“No,” I interrupted. “This doesn’t feel like that.”

  “Cas,” Kieran said, stepping in front of me. “I know what you’re thinking, but Poppy’s fine. Neither you nor I would be here if not.”

  “Look,” I snarled, lifting my hand. “Look at the imprint. Does it seem different to you?”

  Kieran’s warm fingers encircled my wrist. His brow furrowed as he stared. I tasted his icy shock before it skittered across his features. His eyes snapped to mine.

  “Fuck,” he whispered hoarsely.

  “What?” Panic crept into the single word Delano spoke.

  “I need to go to her.” Tearing my hand free, I summoned the essence and focused on an image of Poppy, waiting until I caught her jasmine scent—sweet, earthy, warm, and all her.

  I couldn’t find it.

  This wasn’t like when I tried to shadowstep earlier and learned I couldn’t. I could feel her then. I just couldn’t open the realm to Pensdurth.

  This was different.

  My chest turned cold as I lifted my gaze to Kieran’s. “I can’t find her mark.” My voice sounded strange. Guttural. Thin. “I can’t find her, Kieran. I can’t feel her.”

  Panic flashed across his features. “Does that mean she’s not in this realm?”

  “I don’t know.” I thrust my hand through my hair. “Why would she leave?”

  “Did you feel her absence the last time she left?” Kieran demanded as Delano took several steps back. “When she went to the Continents?”

  “I don’t think so. But the Fate—Aydun—was here. His presence could’ve messed with things.” Turning from him, I closed my eyes again, refocused on Poppy, and found…nothing. “Fuck!”

  “Okay. We need to stay calm,” my father started.

  “Fuck calm.” I spun on him—on them. “I fucking knew I should’ve gone!” My heart slammed into my ribs. “That this was the wrong decision. That we were stronger together. I fucking knew it!”

  “Cas.” Kieran stepped forward.

  The ground beneath us started to shake, and plumes of dust fell from above. I fisted my hands. If this was like when Rhahar had died, a god—a Primal god—had fallen. One that ruled over a Court.

  Fuck.

  I couldn’t think of that right now.

  “If something happened to her,” I seethed, “if a single hair on her head was touched, I won’t forgive—”

  The presence bore down on me at the exact moment Kieran stiffened. Soul-deep, unending coldness settled on my shoulders, stirring the embers of eather. The presence felt heavy and thick, coarse and wrong against my flesh, like cold fingers trailing down my spine. It left a slick feeling behind.

  Delano seemed to notice it next, his body tensing.

  A shadow crept over the Great Hall, drawing our stares upward. The clouds thickened and spun, their edges tinted in…crimson.

  “Kolis,” I growled.

  The sky turned ink-black in a heartbeat. Crimson bolts pierced the darkness, and in the distance, I heard Nithe’s staggering call end abruptly.

  Then I heard something else.

  A humming sound that rose and fell. “Do you hear that?”

  “The…the humming?” my father said.

  “Yeah. But it’s not just a hum.” I lowered my gaze. The sound seemed to come from above and below. “It’s singing. It’s a song…”

  And it was haunting. Melancholic.

  Hisa gasped at the same moment something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye.

  “What was that?” my father demanded.

  Hisa strode toward one of the many windows. “Something just fell. I think it was…”

  Another thing came down, just a blur of black plummeting through the open air to the ground beyond the window. I heard the impact then. It was…fleshy.

  “Oh, my gods,” Hisa breathed as another fell and another as she raced to the second floor of the alcove and turned to look back at the domed ceiling. From her view, she could probably see some of the higher floors. “They’re falling from the balconies.” Her face paled to a shade of white as she looked down at us with her palm pressed to her chest. “They’re jumping.”

  They’re jumping…

  The singing.

  “Watch out,” Hisa shouted.

  My father’s head cranked back as Hisa launched over the railing. A body fell, their arms spread wide. They hit the glass, punching a hole straight through it. I couldn’t look away as they fell into the hall, smacking into the stone. Blood immediately stained the light-brown uniform. It was a mortal, responding to the…call of Death. To Kolis’s will. What had Poppy said? My father jumped as another crashed through the dome. It affected mortals and those of—

  Another fell toward the dome.

  Hisa’s scream darkened my soul as the body hit the floor with a sickening thud. It shifted, still limbs replaced by brown and white fur. That kind of fall…not even a wolven would survive that, no matter what form they were in. The scream echoed what I already knew. What I had seen in the brief moments as she fell silently. Short blond hair. Skin reflecting the scars of battles fought and won. My father staggered to where the wolven lay, and Hisa darted across the hall, falling beside my father. Her hands trembled as she reached for her.

  “No, no,” she whispered. “No. Oh, my gods, no.”

  My father looked up, and I would never forget the horror on his face. The disbelief.

  Seeing it snapped me into motion.

  “It’s Kolis! He’s calling them to their deaths!” I shouted as I spun, locking my gaze on Kieran first and then Delano.

  They were still, their faces blank as the haunting song grew closer. Another body came through the dome, landing on the dais.

  I saw both wolven reach for a weapon. Kieran went for the one strapped to his chest, and Delano’s eerily steady hand lowered to his hip and the bloodstone dagger.

  I heard Poppy’s voice. If he’s the cause by hand or will, the Joining won’t protect either of you.

  I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t think. I shot forward as I shouted for my father, knowing I could only make it to one of them. Knowing I was making a choice.

  I slammed into Kieran and took him to the floor again. I shouted at him as the bodies kept falling like leaves in the northern parts of Atlantia, one after another after another—some mortal, others wolven. I grabbed his wrist and wrenched his arm back as my father raced past me. Kieran fought. The fucker was strong. He pulled against my hold, trying to lift the dagger to his chest. Driving my knee into his stomach, I twisted his arm as I saw Delano turn the bloodstone blade inward, his hands gripping the bone hilt.

  “No!” I shouted, putting pressure on Kieran’s wrist as my father collided with Delano, ripping the wolven’s dagger from his grip.

  There was no time to feel relief. “Sorry,” I grunted, snapping Kieran’s wrist. “It’ll heal.”

  He didn’t make a sound as the dagger fell from his fingers, didn’t even flinch as he reached for the second dagger, unsheathing it with startling quickness.

  “Motherfucker.” I shifted over him, grabbing that arm—

  The glass dome shattered, drawing my gaze upward as Kieran yanked at my grip. Crimson-laced eather streaked through the clouds, and the presence poured into the Great Hall.

  Kolis was here.

  My gaze shot to my father. He was still fighting with Delano, who was trying to get to one of his swords. I looked over my shoulder to see that Hisa held her cloak.

  “Hisa!” I yelled at her. “He’s here!”

  “There’s no honor,” she whispered, but I heard her as I saw the cloak become a death shroud. “There’s no honor in this.”

  I felt my grip slip.

  My head swung back to Kieran. He had the blade at his chest, piercing his tunic.

  Fuck.

  I didn’t have time for this.

  Not holding back, I jerked Kieran’s arm back and snapped that bone, too. As the dagger clattered off the floor, I didn’t have time to root out all his weapons or fight him like my father did with Delano. I gripped Kieran’s head and slammed it into the floor. The crack of his skull off the stone was lost in the shock of the gilded doors swinging open and slamming into the wall.

  Kieran’s body went limp as a mass of midnight and crimson whirling mist entered.

  The singing stopped.

  The Primal mist unfurled, revealing Kolis. His face was more bone than flesh, his eyes burning like hot coals. And he was a fucking mess.

  His throat had been torn open, leaving strips of flesh hanging from fresh, pink skin. A chunk of it was missing from his shoulder. His chest was ripped open, exposing fractured ribs, and his stomach hadn’t fared much better. Something had clawed at him. Blood and clumps of tissue stained the front of his white pants.

  Please, gods. Tell me Poppy had done that to him.

  Kolis’s head lowered, and the mist contracted as I rose.

  It happened so fast, yet it felt like time slowed to a crawl as his blood-red gaze flicked to Hisa. Bone cracked as her neck twisted sharply to the side and kept cracking. She jerked as blood leaked from her nose and mouth and then didn’t make a sound as she tipped forward, her body falling across Lizeth’s.

  Kolis’s head turned to my right.

  Delano stiffened, then shuddered. Crimson poured from his eyes and nose. His mouth opened, and blood—gods, blood gushed from it as his knees collapsed and his head fell back.

  My father caught him as he shouted. I staggered back.

  “What did I tell you?” Kolis’s voice boomed.

  My father’s head jerked up, his eyes locked with mine and widening.

  I halted.

  Everything came to a stop inside me. My heart. My lungs.

  “What did I promise?” Kolis’s voice slithered through the Great Hall.

  The flesh peeled away from my father’s face, his throat. His armor shattered as Delano slipped from his arms, crumpling to the floor. Exposed muscle ripped and splintered. His spine snapped. Bone crunched and turned to ash.

  “I promised both of you,” Kolis hissed. “That I would kill everyone you held dear in front of you.”

  Valyn Da’Neer didn’t make a sound as he held my gaze.

  He didn’t scream.

  He didn’t groan.

  My flesh went taut. My insides cold.

  The last thing he did was move his eyes from mine to Kolis. The last words he spoke sounded wet and broken. “He will kill you.”

  Kolis laughed.

  He laughed as my father fell beside Delano in an unrecognizable heap of blood and bone.

  A buzz hit my blood, and the corners of my vision darkened. The air around me charged as I stared at my father. He was gone. His last words a threat.

  Delano was also gone. My last words spoken to him a taunt.

  Hisa and countless others were gone.

  I couldn’t sense Poppy.

  And I knew they would all still breathe if I had not remained here.

  Something dark and needy, hungry, unraveled inside me.

  “What is it about this bloodline that’s so stupidly arrogant?” Kolis questioned, his voice strengthening and becoming less garbled. “I can’t wait to hear what you have to say.”

  “What,” I said, the air chilling around me until I could see my breath, “did you do to her?”

  “What did I do to your precious Poppy?” His laugh crawled over my prickling skin. “Your pretty flower?”

  The distaste in his tone, the loathing… I twitched.

  “She thought she could kill me.” Kolis’s laugh turned my stomach. “That I would still be in love with her.”

  My fingers spasmed.

  “A thousand years entombed is a long time,” he growled. “I was conscious for quite a bit of it. Had a lot of time to think. Had even more for whatever I felt for that bitch to wither and die.”

  What had I said? Kolis had not behaved like a man in love when he controlled Poppy. Energy ramped up inside me. No one had listened to me. And I’d been right. Everyone, including the true Primal of Life, had been wrong.

  “What did you do?” I asked.

  “I drained her—”

  I threw my hand out as I turned to him. Dark-gray-and-crimson-streaked eather erupted from my palm. The bolt of essence flew across the chamber.

  There was a flicker of surprise as Kolis waved his arm. The bolt collapsed an inch from his chest. “Parlor tricks,” he laughed. “Adorable.”

  I fully turned.

  His eyes flared with crimson, but it was a dull pulse.

  The essence swelled in me. In my mind, I saw what could not be seen by those with the essence of life in them.

  I saw marks of death.

  The torn arteries that still hadn’t healed. The fluttering essence weakened by the use of eather. The sluggish beat of his heart and the inch-long wound there, where I knew Poppy had planted the Ancient bone. She had wounded him deeply. Maybe even Attes. Perhaps even whoever had intervened and fell, causing the ground to tremble.

  At the moment, the only thing that mattered was what that meant.

  “You’re weak,” I said. “I can sense it.” My head cocked. “You shouldn’t have come here.”

  “I see the slut gave you some powers—”

  I shot across the Hall. Kolis started to rise, mist seeping out of him. I prowled forward, the bodies sliding out of the way as the eather slipping through my veins took hold. My flesh hardened as Primal mist spilled out of me, thicker and moving faster than what surrounded him.

  Kolis’s eyes narrowed. “What the fuck?”

  I launched into the air and through the stinging, churning mist. It tore at my skin and burned, but the pain didn’t stop me as my nails sharpened and strengthened. It couldn’t stop me.

  He didn’t have the power to do so.

  Not right now.

  Crashing into Kolis, I thrust my hand into his ruined stomach and slammed him into the wall. He grunted as the impact cracked the gold-veined marble.

  Kolis stared at where my hand was now buried below his sternum and then lifted his gaze to mine.

  “My Queen,” I spoke, my voice filling with shadows and smoke, “gave me more than just parlor tricks.”

  Tearing out ropey tissue, I gripped a fistful of his hair and pulled him back from the wall. My head snapped down, lips peeling back. I sank my fangs deep into his throat and didn’t release them.

  Pain erupted in my chest as he slammed his fist through it. Skin tore. Muscles snapped. Bones broke. I held on as I drank, pushing downward.

  We hit the floor, cracking the stone. Still, I held on, drinking fast and hard, easing the burn of pain as my gaze landed on what had become of my father. My vision changed, contracting and lengthening until I only saw him through a thin slit.

  The rage turned to an icy fire in my veins. Dual pain ripped through my back, right at my shoulder blades. This wasn’t Kolis. No, it was my bones—vertebrae expanding and shifting, breaking through my skin, unfurling.

  Tearing through the flesh of Kolis’s throat, I jerked my head back and rose, lifting him from the floor.

  Kolis’s brows lowered, and his eyes narrowed. “What the…?” His gaze shifted behind me, and his expression smoothed out, his lips parting. “Impossible.”

  My vision rapidly expanded and returned to normal as I spat a mouthful of blood into his face. “What did you do to her?”

  I twisted, throwing Kolis with a shout of rage. His body smacked into the floor, shattering several tiles.

  He hit the ground and rolled. I didn’t give him a chance to recover. I was on him instantly, grabbing him.

  “What did you do to her?” I shouted as I dragged him from the floor, twisted at the waist, and tossed him between the pillars and out the window, shattering the glass.

  Blood poured down my chest, mine and his, as I prowled forward. My feet left the floor as I shadowstepped outside.

  Sunlight broke through the remaining clouds, and I saw a shadow on the ground before me. Twin arcs that swept high as another quake ripped through the ground. Something exploded, drawing my gaze. Beyond the Rise, a smoke plume rose from the city as the sound of distant screams were swept away in the roar of the wind. I scanned the bloodstained ground, and the bodies littered about. So many. Most mortals—servants who had done as…

  Kolis wasn’t here.

  The eather rose—

  A shock of pale-blond hair matted in crimson stopped me. Arms and legs broken into unnatural angles.

  It wasn’t Delano.

  But…

  My chest seized. I turned sharply, willing myself back to the Great Hall, returning to them.

  Hisa and Lizeth.

  Delano and my father.

  Kieran.

  I staggered, then my legs gave out. My knees hit the ground.

  Delano was gone.

  So was Hisa.

  Lizeth.

  My father.

  My fucking father.

  None of this was supposed to happen. My mind raced back over the years. I was supposed to free my brother. I was supposed to take the Maiden. I was supposed to end the Blood Crown. Poppy wasn’t supposed to stop me from following her—from preventing this.

  None of this was supposed to happen.

  My trembling hands balled into fists as I pressed them against my bloody chest. My heart. I couldn’t feel it beating. I hadn’t felt it since Kolis arrived in the Great Hall.

  Poppy.

  She was hurt. She had to be.

  I had to get to her.

  I tried to focus on her, but like before, I couldn’t find her mark.

  I couldn’t—

  I jerked my left hand from my chest and opened it. Blood covered my palm. Heart thumping, I wiped at it with my other hand, over and over—

  Bone.

  All I saw was flesh fading into silver bone. I couldn’t see the imprint. I couldn’t feel her.

  The roar of rage and eather built and built as the crimson-streaked mist poured out of me and spilled into the air.

  I couldn’t sense Poppy.

  My head kicked back, and a scream tore through me. The sound burst forth, turning into pure ruin the moment it hit the air. I slammed my fists into the stone.

  Marble and gold exploded as patches of my flesh faded along my arms, replaced by the gleam of bone.