Corbin gripped my hand so tight that he’d have cut off circulation if I actually still had circulating blood, which I doubted. As he dragged me down the endless, dust-swept black hallway, the knife handle bobbed on my chest. I barely noticed the familiar wooden doors or the humming stone walls – it fascinated me so much to see this foreign object sticking out of me.

I should be able to feel it inside me, but instead my whole chest is numb, like my mouth after the dentist gives me a shot.

Corbin kept looking over his shoulder at me, as if he expected me to disappear. His fingers tightened around mine, crushing me with his fear. Our feet scuffed at a fine layer of sulphur dust and red-stained sand coating the floor. The humming buzzed in my ears, and it took me a few moments to realize that I couldn’t hear any shrieks of pain from behind any of the doors, like in my dreams. The whole place was eerily quiet.

“Where is everyone?” I asked.

“At the Slaugh. Or rather, wherever you sent them when you destroyed the Slaugh. The shades ride the horses, but they need all the demons and fae at the rear to poke them with pitchforks or something.” Corbin shrugged. “From what little my books said about the Slaugh, I think when you destroyed them what you actually did was allow those shades to pass over to the next stage of their journey, and you probably took all the demons with them. That might be a good thing, if the tortures I’ve been witness to these past three days are any indication.”

“I saw my parents,” I said. “They were begging me to come with them.”

Corbin shuddered. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice wavering. “That’s part of the Slaugh’s power. They use your loved ones to tempt you into death. Your soul is so much sweeter that way.”

“Liah shot them with her arrows and they disintegrated to dust.” I closed my eyes. “That’s the second time I had to watch them die in front of me.”

“If it’s any consolation, I think they’re now finally at peace.”

“What about the demons? Are they trapped on this other plane with the shades?” I hated the idea of my parents and Blake’s parents being tortured somewhere I couldn’t help them.

“The demons will eventually find their way back here. Natural order will have to be restored. It just takes some time. All I know is, this place is ours for the moment, but we’re got to move quickly. It’ll start filling up with recently deceased souls soon, and the demons and fae will return. After how you defeated them so thoroughly, it’s best if we’re not here when they do.”

“Where are we going?”

“To stop Daigh. Quickly. We’re close now.”

As we rounded another corner, the ground rolled out from under me. Dust cascaded from the ceiling as an earthquake shook the hallway. I pitched forward. Corbin caught my arm before I smashed into the floor.

“What’s that?” I cried, steadying myself against the humming stone wall.

“Hopefully, it’s the only remaining demon kicking Daigh’s arse before he gets his hands on that crown.”

Corbin gripped my arm and flew down the hall twice as fast as before. My feet slipped and buckled beneath me as I struggled to keep up with him on the uneven ground. Somehow, he pulled me along and I avoided face-planting. Rocks and debris tumbled down around us. My throat closed up with fear.

Would those stone walls hold? This place had the oppressive weight of being deep underground. If the tunnel collapsed, would we be trapped without air? Did we even need air?

Are we even breathing right now?

A huge smoldering rock crashed from the ceiling, blocking our way. A lattice of cracks spiderwebbed out from its base. Black tendrils snaked from the cracks, reaching up toward my ankles. Corbin yanked me around the edge of the stone. On the other side, we faced the wide hallway and the arch made of bones leading into the gloomy chamber beyond.

My mouth dried as I remembered my dream, how I’d peered into that blackness and felt the oppressive presence of pure malevolence trained on me. Of the hand on my back, shoving me inside, and how I fell into eternity before landing in my own bed.

Only this time, I was pretty sure this wasn’t a dream. As we neared the black void, the knife in my chest stung. The pain intensified.

Corbin squeezed my hands. “It’s a veil, Maeve. It’s designed to keep out enemies and shades. Here,” he took a small stone container from his pocket and tipped it onto his hand. A thick, black mucus poured out of it. “Demon blood,” Corbin said, holding up his hand. Before I could protest, he’d smeared the blood over my face, rubbing it into my cheeks. Globs hung off my eyelashes and clung to the hairs in my nose. It smelled delicious, like rotting meat and burning plastic.

“This is disgusting,” I mumbled, not wanting to part my lips in case I accidentally swallowed a glob of it.

“You’re telling me.” Corbin rubbed his hands over his own face, smearing on the blood like war paint. From the black sludge, his eyes shone like bright crystals.

“How did you acquire a container of demon blood?”

“With great bravery and daring-do,” Corbin grinned, snapping the box shut and replacing it in his pocket. He held out his blood-soaked hand. “But that’s a story for another time. Shall we?”

I peered at the door. Is it just my eyes adjusting to the gloom, or does the darkness not seem quite as dark as before? Corbin slid his slimy, blood-covered hand in mine and pulled me into the gloom.

We stood at the entrance of an enormous cavern, the vaulted ceiling reaching so far above our heads its apex was hidden in darkness. The space was carved of the same dark-veined stone as the hallway, but here the veins stuck out in high relief, twisting up the walls and pulsing as though they were actual veins pumping blood through a living body.

“Shite,” Corbin swore. “We’re too late.”

I followed his gaze and gasped. In the center of the room was a tall dais, accessed across a chasm of fire by a narrow stone bridge. The dais held a high throne made of bones – femurs fanning out into elaborate arches, piles of bones forming steep steps that led to the seat of the king of hell.

At the foot of the steps, a giant shape made of smoke and nightmares writhed on the ground, its power fading as it wilted into nothingness. Daigh stood on its back, his bone blade raised above his head. He looked over at us and winked, then brought the blade down, burying it deep within the creature’s shadow flesh.

The creature bucked and writhed, and a wave of heat shattered the air, knocking me off my feet. Corbin dragged me back as tendrils shot out of the demon’s body and slammed against the walls, sending bones and rocks raining down. The fire in the pit flared, showering spikes across the narrow bridge.

With a final heave, the creature shrunk against the ground, collapsing in on itself like a star becoming a black hole, leaving behind only a smudge of black soot on the ground and a large crown fashioned from skull and bones.

Daigh tore off his crown of wilted vines and horns, and tossed it into the fire. He raised the demon’s crown above his head and settled it on his dark hair. Dark tendrils snaked from between the bones, pouring through Daigh’s ears, into his mouth, through his nostrils and eyes. He turned to me, and grinned.

“Hello, daughter.” Even in the intense heat, Daigh’s cold voice chilled me to my bones. “It’s fortuitous to find you here. Now, if you’ll indulge me by getting on your knees. It’s polite to prostrate before the new king of the underworld.”