Blessed Monsters (Something Dark and Holy #3) - Emily A. Duncan Page 0,10

tightened its grip and he was pulled abruptly into the light.

It burned.

Malachiasz coughed, spitting up blood as he tried desperately to move back into the darkness and the figure held him down. His skin was bare, the shirt he’d been wearing long since rendered into tatters by his shifting body, and his flesh was sizzling like hot oil. Eventually he was let go and kicked back into the shadows. He slunk away like the wounded animal he was.

When he next woke, it was in the tiny room in the church, the oven still cold and dormant in the corner. He retched, spitting out a mouthful of bile.

Scorched flesh ran up his arm, bubbling into blisters. He gritted his teeth, hissing against the pain. Light flickered in through the shattered window and he carefully moved out of its way. After some consideration, he tentatively stretched his fingers out underneath the beams.

He jerked his hand back, squeezing his eyes shut against the white heat—the terror of what this meant. Against the ripple of chaos shuddering through him as his control slipped.

Taszni nem Malachiasz Czechowicz.

Taszni nem Malachiasz Czechowicz.

Taszni nem Malachiasz Czechowicz.

He needed to get out of here. Figure out this new … development. Had that dream been real? Was he not alone? Blood and bone, he hoped he was alone.

“Never truly alone.”

Malachiasz buried his head in his hands, his breath coming in pained, shuddery gasps. He was going to die here if he remained, or worse.

He wasn’t used to not knowing what to do. There had always been a next step, more to reach for, something else to gain when everything came crashing down. The ashes could always be swept aside to reveal a greater path.

Now, when he pushed the ashes away all he found was darkness.

He didn’t want to live in the darkness. As close as he may be with it, he didn’t like the dark. He scrambled to his feet, deciding to find someplace less likely to burn him. He’d wait out the rest of the day before he made his escape. To where, he could figure out later.

And if the voice in his head wanted him to kill another god, he could see that into being. But what was he dealing with? What kind of god would taint themselves with a heretic like him?

“It’s your heresy that makes you so compelling,” the voice said.

Malachiasz winced. None of his thoughts were safe, then. That was … less than ideal.

“Heresy is too simple a term. It is your denial of reality that makes you so interesting. Your power, your cleverness, your ruthlessness, all things I can use.”

Malachiasz would have to be willing. He knew that much. Nadya’s gods couldn’t force her hand, not truly, they could only suggest and grant power.

“Oh, that is precious,” the voice said, sounding like a sigh and a groan and death and death and death.

Malachiasz stumbled as pain lanced through his head at the base of his skull. He put a hand on the wall to steady himself.

Suddenly he was sitting down, a hairsbreadth away from the light, a needling feeling to edge closer, to let it bathe his face, and burn.

“I can make you do whatever I wish. You have no choice but to comply. I am not like the pretenders. I am more, I am greater.”

Malachiasz swallowed hard. His body sagged as he was released. He shoved away from the light.

Serefin had been dealing with a Kalyazi god in his head—had he managed to break that off? Was he even alive? Malachiasz couldn’t decide whether he hoped the boy, the king, his brother was dead, or if he hoped he’d done what he set out to do and had torn himself away from malevolent powers too great to fathom.

No, not that. Not unfathomable. Malachiasz was near that state, too, wasn’t he? A sidestep into the void, and he could touch the chaos he had power over. Nothing could truly control chaos, though, it did as it willed. Malachiasz was a channel and a vessel but he could harness it, at least; he could point it in the right direction.

He had what he wanted but nothing was right. There had to be another step forward. Surely all the pieces could not have fallen so fast.

The Vultures. He needed to get back to the Vultures. He needed to go home.

To do what? To what end? He didn’t even know if he could get out of this forest. It was idly chewing at the back of his mind.