Mehr raised her hands and shaped a sigil. Then another. She breathed, steady and strong. She danced with all her strength, danced because she wanted to live. She felt the nightmare loosen its grip, increment by increment, until there was nothing left but the fire and the shadow of Amun’s presence.

Finally the storm began to quiet around them. She felt the dreamfire fade away until there was nothing but her aching body and the exhaustion that felt like it filled her head to toe. She stood, swaying and helpless, as the dust settled and the sky lightened with the blush of morning.

She turned, seeking out Amun with her eyes. He was farther from her side than she had expected him to be. When his mind had touched her own in the storm, he had felt so much closer. But instead he was covered in a layer of fine, glittering sand, his body on the ground. Under the dirt she could see that his face was gray and bleak, his eyes half open but unseeing. She tried to walk toward him but her legs refused to cooperate. Instead she fell, her head hitting the ground, agony bubbling in her blood.

The world went suddenly and blissfully black.

She woke in someone’s arms, face pressed against musty cloth. She was being carried back to the temple, the mystics around her utterly silent. She looked up blearily. Bahren was the one holding her. His hood was thrown back, his expression grim. When he felt her stir, he looked down.

“Are you awake?”

Mehr didn’t respond. Something at the corner of her eye had caught her attention. She let her head loll back, looking behind Bahren at the fading dreamfire behind him. Tangled with jeweled light was a creature as brittle and pale as bone, its eyes the flat silver of a sharp blade. It skittered behind them, flickering in and out of life as the dreamfire wavered with it.

She remembered the feel of the pale flame inside her, tracing her bones. She shivered. She’d felt this one rise out of suppressed, leashed dreams. She’d felt this one being born.

“There’s a nightmare following us,” she slurred out.

Bahren did not look. But she felt his grip on her tighten.

“I don’t like this,” Bahren muttered. “I don’t like this at all.”

The mystics around them said nothing, but Mehr could feel their unease. She swallowed. Her mouth tasted of ash and blood. She kept her gaze fixed on the nightmare until her vision grew hazy again, and the blackness gently retook her.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN