“Where the hell is it?” I muttered.
My gaze wandered around, trying to make out the heart in the rest of the debris that littered the thick blanket of snow in this small clearing. Soul and Kelara went after the remaining Darklings. Trev was unconscious and bleeding. His condition wasn’t fatal, but we had to get him out of here as quickly as possible.
Ridan’s spine-tingling roars echoed through the woods, making the trees tremble and shed their snow. The ghouls were foolish enough to take him on in physical form. Ridan spat fire at them—a thick and unforgiving stream that set them alight. He then snapped his jaws around them, tearing limbs and heads off like it was a twisted game. I could almost see the excitement and pleasure in his big, amber-colored reptilian eyes.
But the heart… I couldn’t find it. Meanwhile, Danika was in the process of getting up. I only had seconds to get this done, and my pulse was racing. Eventually, I spotted the lonesome organ under a broken ledge. I made my way through the snow to grab it, but a sudden burst of cold air smacked into me, and I fell.
“Na-ah-ah! That one’s mine, silly,” Danika said, scythe glowing white as she walked toward me. Her smirking satisfaction was short-lived, however, as fire swallowed her whole. The screams tearing from her throat made me quiver.
Ridan had gotten her good. I managed to retrieve Ramus’s heart, then rushed over to Trev’s side and put his arm over my shoulder. Planting my feet firmly into the frozen ground, I helped him up just as Ridan finished scorching the daylight out of Danika.
“We need to go!” Soul cried out. “Something’s happened in Roano!”
Danika screeched as she ran toward a mound of snow, flames dancing on her reddening, melting skin. She screamed from the bottom of her lungs as she struggled to put the fires out, but Ridan gave her another round of dragon breath. Even in such agony, she didn’t let go of the scythe, and I knew that had to be the only thing that kept her from dying.
“Ridan! Retreat! We’ve got the heart!” I shouted, and the dragon turned his attention to me, huffing and puffing as he moved away from Danika. The rest of the Darklings and the ghouls were dead, and we’d gotten what we’d come here for—albeit the hard way.
“Ah. And I thought you might be in need of assistance,” Widow muttered, suddenly appearing to my left. Kailani, Hunter, Nightmare, and Dream were with him, and they looked startled and worried, partially covered in soot and minor scratches.
“What happened to you?” I asked, out of breath.
“It really is a story worth telling another time,” Nightmare said. “Let’s go. Now!”
Before Danika’s fire was completely out, Ridan shifted back into his humanoid form, prompting the Reapers to squirm and moan in protest. “Good grief, man!” Widow turned away.
“You perv!” Soul mumbled, looking away.
“Sorry!” Ridan shot back. “Shifting doesn’t include clothes.”
I slipped Ramus’s heart into my satchel, and we all linked hands. Trev leaned into me, and that was all the physical contact he needed. A few more minutes without any healing packs, and he’d pass out again.
Danika looked terrible, black-and-red crusts covering her whole body. That long blonde hair was gone. Her clothes, too. The prosthetics had melted, and I could see some of her bones through the charred flesh. As long as she had the scythe on her, she wouldn’t burn completely. Now the fire was out, but she was far too weak and in too much pain to even try to move.
“I’ll kill you!” she bawled. “I’ll kill you all!”
“What’s with the fried chicken?” Hunter asked Ridan, pointing a thumb at Danika. “New recipe?”
I couldn’t hold back, bursting into laughter as Kelara teleported us away from this snow-laden clearing. We’d left death and destruction in our wake, but we’d managed to retrieve Ramus’s heart. Danika still only had three shards of Spirit’s soul, and the damage she’d taken would take a while to heal. Even with death magic protection, dragon fire had managed to do quite a number on her.
As soon as we reappeared in Roano, however, more trouble waited for us. Seniors were rushing toward the north tower. Dozens of them, their fangs and claws out, aggression radiating from them. There was a general air of danger in the city, and it hung heavy and thick, like smoke.
“Ridan, here,” I murmured, pulling a simple one-piece set of overalls from my satchel. I always carried one just in case he needed it. The perks of dating a dragon…
“Something’s wrong,” Widow muttered.
“We don’t have Telluris to reach out to Derek anymore, either,” I said. “Danika burned our comms, too, with that pulse.”
We made our way up the cobbled road, looking around carefully as we went. The Orvisians stayed back, giving each other confused and worried looks. There was no sign of the other Reapers in this part of Roano. I didn’t see Esme or Sofia anywhere. Or Kalla. Only more Seniors running, eager to take someone or something on.
Finally, I spotted Arya farther ahead. “Arya!” I shouted. “What’s happening?”
She stopped and turned around, surprised to see us all here. I put Trev down and handed him a healing pack filled with nutrients and swamp witch potions designed to speed up his recovery. He’d already been trained on what this stuff did, so he just tore off the top and chugged the whole thing down.
Arya walked over. “Petra did something,” she said. “One of the Visentis boys told us.”
“What did she do?” I asked, once again feeling the cold grip of fear, its icy fingers tightening around my throat, squeezing and cutting off my air supply.
“She had Moore attack Esme. Then Esme rushed back to the western tower, saying Petra wasn’t here to help us at all,” Arya explained. “That’s all the boys could tell me, but they were worried about Esme, so I mobilized the Seniors at once. A couple of them confirmed suspicious activity in the north tower, and they had also spotted Derek, Sofia and Esme running in there. Petra must’ve set herself loose, somehow, and found Kalon.”
The Reapers and I looked at one another. Less than a second later, we were all running with Arya, the north tower rapidly rising ahead. By the time we reached its main entrance, the first signs of trouble emerged. Derek and Sofia held the Seniors back, urging everyone to keep their distance.
“We don’t know what she’s capable of, and we—as living creatures—can’t do anything against her,” Derek said. “Lumi and Esme and Time are up there. Hopefully, they’ll be able to get her out.”
“Get her out from where?” I asked.
“Kalon’s room,” he replied, his voice strained. “She got to him.”
“Let us help!” Mira insisted.
“You can’t,” Sofia replied. “I wish you could, but you can’t. Petra is capable of killing any of you. We can’t lose any more people. Besides, she’s sealed herself in the room with Kalon’s interdimensional pocket. No one has been able to get through so far, not even Time.”
“What the hell happened?!” Kailani blurted. She quickly checked Sofia’s healing bruises, then Derek’s. “You two look like crap.”
“Petra. Petra happened,” Derek said, and gave us a brief rundown of the events leading up to this moment, including a more detailed description of the sleeper spell the high priestess had activated inside her own son and the scythe he’d carried his whole life without even knowing it.
The more he spoke, the more my nausea intensified. I swallowed back bile as I looked up at the tower. “When we came to, Esme was already running up towards the north tower to catch her, but it was too late,” Sofia continued. “Petra blocked access to Kalon’s room.”
“We should’ve seen this coming,” Hunter muttered. “We should’ve checked her more carefully for hidden weapons.”
“You wouldn’t have found anything,” Soul said. “Judging by what Derek just told us, Petra mastered the art of Concealment, which is how we hide our scythes from sight by manipulating the laws of space and matter. She used it to hide a weapon on her youngest son, an
inconspicuous carrier. So, when Time checked her, he didn’t see anything.”
My heart beat erratically, and I couldn’t sit still for another moment. I couldn’t let Esme stay up there alone. “Where’s Amal?” I asked, hoping my sister wasn’t involved in any of this.
“She’s safe in the eastern tower, working on the day-walking cure,” Mira said. “I was visiting her when Arya called us all out.”
“And the Visentis boys?” Ridan replied.
“With Kalla. They’re also safe,” Sofia said.
“I have to see this for myself.” I dashed around her, heading for the tower.
“Amane, wait!” Sofia shouted, but it was too late. I was already running up the stone stairs, spiraling upward until Esme and Lumi came into view. They stood in front of an open doorway. Time sat on the floor next to it with his back against the wall.
“She’s been playing us,” I said. “Petra’s been playing us.”
Esme whirled around, exhaling deeply when she saw me. “You’re okay. And the others?”
“Trev took a hit, but he’ll live,” I replied with a nod. “You?”
She frowned, a muscle ticking in her jaw. “She’s trying to get to him.”
“And she will succeed,” Time said quietly, his gaze lowered. “Petra has the power to reach into Soul’s interdimensional pockets.”
I moved closer, standing next to Esme and Lumi. I could see Petra from here, the air glimmering in the doorway. She’d put some kind of shield up to hold us all back. She gave us a sideways glance and smiled.
“Oh good. An audience,” she said.
Her scythe lit up a strange blue color unlike anything I’d seen before. It had a faint violet glow, and it felt… ominous. She moved the scythe slowly, the blade’s tip leaving a dark trace in the air as her lips moved. Petra was whispering a spell.
“She’s opening the pocket,” I croaked.
Esme
As soon as I’d come to, I’d run up here, knowing Petra would find Kalon. Indeed, she had. Not only that, but she’d somehow managed to outsmart the Time Master. She’d kicked him out of the room and placed a powerful shield against the door and the walls, effectively prohibiting anyone from entering.
And now she was cutting through Soul’s interdimensional pocket while we watched. Terror froze the blood in my veins while rage lit fires in the pit of my stomach. I was a miserable mess of hot and cold, shattered by the speed with which everything had gone awry. We couldn’t have spotted that second scythe. We’d been fooled. It wasn’t the first time, but it was definitely the last. I’d make sure of it.
One way or another, Petra was not walking out of here alive. The only problem was that she was moments away from reaching Kalon, and that would further put him in harm’s way.
“Why would you do this?” I asked. When she didn’t answer, I slammed my fist against the defensive spell. It pushed me back like a surge of electricity, making my skin buzz. I shook it off. “Petra, he’s your son!”
Amane put a hand on my shoulder in a bid to comfort me, but nothing could help. Nothing, except Kalon’s safety. Lumi continued analyzing the shield, using one glowing index finger to slowly touch the glimmering membrane as she tried to understand what it did and how it could be broken.
Time was disillusioned and self-deprecating because Petra had thrown him out of his own space. “How did she do that?” I asked, trying to wrap my head around this fuzzy concept.
“It was in the Spirit Bender’s chronicles. Instructions on how to outfox each of his First Tenner brothers,” Time said. “She knows who I am because I told her.” That had to hurt. I certainly sympathized with the Reaper. An entity of his domain and talents, outdone by a resourceful Aeternae. Yeah, that had to sting.
“Meh, I would’ve figured you out, anyway. Spirit gave us accurate descriptions of each of his brothers and sisters. With that timepiece, you instantly stood out,” Petra replied.
“She used an altered expulsion spell by editing the wards I carved into the exterior walls of the room. As soon as she came in and uttered the subwords, I was thrown out,” Time said to me. “All this, just so she can get her own son killed. It’s despicable.”
“He’s my son, like everyone keeps reminding me, yes. But he’s also a traitor,” Petra said. “And I like living too much. I thought I’d already explained myself.”
“I need you to do it again, because I simply can’t fathom how a mother would do this to her own child! You gave birth to him! You raised him. He’s a part of you, and you’re going to get him killed!”
“He made his choice the moment he allowed you into his life,” Petra spat. She slipped the scythe into the dark cut, using her other hand to open it wide. Smiling, she put the scythe away and reached into the nothingness, feeling for something until she found it. Well, until she found him. Kalon. “There you are, honey…”
“Petra, if you do this, I swear I will kill you. No one will save you. I will cut your head off and ruin everything!”
Lumi clicked her teeth. “And I’ll watch with great delight. I swear I’m not a sadist, but she really deserves it.”
“Is there no way to get through?” Amane asked Time.
“No. She used words I never learned,” he replied, his crippling disappointment apparent.
“It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try,” Amane said.
“I have tried! Every attempt to take this thing down results in electrocution, the kind that hurts both the living and the likes of me! It doesn’t work. I don’t know the words.”
“Wouldn’t Death know them?” I wondered, my gaze fixed on Petra as she slowly pulled Kalon’s crystalized form from the nothingness, my heart shrinking painfully in my chest.
“Sure. But she wouldn’t know what combination was used for this particular spell,” Time reminded me. “That has always been the trouble with the words she gave the Spirit Bender.”
Taking a deep breath, I looked at Petra again. “You’re making a big mistake. We could have protected you.”
“What, you think once the Unending was free, she’d grant me amnesty?” Petra chuckled, openly mocking me. “Don’t be ridiculous. I would be the first to be snuffed out if the undead bitch gets free. No, I like my Visio just the way it is, thank you. I’m a Darkling. I’ve always been a Darkling, ever since I was a little girl. This is the only way, and I was fortunate enough to learn this transfer spell. Kalon has caused me nothing but grief, so maybe it’ll feel less horrible when Danika tears his heart out and completes the Spirit Bender’s soul. Either way, our founder shall return, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“You won’t win. I promise you!” I snarled, but it only made her laugh harder.
She made me feel helpless. The pain in my chest expanded as she set Kalon’s figure on the floor. With the tip of her scythe’s blade, Petra cut open the crystalline coating in which Time had kept Kalon. I could see him now. He seemed so peaceful, immersed in a deep sleep. He didn’t deserve what Petra had planned for him. I couldn’t let her do this to him.
Soul and the other First Tenners joined us, all of them sullen and worried as they tried to get past the barrier. None succeeded, which only amused Petra even more. It wasn’t like we could break down the wall to get to her. The exterior wardings she’d modified protected the entire room. Therefore, the barrier didn’t solely apply to the doorway or the windows.
“Try all you want. I spent years learning my magic,” she said. “I’m going to make you all watch so that you learn this lesson once and for all. The Darklings are here to stay, and we will prevail. The Unending will continue her cycle, and you will all fail!”
“Technically, that’s not true,” Seeley said, coming up the stairs with Nethissis and Kelara by his side. “Death will be free eventually, and she will wipe you all out of existence. At best, you’ll buy yourselves a couple of centuries.”
“Not if we bring the Spirit Bender back,” Petra retorted, straightening her back as she looked at Seeley. “
From what I’ve learned, the Spirit Bender was the one who sealed Death in the first place. If we restore his presence, our empire will survive and thrive forever.”
Widow leaned into Lumi. “Any luck yet?”
“With Word magic? No. I was hoping you might have something,” she replied.
“If Time—who’s better versed in this than we are—couldn’t hack it, I doubt we could.” Widow sighed, revealing his scythe. “But maybe some good old-fashioned violence will at least put a dent in the damn thing.”
He rammed the enormous blade into the defense spell. It blew back in a spectacular fashion, tossing him against the wall. His scythe dropped and fell down the stairs, clanging incessantly until it reached the ground floor.
“Dammit,” Widow muttered and went down to retrieve it. By the time he was back, we’d definitely learned something.
“Yeah, so good old-fashioned violence won’t help either,” Dream replied dryly, then pursed her lips as she scowled at Petra. “You’re going down for this, I promise you.”
“Mm-hm. Yes. Plenty of threats in the face of the inevitable. You’re all pathetic,” Petra said, unbuttoning Kalon’s shirt. She knelt beside him and cut a small incision into his chest.
“Don’t!” I screamed. “Dammit, Petra, don’t do this!”
Amane held me back, as I was about to kick and punch the crap out of the defense spell, even though I knew it would shake me to the core, and not in a good way. I struggled to free myself, but she didn’t let go even as I cried and called out Kalon’s name over and over, hoping he might hear me. Hoping he might wake up and stop Petra before it was too late.
“Kalon! Kalon! Open your eyes! Kalon!”
Petra snickered, opening the top part of her dress to reveal the smooth, pale skin of her chest. She cut herself the same way she’d cut Kalon, then pressed the tip of the blade into his incision. Almost instantly, a golden thread appeared, connecting the cuts. The blood became incandescent as Petra inhaled deeply and proceeded with an incantation.
A Shade of Vampire 84: A Memory of Time Page 23