Page 143 of By the Flames of Her Fury

I conjured my own shadows, but they shrank away from the strange darkness before us, twisting up my arm to get as far from it as possible. Reaching out, I slowly slipped my hand into the storm cloud.

Sloane jumped forward. “Wait, Vera, no⁠—”

Searing pain jolted up my arm. I tried to yank it away, but the spirits pulled me deeper into the heart of the storm, clawing at my skin and clothes and magic. My phoenix half screeched in anguish—but it wasn’t my anguish. It was theirs. The lost Pyraethis.

The foreign shadows crawled toward me and buried themselves in my chest, forcing me to feel everything they felt. Their collective grief, their pain, their suffering. They were so alone. So lost. They just needed someone to bring them justice.

I stopped fighting and stood still in the center of the storm. Wind, shadows, and lightning whipped around me. Ghostly faces with cracked lips and hollow eyes rushed in and out of view as they swirled in the storm cloud.

“I see you,” I called, taking a step forward. Sharp wisps of shadows tore into my skin, and streaks of blood ran down my arms. Through the haze, I saw the outline of a door.

“I’m here now,” I forced out. “Please, let me through. Help me end this for all of you.” I stretched out a bloody hand and pressed my palm to the door.

At first, nothing happened.

But with my next breath, the shadows collided in on themselves in a wave, and golden light burst from the door.

68

Vera

The door flew open. The violent storm cloud of shadows was swallowed by the pulse of gold light, and once it was gone, the entrance to a new chamber loomed before us. The catacombs. Dom and Sloane told us what lay beyond, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the truth.

Hundreds of bodies. Thousands. Endless rows of them, illuminated only by my phoenix fire, stretching into the infinite darkness. They were like statues on display. They stood straight, skin hard as stone with charred cracks running through the flesh, faces frozen in gruesome screams.

I sucked in a breath. “Are these…”

Sloane stepped up beside me, face solemn. “Our people. The ones they told you you’d be saving.”

Horror crashed through me. I couldn’t believe someone could be so vile. So heartless. They had killed entire generations of people. Sloane was right—if the Elders were willing to do this to their own kind, I couldn’t imagine what they’d do if they got their hands on the outside world. On Veridians. My friends and family, my people…

I had to find Everett and destroy them. There was no other choice.

I sent balls of fire flying through the chamber. The long corridor we were in branched off into three more at the end. “First things first,” I said. “We should split up and look for Everett.”

The others nodded, hands on their weapons and eyes scanning the space uneasily. We crept forward until we reached the split, then each took a tunnel.

More bodies caged me in. It was a mausoleum of Pyraethis, all sacrificed by the Elders. Even with my phoenix fire, a chill spread through me with every step I took into the darkness.

My boots echoed off the hard stone. I honed my Shifter senses to search for anything that smelled or sounded like Everett, but it was eerily quiet. I came upon a set of stairs descending deeper into the ground. The dry, stale air tickled my nose. At the bottom was another long corridor, pitch black save for my fire. When I sent several streams of it out to shed light on the space, my eyes widened.

Along both sides of the walls were smaller chambers, almost like cells. They all had similar raised platforms with altars on top. Some were empty, whereas some held more of the deceased vessels lining the walls. I gasped when I looked to the right and saw a dead body still strapped to an altar, half-decayed with runes carved into its forehead.

From the opposite end of the corridor came the sound of chanting. Magic sparked in the air. Golden light curled like smoke, casting a glow across the dark ground. It crackled with dangerous energy, and I felt its power tugging at my own.

A strangled cry ripped through the air. “Help!”

My heart froze. I would know that voice in my dreams.

“Everett!” I screamed, then lunged into the swirl of magic.

69

Everett

FOUR YEARS AGO

“Songbird!” I screamed. I lunged away from the hands that grabbed me and scrambled for the trap door hidden in the earth. I’d been knocked out as strangers dragged me from my cell, but I came to once we hit the fresh air. The grass, the trees, the breeze—it flooded me, shocking my senses after years spent in that musty, rancid cell. I breathed it in, nearly choking through my shouts. I didn’t even have time to gape at the moon and stars above me as I desperately fought to get back to my Songbird.