Damian and Tia ate in silence.
Neither felt like talking, and any attempt at conversation quickly fizzled out. Despite the rudimentary rations in the safe house, Tia had managed to make a rather tasty dish, although it paled in comparison to the usual fare the chefs provided at the Palace.
Damian flicked through the newspapers Lynn had left behind, but the articles offered no concrete information he could use. The media were just speculating, interviewing every passerby and person of note, cobbling together vague theories on possible motives.
Who would gain the most from killing my father?
Damian turned the question over in his mind as he ate.
Though he hated to admit it, the Crown had many enemies, and many more who would benefit greatly if Sidralis was destabilized. Rastia were embroiled in a civil war, so Sidralis' traditional enemy was otherwise occupied, but rogue terrorist groups along the border were known to cross into the Heavenshard Pass. Then, of course, there were political rivals within the royal family itself—including Duke Lombrass.
No, I'm thinking too much. The Apostles are the first piece of the puzzle.
If he looked at the information he had at hand, then the most obvious suspect was, of course, Morgan Blackbriar and the High Table. Tenebrae's de facto leaders were publicly against the king's taxation policies and anything that would restrict their profits.
But would Blackbriar assassinate a king?
The First Seat had certainly seemed interested in the idea of Damian inheriting the throne—but that assumed Damian held different views than his father. Would Blackbriar take such a dangerous risk, just to secure a more desirable future?
Perhaps it's a coup?
Tenebrae's greed was amplified by their connection to the Angel of the Deep. What if their desire for expansion had grown more than the Crown suspected, and Blackbriar was looking to seize control of Rossheim?
But if he was going to do that, why not take the Rosa Regalia from my father and declare himself king?
Only King Xavier had been murdered. No Priests. No staff. It was a targeted assassination, designed to eliminate the head of Sidralis.
According to the papers, the Deep and the Order's worshippers were clashing in the streets. Unrest didn't suit Blackbriar's motives, and Damian didn't know enough about the other members of the High Table to make an educated guess.
"I wish Leon was here," he muttered, sliding his chair back from the table.
Tia cocked her head quizzically.
"What was that?"
"I said dinner was lovely. Thank you."
Damian offered her his most charming smile.
Tia blushed and mumbled, "It's my job."
Unexpectedly, the Flame-blessed light overhead flickered, the Cinder within winking out of existence and plunging the room into unexpected darkness. Tia gave a childlike yelp, which prompted an unbidden chuckle from Damian.
"Don't laugh at me!"
"Well, if you blush bright enough, we might be able to see."
"Oh shut up!"
A foot kicked his shin and he laughed again. There was something so relaxing about having Tia around—she always managed to make him smile when he least expected it, even in a situation as miserable as this.
"Hold on, I'll give us some light."
Damian summoned a Flame to his fingertip—
—an Apostle plunged from the darkness, slamming an elbow into his ribs.
Damian tumbled backwards over the wooden chair, rolling into the lounge room. His chest ached and his concentration faltered, the Cinder disappearing from his fingertip, plunging the safe house back into darkness.
"Damian?!"
Tia squealed in the dark, and Damian heard the rustling of limbs.
"Tia!!" Damian bellowed in return. He stumbled upright and shoved his left hand outward, channeling a wordless invocation that exploded in a bloom of uncontrolled Flame and light.
A moment frozen in time, captured like a photograph—
—Five Apostles, their white, faceless masks reflecting the light back at him.
Tia on the ground, pinned down by one of the Apostles—
—And shadow. So much Deepshadow. Crawling like worms on the wall, writhing, squirming, a tentacled mass descending from the corners of the room and reaching out to grab him—
"Aspect of Wrath Unleashed, Thorn of the Angel!"
Flaming chains writhed around his wrist and coalesced into a dagger, longer and deadlier thanks to the assistance of the Regalia. The blade illuminated the room, throwing the Deepshadow back with an audible screech.
No time to think!
Three of the Apostles leaped at Damian, summoning weapons of pure shadow. Spears of inky darkness formed in their hands, and they attacked in tandem, their blows raining down on Damian with practiced precision.
Damian parried the first strike, but the next slipped through his guard, shallowly gouging his stomach. He twisted away, avoiding the third blow, but then the Apostles were attacking again, working together in perfect harmony.
Their attacks drove Damian back farther and farther, until his back was against the far wall.
"Damian! Damian, help me!"
Tia shrieked and shouted from the kitchen, calling his name, but couldn't reach her.
No, no no, no no no—
Desperation welled up inside his gut. How could so much go wrong so quickly? How could his entire life fall apart within the span of a single day?
Damian lashed out, slicing the nearest Apostle's throat open. Crimson blood sprayed from a severed artery, and the attacker fell with a gurgle.
The other two Apostles responded quickly, hurling their spears across the room. At such close range, they were less like javelins and more like swords, impaling the wall and blocking Damian from advancing into the kitchen.
Don't go through, go over!
Damian placed a hand on the topmost spear and vaulted over, his stomach and ribs screaming in protest. He landed awkwardly, stumbling over a chair. His dagger kept the Deepshadow at bay, forcing the disgusting tendrils to shy away, writhing and squirming against the walls like a mass of earthworms after the rain.
Tia was on her back, struggling with an Apostle holding her tightly. Her hair was plastered to her face, and she reached out a hand to Damian—
The fifth Apostle—the one Damian hadn't been keeping track of—slammed into his injured side, pinning him against the wall. The suddenness of the impact broke his concentration, and the Flame's weapon dissipated in a shower of embers.
With alien intelligence, the Deepshadow seized the opportunity.
Tendrils of darkness wrapped tightly around Damian's ankles and shoulders, chaining him to the wall. He opened his mouth to chant another invocation, but then the tentacle-like protrusions wriggled their way down his throat, burrowing deep into his lungs.
Damian gagged and vomited, a mixture of frothy blood and bile coming up the back of his throat. He tried to scream, but his voice was muffled by the Deep choking him.
Deepshadow violated the insides of his body, writhing inside his mouth, his throat, his lungs. He thrashed against the wall, but the Deep held him tightly, sending more tendrils crawling over his face.
Damian screamed again, his voice nothing but a high-pitched whine. The Deep lifted up his eyelids and slipped into the spaces around his eyeballs, reaching into the cavities of his skull.
Everything was dark—darker than dark.
Blacker than black.
Like the entire universe had died and left nothing behind but the memory of its own existence.
Damian screamed in pain and terror, but he wasn't even sure he was alive anymore—after all, how could someone be alive in an abyssal place like this?
Time slowed to a crawl.
There was only the darkness, only the Deep. The shadow slipped through the walls between realities, reaching towards his very soul, where that tiny flicker of Flame burned deep inside.
Instinctively, he knew that if the Deep reached that sacred place, the Flame would be taken from him. He would truly be Flameless, incapable of communing with the Angel.
Please. Please! Angel, I beg you!
Damian prayed as he'd never prayed before.
He prayed to the being that had forsaken him all his life. He prayed to the Angel that had failed to save his mother and his father. He could forgive that. He could forgive anything, if only the Angel would save him from this torment.
Help help help helphelphelphelphelphelphelpme—
—and then his prayers were answered.
The explosion of light was unlike anything he'd ever seen.
A hundred Priests together couldn't hope to produce the amount of Flame that appeared in the room at that very moment.
The sheer intensity of the heat barreled into Damian, scorching the tendrils of Deep from the inside out. The shadow screeched a horrible death-cry, exploding into a shower of small, dust-like motes that scattered to the far corners of the universe.
Damian collapsed to his knees and retched, spilling the contents of Tia's dinner all over the floor. He coughed and gagged, bringing up bile and saliva along with traces of frothy blood from his lungs. He blinked rapidly, tears spilling freely from his eyes, as though his body was flushing out every trace of the Deep.
The powerful Flame reduced until it was little more than a globe hovering in midair.
Damian looked around frantically.
"Tia…?" His throat burned as though he hadn't spoken in decades. "Tia!"
The Apostles were gone. They had been burned away by the intensity of the Flame—their existence ripped apart by the ferocity of the Angel's wrath.
"I'm sorry. I was too late to stop them from taking her."
The unexpected voice sent Damian reeling back. His ribs still ached, and the wound in his side burned—but all that faded as shock took over.
A man stood in the centre of the room, the powerful Cinder hovering just over his left shoulder. The stranger was perhaps forty years old, with long hair pulled back in a ponytail, and deep lines etched into his face.
His eyes were dark with amber flecks.
Those were the details Damian noticed first.
After that came the uncanny realization of looking into a mirror. A warped mirror, shifting his proportions and dimensions, twisting his face until it looked similar but not exactly alike.
"Who…are you?"
The moment the question left Damian's lips, he realized how futile it was. He already knew the answer. Yet he still needed to ask, to ascertain the truth for himself.
The stranger exhaled, as though he was about to undertake the most difficult task of his entire life. He raised his left hand. On his ring finger rested a square-cut ruby nearly identical to the signet ring on Damian's own hand.
Not nearly. The same?
With a gruff voice that sounded eerily familiar, the man introduced himself.
"My name is Xavier the Sixth, King of Sidralis. I'm the you from the future. And I'm here to help you."