by John Corwin
A portal winked open thirty yards in front of us. Bless you Percival! But instead of seeing our friends waiting on the other side, Victus and Garkin stepped out. They seemed just as surprised to see me as I did to see them.
Harris and I skidded to a halt and backed up, the awful sounds of the demon spawn crunching Cumberbatch's bones not far behind us. I jerked Harris left again, and we ran back toward the pool house.
Bolts of energy blasted the turf around us. I cast a shield and pulled Harris down behind it. Searing heat blasted my barrier, and washed over us. Garkin readied his wand for another volley, but Victus stopped him.
"Last chance, Conrad." My father held out a hand. "You've proven yourself worthy. Join me, and we will make the Arcanes supreme in this world. We can rid it of the vampire and lycan menace."
"What about the Daemos?" I shouted back. "Do they have a place in your new order?"
"Of course they do," he said. "Who can better control demonic elements than them?"
I tried not to look at Kanaan and Asha as they circled the giant scorpion and flanked Victus and Garkin. "What does Zarin think of your plan?"
"He does not care who rules the Overworld, only that I return his Aerianas to him." Victus shrugged. "Once I am able to repair the Grand Nexus, entire new worlds will open to us."
It was of some small comfort to know he hadn't opened the gateway to an invading Seraphim army at least, but the scorpion was nearly finished with its meal, and Garkin looked ready to end us the moment Victus gave the word.
Victus looked toward the scorpion and frowned. "Is that Rufus?"
"Doctor Cumberbatch is dead," I confirmed. "And I guess I'm next, because I refuse to join you."
"Your lies won't save you, Overlord." Harris brandished his wand. "You can't convince me I'm not the son of prophecy. I don't believe a word you say."
Before I could say anything else, Victus sighed and nodded at Garkin. The Arcane flicked his wand and unleased a concussive bolt that shattered my shield and sent us tumbling backward. The scorpion rotated toward Victus and Garkin and shrieked, sensing its next meal.
Kanaan and Asha fired spells from Victus's flank, sending him and Garkin diving for cover. Zarin leapt from the other side of the portal and raised his hands at the rushing demon spawn. At first, I thought the creature would kill him, but the Daemos stood firm. The demon scorpion slowed, stopped.
It spun toward Kanaan and Asha and skittered in their direction.
The momentary diversion had given us just what we needed—time. I took out one of Max's banana peel potion bombs and threw it at Zarin. It exploded on impact, covering him and the ground in a thick yellow slick. The Daemos fell and skidded across the lawn, unable to stop.
With his concentration broken, the scorp stopped following his commands and charged Victus again. Garkin fired a withering blast at the creature, but the magic splashed off its hide.
With chaos reigning, Kanaan and Asha reversed course and headed back toward the pool house where the portal waited.
"Let's go!" I dashed away as shrieks of demonic rage filled the air. I hoped the demon scorpion got my father, but doubted it would prevail. I looked back at Harris and realized he wasn't there. I stopped, looked around. Harris had run the other way, creeping behind one of the ornate shrubs decorating the back yard and coming up behind Victus.
I wanted to shout, but doing so would let Victus know the boy was right behind him. Garkin uprooted a sapling with a spell and shot it like a giant arrow at the monster. The wood splintered on the chitin to no effect.
I stood rooted to the spot for an instant, then ran after Harris. There was no way he was strong enough to kill Victus by himself.
Harris sprang from concealment and blasted Victus in the back with a bolt of orange energy. My father stumbled forward. Two more blasts caught him square between the shoulders. He steadied himself, spun, and channeled a shield.
Harris fired again and again to no effect against the shield. "How did you survive that?"
Victus laughed and patted his robes. "Armor enchantment, boy."
"But I'm the son of prophecy!" Harris shouted. "You should be dead!"
Victus roared with laughter even as Garkin fought desperately to hold off the giant scorpion behind him. "Have you even read all the foreseeances, boy? If you had, you'd know that there is no son of prophecy." He aimed his wand and fired.
"No!" I cast a shield, but it was too far and too late. The blast caught Harris in the chest and exploded out of his back in a gout of boiling blood. He fell in slow motion, body rotating toward me, a look of disbelief on his face. For an instant, our eyes locked, and then Harris's eyes went dull and dead.
My mind flashed back. Cora dying of cancer, a victim of the curse that preserved the souls of Victus and Delectra. Delectra dying in my arms after she took the killing blow meant for me. This would happen over and over again. More people would die so long as Victus lived.
Rage surged through every fiber of my being.
I pulled upon the strength of my mothers, for they were the ones who gave me life and a will to live. A crimson bolt of fireblade from my wand seared the air. Victus channeled a shield. Fireblade sliced through it and smoked against his clothes. His magical armor burst into flames. Garkin spared an instant from fighting the scorpion, using a second wand to quench the fire. I sliced the burning ray toward the magitsu master, but Garkin wasn't foolish enough to fight on two fronts. He hauled Victus to his feet by the hem of his clothes and shoved him through the portal. Fireblade slashed the air, but Garkin vanished inside the portal an instant before it reached him.
The portal winked away. Deprived of its meal, the scorpion turned toward Harris's body. "No!" I waved my arms and the monster turned toward me. I waited until it was yards away before hitting it with a banana peel potion. The monster shrieked as it skidded helplessly across the lawn.
I raced to Harris's side. A blackened, cauterized hole gaped where his heart had been. Tears burned my eyes, but I couldn't afford to cry now. I hefted his body and tried to run back toward the pool room. Before I got even a few feet, the demon scorpion recovered and skittered toward me again. I dropped the body and took out my wand. I had no more potions and it was too far to run back to the portal.
The creature shrieked, the jaws on its stinger tail chomping as it closed in for the kill. Hands gripped me and jerked me to a hard stone floor. A portal winked off just as the scorpion lunged. I shouted and threw up my hands. I wasn't in England anymore, but back in the arch control room at El Dorado, my friends gathered around.
Harris's corpse lay next to me.
"No!" Baxter cried. "No!"
Lily screamed and burst into tears. I looked up at Ambria and Max. They wept like me, but with sorrow tempered by the knowledge of too much death and loss. I got up and hugged Ambria. She said nothing, because there were no words to make this right.
Chapter 32
Shushiel wrapped Harris's body in webs like a funeral shroud and put him behind one of the many arches so we wouldn't have the constant reminder every time we looked that way.
Meanwhile, Kanaan tested each of the freed prisoners and confirmed they were not infernus. Our mission was a success, but I felt as if we'd lost. Every time Harris's death flashed before my eyes, I saw Delectra dying in my arms, saw Cora rotting from cancer.
Damn you, Father!
I should have agreed to join him, won his trust, and betrayed him. What had Harris been thinking when he tried to kill Victus? Hadn't it occurred to him that someone as clever and paranoid as Victus would wear body armor?
Ambria squeezed my hand. "Don't let it eat you up inside. It's not your fault."
I caught an angry glare from the teary-eyed Baxter. "Not everyone here would agree."
She looked back at the ginger boy. "He's the only one who blames you."
"I blame myself for not realizing what Harris wanted to do." I blew out a breath. "He convinced himself what Victus said was a lie."
Ambria shook her head slowly. "What do you suppose Victus meant when he said there is no son of prophecy?"
"Maybe the foreseeances are lies?" I shrugged. "There's no telling."
Max sat down next to us. "Percival said it'll take a few days, maybe weeks, but Ivy and the others should start to recover their memories. He said if he had access to his lab he could make potions that would help."
"We're outlaws, Max." Ambria sniffed. "Going back to his lab isn't an option."
"We need food." Max rubbed his stomach and looked around the room. "And we need someplace more comfortable than this to sleep."
Asha walked over and knelt in front of me. "How you holding up, brother?"
My spirits lifted at the new and strange feeling of having a sibling. "I'm okay, but I don't know where we go from here."
"We can go anywhere." She looked back toward the omniarch. "For now, we need a place to rest and recover."
Kanaan walked into view from the far end of the room where a giant map spread out across the wall. He motioned for us to come, so we got up and walked over to him. Lily joined us, but Baxter scowled at me and remained behind.
I felt lost and adrift at sea and hoped this wise man could point the way. "What now?"
"Come." Kanaan turned and walked away.
I looked back where Percival tended to the rescued prisoners while a sulking Baxter stared at the floor. The woman with green eyes smiled at me and I couldn't help but smile back. When I turned around, my friends were already several paces away, so I hurried to catch up.
Kanaan led us through a door and into a great cavern lit by dim yellow light. Red and purple scales glittered on massive reptilian forms in the middle. We gasped and stopped in our tracks. Kanaan continued walking.
Max and I looked at each other, swallowed hard, and followed. The others regained their courage and caught up. The magitsu master stopped less than ten yards from the creatures. A massive eye opened, the slitted pupil of a reptile focusing on us.
"This is Altash and his mate Lulu," Kanaan said.
"Holy cow." Max reached out a tentative hand, but stopped short of touching the giant. "Earth dragons!" He squeed like a small child and clapped his hands. "Dragons!"
"Will they help us?" I asked.
"No." Kanaan sat in the shadow of the great red dragon and motioned the rest of us down. "Should they enter the fray, the great nemesis would end the truce and act against them."
"Who's the great nemesis?" Lily asked.
"They will not say," Kanaan said. "In fact, they do not say much."
I tried not to feel too uncomfortable with Altash's giant eye watching us. "Then why bring us here?"
Kanaan waved a hand at the cavern. "Once this place teemed with the undead husks of blighted angels. The destruction of the Grand Nexus drained them of light, turning them into monstrous creatures that craved the light of others. For thousands of years they roamed these caves, doomed to eternity as dark creatures.
"Then Justin Slade led an expedition here to confront Vaedaemos Slade. During a battle, many of the husks were devoured by earth dragons. It was after this battle that Altash realized the husks could be revived by nesting them in the intense aether radiation inside their maws."
Altash's long lean maw opened suddenly. Most of us screamed. I jumped up and ran several feet before realizing he didn't mean to eat me.
Shushiel bobbed up and down with laughter at our reactions. "People are so afraid of monsters."
"Bloody right," Natalia said with a growl.
Altash turned his head to reveal rows of jagged teeth. Brilliant light glowed in the depths of his maw. Heat washed out over me, but this time I held my ground. Apparently satisfied with the demonstration, the dragon closed his mouth and returned his head to its original orientation. A purple head, long and lean like Altash's, rose, and a great eye opened.
Lulu, I presume? Lulu's eye rolled the same way Ambria's did when she disapproved of something me or Max did. Maybe she thought Altash took himself far too seriously.
Kanaan continued his story as if there had been no interruption. "Justin discovered that the dragons were reviving the husked angels. Before long, nearly every husked Seraphim was returned to their original state, whole and renewed."
"In other words, what looks like a hopeless situation might not be," Lily said.
Kanaan raised an eyebrow. "Just so." He pointed around at all of us. "We must train in the ways of magitsu while the former prisoners recover. Once we know our capabilities, we can end the Overlord once and for all."
Max fist-pumped. "Yes!"
"Let's do it!" Ambria shouted.
A warm glow melted the icy despair around my heart. We can do this. Justin Slade had overcome plenty of hopeless situations. With Ivy and the other Seraphim, maybe we could too.
"There is one other thing." Kanaan stood and brushed off his pants. "Even where there is death there is hope."
I grimaced. "What do you mean?"
"I recognize the green-eyed Seraphim. She did not die as we thought." Kanaan actually smiled. "Nightliss is alive and well."
"That's Nightliss?" Max said. "The Clarion of the Templars?"
Wonder filled Ambria's eyes. "That's amazing!"
I turned around and saw the green-eyed Seraphim looking out of the control room and toward us. Our eyes met and her smile filled me with hope. It was then I knew the truth.
We can win.
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Copyright © 2017 by John Corwin.
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Acknowledgments
To my wonderful support group:
Alana Rock
Karen Stansbury
My amazing editors:
Annetta Ribken
Jennifer Wingard
My awesome cover artist:
Regina Wamba
Thanks so much for all your help and input!
About the Author
John Corwin is the bestselling author of the Overworld Chronicles. He enjoys long walks on the beach and is a firm believer in puppies and kittens.
After years of getting into trouble thanks to his overactive imagination, John abandoned his male modeling career to write books.
He resides in Atlanta.
Connect with John Corwin online:
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Books by John Corwin
THE OVERWORLD CHRONICLES
Sweet Blood of Mine
Dark Light of Mine
Fallen Angel of Mine
Dread Nemesis of Mine
Twisted Sister of Mine
Dearest Mother of Mine
Infernal Father of Mine
Sinister Seraphim of Mine
Wicked War of Mine
Dire Destiny of Ours
Aetherial Annihilation
Baleful Betrayal
Ominous Odyssey
Insidious Insurrection
Assignment Zero (An Elyssa Short Story)
OVERWORLD UNDERGROUND
Possessed By You
Demonicus
OVERWORLD ARCANUM
Conrad Edison and the Living Curse
Conrad Edison and the Anchored World
Conrad Edison and the Broken Relic
Conrad Edison and the Infernal Design
STAND ALONE NOVELS
Mars Rising
No Darker Fate
The Next Thing I Knew
Outsourced
For the latest on new releases, free ebooks, and more, join John Corwin's Newsletter at www.johncorwin.net!