“You can thank your brother for that once we get out of this place,” I said, aggressively shaking the chains again. “Ugh!”
Darkness watched with a glint in his eyes as I struggled to free him. He seemed oddly amused as I pulled in a breath to steady my hands.
“Hurry!” Storm yelled from across the abyss.
“I don’t know what to do!” I hollered back.
“Any suggestions?” I asked, looking into Darkness’s glowing eyes.
He nodded.
“And?”
“Hold the medallion to the lock,” Darkness suggested.
I rolled my eyes. “The answer to everything is the medallion, huh?”
“Sometimes,” he said, exhaustion coating his voice. He shifted, but his body resisted the movement, forcing him to grimace.
“You okay?” I asked, flashing him a quick look.
“I’ve been here too long,” he said, shifting his eyes from mine. It was almost as if he didn’t want me to see him in the chains. He wanted me to think of him as the undefeatable being I thought he was.
I held the medallion to the metal, waiting as the lock turned orange from the heat. Unable to resist the urge, I yanked my wrist away.
“You can do it,” Darkness insisted with a confident nod. “Try again.”
“It’s too hot,” I said, trying to remove the medallion from my wrist. “Dammit, I can’t get it off!”
“It’s fully bound to you now,” Darkness said flatly.
I shook my head. “No thanks. I don’t want it anymore. I’m more than ready to give it back.”
With Noah having left me to join The Army of Light, I wasn’t sure what my plans were for my future. I hadn’t gotten any time to give it thought, but I’d probably just end up moving back with Aunt Joyce. The medallion wasn’t something I wanted or needed any longer.
“I do not accept it,” Darkness said, looking into my eyes.
“Are you kidding me? After all the hunting and stalking, now you don’t want it?”
Darkness shook his head slowly. “It doesn’t want me. Maybe it never did.”
“It led me right to you!” I said, ignoring the tension in my brow.
Storm’s groan blew through the room like a humid spring breeze. “Free him already!”
I glanced over to see her helping Nightmare to his feet. He brushed himself off before flashing a look of concern to Darkness and me.
“You need to get me out of here,” Darkness said, his voice hoarse. “Time is running out. Someone will be here soon, and we’re all weak.”
“Why did they even bring you here?” I asked, closing my eyes as I pressed the medallion to the lock again. I needed a distraction to take my mind off the feeling of my skin melting off the bone.
“They want the medallion,” Darkness said gently.
My eyelids squeezed tighter. “You… don’t… have… it.”
“Those that reside in The Underworld aren’t the brightest stars in the sky. They’re waiting for Lucifer,” Darkness said with a soft chuckle as the metal hit the ground with a thud. “Now, the other.”
I was about to open my eyes to look at my wrist when a hand pressed down over my face. Darkness guided my arm to the other lock.
“Don’t look. Not yet,” Darkness whispered as Nightmare and Storm approached.
“It’s really bad, isn’t it?” I asked.
“It is nothing more than you can handle,” Darkness said.
I couldn’t contain the searing anguish any longer. My face contorted in a grimace, and hot wetness welled up at the corners of my eyes, threatening to overflow. With a raw, guttural growl, I pressed the medallion harder against the lock, willing it to break it faster.
“Ahhh!” I yelled as my body shook helplessly.
Nightmare held my shoulders as Storm blew a frigid breath against my arm. My knees threatened to give out under me, but I managed to stay upright until the lock thudded to the ground.
Both Nightmare and Darkness moved at lightning speed to catch me before I collapsed. Their grip was firm, and their touch comforting, but I was struggling to keep my eyes open.
“We need to go, brother,” Nightmare said, his words hastily flooding from his lips.
Darkness swept me into his arms as the world around me blurred, and their voices grew distant and indistinct. The boundaries of reality dissolved into an inky void as I desperately fought to cling to the flickering ember of awareness.
“Hang on,” Darkness whispered, his voice floating through my head as I bounced across the floor in his arms. “We’re going to get you out of here.”
