Page 48 of Queen of Stars and Shadows

Xinius casts Zyren a sad smile. “It is not for you to decide, shadow guardian.”

Zyren looks as if he might strike the sorcerer, but I rise off the throne, stepping between them. “What sacrifice, Xinius? What must I do?”

“Each time Avonia released a nightmare through the magical barrier, it created a rift,” Xinius says. “And each time, it weakened the spell that kept them trapped in their territory.”

I nod. “There are three rifts at least that we know of. If that’s the case, there could be dozens more…”

Xinius shakes his head. “Not dozens.Hundreds.”

My eyes widen, and even Zyren looks shocked.

“You no doubt have noticed that your magic is weakened.” Xinius gestures toward me.

“Yes. I can barely summon any magic.”

“That’s because, as queen, your fate is tied to Valaron. Your blood, your heartbeat, your magic. And as Valaron crumbles, so do you.”

Zyren’s body is so rigid, the veins in his neck and arms so strained, he looks as if he might explode.

“The only way to save your realm, and yourself, is to right the wrongs of the past.” Xinius casts a sad look in my direction. “You must break the spell your families wrought two thousand years ago, and you must merge Valaron with the rest of Aureon once again, Sarielle.”

A gasp escapes my lips. “But that’s what Avonia wanted to do. That’s what I’ve been fighting against this whole time.”

“Avonia wants to merge the realms for her own gain, so she can conquer all of Aureon. You will do it so you can save Valaron and Aureon both. Because if you don’t stop her, not only will Valaron cease to exist, but she will spread her reign of darkness across this whole world.”

I shake my head, trying to stop the wild spin of my thoughts. “But if I break the spell and merge the realms, the rest of the nightmares will escape from their territory into Aureon.”

“Not if they have a queen who can command them,” Xinius says. “A true queen who shares their blood and their magic.”

“And the sacrifice? What sacrifice is that?”

Xinius reaches out and places a hand on my arm. “Merging the realms is magic of a magnitude that has only been wrought one other time in history, when the spell was first cast. That time, it claimed the life of the Otreyas who cast it, and it will most likely claim yours.”

“It’s out of the question, then!” Zyren growls, beginning to stalk back and forth in front of the throne. Shadows spin off him, and the air snaps with tension.

“If the realms are not merged, Valaron will fall anyway, and then everyone’s lives will be forfeit,” Xinius explains calmly. “Further, Avonia will continue her assault on Aureon, with no one to stop her.”

“Then the world can fall!” Zyren snaps, his eyes furious. “We’ll figure something else out…”

My gaze flickers between the two of them, my heart hammering in my chest, my blood spiking in my veins. It all seems impossible enough as it is, but the sorcerer doesn’t even know the worst of it. “There’s something else, Xinius… something awful…”

As the words leave my mouth, a sudden darkness sweeps across the throne room, and all the candles blow out in a rush of shadows.

“She’s referring to me,” comes a voice from the far side of the room.

A wall of blacker black moves toward us, a darkness beyond darkness, an emptiness, a void of despair and endlessness.

A figure steps from within it.

The demon.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Zyren

Awoman stands beforeus. Or rather, something that looks like a woman, but with a magic emanating from her with such dark power it’s clear she is anything but. Her presence stirs something within me, some primal fear, a sense of ancient terrors, a time when the world was newly formed and nothing but raw chaos.

Xinius steps forward and throws an arc of light around us like a protective shield. The demon cocks her head to the side and lets out a low laugh that moves across my skin like spiders. With a wave of her hand, she dispels the light as if merely blowing out a candle.

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