Page 129 of Heirs of the Cursed

“I don’t want to lose control.”

“They want to kill you, Darcia. This is a bad time to stay in control.”

She had to know that too. After all, it was her only weapon to defend herself.

With a silent nod, Alasdair watched her as she plunged into the depths of her magic.

Darcia was falling into a maelstrom of shadows. Lines of reality blurred around her as she reached that higher plane her magic designed, seeing everything from above like a goddess of fates.

She lowered her gaze to the place where her physical body still remained, but her eyes were two spheres of oblivion, dark as obsidian. Alasdair was still beside her body, holding a dagger in his hand. His gaze was set on her, worried and at the same time intrigued about what she was about to do.

Aggressive thoughts and dark emotions pulsed through her veins, and Darcia forced herself to keep her eyes wide open. In the distance, between the shadows of the trees near them, there was a veiled figure.

They appeared at last.

“Well, well, well. What do we have here?”

Alasdair stood up, shielding Darcia with his body. “What brings you here, gentlemen?” he asked mockingly.

There were four men. Scars covered their necks and foreheads and their faces were emaciated, as if they’d been repeatedly burned. The threads of their minds were crimson red, so vivid that the first thing Darcia thought of was spilled blood. Thick collars squeezed the skin of their throats, leaving a considerable mark.

Conrad’s dogs.

“We’re looking for someone. Someone,” he said as he nodded toward Darcia, “you might know.”

A dull thought crashed into her mind. Alasdair wasn’t going to let them near her. They would be dead before they were able to reach her.

“You don’t want to do that.”

“Careful, boy. There’s no need for bloodshed.”

Darcia, still in that magical form she’d taken, approached the men from behind and caught a glimpse of the devilish grin that crossed the thief’s face. He was provoking him on purpose.

“Funny.” Alasdair tilted his head to the side. “I was about to say the same thing.”

“She’s coming with us. Stand back and no one will get hurt.”

Alasdair pretended to think about it. “Someone will bleed tonight, then.”

When the men raised their weapons, ready to attack, Darcia unleashed her power against them.

Shadows surrounded them.

There were no trees, no night, no stars. It was utter blackness; a devouring, eternal darkness that provided Alasdair with the advantage he needed.

He pulled out two long daggers that he hid under his clothes. Sharp as death, the arcane metal that composed them shone with light of their own. Such weapons were intended to inflictharm, to kill. As he took a step to face her stepbrother’s dogs, a sharp, violent intake of breath stopped him.

No, Darcia hadn’t only created the darkness . . .

From it, something else was born.

They emerged in haste. With lurid, dangerous maws, their scarlet red eyes rested on the men. They snarled and waved their long, stinger-like tails with strange spikes decorating their spines and the top of their heads, like a crown of death.

The nameless monsters grinned at them, ready to tear and destroy.

“Do you think you can fool us with a bloody illusion?” one of the men yelled, still frozen in place.

Darcia spoke on the real plane, “Not all of them are.”

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