“I will,” said Holland slowly. “When you agree.” Panic tore through him. “To what?” “When I was in Black London—after you sent me there—I made a deal. My body for his power.” “His?” But there could be only one thing waiting in that darkness to make a deal. The same thing that had crushed a world, that had tried to escape in a shard of stone. The same thing that had torn a path through his city, tried to devour Kell’s soul. “You fool,” he snarled. “You’re the one … who told me that to let dark magic in was to lose …” His teeth were chattering. “That you were either the master … or the servant. And look … what you’ve done. You may be free of Athos’s spell … but you’ve just traded one master for another.” Holland took Kell by the jaw and slammed his head back against the metal beam. Pain rang through his skull. The collar tightened, and the seal above his heart cracked and split. “Listen to me,” begged Kell, the second pulse faltering in his chest. “I know this magic.” “You knew a shadow. A sliver of its power.” “That power destroyed one world already.” “And healed another,” said Holland. Kell couldn’t stop shaking. The pain was fading, replaced by something worse. A horrible, deadening cold. “Please. Take this off. I won’t fight back. I—” “You’ve had your perfect world,” said Holland. “Now I want mine.” Kell swallowed, closed his eyes, tried to keep his thoughts from fraying. Let me in. Kell blinked. The words had come from Holland’s mouth, but the voice wasn’t his. It was softer, more resonant, and even as it spoke, Holland’s face began to change. Shadow bled from one eyes into the other, consuming the emerald green and staining it black. A wisp of silver smoke curled through those eyes, and someone—something—looked out, but it wasn’t Holland. “Hello, Antari.”
Holland’s expression continued to shift, the features of his face rearranging from hard edges into soft, almost gentle ones. The lines of his forehead and cheeks smoothed to polished stone, and his mouth contorted into a beatific smile. And when the creature spoke, it had two voices; one filling the air, a smoother version of Holland’s own, while the other echoed in Kell’s head, low and rich as smoke. That second voice twined behind Kell’s eyes, and spread through his mind, searching. “I can save you,” it said, plucking at his thoughts. “I can save your brother. I can save everything.” The creature reached up and touched a strand of Kell’s sweat-slicked hair, as if fascinated. “Just let me in.” “You are a monster,” growled Kell. Holland’s fingers tightened around Kell’s throat. “I am a god.” Kell felt the creature’s will pressing against his own, felt it forcing its way into his mind with icy fingers and cold precision. “Get out of my head.” Kell slammed forward against the binds with all his strength, cracking his forehead against Holland’s. Pain lanced through him, hot and bright, and blood trickled down his nose, but the thing in Holland’s body only smiled. “I am in everyone’s head,” it said. “I am in everything. I am as old as creation itself. I am life and death and power. I am inevitable.” Kell’s heart was pounding, but Rhy’s was slipping. One beat for every two. And then three. And then— The creature flashed its teeth. “Let me in.” But Kell couldn’t. He thought of his world, of setting this creature loose upon it wearing his skin. He saw the palace crumble and the river go dark, saw the bodies fall to ash in the streets, the color bleed out until there was only black, and saw himself standing at the center, just as he had in every nightmare. Helpless. Tears streamed down his face. He couldn’t. He couldn’t do that. He couldn’t be that. I’m sorry, Rhy, he thought, knowing he’d just damned them both. “No,” he said aloud, the word scraping his throat. But to his surprise, the monster’s smile widened. “I was hoping you would say that.”
Kell didn’t understand the creature’s joy, not until it stepped back and held up its hands. “I like this skin. And now that you have refused me, I get to keep it.” Something shifted in the creature’s eyes, a pulse of light, a sliver of green, flaring, fighting, only to be swallowed again by the darkness. The monster shook its head almost ruefully. “Holland, Holland …” it purred. “Bring him back,” demanded Kell. “We are not done.” But the creature kept shaking its head as it reached for Kell’s throat. He tried to pull away, but there was no escape. “You were right, Antari,” it said, running its fingertips along the metal collar. “Magic is either a servant or a master.” Kell fought against the metal frame, the cuffs cutting into his wrists. “Holland!” he shouted, the word echoing through the stone room. “Holland, you bastard, fight back!” The demon only stood and watched, its black eyes amused, unblinking. “Show me you’re not weak!” screamed Kell. “Prove you’re not still a slave to someone else’s will! Did you really come all the way back to lose like this? Holland!” Kell sagged back against the metal frame, wrists bloody and voice hoarse as the monster turned and walked away. “Wait, demon,” choked Kell, straining against the pressing darkness, the cold, the fading echo of Rhy’s pulse. The creature glanced back. “My name,” it said, “is Osaron.” Kell fought against the metal frame as his vision blurred, refocused, and then began to tunnel. “Where are you going?” The demon held something up for him to see, and Kell’s heart lurched. It was a single crimson coin, marked by a gold star in its center. A Red London lin. “No,” he pleaded, twisting against the cuffs until they shredded his skin and blood streamed down his wrists. “Osaron, you can’t.” The demon only smiled. “But who will stop me now?”
IX Lila paced the orchard. She had to do something. The courtyard was brimming with guards, the palace in a frenzy. Tieren was trying to coax answers from Hastra, and several rows away, Alucard was still curled over Rhy, murmuring something too soft for her to hear. It sounded like a soothing whisper. Or a prayer. She had heard men praying at sea, not to God, but to the world, to magic, to anything that might be listening. A higher power, a different name. Lila hadn’t believed in God for a very long time—she’d given up praying when it was clear that no one would answer—and while she was willing to admit that magic existed, it didn’t seem to listen, or at least, it didn’t seem to care. Lila took a strange pleasure in that, because it meant the power was her own. God wasn’t going to help Rhy. But Lila could. She marched back through the orchard. “Where are you going?” demanded Alucard, looking up from the prince. “To fix this,” she said. And with that she took off, sprinting through the courtyard doors. She didn’t stop, not for the attendants or the guards who tried to bar her way. She ducked and spun, surging past them and through the palace doors and down the steps. Lila knew what she had to do, though she had no idea if it would work. It was madness to try, but she didn’t have a choice. That wasn’t true. The old Lila would have pointed out that she always had a choice, and that she’d live a hell of a lot longer if she chose herself.
But when it came to Kell, there was a debt. A bond. Different from the one that bound him and Rhy, but just as solid. Hold on, she thought. Lila pressed through the crowded streets and away from the festivities. In her mind she tried to draw a map of White London, what little she’d seen of it, but she couldn’t remember much besides the castle, and Kell’s warning to never cross over exactly where you wanted to be. When she finally found herself alone, she pulled the shard of Astrid Dane from her back pocket. Then she rolled up her sleeve and withdrew her knife. This is madness, she thought. Sheer and utter madness. She knew the difference between elemental and Antari. Yes, she had survived before, but she had been with Kell, under the protection of his magic. And now she was alone. What am I? she’d asked Tieren. What am I? she’d wondered every night at sea, every day since she’d first found herself here in this city, in this world. Now Lila swallowed and drew the knife’s blade across her forearm. It bit into flesh, and a thin ribbon of red rose and spilled over. She smeared the wall with her blood and clutched the shard of stone. Whatever I am, she thought, pressing her hand to the wall, let it be enough.
Acknowledgments Here we are again. The end of another book. I’m always surprised to have made it this far. It might have taken you days, or weeks, or even months to read A Gathering of Shadows, but it took me years to write, edit, and see this book to publication. That duration renders this moment surreal. Even harder is remembering who to thank. To my mother and father, for telling me I could be whatever I wanted, whether that was a designer, an interrogator, or a fantasy author. To my editor, Miriam, for being a killer editor, a stalwart champion, and an ace GIF user. And for being a friend and companion on this particularly wondrous adventure. To my agent, Holly, for proving time and again that you are magic. To my former publicist, Leah, and my new publicist, Alexis, and to Patty Garcia, for keeping me afloat. To art director Irene Gallo and cover designer Will Staehle, for making things look so fierce. To my beta reader, Patricia, for sticking with me through thick and thin and strange and dark. To my Nashville crew, especially Courtney and Carla, Ruta, Paige, Lauren, Sarah, Ashley, Sharon, David, and so, so many more, for being the warmest community in all the land. To my wee Scottish flatmate, Rachel, for being an utter delight, and not making fun of me when I talked to myself or vanished for long stretches into the deadline pit. To my new housemate, Jenna, because you have no idea what you’re in for.
To my readers, who are, without question, the best readers in the entire world (sorry everyone else’s readers). To everyone else: So many of you have stood at my side, championed my work, cheered on good days and been present on bad, and taken this journey with me stride for stride. I can never thank you all, but please know that if you’re reading this, you matter. You’ve made an impact on my life and my series, and for that, I’m incredibly grateful. (I also want to point out that I made it nine books without invoking the dreaded cliffhanger.)
V. E. SCHWAB (USA, 1987). Victoria “V.E.” Schwab is the product of a British mother, a Beverly Hills father, and a southern upbringing. Because of this, she has been known to say “tom-ah-toes”, “like”, and “y’all”. She also suffers from a wicked case of wanderlust, made worse by the fact that wandering is a good way to stir up stories. When she’s not haunting Paris streets or trudging up English hillsides, she’s usually tucked in the corner of a coffee shop, dreaming up monsters. She is the author of several books for teens, including The Near Witch, about a village where the children begin to disappear, and The Archived series, about a library of the dead. Her first book for adults, Vicious, was named a Best Book of 2013 by both Publisher’s Weekly and Amazon.