Chapter 1

"I want this." I need it. Sacrifice or selfishness, it didn't matter anymore.

"I don't believe you."

"I can't run from what I am, Mal, from what I'm becoming. I can't bring the Alina you knew back, but I can set you free."

"You can't… you can't choose him."

"There isn't any choice to make. This is what was meant to be." It was true. I felt it in the collar, in the weight of the fetter. For the first time in weeks, I felt strong.

He shook his head. "This is all wrong." The look on his face almost undid me. It was lost, startled, like a boy standing alone in the ruin of a burning village. "Please, Alina," he said softly. "Please. This can't be how it ends."

I rested my hand on his cheek, hoping that there was still enough between us that he would understand. I stood on my toes and kissed the scar on his jaw.

"I have loved you all my life, Mal," I whispered through my tears. "There is no end to our story."

I stepped back, memorizing every line of his beloved face. I loved this boy, but a newer, darker part of me wondered if I could have something more. Then I turned and walked up the aisle. My steps were sure. Mal would have a life. He'd find his purpose. I had to seek mine. Nikolai had promised me a chance to save Ravka, to make amends for all I'd done. He'd tried, but it was the Darkling's gift to give. My gift to take.

"Alina!" Mal shouted. I heard scuffling behind me and knew Tolya had taken hold of him. "Alina!" His voice was raw white wood, torn form the heard of a tree. I did not turn. The Darlking stood waiting, his shadow guard hovering, shifting around him. I was afraid, but beneath the fear I was eager. The part of me that was born when he placed the collar on me, the part had grown when I gained the fetters and grew with every kill I made longed to find a home with the Darkling.

"We are alike" he said, "as no one else is, as no one else will ever be." The truth of it rang through me. Like calls to like.

He held out his hand, and I stepped into his arms. I cupped the back of his neck, feeling the silken brush of his hair on my fingertips. I knew Mal was watching. I needed him to turn away. I needed him to go. I tiled my face up to the Darkling's.

"My power is yours." I whispered.

I saw the elation and triumph in his eyes and I lifted my mouth to his. Our lips met, and the connection between us opened. This was not the way he'd touched me in my visions, when he'd come to me as a shadow. This was real, and I could drown in it. I wanted to drown in it.

Power flowed through me – the power of the stag, its strong heart beating in both our bodies, the life he'd taken, the life I'd tried to save. But I also felt the Darkling's power, the power of the Black Heretic, the power of the Fold.

Like calls to like. I'd sensed it when the Hummingbird entered the Unsea, but I'd been too afraid to embrace it. This time, I didn't fight. I let go of my fear, my guilt, my shame. There was darkness inside me. He had put it there, and I would no longer deny it. The volcra and the nichevo'ya, they were my monsters, too.

"My power is yours I repeated. His arms tightened around me. "And yours is mine," I whispered against his lips.

Mine. The word reverberated through me, through both of us. The shadow soldiers shifted and whirred. I hungered to taste his power, to feel the unyielding strength of the Darlking for myself. I remembered the way it had felt in that snowy glade, when the Darlking had placed the collar around my neck and seized control of my power. I reached across the connection between us.

He reared back. "What are you doing?"

I knew why he hadn't wanted to kill the sea whip himself, why he hadn't wanted to form that second connection. He was afraid.

Mine.

I forced my way across the bond the Darlking had forged with Morozova's collar and seized the power in him. I pulled and summoned darkness to me, demanded more and more. Darkness surged through me, pulsing with toxifying strength. The Darkling looked into my eyes, his own filled with shock and fearful astonishment. I lusted for him, for the power I felt in him, and for the darkest part of him which felt all too similar to who I was becoming. He had sowed a hunger in me, had carefully cultivated my desires so that they may match his own, and had given me the tools to build my power to match his.

"Alina, please" He strains to say the words, and I vaguely realize that I feel him fighting me, that he is trying to prevent me access from his power. I immediately hunger for more, and reach further into him, feeling euphoric as I summon more of his power. The air begins to vibrate, and the ground starts to shake under me. I hear the sound of rubble falling from the chapel ceiling and the ground shakes so much the Darkling and I fall to our knees together. He does not release his grip on me, nor do I release mine on him.

The Darlking grabs my face, his forehead touching mine. "You will bring this place down on top of us if you don't stop." I need more. It's as though he hears my thought and when I turn my gaze to his, his eyes show sympathy to the yearning I know he sees in mine. He knows the need I feel, and his hands tightening on the back of my neck and waist tell me he wants to give in to me. "I know how good this feels, Alina, I know what it is to want more, to need more.".

The nichevo'ya thrum around us, awaiting their next command. As I pull into the Darlking more, quenching the thirst for power I feel another surge wash through me. I throw my head back and feel it pulse around me, shadows in the chapel growing. What light there was from the the moon and stars long drowned away. I search through the Darlking's power and feel a well of something more, a power even more enticing than his own. I reach towards it and am hit with a feeling of something terribly wrong. I recoiled, surprised at the feeling and realize this must be the magic through which he commands the nichevo'ya.

Curious, I try commanding it. I reach for it, and am slammed with a wave power. My knees threaten to buckle from the force but the Darkling's grip on me holds me up. Power thrums through my veins and I close my eyes in ecstasy, basking in the feeling.

"Yes, Alina, take it. There is nothing better."

I surrender myself to my desire, and feel his own desire through our bond. He hungers for it the same way I do. He brings his mouth to mine, my lips parting in response to his own. I greedily demand more of the dark magic from him, aching for more, and he deepens the kiss, his hunger matching mine. The dark magic seems to understand my desire and I feel a suggestion in it. It guides me and I lean into the idea I feel shaping. I imagine pulling, shaping the power into a new nichevo'ya. I open my eyes and see a new shape forming in the shadows surrounding us, a new creature with threatening teeth and pits for eyes. The dark magic takes from me, demanding a price for the creation. I feel energy drained from me, some vigor taken from my bones. I also feel power like no other, deep and limited only by how much my body can take. It sucks life from me as I birth another new nichevo'ya into the shadows ready for my command. I thirst for more and demand another from the shadows. The price it sucks from my bones is nothing compared to the release, the high when I ask more of the dark magic.

I feel the Darlking resist my creation through our bond and he pulls back, dark disbelief on his face. "Alina, the price –" I do not let him finish his sentence as I lean into the dark magic and ask for more. More and more nichevo'ya slink into existence around us. I am vaguely aware of a drain on my energy, of my vitality failing, but all I feel is a craving for more.

The ceiling above us groans, and I remember the Darkling's earlier warning but take no heed. I need more of this power. My yearning for it deepens as I create more nichevo'ya and the ache is only satisfied for a moment before it is replaced by a need twice as great as before. I feel it tearing through my body, sucking up the price but the pit of craving is insatiable. I am unable to resist, and the walls shake and vibrate as more power thrums through the room. With a shudder the chapel begins to fall around us. My only concern is for the craving inside of me, but a boulder lands on my leg, and another hits the Darkling. Pain shoots through me as we are knocked to the ground. My hold on the dark magic falters and a wave of nausea sweeps over me. I try and grasp it again, but I am too weak, unable to move, even to breathe. The Darlking tries to move us, to escape the rain of stone falling on us but there is no relief from the rocks and we continue to be hit. The onslaught of rubble is relentless, burying us as if the chapel recognises we are perversions that should not exist. I am only dimly aware of the chapel crumbling, focused instead on my exhaustion, the pure life seeping out of me. I feel like it will kill me slowly, sucking the very last bit of my life force out of my if it does not stop. My lips feel cracked and my mouth dry as I manage to whisper, "Aleksander, help, I can't take this feeling". My voice comes out fractured. Bones broken, and covered in tonnes of stone I cannot move my body except my hands, which grip him, my nails biting into him in barely contained terror.

"That is the price, Alina." But as I leave consciousness I feel him reach across our bond and I feel a fraction of relief from the vacuum of life seeping through me. I sink into darkness as the last of the chapel crumbles over us.