There is speculation that because the Shadowlands sits directly next to the Faery Realm that there was, at one time, a connection or kinship between Shadowkind and Faerykind.
This knowledge and history, unfortunately, has been lost to all.
I’d wondered the same thing. They were so close, there had to be a reason for it.
Finally, I came to the end of the information about Shadows, which hadn’t been that much. To fill the pages, the author of this book had repeated the same stuff over and over, just rewording it differently to fill up space. I’d used the same tactic when writing a few essays for school, thinking I could fool my teachers into believing I’d done more research than I had. It never worked. They knew.
Just as Rhys had warned, there were blank pages that filled up the rest of the book. I flipped past a couple of them...
But then I stopped flipping when I suddenly came to more pages filled with writing. Different writing this time, another hand had written this. And another pen.
To whomever is reading this,
You are very special. I have waited a long time for you and worried that you’d never learn the truth. You’re the only one who can help.
The true history of Shadowkind is lost, not by time or misplaced information, but on purpose. Even I don’t know everything. But I know enough.
Once, not so very long ago, a truly evil curse was placed upon all of Shadowkind—a curse that reached back through the years, rewriting the truth. Only I, a victim of another evil curse, am able to remember some of the truth. I can’t say anything because I know I’ll be killed if I do. So I have to sit back and watch as the years go by and no one learns of this.
Shadows were not always servants. Shadows were not always dependent on their amulets. It’s the amulet that keeps them enslaved, that prevents them from having a choice in their own destinies. It’s the amulet that will trigger an even worse curse—if they kill anything from the dark worlds, they will develop a dangerous hunger that can lead to their execution at the hands of demons who have always been more than happy to kill anything they see as a threat.
I stopped reading for a moment, my heart racing. Michael didn’t only destroy Jonas in the Underworld, but he also killed a hellhound that attacked me. Is that what could have triggered this new curse?
I believe I know how to break the original Shadow curse and help return them to their previous power, but doing so will change the world from that day forward. It is up to you, whoever is reading this, to decide if it is worth it to break a curse that stretches its false truth back a thousand years. Despite knowing all this, I’m personally powerless to do anything but wait. For you.
You’re the only one able to read this. Anyone who is affected by the spell that protects the curse won’t be able to see anything here but empty pages.
You alone have the power to change the worlds. To break the Shadow curse. To save Shadowkind. And while you’re at it, it would be really great if you could break my curse too.
Pretty please.
Hoping to see you soon,
Beasley
I stared at the signature. Beasley. I recognized the name. It was the name of the demon council member I’d met during my trip to the Underworld. The one who looked more like a six foot tall talking cockroach than anything else. Did he have that monstrous form because he was cursed?
I flipped forward through more blank pages and found nothing else that might help fill in the blanks.
But this was enough to completely stun me.
Michael said that the hunger he now felt was like a curse. He had no idea how close to the truth he actually was.
Shadows were cursed—a curse that, according to this, wasn’t created very long ago but it was somehow able to reach a thousand years back through history. This was why Shadows were servants to demonkind and, possibly, why faeries and demons accepted this class distinction without a single argument. Why no one could remember their history except for bits and pieces.
Why everything had been taken away from them and they couldn’t exist without their amulets.
Their amulets were part of their curse. And yet without their amulets, they couldn’t hold solid form and could die. It was a lose-lose situation.
Now that I thought about it, that really did sound like a curse.
Was I really the only one who could read this message from Beasley? Dread had called me the girl with a foot in two worlds. I was half demon and half human. That made me different, I already knew that. I was rumored to be the first Darkling in a thousand years.
Beasley said the curse had reached back in Shadow history a thousand years.
The last Darkling had been killed because she was allegedly too dangerous to live, and any further demon/human romantic interaction was outlawed at risk of death. Darklings had the stigma of being out-of-control dangerous.
Suddenly, I had my doubts about the last Darkling being so dangerous. I knew that I wasn’t that way. I didn’t want to hurt anyone; I wanted to help them. Maybe the last Darkling had seen the truth when no one else could.
Maybe she’d tried to stop it or tell other people about it. And maybe that was what got her killed.
So many questions. They made my head spin.
My hand shook as I put the Shadow book in the top drawer of my bedside table, along with the beautiful faery rose from Rhys and the drawing that Chris had done for me that I now knew was of Clara, the murderously jealous faery girl.
Then I concentrated on my dragon’s tear and tried very hard to open a gateway to the Shadowlands. It still didn’t work. All it gave me was a headache from concentrating so hard.
I fumbled in my pocket until I pulled out the black rock. It hadn’t worked before, but it had to work now. I needed to know what had happened in the castle after I left. Michael was cursed.
Killing that hellhound had triggered this darker side that he wouldn’t be able to control. He thought he could find the answer himself, but according to the letter from Beasley, he would fail.
And he would be executed to protect others.
“Please work this time,” I whispered. I clutched the rock and it warmed in my hand. The room around me began to spin, and that made me hold on tighter. Faster and faster my bedroom spun until it shifted into the gray hallways of the Shadowlands castle.
I breathed a sigh of relief. I wouldn’t be able to communicate with anyone this way, but it would have to do for now.
I hurried through the hallways until I reached my father’s work room with the fireplace, the long table and the gazer in the corner. My father sat in a tall backed chair in front of the fire, staring into the flames as if mesmerized by them. There was a harsh expression on his face.
Anger. Regret.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, although I knew he couldn’t hear me. “Where’s Michael?” I looked around, then I left the room and ran through the hallways trying to find him. I emerged into the courtyard. It was as bright and shiny as the last time I’d been here, a small splash of color that smelled of spring flowers and fresh grass in an otherwise cold and bleak place. He wasn’t here either.
I entered the castle again and raced down the halls, passing servants who scurried here and there.
“You’re back,” a voice said. I turned sharply to see Dread standing there.
My breath caught at the sight of him. “Your rock worked again.”
“Yup.”
“It didn’t work before, after I’d been sent away.”
He shrugged. “I didn’t want it to work then.”
I fixed him with a dark look. “You are the castle, aren’t you? You are the castle’s...
personality. Its guardian spirit.”
He gave me a grin. “That’s me.”
I clutched the rock tighter so I wouldn’t lose my grip on it. “What happened when I left? With my father and Michael?”
“They argued.”
“I’m sure. But what happened then?”
“I can’t say
.”
Frustration filled me. This guy picked and chose what questions he wanted to answer. It was incredibly annoying and not helpful in the slightest. “There’s a curse, you know. A Shadow curse. Does that effect you, too?”
“I’ve been here from the beginning. I have seen everything. And, yes, I know everything.”
“So you can help me!”
He shook his head. “Sorry. I’m only able to help a little and I’ve done all I can. But I do wish you luck.”
Before I could say anything else, he faded away into the wall behind him.
I let out a growl of frustration. “Where is Michael?”
“Your father knows,” Dread whispered, although I couldn’t see him anymore.
Fine. I headed back to my father’s room. He still sat in the chair facing the fire, studying the flames as if they might hold all the answers he sought.
I squeezed the black rock for courage and approached the chair. “Okay, you can’t see me and you can’t hear me, which means I’m not going to be able to ask you any questions. But we need to talk. As soon as I’m able to open another gateway, I’ll be back. You told me that Michael would be okay, that you’d help him. But I can’t find him anywhere. Did you lock him up somewhere so he wouldn’t cause any more trouble? Because if so? Not cool.” Something caught my eye then. A glint of green. My gaze fell to what dangled from my father’s right hand.
A long gold chain. On the end of it was a green stoned amulet.
I stopped breathing. It was Michael’s amulet.
My father had Michael’s amulet. And Michael was nowhere to be found.
I staggered back from him, my chest tightening. “Did you take that away from him? Or did he take it off himself?”
The answer to that question had suddenly become the most important thing in my entire universe. If my father had punished Michael for stealing my energy by taking his amulet, he would fade away to nothing. He would die.
But if Michael had taken it off himself, he would still be strong, but incorporeal. A true Shadow, but one who needed the life energy of his victims to stay alive.
Both answers were bad. But only one meant that he was lost to me forever.
The shock of what I’d seen made me drop the black rock. The image of my father whose rigid expression was lit by the fire spun away and was replaced by the familiar interior of my bedroom. I fell to my knees and began to sob.
He was gone. Michael was gone.
It took me a while to get a hold of myself. Immediately, I grabbed the Shadow book and flipped through the pages to Beasley’s message. I read it over and over until I’d practically memorized it.
Shadow were cursed, but there was a way to break it. To break it would cause more devastation—it would change the world from that day forward.
The question was, which world?
According to Chris, I was prophesied to destroy only one world—the Shadowlands. How I felt toward my father at this precise moment—seeing him holding Michael’s amulet and not knowing what happened—made me think that actually could be possible.
The only one who knew the truth, other than me, was a cursed talking cockroach.
And there was a possibility, a remote one, that I could still save Michael’s life.
I had to find Beasley and talk to him. I needed to know how to break the curse that had rewrote Shadow history and kept them from their true power and freedom for a thousand years.
Beasley, however, didn’t live in the Underworld. Or the Faery Realm. Or the human world.
Nope, none of the above.
It was time for a field trip to Hell itself.
How does it all end?!
The fourth & final book in the Demon Princess series REIGN STORM
is Coming Soon!
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for all the latest news and excerpts!
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michelle Rowen is a national bestselling and award-winning author of many paranormal novels for both adults and young adults. Learn more about Michelle and her books at
www.MichelleRowen.com
Document Outline
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Michelle Rowen, Reign Fall
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