The sepulcher exploded. Blinding red light cast blood shadows across the valley while deafening thunder echoed off the walls.

Shock forces shoved us to the sandy ground like trees toppled in a sudden gale. The rock fractured, hurling pieces big and small. A dull thump to the skull scrambled my mind and my consciousness ebbed in pulsing shades of gray.

Sandy grit scratched at my cheek as I laid face down with hands still bound behind my back. Sharp pain shot from a wrenched shoulder. Dazed, with mind swirling between painful throbs, my eyes barely focused and my body would not move more than a twitch. Warm blood trickled past my eyebrow, dripping into the sand. Obeus moaned beside me, but the soldier that once restrained him fared much worse, stilled on his back with eyes wide and vacant.

The swirling dust settled, dropping like a veil to reveal a woman's form, composed of tightly bound blackness. Standing beside the shattered prison walls, she stretched, lifting arms high, then gazed about with burning red eyes. Still stunned from the blow, I could do no more than witness her emergence as if in a nightmare. And such she was.

Naamah.

From the distance, battle shouts and beastly roars overcame the ringing in my ears as the Chort re-engaged the soldiers.

The soldier that once guarded me jumped up with a war cry. Charging, he plunged a knife blade deep into Naamah's dark body. But the effect was as if stabbing smoke. The soldier's mouth gaped, and he took a step backward.

She only laughed, letting out a chortle that sent shivers down my spine. "Dense fool, you cannot hurt me."

A blazing sword of red magic burst from her hand. She swept it so fast that it became a blur and a hiss. The soldier's head, with mouth frozen in a silent scream, rolled beside me.

Raising to his feet and snarling, Lord Gawyn lifted his hands. Once and again, he fired bolts of magic, smashing against Naamah in showers of blue sparks. Each time, she slid back, leaving shallow ruts in the sand, but seemed otherwise unhurt.

"Pathetic," she spat.

A long red rope uncoiled from her hand, glowing like molten steel. She wielded it like a whip, slicing air with a hiss. It snapped against Gawyn's magic shield. Red and blue flashes sizzled with each contact. He crouched behind the shield, totally on the defensive. On the next swing, the whip slashed through the magic shield and sliced across his body, laying open his torso like a butcher's cut. Gawyn took a final gurgling breath through his gaping mouth and slumped to the ground.

"Tomas!" Obeus urged in an airy whisper, laying nearby. Crimson stained his face below a bloodied nose. "Get up! Call the Fury out."

Blue wisps of magic snaked out from his freed hand. Like nimble fingers, they untied the rope that restrained me, letting it fall away. With a grunt, I pushed up with unbound hands, but fell back as dizziness overtook me, and rolled to my side.

Come out! I pleaded to the Fury, but it was as dazed as I was.

A second effort brought me to unsteady feet, but my mind still swirled. Thin red strands, like spider silk, circled around me, trapping me in a web of glowing magic, squeezing tighter until it was difficult to breathe. It numbed my mind to inaction, becoming my own sepulcher. Obeus suffered the same fate.

Naamah strolled over to me, tilting her head with a sinister smile on black lips as if a spider regarding a captured fly. She gazed with hell-red eyes. "There you are. I had hoped we would meet." She turned to Obeus. "And you. I remember you."

Naamah jerked back as two orbs of bright blue smashed against her. "What now?" she snarled, snapping her head around.

Hawyn and the other mage stood tall on boulders, flanking us, extended hands surrounded by blue auras. Simultaneously, they called forth orbs of magic and fired again. Naamah tumbled back in a brilliant explosion of blue shards.

Coming up to a knee, Naamah bared obsidian-black teeth and growled. With a snap of hands, she fired twin red bolts at her adversaries.

Too late did the mage call up a shield, and the bolt struck, propelling him backward through the air to crash against another boulder. He slumped down with a smoldering hole in his chest.

Calling up a shield in time, Hawyn deflected the bolt in a crackling spray of red sparks. Grunting, Naamah fired again, but missed as Hawyn jumped away, leaping off the boulder. The bolt instead shattered a dead tree trunk with a boom that rumbled through the valley.

On the run, Hawyn fired a blue orb, but this time at Naamah's feet. It blasted against the ground, upending Naamah to her arse while lifting clouds of dust. Even in my dulled mind, I took some hope from Hawyn's strategy. She charged behind the dust cover, bringing forth blazing blue swords from her hands.

With folded brow and open mouth, Hawyn screamed as she leaped at her opponent. Naamah dodged the sword thrusts with an unnatural speed, ducking and twirling, while blocking others with her own magic sword. In a flurry of motion, Hawyn parried a swing with one sword, then with the other, sliced across Naamah's hip.

Naamah screeched as her hip tore in ragged shreds. Stepping back, she turned her eyes down to the injury. With a touch, it mended, the cut disappearing as if it had never happened. Growling, she glared at Hawyn, who's eyes widened in disbelief.

Icy panic rushed through my dulled mind, and I willed my muscles and the Fury to fight against the bonds, but neither would respond. Something about this dark magic paralyzed me.

Naamah launched a counterassault, swinging furiously with twin red-magic swords. Hawyn could do little more than block the raging attacks, as she backed to the rock wall. But one thrust passed through the defense, skewering Hawyn's gut. She stiffened, letting out an airy gasp. Naamah pulled back the sword and grabbed Hawyn's neck, then tossed her body at Obeus' feet. "Join your comrades," Naamah gloated.

Lying on her side and facing away, blood spilled from Hawyn's wound, painting the sand crimson in an expanding swath. From the subtle rising of her chest, I knew she was still alive, although barely.

Grinning as she stalked to my side, Naamah said, "So long has it been since I have had so much fun. Now, where was I?" I stiffened as she placed fingers against my forehead. "That thing within you is most interesting. Would you like to join me? Together we shall transform this world into a perfect order." She chuckled. "Not that you have a choice."

Naamah's touch reached deep into my being, wrapping dark tendrils around my very soul. She pulled, tugging at everything that was me—dreams, memories, emotions, everything I loved. Terror gripped me and I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound emerged.

"There, there," she whispered, pressing her lips against my ear. "Just accept it. You shall become a perfect version of yourself, free of petty human vices. You cannot fight long."

Fight it, I did. I grabbed what anchors I could and held tight: precious memories of my mother and father, of friends, joyous times of love and laughter. And Aria, especially Aria. Even the Fury, now silent, proved a handhold. But the pull became too strong, ripping up everything I grasped by the roots. Deep darkness filled the space behind myself like muddy water flowing into a broken jar. It seemed like falling into a deep pit, the light becoming more distant and fading with every heartbeat. I was losing myself.