Free Web NovelChapter 457: Chapter 457
He kept his arms wrapped around her, unwilling to let her go just yet. According to the queen’s orders, he was to depart in two days’ time, riding eastward to meet the rest of the hunters. He hated how forces beyond his control always found a way to drag him away from her, how every fragile stretch of peace they managed to carve out for themselves was so easily shattered.
As he held her, his gaze drifted idly across the room before settling on a small shadow cast along the wall near the window. At first glance, it seemed insignificant, something he would have ordinarily ignored without a second thought. But now, something about it felt wrong.
The curtains had been drawn back, allowing a steady stream of light to pour through the clear glass. The light gathered thickly in that corner, illuminating it. There was nothing there that should have broken the light or any object that could have cast the shadow..
And yet, the shadow remained, even though it should not have been there.
—
When Circe fell asleep that night, she did not drift into one of her usual visions of a younger Ragnar and his mother. Instead, she found herself standing alone in the middle of a vast, snow-covered field. freewebnovёl.ƈom
There was nothing else in sight.
The land stretched endlessly in every direction, a white expanse that swallowed the horizon whole. The sky above was a dull, lifeless gray, and the air was unnaturally still, as though the world itself were holding its breath.
She took a step forward. Her foot had barely moved before she wobbled, her balance faltering as a low tremor rippled beneath her feet. The earth began to rumble, the vibration traveling up through her body in a way that made her stomach twist uneasily.
Then, without warning, the ground before her split open.
The crack tore through the frozen earth like a jagged wound, widening rapidly as though something beneath the surface was forcing its way through. Circe could only stand there, frozen in both horror and fascination, as the first hand burst forth from the soil.
It was pale. Decayed.
Then another followed. And another.
Soon, multiple hands clawed their way out from beneath the earth, grasping blindly as bodies began to drag themselves upward from the graves that had held them only moments before.
Rotting flesh clung loosely to brittle bones. Hollow eye sockets stared into nothingness as jaws hung slack. The dead rose in grotesque motions, their limbs stiff and unnatural.
Circe could not look away as she watched the decay begin to reverse.
Flesh knit itself back together over exposed bone. Sunken cheeks slowly filled, skin smoothing as though time itself were bending to undo death’s work. The corpses transformed before her eyes, shedding the marks of rot and ruin until they resembled what they had once been, whole and intact.
She did not know how but she instinctively knew that this was all her doing.
Magic crackled in the air around her, charged with a power so immense it rose the hairs at the back of her neck. It was unmistakably hers.
And yet, it was not the same. It felt darker somehow, tainted with something ancient and forbidden. Necromancy.
The word echoed through her mind like a distant whisper. She had always known her power over souls, over the unseen threads that tethered a person’s soul but this...
This was something else entirely.
She had dominion not only over one’s life force, but over the empty husks left behind.
She had awakened the dead. And there were so many of them.
They continued to rise, one after another, until the snow-covered field was no longer empty but teeming with the once-dead. The sheer scale of it made her head spin, her thoughts struggling to catch up with what she was witnessing.
Her gaze shifted, sweeping across the endless expanse, and a sinking feeling settled deep in her chest.
Had she stumbled into a mass burial ground?
Something was wrong. A sense of foreboding pressed in on her from all sides. It felt as though something vast and insidious was stirring just beyond her reach, watching... waiting.
The dead surrounding her were not truly people.
They moved, they stood, they breathed but there was nothing behind their eyes. No warmth. No soul.
They were like empty vessels with no will of their own.
Circe could feel them. Each and every one. A strange tether stretched between her and the countless bodies before her. She could sense them as clearly as she could feel her own heartbeat.
They had crossed into the afterlife which meant they now belonged to death. They were hers to control.
—
Circe jerked awake with a sharp gasp, her body snapping upright as she was pulled from the depths of the dream by force. Her chest rose and fell rapidly and her heart pounded violently against her ribs.
For a moment, the world around her felt distant and distorted. Then she became aware of the firm hands on her.
Her gaze darted frantically around the room, her vision unfocused as panic lingered in her chest. Slowly, awareness began to return, piece by piece, as the dream loosened its grip on her mind.
The room was dimly lit but she could still see that it was her chambers.
And then she saw him.
Ragnar had shifted in front of her, close enough that she could not look anywhere else without first seeing him. His brown eyes were filled with worry.
His lips were moving. He was speaking to her. But she could not hear him.
A deafening ringing filled her ears, drowning out everything else.
Circe squeezed her eyes shut, shutting out the world as she forced herself to concentrate. She clung to the sound of her own breathing, willing herself back into the present.
Gradually, the ringing began to fade. Other sounds filtered in, faint at first until one sound rose above the rest. Her name.
She opened her eyes.
Ragnar was still there, his gaze locked onto hers, searching her face for answers.
"What happened?" he asked, his voice low but urgent, laced with concern.
Circe swallowed, her throat dry.
"I saw dead people," she said. "Many of them."
