Dark Legacies (Book Four in the Brenna Strachan Series)

by Hadena James

  I didn’t bother to climb into bed. The image of the wendigo taking a bite out itself was still burned into my memory. Instead, I stood in my windowless room and wondered about what roamed in the darkness beyond.

  For several hours, it was all that I could think about. Eventually, I managed to fall to sleep, but had nightmares about the wendigo. As I woke for the umpteenth hundred time, I knew what had to be done in the morning. Somehow, I had to secure my house from whatever lay beyond in the shadows. I would need Pendragon. I wasn’t sure he would be up for helping me build a wall since we had constructed the emergency apartments the night before, but I would ask him anyway. If he wasn’t, I’d see about putting a protection circle up at night until he was available.

  Dawn was creeping in. I could feel it in my tired, restless body. My connection to Gabriel and Anubis kept me very aware of the time. I gave up on sleep and crept into the living room. Ba’al and Anubis were both there, whispering conspiratorially.

  “Morning,” I said to them.

  “Did you sleep at all?” Ba’al asked.

  “A little,” I shrugged. “Sleep wasn’t real high on my list of things to do last night.”

  “First encounters with things like the wendigo can keep you awake. I’ll make breakfast,” Anubis stood.

  “What are you not telling me?” I followed him into the kitchen.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Anubis lied. His energy said he was anxious.

  “Try again,” I sat down at the table, glaring at him.

  “Jasmine has been using the DNA from creatures on the island to create bigger, badder creatures. Things like the wendigo are bad, but it isn’t as bad as it gets. There are things that only come out at night that make Cerebus look like a teddy bear. We’re testing the things that hit DC and so far, we’ve found DNA from four different island creatures. Someone is supplying her coven with the DNA and someone within that coven is creating these creatures. Your sister is smart, but she’s not a genetic wizard. It takes more than six months to come up with an arsenal full of hybrid mythics. So how long have they actually been working on it? Six years? Ten years? One hundred years?” Anubis turned to me. “Vishnu is currently asking all the gatekeepers about the comings and goings of the island residents after dark. They keep logs. Hopefully, it isn’t a gatekeeper.”

  That was new food for thought. I hadn’t considered how long it would take genetically to engineer badass beasties. How did that work? Did they have to be born? Even a creature in a lab didn’t just emerge as fully grown. Most things on the island matured like Elders, very slowly. Even a hundred years didn’t seem long enough without some kind of accelerated growth serum. I wasn’t even sure there was such a thing. So, my sister might be the face of all evil, but not the root of it.

  I sighed loudly.

  “Yes, that was our thought. Ba’al and I think some of these things have been growing since the First Elder War. How do you keep something like that a secret for more than two millennia?”

  “How many genetic wizards are there in the Elder world?” I asked.

  “Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. We discovered DNA long before humans emerged as a species. A few Elders even have the ability to manipulate it with magic, but they’re all part of the brothers.”

  “One of my uncles betraying me?” The thought was crushing. Sure, I didn’t have a lot of happy, happy, joy, joy, feelings towards them, but they were still my uncles and I loved them for their kindness and support in the face of doom and gloom. Over the past year, each of them had come to my aid or rescue at least once.

  “No,” Anubis’s voice was reassuring, “the others would know. Even Sonnellion isn’t going to betray the family again.”

  “You say that like it’s destined,” I said.

  “I think it is,” Anubis answered. “Just like I think you are destined to eat breakfast and run off to Pendragon because your hackles got raised last night.”

  “Reading minds now?” I raised an eyebrow at him.

  “No, I just saw you with the wendigo. You’ll run to Pendragon to build a wall today to keep the monsters inside and the scary nightmare creatures outside.”

  “Who are the monsters?” I asked, puzzled.

  “Us,” Anubis answered cryptically. He put a plate of bacon, toast and assorted cheeses in front of me, then left the room.

  As I ate, I kept thinking about what he said about the monsters being us. I didn’t know what it meant. I had never thought of Elders as monsters. A frightening idea suddenly latched onto me. I took the plate in the living room and flipped on the TV.

  Sure enough, the TV reporter was calling Elders monsters. The lead story was the destruction of Washington, D.C., but they made sure to mix in a healthy dose of footage from Berlin, Germany and Dublin, Ireland. What I didn’t expect was the next clip. A woman was tied to a stake and someone had lit a fire under her. Humans were screaming for her to burn. A handful of Elders were trying to get to her, but the crowd was fighting back with everything they could find.

  As she screamed, I turned away. Perhaps wendigos weren’t so bad after all. A lynch mob seemed much worse. The plan was working. Humans were turning against Elders and witches. My heart broke and my soul felt shattered. I left the house in a state of shock. None of the others tried to stop me.

  Blindly, I wandered down the path towards the prison, my thoughts possessed by the woman burning. I could feel her pain and somehow, her image on TV had transmitted her pain to me. My vision blurred with tears as the large, imposing prison came into view.

  “Brenna?” Pendragon was already outside. He ran towards me.

  “I need, I need,” I couldn’t remember what I needed. I collapsed into his arms and cried until my body felt completely dry and my soul numbed.

  “What is it?” He asked after my tears dried.

  “The news, they burned a woman alive,” I muttered.

  “We know. Elderkind are manning portals all over the world to grant access to the island for Witches and Elders. There are only about twenty of us and my children left on the island,” Pendragon said soothingly. “Your help couldn’t have come at a better time yesterday.”

  “Thank you,” I pulled away from him. I had come here for a reason, but it had slipped my mind.

  “I heard you encountered a wendigo last night,” Pendragon steered the conversation and my thoughts away from the burning woman.

  “Yes,” I remembered. “I need to do something to create a safe path from the city to my house, the council chamber, all the houses and apartments of my family. Can you help me? I keep wondering what would have happened if it had been Nick or Daniel and not me that ran into it.”

  “Of course,” Pendragon answered. “We should have done it the other day, but there was so much going on. It was an oversight on my part. Plus, there will be portals opening soon near your house and it would be good for us to be there.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Pendragon and I arrived back at my house as the first portal opened. Portals aren’t see-through, so I didn’t know who was manning the other side. I couldn’t see how many beings were lined up to enter or what sort of security precautions were being taken to ensure that zealot humans didn’t come through and wreak havoc on our island.

  Anubis and Ba’al stood next to the portal. They both looked grim. A handful of others stood behind them. I recognized the woman that ran the boutique with the dragon’s milk soap and the woman that ran the witch supply stores, although their names currently escaped me. A Djinn, named Asher stood on the wall, manning the gate. We watched, all of us, waiting for the sign to open the gate and allow the new residents in.

  The first being through the portal was a very little girl. She might have been four years old. She held a teddy bear in one hand and a small suitcase in the other. Her eyes were wide and a deep shade of brown. Dark brown hair pulled back in a ponytail was accented with curls. She was adorable.

  Pendragon, the most human looking Elder in t
he world, stepped forward. Ba’al and Anubis both stepped backwards. The little girl seemed less frightened at the appearance of Pendragon. Her mother came through the portal next. Her mother had a large suitcase on wheels and a coat for the little girl.

  A second later, a man stepped through with another large suitcase on wheels. The family hugged and moved forward. Ba’al directed them towards the gates. More and more beings came through the portal. Hundreds of them seemed to crowd outside the gated wall.

  They carried duffel bags and suitcases. Occasionally, a child carried a stuffed animal or two or a handful of small toys. The brutality of the situation began to sink in. These were refugees, coming through the portal with only what they could carry. Their entire lives had been tossed into upheaval and they were fleeing from people that wanted them dead. Their sins were no greater than not being entirely human.

  The Elders and Witches on the island were giving directions to the refugees. They were creating packets from thin air and handing them out to adults. Keys were mysteriously being brought into existence with address labels attached to them.

  I moved closer. I wanted to help, but I didn’t know how. I found the little girl, who was the first one through the portal. Just standing there in her dress, she seemed tiny and helpless. Her parents were human and she was a lesser witch. This entire thing was completely foreign to all of them. I didn’t even know how much contact with Witches or Elders they had during their former lives.

  Vera, the woman from the witch supply store, walked up to them. She handed the father a key and the mother a packet. Finally, she turned to the little girl, and to the delight of the child, she conjured up a lollipop and a new teddy bear.

  More portals were beginning to open. The beings continued to stream onto the island. I stared at the crowd and wondered if we had created enough apartments for all of them. Did the island have a capacity? Would we reach it? Elders with human mates and children stood in lines to get their new lives. Witches gathered, trying to figure out where to go and what to do.

  I found a portal with no one standing near it and took up a post. As the beings stepped through, I directed them towards the growing crowd. I directed a couple with an infant to go to the gate and someone would give them their information packets and new temporary living quarters. I didn’t know for sure they were temporary, but I hoped they were. The island didn’t seem to have much vacant real estate, but if this was going to last a while, I was sure more could be built to give people housing options.

  The ground shook beneath me. It caused an older woman who had come through the portal to stumble and I grabbed her arm before she fell. My eyes locked with hers and she smiled.

  “Brenna!” Belinda Jasper said to me. She was a Great House Matriarch.

  “Belinda,” I smiled back. “You should hurry forward.” The ground shook again. Pendragon was looking around. I joined his sky search and didn’t see the black we all desperately hoped wouldn’t appear.

  A few more seconds and the culprits became visible. Gregorian and the chimeras came up the path towards us. I felt his voice enter my mind.

  “We have company,” he said.

  “We have to flee the human world,” I answered. “These are the beings forced to leave their homes.”

  The sight of the chimeras brought chaos. Beings began screaming, shouting, and a few armed their magic.

  “They will not hurt you. They have come to protect you. Once inside the walls of the city, you will be safe from all the mythical creatures on the island. Until then, it is possible that all this magic will attract unwanted attention. The chimeras are here for your safety.” Pendragon’s voice suddenly boomed over the crowd.

  To prove his point, the chimeras began taking up positions around the terrified crowd. They turned their backs to the beings and watched the land around us. I had a feeling they were also here in case something happened with the gathering crowd.

  After what seemed like decades, Pendragon finally nodded to Asher. Asher partially opened the gate. A few Elders on the other side began directing beings where they needed to go once they were inside the city walls.

  The beings still continued to flow through the portals. My job became easy to figure out after a few beings had come through. I was to direct them to the gates, catch them if the portal travel caused them to stumble and reassure them that the chimeras were on our side.

  A large demon stepped through. Hathor smiled at me. I smiled back and she took up position across from me. I hadn’t seen her since I was a child. She wasn’t a lieutenant in Demonnation, and her mate, an angel named Azari, liked missionary work more than the humdrum of a nine-to-five job, so they had travelled the world doing good deeds: Healing the sick, building or rebuilding villages, stopping warlords and drug lords from committing unspeakable acts and now they were here, exiled. The world was filled with bitterness even in my mind. I reminded myself that this wasn’t the fault of humankind, the blame lay on my sister’s coven and whoever was pulling the strings above her.

  A chimera bellowed and then a second one followed. The entire group turned to look at the alarm-raisers. No darkness. It wasn’t Cerebus, but we couldn’t see what it was. A third chimera raised its head skyward and let out the low, deep moan that served as their alarm cry. Then a fourth and a fifth. I jumped through the portal, knocking down a handful of beings.

  Abaddon and a Djinn stood on the other side. Along with about two hundred soldiers that were corralling beings towards the portal. I didn’t know what country I was in, but I was guessing it was Russia by the architecture.

  “Hold up,” I told them.

  “What is it?” Abaddon’s voice held concern and a touch of fear. His emotions were running very high and I had to fight not to let his panic overtake me.

  “I don’t know yet,” I pulled myself back through the portal.

  Hathor caught me as I stumbled through. The threat was still not visible, but all the chimeras were obviously in alarm mode. Gregorian had his head towards the sky. His large nostrils flared as his head swayed back and forth.

  “Gregorian?” I pleaded.

  “Dark magic,” was his only reply.

  Chimeras are sensitive to dark magic. They will even eat Elders and witches with auras that say they have been casting too much dark magic. Loud popping noises echoed throughout the land. The portals were snapping closed.

  “To the city!” Pendragon again managed to shout over the crowd. Beings surged forward. Parents picked up their children and they all hurried. Somehow, the Elders and witches handing out information managed to keep it from becoming a stampeding mob.

  It took only minutes for the entire area to clear. I stood with the chimeras, Pendragon, Anubis, Ba’al, Gabriel, Fenrir and Hathor. We had circled together, backs towards each other without realizing it. The chimeras were backing up towards us, closing the circle around us.

  Gregorian sent a cry skyward. The air became electrified. Clouds gathered overhead. Whatever was coming, I hoped the magic of the city was strong enough to keep it out if we failed.

  Lightning suddenly exploded overhead. The thunder made me jump. No rain fell with it. In the distance, I heard several different animals begin to cry and call out as the ground shook.

  It wasn’t the result of the danger. From over the hills that surrounded us and out of the woods that had stood sentinel for eons, came mythics. Dragons, wyverns, and things I had never seen before were stampeding towards the city.

  A few slammed into the walls, while others managed to turn in time to skirt around the city and flee to whatever lay on the other side of it. An unnatural darkness began to move out of the trees.

  “Cerebus?” I asked.

  “Yes, but he isn’t the cause of the panic. The mythics do not flee him like that. Most have grown used to his presence. Something is causing him to flee,” Anubis answered.

  Whatever was coming our way had spooked Cerebus. That was a feat. My stomach knotted and my lungs stopped working. I began to gath
er magic without realizing it.

  Cerebus came out of the woods at a lumbering pace. He ignored us. Instead, he moved past my house, towards the direction the other mythics had gone.

  Gregorian, head still raised, made a deeper sound. This one was so low that it hurt my ears and vibrated in my chest. Even my father’s voice wasn’t that low.

  On the path before us came a man on a horse. The horse was white with a blood red blanket on it, despite the rider being bareback. He held a crossbow in one hand.

  His features were indistinguishable. Large, white wings sprouted from his back and spread out in an open position.

  The first horseman, an angel, moved towards us in a slow, determined pace. The rider raised the crossbow and fired.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Thinking of nothing else to do, I stopped time. Stopping time is one of the forbidden spells. Everything stops, even Elders, leaving only you free to move about. It isn’t like freezing time and there are dire consequences to those that cast it. My body felt heavy and began to age in the time-free zone. For every five minutes or so that I spent in stopped time, I aged a year, even though I was immortal. Stop it long enough and even an Elder hybrid would die of old age.

  The other consequence was that it had drained almost all of my powers. Only the most powerful witches could stop time. I was sure none of my siblings could do it, except maybe Daniel. If I could kill the horseman with time stopped, I was sure there would be even greater consequences, but I could find no other advantage. Actions done in stopped time tended to create chaos. It was possible that I could kill the horseman and end up collapsing the walls of the city or something equally devastating.

  Summoning the last of my magic, I brought the Strachan sword out of the house. It floated and twirled in the air, as if it were excited about the bloodshed to come. I felt nauseated, but began moving forward. I was within a few steps of the immobilized unnatural creature when the butterflies began in my stomach. I steeled my nerves for the task at hand.