Total pages in book: 169
Estimated words: 156210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
Luke is right by my side, crawling up on all fours without trouble, because his immaterial fingers easily slide into Heartbreak, and he weighs nothing. Most importantly, he cannot be killed by a physical force when he’s like this, so I don’t have to worry about him.
Anatole’s cursing my whole bloodline, the Realm, and the Sea of Sorrows, but when I spot him at last, he’s almost unrecognizable, with dark blood coloring his skin and hair. Heartbreak growls and shifts to the side, like a ball turning in the water, and momentum sends me toward Anatole.
He squeezes a fatty mound with his thighs and slashes at a whole cluster of black, pulsing hearts, shrieking like a madman. Without a Dark Companion, he had to infuse his blade with his own shadow and it flickers, fading with every heart he manages to pierce.
I fight gravity as the beast keeps turning in an effort to shake us off, but just as I’m about to lose my footing, Luke solidifies next to me, keeping me from tumbling off, and I seize the opportunity to slash at a big, red blob. Rancid blood explodes all over me, and I press my tongue against my palate in a desperate attempt not to smell it. But the beast thrashes and shakes, so I continue, getting ever closer to Anatole as Heartbreak shifts, forcing me to move.
Beyond my cousin’s back are the green lights of the arena, and I roar, stabbing another heart while Luke assists me, unaffected by the shaking.
Anatole falls over, frantically grabbing at a white rock oddly reminiscent of a chair-sized tooth, and when his eyes peek at me, two white ovals embedded in blood-red features, he sneers, gasping for air.
“You cheated all of us. You never deserved a Dark Companion to begin with, Sunspawn!” He spits the insult out as though he might resent me more than the beast we’re both fighting.
He jabs the flesh nearby to stabilize his position, the flesh mountain stirs, and I lean back when the surface under my feet parts. Rows of pearly whites—smooth, flat, or extremely sharp—peek at me from inside the gash opening in the monster, wide as if it was struck by a castle-sized axe. They’re not arranged in any sensible way, yet form a mouth, which makes the sight even more of a horror.
I stumble away from it just as the beast’s toxic exhale reaches my senses, only to meet a hard body. I look back to see a flash of blond hair soaked with dark red blood, but before I can decide what’s happening, a shove sends me toward the huge mouth with a throbbing sphincter at the very bottom of its red throat.
Terror flashes through my body, but as my Dark Companion slows my descent, I twist my body and yank at Anatole’s arm. The beast chooses this moment to shake in a spasm of muscles, and my cousin rolls past me with a shriek. His shadow tentacles grab the first rows of teeth, but the intestines twitching inside the monstrous mouth have already captured him, twisting around his limbs and midsection.
Anatole’s eyes are wide when his hand slips, and he hits his chin on a large tooth, but when his gaze meets mine, he reaches for me, as if he didn’t attempt to toss me into that very same hell moments ago.
I see his shadow wrestle the creature’s appendages, but he’s weakening and utters something through his teeth. I can’t understand the words, but I know what he’s asking for.
Mercy. For me to help him, when he wouldn’t piss on me if I were on fire. When instead of fighting alongside me, he tried to push me to my death.
For a split second, I consider that maybe he could be useful in the future, but the truth is that he’d stab me in the back at his earliest convenience.
So I slice apart another heart instead of moving any closer.
His eyes fill with tears that soon spill, washing away some of the blood on his cheeks, but the sound he makes is pure fury. At least until it turns into a scream of agony when the fleshy tentacles wrapped around his body coil. Anatole’s face pales, and his eyes bulge while his hips get twisted sideways with a terrifying snap of bone. Then again. And again. Blood gushes out of his mouth when the beast pulls his bottom half off, dragging it down its mouth pit. As death claims Anatole, his hold on the teeth loosens, his shadows disperse, and his torso rolls down lifelessly.
My head’s burning with pure terror as I lean forward, watching the sphincter unclench to reveal concentric rows of fangs leading deeper into the massive beast. Anatole’s head pops like a blood-filled balloon as soon as the muscles holding the sharp teeth tighten around it. I need to fight off a wave of nausea when some of it sprays up, and I sense the tiniest bit of new wetness on my skin.