Magic Underground: The Complete Collection (Magic Underground Anthologies Book 4)

by Melinda Kucsera

  Iraine stole carefully through the shadows listening hard for voices. She didn't want to explain what she was doing here after she'd been given leave to take a much-needed break. But God had her back, the tunnel was deserted. Good. Iraine pulled a yellow lumir crystal from her utility belt and played its light over the trail of fallen rocks leading to the collapsed tunnel.

  She'd roped off this area after the ‘bird monster’ incident, which still made her laugh when she thought about it. Those unlucky Guards must have startled Nulthir’s creature friends, and they'd dived at the interlopers to scare them away. But his owl-cat creatures hadn’t left so much as a scratch on any of the hapless Guards.

  What a sight that must have been. Too bad she’d missed it. Laughter died in her throat as the glow of the lumir crystal fell on the severed rope. What in hellfires happened here? Iraine crouched down to examine its frayed ends. Someone had sawed through it.

  Footfalls sounded nearby. Rocks scraped and skittered. Who was poking around in the rubble?

  Iraine closed her fist around the lumir crystal, so only a narrow beam knifed between her gloved fingers. Thank God her skin was as brown as her eyes. In her dark blue uniform tunic and trousers, she blended into the darkness and became one with it.

  A thrill went through her. God, how she loved the hunt. Iraine patted her handcuffs. They were still secured tightly to her utility belt, too tightly to jangle as she crept through the darkness. Good because she might have to restrain someone—like one of the creatures she'd spoken to earlier.

  That bird creature was the only other being who knew about the magicked glass mixed in with the rocks. An image of that owl-cat creature flashed through her mind. He’d fixed such sincere yellow eyes on her when he'd warned her about the strange shards mixed in with the fallen rocks. If they were so dangerous, then why had he returned?

  Iraine slowed as the sounds of someone sifting through the debris grew louder. She ducked behind a stalagmite that had somehow escaped damage during the collapse and peered around it at a wall of rocks, blocking the tunnel. A hooded person in flowing gray robes squatted in the rubble, holding a lumir crystal in one hand and a dark shard that seemed to drink in the crystal’s light in his other hand.

  He seemed to be unaffected by it. How strange. But his light source wasn’t so fortunate. It went dark, and Iraine drew back involuntarily at the sight of that evil glass and its power.

  Iraine laid a hand over her racing heart and the three crosses under her tunic. They were probably glowing, but she couldn’t check right now because the lumir crystal in her hand had just winked out. Darkness consumed the tunnel. But if she couldn’t see the scavenger, then he couldn’t see her.

  “I know you’re there,” the scavenger rasped, killing that plan. “Come out and face me.”

  Yeah right, like that was a good idea. Iraine circled the stalagmite. She needed answers, yes, but at what cost? Those shards were dangerous. They’d almost knocked her out the last time she’d gotten near them, and she was the only Guard who knew about them.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have roped off the area so quickly. Was it too late now to make a clean breast of it to her supervisor? Not if she could slip away unseen. Mart needed to know about those shards, the collapsed tunnel, and the strange illness affecting the inmates in this part of the prison were all connected somehow.

  Her faith had saved her earlier, and it would save her again. Iraine darted out of cover. The transept wasn’t far, just on the other side of the next cell-lined cavern. Mart should still be there. Iraine crept over and around the rocks scattered about until she’d cleared the edge of the debris field. She hoped none of those shards were in her path.

  Cold stung the nape of her neck, freezing her in place as that vile magic rolled down her spine, stealing her heat and something else deep inside her. Iraine tried to touch her crosses for protection, but her arm wouldn't cooperate. "Drop the shard. You're under arrest."

  A raspy laugh started her. “Not likely. You're the one who's going under. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. You were an innocent bystander caught up in something you couldn’t understand,” the scavenger said as Iraine fell into the arms of darkness.

  Catch your Guard, my Savior, please, Iraine prayed as the world slipped away.

  Chapter Four

  Amal shouted something, but Thing ignored it. Through their bond, he felt her concern, but she was worrying in vain again. The halls of Nulthir’s mind were as familiar as his own. Silly mate, Thing sent to her, and that errant thought did its job. No magic can keep my friend from me. Not even the dark magic pulling his friend back down into unconsciousness. It wouldn't win.

  Amal shot him a glare for the 'silly mate' comment. At least she wasn’t fretting anymore.

  Thing shifted his weight. His muscles ached from all the sitting about, but that very stillness was necessary, especially for periods of deep concentration like right now. Thing put his mate’s concerns and her repeated shouts of ‘you’re losing him’ out of mind as he kept up the psychic pressure. Fight it, old friend.

  “Are we going to lose him?” Crispin asked in concern.

  Did no one have any faith in him anymore? Thing shook his head, but that nonverbal response didn’t allay anyone’s fears. He sighed and worked his beak. It was stiff from all that teeth grinding he’d been doing.

  “No,” Thing said finally, and there was such finality in his voice, it raised his mate's hopes. Thing felt it through their bond, and he doubled down on the call. He had a tenuous connection to Nulthir, and he pulled on it with all his mental might. Wake up and talk to me. You’re scaring the kits.

  Come back to us, Amal added her mind-voice to the call before Thing could stop her. It's not your time to die. You've only just begun to live.

  But That did it. Consciousness was a blue flame to Thing’s eyes. It caught after three tries and burned low in his friend’s mind. The darkness was in there too, waiting for a chance to pounce, but Thing held it at bay with the power of his mind.

  “He’s coming out of it.” Thing roused his feathers. He needed to move. “Help me hold him here.”

  "How did you bring him back?" Amal asked, but Thing didn’t have time to answer her. So, he did the expedient thing, he packaged up the whole tête-à-tête he'd had in Nulthir’s mind and shunted it across the mental bond he shared with her.

  Ouch. Thanks for the headache, honey. A little warning next time, please, Amal sent. She shook her head as the highlights of his psychic travels unfolded, complete with sound and pictures then fell into a deep silence as she absorbed everything. Her prehensile tail reflexively stabbed the air, showing just how upset she was at him. Oh well, she needed to know, and he didn’t have time to explain it all.

  I didn't realize you were so delicate, Thing sent with perhaps a touch more sarcasm than was necessary. The seeing stone shuddered, and Thing shut the door between their minds before Amal could reply or get a glimpse of the item. This wasn’t for her eyes yet, not until he knew whether there was anything to report.

  Thing felt Amal’s glare as he swung up onto the headboard still gripping that stone. When he’d put enough distance between them, Thing opened his hand. The eye carved in the stone in his hand opened as a presence activated the watcher spell carved into its twin—the stone he’d left back with those strange glass shards. Thing mantled his wings. No, not now. Not when he was needed here. This was the worst time for that stone to wake up.

  But it had awoken and unlike him, it couldn’t see well in the dark. It could just sense when something broke the invisible beam its twin generated. Which meant someone was rummaging around in the debris where the shards of that glass object were. Thing had known that would happen, but it was too soon.

  “What are you looking at?” Amal used her tail to swing up beside him.

  Below, Nulthir opened his eyes. They were black pools, but his friend was in there. Thing exhaled in relief. Stay with him. Keep him from slipping into the dark again, Thing sent a
s he launched himself off the headboard and flapped hard for the door.

  “Wait, where are you going?” Amal called after him.

  “To get answers.” Thing punched the rune that shut off the wards and opened the door. Before it had swung completely open, he turned sideways and flew through the gap then tapped the rune on the other side to shut it.

  “Wait, Father, I’m coming with you.” Crispin shot out of that narrowing gap just before the door clicked closed.

  Then fly swiftly, son. There isn’t much time. Thing headed for the stairwell at the end of the corridor.

  As Thing dodged flying buttresses and squawking birds, he kept his thoughts focused on his goal and ignored his friend's frantic call. Amal would hold Nulthir to life until he returned, hopefully with answers. Magic could do anything with the right inducement, and it was up to him to find it.

  Thing checked the seeing stone before they shot through a portal into a dark stairwell, but there was no change. Someone kept breaking its beam. Good, he might just reach it in time to see who had come to collect those vile shards and just maybe, he could follow that person to his master and find out if that person was in league with Nulthir’s family. At this point, any information he could glean would help.

  “Where are we going? You said, 'to get answers,' but what does that mean?” Crispin asked as he struggled to keep up.

  They were winding at breakneck speed around the central pillar in the spiral staircase leading down to the Lower Quarters where the prison was located. But his son wasn’t built for speed. None of his and Amal’s kits were.

  Thing didn’t understand why their kits were more feline than raptor. The next generation was even less bird-like. Then there was the teleporting Furball. Thoughts like these led back to his parents, but Thing couldn’t remember them. When he tried, there was just a younger version of Nulthir.

  “Dad?”

  “What?”

  “You didn’t answer my question. I need to know what situation we’re flying into.” Damn. Crispin had a point.

  Thing dodged the arm of a sword-toting statue. He’d let his circular flight path take him too close to the wall enclosing the stairwell and its decorations. This was taking too long. Thing pulled his wings in and dropped straight down the shaft, adjusting course here and there to avoid those pesky steps.

  If someone saw them, so be it. No humans could catch him. If they tried, they’d just run smack into the prison’s gates or its Guards. But Thing doubted anyone would look up. Below, passersby were few and far between at this hour since most of them were at their jobs doing whatever humans did to earn a living. Ahead, their exit loomed. It was a pale rectangle in the gloom.

  “We’re going back to the prison, aren’t we?” Crispin must have recognized it from the night before.

  “Yes, we have unfinished business there.”

  “It’s those shards, right? Did Nulthir tell you how to dispose of them without it affecting us?”

  “No.” Thing sent his magical senses ranging ahead of him, feeling for trouble beyond the exit and found none. Good, because he shot through the doorway moments later and flapped hard for the ceiling high above.

  “He didn’t? Then why are we heading back there?”

  “For answers. You'll see.” Well, Thing would see. He didn’t need light, but his son might.

  “I hate when you’re this terse.”

  No more speaking aloud. Mind-speech only from here on out, Thing chided him. We don’t know who’s listening.

  Good point. Will you at least tell me what answers we’re searching for? Crispin pushed hard, but he was still several man-lengths behind, and he was falling farther behind with every wingbeat.

  I can’t tell you what I don’t know. And that ate at Thing. With his friend down, there was no one they could turn to for magical help.

  You must pull through, Friend Nulthir. You can’t slip into the dark. We need you. Thing sent those thoughts into the wind blowing through the vents cut in the ceiling as he flew as swiftly and silently as only a creature who was part owl could.

  Chapter Five

  Amal stared after her mate for a long moment before shaking her head. He could be so guarded at times. What are you up to, heart of my heart, and why are you keeping it from me? She considered sending that thought out to him. But Thing had left in a terrible hurry, so his errand was probably urgent. Her questions could keep until he returned. Nulthir needed her now.

  “Amal? Are you there?” he asked in a strangled voice.

  “I’m always here for you.” She extended her hand.

  His hand engulfed hers. “Why can’t I see you? There’s a dark veil over everything. It's choking me.” He gasped for breath.

  That was troubling. Amal squeezed his thumb. “I don’t know. Likely it has something to do with what’s happening to you.”

  “But you see the darkness?" Nulthir pointed at the door her mate and son had just left through.

  Shadows lay thicker there than elsewhere in the room, but she doubted that's what he meant. Amal patted his hand. "It's in your mind. Fight it."

  "How? I don’t want to darken. Down that path lies death, madness, and blood. Dark magic is the enemy of all that lives. I don’t want to become your worst nightmare.”

  But he might not have a choice. His mother had experimented on her children and with each one refined the process a little more, which was why they were all a little nuts. Amal had thought he’d escaped that fate when they’d left Avenia. All that drama wasn’t supposed to follow him. He should be safe in this underground city.

  Amal wished she could push her strength into him. “Then don’t let it take you.”

  Sure, that was easy to say but hard to carry out when that darkness was already inside him thanks to that glass object and the markings on his skin that his own mother had put there. That foul creature's plan was working through him even now, and it set Amal's teeth on edge.

  She stared at the runes inked on his shoulder through a rent in the fabric she'd made when she’d tended the wound there. Had the runes multiplied?

  Amal peeled back more of the blue wool, tearing his tunic further. There were more than she remembered seeing there a few hours ago. “How many tattoos do you have?”

  “Dunno, I never counted them. I’ve had some since I was small.” Nulthir winced as some of the markings moved.

  They were multiplying. No doubt that was his mother’s doing. There must not have been enough skin to write the entire spell that would transform him into what? What had his mother wanted to create? Amal reviewed the psychic conversation Thing had sent her, but it wasn’t much help. What was a 'dark star?'

  “What was your endgame?” Amal mused aloud. “What were you trying to do?”

  “Get more power. That’s what she wants now, but she wasn't always like that. I think it was the death of my brother that triggered it.”

  Amal didn’t think so, but she kept that thought to herself. It couldn’t be easy finding out your family was evil. “I think it went deeper than that. She made you into a vessel for something.”

  “For dark magic. That’s what she wanted, a dark mage. Dark mages aren’t born. They’re made. But she’s not making me into one. Hell no. I’d rather die.” Nulthir tried to sit up and flopped back down on the mattress, the breath driven out of him.

  There’d be no dying on her watch. Amal moved closer until they were eye-to-eye. “You’re not a mage, so the likelihood of you turning into a dark mage is pretty slim.”

  “Maybe you’re right. Mages make magic. They can store lots of it, and I can’t. I can just hold it for a bit and channel it into runes.” Nulthir closed his eyes, not willingly because he struggled to open them again. The conversation was tiring him, and he was darkening to her mage sight. Not good, especially not in a channel.

  He needed more light to drive out the dark, but where could she get that? One person sprang instantly to mind—the mage boy who’d helped them many moons ago. That boy had s
o much magic and light within him; he glowed. But Amal had no idea where in Shayari that boy was now.

  “Stay with me.” Amal laid her small hand on his brow. It was ice cold, not good in humans.

  “Where’s Thing?”

  “Off on some mysterious errand. You know him. When he gets an idea in his feathered head, there's no stopping him.” Amal rolled her eyes, but Nulthir knew what she meant. After all, he'd grown up with her mate.

  “What happened to your wing?” Nulthir squinted at it.

  “This wing?” Amal glanced at it too. It was still numb and hanging limply from her shoulder.

  Nulthir touched her wing with shaking fingers. “It’s so cold.”

  Her flight feathers had already blackened, and that blackness was creeping up her shoulder, darkening her feathers as it went. Amal wished that was all it was doing, but she couldn’t ignore it anymore. Her bum wing drank in the soft light falling on her.

  It was a cold spot not just in her infrared vision, but to her mage sight as well, and that coldness was spreading. The rune on her breast wasn't keeping it at bay anymore. What would that darkness do when it reached her heart? Her mind? The base of her power?

  Amal squawked in surprise as Nulthir rolled off the bed. She hopped to its edge and glanced down at him sprawled on the floor in obvious pain. How the hell were they going to put him back to bed now that the enchanted blanket had been reduced to balls of bespelled yarn?

  “Are you alright?” Thistle landed next to Nulthir, and he shook his head.

  “Why did you do that?” Amal hopped down beside him.

  “I know how to fix your wing.” Nulthir tried to push up to a sit and failed. His shaking arms slipped out from under him, and he crashed back down on his side. Only hours before, he’d been strong and capable. How could dark magic take away his vitality so quickly?

  “Lie still. You must conserve your strength.” Amal placed a hand on his chest.