Prophecies of Light

by E. M. Knight

  I trace my tongue over my fangs, feel the claws hidden under my nails, and step in.

  The moment I’m through, the whole world goes black.

  A suction is exerted over me, pulling me forward, pulling me back, pulling me left and right and in all directions. My body tenses, my muscles tighten in a natural defense, but the force is too much. I open my mouth and scream as the pain consumes me, as it takes over the entirety of my body and all of my mind. I scream until my voice goes hoarse, until I’m sure I am going to be ripped to pieces.

  Suddenly, it stops. I’m left gasping for breath as I stagger forward on unfamiliar ground.

  It takes a moment for the darkness to part. When it does, peeling away from the front of my vision like a set of curtains being drawn open, I find myself in a place unlike any other I’ve ever been in.

  The ground is covered in ash. Far ahead, far in the distance, stand enormous, menacing mountains. Their peaks are jagged, sharp like rows of teeth, and above them is a boiling red sky filled with cloud cover.

  I turn back. Behind me the same desolate landscape extends into infinity.

  There is no evidence of the portal—it must have been a portal—that brought me here.

  I take a cautious step forward.

  No sooner than I step my foot on the ground, the world shifts. The whole land seems to slice sideways through the air.

  I tense, only just managing to keep my balance. I’m not entirely certain if the shift I feel was real, or some sort of after-effect of the trip that brought me here.

  With great care and precision, I take stock of my body. Everything seems to be fine. I feel my fangs, feel the blood pulsing through my limbs. My claws are there, too.

  And the vampire’s killer instinct is most definitely in place.

  I must have been so discomforted encountering that ancient, stronger vampire that it made me question my own abilities. Abilities honed over centuries on this earth.

  Well, without him present, those doubts fade away. I am sure who I am, and what I am capable of.

  I don’t know what this place is, but I intend to quickly find out… and then find my way back to make sure Beth is all right.

  I pick a point in the distance at random and prowl toward it.

  The first hundred yards are unremarkable. But once I cross farther toward the mountains, I sense an undeniable pull coaxing me a different way.

  Instead of ignoring it, or fighting it, I adjust my trajectory to walk in that direction.

  A sort of peace descends upon me the moment I do. It’s like this place is morphing itself to my reality, telling me where to go.

  Given the strange set of events that brought me here, I have no doubt that is entirely possible.

  I walk until I come across a fault in the earth. A long crack splinters across the ground. For whatever reason, even with my vampiric sight, it was invisible from farther away.

  My eyes trace over the line, moving left to right, until they come upon an opening in the ash.

  I blink. That wasn’t there before. Neither did I see it form.

  An inadvertent shiver crawls down my spine. Obviously the regular rules of reality are different here.

  I have to be extremely careful.

  I frown as I come closer and see that the opening is an exact replica of the one Beth and I followed down in the graveyard.

  I stop before the first stair. I feel the subtle, invisible forces beckoning me down.

  I take a deep breath, focus all my senses on the hole in the ground, and make my descent.

  The stairs here go for much longer than they did back before the vampire coven. I walk and walk and walk down them, trailing one hand against the wall, on high alert to any sudden danger.

  Eventually, I reach the bottom. I have to do a double take when I recognize the shape and structure of the walls.

  This is a carbon copy of Logan’s private chamber, down to the pillars supporting the ceiling overhead.

  No sooner do I cross through that, than the threshold behind me turns into solid wall. I spin back, alarmed.

  There is no way out.

  A deep, maniacal laughter comes from the center of the room.

  Apprehension filling my very soul, I turn my head around.

  And, sure enough, there stands my King, in a spot that was vacant just moments before.

  His upper body is bare, revealing those markings all over his skin. His eyes come upon me, and the laughter cuts off.

  But an evil, knowing smile stays splayed across his face.

  “Dagan,” he says, his voice filled with a sort of menace I’ve never heard before. “I know what you did.”

  My mind races to come up with the proper reply. Is he talking about Riyu? About Beth? About something else, anything else, that may have happened in the interim since I saw him last?

  He sneers. “It seems you forgot your place. Bow to your King, show the proper respect!”

  Immediately, a force crashes into my shoulders and pushes me down. Even if I wanted to resist it, I could not.

  But right now, all I want to do is assuage whatever anger he is feeling toward me, so that I can buy myself a little bit of time to think.

  He approaches me. With every step he takes, the invisible force intensifies. It makes me go to all fours, and then causes me to lie prostate, enormous pressure being exerted on my back.

  I see his feet stop in front of me, scarcely an inch away. I get an immediate sense of déjà vu.

  This is exactly how the ancient vampire introduced himself to me.

  Logan, however, does not tell me to get up. Instead, he kneels down and twists a fist through my hair.

  He wrenches my head up toward him.

  When his eyes meet mine, I see that vast, poisonous torrent of black flecks streaming across them. The affliction is many times worse than I’ve seen before.

  “Look at you,” he sneers. “Groveling beneath me like a worm. What happened to you, Dagan? When did my most fearsome warrior become so weak?”

  A growl forms deep in my throat.

  “You ran,” he whispers. “You abandoned your post, you betrayed your coven. Worst of all, you betrayed me.”

  With a snarl he hauls me up and throws me effortlessly to one side. That invisible force contracts over my body, making it impossible for me to right myself or fight back.

  I go skidding over the ground and hit the far wall.

  Logan leaps to me. He clears the distance in a single bound.

  “You risked my demon,” he hisses. “You revealed a great secret to one who is not worthy. Worst of all, you let my bastard son escape!”

  He aims a kick at my side. It lands and sends me flying. This time I crash against a pillar, then skid down.

  My futile fight against Cierra when she attacked my village flashes before my eyes. She’d bound me the same way, then, and rendered me incapable of fighting back!

  A white, hot fury, an all-consuming rage, envelops me. I swore back then that I would never be so helpless again.

  But what can I do now? Struggle all my will against the invisible force I cannot break through?

  Logan stalks toward me, taking his sweet time, a lion on his way to devour wounded prey.

  “You went against my orders,” he tells me, the miasma swallowing his eyes whole. “After everything I’d given you, after all the gifts I let you have!”

  He kicks me again, hard, in the ribs. The force tightens over my body to keep me in place. I grunt on impact.

  “Get up,” he snarls. “Get up, and fight me like a man. I’ll give you one more chance to prove your worth. One more chance for you to show me who you really are.”

  He turns his back on me as a show of disgust.

  “But you can’t, can you?” he asks softly. “You have already forsaken all that you are, the moment you disavowed your ties to magic!”

  What? I think.

  Logan starts to chuckle. “Oh, you think I don’t know?” he asks. “You think I cannot
sense the Spark inside you, waiting to be unleashed?”

  He spins back in a fury. “ANSWER ME!”

  I stare at him, not knowing what to say. The force is so tight I can’t even unhinge my jaw. All the anger, the fury that I feel, feeds into a flame deep in the recesses of my mind.

  “You won’t,” he sighs with regret. “Your hatred of magic runs so deep that you won’t even use it to give yourself a fighting chance.” He scoffs, full of disdain. “You are pitiful.”

  The insult hits a nerve. All of a sudden, the anger, the fury, all fed into that subconscious flame, explodes with a great beam of light. The light bursts through the constricting force, splintering it into thousands of pieces.

  Just like that, I am free.

  I don’t have time to consider the implications. The look of shock that flashes across Logan’s face tells me he was not expecting me to break loose.

  That flicker of a moment is all I need. I pounce on him, my larger body providing enough momentum to pin him against the wall.

  One hand closes on his throat. His goes up and grabs my wrist, fighting me off. But the anger that is boiling inside me cannot be quenched. In a move guided entirely by instinct, I take my free hand, extend my claws, and plunge them into his chest, ripping through the skin into his ribcage.

  Logan’s eyes widen in shock. Somehow, I was too fast for him. My hand crushes his heart, and then I yank it out and toss it behind me in disgust.

  The King blinks, once, eyes already lifeless.

  And then I step back, and his empty body crumples to the ground.

  Only when he’s still, does the severity of what I’ve done come crashing into me.

  I stagger away. I look at my hand, drenched in the King’s blood. The anger seeps out of me, the wind going entirely out of my sails.

  I watch, wide-eyed and terrified, as the King’s body decomposes right before my eyes.

  “No,” I whisper. I shake my head. “No, it can’t be. No, this isn’t—this isn’t right!”

  I keep backing away, utterly horrified at what transpired. The kill was too easy, it was too simple, it did not feel right.

  My shoulder hits the wall. The room starts to spin. That strange, unfamiliar flame that let me break through his magic flickers away to nothing.

  I don’t even know if that was me.

  The room starts to spin. I try to get a grip on things, try to stay lucid and conscious, but the suction that brought me here starts to exert itself over my body once more. I scream as the room goes black, as that darkness takes over all that I know. I scream as I’m thrown back into the vortex, scream as I lose myself completely, scream as I feel my body being torn to shreds, and scream, somehow, even as all that’s left of me is my soul.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The Ancient

  The Crypts

  A disturbance in the magnetic fields around me makes me suddenly come to.

  I leap from the altar, my superior senses immediately alerting me to the danger.

  The link to The King is fracturing, about to be broken.

  I rush through the hall, speeding down the secret path that leads me to his chamber. I throw the final set of doors open, and discover him slouched over his bed, clasping his chest.

  An open wound there expels tremendous amount of blood.

  His sheets, his clothes are drenched in it. Fast as I can, I cross the floor to his side. With absolutely no subtlety, I tear away a chunk of flesh from the inside of my arm. I shove the open cut to the King’s lips.

  He starts to suck, just a feeble trickle at first, relying only on his lowest instincts to do so. But as my blood grants him life, as the wound in his chest starts to close, he draws on my blood with more and more precision. More care.

  He knows, just as well as I do, what would happen to us both if he takes too much.

  When the wound finally closes, he pushes my arm away. I look at my skin, watch the quick healing process take place.

  Then I shift my gaze to him and demand, telepathically, “What happened?”

  He has the humility to look ashamed. “I went into the Demon Realm,” he admits.

  My eyes flash. I release him and spin back in a mountain of anger.

  “I warned you full well the danger of that long ago!”

  I keep my back turned, even as I feel him get out of bed. Very slowly, very timidly, he approaches me.

  He stops a respectful distance away. I don’t need to see him to know he’s hung his head.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I know—I know your feelings on that part of the world.”

  Violently, I twist and face him. The force of my rage is so strong it’s like a physical blast aimed at him.

  He staggers back.

  “I was careless,” he tells me. “I was seduced by the allure of power!”

  “Look what it’s done to you!”

  I advance on him. Logan shrinks away.

  My hand juts out. I grab him by the throat. My fingers constrict. He starts to choke.

  But no matter what, he does not fight back. He never will, not against me.

  I stare deeply into his eyes, my gaze piercing past the miasma to reveal the frightened vampire underneath.

  Finally, when I think he’s had enough, I let him go.

  He falls to the ground, choking for breath.

  “Remember all that you owe me,” I threaten. “And remember how easy it is for me to take it all away.”

  Without waiting for another word, I exit the room, going the way I came.

  After that sort of exertion, I will need to sleep for a very long time to recover.

  But before I allow myself the luxury, I will need to contact my brother and tell him the news.

  His ascent to power might need to happen much sooner than either of us planned.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Dagan

  And underground chamber near the ancient coven

  I sputter and choke, a heavy metallic taint lingering in the back of my throat.

  The fit consumes me for what feels like eternity. When it finally passes, I can open my eyes and see where I am.

  The four robed and ancient vampires surround me. Each has his hood up. Beyond two of them, I see a timid and worried Beth, rubbing her arms in a sign of nervousness.

  As soon as my eyes land on her, she stops. Her mouth begins to drop open.

  Then she catches herself, stops, and gives me a tight smile.

  I begin to push myself up. As soon as I do, four pairs of arms pin me against the bed I am on.

  “No,” one of the ancient vampires says. “You are still weak. Your recovery will take weeks.”

  I try to shake my head, not comprehending, but even that move proves impossible.

  “Weeks?” I mutter.

  “Your body had a virus implanted inside,” one of the others says. “It was leeching your strength, preparing to take over your mind.”

  “Virus?” I repeat. My thoughts are slow, dull. I cannot muster a fully cohesive thought.

  “We sensed it the moment you came to us. That is why we sent you on the trial. Your body had to be broken apart for us to expel the sickness, before we could put you together again.”

  A shudder runs through me.

  “What do you mean?” I look again at Beth. “How long have I been here?”

  She steps forward. “The better part of two days,” she says.

  My gut clenches. “Two days?”

  For a vampire to be out for that long is absolutely horrifying. It speaks to the severity of whatever condition affected me.

  “There is some good news,” Beth tells me. She glances at the tall vampires surrounding me. “They were able to get rid of the curse.”

  My eyebrows go up. “You can’t spy on my anymore.”

  She makes an annoyed face. “I promised you already that I wouldn’t.”

  I look at the older vampires. “What else happened?” I ask them.

  “You were torn apart befor
e being put back together,” one of them says. “Which means you are cleansed.”

  “Cleansed of what? That virus? How did it come about? Was it from the demon?”

  They share a look with each other. Then they motion for Beth to come to my side.

  “She would be better suited to tell you.”

  They back up and walk out of the room.

  I am left alone with Logan’s daughter.

  I push myself up, so that at least I am in a sitting position. It takes a disproportionate amount of effort.

  “Has it really been so long?”

  She nods. She hesitates only for a flicker of a moment and then lowers herself to perch on the edge of the bed.

  She takes a deep breath. “You were poisoned by Cierra,” she says softly.

  A jolt of shock rips through my body. “What?”

  “That is why I could not see what happened to you in the aftermath of the demon encounter,” she explains. “Cierra was there. She ambushed you and wiped your memory. She must have sensed the curse and cut it off, too.”

  “How do you know?”

  “They told me.” She looks the way the vampires went. “They said there is only one living being in this world capable of something like that.”

  “What did she do, exactly?”

  “The poison they spoke about? It would have spread through your body, corrupted your mind, made you a slave to her. She wanted to control you, Dagan. She also had begun to sap your strength and transfer it into her.”

  “But now, I’m…”

  “You’re safe,” she assures me. “The passage to the Demon Realm, and the journey back, allowed them to cleanse you of the taint.”

  I touch the side of my head. “That’s where I was?” I wonder.

  Suddenly, the memories of what happened there crash into me. I bolt straight up in alarm.

  “Logan!” I breathe. “He found me there! Or I found him, but he was there. We fought, and I—” I shake my head in disbelief. “I killed him.”

  “Nonsense,” Beth says. “I’ve been listening to transmissions going in and out of The Crypts the whole time you were out. There hasn’t been one message of the King’s demise.”