Approaching Storm (Alternate Worlds Book 2)

by Taylor Leigh

  Tollin pointed over his shoulder. ‘Seems to be a bit of a leak.’

  ‘Get ‘im!’ another roared, eyes bulging.

  Tollin made a face. ‘Really, haven’t we been through this enough?’

  He hefted up his sword with a gleam in his eye, jovial nature replaced by a deadly calm.

  Sam gnawed on her bottom lip; she was in no way prepared for this.

  ‘Just relax, you’ll be fine!’ Tollin called over to her, mentally filling her with a small bit of comfort.

  Sam squared her shoulders as she watched a Daemon, which looked to be a cross between a goat and a scorpion, come skittering towards her. ‘Right!’ she shouted back. ‘What’s there to worry about?’

  She just managed to catch Tollin’s wry grin before he ducked to swipe at his own opponent. The Daemon she faced carried no weapon; unfortunately, its whole body was one lethal object. The creature made a jab at her but Sam found it surprisingly easy to avoid, instinctive even. When it charged, claws swiping, Sam stepped to the side, ducking beneath the green appendages. She drew her sword out across the creature’s chest. As the blade made contact the Daemon let out a scream before exploding into a flaming, bloody smoke.

  She pulled herself upright, shaking her hair out of her eyes and grinned in triumph. This was almost easy.

  Tollin, across the room, was fighting two Daemons simultaneously. He had a gleeful, wild look in his eyes. It was as if he found the entire situation they were in to be one big game. Sam had a brief flash that maybe he wasn’t quite sane. She took a look at her surroundings, and advanced on a Daemon closing in on her. Maybe she wasn’t quite sane either, she thought.

  Tollin cut through another Daemon with a triumphant snarl and cast a look Sam’s direction, flashing a tight grin.

  ‘We’re coming…’ The thing in the ring let out a low, tired groan.

  She was distracted by a loud crack! looked up just in time to stare in absolute shock. Something new was there, expanding over the top of the stone out of nowhere, reminding her of ink dropped in water.

  She felt a nasty fear hit her in the gut and twist, like a hand had reached in and grabbed her innards. It was the Darkness. The thing in the ring. The thing in Roth. The thing Tollin didn’t understand. And she didn’t think it was something either of them was prepared to face.

  The thing in her ring came to life. It jerked violently, making her stumble forward. She fought to keep from taking another step.

  A loud roar from outside the room shook the chamber and Marus backed in, lowering his heavy body into the shallow water to fit through the narrow doorway. Pushing him backwards was a swarm of screaming Daemons, pikes, swords and pitchforks jabbing and thrusting at the dragon as if they were children faced with a venomous snake. The dragon swept his neck wide, snarling, boiling, fiery liquid bubbling from his jaws, making the Daemons none-too-eager to march forwards.

  Sam didn’t know where to look. Marus was overwhelmed with Daemons, her ring was clenching about her finger and she could sense the Darkness slowly leaking around her; tightening to a circle. Her head was spinning with growing panic from it all. Her eyes squeezed shut. The thing from the ring was pulsing in on her brain, crunching in her skull. The pressure was too great. She felt herself drifting off when Tollin grabbed her arm.

  The entire room had shifted to some dark, isolated planet. The world beyond, where Marus and the Daemons were, might as well have been a Realm away. They were surrounded by a thickening, black fog.

  She could scarcely hear Marus’s growls now. She and Tollin might as well have been trapped under a dark glass.

  Tollin swallowed but squared his shoulders, fixing his expression to one of determination. The fact he was faced by something he didn’t understand frightened her. She didn’t know how this could end well. Still, he marched forwards.

  ‘Bravo!’ A vibrating, massive voice rumbled from seemingly everywhere around them. It was followed by a hollow clapping. ‘We are impressed, Traveller. We were beginning to doubt the rumours about you. I see now how wrong we were. You’re almost as impressive as you once were.’

  Tollin glowered. ‘Do you have a face? I don’t like talking to smoke!’

  A dark chuckle. ‘We have no face besides those we take.’

  The stagnant cloud above the stone began to swirl in a whirlwind. Sam staggered in the sudden change; hair blowing about her face. She grabbed Tollin’s hand in habit and was grateful for the reassuring squeeze he returned.

  Out of the churning mass staggered Avery Roth. His body jerked limply, reminding Sam too much of a puppet. Darkness clutched at his limbs in sticky strands; the hand controlling the mannequin. Roth’s head swung round to face them with gaping black eyes, void of all life.

  Sam stared in fascinated horror. The man defied all sense of logic. If not for the Darkness supporting him, he’d be nothing but a waxy shell. Everything that made a human a human had been sucked away. It was worse than a walking corpse. Her insides began to freeze up.

  ‘Roth. You’re looking…unwell,’ Tollin said, his voice admirably steady. ‘I must say I’m impressed with your tenacity.’

  The Darkness bowed low. ‘You’re not the only one with a reputation.’

  Tollin’s brows hunched. ‘No. But I do try a little harder to keep mine reputable.’

  There came a distant, reverberating pounding. Sam hazarded a look over her shoulder and watched as Marus, back in human form, hammered against the smoky wall that separated them. He shouted something and slashed the barrier with the sword, with little effect.

  Roth roared with laughter. ‘Ha! You are right in that you have done a much better job hiding the darkness of your past, Traveller. But you cannot claim you are any better than I; just that no-one is alive now to remember what you have done. But I remember. We know the darkness of your soul. I can taste it. We feed off of it.’

  Sam bristled despite herself. And grasping Tollin’s hand had seemed to give her a shot of bravery she didn’t know she had. ‘That’s a lie!’

  Tollin groaned.

  Roth thrust his arched neck her direction and looked at her with hollow eyes. ‘Ah? The Traveller’s special little bitch. The lucky human child! Coming all this way to reunite Sahabra for me? How very thoughtful.’ Something about the dark cloud might have recoiled slightly, almost in revulsion. Perhaps she’d just imagined it.

  Sam straightened. ‘Not on your life.’ Still, her arm gave a jerk. She was glad Tollin held the hand with her ring; held it clamped tightly as it twisted again. The thing inside wanted desperately to get back to its other half.

  Roth chuckled again. ‘You think you actually have a choice, don’t you?’ He started to circle them, like one of the giant sharks outside. ‘After all, you’ve been living with us all along! You’ve proved you can resist. You must think you can now, here, where we’re at our most powerful!’

  Sam followed him with her eyes. ‘You can’t make me do anything.’

  ‘Really?’ Roth sounded delighted. ‘Well, we are looking forward to testing that!’

  Tollin’s dark, brown eyes flicked up to look at the creature. ‘Leave her out of this,’ he warned.

  If Roth’s facial expressions weren’t a drooping mess, Sam thought it would be the picture of bemusement. ‘You care for the girl, don’t you? Oh, how delicious. But don’t you see, Traveller, Samantha Turner is already involved. She’s been involved since the beginning.’

  A confused little spike of nervousness at that statement needled her.

  Marus’s shouting echoed through the thick membrane, piercing the heavy silence.

  Roth turned his eyes from them to the dragon, vaguely interested. His jawbone creaked as he swung it open. ‘It looks like your big brother wants to join the party! Shall we let him in?’ Roth flicked one bony wrist and the dome surrounding them dissolved in smoke.

  Marus stumbled forward, a look of surprise on his face, as if he hadn’t actually expecting his beating to work. He took a second to collect himself
, and then charged forward, teeth bared in a snarl. With sword raised, he barrelled down on Roth with clearly no other thought.

  It was then that everything happened at once. Tollin shouted at his brother to stop at the same time as Marus exploded in mid-air, going from human to dragon in the blink of an eye. He landed hard, feet squared, shoulders hunched, blocking Roth from Sam’s view. All of the Daemons that had been too cowardly to confront Marus before now burst from the hallway and swarmed the room. The force of them shoved Sam to the ground, skidding her across the wet floor.

  Somewhere in the chaos, Tollin was shouting her name. His desperation was easier to feel than see beneath the batter of hooves and claws and paws.

  Sam fought to push up through the layers of Daemons, back to her feet. The circling creatures eyed her warily for one brief second. And then in one collective movement they rushed forward and were on her.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  The noise of the alarms and the uncomfortable vibration in the air were enough to make Darius go mad. Couple that with the fact he was expected to shut off a generator that was in the process of melting down, he wasn’t exactly in the calmest frame of mind.

  All he had to comfort him was the handheld he had tightly grasped in his hand. But even that was of no help, for Arkron was battling that terrifying black thing, and unable to do much more than shout at him to calm down.

  ‘But I don’t know what to do! This thing is going to explode! I—I don’t know how to turn it off!’

  Arkron’s body went a brighter green and sent the dark thing back with a blast. ‘Must I do everything? I swear...Fine. Go through my contact list.’

  She let the camera drop to her waist as Darius punched at the screen, trying to find the right folder.

  ‘Okay, Arkron? Now what?’

  ‘Find the name Ghost and connect to it.’ She let out a barbaric yell.

  Darius typed in the name and saw “Ghost” scrawl across the screen.

  Arkron’s profile briefly swung back into view on the screen. ‘When that thing connects, ask for Andrew,’ she barked.

  Arkron was once again off-screen. She swore loudly and there was a flash of green.

  ‘Wha—?’ Darius, bewildered, stared at the screen as it split, shrinking Arkron’s window. A small icon spun, connecting to wherever he’d dialled. A moment later, the frame blinked into pixelated focus.

  ‘Hello?’ A very attractive, black woman answered the call, frowning in what Darius plainly saw as suspicion. She was wearing a leather jacket and had a strange set of goggles set up on the top of her head.

  ‘Uh,’ Darius, still completely confused, was getting flustered. The ground shook beneath him. ‘Hi. Is Andrew there?’

  The woman narrowed her eyes. ‘I’m afraid he’s busy at the mo. Who is this?’

  ‘Uh,’ Darius cast a glance over to Arkron’s small screen.

  ‘He’s with me!’ Arkron called through the speaker. ‘Where the hell is Andrew? He can’t be doing anything that important!’

  The woman rolled her eyes. ‘He’s busy cracking into a safe.’

  ‘Well, tell him to hold off and get his arse over here! This is important, Victoria!’

  The woman, Victoria, arched thin eyebrows and flashed an amused smile. ‘Right, I’ll tell him. He’s in a very cross mood, just warning you.’

  ‘Nothing new there.’ Arkron’s voice muttered.

  The unfeasibility of it slowly dawned on Darius. ‘Hang on a moment! Andrew and Victoria…like the bloke my secondary school was named after? But that’s impossible! He lived like, five-hundred years ago!’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Arkron said, distractedly. ‘So happy you know your history.’

  ‘You mean I’m talking to someone in the past?’

  Arkron puffed her breath. ‘Just because he was born in the past doesn’t mean he’s still there. It’s a long story and I’m not too keen on getting into it now, just talk to him! And don’t let him push you around!’

  A new face took up the screen. A blond man, gaunt, and very irritable. ‘What?’ he snapped.

  Darius was lost for words. Andrew O’Neill, the genius of history, was glowering at him impatiently. Impossible to believe, but Darius supposed he didn’t exactly have time to marvel over it at the moment. ‘Look, you’re a genius, yeah? Well, there’s a generator here and it’s about to blow. I’ve got to shut it off and I have no idea where to start!’

  The man let out an impatient huff, and Darius got the impression that posing any problem to this man was perceived as an insult to his time. ‘Arkron interrupted me for this?’

  ‘Whatever you’re up to cannot be as important as this,’ Arkron chided, briefly bobbing into view.

  Andrew frowned. ‘I’ll have you know I’m here at your request.’ He glanced down at his wrist. ‘Which I’m now fifteen minutes further behind schedule.’

  ‘Oh quit your whining. Think of this as a pop quiz.’

  Andrew scowled and then turned his shockingly pale eyes back to Darius. ‘What do you need from me?’

  Darius passed a hand through his hair. ‘Uh,’ he stared at the generator. ‘I need help turning off this generator, it’s melting down.’

  Andrew nodded curly. ‘Show me the control panel, will you?’

  Darius lurched towards the panel as the ground shook. He held up the handheld so Andrew could get a clear look at the readouts. The man let out a thoughtful hmmm.

  ‘The coils inside are out of balance. We’re going to have to bring them to the same level and then power them down together. Whatever system inside that prevents that from happening must be malfunctioning. Of course they didn’t put it together properly. Whichever coil is higher than the other will explode. So start determining which one is the problem.’

  Darius clenched his teeth. ‘Okay, really don’t have a clue.’

  ‘Start by raising the pressure in the left coil, that knob there. Go as slowly as possible. It has to be exact to the decimal.’

  ‘Raising the pressure?’ Darius gaped.

  The ground rocked again, throwing him to the floor. The handheld went spinning from his grasp.

  From the device came a sigh, ‘This is going to take longer than I thought.’

  * * * * *

  Sam was knocked back before she had time to react, splashing to the floor. Her sword went uselessly sliding away. There was a crack! as her head hit the metal and her teeth clacked together loudly. She saw stars.

  The horrible creatures were all over her, tugging at her legs and hair, twisting her limbs. She fought back with a shriek of rage. Tollin had said they could possess her if she let her guard down. She was not about to let that happen.

  A clawed hand clamped over her face, drowning out Sam’s enraged protest. Her hand flopped about at her waist till she found the knife Tollin had given her. Perhaps it was Daemon metal. Either way, it was all she had. She grabbed hold of the handle and stabbed it upwards. With a cry of surprise, the Daemon’s physical body exploded into ash.

  Sam had no time to congratulate herself. The Daemons were grabbing hold of her, dragging her through the water towards the puppet form of Roth. Claws, pinchers, slimy fingers all groping for handholds. Sam couldn’t see through the press of bodies as she thrashed. Where was Tollin?

  Sam was distantly and rather morbidly reminded of a dying bird swarmed by ants she had once seen as a child

  And then, in an instant, they were gone.

  The Daemons were thrown wide by a powerful swipe from Marus’s arm. He let out a bone-rattling roar and faced them with blazing eyes. The creatures let out whimpering, terrified cries of protest but cowered backwards, fighting against each other to get out of the way of the dragon.

  Across the room, Sam could see Tollin in much the same state she had just been in. But unlike her, he was beautifully dangerous. His shoulders were squared and his teeth were clenched into a defiant snarl. Even at the distance Sam was at, she could see his dark eyes shining with warning. Every time a Daemon d
rew near him, it would jump away with little barks of fear. As overwhelming as their numbers were, they still didn’t dare touch him.

  All but Roth, who turned towards Tollin with liquid, predatory interest.

  Sam stumbled backwards and swept up her sword, which clattered at the back of her feet. She broke forward into a splashy run towards Tollin, eying the puppet slinking towards him from the other way. She had to get to him before Roth did. Even if Sam couldn’t stop Roth, she at least knew what he was. That was more than Tollin.

  She didn’t get far.

  With bravado, Marus shoved Sam behind him roughly. ‘Stay back,’ he snarled at her as he bounded past. It was beyond maddening. Honestly, to think she could just be ordered about like this! She pushed forward in protest but his tail caught her in the ribs. It knocked the air from her.

  Sam fell to the ground, shouting his name as the dragon bounded ignorantly towards the Darkness. She wobbly pushed herself up, ribs aching, and raced after him across the Daemon-filled expanse. In the confusion, Tollin somehow managed to see her and he shook his head wildly. He was yelling at her but Sam could hardly hear. All she could pay attention to was the dragon and Roth.

  Marus hit Roth hard, ending his advance on Tollin and they broke into a mad grapple. Despite being nothing more than a walking corpse, Roth had surprising strength and a black wave of power behind him. Their clash was brief, bodily, and to Sam’s dismay, she watched Roth easily shove the dragon away. Marus’s claws screeched against the metal floor.

  Roth’s body was expanding; the Darkness pumping more of itself into him, stretching him thin. His body strained out sickeningly, limbs, spine and skull elongating till he was matching the dragon in size. Sam could hear snapping and had to fight down her nausea. Strange projections started to burst out of his body and Sam realised in revulsion that it was his bones, growing so long that they no longer fit into his skin. He no longer even looked like the figure of wax. He no longer resembled anything human.