Page 113 of Vasmora

Kazhimyr’s eyes snapped open to the Elvyniran peering back at him. Beyond him, the horde of spiders kept onward, and Kazhimyr glanced around to see they were further from the palace, away from the guards. As if he’d sleep-walked.

Cold and clammy, his body trembled with nausea.

“Were you bitten?” Dravien tugged off his helmet and tossed it over the stone wall into the adjacent woods.

“I’m fine.” Kazhimyr did the same, pushing off his helmet and chucking it after Dravien’s. He angled his head to the side and listened.

The clop of horse hooves in the distance.

“Hide.” Kazhimyr ordered, and the two of them slid over the stone wall, ducking low as two riders traversed the road toward the palace. Regal and poised, their polished golden armor and winged spangenhelms distinguished them from the other Solassion soldiers.

“The Bellatryx,” Dravien whispered beside him.

“We tell them she died,” one of them said as they passed by. “She was assassinated. Anyone who disputes it, dies as well.”

“I suspect they’ll make you General after this,” the other said, though it was difficult to discern which one spoke behind their helmets.

“Unless that cunt Drefan is promoted.”

Kazhimyr and Dravien stayed low, and once the riders had crested the hill, he shot to his feet, stripping the heavy armor off himself. Cool night air danced over the sweat coating his body, dampening his clothes, and Kazhimyr drew in a deep breath.

Dravien awkwardly doffed the last of his pauldrons, tossing it away. “Did she beg for your mercy?” he asked.

“She did. I refused.”

A mist of tears shone in Dravien’s eyes. He nodded. “It’s over, then.” He breathed a laugh. “It’s fucking over.”

Not bothering to respond, Kazhimyr pulled himself up the stone wall and climbed over, then reached out for Dravien, hauling him up the stones.

“Seek him out.”

Kazhimyr turned toward the end of the dark path.

Dravien glanced that way, too. “What is it?”

Clarity dawned on him. Perhaps the voice he heard was that of the gods. A unified sound, tasking him with the impossible. “I have to go save the prince.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

DOLION

“Dorjan!” Dolion snapped upright, gasping for breath.

Flickering images wound through his mind, blinding him to his surroundings.

The silent echo of a slowing heart. Dorjan’s lifeless eyes. Darkness rolling in across the sky. A shatter heard across continents. A god awakening.

The horde of infected.

“Dolion?” Allura’s voice dragged Dolion’s attention to where she sat hunched over one of her journals opposite him. “Are you all right?”

Heart still pounding, Dolion pressed the heel of his palm there and took in his surroundings–the shelves of books, the wooden table covered in scattered bones and leatherbound books, the half-moons beaming through the window behind Allura. Too calm for what he’d seen.

Still, a tremor lingered beneath his skin, the dream far too vivid to dismiss. “The Umbravale is going to fall.”

“Yes. That’s why we’re here. You’ve said this for a number of–”

“No. It’s inevitable. Dorjan is going to die, and not by the hands of King Jeret.”