Page 217 of Of Empires and Dust

Calen lifted his arm, his right eye stinging as he brushed the dust away with his shoulder. At first, all he could see were sprays of red and orange light, but after a second or two, shapes took form.

His blood froze in his veins. Two Bloodmarked stood in the vault, massive and hulking, their runes burning a red glow into the air. A third creature waited between them, its skin white, lips cold, eyes black – a Fade. He’d never seen a Fade in the flesh before, but he’d read enough to know one.

The Fade ambled through the vault as though savouring the scents of a flower garden in spring. But all Calen could smell was coal, fire, and dust, the taste of blood on his tongue.

Calen clutched the two eggs closer to his chest, stumbling backwards, pain shooting through his left leg. There was no other way out.

“Frinny,” he called again, panicking, his stare fixed on the Fade.

The creature’s thin lips cracked into a broken grin, its black eyes drinking in the light.

Calen swallowed hard, then pulled his gaze away from the Fade.

A sinking feeling set into his stomach. Two feet stuck up at odd angles, blood pooling on the stone. It took all the courage he could muster to lift his head a little further and see Frincisca’s shattered spine protruding from the lump of torn flesh and bone that had once been her hips, innards slumped in a pool of blood.

The top half of Frincisca’s torso lay almost ten feet back, her right arm crushed between the stone and the door that had been launched off its hinges. Bits of her were everywhere.

“No…” Calen turned back towards the Fade, his chest numb, his jaw quivering.

The Fade tilted its head to the side. “Oh, to be so insignificant.” It narrowed its deep black eyes. “How does it feel? Nobody will ever find you. Nobody will even remember that you were flesh and bone. That is what you creatures crave, is it not? To be remembered?”

Every instinct in Calen’s body screamed at him to run, to fight, to do something. Instead, he froze, his limbs ignoring his command, his pulse deafening him.

The Fade stretched out an open hand towards the ground. Black fire moved over his palm in a slow, unnatural roll until it formed a sword, black flames dancing along its edge.

Calen took another step back, his legs finally responding. He pulled the two eggs closer, his fingers pressing tight into the scales. “Heraya embrace me,” he whispered. “Varyn protect me. Achyron guide my hand. Heraya?—”

“You pray to gods who abandoned you long ago.” The Fade’s black eyes stared deep into Calen’s. “When you pray and a god does not answer, why do you keep praying?”

Calen stared back wordlessly, his mouth ajar, his mind still processing the question.

“No matter.” The creature moved in a flash, the black-fire blade slicing through the air.

Pain burned, and the world erupted in a flash of light.

Calen fell backwards, his arms jarring as he braced himself against the stone. He snapped his head around, reaching for The Spark as he did, but found himself staring back at Lyrin and Haem, concern in their eyes.

“It’s all right.”

Haem’s voice was steady as he reached out a hand, but Calen recoiled, his vision flashing between his brother and the Fade.

“It’s me,” Haem said, taking a step closer to Calen. “I’m here.”

Calen looked about at the shattered eggshells and rubble, his breaths deep and ragged. He could still feel Mirk’s fear in his heart, in his bones. His heart felt as though it were about to leap from his chest.

“What did you see?” Lyrin asked.

Calen slowed his breathing as he recounted the vision to them, his eyes never leaving Mirk’s bones.

He pulled himself to his feet and pressed his fingers into the creases of his eyes, hoping to rid himself of the images that clung to his mind. He, Lyrin, and Haem searched the rest of the vault and found nothing – no runes and nothing that looked related to the pendant.

They moved along the corridor, searching every room and passageway. Some lead deeper into the earth, some were no larger than the room Calen had slept in back home. There were more vaults, chambers for sleeping, privies, baths, kitchens.

But in them all, one thing remained consistent: death.

As Calen stepped through the next doorway, a chill crept up his spine and the back of his neck, a shadow shifting somewhere down the corridor.

Haem raised an eyebrow.

---