The demon slid over the cottage, sweeping a lazy tongue over its teeth.
“It devoured you,” I said absently, looking to the Bringer for clarification.
“Yes—and no.” The Shadow Bringer’s lip curled in contempt. “If it had truly devoured my soul, we wouldn’t be here. Without a dreamer, the dream collapses.”
The demon yawned from atop the cottage ruin, spreading wide his jaws. From within, the boy screamed.
“Damn you,” the Bringer growled, surging from the ground. Had he his powers, a whorl of mist and shadows would be rising with him. Instead, he had only me. “Release him.”
“You are not of this dream. ” The demon blinked as he beheld us, inhaling a slow, scent-seeking breath through its nostril slits. “Or of this time. But you both have darkness within you. What is it you seek? ”
“I said to let him go,” the Bringer repeated. “He’s not yours to keep.”
“But he is ,” the demon rasped, dropping its head so that it was beholding its midsection. The skin there was smooth, motionless. No sign of life from within. “The dark is where he belongs. I am defending his birthright. His fate. ” It grinned, flicking its tongue as it slid toward us. “It is a symbiotic bond. As it is with all humans. But especially this one. And perhaps you as well. ”
“You’re wrong,” I said, standing my ground beside the Bringer. “Demons steal birthrights and destroy fates.” Angry tears burned at my eyes, reminding me of every twisted, Corrupted body I’d seen. Corrupt children, their lives broken forever. Men and women who would never experience a true, restful sleep. Lives ripped and torn apart before they could be fully experienced. “We will never share a bond with you.”
“Oh, but you already do, ” the demon purred. “This is the beginning of something glorious. ” It was close now, the arch of its skull touching the trees above us. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like to breathe your mortal air. ”
The Bringer motioned me closer.
“On my call, distract it,” he whispered.
“How , exactly?”
The demon rumbled on. “I want to wear your skin. Bleed your blood. ”
“Might I remind you that you ‘reduced a demon to nothing’?” The Bringer looked very much like he wanted to roll his eyes. For the sake of my dignity—or more likely his own—he didn’t. “Or so you claim. So just do as you did before in your brother’s dream.”
He was right. This wasn’t the time to cower. I had to be strong, somehow. I nodded grimly, biting the inside of my cheek.
“Soon I will know how it feels ,” the demon said, eyes glistening in ecstasy.
I felt the Bringer’s hands on my shoulders, a brief graze of cool fingertips. Then he shoved me forward—right in front of the demon—with what I swore was a chuckle. I spun back to yell something unkind, but he wasn’t there.
The demon fixed its red eyes on me, saliva dripping from its teeth.
“Your skin is soft. Your blood is fragrant. I think I prefer you to the child inside me. ”
Shivering in disgust, I lifted my sword in front of me. It glistened with life, even in the murky half-light, and the demon beheld it, considering its level of threat.
“You won’t take either of us, demon.”
“Come here, girl. A truth for one of your teeth. ”
The demon moved to attack, handling its body with startling speed and flexibility. As it slid, bones began to grow out from its back, forming into the shape of six arms. Arms edged in long, brutal claws. I lurched sideways, trying to dodge, but I was too slow—a claw caught my side, ripping my tunic and the skin above my ribs. I crashed into a tree at the force of it, gasping as I worked to catch my breath.
How could I heal myself? Was the process the same as other things—making a glass of wine or a coat lined in velvet? The injury throbbed, dripping wet down my ribs. I tried to focus on its pain, its length, its shape—but the demon moved again, fast, too fast, striking me down a second time.
The demon dipped its head, considering me. “You fascinate me, dreamer. Fragrant indeed is your blood. How might I spill it more? Let us see. ”
A flash of something dark and quick caught my eye—the Shadow Bringer, under one of the demon’s arms. He had become a shadow, a ghost, a memory, silently threading something around the demon’s arms, spine, and head. Something thin, hair-like.
Threads of shadow, spiraling out from the Bringer’s hands as he wove them tight.
Was he planning to bind the demon, somehow?
I gritted my teeth against the pain blooming in my side, determined to do what the Bringer had demanded. Distract it . I struggled to my feet, meeting the demon’s gaze. “You’re stronger,” I ground out, holding my bleeding side. “How did you manage to grow all those arms?”
“I am fed by the one who sustains me. I am made strong by his blood, his bones, and his darkness. ”
My stomach churned in response.
How many children perished in the bellies of demons? How many rotted into Corruption there, believing every lie that their cursed dreams fed to them? Gently, meagerly, light began to unfurl from my sword. I focused on growing the blade’s light, letting my anger and desperation fuel its strength, and imagined that the light could move, quick as a whip and as fluid as the wind.
The demon chuckled. “Bind me, bind the boy. Kill me, kill the boy.”
At the demon’s threat, I hesitated.
What if the demon was right and I did hurt—or kill, even—the boy? Would the Shadow Bringer die too, then? Demons were masters of lies and half-truths. Still, it seemed possible. After all, Corruption bound a demon, physically and mentally, to its chosen human. Maybe that truly was the dark reality of it all; that to kill a demon, its human must be killed, too.
There was no salvation without death, similar to the Light Bringer’s creed.
“You may join him, if you would prefer, ” the demon rumbled. “I can arrange it. Or do you prefer that which you cannot have? The older male—the chosen, the damned?”
I glanced toward where I thought the Bringer stood, but he was nowhere to be seen. I had tried to be brave, tried to play the hero, but fear threatened to crumble it all. The demon was a monster—a monster .
“Let him go,” I said, my voice fiercer than I expected it to be. “What do you want from us?’
“I will make you a bargain. The boy’s soul for yours. ” The demon made to taste a blood-tipped claw, its face bright with triumph, but its arm jerked to a stop before it could. Bound by the Shadow Bringer’s threads, the demon couldn’t move. It roared, struggling mightily against the bindings even as they cut deep into its skin. “Cursed dreamers—what is this? ”
The Shadow Bringer burst from the forest, using his patchwork of threads to climb the demon’s back. As he climbed, he sent a breath of shadow into the demon’s red, smoking eyes, blinding it. The demon roared again, and quickly, wildly, the pond began to rise. Its scum lapped against my feet, ankles, shins—the Bringer finished his climb, making to wrench one of the demon’s horns from its head.
And the horn broke free.
The demon hissed, thrashing in its blindness—it caught the Shadow Bringer off guard, and he fell, crashing through his threads, snapping them. He cursed, making to grab a thread, a bone, a horn—but they slipped from his hands, just as the demon broke free an arm.
It happened fast.
The demon threw its arm into the Bringer, slamming him into the pond-soaked earth. I expected him to rise immediately—to shrug off the demon’s arm that pinned him underwater—but the demon persisted, leaning its weight into his back as he drowned. I ran forward, raising my sword just as the demon grabbed for its fallen horn. Hissing, growling, grinning , it drove the horn down, stabbing clean through the Bringer’s armor and piercing through his chest.
“No! ” I screamed, shuddering in agony.
It was as if the horn was in my chest. I couldn’t see the Bringer, couldn’t see if he was moving—only dark, bloody water, pooling from where he was pinned.
The demon turned. Its vision had been restored; hatred burned in its eyes.
“Now it is your turn, ” it said simply, just as its bindings dissolved.
It rocked forward, widening its mouth into a colossal, endless hole. I couldn’t move—mud clung to my legs, rising up with the water. Frantically, I lifted my sword, desperately calling to its light—too late.
The demon brought its jaws over my body.
