Rival Demons

by Sarra Cannon

  I kept one hand on the cliff wall at all times. Somehow, we all made it to the top. When I stepped out onto the blue-green grass of the nearby field, I realized just how tense I'd been holding my body. My shoulders were practically attached to my ears.

  I took a deep breath in and out, letting the panic melt away. No amount of breathing could get rid of my fear and sadness, though.

  "We're heading toward the Obsidian Forest," Jackson said. He pointed off to the east. "See there?"

  In the far distance, I could see a wall of trees, black as night and thick as any forest I'd ever seen.

  "Ominous," Mary Anne said.

  "We should keep moving," Jackson said. He was all business. "Stay close and be as quiet as you can."

  "Yes sir," Mary Anne said. She followed close behind Jackson, but the way she limped made me wonder if she was really up for this trip. Lea had offered to carry her part of the way, but she'd refused and said she was fine.

  I hung back from the group a little bit. Being too close to Jackson right now just made me ache.

  The grass slid under the bottom of my feet like oily snakes. Had it rained here? The ground squished with each footstep, and I had small seeds snuggling between my toes. Definitely an improvement over the solid rock, but I kept glancing down to make sure there were no bugs crawling on me.

  Soon, though, the second sun began to slip under the horizon, leaving nothing but darkness and the light of a single amber moon that rose slowly above the trees of the Obsidian Forest.

  No one spoke as we walked, and unlike home, there were no crickets or frogs to sing into the night air. The only sound in my ears was the sound of the light wind as it hissed across the tips of the grass. I let the steady rhythm of each footfall lull me into a kind of hypnosis. I wanted to forget the horror of the attic at Shadowford. The nightmare of facing death. The heartache of forbidden love.

  Walking here in the grass under a foreign moon might be my last real taste of freedom for a long time.

  I opened my heart to it, letting myself be vulnerable to the night for just a moment. I tried to remember a simpler life, but when had my life ever been simple? Maybe in the very earliest of days before the first fire. Before my powers had ever manifested. But my memories of those days were few and far between. It was easier to remember the tough times. The bad foster homes and the fear of knowing I was different.

  My whole life, I'd longed to fit in and belong somewhere. I'd wanted to find other girls like me who could move things with their mind and see the world the way I saw it.

  Be careful what you wish for.

  I sighed. Who would have ever thought that finding those girls would lead to all this?

  As we walked in silence, I wondered what Lark and the others were up to back home. Had things gone back to normal? Did they ask about me? Or had the Order wiped their memories? I thought about the fact that somewhere in that town, I had a half-sister. A real flesh-and-blood family member. Everything had happened so fast after the night I'd first read my mother's journal, I hadn't had time to think about my sister very much. She might only be a half-sister, but I wanted to find her more than anything. She was my father's daughter, and maybe if they both were still alive, we could have a normal family someday.

  Well, normal except for the witch thing. Was my sister a witch? I guess I'd never given it much thought. Just because she'd been born in Peachville didn't mean she was part of the Order.

  Still, as I looked up at the rising amber moon, I wondered when I would ever get back there to look for her.

  Up ahead, Jackson froze, then crouched down toward the ground. He put a finger to his lips and motioned for us to get down. I broke away from my thoughts and dropped to my knees in the tall grass. I looked all around, trying to figure out what had him spooked.

  I held my breath, not wanting to make a sound in the near silence. Somewhere in the distance, the grass rustled with movement. My legs tensed, ready to run. I didn't know who I was more scared of. The sentinels, the hunters, or the crazed twin whose sister I had killed. My heart raced.

  I turned my eyes to Jackson, waiting for some cue to run or fight.

  After a few minutes, he stood and gestured for us to follow again. This time, I kept my attention in the present, not wanting to make a mistake that could cost us our lives. We only made it another half-hour before seven flames appeared in the distance.

  Jackson must have seen them the split second after I did. Quickly, he ducked behind a large boulder, furiously signally for the rest of us to hide.

  I watched as the flames drew closer. I could see now why Jackson looked so frightened. Walking in a straight line across the field were seven men in matching black and red uniforms. The Sentinels? It had to be. Magical orange flames hovered in the air beside each of them, illuminating the area like large torches.

  I held my breath and crouched even lower to the ground. Everyone else in our group was dressed in dark colors, but my white dress stood out against the night. If the light caught it at all, the Sentinels would see us for sure. Then what would become of us? Jackson made it sound as if we'd all be thrown into the dungeons.

  The Sentinels drew closer, their light reaching almost to the rock where we hid. Five or six steps to the right and the flames would have given us away.

  The four of us huddled close, a mass of tension and beating hearts. Even Lea seemed frightened of her father's men. I don't think any of us took a single breath or moved a muscle until the men had safely passed us by.

  "That was close," Lea said.

  "Too close," Jackson said. "We're going to have to try to move faster. I think we'll be safer once we get into the darkness of the forest."

  I stood and stretched out my aching legs. I reached my hand out to Mary Anne, helping her up from the ground. She winced and held her side for a moment.

  "Are you okay to keep going?" I asked her.

  She nodded, but I could tell she wasn't feeling well. "Let's just get somewhere safe," she said. "I'll be fine."

  Not wanting to waste another moment, Jackson once again led us toward the outline of trees in the distance. Even though we'd already been walking for a while, the forest still looked far away. It was going to be a very long night.

  I wasn't sure how much time had passed when I could have sworn I heard a twig break nearby. I turned around, frightened and half-expecting to see a Sentinel standing behind me. But the area was dark and silent.

  Jackson came back around to me, following my gaze toward a couple of outlying trees. "What is it?" he asked.

  "I heard something," I whispered. "Like a branch breaking under foot."

  He listened for a moment, then shook his head. "I don't see or hear anything," he said. "Maybe it was just an animal or something."

  "Yeah, maybe," I said. A feeling in my gut told me otherwise, but maybe it was just my fear talking.

  Then, about twenty minutes later, I thought I heard footsteps behind me in the grass. Just in front of me, Mary Anne flipped her head around. Judging from her wide eyes, I'd say she heard it too.

  "Jackson," I said. "There's someone following us. I heard footsteps."

  "Me too," Mary Anne said. "But I don't see anyone."

  Worry darkened Jackson's features. He looked toward Lea. "What do you think? Do you sense anyone? See anything?"

  Lea turned in a circle very slowly, taking her time to study the areas around us. "If someone is following us, they're very good at concealing themselves."

  She motioned toward a cluster of small bushes and rocks just ahead, then whispered something in Jackson's ear. He nodded, then told us to follow him as if nothing were wrong.

  When we reached the bushes, Lea stealthily dropped from the group and hid behind them while the rest of us kept moving forward. I wasn't sure exactly what was going on until a few seconds later when she leapt out from behind the bushes and placed her hands around the biceps of an unusually small man with spiked hair and a very large nose.

  As soon as we
saw what was happening, the rest of us ran back toward her.

  "Why are you following us?" she asked, her eyes locked on the man's face with a deadly focus.

  "Princess," the man said in a breathy voice. "It really is you. Your father has placed a reward for anyone who finds you, you know."

  He struggled against her grip, suddenly breaking free. His body started to turn to black smoke as he shifted to his demon form, but before he could complete his transformation, Lea reached into her pocket and threw a glittering powder on him. The man froze like a statue in mid-shift, half-man, half-smoke.

  "Damn," Jackson said. "What do we do now?"

  "We keep moving," Lea said. "Only faster this time. The powder will only hold him for an hour. Maybe two if we're lucky."

  "There's no way we'll make it to the portal in an hour," Jackson said.

  "Not if we keep wasting time," Lea said.

  Without even discussing it, she lifted Mary Anne onto her back and began to run toward the tree-line. Jackson turned to me, our eyes meeting in the near-darkness as he reached out and lifted me into his arms. I threw my hands around Jackson's neck and buried my face in his shoulder as he ran.

  I tried not to think about our past or how this would probably be the last time I felt my body pressed against his. I focused only on the rhythm of his feet against the ground.

  When we reached the edge of the Obsidian Forest, we stopped and looked back, the silhouette of the frozen man black against the night sky.

  Out of The Shadows

  Under the canopy of the Obsidian Forest, all light ceased to exist. I kept waiting for my eyes to adjust and for something to come into view. A tree. A shadow. Something. I could put my own hand two inches away from my face and never see it.

  "I can't see anything," Lea said. "We'll have to set them down and walk together."

  Jackson helped me back to my feet. "Harper, hold Mary Anne's hand. Lea take Harper's free hand and use your other one to grab onto my arm," he directed.

  We formed a chain and began to move through the darkness. Jackson moved fast, and I struggled to keep up, my heart pounding as I tried to catch my breath. The journey through the forest was terrifying. Around us, the wind howled and animals moved in the trees. It took some serious willpower not to jump every time a vine slipped across the skin of my leg.

  An eternity seemed to pass before finally, up ahead, the faintest strip of moonlight appeared in the distance. Around me, the shadowy figures of the trees, low bushes and underbrush began to form.

  "How much farther?" I asked.

  "We're getting close," Jackson said. He pulled a tattered piece of paper from his pocket and unfolded it. "The map says it should be just past the edge of the forest on this side."

  Minutes later, we finally emerged from the forest. Even the moonlight seemed brighter after the pitch darkness we'd been in. I broke off from the others and stood on my own, staring up toward the amber colored moon, noticing that now, there were two moons in the sky. One amber and one lavender. It was breathtaking.

  "We have to keep moving," he said, taking off down a path that led along the edge of the forest.

  Soon, we came across a small bridge that floated over a stream running with icy blue water.

  "This way," Jackson said. He motioned for Mary Anne and I to cross first.

  I stepped up onto the bridge, half expecting it to wobble since it was just floating in the air, but it was surprisingly sturdy. I was over to the other side in five steps. The grass beyond was strange and stiff, almost white as if it were frost-bitten.

  I studied the new terrain as the others crossed the stream.

  A field of white grass was cut into an almost-perfect circle. All around it were large red stones, like markers of some sort. In the center of the circle was a cluster of something black, but from this distance I couldn't quite make out what it was. I stepped out onto the stiff white grass, my legs instantly breaking out in goosebumps.

  "Wait," Jackson called, then jogged over to me. He pulled me back off the grass. "It's enchanted with frost. If you tried to walk all the way to the middle, you'd be a frozen block of ice before you got there."

  My eyes widened. "You can't be serious."

  "I'm deadly serious," he said. "See the ring in the middle? That's where we're heading."

  "And how do we get over the enchanted grass without using magic?" I asked.

  "You don't," a voice said, coming out of the shadows just beyond the stream.

  I turned, my muscles tense and on high-alert. The man who spoke was tall and lean with dark tanned skin and hair as black as night. His eyes gleamed almost white. He squinted at us in the darkness, weapon drawn.

  "Jericho," Jackson said. "Old friend. Don't you remember us? Denaer and Lazalea."

  It took me a moment to realize Jackson was giving this demon their true names. I realized with a pain in my heart that I had never heard his true name until this moment.

  Denaer. So much like his twin brother's name. It sent chills through me, making me feel as if even after I'd felt so close to him, there was so much I still didn't know about him.

  The demon he'd called Jericho straightened, then stepped closer, shaking his head. "It can't be," he said. "But you disappeared years ago. We haven't heard a word from you in ages."

  Lea moved to him, extending her hand. "Jericho, don't tell me you've forgotten me already?" There was a sweet coaxing to her tone that I'd never heard before.

  Jericho bowed his head to her. "Princess Lazalea," he said, his voice cracking a bit on the words. "It's an honor to see you again."

  "Thank you," she said. "But please, you don't need to bow. We're the ones who have come here to ask a favor of you. And I'm afraid we're in a hurry."

  Jericho's eyes searched the small group. His attention flicked from Mary Anne to myself, not even trying to conceal his distaste. "Human witches?" he asked. "Are they your prisoners?"

  "No," Lea said. "They are our friends, and they're in serious danger. The Order of Shadows is searching for them as we speak. It's extremely important that we gain entry to the Underground."

  Jericho lifted his head, surprise on his face. "Princess, you can't ask such a thing of me," he said. "Humans are not allowed below."

  Lea's patience was growing thin. I could see the frustration and determination in the set of her jaw and the way her feet planted firmly into the ground just outside the white grass. "Listen to me, in a few minutes this forest will be crawling with Sentinels. My father knows I'm here, and he's going to come looking for me," she said. "Now, if that happens and he finds me here with two human girls, we both know he'll throw me into his dungeon. Then, he'll probably leave these two witches to fend for themselves here in the shadow world, and believe me, it won't take the Order long to find them."

  "I'm sorry Princess, but I-"

  "This witch in particular," she said, cutting him off and pulling me forward, "is extremely important to the Order of Shadows. Believe me when I say they will do anything to capture her. We can't let that happen, Jericho. She is bound to Aerden and we have promised to protect her life. If you feel any loyalty to me at all, I ask you to please let us in."

  Jericho's eyes shifted back and forth between Lea and me. He looked frightened and unsure. "She's important to the Order?" he asked.

  "She's critical to their plans," Jackson said, stepping forward. "As enemies of the Order, we have a duty to protect her. Now, please. We're running out of time."

  The demon seemed to be at war within his own mind, wringing his hands together nervously. Finally, he nodded. "Okay, then let's get underground as soon as we can," he said. He moved to the white grass, then turned to look at me over his shoulder. "Stay on the black path at all times."

  I opened my mouth to tell him that I didn't see a black path, but before I could say a word, he lifted his hand and a black oozing smoke drifted from his fingertips down to the grass, slinking along the white toward the middle, turning everything in its path a shimmering bl
ack.

  He moved quickly along the new path, so we all followed. As we approached the center, though, I hesitated, my heart skipping a beat. There, in the center of the frosted grass was a perfect ring of black roses.

  "What's wrong?" Lea asked.

  I shook my head and pointed to the center. "I'm sorry," I said. "I just have some bad memories of black roses."

  Lea narrowed her eyes and looked from me to the circle of black roses. "Don't you remember the roses at the portal when we first came in?" she said. "It's perfectly safe."

  Mary Anne shifted beside me, obviously uncomfortable with the roses too. It was her family who had been using the black roses. They'd gotten the dark magic from old spellbooks of the Order of Shadows. Mary Anne had probably seen them used several times in her childhood.

  Jackson spoke up. "Harper, the roses work a bit differently here than back in the human world," he said. " The black roses act as a conduit, pulling the essence of a witch or a demon into the black rock below. It's the same kind of rock you saw in the human world. A soul stone."

  I was listening, but so far, he hadn't convinced me.

  "The difference here is that instead of a small soul stone that traps the power inside, the entire ground below this area is made of this special magical rock," he said. "When a demon's being passes through the stone, the black roses on the other side, underground, help pull them through and out the other side. I promise, it's safe. Just a little scary at first."

  "We don't have time for fear," Lea said. She moved forward without hesitating even for a second. She stepped over the roses and into the circle. "I'll go first."

  Lea disappeared in the blink of an eye.

  "She's fine," Jackson said. "She's in the Underground below us now."

  I peered over the edge of the roses and noticed that in the center was an iridescent black rock that looked exactly like the soul stone the crow witches had used to steal Caroline's power back in Peachville. Jackson's explanation didn't make complete sense to me, but I knew we didn't have another minute to waste.