Wrong Side of Hell (The DeathSpeaker Codex Book 1)

by Sonya Bateman

  It took my brain a few seconds to realize I could only know that if his eyes were open.

  “Um. Taeral…”

  “What?”

  Before I could elaborate, Daoin bolted upright with a gasp.

  Taeral’s eyes widened, and he spun to face him. “Father?”

  Daoin swung his legs to the ground and stood slowly, his glittering silver eyes fixed on Taeral. His mouth twisted into a terrible sneer.

  “Traitor!” he roared.

  And then he attacked.

  CHAPTER 41

  A single shove from Daoin sent Taeral flying halfway across the room, where he landed flat on his bruised back. I wasn’t sure if he’d been too shocked to defend himself, or Daoin was actually that strong.

  But I did know that no matter what this guy said, Taeral wasn’t a traitor.

  “Hey!” I said. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”

  Daoin’s silver glare turned on me. He held a hand out and curled his fingers into a fist. “Thost,” he said.

  I grunted and staggered back as an invisible something clamped around my throat. And when I tried to shout at him again, no sound came out.

  He’d muted me.

  With a snort, Daoin headed for the fallen Taeral, who was struggling to right himself. He was on his knees when Daoin reached him, his face a mask of shock and pain. “Father, what—”

  Daoin backhanded him to the ground. “I’ll kill you,” he intoned in a dead voice.

  Taeral pushed back to his knees. There was no fight in him at all. “Do what you must,” he said. “But I am no traitor.”

  Maybe he didn’t care if Daoin killed him, but I sure as hell did.

  I ran for him, grabbing the first weapon I could lay hand to. It was one of my blades. I didn’t really want to hurt him, but I was going to stop him. Slow him down, at least. It couldn’t take much—he’d been near death just a minute ago.

  Taeral saw me, and his eyes widened. “No!”

  That was apparently enough warning for Daoin, who turned with impossible speed and snatched the knife from my hand. At the same time, he drove fist into my gut, dropping me neatly to my knees.

  I looked up through watering eyes, just in time to see him plunge the blade deep into Taeral’s side.

  Daoin stepped back from both of us. He raised his hands and started speaking in the same language Taeral used. An ominous rumbling sounded from somewhere above.

  “Stop him!” Taeral cried. “He’ll bring the whole place down!”

  Oh, NOW you want to stop him. I still couldn’t speak, and I could barely move. But I lurched to my feet and managed a single step toward Daoin.

  Someone barreled into me, pushing me out of the way.

  Murdoch.

  “An Unseelie noble,” the bogeyman said with a terrible grin. “And you’re completely insane, aren’t you? How sweet.”

  He changed. And what he became terrified me to the core.

  It was Taeral. Glamourless, battered and bloodied, a desperate leer stamped on his face. Two whole, normal arms. In one of them he clutched a dark-haired, screaming infant by the scruff like a wayward puppy.

  In the other, an upraised knife.

  Daoin let out a splintering, wordless scream and staggered back, his hands clamped to his ears. “No. Please…” he gasped. “Taeral, don’t!”

  “You love him more,” Murdoch-Taeral thundered over the wailing infant. “Don’t you!”

  “Please,” Daoin moaned as he sank to his knees. “Please…”

  He froze there, staring in horror at the figure looming above him, the knife poised to strike. His already gaunt frame began to wither—and his hair started turning white.

  Taeral grabbed the blade in his side and pulled it out with a wrenching cry. “You’re killing him!” he shouted, lunging to his feet. “Murdoch, stop!”

  He didn’t.

  “Blasted vermin!” Taeral threw himself at his own image—and went right through it like smoke.

  Terrific. The bogeyman was a ghost, too.

  Murdoch laughed in Taeral’s voice. It was a hollow, chilling sound. “Not true, little brother,” he said. “You’re killing him.”

  Think, damn it. Whatever he was doing, it was bleeding the life from Daoin. Already thick streaks of white shot through his hair, and his face wasn’t much more than skin stretched over a skull. We couldn’t physically force Murdoch to stop. I’d try to talk him out of it, but I had no idea how—and besides, I couldn’t speak.

  Then I had a crazy thought. He was a bogeyman, right? And people got rid of the bogeyman by turning on the light.

  I crawled over to Taeral, shook him hard, and gestured to my throat.

  “What is it?” he snapped. “I’m a bit occupied here!”

  I gestured again, moving my lips soundlessly for emphasis.

  “You cannot speak?”

  I nodded vigorously.

  “Father…” He tried to get up again. Almost absently, he waved a hand at me and said, “Araais.”

  I felt my throat loosen and instantly turned toward Murdoch. “De’ársahd!”

  The light that burst from the moonstone was brighter than I’d ever seen it. I must’ve really meant it this time. Murdoch-Taeral gasped and turned briefly back into just Murdoch, wearing an expression of pure surprise.

  Then he unraveled like fog in the sunlight.

  I sagged back on my heels, completely spent. “Er. Staad,” I mumbled, and the pendant went dark. I was too tired to think it off. Groaning, I looked around to see how everyone else was doing. Taeral had clamped a hand to his bleeding side and half-stood, staring at the spot Murdoch had just been.

  Daoin remained frozen in place for a few more seconds, and then dropped face-first on the ground.

  CHAPTER 42

  It took a while for things to settle down after that.

  Taeral and I had dragged Daoin over by the fire. He was cold now, and back to limp and unresponsive. His hair had gone pure white. At least he was still breathing…but Murdoch had damn near scared him to death. Literally.

  I didn’t think that was possible, until now.

  Sadie had checked in briefly, and then gone off to help some of the others. She’d missed most of the fight—pretty much everyone had. Despite how long it’d felt, the whole thing lasted less than five minutes. But there were a lot of revelations packed into those minutes, like the fact that Murdoch wasn’t really there. That was probably why he hadn’t been injured in the raid. He couldn’t be shot, because he didn’t have a body.

  And then, there was Daoin’s nightmare.

  “Taeral.”

  He looked at me, and I almost changed my mind about asking him. I’d never seen anyone so miserable. But I had to know. “About what Murdoch did back there,” I said.

  “What about it? You want to know if it’s true?” He made a heavy sound and stared into the fire. “The image, no. I’d never so much as threaten an infant, and I’ve no idea where he might have pulled that thought from,” he said. “But the words…yes. I did say that to him.”

  “And you meant me.”

  “Aye.” He still wouldn’t look at me. “He’d banned me from his home, the home he’d made with your human mother. And soon to be you, as well. After I’d left my life, my whole world behind, out of loyalty to him. Sacrificed everything to stay in this miserable human realm…only to have him abandon me here.”

  “Wait. What do you mean, left your world behind?”

  “I left Arcadia,” he said. “When the Unseelie Queen banished my father for his love affair with a human. I was not banished, but I chose this exile to stand with him. To prove my loyalty.”

  “And he kicked you out because of me?” I said unsteadily.

  “He insisted that I was a danger to you and your mother. He’d learned of Milus Dei and knew what they hunted. He reasoned that my presence would attract them, because I’d not spent time around humans and learned to mimic them.” He let out a shuddering breath. “And his pr
oposed solution was that I allow them to capture me, so I could study the enemy and report back.”

  “Jesus,” I breathed. “You didn’t…”

  “I did. I turned myself in out of pure spite, not knowing…what they were capable of, too proud to believe humans could ever harm a Fae. But not before Daoin and I fought bitterly over you.” His eyes closed briefly. “The last thing I said to my father was that I hoped the son he’d chosen would love him, because I did not. Then they captured him, the very day after I surrendered—and I thought he died believing that I despised him.”

  If there was something appropriate to say here, I couldn’t think of it. So I went with another dumb question. “Why did you save me?” I said. “I mean, after all that, you should’ve hated me too. Hell, I would’ve hated me. But you didn’t?”

  “Of course not, brother. How could you have been to blame for Daoin’s actions?”

  “Daoin,” a horribly cracked, rusty voice said. “I think…I knew someone called that, once.”

  The voice came from Daoin.

  I reached reflexively for a weapon.

  “No,” Taeral said, staring at him with faint horror. “He’s different this time. I feel it.”

  I felt something. But it probably wasn’t anywhere near what Taeral did, because my feelings were firmly in the negative camp. “If he tries to kill you again, I’m stopping him,” I said. “Before he pushes the mute button.”

  “He’ll not try.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Daoin blinked and turned his head slowly until he was facing Taeral. “It’s dark in here,” he said. “I think someone moved the walls. Is that you, Dr. Garret?”

  “No, Father. It’s me.” Taeral’s voice broke as he moved toward Daoin and slid an arm under him. “Let me help you sit up.”

  He managed to ease him upright. Daoin sat with slumped posture, head bowed, his back to the fire. “You’re new,” he mumbled with a quick, sidelong glance at Taeral. “Dr. Garret said I couldn’t see new people. Because of…what I did to the last one. He promised I could sleep.”

  “Father…”

  He raised his head with painful slowness and stared at Taeral. Something in his face changed, a brief light flickering in his eyes, but then it vanished. “I think…I was Father. I had a son. Is that right?” he said. “You look like him. Sometimes I forget things.”

  “Yes. I am your son. Taeral.” The words came out thick and hoarse. “And you are Daoin.”

  “Daoin? I knew someone…” He shook his head and blinked again. “No, that’s not my name,” he said. “My name is Seven.”

  At least I didn’t have to worry about him muting me. I was too horrified to speak.

  Maybe I’d never known him before, but I knew this wasn’t Daoin anymore. This was a broken shell, the product of twenty-six years of torture. There was no one home behind those eyes.

  “Oh, Father,” Taeral whispered. “What have they done to you?”

  Daoin cast him another half-terrified glance. “You look like my son. I had a son, once. I had two sons…” He shuddered violently. “They brought me the baby. After my son killed him. They let me keep him, and he was my son. My dead son. I washed the blood from him…every day, I washed the blood away. But he stayed dead. I dressed him and held him and he was dead.”

  Something in me tightened until I could barely breathe. Taeral’s face said he felt the same. This was where Murdoch’s nightmare vision came from. Stage dressing, warping his mind—the same way they’d convinced Taeral they killed Daoin. Only it sounded like they’d actually given him a dead baby and told him it was me.

  “Please,” Daoin said. “Dr. Garret promised I could sleep. The baby’s crying again. Can I sleep now?”

  “Yes. Yes, you can sleep now,” Taeral said.

  Daoin nodded and lowered himself to the ground. “You look like my son,” he said, his voice weakening. “I’m supposed to remember…but sometimes I forget things.”

  He closed his eyes, and within seconds his breathing evened.

  Taeral drew his knees up and pressed his face to his legs. “Gideon, I’d like you to leave me for a few moments,” he said thickly. “Please.”

  “All right.” I understood why—and even if I did stay, I had no idea what to do or say. He’d found his father after all this time, but it wasn’t his father. Not even close. This might be even worse than watching him die.

  I stood and walked away without a word.

  CHAPTER 43

  Sadie was half-crazy worrying about Taeral, and nothing I could’ve said would make her feel better. But if I didn’t tell her something, she’d probably kill me. So I settled on the short version. “Daoin is alive, but he’s insane.”

  She frowned. “How insane?”

  “Completely. He thinks his name is Seven and he’s still at Milus Dei.” I wouldn’t mention anything about dead babies, or him not knowing Taeral.

  “Oh, God. Poor Taeral,” she said. “He must be devastated.”

  “Yeah, that’s an understatement.” I felt pretty terrible myself. My mother was long dead, but when I heard about Daoin, I’d kind of hoped I would at least get to meet my real father. Now there was no chance of that. But my sad little dashed dream was nothing compared to Taeral’s, so I kept it to myself. “So, how’s everybody else doing?” I said.

  She shrugged and looked around. We’d taken a seat on an empty bench near the back of the vast room, where hardly anyone stirred. “Resting, for the most part,” she said. “We’ll have to do something soon, though. Can’t stay here forever. And they’re probably getting hungry, or they will be.” She smirked. “Personally, I’m starving.”

  “I’ll bet,” I said. “I remember how much you can pack in.”

  Her crooked smile faded. “Seriously, though. I really need to eat soon.”

  “Yeah, I know. But it’s not like we can get pizza delivered down here.”

  “No. You don’t know.” She pressed her lips together. “Werewolves are kind of stuck with some real-wolf behaviors,” she said. “So when we get hungry, desperately hungry, and there’s nothing else around to eat…”

  I understood where she was going right away. “Christ. You attack people,” I said. “That’s what a wolf would do.”

  She gave a hesitant nod. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t want to. It’s an instinct—and eventually, I won’t be able to fight it.”

  “Believe it or not, I understand.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah. I actually know a lot about wolves.” I stood and stretched for a minute. I’d been hoping to get some rest myself, but Sadie was right. She needed to eat—and I’d just realized I was getting hungry myself. Everyone else probably was too, at least the ones who were conscious. “So, what do you think…seven or eight pizzas, and maybe some two-liters? It’s the middle of the night, so we won’t find much else open right now.”

  “Really? We’re going to get food?”

  “Long as you can find your way up to the surface and back here,” I said. “I’m lost.”

  She gave me a grateful smile. “I can do that.”

  “Good. Let’s roll.”

  Bob’s Italian Eatery was not very Italian—more like modern dive bar with a little American slum thrown in. And the guy behind the counter, who may or may not have been Bob, didn’t appreciate us ordering eight pizzas at four in the morning.

  We could hear him in the back, cursing and banging things and wishing some very inventive, unpleasant deaths on us.

  We’d come up through a service ladder just off the subway station at Seventh and Forty-Ninth, headed to the surface, and walked until we came to the first open place that served food. Which happened to be this one, much to Bob’s chagrin. The moon was still up, so I’d kept the pendant out to let it recharge. I figured the way things were going, it wouldn’t be long until I needed it again.

  Before we left, I let Taeral know what we were doing. He didn’t seem to care.

  I underst
ood how crushed he was, but I really hoped he’d snap out of it soon.

  Now, Sadie and I sat at the bar counter, listening to the background music of Angry Bob and the Crashing Pans. I had a beer he’d grudgingly poured me from the tap, muttering something about last call and liquor licenses the whole time, and Sadie was working her way through a plate of pizza rolls that looked like they’d been sitting in the hot case since sometime last week.

  I suspected it wouldn’t taste much different if she ate the plate, too.

  So far I’d avoided thinking too far into the future. But now that I wasn’t fighting cult members or getting blown up, the panic started creeping in. Taeral and the rest of them were officially homeless, we had a dozen misplaced, damaged Others who needed somewhere to live too, and a whole bunch more out there who still had to be rescued. I didn’t know where to start, for any of it.

  Hell, I didn’t even know how to rent an apartment. I lived in a van.

  “You look troubled, little brother. What’s on your mind?”

  Sadie and I both jumped at the sound of Murdoch’s voice. I turned toward it with a snarl and saw him standing a few stools away, grinning that insufferable grin. He looked…less horrifying than before, somehow. Like some of his flesh had started pulling itself back where it should be.

  I would’ve attacked him right then, if I hadn’t known it was pointless. Instead I said, “I’m not your brother, you son of a bitch.”

  “Well, not technically,” he said. “Your brother is probably back in that hole, crying over dear old Dad. Am I right?”

  Sadie stood, preparing to lunge at him. I grabbed her. “Won’t do any good,” I said. “He’s not really there.”

  “I’m here. Just not as substantial as you.” He picked up a coaster from the bar and spun it like a coin. “See?”