Darkness Loves Company: A Tides of Darkness Prequel

by Sarah Blair

  Relentless.

  “Lake.” Williams clamped down on her shoulder. “Do something.”

  “Scott. Man, I don’t want to hurt you, seriously. Shitshitshitshit.” Sidney pleaded with the hipster. She shouted inside to the witch. “Victoria! Would you just fucking quit?”

  She dug into her pockets for salt and flung it out in front of her. Scott screamed and flinched. He only made it one step back before he shook himself off and started prowling toward them again.

  Sidney yelled and flung more salt. Her whole body shook. All she knew was that she couldn’t let that thing get near her. There was only so much room she had to use the harpoon. If she was going to get any leverage, it was now or never. The idea of running through a human was different from the koalas.

  “I don’t want to kill him.” Sidney cringed. She brought the end of the harpoon down on his head like a baseball bat. It barely phased him.

  She jabbed into his leg. Nothing.

  The harpoon stuck. She yanked, but it only brought him closer.

  “Get him, Lake! Kick his ass!” Williams shouted behind her.

  “It’s stuck.” She yanked. Then he swiped. She dodged to the side. The harpoon slipped free. Her hand flew back and hit the wall. Pain radiated up her arm into her shoulder.

  “Holey fucking buckets!” Williams flailed.

  Sidney’s hand throbbed. She glanced over to see what she’d hit. A fire alarm. She reached up and pulled.

  Sirens wailed. Water gushed from the ceiling.

  Williams screamed. Sidney screamed.

  Victoria’s chanting stopped. The candles spit out.

  Everyone in the room collapsed like rag dolls.

  Sidney’s knees gave out and she sank down against the wall. “Holy fuckballs.”

  “Welp.” Williams leaned against the wall and shut his eyes, letting the water spray his face. “It’s a good thing my pants are soaked, because I’m pretty sure my water just broke, too.”

  Sidney let out a weak laugh.

  “Nice job, Agent Lake.” Williams held his hand out and she slapped him a weak high-five.

  “Not an agent yet.”

  “Yeah. You are.”

  Sidney took a deep breath and let it out. Not even caring that the icy cold water soaked through straight to her skin. The people down the hall started to sit up, dazed.

  Sidney glanced over.

  It happened in slow motion. Power gathered up into billowing clouds. Red lightning flickered inside. Black flames exploded. A heavy roar billowed out of the galley. Sidney had just enough time to think it looked like a bad horror movie before the darkness rushed toward her.

  The koalas screeched in a frenzy.

  Fur flew.

  Human screams mixed long and ragged with the screeching koalas. Scott pushed to his hands and knees and turned around.

  “Don’t!” Sidney shouted.

  Too late.

  Claws ripped his hat off. His scalp hung in tatters off the side of his head, exposing his pale white skull underneath. The outline of tufted ears appeared over him, lit against the backdrop of flashing red.

  Sidney gripped the axe. She scrambled for purchase on the slick floor, bracing her boot against the wall, and swung.

  The axe cleaved the koala halfway down and stuck in the hipster’s shoulder. They both collapsed. A knot formed in Sidney’s throat. “Oh, shit. I’m so sorry. Fuck.”

  Screams and chaos echoed from the room.

  “Yeah, I wanna dance with somebody.” Williams twisted the harpoon out of Scott’s leg, and nailed a flying ball of fur before it landed on Sidney.

  “Agh!” He swung the still wiggling koala around.

  Sidney ducked.

  “I wanna feel the HEAT!” He slammed it on the wall a few times until it hung limp.

  “Help me!” A woman screamed. Her arm vanished behind another ball of fur. Sidney swung the axe, knocking the koala back. She tripped. Her vision flashed bright then black. Pain cracked her skull as her face met the floor.

  Angela huddled under the table next to her, hugging her knees and sobbing. “I don’t know what happened. That’s not my sister.”

  All Sidney wanted to do was stay on the ground. It was so nice there. But she was afraid if she did, she’d never get back up. Sidney took a deep breath and shoved herself up, planting her feet in a low crouch.

  Angela remained under the table whimpering and saying the same thing over and over. “That’s not my sister.”

  Victoria towered over them. An electric red tornado circled around her, lifting her hair in a static charge of power. Sidney’s heart tried to crawl out of her throat and make a run for it. Her brain scrambled in an endless loop, trying to process what the hell her eyes were seeing.

  “Lake?” Williams’ voice cut through the din. “Where’d you go?”

  “Here!” She grabbed onto his belt loop and stayed close to him, shouting in his ear over the din. “I’m out of salt. Something else took over. She’s not in control anymore. We need that grimoire.”

  Williams hit and hacked his way past snarling koalas and a mess of cowering humans. Sidney ducked and weaved behind him. “Where is it?”

  Victoria stood inside a circle of kohl on the floor. An intricate lace of symbols and shapes lined the outside. Candles lifted from the floor, drifting in midair. Her long hair billowed around her face. Eyes glowed red.

  “There.” Sidney pointed to the book at Victoria’s feet. “It’s inside the circle. How do we get it out?”

  “Just grab it,” Williams yelled.

  She dove onto the floor, reaching out for the book. Her hand slammed into the edge of the circle. Buzzing pain shot up her arm, followed by radiating numbness. “OW!”

  Sidney gritted her teeth against the pain, cradling her arm to her chest. Williams blocked a growling woman, and used the hilt of the axe to knock her out.

  The floor swayed.

  A salt shaker rolled up against Sidney’s foot. She grabbed it and opened the top, flinging it at Victoria’s face.

  The thing inside her roared. Its screech blew through Sidney, stealing her breath away. She threw down the empty salt shaker and covered her ears. The sound reverberated inside the galley, gathering power. Waves rocked the ship harder, tossing Williams into Sidney. Loud bangs shuddered around them as the hull knocked into the concrete dock outside.

  The wall cracked. More water sprayed in. Then gushed.

  “Are you KIDDING ME.” Sidney shouted into the din.

  Anger flooded through her, and she embraced it. She was supposed to have a nice relaxing Sunday evening. Dinner with Mitch. Followed by potentially mind-blowing sex.

  Sidney turned, ready to beat the hell out of whatever had taken over Victoria’s body.

  A flying ball of fur leaped through the swirling red light and Victoria’s face disappeared. The thing screamed, loud and long and human. The koala growled and they both fell into the middle of the circle.

  “Victoria?” Sidney fell to the floor clearing away Victoria’s hair from her face. Her hand came away dark and wet. Victoria’s throat was gone. “Oh, fuck. Williams, we got a big problem.”

  Williams swung the axe, nailing a flying tuft of fur right out of the air. “Bigger than devil koalas?”

  “Everybody freeze!” A loud voice shouted from the door. Police officers rushed in. Gunshots rang out.

  Williams ducked under a table.

  A semi-truck collided with Sidney, smashing her flat to the floor. The air huffed out of her. Accented words, thick and gravely hit her ear, “Head down, lassie.”

  More gunshots. The officer shoved Sidney under the table with Williams. She turned to thank him, but he disappeared into the fray.

  “I need the grimoire!” She shouted to Williams.

  “Just a sec!” Right Said Fred played again. “Hey, babe. You bet! Totally on my way.”

  “It’s loose!” Sidney yelled.

  Another round of gunfire erupted.

  A woman f
ell next to Sidney and the grimoire sloshed across the floor.

  Sidney pounced.

  “No, everything’s under control, sugar pie,” Williams shouted. “We just gotta breathe. Hoo hoo, heeee! Hoo hoo, heeee!”

  Sidney snatched up the book but it was too dark to see. “Williams, light!”

  He flung the flashlight to her. She caught it and tried to turn the pages but they were water-logged and the ink dissolved faster than she could read it.

  “Damnit, the water blurred all the ink.” She threw the book down, frustrated and helpless. Icy water sloshed over the tops of her boots, freezing her feet, sending frozen chills up her spine.

  “Motherfucker. These are my favorite boots.” Sidney climbed to her feet, trying to stay balanced inside the quickly tilting hull. She scanned the room, sweeping the flashlight around before she landed back at the circle. The candles bobbed on the surface of the water, extinguished

  Hands reached around her, clawing at her face. Sidney flung her arm around, grabbing a handful of hair and threw her weight forward. She flipped her attacker upside down, throwing them into the water with a splash.

  Angela snarled. Red eyes glowed. She turned and balanced on hands and knees, rearing back.

  Sidney took a deep breath. All the chaos and noise around her continued. Something pulled tight within her, low and heavy.

  She held her hands up, palms out. She soaked up the energy in the water, imagining herself like a straw. A raw and primal shout came out of her from the deepest part of her core. There was nothing else, just the water and the force of it all rushing through her.

  “Consummatum est! Dona nobis pacem!” Sidney’s words filled the galley. Overpowering the rush of the water, and the shouts and screams all around her.

  Angela fell back, convulsing in the quickly rising water. Red clouds lifted and swirled out of her mouth and eyes, sweeping back inside the circle the same as getting sucked through a vacuum. Sidney’s ears popped. All of the power in the room imploded and disappeared in a swirl.

  The pressure in her head released.

  Sidney sank to her knees, exhausted, drained. The same as if she’d done a marathon sprint in the pool. Florescent lights flickered to life overhead, illuminating the full-extent of the carnage.

  “Lake.” Williams leaned against a table, catching his breath. Hair hung limp and soggy across his forehead. His jacket was plastered to his narrow frame. “What the fuck.”

  “Two years of Latin required at my school.” She gasped for air, light and shaking with relief. “I swore up and down I’d never need it.”

  A police officer approached them, different accent from the one who’d tackled her. “You two okay?”

  Sidney nodded, unable to speak.

  “Oh. Shit.” Williams’ brown eyes went wide. He bent double and Sidney thought for sure he was about to puke. “I need to get to Lenox Hill. My wife’s having a baby.”

  Twenty-Six

  “Mitchell, how pleasant to see you again so soon.” The tiny tink, tink, tink of a chisel on marble stopped. A layer of fine white dust covered Dimitrius. “I do beg your pardon on a handshake.”

  Tall windows and a skylight illuminated the expansive art studio at the top of Dimitrius’ Centre Street headquarters with plenty of late afternoon sunlight.

  Dimitrius pulled a towel from his shoulder, smoothing it over an intricate marble likeness of Tyran. The man himself posed on a chaise nearby, stark naked. A bunch of grapes dangled from his fingertips. Skin so pale and flawless, it was difficult to tell the difference between stone and reality.

  “I apologize for not making an appointment,” Mitch said.

  The rest of the sculpture towered overhead. An enormous dragon, mouth filled with razor sharp teeth, gaped over Tyran’s body. Fragile wings billowed out in a span that was so ridiculous Mitch couldn’t imagine it all coming from one piece of marble.

  “Do not speak of it. We’ve long since surpassed the need for such formalities.” Dimitrius wiped his hands on the towel. “What brings you by?”

  “I’ve been thinking about what you said,” Mitch started. He was still distracted by the eerie lifelike qualities of the sculpture. It felt like the dragon might turn on him any second to scorch him where he stood. “We need to talk about, uh . . . .”

  He followed the lines of the dragon down to Tyran’s form emerging from the rest of the unfinished slab. His figure splayed casually beneath the vicious roaring creature. The stone portrayed everything with the most minute detail.

  The nudity itself didn’t bother Mitch, it was art after all, but it sparked the still-fresh memories of firelight on porcelain soft skin and the way Sidney tasted so fresh and sweet, and wet enough to drink.

  “I think, I um—” His face flushed with heat and his body tightened. He turned his eyes to the drop cloth on the floor and hoped he wasn’t too obvious. “I need to talk to you.”

  “Eftsittan fæle.” Dimitrius spoke over his shoulder to Tyran in a language that sounded Germanic, but Mitch couldn’t place it exactly.

  Tyran sat up and ate some of the grapes off the bunch. “What do you think of our Benadur’s work, Mitchell?”

  “It’s lifelike.” Mitch didn’t know what else to say.

  Dimitrius studied his sculpture and his shoulders sagged. “It’s accurate enough, I suppose.”

  “He’s captured the suspense of the moment quite well.” Tyran’s eyes roamed over the piece, sparkling like sun on snow. So different from the other night in front of Sidney’s apartment. “Though, the dragon had to be shrunk down to an unfortunate size in order to get the marble through the door. ’Twas a great deal larger in life.”

  “Aye, gets bigger every time Argus and Malcolm recount the tale.” Dimitrius tossed the towel aside. “At this point, we’d need a full mountainside to accommodate its form.”

  “Their tales are accurate, to my experience.” Tyran slid off the chaise and came around to join them. He plucked grapes from the bunch, eating them one by one.

  Mitch fixed his eyes on the marble. Though the depiction of the dragon might be scaled down, every single thing about the fictional Tyran was definitely true to size. “You didn’t see it from my vantage point. The jaws had to have been at least—”

  “We’ve done enough for today. Be gone,” Dimitrius dismissed him. Tyran sauntered out after inclining his head and shoulders in a small bow.

  Dimitrius turned his attention fully to Mitch. “Apologies. If given the opportunity, he’d speak of himself continuously. I daresay, you have more pressing matters on your mind.”

  Mitch followed him out the French doors onto an immaculate rooftop garden. Plants and small trees flourished at the edges of a winding stone path. Beehives sat interspersed among the plants with a few inhabitants still buzzing in the last hints of warmth from the afternoon sun.

  Mitch took in the iconic scene of lower Manhattan spread out in front of them. “Wow. I didn’t know this was even up here.”

  “Maintaining a high and clear vantage point is essential in all things. Would you not agree?” Mitch wasn’t entirely sure if the question was rhetorical, so he stayed quiet. Dimitrius pulled in a deep, satisfied breath. His attention shifted from the city back to Mitch. “Do you care for tea?”

  “Sure. Thank you.”

  Dimitrius poured into a waiting china set on a small table set up for two. The cups were delicate, hand-painted antiques. Relics Mitch would expect to only find in a museum and definitely never touch. Dimitrius grabbed his by the edges instead of the handle, drinking from it without ceremony. His hands were still caked with dust, and he was completely casual about it, like this was just any other cup, instead of something impossibly fragile and enormously valuable. Mitch left his cup in the saucer.

  “I took your suggestion and got some fresh air yesterday, so I could consider what we discussed at our last meeting.” As much as he didn’t want to admit he’d taken his advice, he knew men like Dimitrius enjoyed hearing it. And right now, Mi
tch needed him on his side as much as possible. So he looked him straight in the eye, and admitted, “You were right.”

  “You’ve had a change of heart?” Dimitrius kept his face bland, but there was a lilt of hope in his tone. “You won’t be leaving us, then? Well, that is good news.”

  Mitch’s heart pounded. He’d been practicing the conversation for six hours in the car, but now that it was happening, he could hardly remember a word he’d rehearsed.

  “I need to get some things straight, first.” He studied Dimitrius’ face for any hint of emotion. Anything at all he could play off of to know how this was going. He got nothing.

  Dimitrius placed his cup in the saucer and sat back, weaving his fingers loosely together in his lap. “I’m listening.”

  Mitch took a deep breath and started in. “Three years ago, you came to me with the idea for this agency. I got on board because I knew there was more in this world than most people have the audacity, the sheer bravery, to acknowledge. Having the opportunity to work cases that most law enforcement would abandon as unexplained was a fresh and exciting challenge. I’m grateful that you chose me to be part of it.”

  Dimitrius nodded once, a gracious gesture, but otherwise didn’t interrupt.

  “But, if I’m going to continue, I need to know that we’re both in this for the same reasons. Full disclosure; why did you start all this? What are you hoping to get out of it?”

  “First of all, I would like to say that I would never have called upon you for this duty if I didn’t believe your character and ability to be the highest standard.” Dimitrius saluted him with his cup and took a long, thoughtful drink. “You are astute, Mitchell. Deeply intelligent. Truly the most trustworthy and capable of gentlemen.”

  After a moment, Dimitrius put the tea down and sat back again, scraping his hand through his lustrous, dark hair. Mitch couldn’t help but feel a pang of jealousy. He wondered if Sidney would rather have something more to grab onto. Dimitrius cleared his throat.

  “Your responsible and unerring character is why we have hardly been discreet in our interactions here with you.” He fixed his deep brown eyes on him, and Mitch wondered if he could see his thoughts somehow. “Deep down, you’ve already deduced there’s more going on than meets the eye. But if I must lay it out, so to speak, then I shall.”