I savor it as my fangs sink into the flesh of his forearm.
The copper taste of his blood coats my tongue. I grin as the blood drips down my chin.
His blood. Not mine.
“I will fucking kill you!” he screams.
My bite is not nearly enough to weaken him, and he is spinning to return the favor before his roar is complete.
Ivar’s next move takes me by surprise. His fist hooks toward me as expected, but then a foot swings wide and sweeps mine.
I fall hard.
The wind is knocked out of me. I try—so hard, I try—to get up, to keep fighting. But my body can only manage to twist onto my stomach. Air abandons me. My lungs rebel.
Again, hope fails, reminding me why I’ve stopped trying. I stare for a long moment at the rock beneath me.
He can’t know.
He can’t know the secret I hide in my blood. The red that flows so eagerly into the soil is the one thing I can keep from them. If I die—when I die—it must be outside of this fortress.
Rage like fire burns in my soul. Pain so intense I know it may consume all of me.
I have worked every hour of every day to keep the shadows in my blood at bay. Will I lose that battle today?
When the cold rush of power fills me, I choke on it. Sputtering in fear.
No, it’s not right. I can’t let the shadows take me.
Ivar lands another powerful blow, this time to my stomach. The noise that leaves my lips is one of a dead man—wet and pathetic.
I bend over, unable to think or see or feel beyond the pain. I can’t breathe.
“This is pathetic,” someone mutters.
“Finish him, Ivar!” another calls out. And quickly, a chant begins.
Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.
Their violent cries ricochet inside my skull. I should have died years ago, but I didn’t, and I am here now. I will not let it all be for nothing.
There is only one way she and I both survive this. There is only one escape, and it is the one thing that scares me the most.
I open my soul a second time, letting the all-consuming darkness creep out from the black hole somewhere inside. I can feel its claws as it slowly creeps from its hiding place.
It is eager. So, after one short moment of examining its surroundings, it escapes, tearing its way through me with burning fire. I look down at my still trembling fingers. There is nothing different about them. No physical black fire or inky oil. I am the same.
Yet, somehow, as I lift my gaze to meet Ivar’s I know he sees it. He knows.
Panic crosses his expression, and he leaps to end this battle before the tides are turned by Nihil himself. He wraps his arm around my neck and squeezes.
The absence of breath in my lungs should be terrifying. The darkness alive inside my body should be horrifying. But for the first time, I just let it be.
My vision is lined with black as Ivar tries to end my life before I can fight back. I lift my hand and place it on his bicep.
His scream of pain is like an offering to the god of destruction, who sucked the soul from the land and devoured every good thing.
Not everything, I remind myself.
