Page 56 of An Inheritance of Monsters

I turned and held up a hand to Rask, who watched, crouched protectively, as Voraal led me towards the interior of the island. Fortunately, I’d brought a wool blanket with me, and kept it tucked protectively around myself.

I wasn’t yet ready to roam around the Void completely nude, even with a monster to protect me.

It was a massive expanse of rolling black dunes, with configurations of stone that had been made by no mortal hands. Their geometry was so off-kilter, soinhuman, they almost made my head hurt to look at.

“You have many questions.”

Voraal’s statement filled the silence between us. I allowed my thoughts to race for a moment before forcing them back into a coherent semblance of order.

“Many. But I don’t know where to begin.”

The shadow monster looked down at me, tipping his head. “Start wherever you like, and I will answer you as best I can.”

He led us through a rolling set of dunes, and I carefully picked my way over several round stones that glowed with the same marks as the ones inscribed on Voraal’s body.

“What does the Fuseli Comet have to do with this island?” I finally asked. “Rask claims he needs to mate me before its arrival, or… I’ll be lost to him.”

As we moved, I realized Voraal’s legs had vanished into a tornado of shadows. He glided along the ground, his hand holding me upright.

“It is no true comet.” He raised a hand to the swirling sky. “It is the remains of an Elder One—an eldritch god of the Void. And when it arrives, the doorways connecting the Void and your world will be greatly strained, for he who is dead never truly dies, and he wishes to come home.”

I almost wanted to roll my eyes. It was impossible to get a straight answer out of any of these monsters.

“So this comet is a dead god who tries to come home every hundred years?”

Voraal looked down at me and nodded. “He was bound and ripped from this world for a reason—if he returns, the connection between our worlds will cease to exist. He will tear through the Void, annihilating all… and eventually move to your world. And it will be destroyed by madness if he is allowed to return.”

I sucked in a breath, chewing my lower lip again. “And this is what you’re the guardian of. These doorways… this world… but what does that have to do with mating Rask?”

He nodded again eagerly, but the light in his eyes dimmed as his mouth moved and nothing came out.

Finally, he spat a word in that alien language I couldn’t understand, but was quite sure would be our version of ‘fuck’. “I cannot tell you more. The ancient rituals bind me from speaking it.Youmust put the pieces together.”

I sighed. “Of course. But every time I find another piece, everything else just remains a confusing mess. Can you speak about the idols?”

Voraal’s hand tightened around mine. “The idols… yes. They are beacons, waypoints for lost souls.” He pointed upwards, towards the swirling vortex in the sky above us. “The Beyond awaits us all. The idols allow them to come home and find true rest.”

My heart started pounding as he spoke.

Beacons for souls… and twice now, I’d seen ghosts climbing into the idols on the beaches of Duskwood.

Was it also coincidence that I could see ghosts—and had been invited here before the dead god passed over?

I thought not.

“And what about the Lady of Dark Waters?” I was desperately curious about her, the one that no other human would speak of. The one who had supposedly saved Crispy from… what sort of fate?

The thought of the world itself being torn into madness if this god landed was bad enough... but what were we, here on ground zero, going to experience?

Voraal shook his head, grimacing. “I do not have permission to speak of her.”

Before I could ask another question, we walked over a rise on the dunes, and were met with another stone configuration.

But this one was recognizable: an archway, a door of pure darkness. A liminal space in and out of the Void.

Voraal gripped my hand tighter. “I will take you home, Juno. Trust me.”

I did.

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