CHAPTER FORTYݍFIVE
IN SMOKE AND RUIN
he guards had returned me to my cell without ceremony after the bath,T their eyes carefully avoiding mine as though they’d witnessed the way Valen washed my hair.
I knew they hadn’t, but it did not stop my mind from whispering that they had.
I settled onto my straw mattress, the rough fibers poking through the thin blanket beneath me, and tilted my head back against the cool stone wall. My hair was still damp, hanging loose around my shoulders where Valen’s fingers had combed through the tangles with his unexpected gentleness.
I closed my eyes, but the darkness behind my lids couldn’t hide me from my thoughts. Valen in the bathing chamber, his voice stripped of its usual sharp edges as he spoke of his creation, of his loneliness. I kept imagining him as he must have been—newly formed, filled with wonder, creating life because the emptiness around him was too vast to bear.
I shuddered, disturbed by the parallel between myself and this god. What did it say about me that I could look at the monster who had done such terrible things and feel even a flicker of understanding?
My gaze caught on our shared thread. As if beckoned by my thoughts, it emerged brighter, twining crimson and silver in a spiraling pattern that pulsed with undeniable strength. I no longer questioned where it led. I could feel it tugging, practically yanking me toward the direction of Valen, wherever he might be in the vast expanse of the palace above.
I examined it. The crimson strands within it glistened, like freshly spilled blood caught in lamplight. But the silver—the silver gleamed with the same moonlit radiance as my other threads, pure and untainted. How strange that something connecting me to Valen could harbor anything but ruin.
I reached toward it, my fingers trembling with a desire I couldn’t name.
What would happen if I touched it? Would I see his thoughts, feel his emotions, know the truth of what bound us together? The rope twisted in response to my nearness, the crimson darkening, the silver brightening, as though anticipating my touch.
I hesitated, every instinct screaming at me to pull back, to leave well enough alone.
But the urge was too strong. The need to know, to understand, overpowered everything else. I pressed my finger against the rope.
For an instant, nothing happened. The rope was cold beneath my skin, smoother than silk, harder than steel. Then, with a jolt that sent my entire body arching off the mattress, I was pulled under.
The transition was violent. One moment I knelt on the cold stone of my cell, my hand outstretched. The next, I was falling through an endless void.
The air rushed from my lungs as if I’d been thrown from a cliff, my stomach lurching in sickening free-fall. The darkness pressed against my eyes, my ears, my mouth—a living thing that sought to consume me. I tried to scream, but the sound was swallowed by the void.
For a heartbeat, I thought I had gone blind, that the thread had somehow stolen my sight. But then shapes began to emerge from the darkness, hazy at first, then sharpening with terrible clarity.
Stone walls. Iron bars. A high grating that let in a sliver of pallid light.
My cell. But not as it was now.
The straw that littered the floor was rotted, black with mold and what looked horribly like the stains of forgotten blood. The air hung thick with the stench of waste and decay and despair. The walls were marked with hundreds, perhaps thousands of tally marks—crude scratches that, I knew, mapped the passing of time. Years of time.
And there, hanging from the manacles that had so often held me for
Valen’s pleasure, was a woman.
No. Not just any woman.
Me.
The figure suspended from the chains was so changed I almost didn’t
recognize myself. Her hair—my hair—had grown past her hips, the once- glossy black now lank and matted, streaked with gray. Her body was gaunt, all sharp angles and protruding bones, the skin stretched taut over her frame like parchment over a drum.
She hung limply in her chains, her arms stretched high above her head, shoulders dislocated from the strain. Her skin bore a network of scars both old and new, layered one atop another like a grotesque palimpsest of torture.
There were so many. Too many to count. Too many to comprehend.
The thin shift she wore was gray with filth and torn in places, revealing more scars, more wounds, more degradation. Her feet barely touched the ground, forcing her to stand on tiptoe or hang from her wrists—a position I knew from experience grew agonizing within minutes, let alone the hours, days, perhaps years she—I—must have endured.
But it was her eyes that horrified me most. Sunken deep into hollowed sockets, they were dull, vacant—the eyes of someone who had long ago retreated from the world, who existed only in the most technical sense of the word. The spark of defiance, of life, that I still carried despite everything—it was gone from her. Extinguished, like a candle snuffed between cruel fingers.
Those eyes that were previously full of silver, that always caused such distrust, such isolation, now shown with nothing but despair.
I wanted to look away. Could not look away. This broken thing, this hollow shell of a woman—this was my future. This was what awaited me if I remained in Valen’s grasp. Not death, not release, but this slow, endless erosion of self until nothing remained but an empty husk, a living corpse that breathed and bled but did not live.
I took an involuntary step forward, bile rising in my throat. This couldn’t be me. I would die before I allowed myself to become this.
As if finally sensing my presence, the woman’s head tilted slowly, the movement requiring visible effort. Her gaze, unfocused at first, sharpened as it found mine. Recognition dawned in those dead eyes, followed by something worse—a flicker of pity.
Her cracked lips moved. A sound emerged, barely audible, a rattling whisper that seemed to bypass my ears and lodge directly in my mind.
“You,” she croaked, her voice like stones grinding together. “You’re still whole.”
I couldn’t speak. My tongue felt swollen in my mouth, useless as a dead thing.
“You still have time.” Her head lolled forward, the effort of speech clearly draining what little strength she possessed. “Don’t trust him. He doesn’t change.” She took in a breath that seemed to rattle against her lungs.
“You must escape.”
“How?” I managed, the word a strangled gasp.
A sound from beyond the cell drew her attention—heavy footsteps approaching with measured pace. Footsteps I knew. Panic flashed across her ravaged features, and as we stared at each other, she must have seen the same look mirrored across mine. “He’s coming,” she whispered, true terror animating her face. “Run. Fight. Die. Anything but this.”
The footsteps grew louder. A low, hungry chuckle echoed through the corridor.
“Please,” she begged, tears cutting clean tracks down her filthy cheeks.
“Don’t become me. Promise me.”
She lifted her head fully then, and I saw something I had missed before— a heavy iron collar around her neck, crusted with old blood.
“I promise,” I whispered, reaching toward her.
As my fingertips brushed her cheek, she disintegrated not into dust or ash, but into threads. Thousands of them, silver and crimson, twisting and unraveling before my eyes until nothing remained but a single silver strand that wound around my wrist like a manacle of light.
The darkness rushed back in, and I was falling again, tumbling through an endless void. The silver thread tightened, cutting into my flesh until I screamed — I jerked back to reality with such violence that my head slammed against the stone wall behind me. No sound came from my mouth, though I could feel the scream trapped in my throat like a living thing clawing to get out. My chest heaved as I gasped for air, my heart hammering against my ribs with such force I thought it might shatter them.
The cell around me looked exactly as it always had—clean straw, solid walls, no blood-stained scratches marking endless days of torment. But the vision clung to me like a second skin, the memory of that broken woman’s hollow eyes burned into my mind.
I looked down at my wrist where the silver thread had wrapped around me in the vision. Nothing. Just pale skin marred by the faint bruises Valen had left during our last encounter. But I could still feel it—a phantom weight, a reminder of what I had seen.
Don’t become me.
The woman’s—my—plea echoed in my skull, bouncing off the walls of my mind until I wanted to claw at my temples to make it stop. Was that truly my future? Years of slow degradation, of having my spirit carved away piece by piece until nothing remained but an empty shell hanging in chains?
I wrapped my arms around my knees and rocked forward, trying to make myself as small as possible. The motion did nothing to quiet the chaos in my mind. If anything, it made the vision more vivid—I could still smell the rot and decay, still hear the rattle of chains, still see those dead eyes that had once been mine.
I tried to shift my focus anywhere else, tried to think beyond the horror I had just unveiled, and my eyes caught on the silver-white thread. It seemed to be vying for my attention, its silver and white strands intertwining and twisting together in a pattern that seemed to whisper rather than shout, to gently pull rather than demand.
The white had softened, no longer the harsh brightness of sunlight on snow, but the luminescence of the moon through clouds, the gleam of bone polished smooth by time. It had a stillness to it that the crimson-silver rope lacked, a certainty that felt ancient rather than violent.
Yet beneath that stillness lurked something vast and unknowable, like the depths of an ocean glimpsed through clear water.
I leaned forward on my straw mattress, my body moving before my mind had decided to follow. My breath still heaved in my chest, but the thread connecting me to Death seemed to want to offer comfort. As if it wanted me to reach for it.
My fingers twitched with the need to do just that. Perhaps it would show me how to escape, or perhaps it would validate my fate if I stayed in this cell.
Or, dare I hope, it would show me a better future than the crimson-silver thread offered.
And before I could consider my actions further, I grazed my finger along the cord, plunging back into darkness.
The darkness that enveloped me was unlike the darkness from before. It wasn’t violent, but a velvet shroud that brushed against my skin with a
deliberate, sentient caress. I could feel it breathing around me, through me, as though I had been swallowed by some vast entity whose body was shadow itself. And then my vision adjusted, not to light—there was precious little of that—but to the different qualities of darkness, the subtle variations in the black that surrounded me.
I was kneeling on a floor of polished obsidian so smooth it reflected the vaulted ceiling above like still water. Looking up, I beheld a cathedral crafted not from stone, but from bone and shadow. Massive ribs curved upward, meeting at a spine that ran the length of the ceiling, each vertebra larger than my entire body. Between these pale archways, shadow had been woven like tapestry, occasionally parting to reveal glimpses of a star-strewn void beyond.
Columns rose around the perimeter, not carved but grown—femurs and tibias from creatures too vast to have ever walked the mortal world, stacked and fused into pillars that seemed to sway slightly, though no wind disturbed the heavy air. Skulls nestled at their bases and capitals, their eye sockets filled with a phosphorescent white glow that provided the chamber’s only illumination.
The space stretched impossibly in all directions, its proportions defying what I knew of architecture. Distances seemed fluid, with far corners suddenly appearing closer when I focused on them, only to recede again when my attention wavered. At the far end of the hall—or perhaps it was the center, space being so unreliable here—rose a throne that appeared to be bleeding shadow, thick rivulets of darkness dripping constantly from its arms and back to pool at its base.
Looking down at myself, I saw that the simple robe I had worn in my cell was gone. Instead, my body was clad in a gown made of living shadow, the fabric—if it could be called that—moving against my skin with the same sentient quality as the darkness around me. It hugged my form but flared at my hips into a skirt that melded with the shadows at my knees, as though I were emerging from the darkness itself rather than merely kneeling in it.
The silence was absolute, but not empty. It pressed against my ears with a weight that made my heartbeat sound thunderous in comparison. I could feel the quiet as a physical presence, ancient and watchful, waiting.
And then I felt it—a presence before me, vast and terrible. My eyes lifted slowly, reluctantly, to the figure looming beside the shadowed throne.
He was tall, impossibly so, his proportions as fluid and defiant of natural
law as the cathedral itself. A cloak of smoke and ruin trailed from broad shoulders, occasionally revealing glimpses of armor made from some kind of metal. His face was concealed behind a mask of obsidian and bone, carved into features that suggested a permanent scowl, with apertures for eyes that revealed nothing from within.
I leaned back slightly as he stepped toward me, every instinct in me begging to flee. His form radiated power held in check, leashed but not diminished. The strength in his movements was liquid grace, deliberate and measured, as though each small gesture required conscious restraint to avoid shattering the very space around him. There was nothing human in his form or bearing, despite its vaguely humanoid shape. This was divinity unfiltered by mortal constraints, raw and terrible.
I knew him immediately, bone-deep, soul-deep. My harbinger. Death.
He said nothing as he slowly made his way forward, his attention on me like a physical weight pressing me down, making it difficult to breathe. It occurred to me, in a distant, detached way, that this was not a future vision, like touching all the other threads had shown me. That this may be something else… something current.
I immediately dropped my gaze, not able to meet his eyes—those fathomless holes in his mask. Instead, I let myself take in every detail of him from periphery to ground.
Below his mask, his neck was visible and corded with muscle, a column of pale alabaster marked with faint scars that matched the ones on the hand I had held through my cell bars. They pulsed with each breath he took, glowing briefly before fading back to silvered lines etched into his skin.
My eyes drifted to his shoulders… Shoulders that stretched wider than seemed possible, the breadth of them nearly twice that of a large man, tapering to a torso carved from unyielding marble. The cloak parted as he shifted, revealing a chest covered in intricate armor that I could now see wasn’t metal but something darker—plates of shadow solidified into material, each piece fitting perfectly against the next, moving fluidly with his breathing. The armor bore engravings that shifted and changed as I watched, sometimes resembling constellations, other times appearing as ancient script in languages long forgotten.
His arms were massive, rippling with strength even at rest, his hands large enough to encircle my waist with room to spare, larger than the hand that caressed mine so gently. Each finger on his left hand was adorned with a
metal talon, curved and sharp as a predator’s, yet he moved with such precise control that I knew he could touch a butterfly’s wing without damaging it should he choose.
This was not my harbinger in the form I knew him, but he was him
nonetheless.
And that was when I saw the chains.
Even here, in what must be his domain or the representation of his true self, he remained bound. Manacles of a dull, matte metal that absorbed any and all light circled his wrists, his arms, his ankles, each linked to lengths of chain that faded into shadow before I could see where they led. They were the only solid, unchanging elements in his otherwise fluid form, as though they were more real than he was himself.
The sight of those chains stirred something protective and fierce in my chest. Whatever this god had done, whatever his power that required such binding, seeing the evidence of his captivity in this place of his own making made my heart ache in a way I couldn’t explain. I had known him feared and powerful, terrible in his domain despite his physical imprisonment. But these chains suggested a more complete subjugation than I had imagined—one that followed him even into the realm of his own mind.
Death stopped in front of me, towering over my kneeling form. I could feel his gaze boring into me, the weight of his attention pressing down on my shoulders, making me want to curl into myself. The silence stretched between us, and although I sensed no malice from him, the sheer power radiating from his presence made it impossible to lift my eyes to his.
Death’s fingers reached toward me with intentional slowness, each inch of movement a decision rather than an impulse. I watched them approach as though time had thickened, unable to move, to flee, to even look away. When they finally made contact with my skin, curling beneath my chin with his usual gentleness, a shock ran through me like lightning seeking ground. His touch was cold—not the chill of flesh deprived of warmth, but the absolute cold of deep space, of places where heat had never existed. It should have burned with its intensity, should have shattered me like glass in winter, but instead it sent a wave of stillness through my body, a cessation of movement so complete that I forgot even to breathe.
He tilted my face upward, forcing my gaze to travel the impossible height of him, past the shifting shadows of his cloak, the gleaming bone-white of his mask, until finally I met his eyes.
Behind the obsidian apertures, they burned like twin stars caught in ice— a blue so pale it bordered on white, yet containing depths that spoke of eons passed in watchful silence. They were ancient beyond comprehension, those eyes, windows to an existence that had witnessed the birth and death of worlds. Yet as they fixed on mine, I saw something kindle in their frozen depths—a hunger, an interest, a focus that seemed to narrow all that vast
attention to a single point.
Me.
The realization sent warmth flooding to my face, a living blush confronting the chill of his touch. My lungs began to burn with the need for air, but my body remained locked in that perfect stillness, caught between his will and mine. When I finally managed to draw breath, the air tasted of night and pine, of frost-covered forests and starlit clearings—places of perfect silence where death came as gently as sleep. The scent was intoxicating, filling my head with a lightness that made thought difficult and desire easy.
Despite the terror that skittered along my nerves, despite the knowledge that I knelt before a being whose power and nature were beyond my mortal comprehension, I found myself wanting to close the distance between us. To throw myself against his chest, to feel those inhuman arms close around me, to surrender to whatever fate such an action might bring. The desire made no sense—it wasn’t the heated pull I felt toward Valen, nor the comfort of human connection I sometimes craved in my isolation. This was something deeper, more primal—a recognition of something essential to my nature that I couldn’t name.
“Lost in the forest again, little fawn?” The words wrapped around me like a familiar blanket, nearly the same phrase he had spoken when I first awoke in my cell. But here, in this realm, his voice was different—not confined by stone walls or the limitations of a physical form. It was a whisper that came from everywhere at once, from the air itself, from inside my own mind. Each syllable contained harmonics I couldn’t quite perceive, undertones that suggested meanings beyond the simple words. It was beautiful and terrible, a sound that could reshape reality or shatter it entirely.
The gentleness in that voice, the same tenderness he had shown me through the cell wall when I was at my lowest, broke something inside me.
My chin began to wobble beneath his touch, emotion welling in my throat too complex to name. This was a god who had healed me at the cost of taking on my pain, who had guided me through my darkest moments. In his way, he
had been my only constant, my only ally in a world that had become nothing but pain and confusion.
Death bent his knees, his towering form folding with that same deliberate grace until his masked face was level with mine. His hands, those impossible hands with their too-long fingers, moved to frame my cheeks, cradling my face with a delicacy that belied their obvious strength. The cold of his touch seeped into my skin, not numbing but clarifying, sharpening every sensation until I could feel the individual whorls of his fingertips against my flesh.
“Don’t cry, yshera,” Death murmured, his thumbs brushing along my cheekbones as if to wipe away tears that hadn’t fallen. “You are safe here.”
I swallowed hard, struggling to keep the walls I’d built around my heart intact as I felt his cold fingers against my skin. The tenderness in his touch coaxed forth an avalanche of emotions, a maelstrom swirling within me that threatened to break free.
I wanted to believe him, wanted to cling to the illusion of sanctuary he offered—yet the darkness still lurked at the edges of my mind, that echo of despair lingering like a specter of my own making. I saw what would become of me if I stayed in my cell. I knew with a certainty that who I was now would be lost to Valen’s torture, and I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to break.
I couldn’t hold it any longer. My lips quivered, betraying my resolve. I leaned into his hands instinctively, ache pooling at the center of my chest as if everything I had lost and everything I will lose pressed down upon me from all sides.
“I don’t want to be lost anymore,” I whispered, the words escaping as a plea laced with desperation.
A single tear collided with my cheek, trailing down like a comet streaking through darkened skies. It caught on his fingers where they cradled my face, its heat mingling with the chill of his skin, creating an unsettling warmth against the cool air that surrounded us.
His gaze softened, a flicker of something that reminded me of the sliver of light before dawn, breaking through the oppressive weight of night. “Tell me, how did you find your way here?” There was no accusation in his tone, only softness, a curiosity in how I came to be kneeling in his cathedral. His hands remained on either side of my face, his touch both an anchor and a brand, keeping me present in this impossible realm. I was grateful he did not mention my tear, allowing me a moment of levity when there was none.
I suddenly sensed that my presence here was unexpected—perhaps even unprecedented—something that had caught this ancient being off guard. The realization was both terrifying and exhilarating, like standing at the edge of a precipice and feeling the wind invite me to step forward into nothing.
I struggled to find my voice, grappling with the intensity of his gaze. “I —“ The words caught in my throat, still unsure if I could speak of my threads. I could feel the pulse of our silver-white cord, urging me to speak, to reveal what I had learned, yet fear clutched at me like iron bands.
His features remained patient behind the mask, but I felt an undercurrent of something—anticipation? Unease? It made my heart race faster, wild and untamed. What was it about him that drew me in so completely? It felt as if we were two halves of some greater whole—an echo of a connection forged through blood and sacrifice.
“I saw... another version of myself,” I finally confessed, each word trembling as if it could shatter the stillness between us. “In a nightmare. She was... broken.”
His grip on my face tightened almost imperceptibly, a flicker of concern passing through those pale eyes.
“I wished for comfort,” I said, the words spilling out in a rush, desperate to distract him from the vision that still haunted my mind, not wanting it to ruin the current moment. “And then I was here, with you.”
For a moment, his eyes bore into mine, searching for truths I had no intention of revealing. But then, just as quickly, he softened again. The fierce intensity flickered in those pale depths, replaced by something gentler yet still filled with an ancient weight. “You will not become that broken woman,” he said, his voice a calm whisper amidst the echoing shadows.
“You will not break.”
A swell of emotion rose within me at his words—hope mixed with disbelief. How could he assure me of something so monumental? In my heart, I felt the tendrils of despair creeping closer, inching toward my very essence. Yet here was this god—the embodiment of death itself—offering me solace when all evidence pointed to my inevitable decay.
“But what if I do?” The question slipped past my lips before I could reconsider, raw vulnerability slipping through the cracks of my guarded soul.
“What if that is all there is for me? You didn’t see her.” I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment, a shudder passing through me before I could continue.
Lifting my gaze back to his, I whispered, “She was… gone. A wraith dressed
in skin. I would rather die than become her.”
Death’s gaze hardened slightly, and for a moment, I thought he might turn away—disappointed by my lack of faith. But instead, he leaned closer, the coolness of his breath ghosting across my skin. “Yshera, you are more than what you fear. You are stronger than you think, and you will not break.”
I nodded my head, my eyes flicking between his as I tried to keep more tears from falling. Words seemed inadequate to express everything I was feeling. The certainty in his voice, the way he believed his words as truth, it stunned me. It made me want to believe him.
I leaned forward, drawn by an impulse I couldn’t name. The movement was slight—a mere inch closer to this terrifying god—but in this realm where intention seemed to shape reality itself, that tiny shift felt momentous, irrevocable. The cold emanating from him intensified, wrapping around me like smoke, and I welcomed it.
Just then, a gleam of silver against the darkness of his form caught my eye. I looked down, past the sharp angle of his jaw beneath the mask, along the elegant column of his throat to where chains bound his wrists. And there, twined around the heavy links, were threads—my threads. Fine as spider silk but unmistakable, they wrapped around the metal in complex patterns, ending at the manacle that encircled his wrist.
My hand lifted of its own accord, fingers outstretched toward this unexpected connection. Death didn’t move to stop me, though I felt a tension enter his frame, a watchful stillness that suggested he waited to see what I would do.
Slowly, deliberately, I extended my fingers to touch the point where silver thread met ancient metal. The threads seemed to reach for me in return, winding around my fingertips in greeting. There was warmth here, despite the pervasive cold of Death’s domain. It was a warmth of recognition, of belonging. I plucked at the thread gently, as one might test the string of an instrument.
The sound it made was not audible but felt—a perfect note that resonated in my bones, in my blood, in my soul. And as it sang, the impossible happened. The chain, that dull metal that had seemed more real than anything else in this shifting realm, began to dissolve. Not breaking, not unlocking, but simply ceasing to be. Transforming from solid matter into motes of light that scattered into the surrounding darkness like dust in a sunbeam.
I gasped, my eyes widening in shock as I looked up to meet Death’s gaze.
His eyes had narrowed, the cold light within them flaring with an emotion I couldn’t read—surprise, anger, hope? In that moment of unguarded reaction, I glimpsed something beneath the mask, a fleeting impression of features both beautiful and terrible in their perfection.
Then the world turned inside out.
The cathedral of bone and shadow collapsed around me, reality folding in on itself with dizzying speed. I felt myself falling—or perhaps flying—ripped away from Death’s presence and hurled back across whatever boundary I had crossed to reach him. The journey was both instantaneous and eternal, a compression of space and time that left me disoriented and breathless.
I slammed back into my body with such force that I was thrown backward onto my straw mattress, every muscle seizing as though I’d been struck by lightning. My lungs heaved, desperate for air that suddenly seemed too thin, too mortal after the richness of Death’s realm. My limbs trembled with exhaustion, a bone-deep weariness that suggested whatever I had done had cost me dearly, though I had felt no effort in the moment itself.
Then the darkness swept me under.
