The phone buzzed in her pocket an Iris jumped in her seat. When she saw the caller ID her heart skipped a beat. "Logan?"
"Iris! Hi!"
"Oh my God, Logan, are you okay?"
"I am now. Thanks for the hug, by the way."
"You found the hairpin? I was so nervous, I nearly missed your pocket."
"Found it and used it."
"Does that mean you're—"
"Free? Yes. Well, sort of. We need to lay low for a while but—"
"We?"
"Tell her about Kane," Iris heard a chirpy voice in the background.
"Who's that?"
"Oh, that's Lexi. She was in there with me."
Iris remembered the girl with bright-pink hair in the cage next to Logan's.
"Listen, Iris. You have to deliver a message to Connor."
"I can't. Not tonight."
"That's just it. It has to be tonight. I've been trying to call him but I keep getting his voicemail. Lexi says there's no reception in the area because of some sort of energy field. Anyway, you need to get there and tell him that Kane is sending an army of supernaturals and humans to the mansion tonight. Lexi thinks he wants the Amulet."
"What?"
"You gotta hurry, Iris."
"Wait, what does an army mean, exactly?"
"It means the entire Underground Society and over half of Forest Hills."
Iris drove like a madwoman, like she'd never thought she could drive, and she wondered what Dorian would say if he were there. He wouldn't laugh at her then, although he would probably find another reason to mock her. For a moment she wondered if she should call him. If what Logan had said was true, then the Elwoods needed all the help they could get and, despite their differences, Dorian had helped them before and he might be able to help them again. But would he be willing? Or available? He was probably long gone by then. With the hounds dead, he had no reason to stay in town any longer.
Iris kept redialing Connor's number although she knew in the back of her head that chances of him picking up were slim if there really was an energy field around the Elwood mansion. She had to get there and deliver Logan's message in person. Your destiny is to save the Fae. She wondered if that was what Agatha's words meant.
The streets were surprisingly empty. Iris was grateful but also worried because that only added more weight to Logan's ominous warning. She shuddered at the thought of what might happen if it was true. How would the Elwoods manage to stop a few hundred people, supernaturals included, from stealing the Amulet on the one night it reveals itself to the whole world?
When she pulled into the alley leading to the mansion her worst fears came to life. The forest on each side was crawling with people, all heading in the same direction as her. They were advancing slowly, as if they were sleepwalking. They were all looking ahead, seemingly unaware of her presence, like they were hypnotized—or compelled. Iris pushed the gas pedal and sped through the trees but she was soon forced to slow down because the closer she got to the house the tighter the crowd became. She honked to get them to move out of the way but they seemed deaf and dumb and when that didn't work she had no choice but to stop and proceed on foot. She got out of the car and started elbowing her way through the crowd. When she finally reached the front door, she was out of breath and her chest hurt every time she inhaled. She started pounding on the door, looking back at the crowd repeatedly. When the door finally opened, she barged inside, her hands on her chest to prevent her heart from jumping out before she could deliver her warning to Connor and the others.
31
The Amulet
Iris and the others had been staring at the crowd outside for what seemed like forever. The mansion was now surrounded from all sides and Iris could recognize most of the faces—at least those in the front rows, because there were hundreds gathered around the house. They belonged to people she'd known her entire life, people she'd laughed and joked with, people who smiled back at her. Now they all had the same blank look pointed at the house, like an army of soldiers ready for attack.
"What are they waiting for?" she asked eventually. The simple fact that they were all standing there, motionless, staring at her through the windows, was making her uneasy.
"A signal," Connor said, looking back at an invisible spot in the middle of the living room.
"What kind of signal?"
She barely finished her question when the living room lit up. At first, Iris thought it was an explosion and instinctively got down to the floor and looked at Connor and the others. Still standing, they turned around and Connor pointed at the spot he was looking at earlier. "That."
Iris got up and followed his hand with her eyes. A red sphere was floating in the center of the room, sending shots of energy in all directions. Red and orange shadows danced on the walls, making the inside of the room look like the setting of an autumn-themed laser rave. A blood-red stone, the size of her fist, encased in a gold oval frame, pulsed inside the sphere.
Iris looked out the window. The crowd had started to move in and was already on the front steps. In the distance, she noticed a ring of figures staring motionless at the mansion. She suspected they were supernaturals, waiting for their human minions to bring out the Amulet. She looked back at Connor. He had his sword in his hand but it was still in its sheath. Lorelai was in the foyer, a few steps up on the stairway. She had a long, thin sword in one hand and what looked like a boomerang in the other. Aeryn was guarding the front door. Her hands were resting on the belt of throwing stars, wrapped tight around her waist. No one said a word. Connor took Iris by the hand and pulled her away from the window. He slowly took a step in front of her, his eyes fixed on the Amulet.
The crowd had started pounding on the front door. When the first rock came through one of the windows of the living room, Iris jerked, screamed and instinctively grabbed Connor's arm. He put his hand on hers but then released himself from her hold and ran to the window. A few people were already breaking the glass and struggling to get inside. They seemed unaware or maybe had been compelled not to care that they were cutting themselves in the process. Connor fought them for a while and Iris noticed that he wasn't dealing any fatal blows. It occurred to her that that was the reason Kane had sent humans after the Amulet—mainly because they had access into the mansion, but also because killing half a town would have been hard to cover up even for the Elwoods.
A loud cracking noise came from the foyer and a second later a wave of mindless bodies flooded inside the house. Iris saw Aeryn back up into the kitchen. Connor grabbed the Amulet, took Iris by the hand and made his way out of the living room and then towards the back of the foyer. But then he stopped all of a sudden and turned around, looking at the crowd, waiting. Neither of the Elwoods was moving anymore and Iris didn't understand why.
"Hold it," Connor said, his eyes fixed on the incoming crowd. At first, Iris thought he was talking to her, but then she looked at Lorelai on the staircase. The girl was holding a boomerang in each hand. Her eyes were two yellow flames. Then, as the mob filled the foyer, Connor's voice exploded. "Now!"
Lorelai released the boomerangs. As they flew around the house, they released drops of water all over the crowd, like sprinkles after a fire alarm. By the time the weapons returned to their owner, the crowd was lying on the floor, but a new wave was already making its way into the mansion. They were stomping all over the bodies on the ground, kicking them like they were nothing but logs of wood, mere obstacles blocking their way to a pot of gold. Some of the fallen ones were watching her, like they were still awake but unable to move, and Iris swallowed back nausea and closed her eyes so she wouldn't have to see those blank looks anymore.
She jerked when Connor grabbed her wrist and pushed her through a door underneath the stairs that she'd never noticed before. He put the Amulet in her hand. "Take this and go. This leads to the basement. Behind the bookcase you'll find a door. It opens into a tunnel. Take two rights, a left and then another right and you'll exit into a clea
ring. I'll be waiting for you there."
"But—"
"Go!"
As she advanced through the darkness of the tunnel, one hand tightly clenched around the Amulet, the other tapping the wet stone wall, Iris tried not to think of what she might be touching and all the creatures that were probably hiding in every corner of that tight, moist and dark place. Instead, she thought of Agatha's words again. She looked at the Amulet. Warm and pulsing in her hand, Iris had the feeling she was holding a beating heart. The stone emanated a soft, red light and Iris thought she could use it to guide herself in the dark. There were beautiful engravings in the golden frame around the stone, with the same strange letters which by now, after seeing them so many times, she assumed were the Fae written language. They were glowing dark red, despite the fact that there was absolutely no source of light inside the tunnel, and Iris suspected that the energy was coming from the bloodstone itself.
Focused as she was on the Amulet, she nearly missed the split in the tunnel and it was only when she noticed that the texture of the rock wall had changed that she stopped and turned around. It was only a couple dozen feet from the split, but it would have been enough to lead her God knows where. She tried to remember Connor's instructions and took a right turn, wondering how the Elwoods were doing and if he would manage to break free and meet her in the clearing as he'd said. She looked back instinctively and didn't notice a heavy rock in the middle of the tunnel. She tripped and fell. Eager to protect the stone, she broke her fall with only one hand. The consequences were dire. Her wrist made an unnatural sound and her teeth cut so deep into the inside of her lower lip as her chin hit the ground that her mouth filled with blood almost instantly. She lay there for a minute, afraid that she would faint from the pain. Then, slowly, very slowly, she slipped the Amulet in her pocket, propped herself on her good hand, spit a mouthful of blood and got up. She took out the stone again, holding it in front of her, and went on, praying that she would come out of that infernal tunnel soon.
For a while she had the impression that she'd gotten lost, and the thought of spending who knows how much more time in there before the Elwoods found her made her shiver. She closed her eyes and shook her head to chase away the thought that someone or something else might get to her before they did. Despite her better judgment, she kept running her tongue on the cut inside her lower lip. It was deep and still bleeding. Not to mention that it hurt like hell, and yet still not as bad as her wrist. That one needed a cast for sure.
A sharp, metallic noise made her jump and forget about the pain. With her heart in her throat, she looked around, although she was well aware of the fact that she couldn't possibly see more than a few feet in front of her. If there really was someone or something in the tunnels with her, they could very well attack her at any moment without her even sensing them approach. At that point, all she wanted was for them to do it quickly. Panic slowly creeping in, she fell to the ground and screamed when she felt a draft hitting her from the front. In the movies, ghosts often made their presence felt by way of drafts and it wasn't so farfetched to believe in ghosts when you knew for sure that Fae and vampires were real.
It took her a while to realize that the draft was actually constant, which meant the exit was close. The thought of getting out of there sent a shot of adrenaline throughout her body, which alleviated the pain and gave her a new dose of energy, enough for her to get up and dart towards the exit. When she finally saw the silver rays of the full moon creeping inside the tunnel, she smiled and gave a sigh of relief. But there was something about the shadows cast on the tunnel wall that didn't seem right. A second later she realized what it was—the exit was closed by a metal grate.
She grabbed the grate with her good hand and began to push and pull but it didn't budge. She must have taken a wrong turn and exited somewhere else, otherwise Connor would have known about the grate. She knew him and he wouldn't leave anything to chance. He and Lorelai would have made sure to check all possible exit routes, running a hundred different strategies to make sure they had everything covered in case of an attack. She was about to head back into the tunnel when someone grabbed the grate and pulled it out of the frame. She turned around.
"Connor, thank God."
"Not quite, Miss Davenport."
"Sheriff? Wh—What are you doing here?"
Sheriff Sanders was the last person Iris expected to see there. The way he was standing in front of her, with his gun drawn and the moonlight casting dark shadows on his set face, he looked scarier than usual.
"I came for that." He pointed his armed hand at Iris' pocket. She instinctively slid her hand inside and grabbed hold of the pulsing stone.
"I—I don't understand."
"Come on, Iris. Don't play dumb. Just give me the Amulet and go home. It's not safe for you out here tonight."
"No!"
"Don't make this harder than it already is. I don't want to hurt you but I will if I have to."
Iris looked at the gun pointed at her and remembered the night Dorian was shot.
"You're the sheriff. You're supposed to protect the town."
Her words must have had a deeper impact than she'd thought because when he spoke his voice exploded like thunder. "What do you think I'm doing this for?"
"What do you mean?"
"I'm trying to protect us all. These—These creatures, they feed on humans, treat us like we're ants, like this world belongs to them and we're here only because they allow it, when the truth is they're the parasites. And like with all parasites, they need to be dealt with."
"They're not all bad."
"They took my son!" There was desperation in his voice, the kind of desperation you saw only in a parent who'd lost their child. "They made him their slave and kept him locked up in a cage like an animal. Logan has a thing for finding trouble, I know that, but he didn't deserve this."
"But he's okay now. He called me earlier. He escaped."
"I know that. But for how long? How long before they take him again? Before they take every human in Forest Hills and turn them into their playthings?" He shook his head. "No. This has to end. And I won't stop until every last one of them is dead and buried."
"How did you find out about them in the first place?"
"A few months ago, we got a disturbance call from the haunted mansion west of Magnolia Lane. I thought they were just kids causing a ruckus but when my deputy and I got there…" He turned his head to the side and closed his eyes for a few seconds before he continued. "A young woman was lying on the ground and three boys were… feeding on her. As soon as they saw me, they came after us. My deputy shot them. I checked their pulse. They were both dead. The girl was barely breathing. I was on the phone, asking for medical assistance. By the time I ended the call, the boys' bodies had vanished. A couple days later I saw them harassing Mrs. Thompson in front of a spice shop. I didn't understand how that was possible. I thought I was going crazy."
Iris understood him well. She'd been in his shoes. Looking back, she considered herself lucky to have had someone who'd been able and willing to explain to her the things that her mind found it hard to accept. In a way, she felt sorry for the sheriff for having to go through that process alone.
"How did you get the cold iron bullets?"
"Every night after that I spent patrolling. I talked to every weirdo, every drunk, every bum in town. I've had to sort through a lot of creepy stuff but eventually that led me back to the spice shop, which, it turns out, is not your run-of-the-mill spice shop. At first the owner, this girl, Lexi, told me I was insane. But then I threatened to throw the book at her and she eventually told me everything about the supernatural creatures living in Forest Hills. For a while, I didn't even know what to do with what I'd just found out. How do you stand up to someone who's faster than you, stronger than you? Those boys in the alley, they were already dead when my deputy shot them. I was hopeless. But then Logan was taken. I begged them to let him go but they just laughed in my face and told me that, i
f I missed him so much, I should join him. That's when I decided to fight back. I made my own bullets—cold iron, silver, wood even—and began to hunt them down. But they're too many and I won't live long enough to kill them all one by one. That's why I want the Amulet. I need to find a way to get them all at once. Rid our town of this pest."
Strangely, Iris understood. After seeing Logan and Lexi in those cages, she understood why someone would want to take revenge on the monsters that would do that to someone, human or otherwise. Still, killing all supernaturals was not the way.
"I'm not giving you the Amulet. You can't shoot me. I'm human."
"Oh, I can and I will. You may be human but you became one of them when you decided to help them. Now give me the damn stone."
"No!"
He fired his gun into the ground at her feet and Iris jerked and took a step back. She'd forgotten about her broken wrist and the sudden movement sent a wave of fresh, excruciating pain through her arm, all the way to her shoulder. Her eyes filled with tears. "Please, Sheriff. Don't do this."
The Fountain of Truth (Tales of the Dark Fae Book 1) Page 28