by Eric Asher
And he was right. I whirled on the mirror, calling on my necromancy without hesitation. Without restraint. And when my hand should have struck glass, it passed through and found flesh. The entire surface of the mirror rippled with golden power, alternating waves of mine, Gaia’s, and whatever this creature was.
I pushed my aura forward, carving a path through that golden light until it struck the slow-moving black and white aura of the ghost in the mirror, and the world went white.
I’d grabbed enough ghosts over the years to know what to expect. My memories were blending with those of the spirit in the mirror, but what I didn’t understand was the fact I was staring at myself. That memory flashed away, and I watched as Utukku was crowned the leader of our Sect, seated on an ivory throne in a lost cavern in Gorias. She was the right choice, and I reveled in the fact I’d supported her since the beginning, but I couldn’t show that kind of pride. Utukku, as a people, did not show all of what they felt.
The scene changed, and the wars came. Utukku was a great leader, but even the best of her warriors died when the Mad King came. They were ground into the earth until it mattered little how much they wanted to fight. If they wanted to survive, they had to flee, and while many called their leader a disgrace because of it, she was the only reason the lines would continue.
A time of peace came, when the new king of Faerie would form an alliance with the Utukku, and they were welcomed once more into the great halls they had abandoned. But the vision jerked forward, to a time when I saw the necromancer again, and yet I knew the necromancer was me, and the water witch was Nixie.
You may call me Hess, if it pleases you.
My immersion in the vision broke, my perspective shifted, and I could see both through my eyes and those of the Utukku. Watch as she fought the assassins, watch again as she sent a Dullahan away, but I couldn’t pull out of the vision. It fused together once more until I was Hess and she was me.
They stood on the fields at Falias at the Morrigan’s request. Battled outside the walls with Appalachia until news came of a lull in the battle. They returned to Antietam.
And there they stayed until the war finally came to the armory. Hidden beneath Antietam, it should have been secret. It should have been safe. But it was their undoing. The dark-touched came through the tunnels, dying in droves in the traps set by the Utukku and the Fae, torn down by the werewolves before the wolves themselves died.
And it was there, back to back with Caroline, that Hess met her end. I saw only the shadow and fang of the dark-touched that struck Caroline before it was impaled on my spear. But before I could do more, a second cut deep, and silence fell.
The seeing should have broken apart in that moment, but it held. It held as the golden glow of Hess’s eyes rose to meet mine, and the pupils slid into that rainbow light of the Eldritch things.
And I screamed at the Utukku. “Your name is Hess!”
I didn’t know why I said it as the Utukku stalked toward me in that mirror. I could only feel her confusion at the seeing of what had come before, and why she felt she’d been abandoned in the armory beneath Antietam. But the words froze her in her tracks.
“Nixie is your ally,” I growled. “I am your ally. Let me help you.”
Nixie screamed behind me, and I was a blink of an eye away from lighting a soulsword and devouring Hess’s spirit. Instead, I pushed my necromancy forward, flooding the ghost with power until her hands rose to her head in a blood-curdling cry and glass shattered around us.
“Damian, she’s free!” Foster shouted.
The fury in my blood fled, and I relaxed my hand. I stepped away from the broken mirror and stared at Hess’s ghost, and the eyes of something else beside her. A shorter spirit. A cu sith’s spirit. “Hess. Why are you here?”
She didn’t answer at first, flexing her hands as she stared at them. Hess walked forward, and the remnants of the mirror crunched beneath her feet. The gold faded, but my heart almost stopped when I realized what had happened. I’d shoved too much power into the ghosts. She and the cu sith would be corporeal for a time.
“Hess?”
The cu sith followed her out of the frame.
Hess looked up to meet my eyes. “I would ask the same of you, Damian Vesik. Why have you come to Gorias?”
I didn’t respond at first, all eyes for the ghostly cu sith at her side. The cu sith growled, a scar lighting across its flank as it shuffled closer and sniffed at my boots.
“She likes you,” Hess said. “Unusual.” The Utukku cocked her head to the side.
The cu sith opened her jaws and closed them on my ankle, gently tugging as her braided tail snapped from side to side. She released me, rubbed up against my legs, and then flopped onto my feet.
Satisfied she wasn’t about to maul me, I turned my gaze back to Hess. “You said something about Gorias?”
“Yes, why have you come? Are you too hunting the basilisk?”
A frisson of terror lanced down my spine. That’s where I’d seen tunnels like that before. Beneath Falias, where the basilisks once nested.
Samir crouched down to scratch the ghostly cu sith on the ruff. She seemed more than happy to let him do it.
“What happened to your cu sith?” Foster asked.
Hess crossed her arms and smiled. “She fought in the rebellion inside Falias. Took down some of the Mad King’s guard and saved many lives.” Hess frowned. “But that was before she … she died when Falias was torn from Faerie. As countless did.”
“I’m sorry,” Foster said, and his voice cracked.
I glanced at the fairy. “Are you okay?”
“You don’t recognize her?” Foster asked, a heaviness in his words. “You met her before.”
And my brain finally put the pieces together. The gentle tug on the ankle wasn’t a threat. She was telling me who she’d been. I cursed. “No way.”
Foster smiled sadly. “She gave us Bubbles and Peanut.”
The cu sith chuffed.
Hess looked around, studying the walls and the mirrors. “We are not in Gorias, are we?”
I shook my head. “No. We’re in the commoners’ realm. Fifteen miles south of my shop, if you remember where that is. That was you in the mirror, wasn’t it?”
Hess tilted her head. “The iron-touched Fae was there.”
“Yes, that was it.”
“Why are we here, Damian Vesik?” Hess asked.
“You came to us. And a great many ghosts seem to be drawn to you.”
This brightened Hess’s eyes. “A Spirit Hunt. It is a rare gift for those who have gone before.”
Nixie rubbed at her eyes. “What’s a Spirit Hunt, Hess? Hopefully not anything as painful as you trying to eat my mind?”
“My dear, I do apologize. I was only making an effort to communicate. It is … problematic when one is dead.”
Nixie gave a pained smile. “You definitely need some practice.”
“The Spirit Hunt,” Hess said, bringing focus to her words. “It is a legend, or so I thought. When the realm is under dire threat, the fallen can sometimes return for a final hunt before we are welcomed to the sands of the beyond. And my dear Popcorn can return to the endless fields around Finias where she was born.”
“You kept her name,” Foster said with a smile.
“It was certainly not a traditional name for one of the mighty cu siths, but she was explosive, and I felt the name was earned.”
Foster grinned. “Cara gave her that name because she liked to eat popcorn. Maybe you’ll see Mom in those fields, huh girl?”
We all knew she wouldn’t, but no one said anything as the fairy landed on the ghost of a cu sith and scratched her ears.
Hess studied her hand as she turned it over, an ethereal glow emanating from her, but with a substance it hadn’t had before.
“Why are you gold?” I hesitated to ask the follow-up question, but I wanted to know what we were getting into. “I thought gold was for the souls of humans.”
Hess
smiled, revealing daggerlike teeth that would have been unnerving before I’d known the Utukku. “Have you not seen this power before? Have you not walked hand in hand with it in the darkest realm? A light in the Abyss?”
“Gaia.”
“Not only Gaia, it would seem. How is it the power of a Titan flows from your own?”
And so I told Hess what I knew about the battles that came to the armory, and my own fate beneath Falias. Nixie told her of what transpired in Atlantis, and how she hoped the water witches would find a better unity with Nudd thrown down. And it was perhaps that Hess most reacted to.
“Nudd is dead?”
“Very dead.”
And Foster spoke of other battles, and a terrible wound Zola had sustained in the battle with an Old God. Listening to that, I was more worried about her than I’d been before, but Foster assured me she was well. For now, that would be enough. I supposed I’d seen her after the fight with Nudd. I understood needing time, and she’d been through more than I could imagine of late.
Hess turned toward the tunnel. “Then I am not here to hunt Nudd. I am here for the basilisk that dwells in these tunnels.”
I reached out and touched her shoulder as Nugget brushed against my leg. The contact overwhelmed me as power raced down those tunnels, showing me visions of gold and blue as it took twists and turns and showed me corridors that should not have been beneath those streets. Roots and rot that had invaded those dark spaces were bathed in light.
Something pulled me back, and I stared into the shadows, slowly retracing the labyrinth in my mind’s eye. “Did you see that, Hess?”
“I did. Some of those corridors were not carved by a basilisk. That is why I thought this land was Gorias. There are fragments of the golden city buried beneath our feet.”
“Like Park’s base in Saint Charles?” Foster asked.
I nodded. “Almost exactly like that. We need Aeros. We need … I don’t know what we need.”
Hess bared her teeth. “We need to hunt.”
I held my hand up to ask for a moment before turning to Samir. “You good?”
He shook his head. “Good is a strong word. But I have ghosts?”
I laughed under my breath. “You could say that. Hess, Samir, Samir, Hess.”
“I will not trouble your dwelling long,” Hess said. “I will honor you in the hunt, as all good hosts should be honored.”
“Thank you?”
Hess offered a shallow bow.
“Are we safe here?” Samir asked. “Should I send my staff home?”
“Just a second.” I knew Zola wanted time alone, but she was the best person for this job. I texted her one sentence.
Please send Aeros to Samir’s to close off basilisk tunnel.
It didn’t take long for her reply to come back.
Boy. What in God’s name have you gotten into?
Long story. I’ll call if we get in over our heads.
See that you do.
I smiled and slid my phone back into my pocket. “Okay, Aeros should be here later to seal off this passage. You and your staff should be safe.”
“Aeros is the big rock, yes?” Samir asked.
“That’s him,” Nixie said.
Samir blew out a breath and looked around our motley group. “Well then, you best talk to Edgar about your peacock, as he hasn’t taken his eyes off the tunnel since we came into the room.”
“Good idea. Hess, come with us, will you? It may give us more direction for your hunt. Or if we’re really lucky, it will keep us from getting turned into accent pieces for Samir’s topiary.”
“Topiary?” Samir asked. “I have no topiary.”
Nixie and Foster chuckled.
CHAPTER TEN
As anxious as Hess was to start her Spirit Hunt, I wanted to understand what in the hell we were about to put our foot in. I knew enough about basilisks to know I had zero interest in facing one, let alone facing one unprepared.
“I think this one senses her old master,” Hess said, patting the head of the cu sith as I glanced in the rearview mirror. “She only came to me today.”
I swerved when Hess’s face changed, and I saw the skull of an Utukku with golden fire in its eyes.
“Damian!” Nixie shouted from the passenger seat. “You’re going to kill Foster!”
My gaze flashed the dashboard, frantically trying to find the fairy who was now tangled in a small packet of tissues I’d left out in the middle of the dashboard. I laughed, and then remembered the skull, and sobered immediately.
“Shut up,” Foster muttered.
“Nixie, check the glove box.”
She opened the door mounted underneath the dashboard. It wasn’t original to the car, but it proved convenient at times.
“With my apologies,” I said to the fairy.
He scowled until he saw the small block of fudge in Nixie’s hand. “Is that peanut butter?” Foster jerked his leg free from the tissues. “From Oh Fudge?”
“Yes, it is.”
“All is forgiven, oh great and clumsy necromancer.”
I glanced in the mirror again, happy to see Hess’s face sitting beside the cu sith instead of the skull. And somewhat surprised to see Nugget happily camped out on top of the cu sith’s ghost, much to Popcorn’s annoyance.
“Hess, you said you only got Popcorn today?” My voice didn’t entirely hide the hesitation behind that question.
“I do not know. Time does not feel right. I should be at rest, Damian Vesik, and yet I still wander.”
“Have you ever heard of another Utukku being trapped inside a mirror?” I asked.
“The veil watchers. Yes, of course. Those slain by a basilisk.”
As much dread as I felt asking Hess that question, her answer didn’t help things.
Foster hacked off a piece of the fudge with his sword and offered half of the block to Nixie. It was barely a nibble, but she took it with a smile. The small chunk of tan fudge disappeared in tiny bites from Foster’s hand.
He cocked his head to the side. “The veil watchers. I’ve heard that story. But I didn’t realize it was tied to a basilisk.”
“Hess wasn’t killed by a basilisk,” I said, as the vision of the battle in the armory came back into my mind.
“Of course not,” the Utukku said from the backseat. “It has been many years since we fought a basilisk.”
“But I saw you in a mirror,” I said. “At Death’s Door. That was you behind the glass in the bathroom. And again at Samir’s shop.”
Hess smiled. “It is easy for my kind to travel in such ways. But I was not trapped in those mirrors, only looking out at another world, until you brought me back into this one.”
Nixie ate a second piece of fudge when Foster offered before she asked the Utukku a question. “Hess, the spirit realm for the Utukku, it is not the same as the spirit realm for the commoners, is it?”
“No. I believe it is something more akin to the Shadowed Lands. A place where we are not truly alive, in the sense of the commoners, but we retain some piece of ourselves. Until the cycle begins anew, and it is time to walk upon the earth once more.”
“Unless you are summoned for a Spirit Hunt,” Foster said.
Hess bared daggerlike teeth. “And that is a rare honor, indeed.”
I’d heard stories of what Beth and Cornelius saw when they visited the Shadowed Lands. None of those stories sounded as though the residents of that realm were dead. Perhaps what Hess meant was that they did not have influence over our realm without the assistance of a blood mage. Much as Hess herself could not affect our realm before I pulled her through the mirror.
“Then why were you at Death’s Door?”
Hess looked up to meet my eyes in the reflection. “I was called there. I do not know the name for it. It was not a voice, but I call it a voice. As you have spoken of being drawn in the Abyss, it drew me to the lens where the iron-touched Fae worked. From there, I watched, until I saw you, and a strange box.”
Nixie sat up a little straighter. “You weren’t trapped in the veil mirror, but it called to you? Whoever is trapped inside of it called to you?”
Hess gently stroked her chin. “There are stories of the Spirit Hunts. Things told that my kind always believed embellishments or fictions. But perhaps they were not. If you are correct, and I was called by an Utukku trapped inside that mirror, I may have more of a bond to it than I am aware.”
Foster’s head snapped from side to side as he looked between me and Nixie. His voice got a little bit faster with every word, the fudge having invaded his bloodstream. “Then you know what we need to do. We need to take Hess back to Death’s Door. She needs to see that mirror. See if it reacts differently to her. Damian saw something none of us did. Maybe that affected Hess. We should take her back there. Let’s go back to the store. Did Calbach already hide the box in the wall again?”
“Slow down, speedy,” I said. “You’re either going to have a very bad crash, or break the space-time continuum.”
The peacock honked in what I can only think of as agreement.
“I still can’t believe Dad’s sword was hidden in the wall all this time. Haven’t seen that since I was a kid. I don’t understand why Cara kept it hidden from us. That wasn’t very nice. Course, I guess she kept some more important things hidden from us as well. Maybe not so bad. You know, when you consider that fact. It’s not like she was hiding the whiskey.”
Nixie groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose. “It always amazes me how much you can say when you have nothing to say at all.”
“Oh, for sure. You know, there’s a story about veil mirrors in Faerie. It’s not quite the same as what Utukku says. If I had to guess, hers is more likely the truth. Fae can be cruel. I don’t have to tell you that. But I think there’s another part of the story. Something Hess doesn’t talk about.”
“I have hidden nothing from you,” Hess said. “What I have told you is what I remember. There is more to it, of course. The harvesting of one’s soul from a stone body is no simple magic.”
“Right.” Foster nodded like a bobble head. “But veil mirrors were forbidden after the Wandering War. They were said to be made of old magic. Titan magic. And that is the kind of magic even Gwynn Ap Nudd, the Mad King himself, feared beyond all others.”