was no longer the only change. In front of her, the rock she’d used to crush the demon down had been torn free. The pit where he’d lain was now a gaping chasm, the ground ripped away along with the seed. Around it, the grass was gummy and decaying. No wind blew, and a foul smell was rising up from the soil, making her gag.
Rot, Nico realized with a spike of terror. Her field was rotting. No, this was her world. She was master. Nothing happened here without her consent. But even as she thought it, the hunger roared in her mind. The need to eat sent her to her knees. She could almost feel her stomach curling up and vanishing inside her. She had to eat. Had to eat or she would die.
After that, the hunger became all-consuming. It seized control of her mind, bending her to its will. Eat the sword, it commanded. Eat the human. Eat everything. Eat and grow strong. You can’t be king if you’re weak.
“No!” Nico shrieked her answer. “Weak or strong, dead or alive, this is my body.”
You’ll die, the hunger jabbered. Die die die die die die.
Nico shut herself down, refusing to listen. Slowly, mechanically, she crawled up the large stone that had held the demon in his prison and curled into a ball on top of it, wrapping her arms around her wounded chest as she stared into the dark.
Out on the edges of the field, blackness was lapping like water. It rose as she watched, flooding over the rotting grass and fetid ground, pouring into the chasm where her seed had been. It rose until her rock was the only island in an endless, black sea. Rose until the dark waves were lapping at her feet. The darkness was as cold as the space between the shadows. It froze her wherever it touched, but Nico refused to move.
The hunger was gnawing at her bones now, surging with the black water that threatened to drown her. The madness flooded her mind with each wave, but Nico did not budge. If she moved now, if she showed any weakness at all, she knew without a doubt she wouldn’t be able to stop herself from attacking Josef and the Heart of War.
So she didn’t. She sat perfectly still as the black water rose over her calves, then her knees. Rose to her chest, then her neck. She squeezed her eyes shut when it touched her chin, but her mouth opened despite the bitter, freezing dark that flooded through her lips. Even as the darkness choked her, she opened her mouth and spoke the one truth that must remain though everything else was lost.
I am the master of myself.
I am the master of myself.
She said it over and over until the words ran together. Said it until she was screaming, even though the blackness was pouring down her throat now, eating her voice, dissolving her to nothing. But despite the cold, despite the darkness, despite all that had happened, she kept going. She was the master of herself. The choice to step forward, to take another breath, was hers and hers alone.
This was the lifeline she clung to, her mouth moving frantically, shouting the truth again and again as the black water covered her head.
Josef stood with the Heart planted in the stone between his feet, one hand on the hilt, the other bracing against Eli’s shoulder for balance. In front of him, the sword’s open spirit was slammed down on the mountain slope with enough weight to press the snow into clear ice. The enormous black pillar, however, howled on as before, completely unaffected.
“It’s not working,” Josef announced unnecessarily.
“Well, it is helping to keep the panic down,” Eli said, raising his voice over the demon’s wailing. He pointed at the mountain beneath them. “The stone should be cracking itself in terror by now, but the Heart’s weight is keeping it still. Not too elegant, but it should keep the League off our backs for the moment.”
“Hang the League,” Josef growled. “I want Nico down from there.”
They both looked up. Nico was still hanging in the air at the center of the black pillar. The Heart’s pressure hadn’t even touched the surging darkness. It flowed uninterrupted, shooting from the ground to the sky like a black river. Nico’s body was motionless under the flood, her white limbs seized up in terror or pain, probably both. She was so still, Eli wouldn’t have believed she was alive were it not for her mouth.
Nico’s mouth was moving frantically, her jaw opening and closing like she was screaming the same thing over and over again. It was clearly a full sentence, but with the Heart’s pressure and the roar of the dark river itself, Eli couldn’t get close enough to read the words on her lips. Feeling utterly useless, he looked down at the shredded black fabric he clutched in his hands, all that was left of the coat Slorn had made for her.
“We need a new plan,” he muttered. “You keep up the pressure as long as you can. I’ll think of something.”
Josef nodded, releasing Eli’s shoulder to rest both hands on the Heart. He trusts you completely, Eli realized with a start as the swordsman settled into his post. It has never occurred to him that you won’t cook up a way out of this.
That thought made Eli feel bleaker than ever. He crept away, tromping over the battle-torn snow until he found a reasonably clear spot. He sat down with a sigh and rested his chin on his fist, the very picture of clever man deep in thought, just in case Josef looked over.
Trouble was, though, Eli didn’t have a clever plan. For once, his sleeves were completely empty. Up here in the mountains, he was miles away from anyone who owed him a favor, assuming there was a favor big enough to deal with something like this. Demons were League and Shepherdess work, but the League was out for obvious reasons and the Shepherdess wouldn’t help him now even if he begged, not that he would. That thought brought the anger flaring back, and Eli closed his eyes, putting Benehime firmly out of his mind. First rule of thievery: one disaster at a time. Always focus on solving the problem in front of you.
Tried-and-true advice, but five minutes of sitting and thinking later, Eli was no closer to a solution than he’d been at the beginning, and he was starting to feel a bit panicky. There really seemed to be no way out of this besides waiting for Nico to win or killing her outright. Neither of those would fly with Josef, and while the giant pillar of darkness wasn’t getting bigger, it wasn’t getting any smaller, either. Their only protection right now was the Heart’s iron grip on the mountain’s panic and the fact that the Lord of Storms would never expect a demon to live through losing its seed. But the Heart couldn’t keep this up forever. Once the sword failed and the panic got out of control, the jig would be up. The League would come, and with Josef so injured already, that would be that.
Dropping all pretenses, Eli slumped forward, resting his head between his knees. But just when he was starting to feel really hopeless, he heard a sound that made him go rigid, the soft, familiar tearing of a cut opening in the veil.
He wrenched his head around just in time to see the white line finish its fall through the air behind Josef. It happened so quickly, Eli could only watch, eyes wide. No, he thought, not yet. With so much going on, why was the League on the ball now?
But while the man who stepped through the white hole in the world was large enough to be a League member, he carried no sword, and he wasn’t wearing the League’s iconic black coat. He was dressed as a workman in a linen shirt and leather apron, but he could have been naked for all Eli noticed. His attention was on the man’s head, or rather the large, brown bear’s head where the man’s head should have been.
“Slorn!” The name was a jubilant shout as Eli jumped to his feet. Josef turned to stare as Eli ran across the ledge, stopping just in front of the bear-headed wizard. “What are you doing here?”
“Monpress.” Slorn’s muzzle peeled back to show his yellow teeth. “And Liechten, too. Good. Just the men I wanted to see. Give me a hand with this.”
He nodded back to the white hole in the air, which was still hanging open, but Eli was just staring at him.
Slorn cleared his throat. “Quickly, please.”
Josef and Eli exchanged looks, and then, since Josef couldn’t leave the Heart, Eli went to do as Slorn said. At the Shaper’s urging, he reached through the white hole and began to pull on the long, rectangular object on the other side. It was unexpectedly heavy, and Eli ended up having to let Slorn do most of the lifting. The thing was off-white and felt almost like soap against his fingers. It was rectangular, as long as Josef and nearly as wide, its four sides, top, and bottom held together seemingly without pins, hinges, or joints. It actually looked very much like a coffin, Eli thought with a sinking feeling. A smooth, white coffin.
The cut in the veil closed as soon as the box was through. Slorn directed Eli to put it down gently, and then he reached over and opened the top with a creak. Eli swallowed when he saw the hollow space in the middle. It was a coffin. And the white material… He ran his fingers over it again, hissing as he finally realized what he was
