A Shade of Vampire 81 A Bringer of Night - Bella Forrest Page 0,80
engraved object. From what we could tell, the Night Bringer had found the Beta elements after Spirit left him here. He’d possessed surviving wood nymphs to look around, and he’d made them carve his messages into each of the elements, complete with his most troubling and vivid memories.
“You know, Seeley got in touch a few hours ago,” I said. “He’s okay. He’s free. The Darklings had captured him. There’s a whole new level of weird going on over there.”
“That makes our mission all the more important,” Phantom replied.
“Yeah, the faster Death gets free, the faster we’ll be able to neutralize whatever threat Visio poses to our entire species. Plus, apparently Spirit had his fingers in that pie, as well,” I muttered. “Seeley didn’t give me any specific details, but I believe him. The living creatures there use death magic and ghouls.”
Morning sighed deeply. “I’m not surprised. Spirit was one conniving SOB. I never thought him capable of such awful things until he went ahead and did what he did to me.”
“Kelara!” Soul called out. “I think we found something.”
I turned to see that he and Phantom had pulled out a sturdy stone block, each side covered in carved symbols. “Are you sure that’s it?” I asked.
“It feels heavy. Emotionally speaking,” Widow said. “Even I can feel it.”
“Imagine how I’ll experience it,” I muttered, walking over to them.
As soon as I touched the top of the cube, the current blew through me as though lightning itself had turned me into a conduit. I blacked out listening to the sound of my own breathing. I heard Soul’s voice somewhere in the darkness, beckoning me to focus. To follow my instinct, because my instinct would do me no wrong.
My eyes peeled open, and I was suddenly assaulted by a powerful feeling of despair. I was a wood nymph again—a different one, who was watching her world die in real time. The sky had darkened, the sun swallowed by the reddish mist that had become a staple of Cruor. The trees were dying, their leaves turning gold, then brown, before forming a sad carpet at my feet.
The fruits fell from the orchards, blackened and rotten. Fish washed ashore along the riverside, their pale bellies facing the sky. Everything was dying. Life could no longer be sustained here. There was something in the air, in the ground, in the water. Something angry and toxic, unable to free itself, unable to do anything. Its impotence struck me hard as I felt its presence inside me. The Night Bringer had possessed this wood nymph, and he was seeing it all through her eyes.
I sensed his grief as well as hers.
Nymphs were dying, too. Some from the toxic water. Others from the poisonous fruit. Many were emaciated, barely able to stand. But they struggled to live on. They were determined to survive. My wood nymph toiled away at the stone cube, the urgency of her situation making my own blood boil. The Night Bringer was writing his message using her hands.
A bright white hole tore through the sky, and I froze at the sight of a strange ship emerging, surrounded by lightning and swirls of hot air. Its propellers spun, but not for long. Flames burst from the back, and the ship descended rapidly, leaving behind a trail of black smoke.
I watched it crash in the dying woods nearby. My carving was done, so I felt it was my duty to see who those people were and how they’d come here. The incandescent hole in the sky was closing up—in my mind, I knew what it was, though I did wonder how it had opened in the first place. Who’d opened it all the way up there? The witches had connected the Supernatural Dimension to Earth, but they typically opened up portals at ground level. This event was unusual, to say the least.
Rushing through the woods, I reached the crash site just in time to see a side door burst open. The ship had sunk into the ground, its metal frame bloated and deformed. Smoke rose from multiple fires, but it was the creature who slipped out of the vessel who caught my attention. She was a witch, her rich dark hair adorned with long black feathers. There were puncture marks on her neck and bare shoulders. Her skin was pale, her eyes sunken. She’d been bled nearly dry.
And now she was desperate to escape from the ship.