by Eve Langlais
The house continued to shudder and groan ominously.
When it suddenly jolted, the floor tilted, and Adara briefly lost her footing, slamming up against the lower wall on the opposite side from Kyla.
“Hurry.” Kyla sat perched on the sill, legs dangling outside.
Haste wasn’t simple given Adara worked against an angle that vibrated and threatened to fall over. The theatre chairs were heavy enough that they hadn’t moved much, and she used them as grips to hand herself up until she reached the window. Kyla eased out just as the building heaved again, the tilt getting more severe.
Adara gripped the sill and hauled herself out, the night air hitting her skin. Feathers ruffled in front of her.
She blinked. “Um, Kyla.” She almost said there’s a giant bird there with them, only to realize the bird was Kyla. The doctor had the biggest, darkest wings imaginable. Adara gasped. “Are you an angel?”
That made Kyla laugh. “Angels don’t exist. I’m a Valkyrie.”
The information hit Adara suddenly. “Descended from the Amazons, you were blessed by a god.”
“Odin gave all his maidens wings so that they might forever fly in his service.”
Adara rubbed her forehead. “And you talk about me living in a fantasy world.” Except as fantastical as it sounded, she knew it to be true.
Remembered it from her history lessons. Valhalla was another plane, a world of wild forests, oceans, and a female-dominated society of fierce warriors.
“Let’s chat about this in a bit. We need to go.” Kyla grabbed hold of Adara’s wrists. “Relax and dangle. You don’t want to get in the way of my wings.”
“What?” Further words were stolen as Kyla threw herself into the air, a firm grip on Adara whose feet left the dubious trembling safety of the house.
A mighty flap of wings caused a downdraft, but Adara was more concerned by the fact that they sunk rather than lifted.
“I think I’d rather take my chances on the ground,” Adara yelled, the idea of plummeting to her death not exactly appealing.
“Give. Me. A. Second,” Kyla huffed as her wings beat, finally reversing the effect of gravity. “You aren’t exactly petite.”
“Neither are you,” Adara retorted. Her doctor had gone from professional and benign to seductress in a business suit. Sultry enough that Titus had noticed.
Odd the relief Adara felt at that.
“I don’t know why I keep trying to help you,” Kyla riposted. “Maybe I should drop you and let you deal with the worm.”
“Maybe you should. Someone’s got to handle it.” This creature wasn’t Earth-based. It didn’t belong here, and if left unchecked, it would cause all kinds of issues.
“I see your beaus made it out of the house.”
Just in time, too. Adara saw them racing across the grass, the yard no longer smooth and pristine, the surface humped and still moving, the sparse working lights causing more shadows than aid.
While Logan sprinted over the lumpy terrain, Titus had more of a glide. The house behind them collapsed in a cacophony of cracking wood and a cloud of plaster.
For a moment, nothing could be seen. It took more than a few seconds for the dust to settle.
When the air cleared…the house no longer existed, unless the pile of rubble counted.
A heap that began to shake.
“It’s not dead,” Adara remarked.
“Short of splitting it in two and destroying its heart, it won’t die,” Kyla said, finally high enough that she began to angle away from the debris.
“Cut it in half… I can do that. Thanks for the tip.” Adara gave her body a sharp twist, forcing herself out of the Valkyrie’s grip.
She hit the ground with a grunt of pain, her knees bent. But she’d been testing herself of late. Noticing that injuries took less and less time to heal. Minor ones, at any rate.
She recovered quickly and sprinted towards the worm. Once more, as if it could see her, it tunneled its way through the wreckage.
“That’s it. Come to me,” Adara muttered, pulling forth her sword. It extended longer than usual but remained just as light.
By her side, a shaggy, familiar friend appeared. “We’ve got to cut it open,” she announced so he would understand her intent.
With a sharp bark, Logan veered slightly away and ran to intercept the worm. It might be intent on Adara, but she noticed it still had a sense of self-preservation as it shifted its head left and right, keeping track of both her and Logan.
As they neared, the scent of it washed over Adara, and her stomach heaved. More than just dirt, it stank of death, of things decaying underground, and age. This worm had to be old to get this size.
Within feet of it, Adara could see the scars of battles past. The slice that had bisected a few mouths and left them open and drooling. And it had eyes, she could see them now, embedded in the tongues, black orbs that stared.
Adara’s sword rose. The worm stretched for her, then halted. Turned the tip of its head upward.
Something distracted it.
A quick glance showed Titus atop the worm, daggers out, grimacing, the tether between them open enough that she could hear his thoughts. “You’re going to owe me a new suit.”
Then the daggers dug in, giving the opening she needed.
Adara dashed forward the last few remaining steps, sword gripped in two hands so that it wouldn’t pull free when she hit the beast.
The blade slipped into the tough skin and stuck, making her grunt as she pushed with all her might. The mouths closest to her snapped, and the tongues waggled, not long enough to actually touch, but gross.
The worm didn’t scream audibly, and yet the tension in the air changed, a fine tremor that rattled the senses.
“Die, damn you,” Adara muttered. If only her sword were sharper. She focused on the strength in her arms and blocked out the sounds of snarling as Logan harried the worm’s other side. She ignored the ichor pouring down the skin in noxious rivulets as Titus kept stabbing.
She only listened when Kyla said from behind her, “Use your magic. Feel that tingling in the air? Imagine drawing it in and focusing it through your sword.”
It sounded stupidly innocuous. How could magic be so easy?
Yet the moment she began to pull, tugging all that weird, tickly stuff, she found she needed a place to put it. So she poured it into her hands, which heated the pommel of her sword.
It began to glow. White. Hot. Blazing so that it sliced through the worm like butter, splitting it open and cauterizing the flesh. The burnt smell clung to her as she ran the length of the body, slicing it open.
Kyla ran alongside her. “You need to keep cutting until you find its heart. It can be anywhere depending on how it began life.”
“What?” Adara stopped and wondered why she was splitting it lengthwise when she could cut it in half.
The sword didn’t take long to fillet the body into two sections.
Kayla yelled, “Not like that. Now you really need to hurry. Quickly, finish splitting it.”
Adara almost asked why but something in the doctor’s panicky voice had her running again, splitting the long body of the worm, almost reaching the rubble of the house when she saw it. A dark, pulsing heap.
The heart.
The tip of her sword pierced it, and the whole worm shook, the silent scream almost deafening for its lack of sound.
Adara sawed the heart in half and watched until it stopped moving. The whole body went limp.
“I did it.” Triumph filled her. She should have known better than to run. She turned to say something to Kyla, only to yell, “Look out behind you!”
The other half of the giant worm spat out maggots. Dozens of them, each about a foot long. They hit the ground and began digging.
“What is that?” Adara asked as Logan chased one and bit it into pieces.
“It’s how the worms replicate. The larvae are dormant until you cut a section off from the heart. That’s their signal
to escape. It’s why you have to destroy the heart first,” Kyla said.
“That’s a lot of worms,” Titus noted as he came to stand near them.
“Most won’t survive long,” Kyla remarked. “But enough will to cause an issue. I’ll have to report what happened.”
“Report to who?” Adara asked.
“The tribunal.”
“But if you do, won’t they know you were helping me?” Adara might not like how Kyla had lied to her, but she did owe the woman for at least releasing her from Mammon’s dungeon.
Kyla arched a brow. “You were never here. I came out because the cabal leader reported some strange things happening on his property. With the help of the vampire, we managed to subdue the worm, but not entirely contain it.”
“A good story that requires us getting Adara out of sight.” Titus reached into his pocket for his phone. “I’d better make some calls. A safe hiding place might be complicated given the dragons have made us persona non grata.”
“Not my fault their security is lacking,” Adara muttered on a sulk but straightened quickly as she saw Kyla moving away. “Where are you going?”
“Like I already said, this must be reported.”
“But I’m not done asking you questions.”
“I’m afraid I cannot linger. You know enough. Enough to realize you’re not safe on this plane.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Find the one who is trying to eradicate you.”
“I’ve been trying to do that,” Adara snapped. “It hasn’t exactly been working for me.”
“Because you’re looking in the wrong place. It isn’t Earth that is after you, Erela.” Kyla’s gaze met hers. “You need to return to where the troubles originated.”
“Which is where?” Because her whole life was a series of problems.
“Given the demons who keep attacking, I’d say it’s obvious.”
Ha’el.
The very idea brought a chill to Adara’s skin and a soft, yet vehement, “I can’t.”
“Then expect more of this,”—Kyla swept a hand—“until you die.”
Chapter Nine
After the worm fight, Logan got the unenviable task of taking Adara to a safe house. Adara didn’t exactly cooperate which might be why he stuck to his wolf form as he walked her down the road.
They’d ditched the car a few blocks back. To mask their scent trail for anyone following, Adara shook a vial of cayenne pepper on either side of her—the spice found in the glove box that Titus informed them was part of Stefan’s stash. The old spy who tried to stupidly follow two masters.
“I’m tired of hiding,” she said, not for the first time.
Funny how she had a hard time talking freely to the man, but the wolf? He got to hear every confession. Couldn’t say much with his muzzle, but he could make disparaging noises when she said something dumb.
Like her dislike of hiding. Hiding wasn’t always a bad thing. Hiding allowed a wolf to regroup, heal, and plan. But Adara saw it as a punishment.
“I can handle myself.” A fact that became more and more evident. The Adara Logan had first met, the one who fainted at the sight of a zombie, now took on Tremor-sized worms. From dainty to warrior-strong.
She’d need to be strong if she would ever get his pack to accept her. They grumbled at their absent alpha. Not just his beta anymore, but his whole pack. They talked about how Logan’s time was consumed by Adara, who wasn’t one of them. There were rumblings of him being weak.
In other words, step up or step down. A choice would soon have to be made. Would he return to his pack and rule them as a proper alpha, or abandon them because he panted after a woman? Thus far, it seemed as if he leaned towards the latter.
Glancing at the woman stalking beside him, he began to question his choice. While she might have kissed him, she’d called him by another man’s name.
Not exactly the most flattering thing. Did his kiss make her feel so good that she forgot herself? Or was she imagining another touching her lips?
Is she just using me to get over that genie dude? That would make him the rebound guy. He’d seen that movie and knew how it ended.
“…can’t believe Kyla left.” Adara still ranted. “The only person who could have filled in some holes for me. Instead, she flies off. Flies! I never would have suspected she had wings.”
He chuffed. He’d never guessed it either. Still didn’t quite believe it despite seeing it with his own two eyes. Kyla didn’t smell like a shifter, which made him wonder, did all Valkyries smell the same? He’d have to make a point of meeting some more for a comparison sniff.
He should also ask the bird lady how she’d masked her scent and otherness the first time they met. Because he could have sworn she was 100% human.
“What is a Valkyrie doing here in the first place? They are a super reclusive bunch.”
“Awoo?” he said, trying to make it a question.
“How do I know?” She shrugged. “Just one of those things I remember. Part of my history lessons. My knowledge of them is limited. Never met one before in person. One hasn’t been seen in centuries because Old King Nabopolassar banished them.”
That was interesting. Why had the king done that? Was there still bad blood between the two groups?
“According to legend, the king entertained a large group of them during an inter-world diplomatic visit. They spent some time in his court, which is where he fell in love with a Valkyrie. Got her pregnant, too. When the baby was born, a girl, the mother left with her. Never said goodbye. Never came back. The king never forgave her.”
His harrumph of disgust made her laugh. “No, not the nicest thing she could have done and yet, as a matriarchal-based society, not completely unexpected. The king should have known better than to think he could change their ways. The Valkyrie is a race of powerful women. When I was younger, I used to wonder if one of them was my mother. A dream my teacher shattered when she said they only abandoned boys.”
“Awoo?”
She slapped his fur and laughed. “No, I am not a boy.”
The fact that she could jest after that nasty battle with the worm was telling. Old Adara would have been tucked into bed, trying to escape nightmares. He’d have snuggled by her side, enjoying a good scratch.
Now, she wore as much worm goo as he did, and she seemed ready to go into battle again.
The night wasn’t yet over. She might get her wish. The building Titus had sent them to loomed in the dark, the streetlights too short to fully illuminate.
“What I don’t get is why the Valkyrie aren’t punished for mating outside their own kind. They are the only ones who do it with impunity. Or so I assume.” Adara frowned. “There is so much I don’t know.”
The steeple projected spear-like into the air. The cross atop it made of some kind of metal that caught the scant half-moonlight and reflected it.
A bloody church was their destination. And the irony? A vampire had sent them there.
A nonplussed Adara cocked her head and said, “What a strange place. Do you feel it?”
Feel what? He nosed the air, looking for a smell out of place. He didn’t find any. However, the fur on his body sprang straight as if magnetized.
“It’s edging the place. Like some kind of security barrier.” She spoke aloud, her eyes slightly out of focus as if she saw something more than his wolf’s eyes could. Adara knelt on the sidewalk and reached out in front of her. Traced her hand back and forth, causing the air to flicker and spark as it showed faint lines of colored energy. “I think it’s magic.”
There must be wards around the place. Logan had encountered a few at Titus’s, but since he was keyed to them, he didn’t really pay them much mind.
“I wonder what they do?” A question asked even as she strummed her fingers through the air, causing the wards to quaver and illuminate.
If he’d been a man, he would have barked, “Idiot, you just let them know we’re here.”
&nbs
p; But, apparently, she understood. She stood and said, “They’re expecting us.”
They? Titus had never mentioned there would be other people here.
Adara stepped forward through the wards she’d played, and strode, head held high, towards the golden, gilded doors.
He waited a moment, long enough that she turned her head and said, “You coming?”
Now that he knew she wasn’t getting hit by lightning or exploding into chunks that would stick to his fur? Sure. Again, he’d watched movies, and mocked them enough to show a little care.
The doors to the church swung open at her approach. No one appeared, however, a warm breeze redolent of burning wax candles and sawdust brushed past his muzzle.
Showing no signs of hesitation, Adara walked in. Did the woman have no sense of self-preservation? There was brave, and then there was Adara, determined to confront everything without care.
Again, no body parts came whipping out the door, so he trotted to follow. There was no warning. No sign. Logan stepped over the threshold, and as soon as his last paw hit the floor, a jolt of something electric and painful went through him. He howled, a noise that turned into a yodel of surprise as he found himself lying naked on a tile floor.
“What the fuck?” Logan jumped to his feet, his entire body alert and tense. He’d never experienced an involuntary change before. He didn’t recommend it.
“Logan!” Adara exclaimed. “Where’s your wolf?”
“Gone.”
“I see that. You’re naked!” He caught the blush in Adara’s cheeks a moment before she turned her head.
“Don’t blame me. There’s something wrong with this place.” Really wrong since he’d never even known such a thing as spontaneous morphing was possible. “We need to go.”
“But Titus told us to come.”
“This place ain’t right.”
Whirling, he was in time to see the church doors slam shut. The ominous click let him know he’d not find an easy exit. “Fuck.”