Approaching Storm (Alternate Worlds Book 2)

by Taylor Leigh

  Tollin gave her a rather surprised look, eyebrows arched high. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Sorry. I better stop there.’

  Sam shook her head. ‘No, tell me about the Daemons. I need to know.’

  ‘Right. Daemons. Well, they’re a bit of a problem. They’re not capable of Realm jumping, never have been, haven’t got the right genes, but that hasn’t stopped them. There are cracks in Realms sometimes—like that one you stumbled onto in the temple—places where it’s easier to get through, easier to jump. Sometimes Daemons can squeeze through. And they’re constantly trying to.’

  ‘Why?’

  He drummed his fingers on the table. ‘Daemons are just energy, really. A bit like you and me, but not flesh and blood. They’re negative energy that’s able to take on a form, kind of like electricity. They don’t have many physical needs, but they still need to feed, like every other living thing.

  ‘Being energy, as I’ve said, so it only makes sense that is what they feed off of. Human emotions are their favourite. Latch on to some human host and start feeding off of their moods, there’s no greater treat for them. The worse the mood, the more satisfying the meal. And they want it to go on for as long as possible.

  ‘I’ve seen entire planets turned over to nothing but factories of negative emotion. People stumbling about like zombies, weighed down with Daemons, living miserable existences. Nothing can live like that. Nothing should have to.’

  Sam raked a hand through her hair. ‘But why? Why would the Myrmidons want anything to do with them?’

  Tollin pulled a long face. ‘I’ve been dealing with them for a long time. You see, Daemons can possess things, as I’ve said. And they can also be trapped in things, like your ring. Thanks to that, there’s a lot of misinformation about them. Think about wish-granting djinns and things like that.

  ‘The Myrmidons think they can control the Daemons. Their understanding of such creatures is a bit naïve. Ignorance and manipulation have confused them. Their views are foolish, I would say innocent, but we both know that’s not the case. They understand that the basic principle: that there are other dimensions out there. And I suppose they rightly see that as a great opportunity. But they’re just humans.

  ‘Since the Myrmidon don’t know much, they obviously think they know everything, if you catch my drift. They believe they hold some terrible secret about the other Realms and they want to get through, they think Daemons can help with that. It’s like…like the prospect of meeting an alien race. Wouldn’t most people give up anything for that chance to actually know and meet another species from another world? It’s curiosity that so often gets you humans into so much trouble.’ He flashed a big, stupid grin.

  Sam sat back, not feeling Tollin’s flippant glee over the issue. ‘So, they’re going to unwittingly let through a Daemon hoard just out of curiosity? Blimey.’

  Tollin nodded, sighing dramatically. ‘Frustrating, I know.’

  She shakily laughed. ‘So we’ve got one dragon, one genius and we’re up against the end of the world.’

  Tollin grinned. ‘That’s about the size of it.’

  ‘Perfect.’ Sam rubbed at her temples. ‘Just how many different species are out there?’

  He raised his eyes to the windows. ‘Oh… difficult to say. More species than I’d be able to count. You’d be surprised how many humans there are, scattered about.’

  She tried to study him without being too obvious about it. ‘And you’re…half dragon, right? Is that it? Does that have something to do with giving you the ability to jump? Because Marus doesn’t seem to have the ability, what makes you different? Can you turn into…you know?’ She was embarrassed to find herself shudder slightly at the prospect of Tollin turning into a monster.

  ‘So many questions!’ Tollin sucked in a breath. He cast his brother a look and squirmed a bit in his chair. ‘Well…’

  Marus barked out a laugh, cutting him off. ‘Ha! No! And he’d make a pretty sorry dragon if he could! All legs and no fight!’ Marus seemed happy for a chance to talk. ‘Dragons can transform into any species they choose, it’s a nice little disguise, kind of like a chameleon, I guess. We call our forms avatars. But once we pick an avatar, we have to stick with it.

  ‘Anyhow, Tollin’s father—and my father as well—was a dragon, his mother was human. End of story. Tollin’s got the human looks, the dragon DNA but none of the skill of either, besides the Realm jumping quirk.’

  Tollin’s brow lowered. ‘And the memory. Which is all that matters.’

  ‘Sorry, memory?’ Sam again found herself looking him over closely, trying to see anything dragon about him. He certainly didn’t look it. He looked absolutely human. As did Marus. How many people had she run into during her life that weren’t actually people? Such a thought was flooring.

  ‘Dragons have inherent memory. They practically live for ever and their few numbers are spread all throughout different Realms. They’ve managed a handy trick when they reproduce; all of the long-term memory of every other dragon in the past is passed down to the new descendant. It helps them survive. Of course, dragons also have an annoying habit of completely forgetting other things, but I suppose a mind cannot hold everything. Luckily, I’ve got that. I would like to claim all of my cleverness is my own, but I’ve had a bit of help.’

  Sam shook her head. ‘Seems like your head would explode.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I’ve got a thick skull.’

  She smiled weakly. ‘So what do we do now?’

  Tollin stood up. ‘Well, it’s too late to do anything tonight. I suggest we all get a good night sleep. Once our heads are clearer we’ll be able to decide what to do tomorrow.’ He glanced down at a timepiece on his wrist. ‘The Passing is going to happen soon and I want us all tucked safely away.’

  Marus finished off his glass of liquor in one swallow, saluted both of them and then swaggered from the room, humming to himself. Sam and Tollin watched him.

  ‘I’m not exactly sure where to go,’ she said, timidly.

  Tollin smiled and stood with her. ‘You can have the room across from me, well away from any cross dragons.’

  Sam bit her lip in a smile. ‘Right, won’t complain about that; don’t want any fire breathing brothers irritated with me.’ And with that she trailed after Tollin into the darkened passage.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The shuttle scraped against the concrete floor of the hangar. Its overhead lights flickered sickly as the engines died out. It was hardly in the best of condition, and if not for the Passing, Roth doubted the machine would have had the power to make it across the gap, but it had. One couldn’t complain about what one was presented with in a jam.

  It was a good thing Roth knew the base on Scottorr so well; the Darkness had absorbed all the information his brain had to offer and was confident now as he strode down the ramp as it clanked to the floor. If the Traveller and the stone were on Scottorr then this was where he needed to be. Hunger twisted within him, hardly contained by these new layers of flesh.

  Behind him there wasn’t much left. He hadn’t been able to control himself; Roth’s soul had been so unfulfilling and the need had been too strong. Dillian and Amy hadn’t lasted long. Most of the night crew hadn’t. Still he was hungry. These souls did nothing to satisfy him. After so many years of being trapped, all he wanted now was food. Now, however, as he watched the small team of Scottorrian Myrmidons hurrying towards him, he would have to contain the urge. He needed them alive.

  He could sense the entity in the ring now. Very faint, very tired, but still alive, fuelled by the girl. It could barely speak, subdued and broken, but it was longing for him to find it.

  ‘We are here. He is here. She is here. Come and find us. Set us free. Let us re-join you.’

  The armed guards were clearly flustered as they pulled to a stop before him. Roth was respected here. Things would certainly move smoother, thanks to that. This unannounced first visit from him was cause for stress. Good. He wanted to keep it that way. />
  A lone man was jogging across the hangar, pulling on a jacket as he came. It took a moment for Roth to access the brain’s memories on him. An old colleague. Possibly the most difficult one he’d have to fool.

  ‘Hullo!’ the man, who Roth recognised as Clieg Erikson, sang cheerfully. He, unlike the rest of the group, was clearly more than happy to see Roth. ‘Avery Roth, been a while since I’ve seen your daft old mug! What a time for a visit, aye? Amazing things happening!’

  Roth smiled tightly. ‘Things have been busy. I apologise there hasn’t been time to check in on how your little science project is coming along.’

  Erikson looked slightly wounded by Roth’s words. ‘No reason to apologise, mate! But the advancements we’ve made recently you really have to see with your own eyes to truly believe.’

  Roth let out a humourless laugh, yet on the inside, excitement began to stir. This planet was so very close to control, and these stupid humans, oh, they were helping with smiling faces. ‘Is that so? Don’t tell me you actually got the bloody thing working!’

  Erikson looked ready to start jumping around the hangar. ‘Yes! Well, no, not quite. Not in the sense I think you mean. But I know I can, I think! Project Gateway is working.’

  Erikson was a tall man, with a hooked nose and closely shaved head. His expression, despite his somewhat menacing appearance, was warm. ‘Well, anyhow, welcome, welcome! I assume you’re here to see how the bloody thing is coming along? It is quite a surprise; you should have let us know! Is it just you?’

  Roth shook Erikson’s hand tersely. ‘Yes, alone. I’m here to open the door for you.’

  Erikson frowned but nodded. ‘Ah, all right then! Well please, come inside. We’ll catch our deaths out here. The Passing always buggers up the atmosphere!’ He gestured, clearly ruffled, towards the hall.

  As he followed the small procession, Roth surveyed his surroundings. It was a simple metal structure, buried deeply in the forest. The whole place hummed with power. Power that sucked against the very edges of the Realm, pulling it inward, tearing it asunder. They were creating a black hole, breaking through the fabric of two realities. It was an incredible feeling to be this close.

  And the ring. It was somewhere here, the presence inside of it pricking at his insides in longing.

  Erikson was still talking as they rode the lift down. Roth wasn’t listening. He tuned in just in time to hear Erikson’s explanation, ‘It happened yesterday morning. I was working with the power levels and how they affected the stone. And then it happened. The perfect amount of power. I couldn’t control where it opened, but I was able to track it down. A rift appeared just above our base, hanging above the atmosphere of the planet. Once the Passing is over, we can take a shuttle up and see it for ourselves.

  ‘The rift is almost completely stable now and we’re receiving constant readings from it. I don’t even believe we need the secondary stone now, wherever it is—or any more living tests. We already have a portal open, which in itself is incredible! We’ve broken through this dimension! We can study it for years without having to worry about the stars sliding out of alignment! So far we’ve seen nothing inside of it, but it’s proven that we can break through with the proper amount of power and nothing else!’

  Roth stopped Erikson and gave him a stern look. ‘We are not stopping with the rift. The rift is nothing. Readings from a blank void are of no concern to us. We must work to completely open the portal, we must wait for the anniversary! I must be united with the second stone. And I need the man. The man who will be physically capable of operating it without failure.’

  Erikson laughed hoarsely, nervously. He glanced down at Roth’s hand clamped on his shoulder. ‘B—but, Avery, we don’t even know if there is anything on the other side! We can’t risk losing this small crack we have. We might not get it back again. Attempting to open a completely new portal could just be grasping at smoke; at least now we have something! N—not to mention the damage it is doing to the very space in this world as it is. If we attempt to tear it open any further, we could completely rip the fabric of this dimension apart! It is impossible to know what would happen then. Two dimensions colliding could mean the end of everything.’

  ‘We have nothing!’ Roth growled between clenched teeth. ‘We must open a proper portal. Nothing less of that is acceptable! Have I made myself clear?’

  Erikson nodded submissively. ‘Yes, of course, and I’d like to believe it would work, but we don’t even have the second stone—’

  ‘We do. It’s here. On this planet. As is our operator.’ Roth pulled his handheld out of his pocket. He punched a few buttons until Samantha Turner and the Traveller’s blurry images blinked into view. He almost shoved the device into Erikson’s face. ‘We just have to go and claim them.’

  Erikson swallowed and looked into Roth’s eyes. Roth could see hesitation there, unease. But, slowly, the man nodded his head.

  Roth turned away, glancing through the window towards the device that had taken so long to build. The great red stone pulsed with a sickening, organic light. He smiled tightly.

  Yes, soon things would be exactly as they should be.

  * * * * *

  Tollin lay flat on his back, bare feet propped above him as he slumped in the only uncovered chaise in the library. He hadn’t moved from the spot for some time, too much was on his mind.

  The keep was locked down tight in preparation for the violent event of the Passing. Anything not bolted down had the risk of being yanked up into the night sky and deposited back on Scrabia, and vice versa. It wasn’t the ideal time for a stroll, unless you were willing to go for a quick fly, too.

  He was troubled. Troubled about the whole situation he’d been thrown into. It wasn’t simply Brock Turner’s death and the Myrmidons. There was something else going on, something more sinister. The tear in the sky, the anniversary, and…probably most disturbing, the missing stone. Tollin had been hunting for it for years, but hadn’t found a trace. It had been stored in the treasury of the palace for a time, but after his first encounter with the Myrmidons ages ago, it had been lost to the desert. Tollin was usually bang-on when it came to finding things, but this…he hadn’t found a trace.

  It simply wasn’t on Scrabia. And so the question was: where was it? Had some other Realm Jumper snagged it? He certainly knew there were treasure hunters out there—he was friends with a couple of them—but this was different. This stone was something few knew about, and that made it a problem, because those who did know knew what it was capable of. It made him nervous.

  He only knew one thing.

  Someone had the stone.

  That someone wasn’t on Scrabia.

  That was either very good or bad, bad, bad.

  And then there was the problem of Samantha Turner. Admittedly, not the worst of problems to have. She was a surprise to him. He’d thought he’d had her figured out, and he’d completely misjudged her. For a blonde, attractive daughter of a poor mechanic, Samantha Turner had turned out all right. He was—admittedly—drawn to her, and it had happened alarmingly fast.

  For just once, he’d have liked to not get attached. Doing what he did every day, seeing what he saw, fighting what he fought, it took its toll. He grew weary from always being the outsider, the stranger. The one who was a mystery, older and different from all the rest. Unable to get close for fear of heartbreak or death or propriety or being left again. His work was what many would have daydreamt about. What he did was daring, dangerous, important and, to the few who didn’t understand, glamorous. They didn’t think about his enemies, who were lurking everywhere, cloaking themselves in goodness, threatening to undo all he cared about if he didn’t keep his guard up.

  His thoughts drifted back against his will. Those few he’d let himself get close to. What had happened to them. A painful reminder of just what his enemies were capable of.

  Ever since Molly, who’d been so blatantly taken from him, he’d been wary of getting too close to people. Sure, there
had been a bright spot here or there, some person in his life who shone above the others, some whom he risked getting close to. It hardly ever ended well. One way or another, either by death or circumstances, they all left him—or he them—in the end. People whom he’d been painfully attached to he’d abandoned, unable to stomach the idea of being responsible for their demise. And judging by how rocky the beginning of their relationship had been, Tollin had his doubts things would get much better between him and Sam.

  But…there was something different about her. Something strange…

  Because, alarmingly, Sam had seen the Light, after hardly twenty-four hours with him she’d seen the Light. She’d manage to guide them out of the void. What normal human could accomplish something like that?

  Tollin had to admit: he felt slightly jealous. Why had it appeared to her, and not to him?

  And it made him incredibly nervous because things like this did not simply happen. People did not simply see it. Was it simply helping them out, or was there a more sinister motive behind it? He still could not understand its intentions, after all these years. Molly had seen the Light, he thought. She’d obsessed over it, it had completely consumed her and then WHAM! she was gone.

  His ambiguous spirit Guide had warned him that his enemies were desperate and afraid…but of what, Tollin didn’t know. She had said—from what he could make out from her cryptic words—that there was someone in Tollin’s future, someone who would make him become what he was supposed to be. And for some reason, his enemies feared that.

  That was why the Light had taken Molly.

  To save her, or some other explanation he didn’t understand.

  And that was what confused him.

  Outside came the groaning shifting of things. The planets were aligning.

  He didn’t trust the Light. He hadn’t—not since Molly’s abduction—and yet, his Guide was Light. Everything was in such a confusing jumble it made even his brain hurt. The Light had shown itself to Sam. It had guided them out of the void. So, how could that be bad? But what would happen if Sam kept seeing the Light? Would it eventually devour her, like it did Molly, and take her away?