Darkness Rising

by Cate Farren

  “Stop!” Toren called.

  Clover turned to her. “What is it?”

  “Insects,” said the Fey princess. She glanced around her, her hands dancing in the air, almost as if she were using her fingers as antennae. “I can feel them, crawling over the walls.”

  “Nature just seemed to evolve here on its own,” Clover explained. She noticed one of Saskia’s spell books on the couch. It was open on a page about curses. “There’s birds and frogs and allsorts out there. It’s utterly bizarre, but strangely beautiful. Life finds a way I suppose.”

  “No,” said Toren. “I am linked with nature, as are all Fey. It isn’t as strong on this world, but it’s there. Something is wrong...”

  There was a creak on the stairs. Loki stepped down, stopping on the next to last step. He surveyed them with wry amusement.

  “If you were hoping to sneak up on me then you were sadly mistaken.” His eyes caressed Clover before coming to rest on Zelda, who flinched. “You’ve made so much noise since you arrived here I’m surprised they didn’t hear you in another dimension.”

  “Where’s Jessica?” Clover demanded, hoping Zelda was ready.

  “She’s upstairs,” Loki answered. “She despises you by the way. You left her.”

  “I had no choice!”

  Loki shook his head. “No. You had a choice. You just chose to abandon her when she needed you the most. What kind of mother are you?”

  Clover couldn’t keep herself in control any longer. She screamed and ran forward, morphing her face into Loki’s beloved Chorda as she did. When he didn’t react she knew something was wrong.

  Zelda let loose the spell she’d been brewing. It fired towards Loki, a massive ball of swirling blue energy, and slammed into him. He screamed in pain as his entire body convulsed and dropped to the floor as a pile of goo.

  Adrian grimaced. “What is that?”

  Zelda stepped forward. “Loki is in stasis as the basic form of a shapeshifter. This should last until we can get him back to his prison dimension – hopefully, anyway.”

  Clover ignored them all, concentrating on the goo. Something wasn’t right about this. Loki should have reacted at seeing Chorda’s face, and yet he hadn’t seemed to recognize her at all. Had he been suspecting such an attack and mentally prepared for it? Maybe, but Clover knew him better than that. Chorda was his one true love and his weakness.

  She watched with concern as Zelda pulled a small glass vial from her pocket. She pulled out its cork and held it over the goo. The witch performed another spell and what was left of Loki, Lord of Chaos, was sucked inside the small container.

  “There,” said Zelda, grinning. She put the cork back on the vile. “Loki is no more.”

  Clover continued to stare at the vial. This was too easy. Loki had just let them waltz in and capture him. He hadn’t fought back. There’d been no other resistance at all. How could things be over with no battle and no fight? It was incomprehensible.

  Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Take the win.

  “Where’s Saskia?” Adrian asked. He shook his head. “I can’t smell her.”

  “She’s probably masking herself with magic,” said Lovisa.

  Clover took to the stairs. She had to find Jessica. For now, she’d ignore the warning signs that flashed in her mind about this mission. Her daughter came first.

  “Jessica!

  She pushed open her bedroom door and came to a stop. Jessica was on the bed, her face against the pillow. She wasn’t moving.

  "Jessica!" Clover screamed.

  She ran in, hugging her daughter's body to her chest. The girl's lips were blue and her eyes were blank.

  "No, no..."

  She pushed herself into Jessica's mind, trying to find something there, a flicker. They were connected. There had to be something she could do.

  Jessica, please...

  There was nothing. She was dead.

  Chapter 43

  Clover gripped her daughter's body tighter, weeping.

  Jessica...

  Jessica...

  She heard something behind her but ignored it. Right now she wanted to die. She'd failed Jessica and she deserved a painful death.

  This is my fault. I should never have left her.

  Fuck the world. Fuck everybody else. Jessica was gone...

  “I had so much left to teach you,” Clover whispered. She stroked Jessica’s soft hair. “I know I only had you for such a short time, but it wasn’t enough. We were supposed to live forever. I was supposed to have eternity with you.”

  "And that's what will happen to Jessica for real should you interfere," a voice said behind her.

  She let go of Jessica and turned. There was another shapeshifter standing by the doorway, taking on her daughter's form. The spiteful smirk on its face was cruel coming from the body of someone so innocent.

  "What?" Clover asked. "This isn't Jessica?"

  The shapeshifter smiled. "She is with Loki. She is with her true family."

  Clover raged and screamed, charging at the shapeshifter. She started beating at its face with her fists, crying and angry and wanting to pulverize her enemy until there was nothing left. She felt such hate.

  "You made me think she was dead!" Clover shouted. The shapeshifter at the end of her fists couldn't move or defend itself. Clover was a dervish of pure fury, her fists pummeling it again and again. "And I'm going to get her back and Loki is going to wish he was never born!"

  She grabbed the shapeshifter by the neck and twisted so hard its head ripped off its body. She screamed her grief as a geyser of blood splashed into her face and she threw the useless appendage onto the floor.

  Loki...

  Loki...

  "What the hell is going on?" Jared shouted, rushing in. He almost slipped on the blood. "Clover, are you hurt?"

  She shook her head. "No. I'm fine. Perfectly fine."

  She kicked what was left of the body. Any lingering sentiments she had for Loki had now evaporated. He'd gone too far this time. She'd show him what it meant to be a true being of chaos, because she was going to shove that chaos right down his throat.

  ADRIAN CONTINUED TO hone his senses as they waited for Clover to return from upstairs. The smell here was wrong, full of foul emotions, rotting food, and stale water. It was like dead bodies floating on a swamp, decomposing. How could the others stand it? It was almost overpowering.

  “Stop pulling faces,” Lovisa told him. She was inspecting the spell book on the couch. “It’s not an attractive look on you.”

  “It stinks like death,” he said. He covered his nose, but even then he could taste it. “I’m going to throw up.”

  Several flies were buzzing around Zelda’s head. She wafted at them with her hands, annoyed. The vial containing Loki was sticking out of a pocket on the chest of her combat gear.

  We got dressed up like a SWAT team for the battle of a lifetime and it was over just like that. I was expecting more.

  Not that Adrian wanted a battle, far from it. It just would’ve been nice to let out his wolf side for a fight.

  “This was definitely an anti-climax,” Sutton moaned.

  “I wanted to fight something,” Valeriu muttered.

  Sutton glared at him darkly. “I can try and kill you if you’d like.”

  Toren snapped her hand out, catching one of the flies between her fingers. She squished it and wiped the remains against the wall.

  “These are not ordinary flies,” said the Fey princess. She looked around her, concern written on her face. “They’re enchanted.”

  Zelda slapped at her neck and said, “One of them bit me!”

  At the same time as they heard a scream of pure grief from upstairs a swarm of flies descended on Zelda. The witch swatted at them with her hands, panicking. More of them bit her, over and over. Adrian punched at the flies, catching some of them, but more seemed to take their place. There were dozens of them now, maybe hundreds. He didn’t understand where they were coming from. T
hey seemed to be appearing out of nowhere.

  Toren performed a spell, exploding the flies on contact. Their tiny bodies were disintegrated instantly.

  “Thank you,” said Zelda. The skin on her face where she’d been bitten was going purple. “Who knew simple flies could be so dangerous?”

  Adrian could smell putrefaction even more heavily now. It was emanating from Zelda. He walked up to her, watching with horror as her face and hands started turning purple and then black. She gasped and clutched at her throat.

  “Let me handle this,” Toren said.

  The Fey princess held onto Zelda’s body as she thrashed in agony. Spots started opening up in her skin, bleeding out black/yellow pus. She couldn’t breathe.

  “Help her!” Lovisa cried.

  Toren dropped Zelda and fell back, gasping for air herself before coming to. Lovisa came to the witch’s aid but it was too late. They could only watch as she died right in front of them.

  CLOVER WIPED AWAY THE shapeshifter gore on her face as her and Jared ascended the stairs. All she could think about was destroying Loki. He’d made her think her daughter was dead. How could he profess to care for her and then put her through such agony?

  The scene they found in the living room made them pause. The others were surrounding some sort of bloody body on the floor. She couldn’t tell who or what it was.

  “What the hell happened?” Clover cried.

  Toren was staring at the body, her limbs shaking. She seemed fragile.

  “It’s Zelda,” said Adrian. “Something attacked her. They killed her.”

  “The flies did something to her,” Toren explained. She leaned back into Wynn, who held her upright. “They leached all of her magic away and replaced it with something toxic and poisonous.”

  The body made a squelching sound. The flesh was decomposing right before their eyes. It stank awful.

  “When I touched her I felt it, and it tried to claim me too.” Toren pulled herself away from Wynn and tried to stand up straight. She looked like she was on death’s door herself. “I’m fine now.”

  She didn’t look fine, but Clover knew better than to argue with Toren.

  “How do we go home now?” said Sutton.

  They all looked at each other, confused and defeated. Without Zelda there was no way of getting back home. They were stuck here forever.

  Chapter 44

  They wrapped was left of Zelda's body with a sheet and buried her outside. They did consider leaving her inside, out of the way in the pantry, but the smell she gave off was too overpowering. Adrian was especially put out. He’d already vomited twice and had had to resort of smearing Vaseline around his nose to block the odors.

  Lovisa sighed as she poured a glass of water. There wasn’t much water left in the tank.

  "I'm not sure what to feel,” she admitted. She handed Adrian the glass, who drank the water down greedily. “I know we sort of made up, and I forgave her, but this woman caused me so much pain."

  "I know what you mean," Adrian admitted. He could still smell her, despite the Vaseline. “Perhaps we should just mourn and leave it at that.”

  She took his hand and kissed him. She was glad she had Adrian.

  TOREN PUSHED HER FINGERS into the dirt. She extended her reach mentally, communing with nature. It was weak in this place, almost non-existent, but it was there, albeit in an evolving, proto state. Right now it couldn't offer her much help with her magic.

  "No chance," she said. She stood up, angry. "This place is young. I can't siphon off any nature magic to open a portal."

  Trent sighed. "At least try."

  She stared daggers at him and did as she was bid. It didn't work. She knew she'd be almost powerless away from her own world, but she didn't think she'd be this useless. It was embarrassing and it made her feel weak. She hated feeling weak.

  “Are you okay?” Wynn asked. He tried to take her hand but she slapped him away.

  "The longer we stay here the weaker I'll get," she told him.

  “Then we’ll find a way,” Wynn promised.

  She shook her head. “I wouldn’t count on it.”

  THE BAT LANDED BY THE porch and transformed into Sutton. She stretched her limbs, feeling herself become a vampire again. When changing forms there was always this millisecond of confusion when her body thought it was something else.

  “See anything?” Trent asked.

  Jared’s white bat form was still hovering overhead. Sutton had tried initiating a game of tag with him while up in the air but he wasn’t having any of it. The new Jared was so serious. He wasn’t any fun any more.

  He’s the oldest vampire in the world. No wonder.

  Time travel still made no sense for. How could Jared be thousands of years old when he wasn’t even born twenty-three years ago? How could he be older than his own mother, his own grandfather?

  “Do children of vampires inherit their parent’s cadou?” Darin pondered. “I mean, Jared has taken on Dracula’s abilities.”

  Sutton and Trent stared at him like he was growing a second head. He actually blushed, which Sutton found completely endearing.

  “Why do you want to know that?” Trent asked. He actually smiled when he confronted his son on this, like he already knew the answer.

  Darin shrugged. “Just curious.”

  Gable Trent regarded them with curiosity for a few moments before he nodded his head in understanding.

  “You want to start a family,” the ancient demon stated.

  Sutton looked at Darin, smiled, and said, “The bigger the better.”

  GABLE TRENT STUDIED the way Darin and Sutton stared at each other before coming to a decision. He’d long ago resigned himself to the fact that these two loved each other, despite his objections. What could he do in the face of love? Starting a family was another matter entirely, even though it was clearly something they longed for, Sutton especially.

  “You know what this means, right?” he asked them.

  Darin and Sutton nodded.

  “We won’t talk about it too loudly,” said Sutton. She glanced over at Valeriu, who was watching the burial of Zelda with boredom. “Walls have ears and all that.”

  The only way Sutton and Darn could have biological children was to consume Clover’s blood. They knew that. He only hoped Clover herself would help them.

  “I’ll ask her for you,” Trent offered. “She trusts me.”

  “You’d do that for us?” Darin asked incredulously.

  Trent looked at Sutton. The hope that resided there blew him away. He never thought he’d see the day when Sutton Crane became an adult.

  “I would,” Trent affirmed.

  Sutton smiled and said, “And here I thought you were a miserable old demon.”

  THEY MET UP IN THE living room of the house a while later. The atmosphere was subdued as each of them tried to come to terms with their predicament. Clover could only think about Loki and how much she despised him. He'd tried to turn her while all the time setting up another plan to trick her should she not be swayed by him. Or maybe he knew all along he could never trust her? Maybe Loki never had any faith in her?

  Why does that bother me so much?

  It bothered her because Loki had seemed upset when she left. She'd seen the look on his face. He was devastated.

  Was he in love with me, or just upset that I couldn't join him?

  Trent placed the small vial that held what they thought was Loki on the coffee table. They all stared at it.

  “Who is this?” the demon demanded.

  “You said it was Loki,” said Daniel.

  “Yes,” said Valeriu suspiciously. “You said it was Loki. You said you could tell it was Loki. Why did you lie?”

  Clover felt closed in, like they were ganging up on her. Even Adrian and Lovisa looked away, as if thinking the worst of her. Only Jared and Trent continued to regard her with complete conviction.

  “I felt it was him,” said Clover. She picked up the vial. “And I still
sense him in there. I just don’t understand it.”

  “It’s obviously not him,” Valeriu railed, angry. “Why would he trap himself here?”

  She didn’t understand it. This shapeshifter was obviously not Loki, but it felt like him. How was that possible? Each shapeshifter was connected to the Lord of Chaos, even Clover herself, but they each had their own soul, their own flesh and blood. They were all different. So how could this be Loki and not Loki at the same time?

  “It could be one of Loki’s biological children,” Darin suggested.

  Toren looked up, startled. “It could be my brother.”

  They each looked at Toren in shock.

  “Chorda and Loki have a child?” Trent demanded. He sounded furious.

  “Yes,” Toren confirmed. “But I don’t know where he is.” She sighed and came over to Clover. She placed her hands close to the vial. “Could this be him? Could Loki have been in contact with him all along?”

  Clover wanted to think Loki wouldn’t use his own child like this, but she knew what he was capable of now. The bastard would let even Chorda herself, if she were alive, rot just to achieve his goals.

  There was only one way to find out this fake Loki’s identity. Clover popped the cork off the vial and emptied the goo onto the floor. It immediately reassembled itself.

  “Where am I?” Loki asked, confused.

  “Cut the crap,” Clover snapped. “We know you’re not Loki.”

  The shapeshifter didn’t move. He looked at them all each in turn before sitting on the edge of the coffee table. He was so unconcerned that Clover imagined he thought he’d been invited to a tea party, not an interrogation. The arrogance astounded her.

  “I am Loki,” he stated.

  Clover pushed herself into his mind, wrapping herself around their shared connection. He was Loki. He felt like Loki. There were even flashes of memories of the two of them in there, thoughts of Chorda, even Gable Trent on the day he flung Loki’s dead body into the Primordial Womb. For all intents and purposes this was Loki.