by Eric Asher
I sat down and threw my legs over the entry to the sewer. It was a bit longer than I would have liked to simply drop into the water below, especially not knowing how deep it was. I grabbed the ladder rungs sunk into the wall and eased my way down.
While I was happy to find the cold water wasn’t any more than ankle-deep, it was still soaking through my shoes and turning my socks into waterlogged chafing machines. The peacock followed me down, politely landing on my head before dropping to my shoulder and honking.
If I thought that bird was loud above ground, it was nothing compared to the echoing thunder underneath the street. Foster laughed as he sailed by my head and Nixie splashed down beside me.
It was only a few feet from the entrance to the sewer to the doorway in the pipe. It looked like something off an old submarine, and it gave freely when I twisted the wheel.
I might have coughed to cover the squeal that came out of my mouth when I saw the shadow standing on the other side of the door.
“Casper,” I muttered. “Fucking hell. Don’t do that.”
“You mean stand here in silence while waiting for you? Of course, I realize how terrifying that must be.”
I narrowed my eyes at the sniper. “You could have told me you were nearby.”
“This was more fun.”
Nixie patted Casper on the shoulder as she stepped inside the base. I followed as the pair turned around and led the way forward. Foster exploded into his Proelium state so he could shut the door behind us as Nugget honked again.
Casper stood up ramrod straight before spinning to face the bird. “What the hell was that?”
“My alarm clock. Say hello.”
Nugget honked again on cue. It echoed down the corridor almost as well as it had in the tunnel.
Casper eyed the bird before turning around and leading us through the bare metal hallway. “So what kind of danger are we looking at?”
“We fought a basilisk in the tunnels,” I said. “It only almost killed two of us.”
“Can we shoot it?”
“Probably,” Foster said. “But I don’t think hitting it anywhere other than the eyes is going to do you any good. Skin is armored, and it’s hard to get through.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem. How large is it? Give me an eye the size of an apple, and I’ll hit it from the other side of the river.”
“I don’t doubt that you could,” I said. “The other problem is, if you look into its eyes, you’ll turn into a garden gnome.”
Casper let out a low laugh. “A garden gnome? That’s ridiculous, Damian, even for you.”
“In a matter of speaking, it is true,” Nixie said. “The basilisk can turn you to stone, as surely as the stone swords can slay an undine.”
“From how far away?” Casper asked.
“Each basilisk is different. A quarter mile, perhaps, and you should be safe. But should is not the same as an absolute.”
Casper nodded. “Explosives?”
“Possible.”
“Explosives underground?” I asked. “That sounds like an idea bad enough for Frank to come up with.”
“Funny you should say that,” Casper said. “It was partially his idea to line some of these outer halls with antipersonnel mines. Park didn’t like the idea at first, but he came around to it after the infiltration of the Unseelie Fae.”
The metal hallway ended at another door that looked as if it belonged in a bulkhead. Beyond that was one of the displaced corridors from Gorias. But this one was not so disorganized as where we’d fought the basilisk. Here a handful of old wooden furniture still survived its time beneath the earth.
Park and Casper’s people had made use of it, stashing supplies in the empty cabinets and drawers and setting up gun racks in other parts of the hall. It looked like a strange blend of a modern barracks and something out of a D&D campaign Sam and I had played when we were kids.
The hall would be large enough for a basilisk, even if the basilisk was as large as the one we’d already fought, but the tunnel leading to it would be like trying to ram your arm down a Pringles can. The basilisks weren’t going to fit.
“What is it?” Casper asked.
“I was thinking we could defend the entrance to the underground, but the basilisks won’t fit through those doorways and tunnels. It would need something of this size to breach your base.”
“What will it do if it can’t find a way in?”
Casper’s question had an edge of hope to it, and I had little doubt she was hoping that meant the basilisk would simply go away.
It was Aideen who answered. “Then it will make a way in.”
As if in answer, the side of the hall thundered with an impact. We turned to face the wall when one of the gun racks fell, scattering rifles across the stones. A door I hadn’t seen opened to reveal a rather unfriendly face.
Casper fumbled with her gun before I reached out and placed a hand on her wrist.
“Friends.”
Casper did a double take, glancing between me and Aseer standing in the doorway that hadn’t been there a moment before.
“The basilisks grow near. You were correct, Damian Vesik.”
“What do you mean?”
Hess stepped forward. “She means the basilisks are coming this way. We do not have much time. You need to evacuate what commoners are here or prepare them for death.”
Casper pulled a phone off the wall. It didn’t have any buttons or dials, she just started speaking, and her voice boomed across the PA systems. “Arm all mines in the outer corridors and retreat to the mess. Repeat, arm all mines in the outer corridors and retreat to the mess. All other soldiers, get out of the tunnels or shelter as close to the mess as you can.”
She slammed the receiver down. It took all of thirty seconds before red lights and a siren almost as piercing as the peacock’s cry lit up the corridors of the underground base. A pair of soldiers burst through the door at the far end of the hall, freezing when they saw Hess and Aseer.
“Carry on,” Casper said, and it said much of the soldiers’ exposure to weird shit that they simply went about their business, grabbing extra mines from storage before setting up tripwires across the far door.
“They’ll make for the largest hall to nest after a fight,” Hess said.
“We aren’t far from that,” Casper said. “We’ll set the mines and prepare an ambush there.” She typed something out on her phone. “Park has been told to stay back because it isn’t safe inside a quarter mile. I need my rifle.”
I didn’t know what Casper was planning on doing, considering we didn’t have nearly a quarter mile of space at any point in the underground. But I suspected the sniper had a plan, and considering how many times she’d saved my ass, I was willing to go along for the ride.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The largest corridor left us next to a hub of monitors and computers that I imagined no one would be happy about losing. But more importantly, it showed a bank of cameras that allowed us to see every corner of the base without linking to the peacock. Casper switched a few monitors around and pointed to each in turn.
“These sectors are the farthest out. They’re also the most heavily fortified.”
I watched the soldiers on-screen as they made their way out of those rooms. Each worked a section of the wall, arming what I assumed were mines that I couldn’t quite make out on the screens. But it was easy enough to see the dark gray rectangles.
“Is each one of those an explosive?”
Casper nodded. “Antipersonnel mines. If we’re lucky, they won’t collapse the corridor. If we aren’t lucky, shelter close to the nearest support and wait for someone to dig us out.”
“Well, that’s reassuring,” Foster muttered.
I glanced back at the fairy and grinned at him. “We’ve been through worse.”
“Just because we’ve been through worse doesn’t mean I want to go through it again.”
“They come.” I didn’t need to see Aseer speak
to know it was her. I’d never heard a voice quite like that, not even in the Burning Lands.
Hess slammed the butt of her glowing spear into the steel floor, sending a small shower of sparks across my boots. “It has been an honor. A rare gift for a Spirit Hunt to be shared by friends of Utukku who are not Utukku themselves. Our victory will free all those spirits who joined this hunt.”
I turned to Hess. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there in Antietam. Sorry I couldn’t do more.”
“You slayed the Mad King, necromancer. It is more than most could dream of doing. And it has saved more lives than you could possibly imagine.”
They were kind words that Hess did not need to speak. I was grateful for them, but I’d always feel like I let my allies down when I lost myself to the Wild Hunt. Nixie squeezed my shoulder—the one not currently occupied by a rather large peacock. I wrapped my fingers around hers before letting her go.
Casper picked up a pair of goggles from the console, and I finally understood what she was going to do.
“Night vision?” I asked.
“Not only night vision,” Casper said as she slid them over her face. “More of an augmented reality.”
“A HUD?”
“Sort of. But it encompasses my entire field of view and overlays everything in front of me. It’s harder to aim, but it’s certainly better than getting turned to stone.”
“I do not understand,” Hess said.
Nixie pointed to the monitors. “It would be no different than looking at a basilisk on one of the screens. It cannot look into her eyes, and because of that, its magic is dulled.”
“Only dulled?” Casper asked.
Nixie inclined her head. “It could still bite you. And it would not matter whether or not you met its gaze should that happen.”
Casper stood up and stretched. “Good to know. We wait here. Once the basilisks breach the base, I will follow your lead.”
I glanced over at the fiery Utukku and Hess. “We’re following their lead. You’re probably the first commoner ever to be on a Spirit Hunt.”
Hess nodded. “Undoubtedly. The first necromancer. The first undine. And the first commoner.”
“And the first peacock?” I asked.
Hess narrowed her eyes, but she didn’t answer. I grinned at the Utukku.
“They are here.”
I looked into the flaming eyes of Aseer’s skull, and the base trembled around us a moment later. Thunder echoed through the halls as the ceiling shook above us.
I thought the basilisks might follow the same path, and slither into the same trap. Of course, my luck hadn’t been that good in quite some time. Soon after the earthshaking collision, another struck, the sound distant, not nearly so close as the first.
“There,” Casper said, pointing to a monitor.
The screen she pointed to was crystal clear, nothing like the grainy black and white visuals that were likely stuck in my head from old movies. Dust and stone billowed across the screen as something moved in the shadows. It took some time before it cleared enough to make out the silhouette of the beast that barely fit in the tunnel.
“Just a little farther,” Casper whispered under her breath.
“Where’s the other one?” Aideen asked.
Casper tapped on another monitor where the nearby stone hallway had bowed in. The stone shifted like a rising bubble, enough that a mine exploded, sending shrapnel across the empty hall before there was anything inside of it.
The wall stopped moving, as if the basilisk outside wasn’t sure of what had just happened. So close to setting off the traps when everything grew still, and only a distant rumble sounded nearby.
“Scared it off?” I asked.
“Scared probably isn’t the right word,” Nixie said. “They are not mindless beasts.”
I turned my attention back to the first monitor, the basilisk inching ever closer to the traps set by the soldiers.
“Come on,” Casper said through gritted teeth.
There was no snap of the lines or warning when the basilisk surged forward. One moment the corridor was nothing but smoke in silence, and the next was fire and shrapnel. The basilisk reared up when the first of the mines detonated.
It was the worst thing it could have done to protect itself. Its underbelly exposed, the sudden jerk of its head triggered another series of mines, sending a spray of gore across the hall.
I was sure it was dead. The sheer volume of shrapnel sent into that thing’s hide and throat was enough to bring down a building. My skin crawled when I saw it slither forward, bloody, but its eyes still intact and open wide.
“No!” Casper shouted.
I wasn’t sure why until I saw the other shadows, soldiers pushing their way through the far door, taking aim at the basilisk before it saw them, and then it was all too late.
If I didn’t know better, I would’ve thought they were simply waiting for orders, waiting to spring into action and rain fire on the basilisk. But I knew better, and I knew they would never move again.
The basilisk’s head swayed from side to side, studying its would-be attackers before its tail lashed forward and shattered them into rubble. The serpent coiled and surged to the end of the tunnel, pushing its way deeper into the base.
Casper cursed repeatedly and at great length. “Come on. We have to stop that thing before anyone else gets any bright ideas.”
I scratched the bird under his neck as we followed Casper. Foster and Aideen brought up the rear in their Proelium state. The mines had clearly done damage to the basilisk, but I’d been hoping for something more akin to a deer hit by a semi.
“It only has one path through,” Casper said.
Aideen interrupted Casper with another thought. “Unless it burrows into the earth outside the base again.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t,” Casper said. “If it’s really that smart, I expect it will stay on the path of least resistance.”
“Since when is a face full of shrapnel the path of least resistance?” Foster asked.
“Let’s just hope I’m right,” Casper said, “or we’ll be chasing it through the underground with no idea of how the tunnels are actually laid out.”
“We have a peacock for that.”
Casper glanced at me, looking like she might have a dozen questions at that comment, but just shook her head instead.
We turned down another hallway, one that was a blend of stone and metal where a wall from Gorias had only partially been brought into this realm. Casper slowed around the next intersection, taking the rifle from her back as she lowered her goggles.
“This is it. If it continues forward, it has to come through that corridor. It’s low and narrow, but I think it will still fit. It’s our best chance for a clear shot.”
I reached out to Nugget with my aura and closed my eyes. Brilliant golden lines appeared in my Sight, racing forward for a split second before it showed me the basilisk. Even with nothing but darkness and golden outlines, I could see the serpent had been injured. Ragged flesh dragged across the stone, and even without seeing the color of the stains behind it, I knew it was blood.
“Casper’s right. It’s coming this way.”
I opened my eyes, seeing the real world with the overlay of Nugget’s vision. The powers contained in the Spirit Hunt flared out around Aseer, and she stalked forward, twisting the handle of the door open and stepping through.
Foster and Aideen followed, trailed by me and Nixie.
“Stay out of the doorway.” Casper lowered herself to the ground, swinging a bipod out from the base of her rifle and angling it down the long corridor.
I didn’t miss the flicker of flame on Foster’s sword. Nudd might have been gone, but Foster still wielded the mantle of the Demon Sword. He’d told me before the more he used the mantle, the more it tied him to the king. But if the king was dead, what did that mean now? Questions for another time, because if we weren’t careful, we’d be too dead to care.
The steel doorway at the
end of the hall bent inward, and the fiery Utukku lunged for it, sending a spear of fire to crash through the porthole. Something roared beyond, and the bend shattered into a gaping maw of fangs. It happened so fast I worried the basilisk had caught some of us in its gaze, but looking through the peacock’s eyes, I could see one of the serpent’s eyes was gone, ripped away by the mines.
The basilisk writhed and lashed out with its head, unable to bite Hess as the Utukku dove away, but knocking her into Aseer where they crashed and tumbled over the floor.
Foster and Aideen rocketed across the ceiling, dropping down on the basilisk’s neck where they hacked at the open wounds in the serpent’s scales. It might have been nearly impenetrable when the scales were intact, but with damage from the mines, they made progress, but not nearly enough.
I started forward with a soulsword as Nixie grew translucent, slipping between the wall and the basilisk before lashing out with a blade.
But the basilisk wasn’t done with us yet. A violent snap of its head scattered the fairies, and its jaws moved for Foster. In that same instant, I lashed out with the soulsword, cutting off the longest fangs on its blind side.
Casper fired, the boom of her rifle echoing around us, louder even than the screech of the basilisk. It spun to face forward as the second report came. The serpent’s good eye vanished into a red mist as the back of its braincase painted the wall. Casper popped the shell out and loaded another round.
“A worthy commoner,” the fiery Utukku said. “Honor upon you, Casper, in this Spirit Hunt. May it bless all who spring from your loins.”
Casper pulled her goggles up and blinked, looking from Aideen to Nixie. Nixie shrugged before Hess let out an uneasy laugh.
Hess walked back to Casper. “It is best to give thanks if an Utukku says something you do not understand.”
“Thanks?” Casper said.
“Anyone else laughing at Casper being part of a Spirit Hunt?” I asked. “Because, you know, Casper?”
The Fae just stared at me, but Casper herself let out a chuckle.
Popcorn dove at Casper as the walls started to shake. She pulled the sniper into the hall with us a moment before the intersection of hallways and corridors collapsed, and a basilisk crashed through the ceiling.