A Breeding Darkness (Complete)

(45)

Koshmar shivered with hatred, blood dripping from the dagger that still extended from his back. He waved a hand and the shadow creatures around the room swirled into life, snapping at the air and creating a hellscape of screaming and barking and screeching. They lunged at Joon, but came up just short, as if invisible leashes had run out of slack. Just a few inches more, however, and they could tear into flesh and fiber.

Lucy extended her arms, leaning over Joon to try and protect him from the shadows and Koshmar. It was laughably impossible, but she still couldn't let them attack him without trying to stop them.  Koshmar staggered forward, his lips pulling back against his teeth and his eyes as burning as the red flames.

"He is trapped in his own nightmares," he spit out. "The guilt of his evil deed will eat at him, devouring him piece by piece for as long as his natural life holds out."

Lucy drew in a sharp breath. "What is this place?" she asked.

"A last remnant of what you called Zerkalo," Koshmar said. "It is trying to keep his royal blood alive. It wants him to still rule something, and so it is holding on when it should have moved on."

Lucy glanced around her. Zerkalo was gone? That explained why she had been met with nothing when she was knocked out earlier. But here was a small bubble still, struggling to stay with its prince. The darkness of the Heart was not gone yet.

"Lucy, you have to find some way to let Zerkalo abandon me," Joon said. "The dream world cannot exist here. It is impossible. It will soon spill from its containment and wash across the land. It will be even worse than before."

"But the lights are returning," Lucy said, hope lacing her blood. If the lights were returning, that meant Joon would be all right, no matter what Koshmar said.

"Have you never seen the waves in the sea?" Koshmar asked, laughing and dissolving into a wet cough. "Does the sand not show when the waves pull back? And does not the water rush forward again, washing away everything and reaching further than before?"

"You want to destroy Strana?" Lucy asked.

"Yes. My heart burns for it," Koshmar said, his voice shaking in what sounded almost like glee. "Wiping out the country that lived because my daughter died is what I dream of now. And a man who controls dreams can control his own dream."

Lucy shook her head, trying once again to raise Joon. But he stayed firmly planted to the slab.

"Lucy," Joon said, his voice somehow calm in the midst of his imminent death and the jaws of shadow creatures snapping shut just inches from his face. "I deserve all this for what I did. I remember it now, and though I wish to hate it completely, I still remember my reasons. I still remember what it was to be the Joon from before. I still remember his reasons and his feelings, and I think they may win over the Joon I was in Zerkalo."

"No, you can still be the Joon I know," Lucy said, stuffing all the fierceness she could muster into her voice. "You're not that prince!"

"But I am," Joon said, and she saw that hardness lurking behind his eyes. It was warring with the softness she remembered from the dream world. "I deserve this atonement. Koshmar has the right to do this to me. But he can't be allowed to hurt the people of my land. I did this for them, true, but they did not ask me to. I am their protector. I was born to save them, and I still will. So, please, Lucy, help me return all this to Zerkalo before it hurts anyone else."

"It's too late for that," Koshmar said. "You're going to stay here until it all ends."

He reached behind himself, his face contorting in pain as he struggled to wrap his fingers around the blade handle. He yanked it out of his own back, his flesh releasing the blade with a slick and wet sound. Laughing, he held the dripping blade in front of him, letting it glint with the light of the flames.