Page 227 of Owned

I could feel it now, humming along my skin, resonating with the new markings that spread like delicate lace over my arms. My transformation was not complete.

But when it was...

What would I become?

Despite the magnitude of the magic that coursed through me, I felt strangely small in the shadow of what I had done.

My gaze flickered to the bed where Lucian’s corpse sprawled in a grotesque display on the rich damask.

I had expected triumph, but in its place was uncertainty.

For the first time since my father had possessed me, I felt the weight of being alone.

Truly alone.

“They will never forgive you…”

I glared at Lucian’s corpse.

A liar to the last breath.

Theywouldforgive me.

They had to.

The black stainson my fingertips crawled higher, tracing delicate patterns up my arms like ink in water. I stared at them, fascinated and horrified in equal measure. They didn’t hurt, not exactly, but they burned with a cold fire that reminded me of Lucian’s touch.

His power—now mine—pulsed through every vein, every capillary, rewriting who I was with each heartbeat.

I tore my gaze away from my transformed skin and tried to make sense of the devastation around me. The chamber looked as though a hurricane had swept through it.

My memory of the battle was foggy—and I struggled to recall what had truly happened. I hadn’t been the one in control. The ornate wardrobe lay in splintered ruins against the far wall, its carved doors reduced to kindling.

The floor was littered with the detritus of our battle—fragments of the orb glittered like stars across the stone, lifeless and dull, without Lucian’s power.

The candles that had survived our confrontation flickered with unsteady light and cast ghoulish shadows that seemed to bow in my direction. Chunks of the bed’s carved posts had been blasted away, and dark splotches of blood that would never wash out stained the rich coverlet.

Yet most grotesque of all was Lucian himself—his body deflated and withered like fruit left too long in the sun, the hilt of the grimoire’s blackened silver dagger still protruded from his chest, a triumphant marker of his demise.

A scream tore through the air, distant yet clear as crystal to my newly enhanced hearing. Then another. And another.

They echoed through my mind. Sharp and painful, and I let out a choked cry as I covered my ears to muffle the sound, but it only seemed to amplify it.

The Necromi didn’t know what had happened—but they knew that something had gone terribly wrong. I could sense the frantic rustle of expensive fabrics as people in the gardens sought out the truth of what had happened. I could sense how they pushed past each other in their haste to understand—or to flee.

I took a breath and closed my eyes, focusing on the sound.

The screams steadied, and then diminished, and I pulled my hands away from my ears.

I tilted my head, listening.

I could distinguish individual voices now, picking them out of the pandemonium as easily as plucking ripe fruit from a branch.

“—did you feel that—”

“—explosion of some kind—”

“—find Lucian immediately—”

---