Page 20 of A Touch of Shadows

And it was calling her. Coming for her. She could feel its touch, like a single fingertip stroking the length of her spine. It sang, it murmured, it whispered.

All she had to do was stop pushing it away. All she had to do was let it in. It would give her everything, every pleasure, every delight. All the power she could imagine.

And as she was fighting, she felt his mind brush against hers. The man with the white hair.

He served the Nox. And he was powerful with its magic. Entwined with its power.

Her breath caught in her throat as she felt invisible fingers trace a line across her lips, as she felt his magic brush against hers. He knew where she was.

He was still behind, somewhere, the white-haired man with the fairest of faces. He had pulled back, the better to concentrate on reaching her through enchantment. His men pursued them, but he sat still and alone on the back of his white horse, in a shadow-dark glade, his eyes closed, his lips moving. She could picture him, reaching for her. He wanted her, needed her. His voice was a song of seduction as intimate as that of the shadows she had heard all her life.

No. He couldn’t have her. He wouldn’t have her.

She opened her eyes, trying to see over Finn’s leg, jostled back and forth like a sack of vegetables. His voice still urged Dancer on, a litany of encouragement, determined and desperate. Another kind of song.

And behind them, a wall of night was rising up through the forest.

Blacker than midnight, deeper than nightmares, consuming trees and horsemen alike. A great wave of shadows, ready to crest and crash down on them all, swallowing them whole.

No, she whispered, or tried to whisper, as she realised what this meant. But she didn’t have the air to make a sound.

Had she done that? How could she have done that?

She couldn’t drive it back on her own. She wasn’t strong enough, not without Elodie. There was no way she could stop it. Not when it contained all the shadows she had pulled out of the darkwood…

Dancer gave a terrible whinny of alarm. Even with the greatest training in the world and the most valiant heart, the stallion couldn’t fight its instincts. It reared up on its hind legs, tried to swing away while Finn fought for control. Something crashed into their backs, the darkness so solid that it flung them forward.

The ground dropped away as the force of magic pushed them over the edge of a ditch or a ravine, or the Aurum alone knew what. And, suddenly, they were all falling.

The forest floor slammed hard into her body and then Finn slammed into her as well.

Just as abruptly everything went still. Far too still.

Darkness rolled over them, silent and terrible, like a blanket above them, cutting them off from the rest of the world.

Dancer screamed, not in terror this time but in agony. The noise brought her to her senses so fast her stomach twisted in knots.

She knew that sound. Knew it, had nightmares about it, hated it. That was the sound of a creature dying, or so close to dying that there was no saving it.

Beside her, Finn moved, his body up and lurching towards the broken body of the stallion before she could do or say anything. She saw him lay his hand on the creature’s shivering skin, try to mouth soothing words, but fail. The knife he carried at his belt was in his hand and it flashed once, twice.

Everything went still again. Too still. Too quiet.

She slumped down into the wet mulch at the base of the ravine and heard only the sound of Finn’s ragged breath. It echoed around her. From the horse, there was no sound at all.

The fragments of the Nox all around her drank down the death. She felt it surround them both, absorbing Dancer’s demise like wine, as she desperately tried to push it back from the two of them. Felt it laugh at her feeble efforts. Then slowly it faded, back into the darkwood, back into the shadows, sated for now.

‘I’m sorry,’ Finn whispered, brokenly. Not to her. Those words weren’t meant for her ears. She felt like an interloper of the worst kind hearing them. ‘I had to. I just—I had to. I’m so sorry.’

Then he went quiet again, except for that ragged breath.

Wren pulled herself up on shaking hands, and crawled across the forest floor to him.

He’d put the horse out of its misery, but he’d loved Dancer. Every nerve of her being told her that. She reached out to comfort him. This was her fault, all her fault, and she had to?—

A sob broke from her lips when that sensation of hunger swept through her again.

She thought of the moment Finn had kissed her, his lips devouring hers, his mouth hot and ravenous, his hands on her skin. She wanted to tangle her hands in his hair and pull him to her and?—