“Nothing destroys like greed, not even war.”

  ― Herman Melville

  Chapter 3: Fracture

  Insanely, like the nonsense of a fever-dream, it was Gabriel.

  Gabriel, the useless, spineless leech Claire had wasted a year on. The guy who’d stumbled into our lives, reeking of cheap beer and cheaper excuses, whining about the perpetual drama of his life while she carried him like a second shadow.

  I’d never liked him. That oily little smile, the way he’d talk over her like he owned her, the way she’d forgive him every time he fucked up. He was one of life’s losers, the kind who sucked everyone around him into his misery.

  Coasting on his superficial charm, that unerring instinct for pity that he played to the hilt.

  She’d dumped him months ago, thank God - but here he was, standing over her body. His hands black with her blood.

  The Mark on his arm didn’t make him look noble. It made him look like a parasite, one that’d finally latched onto something bigger than his pathetic life.

  My stomach churned, bile rising as the pieces clicked into place.

  Gabriel, Chosen? The failure, the sad-sack who used his brother as his excuse for everything wrong with his life? The universe had to be laughing.

  This had to be a cruel, sick joke at her expense. At mine.

  He’d always been a nobody, a hanger-on feeding off her light. And now he’d snuffed it out, with that damn knife.

  The fever in his eyes wasn’t purpose. It was madness: the same selfish desperation I’d always sensed in him, brought to a boil.

  Even a worm can turn, as they say.

  Well, he’d sensed his chance. Seized it.

  -and murdered Claire.

  For a heartbeat, time stopped. Then it exploded.

  “You-” My voice was a soft, strangled whisper, every breath sawing at my throat. “You did this-”

  Gabriel’s lips twitched, a ghost of a smirk or maybe just a tic. “I had to,” he said, his tone hollow, detached, like he was reciting a fact. “-I had to.”

  Like he was pleading for me to understand.

  Like saying it would make it true.

  The knife gleamed as he shifted his grip. There was something strangely familiar about it: With a sick lurch, I recognized the chipped handle, the slight curve of the blade - It was our knife, the one Claire and I used to slice onions, carve meat.

  Seeing it in his hand, my sister’s blood running from the edge…it was grotesque. Just thinking of what he’d done with it felt obscene, almost unreal.

  An invisible vise clenched around my chest. My pulse hammered faster, faster, in my ears, the blood thundering in my skull.

  “Don’t,” Gabriel said, hoarsely, tight but controlled. The knife came up, like a talisman, the point swaying in his shaking hand.

  “Don’t make me do this. I don’t want to-”

  The words died half-formed, caught in his throat. He swallowed, slackly, his Adam’s apple bobbing: I glimpse the tiny half-moons of blood beneath his nails, red as rust.

  It was too dark here. Too dark everywhere: thick and blinding, choking like the black clouds that churned beneath the red sky.

  “You killed her,” I said, wonderingly. “-You killed my sister.”

  He flinched, like I’d struck him. Gabriel’s jaw tightened, some unknowable emotion flickering across his face - Anguish? Regret?

  But only for a moment. In the gloom, it was impossible to tell - for there was no light, none at all, except the cold, sickly fire that burned in my heart.

  “I didn’t want this,” he said, low. Almost to himself. “It was - it was for Justin. I had no choice, don’t you see? It was the only way.”

  And I thought, blankly: Your brother?

  Why would I give a shit?

  He was still talking. Inching toward me, one shuffling step at a time. Then, and only then, did I realize that I was between him and the door. I couldn’t take my eyes off the soft amber glow of the Mark, burning with the surreal light of distant suns.

  The Mark he’d killed for.

  He murdered my sister.

  My head pounded, as though wasps were hatching inside my brain. As though my skull was cracking open. I could feel the howl welling up inside me, behind my locked teeth - Felt my fists clench, until my nails sliced into my palms.

  His eyes narrowed, the last traces of hesitation evaporating. His knuckles had gone white against the knife’s hilt, steadying the blade: I could sense the calculation in his gaze, a quiet implacability stealing across his features-

  “-Get out of my way.”

  It was a snarl, low and sibilant. A flinty, rasping growl.

  I knew, right then, that Gabriel had made up his mind. He would kill me, if I gave him the excuse. He would do it with the naturalness of an animal, for his infinite meanness allowed for nothing else.

  “All right,” I said, though each word tasted like bile. “-all right.”

  I willed my legs to move, though they seemed frozen. Took a single, lurching step to the side, away from the door.

  To Gabriel’s left, towards his empty hand.

  Towards the Mark and its honeyed glow.

  Relief bloomed across his face, stark in its intensity. I saw his shoulders straighten, like some invisible weight had lifted. He smiled - actually smiled - a sick, guilty ghost of a grin, as if it was all water under the bridge.

  As if he couldn’t wait to leave it all behind him.

  That was his way, you see. The infinite meanness of his person. He knew he’d gotten away with it: His mind already a million miles away, whirling through a cascading flutter of plans and fantasies.

  He was still smiling when I crashed into him, fists swinging.

  I had no plan, none at all. All I could think - the only thing I could think of - was of how Claire must have felt, as the knife plunged into her over and over again.

  Yes, I hated him. Yes, I felt a volcanic surge of fury from the base of my spine, thundering in my pulse as the red mist descended.

  But mostly, what I felt was shame. Shame, that I’d let this happen.

  That I hadn’t been there-

  Gabriel had a moment, just a moment, to react. I don’t think he expected me to actually do it, to launch myself at him - You never think something like that is going to happen, until it does.

  But even a rat will bite, if cornered. If driven to extremity.

  The top of my head slammed into the side of his jaw, hard enough to shoot stars into my vision. My arms tangled with his, and we slammed into the wall hard enough to crack the plaster. I heard his shout of incoherent surprise, the blurted gasp of an expletive-

  Wood splintered, as we slammed into the room’s sole table. It went down in splinters, and the edges of it crashing into Gabriel’s back had to have hurt: I heard the breath chuff from his lungs, saw his eyes go wide…

  And then we hit the ground, clawing and tearing.

  I was lucky. I landed on top. I had my forearm jammed against his throat, as I smashed my fist into his face - I heard the crunch of cartilage, a sick jolt of pain shooting through my hand at the impact.

  “Stop-”

  I hit him over and over again, slamming Gabriel’s head back into the tiles. Abruptly, there was blood on my knuckles, all over his face, in my mouth-

  His knee crashed into my side, hard. Not hard enough to dislodge me, but I saw those green eyes go from glazed to focused as he snarled up at me through a mouthful of blood-stained teeth.

  “-fucker-”

  The knife flashed, at the corner of my eye. I grabbed at his wrist, but I was slow, too slow to do anything about it. The tip gouged my arm, a red flare of pain - I felt the flesh part, felt the sickening awareness that can only come with being cut, the liquid heat pattering down.

  Gabriel’s elbow exploded into my face. The impact was stunning: I reeled back, eyes watering, fireworks going off in my skull. For a moment, I couldn’t see: It felt like my nose was broken, teeth jarred loose in my jaw.

  I heard the knife hiss, as it cut the air. Blind, fumbling, I got my hands up - I felt a cold line of fire bite into my fingers, hard enough to grate on bone. The pain was sickening, nauseating: I retched, gastric acid burning the back of my throat, stringy vomit dribbling down my chin.

  God, it hurt, it hurt, it hur-

  He hit me again, across the side of the head, and I went down. I couldn’t seem to move my arms and legs: There was a roaring in my ears, my tongue moving thickly in my mouth as I tried to remember how to breathe.

  Through a haze, I heard Gabriel wheezing as he staggered to his feet. As my vision swam back into focus, I glimpsed his tottering figure, felt the brief contact as he stumbled past me-

  All of a sudden, I was tired. Dreadfully tired. But I couldn’t let him get away.

  I grabbed his leg, with both hands. Pulled, hard - He fell on his face, hard enough to drive the air from his lungs. I heard the crash of breaking glass as he dragged the cup rack down with him, grunted as a shard sliced my cheek.

  The knife, I thought. Get the knife-

  I lay there, for a moment, gathering whatever strength was left. Jagged lengths of wood lay all around, fragments from the shattered table - Stretching, straining, I grabbed hold of one, pulled it towards me. Closed the fingers of my good hand, skinned knuckles and all, around it.

  It felt good in my hand. Heavy.

  Gabriel was trying to get up. He’d hit the ground harder than I thought, but he had his hands under him, and he was less hurt than I was.

  “Kill you-”

  I flailed at him, fumbling with my arm. Half-pulling, half-dragging. Ears ringing, the world swinging madly. I hit him in the back, heard him yowl, did it again.

  He kicked me, legs flailing. Shoulder, arm, face - Hard enough to snap my head back. I nearly went over, but fell forward instead. My limbs felt like rubber, but I tottered up anyway: Getting to my feet was impossible, but I made it to my knees.

  Gabriel was rolling over, his hair matted with blood. His eyes had screwed up to furious slits - He got a hand up, my next blow rebounding from his arm with a dull thud. He was wheezing, but he lashed out all the same. Punched me in the side with his other hand, the impact curiously muted.

  A hard punch, right in the ribs-

  The dizzy world pitched, slid askew. All of a sudden, I couldn’t seem to breathe - There was something cold in my side, a terrible, bone-deep chill that spread through my whole body.

  There was an absurd amount of blood on my clothes, on my hands, on my…

  “Told you,” Gabriel croaked. He coughed a wad of blood out of his throat, face paler than a ghost’s. There was a terrible fascination in his eyes - A kind of morbid revulsion, one that stole all power of motion from him.

  “Told you. Stupid bastard - Made me do it…”

  His knife was buried deep in my side.

  It’s a strange thing, to realize that you’ve been stabbed. To see the hilt protruding from your ribs, like it’d been nailed there.

  To realize that this is forever.

  I wasted a moment gaping, bleak disbelief coursing through me in a sick ripple.

  No, I thought. No, no, no-

  But it was too late, I knew. Too late for anything.

  All I saw was red, and the blade sticking from my side, and red. And that was where the tip was - Right in there, right inside of me, and red.

  The first wave of pain hit me, then. Slow in its spreading, as the first clouds of blackness bloomed behind my eyes. Even with the adrenaline pumping, I knew - right then - that there was worse yet to come.

  Jesus, I never thought it could hurt like this-

  Gabriel was staring, in silent horror. Less perpetrator and more witness, like he’d merely watched it happen. Like he couldn’t believe what he’d done, that it was happening again, right in front of him.

  My final, short-armed swing took him across the top of the ear, half an inch below his hairline. Already, my vision was fading in and out, but it didn’t matter - He never saw it coming.

  There was a dull crunch of bone, and Gabriel dropped as if pole-axed. His eyes were still open, still staring, as he fell with the final and profound stillness of a child going to sleep.

  I fell, too.

  Small mercies - I landed on my unwounded side, even as I began the swift and involuntary process of bleeding to death. The impact jarred the splintered club from my hand: It bounced, rolled like a child’s toy, forever out of reach.

  Silence loomed.

  The pain came again, sharper, but was colder now. Too cold, for this time of the year. I thought it would hurt more, but everything was numb, really: Numb except for my hands, my feet, my aching side.

  I remembered-

  “-Is it that cold over there?” Claire was saying, as Mom fussed with her coat. At this time of the evening, the airport was bustling - Everything gleamed, the white noise of arrivals and departures and announcements a constant background chorus.

  “Claire, it’s America. Everywhere is cold,” Mom said, fond but exasperated. With a start, I realized how careworn she looked, how much she must’ve fretted over this parting: She brushed dust from my sister’s lapels, with the care reserved for a priceless package.

  “-Be careful over there,” she said, at last, satisfied by her brief appraisal. “Remember, don’t stay out too late. Don’t eat out too much. Make sure you…”

  I stood to the side, with Dad. He looked stiff and pale in his black turtleneck - Only now, in the vastness of the airport, was I aware of how gaunt he’d become.

  He put his hand on my shoulder. Over the years, the skin had thinned, enough for me to see the veins through it, but there was still a quiet strength in his grip.

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  “Take care of your sister,” he said, with a faint smile. “You’re all she has, Daren.”

  But I’m no good, I wanted to tell him. I couldn’t help her, Dad.

  His hand grew warmer as his grip firmed, hot enough to scorch my skin-

  With a gasp, I swam back up into the world of light.

  My shoulder ached. Burned, like a hot iron had been pressed against my flesh. It took almost everything I had left, but I dragged my gaze down-

  Red light shone through my shirt. A smoldering, angry glow - Crimson, like a furnace banked low.

  The Mark.

  I had the Mark, now. Too late, far too late, for it to make a difference.

  I tried to focus, to make it resolve out of the gloom: Something about it looked wrong, somehow, jagged and splintered where it’d once been whole. I would have reached for it, if I could, but I couldn’t move my hands.

  But it didn’t matter, not now. Not any more.

  I tried to raise my head, to look for Claire, but it was too heavy to lift. I couldn’t imagine how afraid she’d been, how much she must’ve suffered-

  I’m sorry, I wanted to say. I’m sorry, Claire.

  I was an awful brother.

  I never did anything for you, not even once.

  I wish-

  Darkness, again. This time, the light was slow in returning: I must have moved, because if I tried - if I really tried - I could make out a faint, golden glow from somewhere close-by.

  A low rattle. A slow, ragged susurration.

  Breath, hissing from a body soon to be dead.

  Something about that…

  -felt wrong-

  The heat was spreading, from the Mark. Beneath my skin, through my body. It was starting to hurt, hurt terribly, as pressure folded around me - Round my shoulders, across my chest, pressing down. I tried to kick, to thrash, but all I managed was a kind of gurgle.

  What’s…happening…?

  It was getting brighter, now. Everything was going blurry, sound and light digging into my aching skull. Pain stabbed through me, my torn stomach heaving, like fingers of fire against my flesh-

  Clarity came, from somewhere.

  Oh God, this is it - I’m dying, I’m dying, and…

  The horrible cold was gone, replaced by a terrible warmth. Waves of it, fever-hot, febrile - It was pulsing through every corner of my body, and it would not stop.

  -Am I…?

  It felt like I was boiling from within. Like I was burning up.

  I don’t want to die, I thought. I don’t-

  Then come to Me.

  Furnace light flared. I heard the voice, heard it echo, but knew that it had spoken inside my skull, to me and me alone. It was deep, like the sound of distant thunder - Every syllable freighted with a weight, a meaning, I couldn’t comprehend.

  It vibrated through my bones, settling into my chest with an unbearable pressure.

  Pulling me closer to something I couldn’t see, but that I knew was waiting.

  It wasn’t just a voice: It was a command, a beckoning.

  A summons.

  Come to Me.

  I tried to scream, but no sound emerged, only a dry rasp. My body felt foreign now, nothing but a vessel of heat and strange, pulsing energy. Every breath was a struggle, my lungs fighting against the scorching air, yet the force was inexorable.

  I am your salvation.

  Pulling me. Drawing me closer to whatever this was.

  Do not resist.

  Bloody light flared, and pain flooded me. I was falling without moving, the blood-spattered apartment a circle shrinking above me as I plunged down and down. Every piece of flesh in my body felt as though it were cooking, my nerves singing as the sinew charred-

  The voice, the force behind it, seemed to know my thoughts before they even formed. It hummed in the back of my mind, a soft, insistent pressure, and then the words came again:

  There is so much that you could be.

  What choice did I have? I didn’t want to die.

  Yield to Me, and live.

  I felt the presence rise in me, around me. All-consuming. Inexorable.

  Roaring light spilled forth from the Mark, and the furnace fire poured into me.

  Flames twisted around me, swept me forward. They billowed around me like a tempest, like a storm. I felt light, made of paper - My fingertips beginning to tingle, beginning to glow, as I brightened from the outside-in.

  The fire was in my blood, now. The black specks in my failing vision smoldered with the sullen heat of embers, of coals banked back to life.

  Like ash, turned back into flame. I felt them rising around me: From my arms, my chest, and legs and my feet. So much mass escaping, it seemed impossible that any might be left behind.

  For one delirious moment, it felt like the very atoms of my being were flying apart, ablating into incandescent mist.

  If this is death, I thought, then let it be over.

  Please - please - don’t let me burn.

  I had never imagined how profound it could be - Pleading for mercy, from something you could not stop.

  But then the world fell away, and the stars began to tumble past like snow. A blizzard of them, raising deep and silent drifts of stellar motes.

  I saw-

  It began with wrath and ruin.

  It ended with betrayal.

  On the last battlefield, three armies met. The Ullan hordes, clad in leather and bronze, the skulls of the hallowed fallen raised high on tribal standards. Sounding the call on trumpets of brass, screaming with the joy of battle.

  Running, with weapons of iron and fire in their hands. Less an army, and more a wave driven by fury. The People of War, the sons of the Hundred-Handed, doing what they had been born to do.

  Cinders scattering, badged with boiling blood, they charged down, down into the great mass of the Twisted. Only a warrior who dreamed of his own death would make such a charge, but they were the blessed of the god of war and iron, and they lived only for the certainty of death and the song of slaughter.

  The army of the Wrack rose to meet them. The Twisted were awful things, wretched and warped - Skin stretched and splayed over pulsing slabs of muscle, mutated limbs become thick and branching from years of racing, virile corruption.

  Arms that ended in flapping tentacles, in snapping claws, in groups of hands, around legs that ended in hooves, in vast splaying roots of flesh, in circular pods with a hundred cilia waving in some unknowable pattern.

  Necks topped with overgrown insect heads, with ape-heads, with beast-heads, heads with lizard skin, with eight arachnid eyes, with skulls crushed and whole. An impossible number of once-men with impossible forms.

  The Apostles of the Wrack led them, descending like angels of slaughter. Vile, ablaze with hellsmoke and noxious power.

  Veylith the Whisperer of Doubt, cloaked in lies.

  Korzod the Chainbearer, driving his slaves before his suppurating form.

  Sythera the Weepmaiden, the damned writhing around her like a mournful shroud.

  Proud Lyrak and his palanquins, and here Zethira the Blightmother, and here Morvath and his mighty host. Ever-changing Xyrloth, and iron-souled Drenvok, and Chronath, the Many-who-is-One.

  Elemortis the storming ruin, and Nekros upon his pale steed, and Oblivion, Enemy of All.

  So many. Too many.

  The charge hit home, shuddering, vibrating through ground and air. Man against once-man: Pressing the assault, driving unbelievable fury into the enemy’s ribs. Blades cleaved Twisted flesh, shields taking punishment in turn, ichor and blood mingling on the blasted earth.

  The Ullan would die, but they would die in the name of victory. They fought to hold the enemy tide in place, to pin it with their fury - Until the Knights of the Eclipse, those who rode beneath the sun-and-moon banner of Anhura, could deliver the axe-blow.

  The rumble of hooves shook the fire-dried earth. Eight hundred knights plunged from the smoke, their lances like needles of light. They were tremendous to behold, silver-white plate polished to a mirror finish, laurel garlands adorning the gold symbols of their illustrious order.

  Their thundering steeds ploughed into the enemy, and annihilated them. The horrors of the Wrack fell before them, trampled beneath their plunging steeds. Lances juddered as they tore through bodies, proud riders churning forward through the screaming, milling mass of the damned.

  The Silver Guard followed in their wake. Five thousand men in serried ranks, great shields at the ready. Javelins flurrying forth into the scrambling press of Twisted and Wrack-spawn, blades slicing and chopping into corrupt flesh.

  Caught between the anvil of the Ullan and the hammer of the Goddess’s legions, great slaughter descended upon the foe. The unholy host of the Wrack dwindled, and then disintegrated - The Apostles fleeing the field, like shadows chased by the rising sun. They would trouble Endoria no more, for the age to come.

  The People of War cried out in salute, raising their voices to welcome the riders of Minerva. Their alliance had been a desperate one, forged from necessity: A meeting of iron discipline and feral valor, a last bastion against the all-consuming horror of the Wrack.

  Together, they had consigned to death every monster, ever wretched once-mortal and warped beast that dared to face them. The army of darkness had been broken, in one solid, brutal clash - the earth piled six or seven deep with the enemy dead, stacked high with stinking slopes and mounds of carrion.

  The Ullan were still cheering, still rejoicing with the first flush of victory, when the Knights of the Eclipse fell upon them.

  There was no warning, none at all. Just the great surge of mounted riders, then the cataclysmic impact of iron-shod hooves and iron-tipped lances. Men wailed in horror, in disbelief, in terror, as their once-allies cleaved into them - Tribesman after tribesman hacked down like beasts, murdered as they turned to flee.

  As men turned to run, they were brought down by arrows or javelins. Lancers broke through melees to ride them down. A few masses of resistance remained, where defiant warriors had closed in tight: But before the relentless assault of the Silver Guard, their banners toppled and fell like stalks of wheat beneath the reaper’s scythe.

  I saw it all.

  Saw Aldric, King-of-Tribes, the last to fall. Staggering from his wounds, slashing and stabbing with his broken sword, his armor wet and gleaming with blood. Felt the weight of his despair, his helpless and all-consuming fury.

  I felt the final blow land, the blade cleaving through the back of his helm. Saw the trampled earth rushing up to meet his face, more blows raining down on his unguarded back. Felt his limbs going numb, without feeling, as the black sword - marked with god-runes - fell from his hands.

  I don’t understand, I don’t-

  I saw the world through blood, and then only blood.

  And I woke up.

  It was not a gentle awakening.

  I coughed, and realized I was alive. I opened my eyes to blurry darkness, the gritty, bitter taste of ash-dust in my mouth. My throat was as dry as a desert on fire, a perched heaviness on my tongue.

  My shoulder was agony, but the cold, sick pain in my side was gone.

  Stabbed. I’d been stabbed - Hadn’t I…?

  Strange sounds. A whispering, rasping surrusation, like the clatter of ancient bones…

  I tried to move, groaning at the effort. As sense returned, I felt the uneven ground beneath me, fingers dragging furrows through the powdery silt. My head was pounding, pounding, as I sat up - Still half-blind, as I fumbled at my side.

  Nothing. No knife. Just smooth, unrumpled flesh.

  How…?

  Flamelight flared, settled down to a flickering glow. Startled, I jerked my hand away - Only to realize that the glow came from me.

  The Mark. It shone with an unsteady, fitful radiance: Pulsing with lurid crimson light, as if in time to my heart. The sight of it, glowing against my skin…It drew a low hiss of disbelief from me, a giddy kind of wonder-

  And then I remembered.

  The wincing shame hit me then, as - slowly, so slowly - I struggled to my feet. Claire. Gabriel, that bastard, and what we’d done to each other.

  But that meant-

  I looked up, peering through the gloom.

  Above, the sky hung heavy and starless. Threads of wan moonlight filtered down through ash-clouds, through a shroud of perpetual night. It cast the forest in a murky gloom, with just enough light to see the darkness by.

  Jesus, I thought, my head aching. What is this?

  I was in some autumnal place, surrounded by a labyrinth of thorn-wood. Trees stripped bare of leaves, their branches twisted into a thicket of spikes and claws. Their blackened, skeletal forms stretched endlessly in all directions, interlocking like bony fingers.

  The air smelled like the aftermath of a fire. Everything looked scorched - the chill of the air bit at me, but there was a strange, smoldering heat I could feel through my shoes. Like the long-ago fire was still lurking, like the trees were waiting for the chance to burst into flame.

  “Where…?” I whispered, straining to make sense of it all. “Where am I?”

  The Mark’s uneven light - Something was wrong with, somehow - revealed twisted roots curling like serpents, hollows gaping like screaming mouths. Shadows danced across the thorn-wood, giving the bleak forest an unsettling sense of movement.

  Like it was watching. Waiting for the chance to pounce.

  A low moan of wind weaved through the thorny branches, making them rustle. Distant, unidentifiable sounds punctuated the silence: the skittering of unseen creatures, perhaps, or the groan of the earth itself settling into its ruin.

  It was then - right then - that I began to suspect I was fucked.

  I won’t lie: panic was setting in.

  With each shaky step, my feet kicking up little puffs of ash-dust, I could feel my chest tightening, my mind starting to race. The forest stretched on, endless in every direction. I had absolutely no idea where I was. No idea where to go.

  I was a city boy, through-and-through. Other than two disastrous outings, the requisite punching of the ticket, I’d never been anywhere that wasn’t paved, air-conditioned, or filled with Wi-Fi.

  And here I was. Deep in some godforsaken forest, where every shadow, every rustle, seemed to whisper malice. The sheer vastness of it, the suffocating dark - it made me feel like nothing, like a speck of dust.

  I could scream and not be heard. Die, and not be found.

  My handphone was out, flashlight casting a weak beam ahead. It was barely better than the Mark’s light. I thought about saving the battery, but what was the point? I had no way of recharging it.

  It was almost darkly funny. Here I was, loaded with all the detritus of civilization - car keys, wallet, phone - and not a damn thing that could help me.

  A small part of me was gibbering at the sheer impossibility of it all, as I trudged forward under the twisted canopy. Even moving was a struggle - the ash-covered ground turning every step into a slow slog, like wading through mud.

  I’d checked the time, on sheer instinct. What I saw punched the breath from my lungs.

  My mind refused to process it, but it’d been two hours.

  Two hours.

  It didn’t make sense. It felt like days - vile, barbaric days - had passed, but just two hours ago, the world had still made sense.

  And Claire had still been alive.

  Two hours of insanity and blood. Two hours more extreme than the rest of my life combined.

  My thoughts were spiralling, winding upon themselves, as I picked my way through the forest. Forcing my legs forward, even though every inch of my body screamed to stop, to collapse.

  To give in to the weight of all that had happened.

  I was pretty sure Claire would’ve known what to do. But then again, she’d always been so much smarter than me. There’d have been less blundering, for sure. Less flailing, maybe.

  At the very least, she wouldn’t be stuck here, in this god-forsaken place, with no idea what to do or where to go-

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this, I thought, as I hauled myself over a gnarled, fallen tree. Thorny branches plucked at my jacket, my arms, my sides: I’d tried to avoid the worst of them, but they seemed absolutely determined to have their pound of flesh, one way or another.

  I hadn’t had time to process what the Broadcast had shown me. Not all of it. But I’d seen enough to know that I was supposed to be saving the world. The Mark should’ve made things easy, made things simple - heroic.

  Where were the powers? The cheering crowds, hailing their savior’s arrival?

  Where was the glory?

  Instead, I was here, bleeding in the woods, with nothing but the sound of my own ragged breaths and the crunch of my boots to break the stillness.

  No one told me it would be like this.

  I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was sinking, the ashen ground pulling at me like a mire. Dragging me down, down into the darkness and the endless grey.

  What’s happening, back on Earth? Are Mom and Dad safe?

  Do they know Claire’s dead?

  I could imagine their faces: My mother’s face got ashen, drained of all color. Dad, fighting for calm, keeping his voice carefully level as he tried to make sense of all this-

  What would they think, now that I’d vanished? Would they think I’d abandoned her?

  It could be days before they realized what had happened to us. Longer, maybe.

  There had to be a way to make this right, to make this-

  A root snagged my foot, and I stumbled, catching myself on a tree trunk. The bark bit into my palms, fresh pain flaring as blood seeped into the ash. I would’ve sworn, if I could find the breath: Instead, I braced myself against it, trying to calm my racing pulse.

  Give me something, I thought, praying to any God who might be listening. Something, anything.

  Just give me a-

  The Mark flared. I felt it writhe against my flesh, spreading fiery fingers beneath my skin.

  Come to Me.

  I froze, breath catching in my throat. Slowly, I turned - trying to pinpoint the source - but I already knew that it was coming from within me. It was in my blood, my bones.

  Come to Me.

  And then I felt it. A pull, like iron filings drawn to a magnet. An invisible thread tugging at my core, urging me forward. For a moment, I hesitated - torn between wariness, and the need for direction.

  I’m not an idiot. Even then, I knew anything that sounded like that - like slow machine-gun fire, like the remorseless grinding of gears - could not, would never be, anything good.

  But I wasn’t spoilt for choice, I knew. I could wander the decaying forest until something horrible found me, or sit here until I died or thirst. Put like that, there was only one thing left to do.

  “All right,” I said. I wiped my mouth, spat to clear the taste of ash. “-all right, then.”

  I began to walk. Letting the call, the summoning, draw me forward - Like a compass needle, seeking true north. Or like a moth to flame, more likely.

  As I moved, the ashen forest seemed to shift - subtly - around me. If I focused, if I strained to see, I could almost make out a path between the twisted trees. Or maybe it was just my imagination, spurred on by the faintest flicker of hope.

  And you know what? Knowing that I was going somewhere, that I was no longer rudderless - It did make me feel better. In this frightening, unfamiliar place, a direction - any direction - was like a lifeline to cling to.

  As the voice beckoned me deeper into the unknown, all I could think was: It can’t be any worse than this place.

  The air grew colder, the rustling of the branches louder, but I pressed on. I didn’t know what lay ahead, but there was a certain relief in having a destination, having-

  Behind me, echoing through the trees, came a shriek. Long, drawn-out, a hideous nails-on-chalkboard screech. Then a burst of mad, cackling laughter, making the collar prickle at my neck.

  An animal sound. A devil sound.

  For a stretched-out moment I froze. Slowly, unwillingly, I turned my head.

  There was something in the stand of trees behind me. Man-sized, man-shaped, though its legs were shorter, its arms gangling longer. An ape-thing, scrawny and lean, covered in stiff great fur.

  It had no eyes. Its head - in its entirety - was a gaping mouth of carnivore teeth, lips pulled back to reveal rotting fangs. A black tongue flickered from that awful maw, tasting the air, taking my scent…

  “F, fuck-” I stammered out. Silent, disbelieving, utterly transfixed by the horror before me.

  “Oh sh…”

  With a throat-tearing howl, it charged.

  TO BE CONTINUED