Edge of Darkness ~ A Darkness & Light Novel Book Three

by K. L. Schwengel

  She turned Bolin toward Donovan, standing at the edge of the square, watching with an unreadable expression on his face. Bloodlust surged through him. If anyone amongst them deserved death, it was Donovan.

  "And how simple would it be? A mere thought from you would see him crumble like these very ruins. He is responsible for your beloved Galysian mother's death. It was by his command I acted. He has betrayed the empire."

  Bolin's nostrils flared. His breath came hard and fast. "As have you," he said, though it took far too much effort on his part to maintain any sense of right and wrong.

  "Me? No. No more so than the Goddess herself. Had she not gone back on her word, none of this would be happening. She sought to cage me. To lock me away and have the world to herself. You cannot have Lightness without Dark, any more than you can have day without night."

  This close to her Bolin couldn't escape the power swathing her. It engulfed him. Pulled him under in dark swirls that once seemed thick and oily, but now rippled across him like the finest silk. How many days had he been without so much as a whisper of magic? Now he could have it all. All the power he could ever want.

  "Take it. Use it for the noblest of purposes. Slay your enemies, champion the causes of these lesser fools you chain yourself to, reclaim the Greensward."

  Bolin startled at the image of Maurar gloating behind his back as he rode out of Galys Auld.

  "Do you think I do not know your heart's every desire? The elder who pushed you away is not worthy of the gift you bestowed upon him." The witch laid a hand against Bolin's chest. "Not worthy of this."

  Darkness slid through his clothing, pierced his skin, and flowed hungrily toward the glittering, green gem Bolin kept tucked carefully within the deepest part of himself.

  "You can have both."

  Bolin's hand shot up. His fingers snapped around the witch's wrist like an iron band. "But you can't."

  He forced her arm back and, as he did, Dain stepped suddenly beside him. The Emperor shoved Bolin back and unleashed a torrent of power directly into the witch. A high-pitched shriek split the air as she contorted beneath the onslaught.

  "If you're with us, General, a little assistance would be appreciated," Dain said, jaw clenched.

  Bolin shook his head to clear it. He reached out to gather Dain's power and add it to Nialyne's, strengthening them both, but a cackle of laughter stopped him. He watched in curiosity as the witch's body folded in on itself and sank to the ground in a misshapen heap. From it rose a distorted black figure, more cloudlike than solid, flowing into the air above them and blotting out the sky.

  "You didn't really think it would be that easy, did you?"

  The haze wafted over them, obscuring the glow of Dain's power. The Emperor staggered back and redoubled his efforts, sweat beading his brow. A scream of rage from above shattered Darkness and even as it reformed yet again, Andrakaos plummeted like a rock.

  "My child." Darkness spread her arms wide. "Come then. I will take you in place of the other, just as I offered. Come, let me remind you of the glory that was once yours."

  Bolin jerked his gaze from Andrakaos to Ciara. She stood off to his left, one arm cradled to her body, her other arm extended toward Andrakaos, sketching sigils in the air. Tears streaked her cheeks and her body shook with effort.

  Fear ripped through him. Not for himself. He accepted this could well be his end, but Ciara deserved so much more. She fought, not truly understanding how and doing so, not from any sense of duty or loyalty to the empire, but for him alone. Bolin still couldn't fathom why. He remembered asking her in Broadhead, why she loved him. It seemed a lifetime ago, yet he recalled her response as clearly as the day she gave it. 'Does there need to be a reason other than my heart's voice?'

  "You are fighting a losing battle," the witch said. "I will claim the child and her pet, and how will you stop me then?"

  Bolin drew his gaze from Ciara. "I will stop you with my heart's voice."

  He sucked in a deep breath, released his hold on Dain's power, and called Darkness to him. The shadowy figure turned his way, hesitated, then streaked eagerly downward, answering his summons. Bolin braced himself. He would have a single moment to entrap Darkness within a cage of Nialyne's power and the combined magic that swirled in the sharp angles of Ciara's pendant. A single moment to either control it, or be lost to it. The prospect of the first filled him with keen anticipation he found hard to temper. He trusted to Ferris to keep his oath if it proved to be the latter.

  A scream of rage split the air, and Darkness veered suddenly off, struggling against some other pull. Bolin whirled, fury rising in him, ready to strike at whoever dared intercede, certain it was Donovan. Horror overwhelmed him when his eyes found Ferris, instead. The Sciath's eyes were closed, his face a mask of determination. He stood, feet braced, left arm thrust straight out in front of him as he dragged Darkness unwillingly to him.

  Bolin opened his mouth, a shout for Ferris to stop poised on his tongue. Before he could give it voice, Ferris lifted his right arm to the side, fingers splayed, and sent Darkness streaming directly toward Donovan.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  Donovan would have screamed at the sudden torrent of agony if he could have found the breath to do so. He wanted to. More, he wanted to collapse into a heap much like the priestess. His body, however, refused to give him the satisfaction. His muscles contracted with such force he felt certain they would rip sinew from bone, and his blood raced through his veins hot enough to burn. Even at its worst, the crone's power had never felt as this did.

  The general's eyes locked on his, brow furrowed. His lips moved, forming words Donovan could not hear. He tried to shake his head and found even that gesture beyond his ability. A hand caressed his cheek and he inwardly flinched, outwardly, however, he remained frozen and as immobile as a stone.

  The priestess's voice trickled through his mind, "An interesting circumstance, wouldn't you say, Dark Prince?"

  "What game is this now, Priestess?" he asked silently.

  Her shrug lifted Donovan's shoulders despite his best efforts to prevent the action. "Quite a different one than I had planned, I must admit. We will need to rid ourselves of that pest."

  "We?"

  "I claim what is mine."

  Donovan laughed, an unpleasant sound, accompanied by pinpricks of pain. "I am not yours. I bound you."

  "You bound a Dominion priestess who died upon the walls of Nisair."

  Donovan clenched his jaw. "I bound your power, Priestess. By blood, by body, and by bond."

  "Then why is it you can do nothing but stand and tremble? You lusted for me. Desired Darkness more than anyone. Time to embrace me."

  "I will embrace you, Priestess. Just as I did under the dark moon, and you will do my bidding once again."

  Donovan sucked in a hard breath. His power came quick and eager at his bidding, and curiosity radiated through him from the priestess. No, from Darkness. Time to call it what it was. What he would become, only if he could bring it to heel. The priestess found that thought amusing. As Donovan gathered all he possessed, reaching deeper into the well of his power than he ever had cause to before, uncertainty overlaid her good humor.

  Another inhale, and the pain washed from Donovan. Control returned to his muscles. He wrapped a blanket of his power around Darkness and held it, calling on the words of binding he had used when he had mistakenly thought the priestess nothing more than she seemed. Then, when he could spare the concentration to do so, he spread his awareness outward and drew his focus back to his immediate surroundings.

  His gaze rested momentarily on the Emperor before sliding past to fix on the great Sciath na Duinne, now watching him with the wary appraisal of one predator facing another.

  "We find ourselves at a crossroads, General," Donovan said, though his voice did not sound as steady as he would have liked.

  "You're a fool if you think to stand against us."

  Darkness lay beneath Donovan's own power. Content to obs
erve. Waiting. Thankfully not fighting him. Yet. He had no doubt that time would come.

  "You have tasted Darkness," Donovan said. "You know what I now possess."

  The general sneered. "Possessing and controlling don't necessarily go hand in hand."

  "What is it you are after here?" the Emperor asked.

  "What is rightfully mine." Those words came from Darkness, spat out with venom, and Donovan cursed the slip in his hold over her.

  The Emperor scoffed. "You are a traitor to the empire. Nothing is rightfully yours save an execution."

  "And do you intend to swing the blade yourself, Majesty? Or will you cede the right to your Lord General?" Donovan turned to his daughter. "Will you watch? Or will you beg your emperor's mercy for me?"

  Ciara's chin lifted. "You deserve no one's mercy."

  "Do you deserve mine?"

  The Emperor's power flared to block the bolt Donovan sent his way, and Andrakaos roared in outrage as Ciara caught the brunt of another that sent her rocking back. Donovan brought up a small amount of Darkness, threaded it through his own power, and turned it on the Sciath na Duinne. He made all three strikes in less time than it took to draw breath. None were killing blows, his daughter's nothing more than the equivalent of a slap to the face. Anything more would have required far more control than he currently possessed.

  "There is no need for us to be enemies," Donovan said, and again could not wholly prevent the priestess from voicing her opinion. "Merely accept me in place of your posturing Goddess, and I shall even allow you to retain your titles. Nothing will change, save whom you whisper your prayers to. Daughter, you hold no love for her, what matter is it to you who these others fawn after?"

  A gust of wind pushed at his back, and Donovan cocked his head to watch as Andrakaos lifted skyward and dissolved into a smoky smudge against a fading sky.

  He shifted his gaze back to Ciara. "Do not make me kill you, Daughter. It would be such a waste. You can be far more than these men will ever allow you to be. Far more than either of them, which is why they will keep you from your true destiny."

  "And what would I be with you?" she asked. She wore her fear openly, but without shame. "Will I sit at your side? Rule the world with you? Or will I be kept on a chain, forced to do your bidding? Used for whatever purpose you feel necessary?"

  "You will serve me no differently than you serve them." Donovan gestured and with it went a ragged streak of power.

  The general snatched it deftly out of the air.

  "You fool!" The priestess's scream reverberated in Donovan's skull. "Release me before it is too late. He holds the power of the Greensward."

  Donovan would have considered giving in to Darkness's demand with that bit of news, if the combined assault that struck him had left him any chance to respond. The general took all the power within his reach, combined it with that of the Galysian elder, and hurtled it at Donovan. Darkness railed against him, and the struggle to survive became internal as well as external.

  Donovan gave up any attempt to strike back. He had never been as great a strategist as the general, perhaps, but he believed that, in order to win a war, some battles needed to be lost. So, he wrapped Darkness within the folds of his power, using every shred of it to fortify the words that had held the priestess bound to him with others of older and stronger magic.

  "What are you doing?" she asked, real fear present in her tone.

  "You showed me I do not require physical presence, Priestess, and so I surrender it to the unholies. You, however, I shall keep. You once told me I could have been you. I believe you were correct."

  Pain overwhelmed conscious thought and Donovan gave in to a final moment of outrage, lashing out at those around him. It was futile, but satisfying. The last effort of a dying man before he surrendered his body. Where once Darkness had taken him, Donovan now took it. Only time and the unholies would know the outcome.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  One moment, the air shone and crackled with power, the next, it became suddenly dull and deathly quiet. Ciara blinked in the diminished light, her eyes going to Donovan sprawled unmoving in a scorched ring of dirt.

  He is no longer among us, Andrakaos said as he lowered his head to sniff at Donovan's body, and Ciara couldn't help feel anything but relief, regardless of the blood that bound them.

  "And Darkness?" the Emperor asked, his voice lacking a bit of its usual vibrancy.

  Andrakaos tipped his muzzle skyward and scented the air. No longer within this realm.

  Ciara started to ask if that meant they had destroyed it, but an anguished cry pulled her attention to Bolin in time to see him sprint across the square to where another figure lay. Ciara followed in his wake, terrified by what she would find. Ferris was on his back, eyes open but unseeing, the slow, erratic rise and fall of his chest the only indication he still lived.

  Bolin fell to his knees beside him and cupped his son's face between his hands. "Look at me," he said, a low, desperate plea. "Ferris? Damn the unholies, look at me."

  The Sciath's eyes drifted shut, then fluttered open again, searching until they found Bolin's face. A weak smile twisted the corner of his mouth, but it disappeared behind a grimace almost as quickly as it came. He reached up and wrapped his fingers around one of Bolin's hands, drawing it down to hold over his chest.

  "There's naught… can be done," he said in a breathy whisper.

  "The hells there's not."

  "You are… free of it? The blinding?"

  "Aye. You broke your oath."

  Ferris nodded and his breath hitched. He blinked rapidly, as though trying to keep from losing focus again, and Bolin made a noise in his throat.

  "Better me… than you."

  Bolin lowered his forehead to rest against Ferris's. Whatever he said drew a quiet chuckle from Ferris before his breath caught again. This time his body went rigid, fists clenching, every muscle taut. Bolin lifted his face to Ciara. The undisguised anguish sent a pang through her.

  "He shouldn't have done it," Bolin said. "It was too much. He couldn't channel it quickly enough."

  "Can you take it from him?"

  "No!" Ferris surged upwards, grasping desperately at Ciara. "It will… kill him."

  "It's killing you," Bolin said, and his voice broke.

  Ciara pushed Ferris gently back down, and met Bolin's eyes. "I won't allow this to happen to you. Not again."

  Ferris muttered something more and pushed weakly at her, but Ciara caught his hand and held it, stroking the side of his face, and cooing nonsense. She smiled at Bolin, hoping to provide more reassurance than she felt, and then slipped into the veil.

  It came with an ease that surprised her, though it took her a while to find Ferris. He stood far off in the distance before a pair of huge, plain doors, set in a glimmering wall of white, deeper in the veil than Ciara had ever been. She suppressed a sudden worry she wouldn't be able to get back, let alone bring Ferris with her.

  He glanced sidelong at Ciara as she stepped up beside him. A dark, fragmented haze surrounded him, expanding and contracting like the pulsing of a heart that grew tighter with each beat.

  "It's Darkness," Ferris said, his voice faint. "I forced as much as I could toward Donovan. It was a dangerous gamble, but I couldn't let Lord Bolin take it, and he meant to. He's already had a taste of it. I couldn't risk it destroying him, and I'd rather this, than uphold my oath."

  "For a moment, I thought that's what you were going to do."

  "I was. But I knew you would have tried to stop me, and the distraction would have given Darkness the opening it needed. He would have been lost to us."

  "I'm sorry, Ferris. I didn't mean for it to come to this."

  He raised a shoulder. "'Tis a better ending than it could have been."

  "It could be better. I can draw the extra magic out, just like poison." Ciara only hoped she wasn't oversimplifying the threat.

  Ferris shook his head. "It's too risky. You've no idea what it will do."

&nbs
p; "Maybe not." Ciara angled a thumb back over her shoulder to where Andrakaos waited. "But I brought help, just in case. He seems to have grown rather fond of you."

  We do not want to lose you.

  "M'lady--"

  "Please, Ferris."

  He sighed and looked back toward the doors, a frown darkening his expression. "I've come close to the Halls, but never quite this close."

  "Neither have I," Ciara said.

  Ferris gave her a curious look. "No? Being a healer, I would've thought you'd a bit of familiarity with them."

  "My experience isn't so vast as you seem to think."

  Ferris didn't reply to that, just turned his face back to the doors. After a long moment of silence, he spoke again. "I had a son. Baret. He died when he was seven. He'd be a man grown now, but in my heart he'll always be a little boy. There's not a day goes by I don't think of him." He looked down and slid a foot forward, dragging it back and forth as though toeing at an invisible line, then lifted his gaze once more and jutted his chin toward the Halls. "He waits there for me. I know that for a certainty. Another step, and I could hold him in my arms again, tell him how much I love him. How much I miss him."

  Ciara pursed her lips, blinking against the sudden stinging behind her eyes. "I won't stop you, Ferris. Not if that's what you truly want."

  "Could you?"

  She nodded. "I think so. But it's your choice. I don't know what's passed between you and Bolin, but it's obvious he loves you, and I know it's awfully selfish of me, but I'm afraid if he loses you, too…" Ciara looked hastily away and fought a losing battle against her resolve not to cry.

  Ferris guided her face back around and reached up to wipe the tears from her cheek. "I've no wish to cause either of you anguish." He looked back toward the doors. "I think, if I were meant to join Baret, he'd be waiting on the stoop to greet me. I hold him in my heart and in my memory. For now, that will suffice."

  She blinked at him. "So, you'll come back with me?"

  "Aye. Just tell me what is it you need me to do."