by D. N. Hoxa
Helen did come to her senses some time later.
She was no longer screaming because the plant was no longer burning. It had already turned to ashes. I looked at Damian. Had he gotten a berry, like he’d promised…whomever he’d spoken to about the Treasure of Saraph? I wasn’t sure, but he didn’t seem alarmed.
Now, we watched the other tree—Yoranda—burning, too, because he’d insisted the whole place had to go just to make sure no trace of the plant remained for the Guild to find.
The most important thing was that we were all fine. Helen still looked like she wanted to murder everyone who breathed, but for now, she wasn’t attacking. She was just standing over the ashes of the plant, staring at it.
When Carter, Nikola and Emanuel came back through the light of the yellow ink on the wall, they were all human, and all dressed.
They were also very panicked.
We were sitting on the floor next to the wall with Malin and Kit, so we saw them first. I made it to my feet with difficulty, although at least ten minutes had passed and my strength was returning to me.
“Soldiers are inside the labyrinth,” Nikola said, rushing to Helen. “We smelled them.”
Carter nodded. “There’s no way we can escape them. They must have stopped the game—the walls aren’t moving anymore.”
“It’s the tree,” Damian said, nodding at the fire consuming the healer’s tree. Fucking hell, it was spreading fast. There was already a lot of smoke around it. Malin had lit it up just a minute ago. “There’s no game without it.”
“There’s a back door through that wall,” Helen said through gritted teeth, nodding her head at the other side of the room—right behind the burning tree.
Oh, thank God. Even though I wanted to kick her ass, I could have kissed her right now.
I grabbed Malin’s hand. “Let’s go.”
Helen and Nikola led the way. Damian and Emanuel were behind us as we approached the fire. The heat and the smoke nearly suffocated me—it was so intense. I already couldn’t wait to get out of there, when…
“I’m going to stay behind,” Damian said, stopping me in my tracks at the side of the tree.
“No, you’re not.”
“I have to. Someone needs to tell the Guild what happened here,” he said. “Or at least a version of it.”
Goddamn it. “Then I’m coming with you.”
“No, I’ll handle them. Go—now,” he ordered.
I shook my head. “I’m not leaving you alone.” For all I knew, he’d end up in a different fucking world by tomorrow.
Damian came closer to me. “They can’t do anything to me, but they can do plenty to you. Be reasonable, little thief,” he whispered. The cut on his cheek had closed almost all the way, and his eyes had gained color again. In them, I could see clearly that he wasn’t going to let me go with him, no matter what I said.
“Fine.” I turned around, grabbed Malin’s hand again, and walked around the tree. Sweat covered my entire body, and we all coughed, trying to clear the smoke from our lungs. I almost didn’t see where Nikola and Helen disappeared to through the smoke, but Emanuel must have because he led us right through the back of the wall. There was ink on it, too, except this one was grey and it wasn’t glowing. I would have never seen it if I wasn’t so close.
“Ready?” Malin said, a small smile on her face, her eyes red and full of tears as she tried not to cough. She couldn’t wait to get out of there, either.
I looked behind me, trying to see if Damian had already left, but I couldn’t make him out from the fire.
“Yeah, let’s go.” We slipped into the screen with Carter right behind us, and suddenly, the smoke disappeared.
I don’t know why I expected to find myself out in the open, but we weren’t. A narrow metal construction with railings on the side was ahead of us. Nikola and Helen walked arm in arm, whispering to each other, and Emanuel was right behind them. To our sides, behind the railings, was an open space that smelled almost worse than the smoke—of piss and rot rolled into one. We were still underground, it seemed, and the ceiling was leaking. Water dripped down on us every few seconds, making me jump every time a drop landed on my head.
When we saw the stairway at the end, I stopped walking.
“I’m going back with Damian,” I said to Carter and Malin.
“What? No!” Malin said. “You heard him—he’s got it covered.”
“I know, but I’m going back, anyway. Just follow Emanuel, okay? You’ll be fine.” Emanuel was already looking back at us. He must have heard me.
“Sin, come on!” Malin complained, and Kit did, too, trying to cut my ear off completely, but I was already walking back. Carter just shook his head at me, a strange smile on his face.
“Take her back home, okay?” I told him, but he didn’t answer. I turned around and barely made it to the grey ink on the wall before jumping into it.
Ah, shit. I’d forgotten to hold my breath.
The tree was burning completely, but that wasn’t all. Somehow, the flowers around it and the mud had caught fire, too. For a second, I thought about turning back. Kit hid under my jacket and I put both my arms in front of my face, but it was no use. I couldn’t see shit from the grey smoke, but I could see where the fire was. All I had to do was stay away from it.
To do that, I had to walk all the way to the other side of the room. My eyes were burning, my throat was burning, my lungs were desperate for some clean air, but I kept on going. Just a little longer. Dead bodies on fire all around me. I’d successfully ignored them earlier, but now, it was impossible. I had to make sure I wasn’t stepping on them.
When I made it to the other side, I felt reborn. The yellow light on the wall barely shone through the smoke. With my eyes closed and my breath held, I jumped into it, half expecting to hit a wall.
I didn’t.
The smoke disappeared, and I fell to my knees, trying to cough my lungs out. Kit jumped off me, raising his fists at me as he screamed his complaints, but at least he was breathing fine. It took me a lot longer than I thought it would to stop, wipe the tears off my eyes, and actually manage to get on my feet. When I walked out the door with the frozen glass, I was still coughing a bit.
Darkness spread before me, illuminated by the blue ink swirling on the sides. I hadn’t missed being in the labyrinth at all, it seemed. At least it was no longer silent. I could hear the footsteps loud and clear, and the next second, Damian turned the corner. His brows were narrowed, and he looked genuinely confused to see me there.
“What are you doing, Sinea?”
I held up a finger as I coughed some more. That would teach me to go into a room full of smoke again.
“I’m coming with you.” I said, finally managing to straighten up and walk to him. I could even see a lot better now.
“I already told you—” Damian started, but I didn’t let him finish.
“It’s not about reason, Mister Vampire. It’s about the principle.” I grinned. He’d said the same thing to me before.
For a second, he just looked at me. I thought he was going to grab me, put me on his shoulder and throw me back inside the room full of smoke. Instead, he smiled, his eyes lighting up like fireworks, and offered me his arm.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Damian Reed
We walked out of the entrance to the labyrinth together. I was aware of the risks perfectly. The Guild was in the casino, everywhere around us, and there was no way to escape them, yet I wasn’t worried.
I had yet to fully believe that Sinea had come back to me. I didn’t think I would never understand what she saw in me.
She was calm, too. Her heart beat steady in her chest, and her breathing was even. She was still coughing from the smoke every few seconds, but it was getting better.
There were thirteen Guild soldiers in the control room of the fae game. They all had firearms because we were out of the Shade, but they wouldn’t use them if they didn’t have to—and we weren’t going to give
them a reason.
“Hold it,” one of the soldiers said, raising a fist to his side. “Are you alone?”
“Yes, we are,” I said.
“Don’t move,” he said and raised four fingers in the air. Four soldiers came at us from the sides, slowly, as if they couldn’t see the condition we were in. It had taken me a lot of effort to contain Helen without actually hurting her. When you fought to kill, it was easier because there wasn’t any control involved. But when you didn’t want to hurt someone and had to fight them anyway, it required twice as much focus. I hadn’t been worried about the redheaded witch even if Carter Conti hadn’t been there. Sinea could have killed her by herself, but Helen had been a handful.
We stood perfectly still while the soldiers searched us, took our weapons, then grabbed us by the arms.
Outside, in the casino’s main room, there were another fifty soldiers. The ceiling of the room was almost completely ruined by the witch’s spell. She’d drawn water from the reservoir underground, all the way into the fae game, and the entire building had suffered for it. It was a miracle the ceiling hadn’t fallen completely.
The soldier, who felt confident to stand in front of me now that they’d taken my sword, cleared his throat. “Mr. Reed, we need to ask you some questions about—”
“I’ll speak to Agent Montgomery, if you don’t mind,” I said politely.
“Sir, Agent Montgomery isn’t here, but we need to take you in for questioning all the same,” the soldier said.
“I intend to tell everything that happened in there, but I will do so when Agent Montgomery gets here. Until then, we can stay wherever you want us to.”
The soldier didn’t like it, but he didn’t argue with me. They wanted us to stay outside. Once they searched the fae game and found the tree burning, they decided that it was safer for everyone if we went out of the casino. There were no vampires among the soldiers—the Sacri Guild didn’t work with vampires, unless they signed contracts with their blood, like I had—but there were werewolves who could hear the rumbling of the walls above us. If the casino owners didn’t do something about it right away, the ceiling would fall by dawn.
They separated Sinea and me in the parking lot in front of the casino. They’d shut the entire place down, and now only the vehicles of the Guild were there. She was barely five feet away from me, resting on the hood of a car. Three soldiers guarded her, while five others guarded me.
We didn’t need to wait longer than thirty minutes before Agent Daniel Montgomery came to the scene. He drove an old blue Mustang that was faster than all the other Guild cars here. He and his partner came out of the car like they owned the entire parking lot. I was tempted to smile. I hadn’t worked with Montgomery before, I’d merely heard about him and his partner, but the way he looked at me from behind all the soldiers said this was going to be interesting. He wasn’t exactly afraid—more curious, but also very cautious.
The three soldiers who’d been guarding Sinea brought her to me, holding her by the arms. The others parted to the sides to make way for the two agents to come through to us.
“He’s a Prime wizard,” Sinea whispered under her breath.
“Partner.”
Daniel Montgomery’s partner, Sean Jennings, was a short man, barely five foot four, with a round head and a muscular body. His familiar was some type of a porcupine, only bigger and with a lot less fur on its back.
But that was not why I’d brought these gentlemen here. Sean Jennings was a Sacri sorcerer, and he was a Level Two Psychic. That’s what the Guild believed Sinea to be, too.
“Mr. Reed,” Montgomery said, offering me his hand. I shook it.
“Agent Montgomery, thank you for coming.”
“Of course,” he said. “You remember my colleague, Agent Jennings.”
“Certainly,” I said as the man nodded his head. “This is Sinea Montero.” Neither of them were interested in her. They only shot a look her way before focusing all their attention on me. “I’m sorry to bring you here at this hour, but it was important that you two gentlemen handled this case. A lot happened in the casino tonight, and I’ll tell you all about it. But I’m afraid Ms. Montero here can’t be of any help. She’s unwell—”
“No, I’ll stay. I want to help, too” Sinea cut me off. “They need to know what happened down there, Mr. Reed.”
I’d never heard her call me Mr. Reed before. I could barely bite back a smile.
Now, the agents were showing more interest in her. Sean Jennings took out a small pad from his pocket and a pen, while his colleague said, “We’re all ears.”
And Sinea started.
“I was out with one of my colleagues—Carter Conti. We are maneater hunters, and we had just separated when these people came out of nowhere and attacked me. It was a ghoul and a wizard. They hit me right here.” She turned the left side of her head to them, and pulled her hair up to show them, but she didn’t need to. Dried blood was everywhere on her hair and on the side of her neck, and her ear had just healed from a nasty cut right through the middle. I’d seen the witch kick her in the head down there, but I’d had no idea it had been so much. I watched as Montgomery inspected the wound with a flinch, and Jennings took his notes. “It knocked me right out, and when I woke up, I was in this strange room with some other people, and I was tied to a chair.” She pulled up her hands and showed them her wrists. Thin, raw lines broke her skin with small blisters by the sides. Helen had had her fire rope around Sinea’s wrists when I’d finally found them. Anger nudged the monster inside me awake, but I pushed it down. It was done. The wounds would heal as long as she got to walk away from this.
“They said something about using me as demonstration, but I’m afraid I can’t remember. My ears were whistling the whole time. There was a redheaded witch in there, and she was growing a plant, I think. And then there was a fight. I fell down in the mud.” She made a point of waving down her body, her clothes torn and completely brown with mud. “And then there was a fire.” She sighed, and turned to look at me, her eyes wide and full of sadness. My, my, she truly was a brilliant actress. “If Mr. Reed here hadn’t saved me, I’d have burned to death, too.”
Were those tears in her eyes?
I bit my tongue again, even though both the agents were focused on her now.
“Would you be able to give a description of the men who took you?” Montgomery asked.
“Yes, I would,” Sinea said without hesitation. “I’m afraid they all died down there, in that strange room. There were six of them, I think.”
“Do you remember the species?”
“Two ghouls, a witch with bright red hair, and three wizards. There was also another guy in there, I think a darkling sorcerer, but I’m not sure. They killed him.”
“No others?”
Sinea shook her head. “Not that I remember.”
“We’ll have to check on that,” Montgomery said, looking down at Jennings’ pad as if to see that he’d written everything down. “From what our soldiers have been able to gather so far, there’s been some very heavy magic use here tonight. You understand that we need to test you, just to clear up any suspicions.”
“Absolutely, yeah. Anything I can do to help,” Sinea said.
“That’s great. If you could wait for us here,” Montgomery said, holding up his finger, and they both left us to go speak to some of the soldiers who’d been waiting for us in the fae room.
“How did I do?” Sinea whispered, looking ahead, her lips never moving. Her hellbeast squeaked from her shoulder, and even I understood that he wasn’t happy.
“Better than most, I’ll admit,” I said, barely moving my lips. The five soldiers behind us weren’t werewolves. They couldn’t hear us.
“Better than you?”
I almost laughed. “I wouldn’t go that far.”
Through the corner of my eye, I saw her putting a hand over her mouth.
“Did you get what you needed?” she asked.
I nodded. I�
�d gotten Yutain’s berry before Malin had burned down the plant. I’d also gotten another two. They were with Emanuel, and they would be safe at the penthouse until I got there.
A second later, Montgomery and Jennings turned toward us.
“Go home, little thief,” I said to Sinea. She’d done her part—and perfectly. Both the agents believed in every word she said. Now she needed to leave and go home.
“Will you come over when it’s done?” The excitement in her voice had me fighting for control again.
“Tomorrow at nightfall. I’ll be there,” I promised. It was only hours away now. Hours—and she would be mine. I no longer cared about apologies. I didn’t care about anything after that kiss in the puzzle room. I’d never considered myself lucky before—there was no luck in being dead—but tonight, I couldn’t seem to shake the thought.
When the agents reached us, they took Sinea to the other side of the parking lot, to an ambulance van that belonged to the Guild, but from the outside, it looked identical to the ones humans used. By now, Sinea would have taken the Talent of Agent Jennings, and when they took her blood, the results would be the same as they had been when the Guild first tested her as a kid: a Level Two Sacri sorcerer.
I was nervous, which wasn’t like me. She’d done this before. She knew her blood transformed, too, when she used her Talent, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what would happen if something went wrong.
“Mr. Reed, ready to talk?” Montgomery said when he stopped across from me.
“Whenever you are.”
They took me to the casino and sat with me on its stairs. I’d rather I had stayed on my feet, but I wanted them to feel comfortable around me. I wanted to give them the impression that I was tired, too.
“A few days ago, I got a call from an acquaintance about a special offer he had to make me. He wouldn’t give me any details, but he seemed sure that I’d be interested. All he said was that it was going to happen here in New York during the full moon.”
“And what was the special offer?”