of the Chosen entered, they wouldn’t even see him coming until it was too late.
After what had happened in the Hall of Light, Bell had enough sense to feel a newfound fear near the Shade Lord.
Nasira met him at the head of the four poster marble bed.
“What did Archeron do to her?” Bell demanded.
“He dragged her into the Nether, trapped her there, and then afflicted her with some sort of nasty torment spell.”
Bell fought the urge to hit something. “She’s better now?”
“Stolas was able to break the spell and then calm her.”
Nasira spoke as if Haven’s affliction had been a fever, not some perversion inflicted on her by a madman.
After everything that Haven had been through in her life, all the tragedy and rejection and hurt, the thought of her suffering more made him physically ill. “I’m going to kill Archeron.”
“Get in line.” Nasira’s eyes flicked to Stolas and back to Bell. “What you saw in the hall after Haven disappeared . . .” Another darting glance at her brother. “Has Haven explained to you what that was?”
“Was?” Bell said numbly, because he couldn’t imagine there was a name for something so terrible, so monstrously savage as the thing Stolas had released.
“Every Seraphian royal has a Shadow Familiar.” Nasira’s wings fluttered with excitement as she continued explaining the phenomenon, as if the creature that had destroyed the most beautiful place Bell had ever visited in the span of a breath was something to be proud of. “My brother shares my mother’s Shadow Form, the dire wolf.”
Wolf. Everything clicked into place, the traumatic memories from earlier solidifying. At the time, he was in survival mode like the others, more focused on finding refuge from the shadowy creature tearing stone with its bare teeth than cataloging it.
But now the long snout dripping with fangs formed in his mind. The luxurious black pelt and fiery red eyes and bunched, coiled muscle. Nasira knew what was happening and had thrown up a shield to protect them as the creature rampaged.
It was like the most violent, most powerful storm imaginable had been forced into a wolf the size of a cottage. Everything it touched was ruined. If not for Nasira’s quick thinking, the carnage would have included more than just furniture and stone.
“Stolas had barely discovered his form before Morgryth killed our parents,” Nasira said, softly, almost as if she were speaking to herself, “so it was still a secret. Rather than let Morgryth use it as a weapon, he kept his familiar locked deep inside him, tightly chained, hidden and . . . and starved. He lied and told her it never came. If a darkcaster experiences major stress during their transition years, their familiars have been known to go dormant, sometimes indefinitely. She didn’t believe him, of course. But no matter how long that hag tortured him, he kept it caged until . . . it withered into shadow and ash. We thought it was dead.”
Bell exhaled. He could only imagine the things Ravenna and the Shade Queen would have done with a monster that powerful. Then his mind circled back to her earlier comment. “You said every Seraphian royal has a Shadow Familiar. If Haven is descended from the Shadeling himself, does that mean Haven has one of those . . . things inside her?”
Nasira’s grin confirmed his suspicion.
Enough. He could only handle so much. He’d find a way to compartmentalize that later.
Bell finally dared to look at Haven, part of him already flinching from the pain he expected to see.
Beads of sweat glistened over her upper lip and brow. Her head was thrown back to expose the pale center of her delicate neck, the silver sheets bunched between her curled fingers. But her features were soft, her mouth unlined and parted, breathing gentle and slow. Dusky rose-gold eyelashes fluttered as if she dreamed.
He relaxed. Compared to her desperate condition earlier, she almost seemed like a different person.
“What did Stolas do to her?”
Nasira shrugged. “Fixed her.”
Translation: you don’t want to know the details. And he didn’t. Not right now, at least. It was yet another thing to mull over later, when his nerves didn’t feel like they’d been frayed with razor blades.
Wings fluttered high above as Bell leaned toward Haven, brushing a damp strand of hair from her forehead. “I’m sorry. You deserve so much better than what he did to you, but you’re the toughest person I know, and you will get through this.” He kissed her cheek, and she stirred.