Indigo(41)

She wanted to be sick.

“Who are you?” she asked again, quieter now, wondering if she even needed to speak the words aloud for him to hear them.

As if in some twisted reply to her thoughts, that voice pushed upward and she felt her mouth open, lips forming words against her will. He spoke through her, but the voice was not her own.

I am Damastes. You have kept me locked away long enough. Now I will be free.

The words ripped through her and echoed and sent Nora staggering backward. A flicker of familiarity touched her mind. Had she heard the voice before, back when—

No! She didn’t have time for that.

Nora tried to move and felt the world tilt madly. Her legs refused to obey her commands and her arms shuddered. Her mouth pulled into a scowl on one side, as if she were some kind of human marionette and the voice of the void—this presence called Damastes—was pulling her strings.

Idiot girl, you’ve stepped into my home now. You stand in my temple, and here I will finally take control.

Pain lanced through her, forced her into a shuddering convulsion. There were more words, but she did not hear them so much as she felt them. Her body seized, twisting into a spasmodic arch even as she fell to the ground. The back of her skull slammed into the dirt and her left arm slapped a clay pot that rolled and shattered.

The armed men came for her then. Their faces were lost to her, their words incoherent shouts of alarm, but she understood their intent. She had trespassed where she was not allowed. They would punish her for that. She reached out her hands to draw the darkness to her, ready to become Indigo, to fight if she had to fight. But nothing happened. The guards slowed, moving warily now, and one of them drew his gun.

Indigo? she thought. Half in confusion and half in summons. Nora had created Indigo as a separate persona, someone who had the courage and fortitude to do things Nora might not otherwise have been able to endure, but she and Indigo were one and the same. They were. Which meant the power was her power.

So why could she not wield it now?

Nora tried to reach out to the nearby shadows, to draw a cloak of darkness around her—and she felt Damastes fight her from the void. Just as he’d pulled her strings, he held the reins of her power tightly.

You dare interfere with me? You, who hide in your own shadows and bury your own world beneath a mountain of lies? No more.

The words slammed into her, crushed her under their weight. The first of the guards reached her, grabbed at Nora’s arm, and then reeled back, screaming as Indigo lashed out. Shadows fluttered like hummingbirds and spilled from her flesh into his, cutting through his skin and muscles as they pulsed their way up to his shoulder.

Nora twisted and rolled, her body still fighting against every attempt she made at control. Her muscles jittered as if electrified, and her teeth clamped down hard enough she feared they might shatter.

Indigo screamed. Damastes roared.

A lurking presence from the deepest waters of her soul, he rose now like a tidal wave, dwarfing her, surely large enough to crush her. Nora felt herself dragged down inside herself, her mind trying to escape the presence of the great darkness that tore through her, seeking a way to break its bonds.

Set me free! the demon roared.

For what could it be other than a demon? The thought turned her blood to ice. If she’d had control over her body, she would have wept.

But how am I holding him? What am I doing to stop his escape?

She had no answer to that question, but it seemed Indigo might. A strange calm came over her, a confidence that had been inconceivable a moment before, and Nora knew then that Indigo had surfaced. Perhaps Indigo had no soul of her own, but she did have her own identity. Her own courage. Nora might call upon the darkness, caress and persuade it, but it was Indigo who had spent years mastering the shadows, turning them into her servants. Her weapons.

Nora jerked side to side, whipped her head around. Clawed at her own flesh. Fell to her knees and curled into a fetal ball. The guards shouted at her, both of them with their guns out. Others were shouting. Somewhere not far off, police sirens screamed. But the real battle was being waged inside her, a tug-of-war over the shadows of that internal void. Nora opened her mouth and two voices cried out, neither of them truly belonging to her. Indigo and Damastes fought, lashing at each other, those twin serpents of darkness twisting and diving, two shades of black. Nora lay on the ground and did her best to breathe.

The second guard shouted orders she could never hope to obey. In the space between heartbeats, she saw him begin to squeeze the trigger on his gun.

Nora saw him, but it was Indigo who reached out with a tendril of darkness and whipped at the guard, intending to knock him backward. That other presence, so large and potent, magnified the attack, pouring ebony rage out of the void and turning that tendril into a battering ram that shattered bone and pulped muscle. The guard sailed backward into a half-submerged column of stone with enough force to blast chunks of the ancient structure into the air.

What remained of him oozed down the column.

Nora froze, too stunned even to fight that inner war. Even Indigo was horrified.

A dark glee emanated from Damastes.

Nora stepped toward the ruined man, thinking that if she could reach him in time, it might be possible to save him.

He is beyond redemption. He is of no concern.

One good look at the meat that had been flayed from his bones and Nora knew Damastes was right. Though the man still had a pulse—easily seen as every heartbeat pumped another weak cascade of crimson from his shoulder—it was weak and fading. A thick halo of blood surrounded him.