Page 217 of Nightshade

Instead, he dropped to his knees, and as he stared up at me, I saw something swirling in his eye that I had never seen before in this formidable man. It stirred a thick, black dread in the very pit of my stomach.

Fear.

Not a second later, he tipped his head back and closed his unpatched eye.

His body burst into flames.

No. No! No!

A horrific, agonizing scream ripped through me, watching the fire consume him. “Jericho! Please! No!” The flame licked my hand when I reached out. And in no more than thirty seconds, my entire world crumbled to ash.

No. My head refused to accept it. No. Just a nightmare. Wake up, Farryn! Wake up!

But I couldn’t. I couldn’t wake up from it.

A cold branching fear spread inside my chest. Every muscle in my body trembled. Every cell burned.

No. A shield of denial had me shaking my head. No. Not him. Not him. He couldn’t die. Not when we’d survived. Not when we’d won.

Panic stirred inside of me, reality sitting on the fringes, waiting to pull me under the surface and drown me. Don’t look at it, my head urged. But I couldn’t look away from the pile of ash, all that remained of him, and the pain drove through me like a barbed spike.

I fell to my knees.

No!

A horrible sound of misery ripped from my chest. Every moment with him flashed behind my eyes—Lustina’s memories coupled to my own.

The smile on his lips when he’d mended the bird.

The ever-present adoration when I’d catch him staring at me.

The ocean blue of his gaze that promised endless possibility.

The warmth of his skin when he took my hand.

All of it gone. Erased.

The pain twisted in my stomach, ripping and scratching at my insides with furious determination. I rested my hand there and tipped my head back, tears streaming down my temples.

Too much. It was too much pain!

‘Remember when the pain becomes too much …’ he’d once said to me.

The cold water. The blood moon. A hand covering my face, muting the word to silence.

“Mercy!” I cried out. “Mercy!”

The birds still circling overhead dispersed in an explosion of wings and caws. The world around me stilled. I reached for the blowing bits of ash and held him in my palm.

Gone.

Something else rose up inside of me, like a monster clawing from its depths.

Rage. Pure. Raw. Violent.

I swiped up the sword lying on the ground beside Jericho’s ashes, and as I stormed toward his killer on a murderous battle cry, a sharp pain struck my ankle, sending my feet flying from beneath me, and I dropped the sword. The bone rattling agony spiraled up my leg in shooting jags of hot needles, and I looked up to find the man holding out his hands, as if an invisible bullet had shot out of them.

“Lustina, listen to me.” The voice that spoke to me was familiar. As dreadful as the man to whom it belonged.