Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 92996 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92996 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
“This cannot be!” the demon shrieked.
Lorne’s eyes began to bleed again as he continued to rise, and then…everything dropped. My whole world fell hard, like it was weighted, and then Kamosh was sucked underground as if by a violent, ravenous sinkhole.
I called to Corvus, felt its anger and fury rolling through me, burning, biting, ripping. The land was betrayed, deceived, and now horrified it had allowed such evil to defile our sacred space, to trespass near the rift of the divine, and worse, the greatest sin of all, to be so near the guardian.
Corvus had listened to me, allowed the creature to walk with me, but the creature had betrayed my trust, and corrupted that which I loved, and the land could no longer find Lorne. I knew Lorne was still there, but Corvus did not.
This creature will end, the land said.
End the demon, keep the man, I said.
Both will die, the land answered.
You love the man, I reminded Corvus.
He was underground, far below, moving quickly, and even with some air pockets, there wouldn’t be enough oxygen for a human. The magic of the land was the only reason he could breathe. But also, he wasn’t in a mudslide or quicksand, he wasn’t buried alive by tons of earth. He was in a torrent of soil, sifting through, while the land determined his fate. If the ground stopped shaking, rolling, vibrating, if it decided he was guilty, he’d be dead. If everything settled, he’d be crushed to death.
I love the man, I told Corvus. The man loves me.
Nothing.
The man is a guardian, I said.
Still no answer.
The pomegranates are his. That was my last hope.
Seconds felt like hours, and the silence broke me open.
I would not be the same without him…
The pomegranates are his, the land agreed.
And finally, I could breathe.
There was a sound like a thunderclap, and up from the depths of Corvus, from the mortar of bone and blood, came a screaming Lorne. The demon remained behind, torn from his body, the winnowing brutal but complete.
Lorne was gasping, shivering, sobbing, but whole. I called through the wards and felt them lock into place, a vault once more, allowing nothing that was not for its highest and best. Nothing tainted, the demon purified to feed the land.
“Blessed be,” I whispered, my breathing rough as I crawled over to Lorne.
He recoiled, scrambling back.
“Love,” I soothed him, my voice soft, cajoling. “Honey, come here.”
Brushing away dirt and tears, snot and spit, he came toward me, only to have a claw, a hand—my brain couldn’t put together what I was seeing as it was pitch-black smoke—tear out of the earth and reach for him.
“No!” he yelled, moving fast, struggling to stand, failing, falling in front of me, arm shielding me as the demon, all shadow now, came from the ground, no longer scrabbling for purchase, but looming strong as it came toward us.
Lorne tried valiantly to move, flailing to stand between me and the demon, but it grasped his neck and flung him away.
Shoving my hands in the earth, I felt the land shift around us, under us, and I knew it would envelop the demon and drag it to its core before it let him near us. The unclean thing was poison, and the wards needed to be strengthened, but it would swallow the filth a second time to save me and Lorne.
But the land was weakened from tearing Lorne from the demon, and even now, as it reached for that which was made of shadow, it couldn’t hold it, which was how Kamosh had been able to crawl out of the earth to begin with.
“You shall watch your love die,” Kamosh roared at me.
“No!” I yelled.
But the demon clenched its shadowy fist, and I heard Lorne scream.
And scream.
When he stopped suddenly, I knew he was dead.
Instantly, my chest hurt, my vision blurred with tears, my skin washed cold. I let my head drop to my chest as a sob tore out of me. But then Lorne wailed, and I looked up, over to where he was, flat on his back in the grass where the demon had flung him.
The demon clenched both fists, and Lorne choked out a yelp of pain, his voice going, more a rasping cry, the pain, I was certain, utterly searing. But he endured it, I knew he did, because in moments he went quiet, panting heavily, trying to catch his breath.
I wasn’t stupid. I knew it was Corvus suppressing whatever it was the demon had put inside Lorne, keeping him safe, not allowing him to be taken from me.
With a roar of frustration, the demon rounded on me, and my hands were ripped from the earth as it took hold, hand around my throat, tightening fast, flooding my body with cold.
A thought flashed through my brain, my lord’s words to me from the last time I saw him. If I was in danger, to call for his dogs, the ones that roamed Corvus in the fall.