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Shadows rolled out of my fingertips, with a mind of their own.

They sank into the wound like black oil, threading through the ruined flesh, and every muscle in my body locked.

“Fuck,” I ground out, teeth bared as the darkness burrowed deeper.

It sank through ruined flesh and into muscle, cold as the grave and twice as hungry. My spine locked. My fingers clawed at the deck until splinters drove beneath my nails, but even that pain vanished beneath the agony spreading through my side.

My vision dimmed at the edges. A deafening ring filled my skull, drowning out Solas, Aldric, the sea, everything. There was only the wound. Only the shadows feeding from it. Only the void opening its mouth inside me and trying to drag me home.

Feed the Throne. Feed the Throne. Feed the Throne, the shadows whispered, their voices lapping over one another like a chorus of a thousand dead souls.

Something pressed against my mouth.

I tried to turn away, but a hand gripped my jaw and forced my lips apart.

Warmth spilled over my tongue.

Lyra.

The taste of her exploded through me, rich and violent and unbearably familiar. My body reacted before my mind could catch up, throat working as Solas forced the blood between my teeth.

The shadows shrieked. Recoiling from the wound and peeling back through my flesh like something burned. I choked on a breath that tasted of salt, iron, and her.

“Drink,” Solas ordered, his voice cutting through the ringing in my skull. “Damn you, Rythos. Drink.”

I swallowed again and the bond flared through my chest. Turquoise and bright, splitting through the darkness like a lifeline pulling me back from the brink.

I can step away from the darkness.

I am Rythos Draven.

I am more than the monster within me.

I recited the chant, clinging to Lyra with everything that I was. I felt her on the other side of the bond and my heart ached with a longing so fierce it threatened to break.

She had shattered my heart, and still, every broken piece of it belonged to her.

Every reluctant beat.

Every bitter throb.

Every ruined part of me that should have stopped loving her and simply did not.

I drank the bag dry, then two more before my vision returned and the pain ebbed away to a distant hollow.

I was not sure how many blood bags were gifted to me, but a sinking feeling in my gut told me I was going to run out of both blood and time.

I pushed up onto my elbows, staring down at the wound that had begun slowly stitching itself back together before looking up at Solas.

His hazel eyes were filled with a worry I could not afford to see right now, so I stared at the horizon. At the line where the deep blue depths touched the grey clouds like lovers.

“Hoist the anchor,” I commanded, voice coming out hoarse and used as if I had been screaming. Perhaps I had been.

“Only if you sleep,” he challenged and crossed his arms as he leant against the side of the ship.

“I have no fucking time to sleep⁠—”

“Neither I, nor Solas will man this ship unless you go to the captain’s quarters and sleep.” Aldric spoke as if he believed the fragile delusion that he held any sentiment of authority. The prince was still shirtless, his pale skin turning a tinge of purple from the cold. Yet he refused to shiver. He raised his chin in a way that reminded me of Lyra’s defiance, causing a bitter sharpness to stab through my heart.