Blessed Monsters (Something Dark and Holy #3) - Emily A. Duncan Page 0,2

for—if there was anything to fight for.

Taszni nem Malachiasz Czechowicz.

He couldn’t let himself fall—he didn’t know if he could return from that place of chaos—but his edges were fraying, the presence sliding forward with a scrape. And there was no stopping it.

* * *

The dark was far past that of the Salt Mines—that place where no light touched. This was destruction. This was entropy.

Awareness was a transient concept. Unimportant. Insignificant. The god had pulled him here. Call it what it was, he supposed. His ideals might have to be compromised. But he knew with perfect clarity that this was not one of the gods he had declared war against.

“No.”

Then what?

“Older, greater, far more powerful.”

His bones cracked as he was forced into chaos. Breaking only to be reforged. Steel puncturing through his skin. Teeth slicing through him. Eyes blinking open and fractured vision and how far could it go? How much more could he withstand? How much could he be altered until nothing left of him was human?

“Fighting is hardly in your best interest. We will work so well together, you and I.”

Malachiasz didn’t know how to respond—he had no mouth to speak in that moment. He only had panic and fear and clarity—perfect clarity.

Let this play out. Let him hear what this god had to say.

“Ah, surrender—I knew you were clever. I knew if only you listened, you would see.”

It wasn’t surrender; it was biding time. Malachiasz knew what to do with those who thought themselves capable of manipulating him. He’d known how to handle Izak, and he could handle this.

Except … he had not known how to handle Nadya. An error of a heart he did not know he still possessed. No more mistakes with that—not with her.

But he could make this look like a surrendering of will. He could play this game.

He also had no way to argue. Chaos was an entrapment, it forced him into its will and he was powerless before it. He had known what transcendence could do to him. He had studied enough to know it would either kill him or turn him into something so much greater, but there was no way to predict the result. And the chaos, it was fitting, but it was a punishment, a prison.

Malachiasz did not allow himself the luxury of regret, and, forced back into divinity, his body breaking under the weight and power of this being, this god, he let himself taste it. He had made so many mistakes, told so many lies, and here he was at the end of the universe—a god in power. A boy, broken. So damn tired.

“I know what you want. Listen. It would be less painful for you to not force my hand.”

What did Malachiasz want? Once, it had been clear, but then his path had crashed into a girl from Kalyazin who was clever and vicious and nothing like he’d thought those backward people were, a girl so wrapped around the finger of a goddess who only meant to use her, and Malachiasz’s grand ambitions had altered. He hadn’t killed Marzenya because he’d wanted to topple Kalyazin’s divine empire, he had done it because she’d forced Nadya to watch him break into pieces. Because she had led Nadya to her own destruction—merely her tool to wipe the magic from Tranavia. Because he couldn’t stand to watch as the goddess snuffed out Nadya’s vibrant spark because she had dared turn it in a new direction.

Nadya would never forgive him, but he didn’t know if he could forgive her, either.

Maybe this was all that was left. He had killed one god and he would kill more.

And so, he listened.

“Very good.” The god’s voice was marked with approval. “Together, we will plunge this world into darkness in order to bring the light.”

What is it you want from me?

“You have power—divine and mortal—and I need it to remake this world anew before I scatter your bones on the edges of my domain.”

Oh good … I have only ever wanted to bring peace to my country.

“Is that all you wish?”

So much had changed, so much of him had changed. What had always seemed clear was murky. But, in the end, yes. He yearned for the same thing, no matter its shape. He wanted peace. He wanted no one else to suffer in the acutely specific ways he had. Not with the Vultures—they weren’t going anywhere—but because of this war, this unending madness.

There was more he wanted, quiet things he couldn’t admit, because to admit