Brute 297

Chapter 297 

Atasha’s POV 

“Ah,” the thing in Xylas’s body said. “Sadly, you just spoiled my plan.” 

My breath caught. 

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For a moment my mind tried to twist it into something that made sense, because my instincts had been screaming for one solution since the moment I saw the floating stone. Destroy the stone. Close the passage. Stop the surge. 

But the way it smiled made my stomach turn. 

Because it sounded like it had wanted us to do exactly that. 

I stared past Cassian’s shoulder at the white stone still hovering above the clearing, still turning slowly as if time did not apply to it. The light from it pulsed in uneven beats, and the air around it hummed faintly, the same hum that had yanked me back from unconsciousness. 

If it wanted the stone destroyed, then destroying it was not a victory. 

It was a release. 

“It wanted you to break it,” Cassian said. 

The thing’s eyes slid to Cassian with interest, like it had been waiting for him to finally speak the truth out loud. 

Cassian kept his sword up, stance tight, body angled so I was behind him. 

“Destroying the stone will free you,” Cassian said, each word like it was being forced through teeth. “Not just you. Your kind. Whatever is sealed behind that passage, whatever the core was designed to contain, breaking the stone finishes the work.” 

The thing wearing Xylas’s face smiled wider, as if Cassian had praised it. 

“So you knew,” it said, and the tone turned almost pleased. “You knew what it was.” 

Its gaze flicked toward the stone, then back to Cassian. 

“And you still let me act for so long,” it continued, voice turning mocking. “You still let me wear him. Your kind never fail to annoy me.” 

The blackness under Xylas’s skin shifted as if it was laughing along with him. 

“It gets tiring,” it added “Trying to be noble. Trying to play by rules made for… weak animals.” 

Cassian’s jaw clenched. “If I did not let you reveal your path, how would I reach my brother.” 

The thing made a sound that was almost a cough of laughter. 

“Reach him,” it echoed. “You still think this is about reaching him.” 

Its eyes brightened with cruelty. 

“Even if you find him,” it said, and the air thickened around the words. “You cannot do anything. He might still be alive, yes. He might still be somewhere behind your precious rubble and your collapsing tunnels.” 

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Chapter 297 

It leaned forward slightly. The black coating on its throat moved like something swallowing. 

“But he will not live for long,” it said. The smile turned into something uglier. “Not after I-” 

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Its gaze slid past Cassian toward me, and my skin tightened because the hunger behind that look felt personal. 

Cassian moved instantly, shifting to block its line of sight with his body. 

The thing’s mouth curved again as if it enjoyed being denied. 

“Especially after I devour such a delicious dish,” it finished, voice lowering as if it wanted me to hear it. 

My stomach lurched. Heat flared under my skin in a reflex that did not know where to go. 

Cassian’s sword lifted. “Over my dead body.” 

He lunged. 

Steel flashed toward Xylas’s neck, fast enough that I only caught the motion in the blur of light and shadow, and the thing did not step back like a man avoiding a strike. 

t met Cassian head on. 

ts hand snapped up, and blackness surged over its forearm as if forming armor on command. Cassian’s blade struck it with 

harsh ring that sounded wrong, like steel colliding with something that had no right to be solid. Sparks jumped and died in he damp air. 

The thing laughed. 

Yes,” it said, and the pleasure in its voice made my stomach tighten. “Exactly what I want.” 

The fight exploded into motion so quickly that my eyes struggled to keep up. 

Cassian drove forward with force that made his boots scrape hard against stone, sword cutting in tight arcs meant to end a ife, meant to take a head, meant to split a throat before the enemy could blink. 

Xylas moved like a shadow wearing muscle. 

de twisted away without retreating, his body slipping just off the line of the blade, then snapping back in with a counter that vas not a clean sword strike but a brutal hit aimed to break bones. 

Cassian’s shoulder jerked as the blow glanced off his armor. Then he answered immediately, steel coming up again, cutting or the ribs. 

Kylas caught the blade with his palm. 

Not the edge, not the flat, but the steel itself, and blackness coated his fingers like a glove that should not exist. The sound hat came from the contact made my teeth ache, and Cassian’s eyes narrowed as he ripped his sword free with a hard twist 

The next second, Cassian was airborne. 

I saw the motion in fragments. Xylas’s arm snapped forward. Cassian’s body lifted as if the air had been punched out from under his feet. He flew across the clearing, but he did not hit the wall like a man thrown to die. 

He turned mid–air, boots catching stone, and he used the cave wall as leverage. 

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Chapter 297 

He pushed off it. 

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His body snapped back into the fight with terrifying control, sword already moving again as he catapulted himself forward and cut across Xylas’s chest, not deep enough to kill, but deep enough to prove that flesh still existed under whatever coating the Shadow had spread across him. 

Blackness seeped around the cut like it was trying to close it instantly. 

Xylas’s head turned toward me. 

For a heartbeat, he moved toward me. 

My stomach dropped. 

Cassian intercepted him before he crossed even half the distance, launching himself between us again like his body was a barrier built for one purpose. Steel rang again as Cassian’s sword met Xylas’s arm, and the impact shook up my own arms even from where I stood. 

Around us, the beasts reacted. 

They had been circling and snarling and shifting as if waiting for a chance to strike, but now they faltered. Their heads lifted. Their bodies stiffened. Some backed away in jerky, uncertain motions like animals recognizing a larger predator. 

Then they fled. 

They scattered into tunnels and cracks like water poured onto hot stone, scrambling over each other, claws scraping, bodies slamming into the rock as they tried to get away from the center of the clearing. 

It was not fear of steel. 

It was fear of what stood here wearing the King’s body, and fear of what Cassian was willing to become to stop it. 

My gaze snapped to the floating stone again, because it was still there, still turning, still pulsing. 

And the closer I stood to it now, the more I felt something that did not match the horror around it, 

Warmth. 

Not heat like fire, not pressure like the core, but warmth that pressed gently against my chest and made my ribs loosen a fraction as if my body recognized it before my mind could. 

It felt familiar. 

It felt safe in a way that did not make sense. That contradiction made my throat tighten because I had expected it to feel like the source of everything wrong in this mountain. 

Instead, it felt like the kind of presence that used to exist in stories mothers told children before sleep, the kind that promised protection even when the world outside was full of teeth. 

My fingertips tingled, my healing stirred. For some reason I feel drawn towards the stone. 

And Xylas seemed to have noticed this. 

His 

eyes cut toward the stone for half a heartbeat, then snapped back to Cassian with irritation that looked like disgust. 

“Weak,” he hissed, the word landed like spit. 

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Chapter 297 

Then he moved. 

His kick came so fast I barely saw it, but I heard it. 

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The impact slammed into Cassian’s side hard enough that Cassian’s body lifted again, this time with less control because the strike had landed clean. Cassian hit the wall with a heavy crash, stone dust bursting outward around him, and for the first time in this fight I saw his shoulders dip as he absorbed the shock. 

Xylas turned slightly, as if considering whether to finish him. 

Then his gaze slid back toward me again. The hunger in his expression returned like it had never left. 

Cassian had barely pushed himself off the wall when I saw it. 

The strip of blackness Xylas had torn from his own body earlier, the piece that had fallen and lain still like discarded waste, was no longer still. It had stretched across the stone in a thin smear and then gathered itself, pulling inward like muscle tightening under skin. It moved with intent. 

It lunged. 

The black mass snapped onto Cassian’s back just as he straightened, clinging to his shoulder blades and spreading across the fabric and metal of his armor as if it had been waiting for that exact moment of distraction. It did not splash. It latched. It flattened against him and then began to crawl upward toward his neck. 

“Cassian!” I shouted, but the sound tore out of me too late. 

He reacted instantly, reaching back with his free hand and dragging his sword across his own shoulder in a brutal angle meant to cut it off, but the black substance split under the blade and then sealed again, slipping around the steel and climbing higher like oil poured over stone. 

I took a step toward him. 

Yet, Xylas appeared in front of me. 

One moment there was distance between us, and the next his body filled my vision, close enough that I could see the faint tremor under his skin where the blackness pulsed beneath it. 

I did not hesitate. 

My dagger was already in my hand. 

I drove it forward with everything I had left, aiming for his throat, because I had learned that hesitation only gave these things room to root deeper. 

He caught my wrist. 

His hand twisted around mine. 

The dagger stopped inches from his neck. 

Then, he leaned closer. 

The blackness under his skin crawled toward his jaw again, coating half his face in a dark sheen that made his eye on that side look sunken and deeper set. 

“Now,” he said, and his breath smelled metallic, like blood left too long in open air. “Shall we start?” 

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