Chapter Text
PROLOGUE
I’ve been here before.
This scene playing out in front of me is so familiar that I can no longer discern if I am just a token on the board or the conductor of the game.
In the dark of night, a village burns, people scream, and the venin feast. There’s no one to stop them. There’s no one to stop us. There’s no one left to stop me.
I’ve gorged myself enough on the earth that the always maddening need for more doesn’t have me draining the life from the few civilians who dare to run past me to safety. I let them go. Their power should appeal to me but I’ve experienced energy far more exquisite.
At least, that’s what I seem to remember in my dreams. Heat and desire and magnificence so raw I awaken wondering how the hell I haven’t been blistered from sheer proximity. The sheen of sweat, my pounding heart, and an inexplicable ache linger long after the images fade leaving me wondering if any of it had ever been real.
Wings flap low overhead and I look up just as the large silhouette emerges through the ashy clouds above before gliding into another column of smoke billowing out of the smoldering ruins on my right. Wood snaps and a sharp crack echoes across the town square, announcing the demise of the remaining frame right before it collapses into a frenzy of sparks and embers.
Five figures burst from the shadows, their terror like a beacon in the gloom. My fingers curl in anticipation of the hunt when a soot-covered man scampers so near I wonder if bravery or panic steers his path, but something soft and ethereal stays my hand.
I say ethereal because when my eyes dart to my hand, there’s nothing there. Only emptiness and night air until a silky sensation threads its way between my fingers again, shifting my hardened scowl to utter uncertainty.
If I’m losing my grip on my sanity, maybe I’m not as satiated as I let myself believe. It’s an unnerving thought, one I don’t want to contemplate too long in the middle of a raid. Unfortunately, the decision is not solely up to me
“Why limit yourself?” Berwyn snarls, halting the pounding footsteps that raced by with a flick of his wrist. I don’t even turn to confirm the reason for their sudden disappearance from my eardrums and the ensuing silence thereafter; body husks don’t exactly hit the ground with a resounding thud.
Stolen power rises in him along with his ire. His eyes glow red, sated veins pulsing outward in fed ecstasy. The pull of it makes my mouth water, my throat ache, my head war with itself to slake the never-ending thirst.
Another civilian bolts by, willing to take a desperate risk passing the two dark wielders supposedly in a tense standoff rather than yielding to the inescapable wall of flame that was once her home. Berwyn lets the sobbing young woman live only to see if I can be tempted by her thrumming life force once more.
I turn my head to watch her flee, the fear in her eyes singing to the soulless part of me even as the ends of her unbound brown hair gleam golden in the flickering firelight whispering to a part of me that isn’t quite dead. My body begs me to chase her down, imagines the tantalizing elixir flowing in her veins, but my mind stalls as if there’s some sort of disconnect between its authority over my muscles, and for a bewildering moment, I feel bizarrely proud of my hesitation.
A pride Berwyn clearly does not share when he stalks towards me, all enraged edges and vicious sneers.
“Why do you limit yourself?!” he screeches in my face, his sickly-sweet breath invading my nostrils and permeating the fog spreading soothingly along my skull. Somehow, I manage not to flinch.
“I don’t know,” I hear myself reply in a voice that sounds almost bored even though my confusion is anything but. I don’t know why I stand rooted to the spot, unable to strip the power from every moving thing about me when the ravenous demand for it damn near borders on painful. I can’t understand the mystifying immobility of my limbs or why I’m suddenly capable of infinite control while simultaneously on the brink of losing all semblance of it.
I’ve already accepted that I’m broken beyond recognition or redemption so its incomprehensible how I’m still able to feel the agony of being torn in two. In these moments, I don’t understand what’s happening…
“Yes, you do.”
My breath seizes in my lungs, and my vision narrows until the burning inferno around me and the prowling venin before me fades away. Darkness rushes for me like a swarm of my own shadows but I’m not falling into the oblivion as much as I am floating in it. Cool air surrounds me, dowsing the ever-present angry craving beneath my skin, and for a moment, I can think clearly, yet all I want to do is listen.
I’ve heard this angelic voice before.
“Yes, you have.”
Someone is yelling on the other side of the veil draped like a caress over my mind but I pay it no heed as I strain to hear what further words the enchantress might gift me.
“I’ll keep talking as long as you keep listening.”
My heart stumbles over itself to ink that deal in my own blood, and she laughs—not unkindly—at my eagerness to comply. It’s the most heavenly sound I think I’ve ever heard.
“I’ll do whatever you ask as long as you stay,” I mentally reply, not even caring if it comes out more like begging. I’ll fall on my knees to keep hold of this tether if that’s what she wants. I’ll stand immobile as a statue until I desiccate into nothing and the winds claim whatever remains of my body and soul as long as she doesn’t leave. I’m hers to be used however she sees fit and…
"Noooooo!"
Pain lances through my shoulder and I’m falling to my knees but not at her behest. The acrid tang of smoke floods my lungs and the sweltering heat of my current hell chases away the momentary reprieve of my temporary paradise.
It's not a fatal wound—I’m far too valuable for him to toss away—but enough of a reminder to the both of us that he still holds the most control.
“Well done,” Berwyn croons, but his praise has me stiffening for a reason I can’t explain. The dagger he plunged beneath my collarbone tilts my head skyward, the smooth metal pressed to my chin still slippery in the sheath of my blood as he locks his reddened eyes onto mine with a rabid glee. When he speaks again, it’s not to me, and an icy dread sluices through every one of my saturated veins.
“You’re getting stronger, Violet.”