Page 25 of The War of Wings
Chapter 10
Petra
“I was wondering when I’d finally get to meet you.”
Cal’s sword was raised again, its point following the echoes of the lilting female voice bouncing off the walls of…a cave? He blinked in confusion, though I could tell he was trying not to let it show as he took in our suddenly new surroundings. It was dim, but my eyes still had to adjust after the pitch black of the Darkness Beyond. The room was void of furniture save for a single chair, its deep blue upholstery worn and tattered at the edges. None of it was out of the ordinary, none of it alarming, except for what that single chair was facing.
One wall of the cave was flat, towering so high I couldn’t see where it ended. Attached to the wall were wooden shelves, swallowed by darkness the higher I looked. And on each shelf were vials — thousands of them, each with something inside, though I couldn’t tell what. Whatever was in them emitted somesort of dim light. Not like the glow that came from the rubies in Cal’s sword, but a glow nonetheless. Some sort of apothecary?
Cal’s eyes met mine for a split second, a silent question in his gaze. Where was she?
I took a steadying breath, calling out into the cave. “Had I known it’d be so easy to find you, maybe I would’ve come a long time ago.”
And there she was, emerging from a deep alcove that was hidden between two outcroppings of craggy stone. Deep auburn hair fell in cascading waves over shoulders cloaked in moth-eaten robes. Her skin was tawny, her eyes gleaming silver in the torchlight.
She was the most stunning woman I’d ever seen, and something about her appearance was deeply, deeply unsettling. A part of me retreated at the sight of her, as if some tiny sliver of my being that recognized her power and the grave danger it meant. She looked nothing like I’d imagined she would, nothing like the shriveled old crone with knobby fingers and straw-like hair I’d conjured in my brain.
Holy shit. I’d done it. I’d managed to get us to the Sanguilite’s Realm.
“Even if you knew how easy it was, you wouldn’t have visited me until now.” Her voice was too smooth, so silky and melodic it wrapped around my throat like a strip of velvet. With an unsettlingly fluid grace, she seemed to float over the floor, easily pulling the chair away from the wall of shelves and turning it to face us. Those silver eyes were sharp on me as she lowered herself to sit.
“Well, here I am,” I answered, but it sounded weaker than I wanted it to. Dammit.
“Here you are,” she said on a deep exhale. A perfectly arched brow rose when her eyes landed on Cal, a disconcerting smile splitting her lips and revealing startlingly white teeth. Her eyes roved down his body, pausing when it landed at the sword onhis hip. “Human?” she asked, her tone curious on the surface, but something darker lurked just beneath.
“Yes, your Majesty,” he answered easily.
“I am no more Majesty than Malosym is.” She cocked her head, the movement eerie as her attention remained on Cal. “Never have I had a human soul here in my realm with their body still attached.”
Every once of my muscles tensed in the wake of the chill that crept up my spine. But Cal somehow managed to appear unbothered, completely relaxed. “No?” he asked casually, shifting his weight as if he were bored.
“There are only four places a human can be. They spend their life in the Human Realm, of course, and then most find their way to Heaven or Hell upon death. But the greediest find themselves here in my realm, and even then, only their souls. Their bodies rot in the dirt, but their souls are mine to keep. So tell me, human, how did you end up here, as you are, in my realm?”
Cal was doing a much better job than I was at keeping his expression neutral. His arms crossed over his broad chest. “I found a way.”
“Delightful. And you have such a pretty exterior, too.” She was practically purring as she stared up at Cal. Somehow, even though we were the ones standing over her, it was clear she was the one who held the power in this cave. She stared at him as if she wanted to consume him, as if Cal was prey and she was sharpening her teeth. “You would be perfect for my collection.”
Possessiveness, hot and angry, flared to life in my chest. Actually, no, not possessiveness so much as protectiveness. Some rage-inducing mix of the two, perhaps.
Cal shifted beside me again, feigning nonchalance, boredom. But tension began to ripple off him. “Your collection?” he asked.
The Sanguilite leaned back in her chair, elbows hanging over the armrests leisurely as she gestured to the wall beside her. “They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” the Sanguilite mused, staring up at the shelves upon shelves of jars and vials.
I took a tentative step closer, ignoring the Sanguilite’s smile that was blindingly bright in my periphery. The fragments of light pulsed within the containers, some of them vibrating, some of them knocking against the glass that separated them from the outside, some of them resting against the bottom and dimmer than the rest.
Cal was the only human with his bodystill attached.The greediest of souls found themselveshere.
My mouth went dry, my stomach bottoming out as my chest tightened. “Are those…”
“Souls, yes,” the Sanguilite answered with a satisfied hum as her eyes moved up and down her collection. “Souls sacrificed through blood magic. Go ahead, take a closer look.”
Nausea roiled in my gut, bile climbing up the back of my throat as I turned back to Cal. My eyes met his, and though he was trying to appear unruffled, there was fear in his eyes. Pure, unbridled fear.
“These bring some joy to the monotony. Besides, humans are well aware of what is lost when calling upon blood magic. Every soul here found their way to me by choice.”
I swallowed hard. “You were in the Old World. You saw it burn.”
“I was, and I did. You think this world you live in is new, but it is simply the newest. I lived through the world before this, and the one before that, and every one before that. And every time the world burns, every time some supposed higher power believes they’re making the right decision by burning their world to ash, I remain.”
