The Dark Matters Quartet

by Claire Robyns

  Lily’s gaze flew to Georgina’s neck. She couldn’t tell if the shackle had constricted, but it definitely felt as if her own lungs were—she could barely draw breath. This wasn’t a game at all. Agares would do it, she truly would. Of course she would! And dear Lord, the shackle had crept closer to Georgina’s skin.

  Panic set in as Lily’s frantic gaze searched out Greyston again. His fist had closed over the timepiece. He met her eyes with a sluggish shake of his head.

  It’s over.

  Georgina would be strangled before their eyes.

  Greyston would rewind until Lily was back inside the gates, maybe until Georgina was still bobbing limply on her horse some point where the road curved out of sight. And it would be over, their one and only chance at this.

  “Tick tock,” Agares merrily reminded them.

  “Do it!” Lily shouted at Greyston, her heart galloping wildly. Out of control. She didn’t care. “Do as she says. Get Georgina. Nothing has changed. Now!” she screamed when he just looked at her. “We have to… We have to try.”

  We still have time.

  Greyston shook his head again, his face set into grim slate, ashen grey and cracked with anguish.

  But then he changed his mind and moved, sprinting out of the gates and toward Georgina, his eyes on Agares.

  A burst of shaky energy shot through Lily as she turned and continued walking, her steps measured, her blood thudding in her veins. She had her own part to play. She pulled her right hand out of her pocket, flexing her fingers in readiness.

  Agares’ attention was divided, trying to keep one eye on Lily’s approach and one eye on Greyston.

  That’s what this game is really about, a diversion to keep us preoccupied.

  But the distraction worked both ways.

  While every fibre in Lily’s body ached to see what was happening with Greyston and Georgina, she resisted. This was her single advantage. She had to focus.

  Lily carefully increased her pace, not wanting to appear obvious, suddenly desperate to reach Agares before the show ended.

  A blood-curdling scream ripped the air. Lily’s heart jumped, practically wedging in her throat. Georgina? Don’t look. The scream had Agares absorbed, her eyes fixated there, a cruel smile twisting her mouth. Don’t look.

  Lily looked…just as Greyston reached Georgina. She was still shackled, limp and vacant, as if she’d awoken only for that split-second scream and then promptly switched off again. Greyston grabbed low, his intention clearly to throw Georgina over his shoulder, his eyes never leaving Agares, watching for the moment of attack, the moment that would signal their time was up, they’d failed…and then it happened. So fast, it was done before the warning shriek left Lily’s lips.

  The shackle around Georgina’s neck cracked open and she seemed to eject backward in the air, as if repelled from Greyston’s grasp. The extended rod hit the ground, rippled and coiled. Fluid as water, striking with the deadly accuracy of a viper, lashing around Greyston’s ankles and spinning up around his body until he was wrapped like an Egyptian mummy in thin bandages of ice.

  Everything in Lily went still, her entire world corralled into a pin-prick of anticipation.

  Nothing happened.

  She was still standing here.

  The ice that wrapped Greyston seemed to have solidified, turning into a rigid, transparent tomb.

  Devon charged out of the gates to where Georgina lay crumpled as she’d fallen.

  Time was not reversing.

  The scene was not resetting.

  The mantle of anticipation lifted and Lily crashed back into reality. She went for her sword, but her hand never got near the sheath inside her boot. Ropes of fluid ice whipped from Agares’ fingers, blinding quick, lassoing around Lily and lashing her arms securely to her sides. The ropes melted and joined, then solidified to form a half-corset from her chest to her waist, her arms tucked inside.

  Movement in her peripheral vision.

  Devon had scooped Georgina into his arms and was halfway back to safe ground.

  To her left, Neco barrelled out of hiding with giant strides. From the other side, Ana emerged like a drunken spinning top. Both converged on Agares in a weaving pattern at dizzying speeds. Lily struggled to free her arms. She needed to reach her sword. She lifted her leg, her fingers grasping at the edges of her boot, another inch, that’s all she needed! Just one damn inch! The ice corset wouldn’t give it to her.

  Agares raised her arms slightly and flicked her fingers. Ten bolts of white flashed from the tips and sparked off the ground. The sparks sprouted off into thousands of live, white, rambling vines that spread out like a thousand years of growth in the blink of an eye. Vines tangled into Ana’s spin, grinding the motion into a dying spiral. Neco saw and slammed to a dead stop. Too late to back away. The vines crept over his boots and curled up his legs. He jerked and heaved and clawed, but the icy tendrils kept reaching until he disappeared beneath a shroud of white.

  Lily watched numbly, helpless to prevent the complete and utter slaughter. Less than a minute had passed. Ana, Neco, Greyston…ice sculptures caught in static time. She turned to see Devon skid inside the gates, Georgina in his arms. Safe.

  A hollow victory, and not only because she knew Agares had allowed it, could have stopped them as efficiently as she’d stopped everyone else.

  She looked back to Agares, her heart scooping out as her gaze swerved over Greyston’s frozen form to leave behind a gaping hole.

  “What have you done?” she whispered hoarsely, the question directed at herself as much as at the demon.

  “Just a little something to bind his powers,” Agares said with a smile. “He’ll be perfectly fine once he thaws.” She flicked her wrist and an ice leash shot out to loop around Lily. “Unless those rumours aren’t true and Lord Adair is nothing but a poor human fool. Then, oops.”

  Rumours?

  Hindsight punched Lily in the gut. Agares’ reference to making new allies out of old enemies had never been about Raimlas and the McAllisters. Lily and Kelan’s marriage was fact, not rumour. Agares must have heard something else, suspected that Greyston had demon blood…or rather, that Greyston was another demon, and an old enemy of Raimlas.

  But Greyston wasn’t a demon.

  And that meant he was dead.

  “As much as I love admiring my handiwork,” Agares said, “we have a train schedule to adhere to.”

  She jerked on the leash and Lily stumbled forward. Grief spread through her like an infestation, deadening wherever it touched.

  What have I done?

  Greyston was gone.

  Agares was free.

  And with Lily captured, Kelan and his army were blind. They’d have no warning until after Agares unveiled her next nightmare on the world.

  I should have waited for Kelan.

  He would have gone after Agares with single-minded determination, careless of whether Georgina was sacrificed in the process or not. No rescue attempt would have even featured in his strategy. His decision would have been cold and ruthless, and absolutely necessary.

  Not a decision Lily could have made, not even now, knowing the outcome, but it would have been the right decision.

  With the sudden crystal clarity that came with all else inside her emptied out, Lily acknowledged a truth she’d fought so hard, too hard, to keep down. Kelan made those impossible decisions, he bore the responsibility, so that no one else had to.

  Agares yanked Lily, one stumbling step at a time, and tossed her over the back of a horse with scant effort. Mounting the other horse, Agares handled both sets of reins and set them off on a brisk canter down the road. Lily bounced, her head banging incessantly against the rough flank of sweat and hair. She could wriggle and slide off, probably smash to the ground, get herself trodden on, and Agares would be right there to scoop up the pieces. She was trapped.

  They didn’t ride for long, perhaps a quarter hour, before they came to a barn on the edges of a farm. Inside, two fresh
stallions waited, already harnessed to a wagon.

  “You’ve played the glum act superbly,” Agares said as she busied herself opening an enormous trunk that took up most of the wagon, “but it’s wearing thin, dyanle. After all, we both know you wouldn’t be here unless it’s what you wanted. It’s not as if you care a damn about that silly girl Georgina Bonnington.”

  Because I’m Raimlas, Lily reminded herself dully. A cruel-blooded demon. That’s what Agares believed, and it was the only reason Lily was still alive.

  Agares turned from the wagon, sauntering closer. “You have no idea how much thought went into planning this elaborate alibi, dyanle. All so that you and I could spend this time together without raising the suspicions of your new friends.”

  Anger pulsed through Lily’s lethargy. Greyston’s death wasn’t an alibi, it was a travesty.

  “You do miss me,” Agares said, her smile predatory as she dragged a fingernail along Lily’s cheek. “I see it in your eyes.”

  Lily gagged. “You repulse me.”

  “Hmm, perhaps I’m mistaken. Perhaps you’re here for another reason altogether.” Agares drew back a step and tilted her head. “Perhaps you were hoping to glean more information from me to feed to the McAllisters. Perhaps you were even egotistical enough to think you could sabotage me from the inside.”

  The slap came so quickly, snapping Lily’s head sideways with the force before she could register. Hot pain spread over her cheek.

  “Georgina Bonnington was my plan, my weapon,” Agares spat out. “Did you really expect that to work for you? Using my own ingenuity to draw me into the open, to double cross me? Again?”

  Lily bit back a retort. Even for a demon, and whatever mentality came with that, Agares was clearly a candidate for Bedlam.

  Agares brought her hand up again. Lily flinched, but there was no slap. The pressure of the ice corset changed. The ice was melting, defying the science of gravity by dripping both upward and downward. And then the drips turned into a thousand tiny rivers in spate, rushing down her legs, up her throat, over her cheeks and into her hair. A moment later, a film of fluid ice covered her entire body. Another moment, and the ice hardened with her entombed inside.

  Lily screamed. A soundless scream that no one would ever hear.

  “No need to look so horrified. I’m sure the baggage car will be every bit as comfortable as my first class cabin.” Wearing that awful predatory smile again, Agares hoisted Lily over the side of the wagon and tumbled her into the enormous trunk. “Do you remember the last time we travelled together, dyanle?” She peered inside, shaking her head. “Now there are trains and airships. Who would have imagined? You were gone so long, I thought you were truly gone. And now, here you are, and look at us.”

  Lily had no choice but to look. Her eyes were frozen wide open, staring straight ahead, and the demented demon was right there in her face.

  “It didn’t have to be this way,” Agares said, her tone suddenly soft, almost mournful, and then her face disappeared and the lid of the trunk slammed down.

  The blackness swallowed Lily’s hopes and fears. There was nothing. Her heart and mind were as frozen as her body.

  Time passed. Minutes? Hours? Gradually, Lily’s mind awoke to the fact that she wasn’t dying. She didn’t feel completely alive either. There was a heaviness inside her, as if her blood slugged through her veins instead of flowing. She drifted in and out of consciousness, each time surprised to find herself still in the world of the living.

  But if she wasn’t dead, then neither was Greyston. They weren’t demon, but they did have demon blood. They weren’t one hundred percent human and maybe, just maybe, they’d both survive until their ice coffins thawed.

  FIFTEEN

  Greyston had lost all concept of time. He’d watched Harchings grab Georgina and run with her, back toward the castle, back there, behind him, beyond his vision. He’d watched Agares toss Lily over the horse, he’d watched their backs until they’d disappeared around the corner, and then he’d kept watching the deserted road.

  I’m not sure Agares wants me dead.

  Maybe Lily was right. The demon would have finished Lily off right here if that was the intention. But that didn’t make Lily safe. There were many ways to accidentally die when your captor assumed you were immortal.

  Death...

  Greyston would have laughed at the irony, if he could. His insides weren’t frozen, he didn’t think. But his muscles felt like stone, his blood stagnant, his internal organs stuck on pause. He was sure he wasn’t actually breathing.

  Death isn’t instant.

  That was the thought that had pushed him through the castle gates, the hope he’d clung to with his head and heart torn into two. Georgina’s certain death. The risk to Lily. If he failed… Kelan wasn’t an option. They could wait, and he would probably come eventually, but both Greyston and Lily knew where the McAllister priorities lay.

  But there was still time. He didn’t need much. If Agares attacked, his dying breath would be long enough to catch a memory and ride it back.

  Death isn’t instant.

  In the blink of an eye, Agares’ ice had wrapped and sealed more than his body, it had frozen his ability to rewind time. He was dying a slow, slow death and it didn’t matter a damn. He had all the time in the world, and he could do nothing with it.

  Neco was a couple of yards to his right, just within his vision, caught in the same state. He couldn’t see Ana, but she was no doubt trapped in a similar position.

  Had Harchings made it safely inside the walls with Georgina?

  Greyston didn’t think so. But then, he was having trouble convincing himself that a single soul still survived. For a good many yards in front of him, thick ice covered the ground and reached up into the trees, crystal webs spun between twiggy branches, delicate stalactites dripping, the whole damn place glistening in the dwindling sunlight like a frosted wonderland.

  He couldn’t turn to look around. He could hear, he was sure. He’d heard what Agares had said before she’d left.

  Just a little something to bind his powers. He’ll be perfectly fine once he thaws. Unless those rumours aren’t true and Lord Adair is nothing but a poor human fool. Then, oops.

  But he hadn’t heard anything since. Not the creak of a bough. No calls from behind. No movement.

  He was alone. He imagined a million frozen sculptures, just like him, each one standing all alone in a world turned to ice.

  The shadows lengthened. This close to the Winter Solstice, night would come quickly, the temperatures would plummet even further. No one would be thawing. Maybe everyone was already dead. Had his demon blood spared him? Greyston thought not. He was nothing but a poor human fool.

  The long shadows flickered, reaching from behind and around him like melted fingers. When had that started? He hadn’t slept, but he’d gotten lost within himself for a while there, seeing nothing, thinking nothing.

  The shadows were alive, spitting, reaching, ebbing, dancing like a…like a fire? Voices came from far away. Not many. Two, maybe three voices. And maybe not so far away, merely hushed. Not within sight. Behind him. If the shadows flaring over the ice were any indication, whatever crept up on him was not human.

  The voices faded into silence, but the shadows still danced. With nothing else to look at, Greyston felt himself becoming mesmerised without the strength to fight it.

  He must have drifted off again, into the dark corners hidden from his conscious mind. Flares of orange licked the white glare at the edge of his vision. Again and again, flickering like the shadows.

  Fire.

  Flames.

  A torch of fire brushed the icy ground, sweeping a melting path like a broom. A booted foot stepped into sight. Before long, Greyston had a clear view of the hunched man who held the flaming torch. A castle servant, he guessed, by the liveried uniform.

  Flames licked to his left.

  Another man.

  Both carefully treading only on the melt
ed path they forged.

  Excellent. If they were wise enough to fear the ice, they might just stand a chance at getting him out of this mess.

  The men met and closed the circle, then brandished their torches to widen the standing area.

  “Grey!” Georgina pushed in front of them to look at him, to look into his eyes. Her hands came out, cupping his face, but not quite. Also wary enough to avoid contact with the ice. “Can you hear me? Grey? Are you…? Grey!”

  Georgina. You’re alive. Harchings actually did it. The words formed, but never left his mouth. Frustration trampled through his dulled emotions.

  “Georgina, quiet.” Harchings appeared, indicating to one man to start sweeping a path of fire toward Neco. “We don’t know what else is out there.”

  “I know,” she whispered, her eyes never leaving him.

  No tears, but Greyston knew she was crying. He knew, because for the first time since he’d known her, summer had left the blue depths of her gaze.

  I’m fine, he wanted to tell her. We’re all okay, he wanted to shout, and believe. He’d get out of this tomb, they’d find Lily. This damned world hadn’t beaten him, not by a mile.

  Harchings tugged Georgina further back. He grabbed the torch from the man beside him and held it up, close to Greyston’s chest.

  “What if I burn him?” he muttered. “Adair will be pissed as hell if he actually survives this, only to find I’ve scarred his pretty face.”

  I can hear you! Greyston glared the bastard into oblivion. The Duke could save his life ten ways from here to Sunday, and he still wouldn’t forgive the man.

  “Wait.” Georgina pulled a short dagger from her waistband. She looked into his eyes, her smile small and strained. “I won’t hurt you, I promise.”

  His eyes dropped, following her hand. She scraped the blade against his arm, harder and harder, then she slashed. Her effort didn’t make a scratch.

  My sword. Where was his walking stick? If this ice was demonised, the Cairngorm blade might well slice straight through it. He’d tossed his cane aside before he’d sprinted out after Georgina.