Raven's Rise (World on Fire Book 3)

by Lincoln Cole

  Even if it meant he would die, he should be with her. If he could help her overcome this, then knowing that she would reach safety would give enough solace for him. He didn’t know what kind of help he could offer, but at least he could try to do something. It would feel better than just not knowing what went on.

  With a groan of frustration, he squeezed shut his eyes. He should retreat to his body now. The more tired he grew, then the more the corporeal connection slipped away, but he couldn’t leave just yet. Not without trying his hand at closing the portal, at least.

  Mentally, he focused on the portal, willing himself next to it, and when he opened his eyes, he stood right beside it. The laws of normal physics didn’t apply here, and moving proved as simple as thinking.

  He shifted to the side when more demons came hurtling out of the portal. They didn’t even seem to notice him as they rushed out. He watched them transition from balls of hate-filled energy into half-formed creatures as they went, and then they would disappear, crossing over to the world above.

  Another demon for his friends to face alone. What did Frieda and Dominick have to deal with? A lot of demons had poured out of the portal, and he hoped his friends remained okay.

  Did he stand up there next to them, a vacant and empty shell, or had he fallen to the ground when he left behind his body? With any luck, he hadn’t hit his head or anything.

  Would he even know if something like that had happened to his body? Maybe, he’d died already and would have no body to which to return.

  Haatim forced those worries away, having no good answer for any of them. It didn’t seem worth his time thinking about it if he couldn’t do anything to fix it. Right now, he had to focus only on the portal.

  He scanned it over: basically, just a ring of tightly-bound energy emitting a swirling red glow. It almost felt like he and the ring were underwater, floating on the currents of the sea.

  However, it proved different than that, and even though he had the sensation of floating, it felt numb and empty without any sensory input—like getting stuck in a sensory deprivation tank, and the closer he got to the portal, the worse it got.

  Physically, he couldn’t touch the portal, so instead, he tried to reach out mentally and push. It wobbled, but the action of pushing it drained him.

  “All right,” he said, the words echoing only in his head. “Let’s do this.”

  He reached out again, and this time, instead of just pushing the portal, he mentally redirected the energy and pulled it closed. A few seconds passed, and he wondered if he hadn’t just wasted his time and the last of his energy.

  Nothing happened, at first, except that a wave of exhausted nausea washed over him again. If he could have puked, he would have, but instead, he just felt disoriented and confused. Suddenly, though, something changed. The portal didn’t move, exactly, but he’d done something.

  A long moment passed, and then the silver ring collapsed in on itself as if in slow motion. It seemed as if someone had grabbed hold of the drawstrings of an open bag and tightened it up.

  Haatim felt a moment of triumph as he watched the portal shrink.

  “Yes!”

  The euphoria ended, though, when he glanced through the portal itself. He could see into the hell-scape from whence the demons came. It looked like an endless dark tunnel, full of green ichor on the walls and no light at all. He could see into Surgat’s hell, though not visually: rather, mentally, like touch.

  He could feel inside the place, though. He could feel a trapped human in there, covered in ichor and completely lost to time and sensation. He could feel Arthur.

  Chapter 39

  Somewhere in there, Arthur lived. It took Haatim a second to pinpoint him, but he could feel his spirit a ways inside. He felt empty, vacuous, but not dead. Or, at least, not eliminated and destroyed.

  He stuck out in the tunnel, being the only non-demonic energy, and once Haatim located him, it proved easy to lock on. Though he sensed no bodily form on that side of the portal, only energy, Haatim knew it as Arthur despite never having met the man before.

  There he was.

  Abigail had made it her life’s mission to bring him back since the day he had met her. It consumed her, knowing that he stayed trapped down here, lost in Surgat’s hell and tortured for crimes he had committed.

  Though not her fault, convincing her of that proved an impossible task. The only reason she had come out here to Raven’s Peak to face Nida was because the demon had tricked her into believing she could rescue her mentor from hell.

  A thing she had no capability of doing, which the demon knew.

  But …

  Maybe he could.

  Haatim hesitated, watching the silver ring close in on itself. He had, maybe, fifteen seconds before it sealed completely and his only chance to cross over disappeared.

  Perhaps, he should stop the portal from closing and give himself more time. In the next instant, however, he made the decision not to. If he even managed to stop it from closing, then no way could he start the process again. He’d gotten too drained and couldn’t risk letting the portal remain open.

  Which meant that crossing over to Surgat’s hell offered only a fool’s errand. He could go back now and find his body and forget about this. Abigail didn’t know he had spotted Arthur, and he didn’t need to tell her.

  In fact, he shouldn’t say a word. It would just hurt her and open old wounds. This impossible situation brought a much greater risk than he should, reasonably, undertake to try and save the life of a man he had never met.

  No, he should just go back to his body, forget about ever spotting Arthur, and omit this part of his story if he ever again set eyes on Abigail.

  Right, of course he couldn’t.

  It didn’t matter about Abigail and what she would think of him. It mattered more about himself. Haatim believed that he knew himself as a person and imagined himself as the kind of person who would risk his life to save people. However, he’d never thought that he would get that opportunity, but part of the identity he had created for himself rested on that kind of person.

  If he left now, he didn’t know if he would ever reconcile the identity he’d assigned for himself with the reality he faced down here. He felt terrified of crossing through the portal, and it would mean risking his life to save someone he’d only heard about in stories, but he knew it as the right thing to do.

  Even if neither of them made it out, it would remain the right thing to do.

  Resolved, he steadied himself and then dove through the portal, heading for the essence and soul of Arthur Vangeest.

  ***

  “We’re losing him,” Frieda shouted.

  “What do you mean?” Dominick glanced back at Frieda in the center of the antique shop. They had stood here for only a few minutes since the portal had opened to allow demons to cross over into their world, but already, things looked hopeless. The streets and skies had filled with thousands of demons, and more came through every second.

  They still hadn’t attacked in force, which meant Abigail still fought back against Surgat; but, occasionally, a few wandered close enough that Dominick had no choice but to engage them. It continued to rain, and the odd blast of lightning and thunder struck in the distance.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “He just keeps gasping for air.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. One second, he seemed fine, and then this.”

  “Is he breathing?”

  “Barely.”

  “Then barely has to be enough.”

  Dominick leaned against the doorframe, checking over what remained of their weapons. He had two shotguns with five shells between them, his pistol had gotten down to two rounds, and Frieda had a full clip in her gun. After that, though, they would get reduced to knives and fists.

  He could bottleneck the door to their building and keep the demons at bay when they attacked, but it had a glass front window that would prove easy to break through when
ever the demons decided to swarm them.

  Whenever that happened, they’d be dead. They couldn’t last for more than a few seconds against a concerted attack.

  Nor could they see Abigail any longer. She had disappeared from view amidst the demons; although, the last he had seen of her, she’d stood perfectly still. Her eyes had remained open, and whatever battle she fought, it happened inside her. He prayed that Abigail would win out in the end but had begun to lose hope.

  Worse, the demons grew anxious. They might attack without waiting for Surgat’s commands. Several of the dog-like demons paced out in front of the store, about ten meters away, and watched him.

  “That’s the least of our problems,” Dominick called back. “We’re outnumbered and surrounded, and I can’t even get a clear shot on Abigail. Not that I could do anything to her, but this looks hopeless.”

  One of the rock golems came swooping down all of a sudden, flying in straight at Dominick. He stepped outside, raising one of his shotguns, and lined up a shot. He waited until the demon came close enough that he could reach up and touch its talons.

  Then he fired, exploding the chest and head. The bullet did significant damage, and the demon disintegrated into dust and small stones in midair. A shower of dust hit Dominick a few seconds later as it fell.

  Once the dirt cloud had cleared, he spotted a couple of the little bat-like demons flying at him as well. He drew his pistol, lined up his shots carefully, and pulled the trigger.

  That spent the last of his bullets, and all three of the ugly little bats burst into puffs of smoke. It felt a little bit rewarding to see them explode like that, banished back to hell. His happiness soon curbed, however, when he looked back at the sky and saw the enormous clouds of demons circling overhead.

  “What are they doing?” Dominick stepped back into the building to reload and reset.

  “Testing our defenses,” Frieda said. “And waiting for their commands.”

  “From Surgat?”

  Frieda nodded. “Abigail must still be fighting back.”

  “Do you think she can win out?”

  This time, Frieda didn’t reply.

  “What do we do?” Dominick asked. “We can’t stay here. When they swarm us, we’re done.”

  “I know. We have to wait.” Frieda turned back to Haatim. He still lay gasping. She touched his cheek. “He’s cold.”

  Dominick knelt next to her. “Wait for what?” He frowned. “Frieda, we can’t win. We need to get out of here while we still can.”

  “We can’t leave Haatim.”

  “I can carry him. We need to go, or we’ll never get out of here.”

  She smiled at him sadly and shook her head. “That ship has sailed. I’m sorry I brought you here, Dominick. They have us trapped and surrounded, and when Surgat decides the time to end us has arrived, we won’t stand a chance.”

  Dominick fell silent, frowning, and then said, “So, we have no chance?”

  “Not if Abigail loses.”

  “Then, what do we do?”

  “I don’t know.” Frieda looked up at him. “Do you pray?”

  Chapter 40

  Once Haatim reached the other side of the portal, something shifted in the realm he’d come to. On his side of the portal, it had seemed as though he floated in the air in a black void, freely able to move around but a touch disoriented. On this side, however, it felt considerably more horrible.

  The pervasive sense of otherworldliness intensified dramatically, and everything felt wrong. It felt like he was drowning, but instead of water, it had the substance of a heavy tar weighing him down. The green ichor on the walls clung to him, trying to blot out his soul. He couldn’t wipe it away, and it felt suffocating.

  Haatim could sense himself on both sides of the silver ring simultaneously. Only his essence had crossed over, and the link to his body in the real world had weakened. This world seemed like a living creature, and wherever he’d come, it would prove reluctant to let him leave.

  However, he couldn’t worry about that right now. Arthur remained over here, trapped beneath the green ichor somewhere up ahead. Haatim moved toward Arthur down the hallway.

  Outside the portal, he could move with only a thought and cover any distance simply by willing it. In here, on the other hand, it felt like he’d had heavy weights strapped to his ankles to weigh him down. It reminded him of slogging his way through mud, and each step proved harder to take than the last.

  By the time he made it across to Arthur, the disgusting green ichor covered him. His body no longer remained tangible, yet the stuff still managed to stick and hold onto him. Where it touched, he felt cold and empty, as if it drained his life force. Similar to when Abigail had touched him, only much worse. The stuff had buried Arthur totally, and digging him out wouldn’t give any fun.

  A glance back showed that the silver ring had almost closed. That gave his only chance of escape; though, by now, it looked a million kilometers away. Neither time nor distance seemed to work the same way here as they did outside, and so he had no idea how long it would take for the portal to close.

  He turned back to Arthur, steeling himself for what he would have to do. Then he reached down and scooped at the ichor.

  It felt like sticking his hands into a bucket of frozen ice; only ice wouldn’t have proven nearly cold enough. This seemed more like liquid nitrogen, and the pain almost blinded him. Not normal cold, though, as rather than going numb to the pain, it only grew more intense.

  Within seconds, his mind screamed for him to stop, but he refused. He pushed down the pain and kept scooping, getting as much of the stuff off Arthur’s soul as he could.

  “Wake up.” Haatim reached out and touched the identity of Arthur, which seemed less like a humanoid spirit and more like a golden blob, vaguely humanlike though completely disembodied. When he touched it, the blob quivered. “We don’t have much time. You have to wake up.”

  Nothing happened. Arthur didn’t budge, and the spiritual entity didn’t change. Too weak, Haatim realized. Too drained by the ichor and his time spent in this place.

  Maybe nothing remained to wake. It was possible that Arthur had stayed here for too long and that he had nothing left of his humanity.

  Haatim couldn’t think like that, though. He had to believe that something remained, and that it would take only a small nudge to bring back the powerful man. One last time, he glanced back. Only a small ring of the portal showed. Mere moments made the difference between them escaping or getting trapped here for good.

  Here, in Surgat’s hell, where the Council had trapped him, and where spending an eternity wouldn’t prove any fun. It sapped him, drained him, and ate away at his soul.

  Haatim steeled his resolve, and then turned back to Arthur. Now or never.

  “Come on! You need to get up. We need to get out of here.”

  He could sense understanding from Arthur, but also weakness. The man sat broken, barely conscious, and unable to focus on anything outside himself.

  Haatim remembered when Abigail had touched him, and it had seemed like she siphoned his energy. Perhaps, he could do something similar here, like feeding Arthur to bring him back to consciousness.

  He reached out and touched the golden globe of energy. Focused, he pushed essence out of himself and directed it into Arthur. There didn’t seem much left. After everything that had happened today, he now ran on empty.

  The effect happened in an instant, and the globe shivered under Haatim’s touch as the essence poured into it. Though it weakened him, the idea that it strengthened Arthur emboldened him.

  However, to wake the globe and give Arthur the strength to get out of here, he would need a lot more energy.

  Maybe more than Haatim could give. If he failed, they would both get trapped here.

  With the portal so near to closing, Haatim felt unsure of whether he could escape now even if he fled this very instant. The place had a hold on him, and he’d weakened. It would take everything in his power
to get out. The thought of spending the rest of eternity trapped here in this place terrified him.

  “Last chance,” he whispered.

  But, he couldn’t go. Not without Arthur. If he abandoned him now, he would condemn the man to spending the rest of eternity trapped here. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself.

  With a final push, he turned back and bridged the connection to Arthur, feeding energy into the orb. His essence revitalized Arthur, and the man came back and reclaimed his identity. It happened slowly, though. Oh so slowly.

  It felt like the world closed in on Haatim. He remembered speaking to Father Paladina and how his gift wasn’t endless. At a certain point, it switched over to tapping into his soul, and now, he’d made that switch. It ate away at him, siphoning off parts of his existence, but he couldn’t stop. Arthur had nearly come back.

  He only needed a little bit more.

  The weakness overtook him, and he wouldn’t manage to make an exit from this realm now. Not anymore. He couldn’t possibly escape, not when he’d given too much of himself to Arthur, and so, he had doomed himself to getting stuck here for eternity.

  Though, maybe, Arthur could still get out. Haatim pushed harder, forcing every drop of life essence he could out of himself and into Arthur. More fully now, the man came to life.

  And then reality went out of focus.

  ***

  What is happening?

  The thought came as a surprise when it flitted through Arthur’s mind. From where had it come? Why had it come? He hadn’t had a conscious thought in what felt like ages.

  Arthur hadn’t even realized what it felt like to no longer think until he’d lost the ability to do so. He’d lived in a sad and dark emptiness, which took from him every time he tried to reclaim his reality.

  As a consequence, he had closed himself off to that world, refusing to let his torturers harm him any further. He had retreated into himself and locked himself away, accepting that he would never escape from this realm and that no reason existed for him to allow himself to think anymore.