Darklight 3: Darkworld
Bella Forrest
Contents
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Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Ready for the next part of Lyra and Dorian’s journey?
Read more by Bella Forrest
Copyright © 2019
Nightlight Press
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Chapter One
I ran hard. The slick path wound before me like an abandoned snakeskin, speckled in brown and gray, studded with rocks. I leapt a trickling stream, the smell of the fresh water and damp turf catching in my nostrils.
It was early afternoon in the Scottish Highlands, an overcast August day filled with misting rain. A few thin streaks of light broke through the haze of clouds weaving through the peaks that surrounded me. I sucked in a breath of cool air and pushed my bangs, wet from rain and sweat, from my forehead. Beneath my pale blue athletic jacket, sweat pooled as my body fought to keep up with the punishing pace I had set for today’s solitary run. After hiding in caves and living off scraps for over two weeks while on the run from the Occult Bureau, I was out of shape.
At a sharp bend in the path that jutted out into an outcropping, I paused for a moment to tighten my laces and look out over the landscape. It was a patchwork quilt of gray granite and the hardy green of tough grasses, slightly taller green-brown splashes of heather, and dabs of yellow gorse. The mountains thrust their way up from the landscape—bold, jagged sentinels of ancient stone. Why would Bryce ever leave such a beautiful place?
I restarted my run, continuing up into the steep foothills of one of the mountains not far from Glencoe. Getting to see such beauty every day made me even more grateful that I was finally getting back into a proper training regimen.
It was my first time in Scotland. Just over three weeks ago, I’d stood on a rooftop at the Chicago HQ of the Occult Bureau, an organization sworn to protect the public from supernatural threats, staring down at the man I had once called uncle. Alan Sloane, director of the Chicago HQ, had been hunting me, my team of human dissenters, and the group of vampires we’d saved from extermination at his hand. In the process of taking down Director Sloane and his equally genocidal fellow board members, my team and I had revealed the existence of vampires to the world and were now receiving asylum in Scotland while various agencies in the US investigated the Occult Bureau and discussed how to proceed.
I currently lived with the rest of the rebels in a secret ex-military facility nestled in the mountainous Highlands. Our accommodations had been arranged by our current handler Major Morag Bryce, older sister of my former Bureau captain Nicholas Bryce. We were now on a mission to figure out our next move forward. Some of our group had been here longer than I had. I’d been delayed by the congressional meetings I needed to attend for the Bureau investigation.
I pumped my arms harder, pushing for the burn in my muscles. My limbs felt loose and powerful. I bounded up the path like a surefooted young deer, wishing the future might be as easy as running along a hiking trail.
My runs were an excellent time to think, and that’s what I needed to do. Thinking meant planning. While my feet struck the damp trail, I turned Dorian’s plan for saving the vampire species over in my mind. We had to consider the international political uproar and whatever secrets the Bureau still kept from us about their connection to the Immortal Plane. The heavy media attention only added to our concerns. I had stopped listening to the morning news, realizing the reporters were cycling around the same issues over and over. Vampire this, vampire that. Most of it was misinformation or scaremongering.
I increased my speed for a moment to make it up a switchback in the trail, enjoying the burn in my lungs. The harsh but impressive landscape passed me in a blur—a pleasant reward for my efforts. I liked the solitude of this ancient land.
I slowed my pace as the slick path became even steeper, skirting around a hole I had a habit of tripping on if I didn’t look out for it. The first day I’d done this route, I’d returned with bloodied elbows and a scratch on my face from a gorse bush, much to the amusement of various humans and vampires. The path eventually led to a summit of the small mountain I’d claimed for my exercise the past few days. I jumped over the patch of sodden peat that soaked my shoes yesterday. My favorite part of the ascent was the determined tree growing directly out of a large boulder on the mountainside. I felt a connection to that tree. I don’t give up, either.
A mile in, I stopped for a break. Panting for breath, I shook my head free of water droplets, and a feeling of victory surged through me. I grinned at the downslope of the mountain. From my vantage point, I could see our humble accommodations. Major Bryce had explained that the modest stone buildings and surrounding area had once been a croft, one of the many tiny farms that littered the Highlands. The military had bought the land in the eighties, planning to use the farm as a base for soldiers to do survival training in the wilderness.
The army barracks were newer, featuring low buildings that looked industrial and square amid the less deliberate lines and shapes of nature. The military had painted the concrete structures black in the past, but time had rusted patches of the roof, and the paint was being worn away by the extreme weather.
Its current iteration looked thrown together… because it had been. The Scottish military had quickly renovated it for my team of merry dissenters and our vampire allies. On the roof of the original stone cottage sat an impressive collection of satellite dishes and signal boosters. Several more were affixed to the top of a gray-and-blue portable trailer. Together, they formed our command base, communications hub, and formal meeting room. A few other trailers were spaced around the site, and several green Land Rovers covered in mud sat parked near the gate. Yes, we had a gate.
A fifteen-foot chain link fence topped with coils of barbed razor wire stretched around the perimeter, except for one entrance gate that always had two guards. Major Morag had assured us it wasn’t meant to keep the vampires in, but to keep anyone hostile out. Our location had not been made public knowledge, but hikers roamed the landscape, and if the news had shown me anything, it was that some people weren’t happy in the slightest at the idea of vampires. Although these vampires lived far from civilization and the temptation of dark humans, more extreme groups of humans had gone on the offensive in mobs of “vampire hunters.”
Sitting on a lichen-covered rock, I pulled my brown hair,
now falling nearly to the middle of my back, into a fresh ponytail. I rubbed my hands together for warmth and considered how foreboding the compound looked. Blissfully, it also felt temporary, and despite the gloom, I got to be near Dorian every day, which was a definite bonus.
Dorian and I spent a lot of time together. We went on walks and talked strategies. Yesterday, a sudden downpour forced us underneath a canopy of trees during our march around the perimeter. I huddled next to him, suffering only mild heartburn as he held his cloak above us like a makeshift tent. I could still smell his natural scent of cedar and feel the warmth of him next to me. I smiled to myself.
When we came back, Morag spotted us, dripping all over the clean floor in the barrack entrance.
“If you want alone time, you can do it in a dry room as long as you don’t pass out,” she said with a raised eyebrow, but I’d learned not to take offense to her blunt way of talking. She did a lot for us.
Morag had caused quite a stir when she publicly announced an offer of asylum for vampires and defectors in Scotland without really checking it with anyone first. She had pushed the decision through by sheer force of personality. Since the nation had obtained its independence nearly a decade ago, its English neighbors didn’t have much of a say in the matter. Scottish officials made Morag director over the entire vampire situation, seemingly as a punishment for stirring up trouble, but she’d taken it in stride with her usual level of delightful, no-nonsense determination.
At her suggestion, the official name for the current operation was the Vampire Asylum Military Program of Scotland, or VAMPS. When I first heard it, I thought it was a joke, but I had to admit it was easy to remember. VAMPS currently acted as the human liaison between the US, Scotland, and, to some extent, the rest of the countries that were interested in seeing how the situation unfolded internationally. And who was Morag’s second-in-command? None other than her own brother. The arrangement was equal parts amusing and infuriating for them, and they butted heads as often as they got along. I tried to imagine a situation in which Zach was above or below me in a vitally important international dispute. Hard to put siblings into roles like that.
Thinking of Zach and the rest of my human team, I wondered what they were all doing in the barracks right now. With the vampires who had joined us—over forty at my last count—and some Scottish researchers Morag had brought in to work with the vampires, the camp could be quite a hub of activity some days. It had been a hard but necessary sell to our vampire allies when they’d caught wind of the scientists being brought in. Could anyone blame their hesitation, after first-hand experience or tales of Bureau torture? Not me. But Morag had to appease the international community demanding information. The researchers wanted to do preliminary vampire studies to verify the Bureau’s files. The scientists wanted to study dark matter. At least they were personable and seemed more awed than disgusted by the vampires. The absence of hostility impressed me, but that was honestly a pretty low bar.
I rolled my neck, stretching a sore muscle. The sun broke through the clouds, briefly warming me in my spot atop the peak. Tilting my head to let the sun warm the side of my face, I spotted a flock of small, dark shapes in the far distance. After a minute or two, they were close enough for me to recognize their silhouettes. Redbills. Three of them.
The Scottish military had been wonderful about allowing the redbills to fly freely. It was forbidden to fly a drone near an airport, but our supernatural birds were free to move over Scotland. The redbills flapped their wings in a flurry. My fingers tingled as I stared at the approaching birds, a feeling of unease stealing over me. A vampire feeding party had been dispatched to the Immortal Plane this morning, but they’d said they likely wouldn’t return until evening or even tomorrow if they had to travel far to find food. Had they forgotten something? No, they were flying in too fast for that. Had something happened?
Shaking the stiffness from my legs, I started down the path that would lead me back to the camp. The wet trail was treacherous, and I had to take my time until I reached the foothills that stretched for about a mile across relatively flat ground.
Let’s see if I can break my mile record.
If it ended up being nothing, at least I would get a sprint in. My body groaned at the increased pace, but I leaned into the strain, keeping my breathing as deep as I could as I raced across the open moor. Just under ten minutes later, I trotted up to the gate, gasping for breath.
“No tumbles today, Sloane?” one of the guards, a rosy-cheeked blond guy, asked as I flashed my ID badge.
“Not today, MacGregor,” I replied, still panting, splattered with mud and water. “Did three redbills just come in?”
“A minute ago, aye,” he replied, raising his eyebrows as he waved me in. Maybe he saw the beat of panic in my frown.
The redbills were gathered near the barracks as I raced up the path toward the compound. Maybe it was nothing. I hoped so. Inside the fence, the world seemed much smaller, the wildness outside feeling just out of reach.
On the other side of the barracks, the Scottish military had converted an old structure into a “stable” to house the six redbills we’d brought over to Scotland via military cargo plane. The redbills had been furious. I never again wanted to share a flight with an epically pissed off supernatural bird made of rage and razor-sharp talons.
I caught sight of a tall and sinewy frame in the distance.
“Kane,” I called, jogging closer. “You’re back early.” The rest of my words died as I realized Kane was shouting orders. Two other vampires stood beside him, crowded around a tense, hissing redbill. One, named Neo, was tall with the sides of his head shaved down to skin, the black hair on top left long. The other, whose name I couldn’t remember, was a burly fellow wearing a worried scowl. Harlowe hovered near one of their redbills, her long platinum-blonde hair draping over her shoulder in a braid. Without warning, the redbill shrieked and beat its wings, nearly rising into the air before the vampires called it back to the ground. Something was strapped over the redbill’s back. My stomach twisted with unease. I ran up and, catching sight of Castral’s long green-toned blue hair in its usual braid, realized it was the final member of the party that had gone to the Immortal Plane to hunt.
I needed to help. The redbill would have to calm down so we could move the injured vampire off its back. If we jostled him too much, it could further injure him before we reached a medic. Were the medics in the trailer? I could run and check. The redbill carrying him jerked to the side as Kane attempted to step closer.
“Calm the redbill down. We won’t be able to move him with feathers flying all over the place,” Kane ordered. Harlowe held the redbill’s head close to her chest, rubbing its forehead and murmuring under her breath. The redbill emitted a disgruntled squawk but settled down. What happened to make it so upset? It had to be something they encountered in the Immortal Plane. I’d seen reactions like that before when the redbills tangled with immortal creatures. The injured vampire groaned.
“Is he safe to move?” I asked, immediately snapping into crisis management mode. “Where’s the injury?”
“His leg. Get a medic!” Kane shouted. “Castral’s been wounded. Badly. We’re going to try to get him off this redbill.”
Castral, strapped to the redbill, moaned. I didn’t know him well, but he was part of the vampire cohort Kane brought back from the Immortal Plane. Castral only stood out in my mind because instead of the long cloaks that most of the vampires wore, he sported a rust-colored leather jacket he’d won in a card game with some compound guards on his first night here.
Before I turned to run toward the medical trailer near the barracks, I saw the blood oozing from deep punctures in Castral’s thigh. The skin around his leg and his arm appeared blistered and burned, the flesh raw. Something more powerful than a regular knife had stabbed him. His jacket was ruined on one side.
But it was the blood that hypnotized me.
I’d never had the chance to study large quant
ities of vampire blood before. Injuries like this hadn’t occurred during our Bureau battles. It was red, but shadows shivered through the color. Even when the vampires had fed on Dorian after he’d been hit by the Bureau’s dark energy weapons for the first time, I hadn’t seen blood. God, the Immortal Plane was far more dangerous than the human world.
I tore myself from the sight and sprinted to the large trailer that served as the medical center. Yanking open the door, I yelled inside.
“Medic! We’ve got a vampire down. He’s bleeding out!”
There was a flurry of movement as several medics tumbled from the trailer and ran toward the gathered vampires, who were carefully lifting Castral off the redbill. From the corner of my eye, I saw Neo returning with a vampire I’d seen working with the medical team before, sharing treatments and information on how to treat vampires. Another human medic ran past me, and I followed. My body ached from my run, but I pushed past the pain. The group descended on Castral. Harlowe held the redbill more tightly as it chirped irritably, upset at all the noise and fuss.
“We need to get him stabilized. Can you carry him without jostling his leg?” the first medic, an earnest brown-haired man with blue eyes, asked the vampires. He looked too young to be serving on a military mission, but we had started young in the Bureau too.
“Definitely,” the vampire medic replied. With the help of Neo, he carried Castral, darting across the yard to the trailer. The human medics rushed behind them. The door shut with a slam.
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