“Hell isn’t real. Neither are boogey men.”
“But do you know that? For sure?” His black eyes glittered in the dark of the room.
I shivered and clutched Dad’s knee as if he could ground me to this place and time, where hell didn’t exist and he could still get better.
“The underworld?” I said uncertainly.
Jerick nodded. “This guy can get you in. That’s what I hear, anyway.”
“Jerick, that’s insane. The underworld isn’t real. Even if it was, why would I want to go there?”
“Because the Lord of the Underworld has more power over life and death than you or I could ever imagine. He might be able to save Mikhail. At a price.”
* * *
I FOUND MYSELF WALKING THE streets of East Harlem in the hours before dawn, feeling foolish as fuck for listening to my idiot cousin.
This area of town was as rough as the hide of a shark, and if you spent long enough around it, you’d bleed. But I palmed my pepper spray and kept my protection spells wrapped tight around me, my sights set on a specific address.
I was on a damned fool’s errand, and I knew it. Jerick’s idiot friends and their idiot tall tales. I’d probably find a crack house at the end of this carefully handwritten address, complete with a man waiting to rape and murder a sweet little twenty-something like me.
I clutched my pepper spray tighter and wished my imagination would shut the hell up.
Less than twenty-four hours till sundown and the beginning of Samhain, and I felt the spirits restless around me, like they were in my little Jersey house. The veil was thinning quickly, and who knew what beasties followed me in the night. I longed for the sun to chase away the shadows; I longed for streetlamps that weren’t busted and eyes that didn’t follow me in the night.
“Out for a good time, baby?” a woman asked as I passed her hidey-hole. She perched on a cracked set of porch stairs, her long brown legs bare beneath a mini-skirt that barely hid her goods. She leaned forward, smiling, thick, heavy breasts swinging. “Momma’s got what you need.”
I ignored her, but put my finger on the button for my spray.
“Or maybe Momma can find you what you really need,” the woman called as I hurried past. “We’ve got it all, baby. We can give you all.”
I counted to five, doubling my steps to the words. Nothing followed me but the sound of her phlegmy laughter and the lonely hoot of an owl.
I reached my destination without further molestation. I didn’t have a name — just an address that took me to a Spanish grocery.
The place was closed for the night, lights off and no one around. I peered through the barred windows, searching for any kind of movement within but to no avail. A security light illuminated an empty row of aisles stocked full of brightly colored kibbles, but no people. I knocked; the sound echoed down the street. God knew what kind of attention that would bring.
Casting a furtive glance around me, I checked for witnesses. If there were any, they were well-hidden. I closed my eyes and centered myself, then traced a sigil on the glass front door. Raidho, the rune of travel. I visualized the glass and bars fading, allowing me entry.
Manipulation of energy. Manipulation of molecules. I may not have been able to piece things back together when they broke, but I could damn sure take them apart.
I walked through the bars as if they didn’t exist, and the store’s cool interior rushed around me. Behind me, the entrance sealed together again, and I moved further inside.
I stalked through the grocery, searching for anything out of place. The gently humming refrigerators yielded no results, and the back room was surprisingly clean but devoid of inhabitants. The bathrooms smelled of disinfectant, and the cash register hung open, money drawer gone, presumably in the safe for the night.
But I felt… something. Something not quite right in the darkest corners of the back room.
Calling up Witchsight isn’t hard, but the amount of energy it requires can knock you on your ass. I closed my eyes and reached for my power, the German words my father once taught me flowing from my lips on a whisper. Witchsight would reveal things not visible to the mundane world. Anything touched by the paranormal, by the Otherside.
I felt the energy settle over me and opened my eyes, blinking against the sudden flare. The once dark store was now illuminated by the cast of otherworldly energy. The stuff was everywhere, as if the Otherside had taken up residence in a lonely, privately-owned grocery.
And near the small office, I found an outline of a door in a wall where there was none.
A magickal door required no handle to open. I pressed my fingers to the wall and pushed, and the door swung inward, brilliant light exploding from the interior.
Whatever lay behind the door was most definitely magickal.
I let go of my Witchsight; otherwise, I’d go blind under the weight of it. The ensuing darkness seemed even more deep and dangerous, so I whipped out my phone, triggered the flashlight, and began to descend.
The narrow stone staircase sloped further at every turn, until I had to hold the wall in one hand to keep myself from tumbling down. I took step after step, the earth bearing down on me more with every sweep of the staircase. I walked forever, until I felt the sun had risen above and the world had turned on its axis to begin anew without me in it. Still, the staircase went on.
When the end came, it was so abrupt I nearly fell over my own feet on solid ground. I leaned on the wall, dizzy and disoriented. A hallway stretched into an apex of night before me, my little flashlight revealing nothing.
I fought back a thrill of terror and pressed on.
If the staircase took forever, the hallway took longer. An entire age of mankind could have passed in the silent solitude of my journey. I felt so outside of myself, as if I’d born, lived, and died to walk this tunnel.
I passed no cross tunnels. No doors. The never-ending coffin of stone made my skin crawl until I was ready to claw my way to the surface with only my fingernails.
“Fucking ridiculous,” I spat, kicking at the dusty floor. Something about my voice steadied me. Reminded me I was real. “What am I doing? Where the hell am I? Hello!”
My yell echoed ahead. I laughed, a little hysterically, because it was better to do that than cry.
Suddenly, a figure appeared in the hallway. I thought I’d imagined it at first — a gray shadow with no substance, a trick of the eye because I’d clearly lost my damn mind. But then the shadow blinked, and I was no longer alone.
He was the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen. Messy blond hair fell into eyes that shone mahogany in the light from my camera. He was huge, taller than me by a head, wider than me by a world. Shadows painted hollows on the sharp planes of his face, and he looked like someone’s interpretation of classic beauty in blue jeans and a gray sweatshirt.
Then he slammed me against the wall.
My head hit stone and lights flashed where vision belonged. I noticed in an offhand, uninterested way that my phone flew from my fingers and click-clacked down the stone floor, light extinguished. His hand remained on my shoulder, pinning me to the wall.
I raised a hand to his shoulder and called my power. Witchsight was a pretty amazing thing; see, what infiltrated the mundane world and allowed me to see the unseen could also be gathered and used as a weapon. Witchlight.
Pure energy rushed towards me as I spoke the incantation. I could draw the Witchlight in, like a sponge soaking up water, until I was the one who shone and the world around me dimmed beneath my glory.
Witchlight hit him with a force no less than his own punch. He stumbled backwards and hit the opposite wall, steadying himself with both hands on the stone. I raised my palms, glowing brilliant green, and he hissed.
Sharp, pointy canines glinted in the Witchlight.
CHAPTER NINE
Startled, I lowered my flame. “You’re a vampire.”
He wiped a spot of blood away from his lip. “You’re a witch.”
&n
bsp; “I didn’t know you were… well, real. Vampires.”
He held out his fingers, dotted with bright red liquid. “We are. I am.”
His voice was gruff, like the scrub of bristles on concrete. “Why did you attack me?”
“You’re not supposed to be down here. How the hell did you get in?”
“Through the front door.”
He did not look amused. He turned and began to walk away. “It’s not safe here. The Riders use this tunnel. Come.”
“The riders?” I asked, falling into step behind him.
“Transporters of souls. If they catch you here, your life is forfeit. One way ticket to hell.”
“Good. I’m looking for hell.” I stopped walking and leaned against the wall. “How long do I wait?”
He turned and grabbed my arm, tugging me into his space. His body gave off no heat, but something else surrounded me — something almost animalistic. When my fear warred with desire, I realized it was pheromones.
“They don’t just transport you, sweetheart. You’d be dead. No more Gucci, no more Vampire Diaries.” He let go of me. “Come on.”
“That’s sexist. I don’t even watch Vampire Diaries.”
He grinned over his shoulder, a flash of sharp white. “Good. Less preconceptions I’ll have to break.”
* * *
HE LIVED NOT FAR FROM the juncture where he’d found me. I might have missed the hidden door in the stone wall if I hadn’t been paying attention. His quarters were small and barren, nothing but a mattress, a bathroom, and the bare amenities.
“You live here?” I asked, gazing around the spartan cave.
He tugged off his hooded sweatshirt, and I got a flash of toned, alabaster abs beneath his t-shirt. He didn’t respond.
“Can you get me to Hades?” I tried a different train of thought.
He ignored me and rummaged in a closet set in the wall beside his bed.
Obviously, he wasn’t in a talkative mood. I crossed the room, eyeing the campfire stove and an assortment of canned goods. A tiny box fridge, the kind for college dorms, sat behind the stove. I opened it, not really caring if he disliked my snooping because he wasn’t impressing me with his hosting skills.
“Don’t touch that.”
At his sharp rebuke, I leapt away from the fridge and bumped into him. He had crossed the room in a split second.
I stumbled one step back to vacate his personal bubble. He offered me his hooded sweatshirt, those strange red-brown eyes unemotional. “It’s cold where we’re going.”
“I have a coat.”
He held the jacket up higher. “This smells like me, so maybe the riders will ignore you. Unless you’d like to die?”
I accepted the coat. “Not particularly.”
He returned to his closet.
“Who are you?” I asked, sliding my arms into his sweatshirt. The cool fabric didn’t feel like it had recently been worn, but it smelled heady, like vampire and sex and something sweet. My body rumbled with a hunger that had nothing to do with food. Damn. Vampire pheromones were dangerous.
“Scott Rasmussen.” He emerged from the closet with a different sweatshirt. “Call me Scott, and I’ll kill you.”
This guy could rock the people skills.
“Then what do I call you?”
“Ras.”
I had no idea how that was any sexier than ‘Scott,’ but who was I to argue?
“I’m Brigitta Holtzer.”
“I don’t care.” He fixed the hood of his new sweatshirt and grabbed a set of keys from the table. “We won’t be friends. This isn’t a grand adventure. The further we descend, the more dangerous it gets.” He pocketed his keys and finally caught my eye. “You will lose parts of yourself here. It will change you.”
“I’m prepared. I would do anything to save my dad. I need him.”
“Nobody needs anybody.” Scott opened another closet, revealing more guns than a weapons bunker.
“Everybody needs somebody,” I argued, mainly to ignore the fact he held a Sig Sauer. “Look at you. You have no people skills. You’re a total disaster from being down here alone without anybody to talk to.”
“I have plenty of people to talk to,” Scott interjected. “They’re just no longer alive.”
Ooghy.
“I don’t know what brings you to seek the underworld, and I don’t care to know. I will take you as far as I can go and then you’re on your own.” He held a slim silver gun out to me, hilt first. “The journey takes several hours. It’s dangerous, even for me. You have to be equipped for it.”
“I’ve never used a gun before. I don’t have to. I’m a witch.” I channeled a little leftover Witchlight and zapped him at the heels, just for shits and giggles. He didn’t even flinch.
Scott pounced, a blur of preternatural speed and agility. He pinned me to the wall and bared his fangs.
His teeth scraped against my neck before I had a chance to react. I shivered at the warmth of his breath and lips on my skin. And the way he pressed his body into mine, his knee spreading my thighs, sent the carnal bits of me into a tither.
“Your power has no place in the underworld.” He stood so still against me, his cold hands seeping through my jacket. I wondered if he smelled my desire; if he felt it, too. “The things down here want to hurt you — and you can’t hurt them.”
* * *
“YOU WILL HAVE THREE TESTS to pass to reach the boatman,” Scott told me as we left his nondescript door behind and moved down the tunnel. “Mental. Physical. Emotional. The tests feed on your fears and incorporate the darkest parts of your psyche. You must be strong to survive them.”
“How many people have you seen survive them?”
“None.”
That instilled confidence. I tugged his sweatshirt tight against shivers that had nothing to do with the cold.
“How’d you get this gig?” I asked.
“Pissed off the wrong — ” He cut off, his red-brown gaze going distant. “Riders coming.”
He pushed me against the wall, albeit less violently than the last two times, and covered me with his body.
“For someone who says we won’t be friends, you sure are friendly,” I said, a little breathlessly.
“Shut up.” He looked up the hall, back the way we came. I realized then that I could see his face. The tunnels had a strange, low-light glow that allowed for walking unimpeded, but still remained dark enough to hide details.
A larger glow grew in the farthest reaches of the tunnel, illuminating us. A thunderous rumble shook the stone beneath us. I clutched Scott’s arms as my first real pang of terror hit me.
“Don’t look. Look at me.”
I tore my gaze from the rapidly approaching noise and light. Scott’s face was so close, it was hard to make true eye contact, so I studied the way the surreal light decorated his face in shadow. I noticed the slightest upturn at the tip of his nose, and a nearly invisible scar tracing a pathway beneath his lower lip. How had such a beautiful creature come to live in solitude down here?
Noise translated to hoofbeats. Intrigued, I found my gaze wandering over his shoulder to catch sight of the riders.
Scott gripped my chin and forced my face forward. His fingers bruised. “Don’t. Look.”
For the first time, our eyes locked. No evasive glances, no abruptness. I truly saw him in the glow from the riders as they passed. Shadows didn’t just dance across his face; they lived in his eyes.
The moment the riders passed, Scott let go of me and stepped away, as if he couldn’t stand such a human connection as eye contact. Too late though — I had seen the intriguing man beneath the stoic vampire.
I wanted to know more.
* * *
SCOTT-THE-VAMPIRE WASN’T MUCH of a conversationalist. His fragmented answers to my lame questions like “How old are you” and “What’s your favorite color” gave me nothing to go on.
By the time the tunnel opened, the gun at my hip chafed, and I wanted to sit down
for a rest or hear something other than the scrape of our shoes on rocks.
I got my wish, because the tunnel spilled into a soaring underground cavern filled completely with fire.
The inferno’s deafening roar surrounded me. Sound took my senses until I didn’t know where I stopped and the fire began. My shoes balanced on a crude stone staircase that descended into a wall of flame.
Scott’s gruff voice broke through the roar. “Your first test. Physical. The only way to journey forward is to go through.”
“Is it real?”
“It is real, and it burns,” he answered quietly.
I stared over the raging wasteland. I couldn’t see an end to the flames. Just fire and smoke forever. “Guess I’ll never joke about walking through fire again,” I said, in an attempt at levity.
Scott rolled his eyes. I found the gesture endearing.
I took a deep breath, wondered what the hell I was doing, and descended the stairs.
The heat hit me before the fire — a burst of hot air as if I’d opened the world’s largest oven. Everything in me that stood for self-preservation barked warnings to turn back.
And then I was among the flames.
CHAPTER TEN
As a child, I’d had recurring dreams about being trapped in a sea of fire. That fire hadn’t burned in those dreams, but the terror had been real. I would awake screaming for my dad, and only when he wrapped me in his strong, steady embrace did the memory fade.
This memory wouldn’t fade. My dad wouldn’t be there on the other end to reassure me it was just a dream.
This fire burned. My breath caught in my throat, and I was too shocked to scream. I froze only for the merest second, astonished at the way my fingers began to peel and blister.
Fragile Magick (Descent Trilogy Book 1) Page 6