“He’s way faster than Richard,” Thayen grunted as I helped him back up.
Soph was thrown backward, but Thayen rushed to catch her before she could hit the ground and hurt herself. Richard’s clone came right out, eager to take the three of us on. I wasn’t sure if he was suicidal or simply crazy, but when I spotted the black spray device in his hand, I knew at least one of us would be mentally crippled in a matter of seconds.
Rage filled me to the brim, my temperature spiking as a natural reaction to the damage I knew the clone could do. I allowed this anger to burst out, bright pink light shining from within as I unleashed it all upon him. He stopped, frozen, with only a few yards left between us. As the pink light expanded, he knew he couldn’t continue with his attack, so he scrambled backward instead, while Thayen and Soph moved away from me.
“I’ll be damned…” I heard Soph exclaim.
Richard’s doppelganger was gone. He must’ve escaped, since there was no trace of his corpse anywhere in sight. Jovi and Anjani’s copies had been torched, their forms collapsed in the short grass, reduced to smoking black figures—way worse than what had happened to Chantal’s double. But she’d been modeled after a fire fae, supposedly immune to the flames. She’d been disfigured, though she’d lived and run off. I figured these two clearly weren’t designed to even survive, much like their originals. Hazel’s clone was still standing, but Dafne had managed to sink her enormous fangs into Tejus’s double. He screamed in agony. The sound made my skin crawl as the dragon crunched through his bones until there wasn’t much left of him. Hazel’s copy tried to get back at her, but Jericho slapped her down with his claws and spat enough fire to kill.
The smell of burnt flesh was overwhelming, but I still breathed a sigh of relief when the clearing became safe again. We regrouped—Dafne and Jericho putting their temporary attire back on—and prepared ourselves for the rest of our journey.
“He got you, didn’t he?” Jericho asked Thayen, nodding at the blood on his leather uniform. The tear in the fabric was visible, but the wound had already healed.
“I’ll be fine,” the vampire replied, then looked at Soph. “You okay? Richard’s doppelganger threw you around a bit.”
“I know!” Soph grumbled. “Got one over on me, and I have no idea how that happened. You were right, these spooks are getting better and faster. The creep managed to slip away.”
“What about the energy levels?” Dafne asked me. “Do you feel the remnants of the portal anymore?”
I shrugged. “Barely. As it turns out, I sense them better when they’re about to open in my vicinity, but without a geographical pattern to follow, there’s no way of telling where one will pop up next.” Pausing, I gave myself a second as a troubling feeling took over. “Oh, no,” I managed, quickly realizing what was happening.
“What is it?” Thayen asked. The look he gave me was understandably troubled.
“They’re coming…”
“Another portal?” he asked.
I nodded. Without hesitation, he grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the clearing. Jericho, Dafne, and Soph followed. We ran as fast as we could, but I still felt the tear in space, the portal opening behind us.
“Faster!” Thayen whispered. Trees and ferns brushed past us. The wind caressed my face, combing through my hair as we moved, our feet light and our hearts stricken with fear and fury. I glanced over my shoulder and saw the clearing as it shrank behind us. The portal was bright and wider than the previous one.
“Oh, no…” I mumbled, nearly tripping. Thayen was quick enough to react and keep me going, but he couldn’t resist following my gaze.
“Crap!”
There were dozens of clones pouring into The Shade. I didn’t recognize everyone, but they were all modeled after the island’s inhabitants. There were many of them, just like Isabelle’s clone had said. They were spreading out, quiet in their infiltration of our precious world.
“What the hell are we going to do about them?” Dafne asked, panting as we put more distance between us and them.
Chills tumbled through me, and I prayed to all the stars that this would turn out to be nothing more than a bad dream. Alas, that wasn’t the case. It was real, and it was developing in directions we no longer had any control over. There were too many of them, and they’d caught us off guard and divided. My ability to verify the clones was now more precious than ever. We only had Soul and Kelara to help, and they were on the other side of The Shade.
“We get to the Great Dome,” Thayen replied, shifting his focus to the wild path ahead. The redwoods in this area were the biggest, thick enough to conceal us from those we’d left behind. The underbrush was higher too, foliage spreading out like giants, making it easier for us to hide if needed. Developing this wilderness in the middle of The Shade had been the best thing Derek had ever done. With an invasion like this, our forest was basically an efficient line of defense. “And we pray my parents or at least more of our people are waiting there.”
Branches broke somewhere behind us.
I turned my head only for a second. It was enough to make me want to scream. Footsteps were amplified. A couple at first, but now… there were at least a dozen clones chasing after us. They’d caught up, and I was terrified, unsure of how we’d get ourselves out of this mess. I recognized Rose and Caleb’s doppelgangers. Vita and Bijarki. Dmitri and Douma. “We’re so screwed,” I heard myself say.
Throwing barriers earlier had taken its toll on me. My legs felt heavy. My body and soul weakened. I didn’t have much fight left within me, certainly not enough to take on a dozen clones.
“We can’t stop,” Thayen said, well aware of the newly emerging threat. “We have to reach the Great Dome.”
It was our only option—the hope that our people would be there, and that they would be able to back us against this invasion. The forest was too dense in these parts for Jericho and Dafne to easily move around as dragons, and the enemy would likely take advantage of that fact. Besides, they had foreign magic at their fingertips. I had rapidly depleting Daughter energies and I was terrified.
A horn blew in the distance, low and nasal but loud enough to make my ears twitch. It went on for almost a minute, during which time the shuffling steps of our pursuers subsided. By the time I looked back again, the clones were gone. “Hold on,” I said, stopping for a moment.
“We have to keep moving. They’ll…” Thayen’s voice trailed off as he also realized what was happening. “Whoa. They left?”
“It was the horn,” Soph said. “I don’t know who’s operating that thing or the purpose it serves, but… I think it made them leave.”
“Could it be our doing? Maybe Lumi or my dad?” I asked, daring to hope. “I mean, maybe they got to safety and figured out a way to scare the clones off.”
Dafne gave me a doubtful look. “Or maybe one of the clones came up with a way to communicate an order to the others while our channels and Telluris are still down.”
“We have no way of talking to our people. Meanwhile, they’re openly invading The Shade,” Thayen concluded. “We’ll figure out what that horn is once we find Mom and Dad. For now, we can’t stop anymore. Whether the clones have left us alone or not, we have to get to the Great Dome!”
I didn’t linger. Despite my exhaustion, I started running again. Thayen, Soph, Jericho, and Dafne followed. We were left with few reasonable options and no means of communication. Just like Soul had suspected, I feared we were now dealing with a second wave. The clones we’d seen in the clearing were part of it. I wondered if that was the only portal that had opened up, or if they’d pushed through other access points simultaneously. If I wanted to lay siege to The Shade, that was how I would’ve done it. Multiple entries, smaller groups, highly organized incursions.
My only hope was that we’d actually find our people at the Great Dome, and not more of these wretched clones.
Kelara
My head was a blur. I hadn’t felt like this since… since Cor
bin Crimson had trapped me and cursed me with the ghoul sickness. Dread replaced the numbness as my eyes peeled open. I wasn’t sure what had happened, but I’d clearly been out of it for a while. Someone or something had managed to turn my lights off.
Everything ached, as if I’d run a marathon. But I hadn’t experienced sensations like these since I was alive. It didn’t make much sense. I was lying down on my side. The ground felt hard, though there was a patch of grass tickling my cheek. “Ugh…” I pushed myself into a sitting position, my weakened arms struggling to support my weight. Pain persisted somewhere between my temples, making me cringe whenever I moved my head.
My entire circumstance was unusual for a Reaper. I didn’t lose consciousness. Not usually, anyway. I wasn’t designed for it. But still, here I was, dazed and confused and wondering what the hell had happened. A pentagram with entrapment symbols had been drawn around me in white chalk. The author had pressed hard, causing creases in the rocky dirt, but the traces of white powder were visible.
“No… how…” I managed as the reality of my situation began to sink in.
Death magic had been used to trap me. I couldn’t break out of this circle. Fumbling through my pockets, another fact came to light. My scythe was gone.
“How is that even possible?!” I blurted, then stilled at the sight of Soul.
He was unconscious, trapped in a separate pentagram just a few feet away from mine. I was willing to bet all the gold in the world that his scythe had been taken, too. Looking around, I tried to keep a clear mind, to remember everything that had happened. The haze persisted, covering my memories like a thick blanket, with only the remnants of a bright explosion lingering at the center of my consciousness.
We were in the middle of a forest. Not the redwoods, though. No, we’d gone east. Majestic oak trees, as old as I was, towered around us, their branches reaching out to one another, the emerald crowns blocking out most of the sky. Moon rays pierced through here and there, milky beams that touched the forest floor but revealed little else. Thankfully, as a Reaper the light and darkness of the natural world were pretty much the same to me.
“Soul, can you hear me?” I asked, hoping he’d wake up soon.
Yes, there had been a flash. An explosion. Soul and I had left Stan and Ollie to watch over Isabelle’s clone. We’d partnered with Voss and Chantal. Where were they? Something broke inside me. The charmed coin I’d given Thayen. He needed us, and we were in no position to help him. I’d promised, and now… because of the pentagram trap, I couldn’t even pinpoint his location. “Dammit… Soul!” I shouted.
Nothing. And Thayen’s crew was in trouble… The more I thought about it, the clearer the images replaying in my head prior to the bright explosion became. We’d made it all the way down to the Sun Beach, where we’d come across Richard. The real Richard. I’d tested him myself. I remembered him whimpering from the pain my examination had caused him. The feel of his soul in the palm of my hand. He’d been at the terrace when an attack had torn the whole place apart.
Everybody had scattered, he’d told us. Too many clones to handle at once. He’d dealt with the black spray, too. Still shaken up by the horrifying sensations it had caused. We’d agreed to press forward with our quest for Shadians. To keep checking and gathering originals along the way. It had gone smoothly for a while. We’d found Draven and Serena, then Jovi and Anjani. We’d tested them and told them to head straight for the Great Dome, where we’d meet them along with Thayen and the others. Something happened after they left… a portal. A portal had opened.
I tried to get out of the pentagram, though I wasn’t sure why. I already knew it wouldn’t allow me to leave. Damned reflexes… the invisible shield around me was impenetrable. Pressing my palm against its clear surface, I felt the hum of energy transferring into my core like a silent threat—a promise that pushing my way through would cause me great pain. Yes, this was old-school death magic, and the only possible culprits I could think of were the clones.
Their knowledge of my craft seemed like a new development, however. It made me think their weird foreign magic wasn’t good enough to hold one or both of us down, which was why they’d resorted to death spells instead. But how were they able to cast it? Where had they gotten the scythes? Whose authority did they have? Only Reapers or future Reapers could do this stuff. All the knowledge the Darklings of Visio had used had been destroyed by the Time Master. No one else was supposed to have this ability. There were too many questions and too few answers.
I went back to my fractured memories. We’d left Sun Beach behind, trekking through the woods east of it. Oaks and aspens, just like this one. Hard terrain, rugged and uneven. Plenty of bushes to hide in. And the portal. Yes, the portal had appeared out of nowhere, glowing all white and bigger than Thayen’s previous descriptions of it.
Then the bright blast… and nothing.
I found a pebble big enough to make a mark and threw it at Soul. “Wake up!” These Reaper traps didn’t have specific blocks on non-Reaper objects, and this was a good time to take advantage of it.
The pebble hit him in the shoulder, and he moaned softly. At least he was still functional, thus helping my nerves unwind a little. I loved him more than anything, and we weren’t used to such adversities anymore. Our last scuffle had been with a band of ghouls on Persea, about a year ago. This was something else entirely.
I wanted to reach out to the other First Tenners for help. We obviously needed some assistance. But our telepathic links had been severed as well, I remembered. Not just the comms and the Telluris soul connections of GASP. Again, the reach of this foreign magic baffled me, and we had no one around to answer our most burning questions. I tried to go over my memories again to see if other moments would resurface after the bright blast, but I got nothing. The same black emptiness. The void of a deep sleep.
A couple pebbles later, I finally got Soul to look up and see me. He was as out of it as I had been a few minutes ago, so I gave him a second to wrap his head around our current situation.
“What… what are we doing here?” he asked, trying to get up. He was sluggish and clumsy, as if his arms and legs weren’t working together anymore. “What happened to me?”
“The same thing that happened to me, my love,” I said. “I think the clones knocked us out and locked us in here.”
He froze, giving me a troubled look before he noticed the pentagram used to trap him. “You have got to be kidding me.”
“I woke up just like you.”
“What do you remember?” Soul asked. I told him about Thayen’s coin breaking, then recounted everything I could about the moments prior to the blackout, unable to dig out more from my fractured mind. Thankfully, he had a bit more to fill in the blanks. He frowned as he recounted his own experience. “We were somewhere around here when the portal opened. I felt it. So did you. We quickly realized we were more receptive to its presence during the initial phase, much like Astra. Then they appeared. Clones. Way more than I’d thought were even possible.”
“And then we kicked your asses until you couldn’t remember a thing.” Draven’s voice echoed through the woods. He emerged from a nearby oak tree, his dark blond hair dancing in the evening breeze. His hand clutched my scythe, and I instantly knew he wasn’t really Draven. A clone, a perfect copy of the Druid I’d last seen at the terrace, long before today’s nightmare had begun. “Nice toothpick,” he added.
“Don’t insult their weapons, darling,” Serena’s clone said as she joined him from behind another tree. She was carrying Soul’s weapon, though she was having trouble with its size. It was much taller and probably weighed more than she did. An ancient weapon belonging to one of the most powerful among the First Ten. At least it had an impact on the clone. That counted for something, though I wasn’t sure what just yet. “These are powerful objects we’ve gotten our hands on.”
Soul got up, and I could tell it took a lot of effort, as he wobbled before finding his balance. “What did you do t
o us? How’d you knock us out?” he asked.
“A magician never reveals his tricks.” Serena’s clone giggled.
“Why did you stick around? To rub it in our faces?” I demanded.
Her humor faded. “To give you a warning. Reapers need to stay out of this.”
“Wait. Wait.” Soul chuckled, shaking his head. “You get the drop on us. You lock us down with death magic you’re not even supposed to be capable of wielding. You take our friggin’ scythes, and then you have the audacity to tell us to… butt out? Are you serious right now?”
“Consider this your first and final warning,” Draven’s copy said. “The order comes from high above. Stay out. This operation doesn’t concern you.”
Soul pointed an angry finger at him. “Buddy, I will tear you apart limb by limb and beat you over the head with your own arms. You’ve crossed a line. You don’t belong here. Hell, you’re not even supposed to be alive!”
“And yet here we are,” Draven's copy replied with a cold grin. “We have plans, Reaper. Important plans. Things to do. People to kill. An entire world to change. And you and your undead cohorts need to stay out of our way, lest you learn to regret it. This right here? Consider it a courtesy. We could’ve done much worse.”
That was true. But there was no way we’d ever concede that point. Not after everything the clones had done. “What is your endgame here? How many of you are there?” I asked.
“We are many,” Serena’s clone declared proudly. “We are—”
“If you say, ‘We are unstoppable’ I will throw something at you,” I said, cutting her off. “We’ve heard that line before, and it’s nowhere near as impressive as you might think. Who sent you here? Who’s got a bone to pick with The Shade? Why do you want Astra dead in particular?”
“Come on, talk to us,” Soul said. “We might as well chat for a bit before I find my way out of this seal and rip your heads off. I’ll make it quick if you give us some intel. Pinky promise.”
A Shade of Vampire 88: An Isle of Mirrors Page 10
