The City of Dusk

He had been groomed to hunt beasts and yet somehow, he had become a hunting ground, a land wrecked by tooth and claw and one woman's arrow tip pointed between his eyes.

Coming to my rescue?' she asked in her midnight voice. He watched her breathe, the way her ribs expanded with it, the way the shadows still clung devotedly to her, caressing her skin like a jealous lover. His lungs burned. His blood burned. He didn't know if he was staring at a killer of monsters, or a monster herself.

When Taesia pictured death, she no doubt thought of bones and rot, of dark soil and yellowed teeth in a weathered jaw. But when Risha pictured death, she saw old marble and hallowed ground, the shape of something beyond its original purpose. She felt the empty space of ceased breaths, of potential gone unfulfilled, and the smooth shape of finger bones tucked against her palm Death was lovely and sad, and never quite an ending.

You and I both know there's no end to grief. The solution is to find a way to live alongside it, rather than allowing it to lead you by its leash.

Fuck duty." It was a sentiment she had carried for years, but it had a different flavor in her mouth now, tinged not with adolescent rebellion but with weary disillusionment. What good was something like duty when it amounted to little more than unchallenged obedience?

The world around her slowed, then blasted apart with darkness. She was in the darkness; she was its master. It plunged the entryway into a night so thick it was suffocating. Taesia's whole body shook as it scraped against the boundaries of her control, demanding more, demanding everything from her. In the shadows, she was beyond death and life - she was the breath tentatively connecting them. Delicate as gossamer. More powerful than crowns or wars or blade. Unseen, patient, devastating.