Glamoured (Shadow Beast Shifters Book 6)

The moment the shadows closed over me and took me down into the depths, my ability to breathe was gone. There was no air below, and I struggled against the beast, which was plummeting like it wanted to slam into the floor of his black stone ocean.

Had that been its plan all along? Just take me down to drown?

There was no light under here, and yet somehow my wolf could still make out some shadowy creatures in the distance. More of them than I would ever be able to fight, obviously, since I couldn’t even fight the one holding me.

Sending more feral power into my wolf, we clawed and bit at whatever we could reach, but the shadow didn’t even react. I had a strange feeling that it had been hit by energy as it took us down, and now it was injured… maybe dead. Not that it mattered. Dead or not, it was still trapping me with its bulk, sending us both to the depths.

Deciding to shift out of my wolf form before a lack of oxygen stole my ability to fight, I drew on my change, allowing it to wash over me until I was back in my two-legged form. The change did free me from the shadow, and as it fell away I attempted to kick my heavy legs in the hope of slowing my descent. Even better if I actually headed back for the surface.

Only nothing changed. It was so dense under here that there was no way to travel up, only left or right, if I kicked in that direction. And all the while, I continued to drop.

Panic flashed in the corners of my oxygen-deprived brain. Think, Sam. Fucking think.

I had a daughter and a mate to get back to. I couldn’t just roll over and let this land take me. There had to be a way to best this trap.

Which was, of course, easier thought than done, because no matter what I tried, down was the only direction I’d go.

After struggling for too many precious seconds, I finally gave up fighting and decided to go with the flow. Down is where they wanted me, and I was probably closer to the bottom than the top at this point. Maybe the exit was down there… somehow.

Once I stopped fighting, I plunged like there was no resistance at all. It was odd to be surrounded like this, as if underwater without air, only it was dry and cold. A sliver of light caught my eye as I descended, and I hoped that meant I’d made the right decision to drop.

Light could be an exit, right?

The hope gave me seconds of air as my lungs dredged it up from some stored part of my body. Or maybe it was my focus on the light that had me forgetting I was dying second by second.

When the glow was strong enough to nearly blind me, I realized my mistake. This was no exit or way out… it was a line of power, similar to the ones we’d used to get from the Capital down into the Deep.

This one was four times the size, and a bright relentless gold, a shade that hadn’t been in the other ones. Original power. Was this the Great Queen’s line? A part that hadn’t been severed.

My descent slowed, and as darkness crept into my shaky vision, I slumped across the glowing strand. With the last of my strength, I reached out and wrapped my hand around it. Help me. The words were in my mind, the last of my power fading, and it was like before when the darkness tried to take me from this world. I’m from your line.

The last stores of my air were gone, and I sent out a final goodbye to my loved ones, tears dripping along my cheeks, soaked up by the sandy coal that would form my final resting place. Tabitha’s sweet little face flashed in my mind, and I could only pray they found a way to save her. If they couldn’t, I’d wait for her in the next life.

I’d never leave my baby again.

Or Len.

His powerful features filled my mind, and his energy mingled deep inside where our bond existed. It was tempered by the glamour that held us apart, but we both knew it was there now.

My fae prince held every part of my heart, as did his daughter, and this was no wasted life to have known and loved them both.

When I released my hold on the mortal realm, my soul slipped free from the vessel it had been encased in, following the golden path of light. No longer in the depths, I was moving freely without an ache in my lungs or fear in my heart. The weight of mortality was gone, and as I drifted along, a sharp spike hooked me in my center, yanking me sideways.

Even in spirit form, the sudden movement hurt, and I gasped when I landed on a burning surface. Pushing up, confusion clouded some of the lighter energy as I tried to figure out where I was. My spirit form was standing—not floating, standing—on the surface of a land that burned in flames, as if we’d landed on the sun.

There was no heat as I took a step forward, following the curve of the land, like a cartoon character walking on the top of a small planet. It was too bright to see anything beyond where I stood, outside of the flames that tossed and turned before me.

There was no pain, heat, or cold, almost as if I couldn’t quite interact with the world itself.

My steps continued on until I came upon a golden beam of light, floating a few feet above the ground. It took me a moment to remember that I’d been clutching that same beam when I died.

My pace picked up as I reached the golden line, wanting to touch it, only I didn’t really have hands any longer. Deciding to follow it, I set off once more, the gold growing brighter and brighter as we crossed the curvature of this land. There were no other changes until the strand grew larger, thicker, and so bright that I almost couldn’t look upon it.

It had turned the flaming surface of the sun world into a dull backdrop.

Eventually the cord was as large as a huge water pipe, with a diameter so big that if it had an opening, I’d have been able to walk right into it and not hit my head.

My ghostly head. Or whatever I was now.

This was the point the ground levelled out, and when it did the cord suddenly shrank, as if its size had all been to ensure I didn’t lose it. The gold joined other cords, all of which were attached to… Uh, I actually had no actual idea what they were attached to.

It looked like a giant sphere hovering on the horizon, and weirdly, despite it being the size of a skyscraper, I hadn’t noticed it until right this moment. The dozens of other cords spanned from its surface in a multitude of different colors.

Moving away from the gold line, I drifted between the other lines, heading for the sphere.

As I got closer, I could feel a pulse of energy, one of the first sensory changes since I’d been yanked here. That pulse had me wondering if the giant sphere was a hub of power, feeding or being fed. It was difficult to tell the direction of power.

Maybe it went both ways.

Balance generally required an equal flow.

Not having a clue what I was supposed to do next, I kept pushing forward, losing my gold strand as I closed in on the sphere. The giant structure, floating a few feet above the ground, was not a color I’d ever seen. It appeared to be a wash of every color and every shade that existed in the worlds, moving and ever changing.

When I was close enough to truly see the minute details of the surface, a hoarse sound escaped me, and it was kind of terrifying to know I could make sounds here. This land was so quiet, and I was dead, so sound just felt out of place. But the reason for the sound remained. The sphere was not a mix of colors as I’d thought, but its surface was made up of a trillion tiny images, small and lined up next to each other so that the individual was hidden in the whole, hard to detect until you were all but pressed against the surface.

The images were moving too, akin to a television tuned into a trillion different channels.

“What in the worlds…?” I murmured in a voice that sounded like tinkly bells.

Deciding I had nothing left to lose, I urged my ghostly form closer to the sphere, wanting to touch the power.

When my energy brushed against it, I was blasted backwards, a boom filling the air that was so loud it was almost painful despite my lack of physical ears.

It felt like a warning, and I wondered what I was supposed to do with that.

Backtracking, I returned to the place where I’d lost the golden strand. This was the cord that brought me here, and I wondered if it had something to do with my next steps.

I just had to figure out how to utilize this particular cord.

This time, when I moved toward the sphere, I kept the gold strand in my energy, as if holding on to its essence. It twisted and turned, and I almost lost it a couple of times, having to backtrack to find it again, but eventually I reached the spot where it touched the sphere. It was on the opposite side of the giant power structure.

Bracing myself for the rejection once more, I pressed right where the gold connected, only to find my essence flowing forward until I was on the inside of the sphere. The bright fiery world outside faded, the inside of the sphere just a shimmery gold.

Maybe because of my line of power.

There was nothing inside that I could see, and it was not much larger than my old bedroom back in Clarity. The outside did not in any way reflect what existed inside.

Instinct told me that now I would have to wait. Wait and see where the next path took me.

Maybe that would be for an eternity, or maybe it would happen instantly.

Either way, I’d been led here for a reason, and until that reason was presented to me, there was nothing to do but wait.

Luckily, the dead didn’t fear time.