by Eric Asher
The low-level dread following our every step didn’t help anything, but I kept my Sight tied to Nugget as we ventured deeper, checking his vision every minute or so. A distant grinding sound echoed around us, not so unlike a far-off train.
“We grow close,” Aseer said. “Prepare yourselves.”
Her words sent a surge of adrenaline through me, my heart hammering as my limbs tingled. I studied the peacock’s vision and almost yelped at the golden orbs staring back at me. Nugget’s tail flared, and the bird backed up against me as if trying to stop our progress.
And I was pretty sure the bird was right. His vision circled around the basilisk and showed me the tunnel where the beast waited. Showed me the curve of our current path until it wound back above the hall we stood in now. “It’s right on top of us!”
I didn’t finish the shouted warning before the ceiling shattered, and a rockslide of horned scales and stones filled the void of the hall. The basilisk had come to us.
“Don’t meet its gaze!” Hess screamed as the full length of the basilisk crashed into the stone floor, its body pouring into the room like an avalanche. It hissed like a snake, but infinitely louder, as if a snake were bellowing like a harbinger.
There was no time to collect ourselves before the basilisk struck. I barely had a shield up to protect myself and the peacock when the tail swung around like a wrecking ball. Nixie shifted to a form that was more water than flesh, diving beneath the strike as the fairies scattered, and the Utukku charged.
I caught the full brunt of the tail on my shield, sending an explosion of sparks into the air. But it didn’t absorb all the force of the impact, and I found myself bouncing across the stone floor as Nugget fled the basilisk.
I kept my eyes closed and hurried toward the side of the corridor, or at least what I hoped was the side of the corridor. All around me, shouts echoed off the walls and stone crashed to the floor when the basilisk lashed out.
Something warm and soft thudded into me and I felt the feathers of the peacock as he hopped up onto my shoulder and his talons dug into my shirt.
It only took a moment to realize what the bird was doing. I tied my sight in with the bird again, I could see without opening my eyes, and Nugget was immune to the basilisk’s gaze. I focused and let my aura tie in tighter with the bird’s once more. With my eyes closed, everything grew into a brilliant golden outline.
I could see Nixie in the corner, dragging Hess from the path of the tail as it lashed out again and again. Foster and Aideen took much greater risks, lunging at the eyes, only to turn away before they could focus their power on the fairies.
But the fiery Utukku, so recently released from the veil mirror, showed no such caution. She stood in defiance in front of the basilisk, raising her arms as great waves of energy poured from her. The basilisk hesitated in the presence of that being, but its fury won out in the end.
It struck, and its blinding strike was met with the flaming spear of the Utukku. She bellowed and leaned into the attack, letting the basilisk’s own weight drive the spear up into its head.
The serpent recoiled, spinning around to lash out at anything nearby in a frantic effort to dislodge the burning spear.
“Hold on,” I whispered to the bird. And for once, he didn’t honk in my ear.
I moved forward, holding the focus out in my hand, and waiting until none of my friends were in the path of the blade. Pulling the energy together to light a soulsword was no small task, but I’d grown used to it over the years.
The blade sprang from the hilt, a golden flame in my altered vision. And it didn’t cut through the sides of the corridor or lance out some quarter mile into the distance. It held steady, billowing and licking out like it was hungry for the basilisk, and I wouldn’t let it be denied.
The serpent coiled to strike at Hess, and I lunged, bringing an overhead attack to bear as it sliced down through the basilisk. The beast had to be some eight feet in diameter, but a well-placed blow could still reach something vital.
My soulsword cut through the beast effortlessly, and its scream almost forced me to cover my ears. It whirled on me, its tail scattering the fairies again as it lunged with its fangs.
“Impadda!” Nugget echoed my incantation with a deafening honk. I just managed to move to the side as the basilisk collided with the shield, and even in the peacock’s vision, it was a blinding burst of power. It slammed my arm into my chest, but I kept my feet.
I could see the basilisk’s eyes in Nugget’s sight, and I shivered with the thought that if I’d been using my own eyes, that would have been the end. But I missed the coiling of the tail as that horrifying thought rolled through my mind. Missed the sudden strike as it unfurled and caught my hip, tossing me into the wall with a grunt.
Foster howled as he slammed his sword into the edge of the basilisk’s eye socket. Blood poured from the wound as the serpent shook the fairy off, sending him careening into Popcorn as the cu sith charged. The basilisk’s eye still tracked, locking onto me again as it surged forward.
This time the attack came too fast, and by the time I could so much as think about raising a shield, the fangs were already there, already closing like the strike of a snake until something hurled me away before they shrieked.
I looked up to find Nixie locked in the basilisk’s jaws. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. The serpent’s head snapped from side to side before slamming Nixie onto the stones where she writhed. And even through the eyes of the peacock, I could see the spreading poison, the flesh turning to stone as it bloomed deep inside those wounds.
Aideen raised her hand and a healing art swirled above Nixie, slowing the poison, but not stopping it. The basilisk turned on her, but Hess was there, slamming a spear into its wounded eye until it ruptured and fluid coursed down its face. The eye shut and didn’t open again.
Flames erupted from Foster as the mantle of the Demon Sword flared around him. He plunged his sword into the head of the basilisk as Popcorn launched herself into the air and latched onto the basilisk’s throat.
“Hold it down!” Hess cried as the basilisk shook her free.
Every time the serpent tried to twist toward Aideen, Foster thrust his sword into its head, forcing it to recoil as the glow of the cu sith grew ever brighter, pulled the basilisk to the ground until Aseer raised her arm, summoning a spear of blinding light that she plunged deep through the basilisk’s wounded eyelid.
“Here, Demon Sword!”
Foster didn’t hesitate, only followed the Utukku’s strike with his own, sending a spiral of flame roaring into the basilisk’s eye socket until it was nothing but ash.
“Help me!” Aideen screamed. “I’m losing her!”
I crawled forward, feeling blood pour down my leg where I’d landed on a broken stone that could have been a blade.
“The hunt is—”
Hess didn’t finish her sentence as the collapsing basilisk lunged forward, snapping her up in its jaws. And I tried to block out the screams. The screams of a ghost who shouldn’t have been able to feel pain. Who shouldn’t have been able to feel anything.
Foster leaped into the air, angling his sword down as a maelstrom of fire spun out around him, and he dove like he’d been fired from a cannon. The grisly crack of the basilisk’s skull followed as Foster erupted from the base of the creature’s head. He hurried to Hess’s side when the serpent stilled, prying her out of its jaws.
“It’s spreading too fast!” Aideen cried out as her form brightened.
“Stop,” Nixie hissed through gritted teeth. “You can’t die for me.”
I reached out for her and instead found Nugget standing in my way. I let my Sight fade until I could see the bird. He looked from Nixie to me and back again before his feathers snapped wide, and their golden glow was etched in the white light of a healing.
He turned from me and strode over to stand in front of Aideen. The fairy gasped as the gold of the peacock bloomed entirely white, and he sang. It was not the scree
ching call I’d heard a thousand times in the last day; it was a lilting, withering thing that was as beautiful as it was sad. Every note rose and fell like a delicate bell as the bird stretched his feathers as wide as he could, and Aideen was lost to the light.
When Nugget quieted, and the glow around Aideen receded into something like two suns instead of three, I could see Nixie again. Shaky breaths wracked her body as she turned from one side to the other and then looked down at her punctured armor.
“How?” she whispered.
Aideen took a deep breath and almost collapsed. “The bird, of all things. I’d heard they were capable of great healings, but I’d never seen it. And to pull the venom from you like that. I can’t describe it in words, Nixie.”
“Next time, just let it eat me,” I muttered.
Nixie grinned at that, but her expression faltered when she noticed my leg. “Did it strike you?”
I shook my head. “No, I landed on a rock.”
“Quite the warrior, my love.” She spread her hand, and I felt the waters roll over my wound until the blood stopped and the cut closed. “It is … odd. I feel energized, not exhausted as most healings leave me.”
“Who’s a good bird?” I said, patting Nugget on his neck.
If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn the bird looked annoyed.
“I am okay, Foster.” Hess’s voice caught my attention. I found her sitting a few feet from the open jaws of the basilisk, a rather crusty-looking Foster fussing over her.
“Are you sure? I could see the holes. They went through you.”
“I am aware of that fact. It did not feel pleasant.”
“I am still here?” the fiery Utukku said, studying her hands as she let her spear vanish. “Our Spirit Hunt is not done.”
Aideen groaned and pulled Nixie to her feet.
I gritted my teeth and stood up, looking at the dead basilisk. “Let’s get the fangs. Then we have two more to kill.”
“Two?” Aideen asked. “Are you certain?”
I nodded. “My new favorite bird showed them to me. Both are moving north. If I understand the distance correctly, we need to stop them before they reach St. Charles.”
“It will take hours to walk that kind of distance,” Nixie said.
“That’s why we aren’t going to walk. We’re going to take the Spirit Hunt into the Abyss, and drop in uninvited.”
Hess rubbed at her face. “Damian Vesik, while I am aware you are impulsive, that sounds like something on the brink of madness. We have no way to know what effect the Abyss may have on the Spirit Hunt.”
I grinned at the Utukku.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
It took more time than I would have liked to harvest the basilisk fangs. Every minute we spent breaking them off and packing them up was a minute the other basilisks grew closer to St. Charles. But to leave something that valuable, something so dangerous, to rot in the tunnels felt like a far graver risk.
The other thing I hadn’t considered was how heavy they were. Not like a snake’s fang at all. More like a stone. I used a soulsword to cut them down into manageable chunks before loading them into my backpack. I doubted I’d be able to fit the broken-down fangs of two more basilisks if they were as big as these.
“And you’re sure this is safe?” I asked.
Aideen nodded. “There’s no venom left. That’s why we took the gland out first.”
She made it sound simple, but they’d cut half the basilisk’s head off to remove the gland. Every tooth in its head was a fang, which was why even the smallest bite was lethal. I closed the backpack and slid it over my shoulders. It felt like I was giving Sam a piggyback ride with all the weight from the fangs.
“Wait here,” I said.
The others gave me a blank stare. I grinned and stepped into the Abyss. One step in, one step out, barely catching a glimpse of the golden stars before the reading nook resolved around me. I dumped the basilisk fangs out on the floor, paused at the thought the cu siths might get into them, and tossed them into a wooden chest instead.
“One more thing.” I snatched up a pen, scribbling a note that said simply, “Poison. NO TOUCHY.”
With that done, I turned around, took a deep breath, and stepped back into the Abyss. One step in, one step out, and then a blistering pain as I crashed into a stone wall.
“Damian!” Foster barked somewhere in the distance.
I squinted and looked around, rubbing my face and coming away with a palm full of blood. I hadn’t appeared exactly where I’d wanted, which was somewhat unsettling. “Oww. Gaia makes it look so easy.”
“Does she?” Nixie asked, crouching down next to me after hurrying back to where I was. “I seem to recall getting slammed into more than one wall in our travels.”
I pursed my lips and pondered that. She wasn’t wrong.
Nixie reached out and prodded at my nose. “Not broken, at least.” I felt a brief flash of warmth before the blood on my hands vanished in a healing.
“Small favors.” Out of all the broken bones I’d had healed in the past, there was nothing worse than a broken nose. I cringed at the mere memory of that snapping, crackling sensation that was quickly followed by white-hot pain.
“And you want to send us into a wall now?” Foster asked under his breath.
I grinned at the fairy. “Yes.”
“No,” Hess said. “You risk too much. If you wish to travel through the Abyss yourself, that is your prerogative. But to risk the magic of a Spirit Hunt? That I cannot allow. We will meet you in the north, traversing the caverns of the basilisks’ lair.”
I hesitated and then nodded. “Nixie, how far south does Park’s base reach?”
“Most of it is beneath Main Street and Second, but it reaches almost as far north as 370 and as far south as the Family Arena. But those extremities aren’t where the soldiers are stationed.”
“No, but they’re still entrances.” I turned to Hess. “Meet us beneath the arena.”
“I am not familiar with that place.”
“It’s the only building in St. Charles that can seat over ten thousand people. Not far west of the river. You can’t miss it.”
Hess turned to Popcorn and the fiery Utukku. “We have our destination. Lead the way.”
I half expected the peacock to follow the cu sith and the Utukku, but he stayed at our side. “You all ready for this?”
“Never,” Foster muttered.
Nixie poked at me with her elbow. “At least there aren’t as many walls to crash into.”
“Har har.”
Aideen snapped into her smaller form, followed by Foster as they took up posts on Nixie’s shoulders. I picked up Nugget and winced as he scaled my chest with his talons before nesting on my shoulder like a parrot. A rather heavy parrot.
I took Nixie’s hand and watched Hess for a time, the blue glow of the Spirit Hunt bathing the tunnel around her and casting the fiery Utukku into an eerie light. As we watched, they moved faster, vanishing down the long tunnel as if riding on a roller coaster.
“I think we might have been slowing them down,” Nixie said.
“Looks like. Let’s catch up.” I squeezed Nixie’s hand, and we stepped forward into the Abyss.
* * *
The moment the stars of the Abyss formed around us, I tried to step back out. But it felt like my legs were submerged in honey, like I was being physically blocked from moving. Only when I stopped trying to pull us out did the feeling recede, and the golden path formed beneath our feet.
“Weird. I thought we’d be able to step right back out.”
“What do you mean?” Foster’s voice rose with his question. I knew the fairy wasn’t the biggest fan of walking the Abyss, and I could understand why.
“When I’m by myself, I can usually just step in and right back out. But when we’re together, we have to walk the path.”
“Maybe that’s why you face-planted into a wall?” Foster asked. “Trying to rush a little too hard?”
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I frowned at that. It was something I hadn’t considered, and might have been exactly what had happened. It was going to take more practice, which hopefully wouldn’t include too many walls to the face.
We started forward down the golden path. I felt the familiar tug on my being with the first step and led us in that direction. If the southernmost entry point to the underground base was below the arena, then I had little doubt that was the right place to go.
“Look on the bright side,” I said with a glance at Foster. “If I aim for the parking lot, there aren’t any walls to hit.”
The fairy grinned at me.
It wasn’t long before we stood at the side of the golden path, and I could tell that was where we needed to go. I stepped forward, one foot leaving the relative security of that path before the world spun around us and faded to black.
The next step brought us into the sun, and I was relieved to find we were in the right place, and not falling from a great height. What concerned me more was the fact I had no idea how to get into the base. Nugget hopped down off my shoulder, but not before giving me a face full of feathers.
Nixie rubbed her forehead. “I’m never going to get used to traveling the Abyss.”
“You and me both.” I pulled out my phone and texted Casper.
By the arena. How do we get inside?
I could see she was typing a reply almost as soon as I sent my message. It didn’t take long to come back.
Southeast corner of the parking lot. Into the sewer grate. Door in wall.
I muttered a curse to myself. “Into the sewer, boys and girls. And bird.”
I led the way to the edge of the parking lot, following it south until I came to a manhole cover. Nixie reached down, her fingers becoming translucent as they slid around the edge of the cover and leveraged it off. I shined a flashlight into the darkness and saw nothing but a pipe almost wide enough for me to stand up in.
Aideen went down first, circling the area before disappearing down the southern side of the pipe. Her voice echoed back to us. “The door is here. As Casper said.”