Page 115 of Shade of Ruin

The House of Stone. The House ofEarth.

Nothing about my shadows has been natural. Yes, I am strong with them, but it’s not natural. I’ve needed help every step of the way. I’ve needed to be taught. The other emotions, the ones that come naturally, are not House of Shadows. I may have my mother’s bloodline, but I am not the Princess of Shadows. I am something else entirely.

He moves that enormous head close to me again, his eye only a few feet away from me, and he says, “You are not of the House of Shadows, and deep down, you know this to be true. You may not offer this treasure as payment.”

I try to argue with him, but without hesitation, he swings an enormous set of talons at me. He catches me in them as if to crush me to death, but then I’m not there anymore. No cave. No gold. No torches or Calyr.

Only crimson marble hallways and eight very angry guards.

Chapter 48

They will build their city around me. Even after I have been forgotten, I will wait.

~Calyr the Gold, A History of Magic and Dragons

The eight males movefaster than I do. There’s no chance for me to escape as they latch onto me. Each one of them gets at least one hand on me. And inside me, as has happened so many times in my life, there’s that anger buzzing like lightning in a bottle. The only difference is that this time, there’s no stopper in the bottle, and somehow, I know that.

For the first time, I am furious, and there is absolutely nothing stopping the rage inside me from consuming me. I’d lost control a little with Hazel, and she almost died because of it. This is nothing like that. I’m not even really human.

That lightning in a bottle flows through me, filling me with power and a need to destroy. A need to cause pain. I’m no better than a wounded animal.

I swing my arms, and it’s like children are trying to hold me down, a barely noticeable weight. Four men fly against the marble wall so hard that a thin crack propagates across the otherwise pristine crimson marble. None of them move. I don’t know whether they’re dead or just unconscious, but they won’t be getting up for a while.

The other four guards let go and try to put some distance between us, but I don’t let them. Flames flicker to life around some of them as they move, but I’m faster than them. Like a boar running through the brush, I don’t move gracefully. I just run into them, that angry lightning inside me buzzing louder than ever before.

Everything I’ve done. Everything I’ve worked for. It all came down to that meeting with Calyr, and he rejected my offer.

I grab one man by the collar of his gambeson, and with a single arm, I lift him into the air and toss him against the others. It’s like throwing a stone rather than a full-grown man that weighs twice as much as me. He bowls the other three over, and I’m on them in an instant, that rage inside me desperate for release.

I’ve done so many things, risked myself and others to get here. I walked away from my family and traveled hard roads. I indebted myself to a legend and learned to use magic. All to save my cousin, and now I can’t even do that?

I grab one of the males by the back of his hair and smash his face against the marble as hard as I can. A sickening crunch fills the air, and he doesn’t move again. I move to the next one who turns toward me, brown eyes filled with fear. I can smell it. Like the smell of rot, and I want it to go away. Permanently. I pick him up, one hand on the back of his neck and the other on his pants. I heave him at the opposite wall, and he hits it hands first,but they collapse with the force, his head hitting second, and he crumples after the sound of snapping bones fills the air.

The other two males are on their feet and trying to get away, but I’m on them just as fast. There’s so much anger inside me because of Calyr, and it feels like that anger is going to burn me up from the inside if I don’t let it out.

When I wrap my fingers around this guard’s head, a voice stops me. “Maeve,” a low voice says. Like water over river stones. The Shade.

Someone else who I’m even more angry at. Someone I’d love to see broken against a wall for what he did to Cole. For the debt that nearly killed the man I love.

But when I turn, my fingers still pressing against the guard’s head hard enough that he doesn’t dare move, I don’t see the Shade. Cole is standing with Darian and Lee, all of them wearing their armor. “Maeve,” he repeats in the Shade’s voice, “let him go. It’s time to leave.”

I let go of the guard, turning my attention to him. The rage is a storm that only grows inside me, but when I see Cole, I can’t help the shadows that fall to the ground and race toward him. He’s the source of so much of my desire that he seems to call those shadows to him.

Lee and Darian simultaneously begin to glow, and my shadows can’t reach Cole. They don’t say anything, but Cole does. “Maeve, I know how to help your cousin, but we need to leave now.” The words that come from his mouth are his own now. Not the Shade’s.

I look down at his arm and see that it’s still wrapped in bandages. He’s not the same as he normally is. There’s a weariness to him, and his breathing is labored still. But he’s standing. He’s speaking.

The rage fades as the memory of how I’d left him fills my mind. I’d been so terrified for him. I’d been worried he was going to die, but he didn’t. He’s still hurt, though.

“Why are you here?” I ask slowly, the rage inside me dying down even more as I focus on my words.

Cole’s breathing is even more labored as he stands up tall. “Because today’s not just the Midsummer Ceremony. Today’s…”

A rush of pain burns through my head like I’ve never felt before. The entire world fades in and out of existence, and I fall to the floor. My hands clutch my head as something shifts inside me. Something fills me up with so much power that I’m not sure that I’ll be able to contain it. I feel like my body and mind are going to be shredded from the overwhelming amount of it.

It's too much, and I scream in pain, but no sound comes out. My human body isn’t strong enough to hold this much power. It’s going to kill me. I know it, and there’s nothing I can do about it. I just lie on the ground, my hands gripping my head. I don’t know how long I lay like that on the cold marble floor as the power rips through me. Time doesn’t have any meaning. Minutes pass that feel like years.

My body is a contorted mass of pain. The lightning that I’ve felt so many times in the past is everywhere. My skin crawls with it. My stomach is full of it. It’s as if when I opened my mouth, lightning would stream from it.

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