The Book of the Ghost

by Eric Asher

  The first caught Zola’s shield and shattered. The second sunk into Vicky’s backpack, and the third, the one that should’ve hit her in the head, was caught by a shield from the heavens.

  Drake’s cry was the stuff of nightmares. He wasn’t on his dragon anymore. Perhaps he had taken the idea from the fairy who had almost cut him down. But unlike those failed attempts, Drake was a Demon Sword. And he had magicks to rival the Lords of Faerie. Fire erupted around him. Not the magical blue flame of the dragons, but an intense inferno spun from the bowels of a volcano.

  The Beast of Gorias pulled away, but the heat singed the dragon’s flank, burned away the hair exposed on the rider’s head, and blistered flesh as Drake’s sword rang off the rider’s helmet. The rider was fast. Impossibly fast. He had his own shield up in an instant, and parried Drake’s second blow.

  Vicky didn’t see what happened next, as Jasper dove straight for the ground, Luna launching off his back ahead of them. Jasper barely pulled up in time to land upright, and Vicky’s face smashed against the spikes she’d been holding. She grunted, but she didn’t slow down either. She slid off Jasper’s back, made sure Zola and Terrence were following her, and sprinted after the shadows in the dark.

  Jasper launched himself into the air and released one last fireball toward the horned dragon. It smashed into the other creature’s rear leg, and the beast roared. On singed wings, the beast tilted and fled. But Drake’s dragon fell from the sky, descending on the Beast of Gorias with its claws outstretched, claws that tore through the rider and sent the fairy to the earth in pieces.

  Drake’s dragon looped around upside down and swept up underneath him, catching the Demon Sword across the saddle spot between her spines. She came down gently beside Jasper and chased after the group.

  “He’s hurt,” Vicky said, glancing back again even as she hurried after the sprinting shadows in front of them.

  “Ah know,” Zola said. “But we have to get to Sam. It’s our only chance.”

  Another fireball exploded in the distance, lighting the area around them, and Vicky finally understood why the massive shadow running beside the vampire seemed so familiar.

  “Aeros!”

  The pair paused near a wall, turning to survey who was behind them.

  “God damn it, girl,” Zola shouted at Sam. “You did get away from Vik. And you, you giant pile of rocks, what were you thinking?”

  Aeros blinked slowly at Zola. “I am thinking my friends need help, and so I am helping them.”

  “Sam,” Vicky said. “Don’t.”

  Sam pulled the black mask off her face, and Vicky could see her equally black hair framing sad eyes. “I want to try to talk to him. But if it doesn’t work … if it doesn’t work …” Her hand pressed over a small bump beneath her jacket. Vicky had little doubt that’s where she was hiding the splendorum mortem.

  “There’s another way,” Vicky said, holding a hand out to Sam.

  Sam turned around and looked away. Vicky blinked as she realized how close they’d gotten to Damian. Which meant they were behind enemy lines. Which meant as soon as any of the dark-touched noticed them, they were in deep shit.

  “Gaia can take him,” Vicky said, the words pouring out in a rush as she lowered her hand. “You don’t have to kill us. We get Gaia to take him into the Abyss. If nothing else, it buys us time. Time is all we have, Sam.”

  “You mean to kill him?” Aeros asked, the old god’s eyes widening. He crouched down beside Sam. “Do not let the shadows take the light.”

  Sam took a few quick breaths through her nose, and turned back toward Vicky and Aeros.

  “It’s a chance, Samantha,” Zola said. “It’s a chance.”

  “Are you sure?” Sam asked, her voice cracking.

  Zola gave one slow nod.

  Sam blinked rapidly. “Then you have to try.”

  “Zola,” Terrence said, drawing the attention of the others. Drake’s dragon had crouched beside him, and Terrence was eye level with the fairy in the saddle. “I think Drake’s in trouble.”

  Zola cursed and hurried over to the fairy, Luna close behind her. “The one thing we don’t have is a goddamned healer. Aeros, can you get him to the Morrigan? Or any of the Fae healers?”

  “The city is stone,” Aeros said. “I can do what is needed. But might it not be best for me to take you to Damian?”

  Vicky looked between Zola and Drake. “Don’t let him die. We’ll take care of Damian. Don’t let Drake die. He’s … he’s my friend. Come on Sam. Let’s go save your brother.”

  “I didn’t really think you people could get more insane,” Terrence said. “But your ability to prove me wrong is unsettling.”

  Vicky watched as Aeros gently lifted Drake’s limp form from the back of his dragon. His chest rose and fell slightly at the edges of his armor. He was alive, but the pooled blood that ran out when Aeros tilted his body just a little was terrible. He might be alive for now, but not for long.

  “Hurry,” Zola said with a glance to Vicky. “As fast as you can. And don’t fight anything if you can avoid it. Ah don’t know how much time he has.”

  Aeros turned and Drake’s dragon snapped back into its brown furball form. The pile of fur climbed up on the old god’s shoulder as Aeros faced one of the massive stone walls, and the rock simply parted before him. Stone ground together and shifted out of the way, creating an arch just tall enough for the old god to walk through. Vicky couldn’t help but smile at the small bump in the archway that gave Drake’s dragon just enough clearance to squeeze past. As she watched, the stone closed around Aeros, and he started to sink into the ground.

  “That is one odd subway,” Zola said.

  Vicky looked up at Zola. “Like how you got to my parents’ house?”

  Zola nodded as the rain started to fall in earnest. “That’s right. It seems like a long time ago now, but it’s only been a couple days.” Zola shook her head. “Let’s go.” Even as she strode forward, her eyes stayed locked on the vampire behind Vicky. “Samantha.”

  Sam took a deep breath, gave Zola a quick nod, and started forward with the others. Jasper shifted restlessly on Vicky’s shoulder. On the one hand, she thought it was good that he was staying in his small furball form. He’d be harder to detect, but he also wouldn’t be able to shield them as quickly if another archer as good as the rider of the Beast of Gorias showed up.

  That became the least of her worries as the shadows shifted, and the dark-touched came with them.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Near the top of one of the spires of Falias stood an antlered form. Nudd watched as his weapon, his creation, laid waste to the forces of the Obsidian Inn. He had been working on these plans for centuries. It was why he’d struck up the alliance with the dark-touched, why he had been willing to go into a debt of favors with their lords. But it hadn’t been until Cara introduced him to Damian that a new approach formed in his mind.

  He’d manipulated the sons of Anubis as far back as Leviticus, before the fall of Atlantis. But not even the water witches were aware of that. Nudd liked to keep his influence subtle, to play with grand distractions while his true intentions developed in the darkness.

  In one sweeping blow, Hern had been eliminated, and Vesik had been bonded to him. The necromancer never understood his own potential. The powers he’d shown would be pale compared to what would be wrought by Nudd once Vesik was fully consumed by his own powers and under Nudd’s control. And he was close now. So close. A rare smile etched its way across the old Fae’s face in the shadows of his helmet.

  The only weakness his weapon had was Vesik’s own sister, and the child who had been the Destroyer. And who would be willing to strike either of them down? But they’d shown themselves. What could that pair hope to accomplish? It was unfortunate he couldn’t just kill them both to end their annoyance.

  But now they’d brought themselves to him. He only needed to capture them, hold them where he could keep them alive. Where he could keep the we
akness of his weapon at bay, and bring the commoners to heel.

  It had been a long game, but his pledge to the dark-touched and their masters would be fulfilled.

  Nudd watched the dark-touched flow into the courtyard around Samantha Vesik and the child who he still thought of as the Destroyer.

  Footsteps crunched on the rooftop beside him. Nudd turned to find one of the dark-touched generals. “The battle goes well.”

  “Of course. This battle was fated to go well the moment Hern and Damian collided.”

  “Have you heard from the Demon Sword?” Nudd asked.

  “A pawn you should not trust,” the vampire hissed.

  “Have you forgotten the path of the other Demon Sword?” Nudd asked. “He was loyal to me until the day his mother died. And that is what you do not understand about the Fae. They are loyal to their core.”

  The dark-touched didn’t answer immediately. “The time has come to fulfill your bargain, Lord Nudd.”

  Nudd didn’t miss the slight. “The necromancer isn’t mine, yet. Not fully.”

  “It would be simpler if you would allow us to kill them,” the general said.

  “If there is no other option, you will let them go. And no, I will not hesitate to sacrifice every last one of you if it repays my debt to your lords.”

  “You play with powers you do not understand.”

  Nudd let out a humorless laugh. “Oh, I understand. What you fail to comprehend is the point of the battle below you. This,” he said with a sweeping gesture that encompassed the courtyard and the colossus beyond, “this is to drive out the last of Damian’s humanity. And to that end, this battle is nearly won. The rest are mere jewels in a crown, and perhaps that your lords understand better than you, which is why you must do as I say at their order.”

  The dark-touched didn’t respond, instead studying the scene unfolding below them. One of the dragons was still with the interlopers. Blue flame scorched the stone walls near the street, and the roars shook the spire they were perched on.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The skeletons followed the dark-touched. Vicky cursed as the shadows of Damian’s cloak writhed through the walls around them, and the skeletons’ empty eyes strode onto the field of battle. Even as they cut down the dark-touched, and the vampires wore them down in turn, more came.

  Luna earned her name time and time again, the edge of her wings making short work of one vampire after another. It wasn’t long before the dark-touched realized they were outmatched in a direct assault on the now blood-soaked puffball, and they focused on the dragon.

  Jasper belched an orb of blue fire that blasted one of the skeletons apart and crashed into the edge of a shadowy cloak piece. The substance of it brightened momentarily before it floated away like ash in a strong breeze.

  Vicky barely dodged the swipe of another dark-touched’s claws. She didn’t have time to dodge the next strike, but she didn’t need to. Sam, moving impossibly fast, struck out at the things back. The vampire folded around the strike, and didn’t move again. Vicky didn’t understand what happened, until she saw the bloody blade of the splendorum mortem in Sam’s hand.

  “Jasper!” Vicky shouted. “Burn the cloaks!”

  The dragon cocked his head, and Vicky realized he didn’t understand. She pointed with the blazing soulsword in her right hand.

  “The shadows where the skeletons are!”

  That Jasper understood. He pulled his head back and his neck expanded before a hellish stream of blue fire scorched the stone and shadows and turned every inch of the cloaks they could see to ash. Some of the skeletons fell in the blast, a few managed to start putting themselves back together, but many collapsed to the ground unmoving.

  It wasn’t much, but it was something. Vicky lashed out with her soulswords, cutting away armor and blades and heads. On the opposite side of the courtyard, Zola’s gray cloak snapped in the wind as the skies opened into a downpour. Water streamed over the Cajun’s eyes, but it didn’t slow her movements, or her magic. Lightning roared from the head of Zola’s knobby old cane. Bolts crashed into the stone and cloaks and vampires alike. And wherever the bolts touched, only destruction remained. Flesh parted and exploded into charred masses, revealing the bones of the dark-touched. The vampires howled in pain, only to meet the end of Terrence’s bayonet a moment later. He tried shooting a few of them, but whatever magic his gun had, it didn’t penetrate the dark-touched helmets. It left scars behind, but still the things came at them.

  Zola fell back, keeping Sam behind her as she fended off another skeleton that rode through the shadows on the back of a ghostly horse.

  “We can’t win this!” Zola said. “We go for Damian now, or we lose everything.”

  “Jasper!” Vicky snapped. “Launchpad!”

  The dragon didn’t hesitate. It was a command they’d worked on with Drake, and one that she’d thought silly at the time. But it didn’t seem so silly now. The dragon flattened out and dove into the center of the group. Gray flesh and scales popped up between them all, snapping them up onto the newly formed dragon’s back, much to the shouting protests of Zola, Luna, and Terrence. Vicky guessed she could have warned them, but it was too late now.

  “Hold on tight!” Vicky shouted.

  Jasper launched into the air, narrowly missing the claws of a dark-touched. The other vampires scrambled up the spires and towers around them. Vicky’s heart sank as she realized how fast their pursuers were moving. If they got high enough, they could easily leap out onto Jasper. Vicky patted the dragon’s neck and told him to get as high as he could.

  Jasper’s wings flexed and they rocketed forward. From the corner of Vicky’s eye, as they passed one of the highest spires, she could’ve sworn she saw a shadowy form with antlers watching them. When she turned to look, there was nothing there. The first of the dark-touched leapt, but they were too high, and the vampire flailed as it fell back to the earth.

  * * *

  They cleared the wall, rain stinging their faces as Jasper hurtled at the colossus. The view opened up below Vicky, and the scale of the carnage was laid out before them. Empty Fae armor, shredded vampires, and a handful of what looked like commoners lay strewn across the ground. But even as the dead and dying sank into the mud around the shattered stones of Falias, Nudd’s forces still fought. Every step Damian took blew apart another building, sending a shower of corpses out in a grisly silhouette against the lightning of the coming thunderstorm.

  “Get me up to his face!” Sam shouted. “I want to look him in the eye!”

  Terrence shook his head. “No, get to his back, between the shoulder blades. That’s where I saw him, that’s where I got the pack.”

  Vicky watched in horror as something red and bright bulged near the shoulder of the colossus. It rippled and raced down the obsidian black arm until a fireball the size of her parents’ home exploded from his fingertips. Water boiled in the impact, turning mud to brittle earth in a flash of hellish fire.

  “I think staying behind him is an excellent idea,” Luna shouted.

  Sam didn’t respond. Her eyes locked on the thing that was her brother, and Vicky knew the hollow look of loss. If Sam hadn’t already lost hope, it was barely a flicker in the presence of this nightmare.

  The colossus’s hand turned palm up and swept underneath them. Vicky saw the light a split second before bolts of power erupted from Damian’s fingertips. They lanced into the sky, Jasper narrowly avoiding the two nearest bolts, but the owl knights above the colossus had no such luck. Feathers and armor and screams flew in every direction as the scent of scorched flesh and hair filled Vicky’s nostrils. Something slammed into Jasper next to her and left a bloody streak before it fell off into the chaos of the battle below.

  “I can feel them,” Terrence said with a grunt.

  “By the gods,” Zola said. “Terrence! Terrence, what the hell is happening to you?”

  Vicky glanced back, catching of glimpse of Zola’s wide eyes. Terrence wasn’t the sa
me pale translucence Vicky had become so accustomed to seeing. His edges flickered with red and black, the power of demons. Zola reached out to grab the ghost.

  “No!” Terrence snapped. “Let me do this. I can reach him.”

  Sam drew the splendorum mortem from its sheath once more. “If he turns?”

  “If he turns into what?” Zola said.

  They both look confused, but they weren’t watching the colossus. They didn’t see the flesh of the gravemakers shifting on the giant’s back. The colossus stumbled, and the black sludge of the corrupted armor split. The gap was huge, so deep she could see something like gold inside, as if the thing had been cut down to its very soul.

  But it wasn’t a nebulous light, or the piercing glow of a soulsword. It looked more like armor, or a person. But Damian wasn’t that large. Hern wasn’t that large. It was like something else had sheltered inside of their combined powers. A greater darkness, or a massive demon.

  “I don’t know how long I can hold it,” Terrence said, and when Vicky glanced back again, the reddish black coloring had crawled down his forearms and up to his elbows. In a snap decision, she patted Jasper twice, smacked one of his spines, and the dragon twisted. Instead of a gentle turn around the colossus, Jasper rocketed to his back, crashing into the black mass, and digging his claws deep into the flesh as an anchor.

  Screams echoed in Vicky’s head, pained cries like a thousand people had been stabbed in one mighty blow. It was then she knew Terrence had been right. Damian was still there. But so were all the souls that had been trapped within him.

  “Damian!” Sam said, her voice a cry in the thunder that surrounded them. “You’re killing us!”