Page 73 of Labyrinthine
His stillness cuts deeper than a thousand outbursts. He’s showing me how often he’s come to my aid. And how he won’t do it this time. Not when I reached for another man.
It hurts. But I understand.
I’ve hurt him too.
And actions come at a price. In Starsfall. In life.
My father leans forward. His glee is starting to surface.
Whatever he’s planned—this isn’t strategy. It’s cruelty.
I go cold.
Sweat beads on my upper lip. My stomach twists. But I force my chin up.
“Perhaps the princess should begin the proceedings?” my father calls, loud enough to draw cheers from the crowd.
It’s not a request. It’s a challenge. Submission or strength. Let him humiliate me or let him turn my defiance into a spectacle.
My eyes flick to Darian. He nods. No theatrics. Just understanding. We are both pawns. But I still have hands. And I move them.
I draw breath and step forward. I make sure to meet my father’s eyes and raise my voice to carry to the crowd. “By my words, and by my will,” I pause to let the implications land, “let the next trial begin.”
The slaves open the crates and flee. Ropes pull them out of danger. The tributes form ranks, shields raised, knees bent. Braced for what they cannot see.
Silence falls.
Not the hush of reverence, but a void. A vacuum that devours even thought.
Something is coming.
The stillness presses down like a held breath, like a scream waiting to tear loose. The tributes shift, uneasy, as if the air itself could wound. Outside the stands, even the animals are silent. No birds. No wind. No gods.
Just the sound of a man vomiting in one of the stands, retching onto the arena’s stone because he already knows.
Then—smoke.
It spills from the crates. Thin tendrils at first, brushing across the sand like fingertips. Then thickening. Crawling. Shuddering. Growing darker with every breath it takes.
The air changes. The light bends. The smoke isn’t smoke. It moves like water, but it’s not water either. It pulses. It thinks. It seems alive, evil. And it hates.
A pressure builds in my chest. Not fear. Not entirely.
Recognition.
The smoke deepens—gray to black to a shade beyond midnight. A shade that swallows all light. A magic that devours instead of radiates. I know its name, though no one taught it to me.
Obcasus.
Not a spell. Not a force.A hunger.
Death made manifest.
Once, it was sealed beneath the deserts of the dead, locked in runes of salt and bone. Before the first gods fell. Before men grew bold enough to think they could tame what was never meant to serve.
Obcasus is the oldest wrong. A hunger that learned to wear magic like skin.
I stagger. My hands tremble. My skin prickles.
