Harold nodded, offering Felix a comforting smile which was anything besides comforting. The two men parted, and Harold headed back for the camp, leaving Felix to stew in the dark wilderness.
Harold got the fire going again, just a small blaze, just enough to warm the people he cared about. He loaded it with enough wood so it would burn for the rest of the night without problem. Sahara slept soundlessly, a pile of red hair beneath her head like a pillow. She was the most beautiful thing in Existence. He couldn’t risk losing her. If he fought, succeeded, and died then he could live with that. But if he succeeded at the expense of his friends, his family, his Pack…well, he couldn’t live with that.
He grabbed the sword, stuffing it through a rip in his jean’s waistband as quietly as possible. Then he leaned down next to Sahara and kissed her on the cheek. She barely felt it, only twitching slightly against the brush of his lips. She smiled with her eyes closed. A smile of his own crossed his burned and mutilated face.
How could she ever love me? he wondered.
He rubbed the head of the Alpha Wolf. “Stay here and watch them,” he whispered. Its eyes looked at him with a burning sadness, but underneath that look was understanding.
His eyes were bleary, he was freezing to the point of shivering, and his head pounded with hunger and fatigue and fear, but Harold Storm went on, away from the camp and to the black gates of Bezel’s kingdom.
CHAPTER 50
He approached the gate in what felt like half an hour later, but could’ve been years. By this time, the sky was the color of ink. The only light leaked from the torches on the walls and the flames inside of the kingdom.
As Harold approached, he felt a rush of blood hammer through his body. The smell alone did that; it smelled exactly how he imagined a morgue to smell. Cold, rotting flesh, chemicals.
At the gate, There would be a guard or maybe even more than one there, he knew that. They would resist, fight, scream and shout for backup, he knew that, too. But destiny had other plans. Harold Storm was meant to meet the Dark One face to face, meant to battle him until the death.
He was two steps away from the bars of the portcullis when an old man stepped from the darkness, soundlessly. He was wrinkled like a man who’d spent too much time out in the sun. But there was no sun here. He wore glasses on the ends of his nose, a sword on his belt.
“We’ve been expecting you,” the old man said. “I didn’t think I’d live long enough to see you with my own eyes.” A slightly awed smile was on his face.
“You won’t be seeing me much longer if you don’t raise the gate,” Harold said. His voice was steel.
The smile on the old man’s face widened. “As you wish, Electus. And just so you know, it would be an honor to die by your sword.”
Harold nodded. “I will not kill you without cause, old man. If you wish to die by my blade, you will draw your own.”
The smile disappeared.
“But I’ve been at this damned gate for millennia. I am old and tired. I have no wish to see battle. All I do is pull a lever.”
“Too bad,” Harold said, staring at the man. “Make your choice, now. I have places to be.”
After some hesitation and hands hovering over the black handle of his Hellblade, the old man moved back into the darkness. A few seconds later, chains clinked and the gate began to draw upward.
Harold Storm stepped through.
The kingdom was as much of a kingdom as Gloomsville was a tourist spot. It was not a kingdom at all. A haze of black buildings stood down the road, much like the dead city the Renegades had holed up in, except these buildings had something different about them that Harold couldn’t quite place his finger on. They were older, perhaps evil in a way that a building can be evil, like the old, abandoned house on the corner of the darkest street in almost every American town. The buildings hadn’t looked lived in for centuries, maybe longer. They were harsh and sharp, almost medieval. Tall spikes punched the sky. Glassless windows stared back at Harold like the eyes of corpses. These smaller buildings were built in a circle around the tallest of them all in the center. The tower, the place where Satan lived. It stretched high into the sky, disappearing into the black clouds above.
Harold’s heart beat steady and fast.
“You’ll die here, Harold Storm,” the old man said from behind.
The voice was enough to cause him to jump. He had forgotten about the old man in all his navel gazing. He pulled his sword free, slicing the fabric it was stuck in. When he turned, the old man wasn’t armed. His hands were clasped behind his back, and he looked out at the city.
“We all die here,” the old man said. “He is not happy. He’s out for blood, killing his own.” He looked back at Harold, dark eyes that seemed to lack the malice of the other Shadow Eaters, and for a second Harold felt pity for the man. After all, he was just a gatekeeper.
“Where is he?” Harold asked. “Is he in the tower?”
“I cannot help you as much as I would like to.”
“How many does he have? How many Shadow Eaters are there?” The questions escaped his mouth with the speed of projectile vomit. He couldn’t hold it in. It was the fear, and despite the burns and ruined look, anyone could see it plainly on the Realm Protector’s face.
The gatekeeper shook his head. “He is not in the tower. The tower is dead. He is in the Black Pits. There, he raises an army.”
“From the Void,” Harold said.
“Correct.”
“If I succeed and you’re still here when I walk out of this dead place, I will not spare you, understood?”
The gatekeeper nodded his head. “Maybe then I’ll draw my blade. Maybe not.”
Harold smiled.
He walked on.
The streets were once concrete, but time had taken that along with all its inhabitants. Dry roots grew up through the cracks. Dust and dirt swirled with cold wind. All Harold heard was the whistling and his boot heels clapping the old road. He didn’t have to ask where the Black Pits were. He knew when the damned started screaming, crying out in their pain, and the Dark One’s laughter filled the air.
Harold didn’t slow down, he sped up.
CHAPTER 51
Sahara woke with a start. She had been dreaming sweet dreams, dreams where she was not in this cold wasteland.
Her first reaction was to reach out and grab the man she knew would be laying next to her. But when she reached out all she grabbed was cold soil. Her heart skipped a beat, then she sprang up. Boris was asleep on his side, his horse hooves twitching as if dreaming of running. Frank wasn’t far off, rolled up in tattered animal skins, snoring. Felix was nowhere to be found. And neither was Harold Storm.
“Get up!” she shouted. “Get up!”
Frank sprang up like a man much younger. He filled his hands with his crossbow and pointed it in her direction. Boris was not as quick. He rolled out of sleep slowly then stood up like a zombie, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hands.
“What?” Frank urged. “What the fuck is it?”
“Harold. He’s gone.”
“Maybe he went to take a piss,” Frank said. “Not a big deal. Now if you wake me up again like that, woman, I’m liable to loose a bolt straight through your heart. Nothing personal, just reflexes.”
“The Wolves are still here. He wouldn’t leave without them, would he?” Boris asked, blinking blearily.
All three of them snapped their head in the direction of where their furry guards had sat with muzzles dripping blood.
“Problem solved,” Boris said. “Back to sleep.”
“No! Problem not — ”
A voice cut her off. “He fears losing us.” It was Felix who still wore the unblemished white robe, drifting to the camp like a ghost.
“He’s going to get himself killed,” Sahara said.
“Maybe, Sahara, this is the way it has to be.” Felix crossed his arms again, going from ghost to father in an instant.
“No, that’s not how it has to
be. We came here to help him!”
“We came here to make sure he followed through. His environment in the Mortal Realm has made him weak. He gives up, you know this, Sahara, even if I never stated it aloud, you know.”
Her breathing was rapid and loud. She was filling with white hot rage, though she shouldn’t have been. She did know this. Somehow. She knew this was Harold Storm’s fight. It always was and always would be. Ever since she met him in the alley off of the beach, she sensed something about him. An aura, a pull, strength and masculinity. It drove her mad with jealousy yet attracted her more than she could admit. But it was one thing knowing something would happen when in comparison to it actually happening.
She couldn’t leave him to die. What would she do, sit back around the campfire, roasting marshmallows while the kingdom of Hell’s flames are extinguished, while the souls of the damned pull the one she loved apart?
No.
“This is so you,” she said, her voice taking on the sounds of a teenager rebelling. “You more afraid than all of us.”
Felix’s face usually remained as hard as stone, but not now. His features quivered as if the foundation of his mind — that strong, all-knowing, and wise Wizard persona — crumbled. She could feel Boris’ and Frank’s eyes glaring into her back. Could feel the tension in the air, the uncomfortableness of being apart of something you shouldn’t be, peeling back the curtain of somebody’s life and seeing them how they are behind closed doors.
“They say history repeats itself, right? Is this your history repeating itself, Felix? Are you too afraid to change the course of Existence?”
For the first time in all of Sahara’s long life as a Realm Protector, Felix’s eyes shifted from hers. He looked down at the ash and rock marking what was once their campfire. It was hurt in that look, Sahara determined, and doing so, hurt her. She might as well have reached out and slapped his face. The man who’d helped raise her from birth, who taught her all she knew.
“You’re right,” he said, in a voice that had lost all its power and confidence. “You’re right. You and Harold are both right. I am scared. More scared than I have been in a long, long time.”
He walked over to Sahara and raised his hand. For a moment, she thought the worst, like he was going to call the lightning from the skies and turn her bones to ash and dust. She didn’t know why that thought crossed her mind; Felix had never been one to lash out in anger or abuse his godly powers. It must’ve been the place they were, getting into their heads and making them think like their enemies.
Instead of a hit, he wrapped an arm around her shoulder, then came the other arm, and what happened next was almost more shocking than him lashing out.
He hugged her.
She was hesitant, but she hugged him back, closing her eyes and feeling his warmth. If she could’ve lived in this moment forever, she would’ve.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, Sahara, you’re right. You’re right.”
They parted. Boris watched with eyes no longer asleep, and Frank avoided any and all eye contact like the plague. He was half-spun around, a hand absently scratching at his neck.
“Come on,” she said. “We have to go.”
Ten minutes later, the group — Sahara, Frank, Boris, and even Felix — left, the Wolves walking with them.
CHAPTER 52
He walked down the steps. Warmth reached out to greet him like a handshake from an old friend, and he accepted it willingly. The voices, though — he did not accept those.
They whispered to him like they whispered in his head, except these he could discern. These were actually real.
Each step was a pain. Each step brought him closer. What he would’ve done for a drink he wouldn’t have even said out loud to himself. Just something to calm the nerves, to smooth him out.
“Hello, Harold Storm. We meet at last.”
The voice seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere. It was almost one he recognized but not quite. It was the voice from inside his head, the one that welcomed him to Hell when he crossed the Portal.
Harold reached for his sword.
“No need for your weapon. Not yet,” the voice said.
He didn’t know why, but he listened, his hand falling from the hilt of the white Wolf. He kept walking.
Soon, the flickering orange light drowned out the blackness of the walls. He smelled brimstone, burnt flesh, rot, and death. The steps ended, and he was at a landing made of crude stone — bricks that had been laid a million years ago, so tender they looked apt to crumble at the first sign of pressure. He saw the crooked outline of a large circle. It reminded him of the final showdown in that Clint Eastwood movie The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. It seemed fitting, too, because that showdown had taken place at a cemetery for Civil War soldiers, and Harold knew he was surrounded by the dead. He just hoped if it was the final showdown, and that he’d be the last man standing.
Harold willed himself to look up, his neck and head protesting. It was as if his chin was stapled to his chest. He couldn’t do it, he couldn’t look upon the Dark One — the ancient, black being from his nightmares, the owner of the voice, of all things wrong in their Existence.
The old Harold might have kept his chin glued to his chest, might’ve shielded his eyes, but the old Harold was gone, wasn’t he? No longer would he run from his problems or drown them out with a bottle of whiskey. He would face them, and he would face them like a man, like a Realm Protector…like Electus.
The figure was backlit by a rising sea of fire. He leaned on an old iron gate that seemed to keep the fire contained but had been doing a pretty poor job of it. The figure had both thumbs looped through his belt buckle, looking like a cocky gunslinger. Harold saw the shape of a long blade hanging from his waist as he stepped forward.
He was dark, but Harold found himself squinting as if looking directly into the sun on a clear and blazing August day. As the features came into focus, Harold’s breath caught.
“Not what you expected, is it?”
He was looking straight into Charlie’s face. But…it wasn’t Charlie, he knew.
“Old Charlie here needed an upgrade. This whole place needs an upgrade. I’ve been away a long time. The Realms ain’t like what they used to be.”
Harold felt a thin layer of skin on his burnt face crackle. He was snarling like some kind of vicious animal who only cared about the kill. Charlie, Beth, Chet, Marcy…he didn’t care. If he was meant to kill the Dark One, it didn’t matter what body this being’s mind inhabited.
“So I take it you’ve heard about the Prophecy. Heard all about the old days with me and Felix and the man who owned that pretty sword before you did, didn’t you?”
No answer again. Only the harsh stare. He searched his mind for the growling of his Wolves, and just when they started to rev, he was cut off.
“Yes, the Wolves,” the thing who was not Charlie said. “It was always about the Wolves with Orkane, even carved them into the hilt of his sword. How vain. You know what my animal was, Harold Storm?”
Harold shook his head.
“My animal was nothing. I never had one. Felix and Orkane did, and when they discovered their powers I had to fake mine. I was no good from the start. I’d focus and try to draw whatever animal I was given and boom, nothing. Only blackness. Vile blackness. That’s when I knew — ”
“Knew you were a no good piece of shit,” Harold finished for the man.
The Dark One chuckled. “Knew that I was more powerful than both of them combined.”
“Bull,” Harold said. “You aren’t powerful. True power comes from the heart and you don’t have one of those.”
“No, Storm. I am powerful because I don’t rely on animals to give me strength. I rely on something that is constant, something that is inescapable.”
The fire flickered then dimmed.
“I rely on the Shadows. I rely on the Darkness. When you close your eyes, I can be there. When the po
wer goes out during a terrible storm, I can be there. At night, when you turn your bedroom light off, I can be there. And before all of this, in your Mortal Realm, it is always dark somewhere, is it not? Now as my power grows and your Realm crumbles, I will reign supreme.” He smiled. “Darkness, Harold, you should embrace it like I do.”
“Never,” Harold said.
“That’s too bad. I thought you were smarter than that.”
The Dark One advanced, walking as casually as a man walks through a park. His arms swung by his side, never touching the hilt of his sword, yet Harold touched his.
Wolves howled.
“Let’s see if we can change your mind.”
Harold tensed up, he pulled the sword free, but that didn’t stop the thing in Charlie’s body.
Something behind the Dark One caught Harold’s eye. The lava and flames boiled over the fence, splashing and sizzling on the old cobblestone ground. An arm flopped over the edge, decrepit and black as if burnt to a crisp. Then a terrible bald head with jagged teeth reared its face upward. The thing landed with a wet plop, smelling of smoke and death. Another one followed, and another, and another until it seemed there were fifty or so boiling over, landing hard, leaving behind bits of black ash and skin, then standing up and roaring into the heavy air. They did not have eyes or noses. That skin had long since been calloused over, only leaving the hollow ghosts of those features. All they had were mouths, and they looked hungry.
“Do you like my army?”
“No, they’re kinda ugly,” Harold said, sounding cool.
“Oh, Harold, that’s not nice. I think they look kind of like you. They’re not as strong, no, but there is a lot.””
As he spoke, more roiled out. They lumbered past Harold like Zombies, moaning. He could feel their terrible heat a few feet away from them. It was as if they were baking with a fever, as if they were sick and contagious.
“Yes,” the Dark One said, “they’re heading to your Realm right now. Seven billion souls will be quite the treat. Too bad Marcy and Chet and your mother are no longer around to see it.” He shook his head, clicking his tongue. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.
Deathbound: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Realm Protectors Book 3) Page 23