden sarcophagus I had found with Liam and Yesar. The blood that coursed through the coffin, it was Dearcious's first blood, taken from his body at death to keep on feeding him.

A shattered soul, ripped to shreds and tendrils: the babe's soul, destroyed to feed Dearcious's, to leave space so it could grow. So it could manifest. Not a memory lost. Not a heartbeat slipping to oblivion.

I wasn't sure I was breathing at this point, my stares again finding the king immersed in his searches.

But Blake had been there, amid all the darkness. Amber. He'd been there. He'd been there—

Had he ever been there, in the Norm? If he was shredded and wrecked, could he have been there during all those walks, the chatter, the dance?

I wanted to vomit. I wanted to curl in my spot and hurl up my guts.

Had it been Blake or Dearcious all that time? Had it been both?

He turned then, and his fathomless eyes met with mine for a heartbeat that stretched like a lifetime before I reined my focus back to the pillar. He did not comment, and nor did I as I traced absent mindedly the words in front of me.

Dearcious Blake Dearcious Blake Dearcious Blake Dearcious Blake…

I wanted to scream my frustration out. I wanted the weight pressing on my shoulders, on my neck, on my chest to dissolve. To let me breath.

My hands went lower and lower until…Nightbleed. Red. Mind.

Lower—neck. Ornament. Wreck.

I touched the baseboards, and I knew this pillar had nothing more to give. Knew what that last word was as I stared around me, as I noted the carved jewelry at all of the Elaydas' necks.

Nirikh—the torcs, both of them combined. A neutral power mightier than any could imagine. An instrument that played on both dark and light strings, that controlled minds as well as spirit. An item of power, only wielded by those who could endure its hissing, its might. Because too much power could render one terrifyingly mad. Insane.

I drifted to the nearest statue of the woman I impersonated, fingers almost brushing the intricately done ornament at the neck. Dearcious had noticed it, had heard the snarl that came out of me as I pointed at it.

"Mine.'' I stepped toward him, feline smoothness bleeding to a slow, feral approach. "You have it."

Not a blink at the whispers of my claws, my fangs. Utterly unfazed. "Only the first half.''

Because the second was with Ha-ámej as he believed it to be, while it truly rested with me, impossible for him to find it.

"I want it back.''

"You'll retrieve it when both the pieces merge back together.''

Another step. Another growl. "Back.'' My teeth grew longer, sharper. It was too dangerous to remain with him, half or not. "Now.''

Something hard went into my middle, and I had to look down to feel the hands he had on my wrists, pushed back against my navel. The claws—my claws—that had gone into my flesh as he pushed me back. Right where he'd torn me in half before.

Cold blood trickled down onto my leg as I pulled them out, and whatever word, whatever order he was about to bark faded as he stared at the thick, black liquid that seeped out of me.

He didn't resist the clean hand that pushed him away, didn't blink or retort to the snarl I'd breathed out before taking a step back, wound already closing. I wiped the blood on my pants, nails replacing the steel as I aimed for the corner he studied mere minutes ago.

For a few seconds, he remained there, remained watching as I crouched down in front of the prophecy he was inspecting.

Too far, I was pushing him too far especially with how saturated the darkness reeking out of him smelled. I couldn't play him like this morning, couldn't push at his buttons like I usually did.

His steps were silent, but I still felt him as he neared, as he crouched next to me. The hand he put on my shoulder slowly, carefully, slid down until it rested above the torn tank top and the healed wound, pressing on it. Hard.

I put mine over his as he leaned closer to read what was left, breath burning hot on my skin. And ever so slowly, the blood and the scent that stuck to his fingers slipped back into me, if ever because I couldn't risk letting him go with my blood still on him. Couldn't risk him contemplating its scent for long.

Gently leaning closer, his body heavy on my back, he traced a symbol I couldn't read, the names hazy in my ears as he whispered them so effortlessly. Words and stories, he read them all, the procedure he'd been working through to bring his god back.

There had been bits within it that I knew, bits that I had unraveled with my court during our journey. Some, I had read through the Book of Astazan. But for the greatest part, I relied on him to go through them until he reached his latest deciphering and halted, not having truly anything more to add.

Silence spread between us, wove itself with the fabric of the place, crisp and clean, nothing to interrupt it until I breathed, ''I remember.''

His only response was the weight that pressed heavier on my back as he leaned in even more. He was so close he could hear every breath, could feel every heartbeat, could brush the skin of my shoulders with his chin.

A hand fell on the last line Blake had read, and the words that came out of me were a hiss in my mind.

''Deep into the Dark lies the Wrath,

Hollowed, spread at the plunging foot of the strath.

An oath to wreck, to revenge, to destroy,

A key to the door at the heart of the sunken hoy.

The beak's red bleeds dark at the edge,

For the shadows famished await beneath the crumbling ledge.''

The prophecy echoed hollow, but Dearcious had been keen on every word, understood what it meant, what the hoy and the wrath meant. I still had to uncover them, to find the bits he had unraveled before I did.

The beak—the sparrow's beak—was all I could truly make out.

I felt his stares sliding from the carved pillar to my shoulders leisurely before his free hand traced over my shoulder blade. His touch was warm—burning—as it traced down, running over the inked words in long strokes. Apocalys's darling, the bearer of his words. I had given him already so many authentic clues.

They went lower, sliding the thin strap of my top over my left shoulder. Lower and lower and lower, the whisper of a claw tearing the band of linen wrapped around my chest.

My free hand went up to my shoulders, pinning them all in place as his eyes and fingers kept trailing down. Blake's voice so low, so frighteningly hollow as he read the words and horrors marked on my back, swaying like smoke caught in skin.

Lower, each touch, each echoing breath making my spine tingle, my skin simmering as though on low fire.

I couldn't make out the sounds coming out of him and I wasn't entirely sure I wanted to know them at this very moment. Such bitter, heavy darkness danced around us as he whispered, the hums of the winds echoing within my bones, growing louder and louder. Like a rising storm. An advent of war.

It felt like the world caved around us, like it swirled and focused around the chants he uttered, as though it had been astray for too long. As though those words were the anchor of the universe.

The other strap slid over my arm, and I felt his touch going from side to side as it still traveled down, running over every word, every scar, every bit of showing skin.

Dearcious had been so immersed in what he was deciphering on my back that he didn't notice how lightly I pulled my hand from over his, only the bottom still in contact. He didn't realize how I focused on my palm, on the spinning smoke, the birthing and wilting words flashing.

A prophecy not made to be found by him, not given by his god.

The seven Thrones down into oblivion fall,

Their lights no longer mighty, no longer tall.