Beneath the shadow of the hood I could make out a sharp jawline, skin like gray stone. Lips, colorless and pale, were drawn tight. A man of sorts, a demon, perhaps. He stepped in front of me again. Cold rose from him, adding a puff of white in front of my lips with every breath.

“Who are you?” The question came out in a whisper, rough and edged in fear.

“I am he,” his rasp of a voice frosted against my cheek. “And we are we.”

“Yes, you said that before. It explains nothing.” I stepped around him. He allowed it, studying my movements with a harrowing curiosity. Like he might still be considering using his blade to cut me down, but was a bit more intrigued than bloodthirsty.

I flexed and curled my fingers once, twice, and kept my spine rod straight. If he was an illusion of my fears, of my own mind, why was he not fading?

If anything, he’d damn well gotten more solid.

The shadow’s silky presence followed me. Sometimes a cold strand of mist would curl over my wrists and shoulders, as though he were tasting me with his darkness.

“Screams.” The phantom’s eyes closed into blackness for a breath, then sparked open, almost with a strange touch of humanity when he pulled back. “I remember your screams.” With a quick motion, he drew me against him. I struck a cold, broad chest, and a shriek split from my throat. “How are you doing this?”

“Doing what?” I pushed back. “Leave me be.”

With a rough snarl the shadow recoiled, fastening us together. Left in the space between us was a thin thread of sunlight gold. I screamed and tried to step back. The thread only stretched, and the phantom groaned as if unsettled.

His hellish eyes locked on me. “What are you? What have you done?”

“Nothing! You touched me, now…break this away.” Gods, what if I was trapped here, chained to this creature. I stepped back. The thread between us only stretched longer. “I-I-I don’t know what this is.”

He pulled me closer, his shadowed nose cold and dry along my cheek. “What cruel games the Norns play.” His nearness sent a tremble dancing up my arms, and the whisper of his rasp bit like a frosted wind. “You will not claim me with whatever dark casts you’ve spun.”

“What?” My eyes darted between his. “I don’t want to claim you. Craft is pulling me toward you. Let me go and it will break.”

“Yes. This thread is doomed to be severed. It must be or it was all for naught.”

He made little sense, but there was an odd touch of melancholy in his hissing tone.

“Continue taking the bones, Melder, and the Thief King will corrupt everything,” he snapped. “There will be no voice but his, and you will force my hand to end you.”