killing arc, her sword cutting the air in two as she drew a slanting path.
Dom narrowed his focus to the corpses and Corayne, keeping both at the edge of his perception. With
the girl behind him and the creatures ahead, he took lunging steps, his sword twisted in both hands,
flashing with the weight of starlight. He drove through the first creature, hefting his blade like a
woodsman’s ax. It cut the corpse in half, severing the body at the waist with the ease of steel through
water.
Were they always so frail? he thought, turning on his heel to chop down another.
Despite her training as an assassin, Sarn stumbled next to him, nearly losing her balance as her sword
passed through an Ashlander. She bit out a cry of bewilderment, stopping to watch the corpse soldier.
Dom did the same, and hardly believed his eyes.
Instead of cutting the Ashlander from shoulder to hip, cleaving through flesh, her sword moved as if
through mist. The edges of the creature curled from the blade in wisps of white, black, and a shock of
ghostly blue. The rest faded like the smoke of a snuffed candle, trailing into nothing.
Sarn did not react, her focus snapping to the next Ashlander, and the next, still coming through the trees.
They were faster now, lunging, spurred to action by her strike. She never lost her balance again.
Dom balked, looking back at the two he had already dispatched. But instead of bodies, there was only
smoke curling on the ground, disappearing into the grass.
Corayne gaped, slack-jawed, at the sight.
One roared a tortured scream, the voice inhuman, and Dom reacted with blurring speed, raising his
sword to parry a cursed blow. Instead his blade passed through the ruined iron of corpse armor, and
another Ashlander gave over to nothing.
The others did the same, fleeing before every strike. Their own weapons turned to dust against steel,
until there was nothing in the clearing but the trio and the drifting smell of flame.
In the trees, the horses continued to doze.
Dom spun in a circle, searching for more. Searching for the trick. He expected Taristan to fall on them,
expected the wizard to rain lightning. He thought he heard the bell again, tolling for the temple and the
fallen. But there was nothing but the breeze in the cypress. His breath came hard and heavy, not from
exertion, but from pure bewilderment.
Corayne fell bodily to the ground, her face bone white.
Before Dom could reach her, Sarn blocked his path. The scorpion on her neck looked poised to strike.
“What the fuck was that?” she growled.
The world wheeled around him.
Dom opened his mouth to answer, and vomited rabbit liver in reply.
10
JYDI CHARMS
Corayne
She blinked, the air warm again, her blood running hot, the grass smooth between her fingers. The fear
was paralyzing, and she searched against the darkness, hunting for another walking corpse.
This is your fate.
The strange voice rang her skull like a bell. Corayne winced as the words cracked and splintered, flowed
and coiled. It was human but not, something more, something less. And so cold, leaving her skin
prickling.
It does not wait, the voice continued, fading without echo, barely leaving behind a memory.
The white-faced demons were gone too. The smell of smoke and burned flesh disappeared with their
forms.
A dream. They’re getting worse, she thought, her lips parting. She gulped down a bracing breath of air. I
was asleep, and I dreamed of those creatures, red and terrible, broken and hungry.
But there was Dom, doubled over, spitting into the grass. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand,
his face nearly as white as the creatures. Sorasa grimaced at him, disgusted, her sword in hand, her
body still tensed to fight. She glanced at Corayne and her gaze was hard.
Not a dream.
“Calm yourself,” the assassin said sharply. “Breathe slowly through your nose, then out through your
mouth. You too,” she added, rapping Dom with the flat of her sword. He glared and spat again.
Corayne did as she was told, sucking in air.
Not a dream.
The leaping sensation in her gut began to ebb, leaving behind cold truth.
Not a dream.
“That’s what came from the Spindle,” Corayne said aloud. With a will, she pushed herself to her feet, her
legs quivering beneath her. “That’s what you fought at the temple. With my father.”
Dom straightened. “It is as I said before.” His face turned more grim, if that was even possible. “They are
of the Ashlands, a burned realm, cracked with Asunder, consumed by the
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