The Night Realm

by Annette Marie

  They whipped around a bend and her voice died, her question left unspoken—because the answer was obvious.

  A streak of rippling green and blue light danced along the cave floor, following a jagged wall for ten yards before disappearing into solid rock. Various contraptions and machines straddled the ley line, and cords and cables ran back into the main chamber.

  “What’s wrong with it?” Clio whispered.

  She could feel it too: the way the line’s energy, which should have felt like a warm, rushing river of power, stuttered and buzzed like flames in a downpour. A bizarre sensation, like a blaring screech too high-pitched to hear, scraped at the inside of his skull.

  “It’s unstable here,” he answered, guiding her past the undulating light. “We have to go deeper. The line continues farther down.”

  “A ley line beneath Asphodel.” She clutched his arm, struggling to keep pace. “And Hades knows it’s here? But the danger of a line right under the town …”

  “I told you I know too many secrets to ever leave this place.”

  Her fingers dug into his arm, and she reached into the fabric belt around her waist. Her hand reemerged holding a small fabric bag—one he recognized.

  “Here,” she said breathlessly. “You’ll need this to travel the line.”

  He grabbed the bag and pulled it open with grateful urgency. His lodestones. Damn, the girl came prepared. He dumped them into his palm—a dozen sparkling diamonds, the best precious stone available to store magic.

  He clenched his hand around the stones and drained them all, drinking the magic into his exhausted body. Power burned through him, too much at once, but he embraced the pain as strength followed. For the first time since Dulcet had hit him with the death spell, he felt steady. Not at full strength, but no longer on the verge of collapse either.

  He shoved the empty lodestones into his pocket and took Clio’s arm again. They followed the twisting cave around another bend, and the gurgle of flowing water joined their thundering footsteps and labored breathing. A narrow river flowed alongside the uneven cave floor, its surface black—but not dark enough to hide the flash of movement beneath the water.

  But he didn’t care what might or might not be lurking in the water, because fifty yards ahead, the ley line emerged from the rock and crossed the cave, stopping at the river’s edge. It rippled and danced, beckoning them closer. Escape. All they had to do was reach the line, and they could jump between worlds.

  Freedom was fifty yards ahead, and he could almost taste it.

  Clio pushed her shoulders straight, gathering the last of her strength for the final sprint. With his arm around her waist and her arm hooked through his, they ran side by side for the wall of light. Its warm, rushing energy whispered across his senses.

  An ugly stutter cut through the flowing energy.

  Dulcet burst out of the line, blood running down his chest and black eyes blazing with triumph. Lyre skidded, dragging Clio to a stop, unable to believe what he was seeing. Dulcet had jumped down the line—using the unstable patch hooked up to the experimental machinery. Was he insane?

  Of course he was. Lyre already knew that. But he still wasn’t fast enough to cast a shield.

  Dulcet’s wild blast slammed into Lyre and Clio, hurling them backward. Lyre hit the ground hard, his bow flying out of his hand. It clattered on the stones as he rolled to a stop, ribs aching and lungs empty. His quiver fell off his shoulder as he shoved up onto his knees and looked around wildly for Clio and Dulcet.

  The second blast struck him in the side, and he was airborne again. But this time he didn’t land on a rocky floor.

  He plunged into icy water and accidentally swallowed a mouthful. Flailing as the sluggish current dragged him away from the rocky ledge, he kicked violently, pushing himself toward the shimmer of light that marked the river’s surface. His head broke free and he gasped for air.

  Clio was screaming.

  Her cries echoed off the walls, magnified and full of terror and pain. The sound tore through him like a knife, and he lurched toward the rock. Grabbing the edge, he heaved himself up.

  Something wrapped around his leg and constricted tightly. Then he was ripped off the ledge and back into the water.

  For a second time, he went under. A crushing grip wound around his other leg, then something enclosed his waist, squeezing hard. Blind in the dark water, he grabbed at the thing around his waist, his fingers digging into slimy scales.

  Bloody hell. Of all the times to get tangled up with local wildlife. As the aquatic creature dragged him down to the riverbed, he struggled to pry himself free. His weavings were of no use underwater.

  Magic couldn’t save him. He needed a weapon.

  Dropping his glamour was only too easy. Tingles rushed across his skin, then strength saturated his muscles. The tentacles writhed around him, disliking the pulse of magic. Another one caught his wrist and coiled up his arm.

  He hadn’t been carrying any weapons in his glamoured form, but that was no longer the case. With his free hand, he pulled a throwing knife from the sheath on his forearm and jammed the blade into the tentacle holding his other arm. The scaled limb jerked away. Pulling another knife, he stabbed both into the creature and dragged them through the tough flesh.

  The squeezing pressure disappeared, and he could feel the current pulling him again. Uninterested in prey that fought back, the creature had abandoned him.

  Knives at the ready, Lyre shot for the surface. His head burst out of the water, and this time the cavern was quiet—and that terrified him. He swam for the ledge and dragged himself out of the river.

  Twenty feet away, Dulcet crouched over Clio. He held her by the front of her shirt, watching her slack face with rapturous intensity.

  Lyre drew his arm back and flung the knife. With Dulcet’s shields, it would merely bounce off, but anything to distract him from Clio. The knife whipped through the darkness—and impaled Dulcet’s lower back.

  Dulcet shrieked in pain and shock, dropping Clio. Surprise cut through Lyre too. He had damaged one spot in Dulcet’s shield, but the rest of it should have been near full strength. So how …

  His gaze darted to Clio, slumped on the ground, unmoving. Had she broken Dulcet’s weave while Lyre was underwater?

  Dulcet yanked the blade from his back and spun around. Lyre hurled the second dagger. Dulcet flicked his fingers in a simple cast, knocking it out of the air, but Lyre was already charging in after it. Out of glamour, with his daemon strength to aid him, he flew across the distance and slammed his fist into Dulcet’s face.

  Dulcet staggered back, then his body shimmered as he too dropped glamour. His hair paled further, glistening radiantly in the dim light, but his face changed for the worse. Ragged scars dragged down the left side of his face, mangling his features. But his smile was just as deranged as usual.

  Lyre threw another punch and Dulcet caught it. For a moment, they stared at each other with equally black eyes.

  Then they attacked. Magic burst from them, casts and shields flying as fast as their blows. With unbridled violence, they hammered on each other, too close to use weaves or lodestones. Lyre drove into his brother, pushing him farther and farther from Clio, who still hadn’t moved. Dulcet roared and snarled, feet digging into the floor.

  Lyre swung his fist, coated in magic. Dulcet threw up an arm, the limb shielded, and Lyre hit the barrier in a fiery blaze. He kicked Dulcet in the gut. His brother staggered backward, and Lyre thrust out his hand, magic sparking over his skin.

  His palm hit Dulcet’s sternum—no shield between his blast and his brother’s chest. Dulcet crashed to the floor. For an instant, Lyre was confused as to why Dulcet hadn’t shielded against that blow.

  Then, from the ground, Dulcet grinned as he grabbed at the chains around his neck, and Lyre realized his mistake.

  He launched forward, but too late. With the time and space to use a lodestone, Dulcet activated a skin-tight shield spell to replace the one Clio had de
stroyed. Lyre skidded to a stop, reaching for his chains, but Dulcet was already lunging up, and another gem flashed.

  An invisible force rammed into Lyre. He sailed through the air, hit the ground, and tumbled across the ground.

  “A good fight, Lyre,” Dulcet called. “But now … by what method would you like to die?”

  Lyre shook his head, struggling to focus his eyes and unsure if all his bones were still intact. Laboring for every movement, he pushed onto his knees. His brother stood remarkably far away. How far had the spell thrown him?

  Dulcet sorted through his chain of spells. “I’m feeling rather generous since I get you and the girl, so I’ll let you choose how you’d like to meet your death.”

  A few feet away, his bow lay on the rocks, miraculously in one piece. Three yards behind him, Clio was still unconscious. Lyre glanced back at the ley line, measuring the distance. Then he stretched his arm out and grabbed the bow. Each movement stiff with pain, he staggered to his feet.

  “Oh?” Dulcet smiled. “You still want to play with me?”

  Lyre reached over his shoulder. All his arrows were safely lodged in the quiver, held in place by a spell that kept them from falling out. His fingers brushed across the fletching.

  “Really, Lyre. You already know a single arrow can’t break my shields. And this time I won’t let you keep shooting me.” He plucked a gemstone off his chain. “This one, I think. I’ll get to hear your screams for quite a while with this one.”

  Lyre drew an arrow with black fletching and laid it against the bow, cradling the shaft between his hand and the leather-wrapped grip. Dulcet raised his arm over his head as light flashed over his gem. Magic erupted around him, spiraling out from his feet in blades of red-tinted gold.

  “You can’t defeat me, Lyre,” Dulcet cackled as the weaving blazed even brighter. “You’re too soft, too timid. You don’t have a single truly destructive spell, and that will be your undoing.”

  Still laughing, he wiped his fingers across his bleeding back, painting his skin red. He clapped his bloody hand over the gemstone and the blades of magic flashed from rose to eerie crimson.

  “You won’t even weave blood magic!” he trumpeted.

  Lyre lifted the bow, and as he drew the string back, he pulled it farther than needed—pulled it until the arrowhead cut into his hand. As he flooded the arrow with magic, he relaxed his arm, bringing the bow back to proper draw, and aimed at his brother.

  The pointed tip, glistening with his blood, glowed crimson.

  Dulcet’s triumph faltered as he stared at the arrow—and realized how wrong his last statement had been.

  Lyre relaxed his fingers and the arrow snapped away. It flashed across the distance between them, speeding toward Dulcet. Crimson light blazed as the arrow reached him, then it blasted onward down the long cave, unhindered.

  Dulcet stood for a moment longer, jaw hanging open and arms still raised as though unable to comprehend the gaping hole in his chest where his heart, lungs, and ribs had once been.

  Lyre whirled around, already running as his arrow hit the cave’s far wall.

  The detonation screamed back up the tunnel and the floor bucked. Red blades of power launched in every direction, slicing through stone like butter. Lyre stumbled and fell as the first concussive wave slammed across him, but he sprang up. It wasn’t over yet.

  He snatched his fallen quiver and threw Clio over his shoulder, then bolted for the ley line.

  The howling explosion charged after him, racing him toward the line. Giant chunks of stone plunged into the river and crashed down all around him. He pushed even harder, the line so close, so close!

  The blast hit him in the back, throwing him forward. Green light filled his vision and the line’s warmth engulfed him. Rock screamed above his head and the cavern ceiling dropped in a wave of crumbling earth.

  Casting a shield over Clio, he flung them both into the screaming oblivion between worlds.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Aching pain dragged Lyre back to consciousness. He groaned and forced his eyes open, squinting. The air tasted different.

  It tasted like Earth.

  Soft light glowed through the overcast sky. Pine trees struggled for life in the rocky soil, and leafy ferns covered the small clearing. Behind him, the ley line’s smooth power rushed by, whispering to his senses.

  Earth. He had made it to Earth.

  Pushing himself up on his elbows, he looked down at Clio, half underneath him where he’d fallen after exiting the ley line.

  They had made it to Earth. Together. He would never have escaped on his own.

  Drawing in a shaky breath, he sat up and pulled Clio’s head and shoulders into his lap. Closing his eyes, he used the lightest touch of healing magic to ascertain her injuries, then exhaled in relief. The cut on her arm, blood loss, and a shocking amount of bruising, but otherwise, she was okay. She would recover.

  He checked her arm to make sure the bleeding had stopped. Later, when he had recovered enough power, he would heal the wound as best he could, but for now, it was better to leave it. Almost all the magic he had drawn from his lodestones was gone—consumed in his battle with Dulcet, in the triggering of his blood-magic arrow, and in the passage through the ley line. With his lodestones depleted, his power would be slow to rejuvenate.

  He climbed to his feet, frowned at the second quiver, then shrugged it onto his shoulder beside the first—the one he always carried beneath his glamour. Until he shifted back to his human form, which he didn’t dare do with his legs so weak, he was stuck carrying both. Same for his two bows.

  He scooped Clio into his arms, wheezing even though she hardly weighed anything. With a final glance at the ley line, he walked into the trees.

  The best thing about ley line travel was its untraceable nature. There was no way anyone could identify his destination without blindly checking every line they thought he might have used. Eventually, his brothers would investigate this one for signs of his passage, but he’d be long gone by then.

  He pushed through the foliage until he found the road, its pavement cracked and sprouting weeds. Pausing at the edge of the asphalt, he stared gloomily at the long, straight highway that stretched all the way to the horizon. This was going to suck.

  Heaving a sigh, he started forward, arms already tired from carrying Clio. But what other option did he have? If he had to walk, then he would walk all damn day.

  The sun was blazing low on the horizon when Lyre finally felt it—the quiet pulse of distant magic calling to him.

  He trudged onward, Clio’s dead weight in his arms, his legs burning with exhaustion. Shadows bathed the uneven pavement, and he stumbled often as the uncertain light disguised the dips and cracks. Breathing deeply, he continued forward, following the familiar beacon.

  Ahead, the silhouettes of skyscrapers jutted toward the orange and pink clouds. The city beckoned, but that wasn’t where he was headed. Not yet. He was too exhausted, too unprepared, and not ready to face the dangers that came with a large populace of humans and daemons.

  Without the beacon, he would have missed the dirt road, obscured by the shadows of overgrown bushes, that veered off the highway. Gravel crunched underfoot as he followed the road—a driveway, actually—into the trees. He passed the beacon: a metal ring around a tree trunk woven with a spell that any daemon who visited Earth had been taught to recognize.

  Half a mile later, he walked out of the trees and onto the sprawling lawn of a huge manor house. He paused, blinking in surprise. It was larger than he’d expected.

  Though it looked like a wealthy recluse’s hidden mansion, the reality was far different. Like the hundreds of others scattered across the continent, this was a Consulate—a sanctuary for daemons visiting Earth. With a strict policy against bloodshed, free accommodations and food, and well-trained Consuls to prevent conflicts between “guests,” it was the safest place for him and Clio to recover their strength.

  Closing his eyes, he pulled
his glamour back into place. Tingles washed over his skin, and the last of his strength vanished. His knees almost buckled and he braced his shoulder against a tree. When he was steady again, he staggered across the lawn and climbed the front steps.

  He shoved the large front door open with his elbow and stumbled inside. A grand foyer met him, with polished wood floors and a curved staircase sweeping up to the second level. A reception desk nestled beside the stairs, where a man with a shaved head and neat goatee read a thick book. The man glanced up at the opening door.

  Lyre took one step and his legs gave out.

  He crashed to the floor, barely keeping Clio’s head from smacking against the wood. The Consul launched right over his desk, shouting for help, and rushed to Lyre’s side. He tried to find the strength—and the dignity—to get up again, but his abused body refused to obey.

  An hour later, he was still mourning his lost dignity as the Consul left him alone in the small room. Wishing his legs felt steadier, he limped to the door and wove two wards into it—one to seal it shut, and one to kill anyone who broke the magical lock. He trudged to the room’s opposite end and gave the window the same treatment, then turned to the bed.

  Clio lay across it, her face haggard but clean, the blood washed away. A fresh bandage was wrapped around her arm. He and the Consul had stripped off her ruined clothes and pulled an oversized shirt, donated by the Consulate, over her slight frame. The man had helped Lyre care for her with amicable efficiency, never once remarking on their wretched state. Lyre didn’t much like Consuls, but at least they never asked questions. Another daemon-friendly policy.

  His clothes were almost as bad as Clio’s had been, but he would worry about changing after he rested.

  The small room sported only a double bed, a dresser/desk combo with a wooden chair, and an attached bathroom. Sleeping in the chair wasn’t happening, but the floor didn’t hold much appeal either.

  Yeah, screw that. Clio would just have to share.

  He nudged her to one side of the bed, then collapsed onto it. Fatigue rolled over him in painful waves and his muscles ached after so much abuse. He wasn’t sure he’d ever been this tired or sore in his life.