Cries went up from around the group. A brief gleam went up through the room, like a glass wall had been erected, followed by another, the Brandts engaging their mystical barriers. Herald and Mason took the front – our vanguard – each raising a shield, one made of ice, and the other called from the Vestments.
We were as defended as defended could be against whatever had blown in the windows, but whatever it was hadn’t deigned to reveal itself. The world outside was darker, and the shadows seemed to be seeping into the room, choking the air itself with blackness.
But worst of all, Delilah was no longer muttering. She was cackling. Staring at me, her hair a mass of white snakes against her pillow.
Something darker than dark, like a hole in reality, entered through the window. A humanoid shape cut out of the blackest velvet, smoking and shimmering as it passed through the artificial night – then through the Brandts’ barriers completely.
“Shit,” Bastion hissed. “Down the stairs. Everyone. Now.”
I lingered just long enough to see Bastion tether Delilah’s cocoon in its own telekinetic bubble, and we hauled ass straight down the staircase. Herald fired a tentative spray of icicles as we retreated, backed up by a salvo of Romira’s favorite fire grenades, yet all of them passed harmlessly through the black shape.
Was this Delilah’s darkness? The thing that lay sleeping. Did she
summon it in her madness, some avatar of the Eldest?
We watched, transfixed, as the shape walked – no, glided down the stairs, an amorphous, vaguely humanoid blot of shadow. Tendrils of night lifted from where its shoulders would be, like wisps of smoke, of pure darkness.
“Chernobog,” I gasped.
At the sound of his name, the god vanished from the stairs, then reappeared mere inches from my face, the mask lifted from his own. He had shadowstepped, or done the closest thing to it. Hooded, sinister, the god of darkness smiled with a mouth full of sharp, silver teeth.
“I promised to hurt you for what you did to Metzli, mortal,” he said. “And I keep all my promises.”
His hand passed through my jacket, my shirt, my skin and flesh, reaching into my chest. Then it pressed, squeezing around my heart. I screamed.
“You were warned to stay away from the Midnight Convocation. We know that you’ve seen Artemis.”
I heard Herald’s voice scream my name. Flashes of fire and ice fired across the room, but every bolt slung in Chernobog’s direction passed uselessly through the shadow of his body. His talons raked like fire through my flesh, burned like a white-hot gauntlet around my heart. I remembered when Carver had done the same to extract my screams of anguish. But Carver had meant me no harm. Chernobog clearly meant to leave his mark, if not kill me outright.
“Your friends cannot see into the pitiful husk of your body,” Chernobog rasped into my ear. “But I see all, especially the blackness within you. The Dark still lives, mortal. Will you succumb to it? Is it not easier to unleash what still dwells in your heart?”
“Please,” I said through gritted teeth. “Don’t. It’ll kill everyone. Please. Kill me first.”
Chernobog’s grin went from ear to ear, his teeth like jagged rows of razors. “With pleasure.” He pressed harder. I gagged and sputtered on the blood rising up my throat.
And then, the pain was gone. Tufts of grass pressed against my skin, my back warm against a lawn still steeped with the heat of day. I stared up at a blue sky, the sun beating against my face. I sat bolt upright, hacking and spitting onto the ground as my own blood threatened to choke me. A hand slapped me on the back.
“No need to thank me,” Royce said. “How many times have I saved your life now? Hey, who’s counting, right? But that’s okay, drown in your blood. No need to thank me.”
“Fuck off,” I murmured, squeezing his shoulder so hard I could have crushed bone. It was the best I could do to thank him for teleporting me out of harm’s way, yet again. We were somewhere on the grounds, not far from the mansion itself, judging from the cloud of black still lingering near the windows.
A face peered out of the smoke, Chernobog sneering. His expression was a strange mix of satisfaction and restrained disappointment. My hand trembled as it went to my chest. I could feel my heart pounding, the shard of star-metal in it still searing. I’d come so close to unsealing the Dark Room. Too close.
The cloud dissipated, and slowly the light of day returned to Brandt Manor.
“Come on,” Royce said, pushing himself off the ground and offering me a hand. “Time to head back to the others. Looks like the worst is over.”
I forced a smile, stumbling as I tried to get up, but I never touched Royce’s hand. The next thing I felt was something sharp pressing into my flesh, like a spike had been driven into me.
I looked down at myself, at the patch of blood spreading like a crimson flower across my shirt. The knife in the middle of my chest, that wasn’t there a moment ago. The hand holding it wasn’t there, either. Then the rest of the arm, the shoulder, and the body materialized, until I was looking up into a grinning, malevolent face.
“Donovan,” I gasped.
“The worst isn’t over,” he said. “It’s only just begun.”
Donovan blinked out of existence, vanishing before my very eyes. But the knife was still inside me. Royce shouted my name, but all I heard were my own screams. All I heard was my own laughter as the Dark Room burst from my chest, returning to our reality.
It lies sleeping, not truly dead and gone. It waits.