Darklight 3: Darkworld

by Forrest, Bella

  From my perspective, I could see the handsome outline of his sharp profile. His lips were set in a serious line, a muscle twitching in his strong jaw. He put on a brave face, but the news had to be devastating. The allies we so desperately needed wanted nothing to do with our cause.

  “We appreciate that.” Mox looked set to dismiss everyone and wash her hands of the matter.

  “As one last humble request,” Dorian said abruptly, “I would like knowledge about your route to the Immortal capital. It will be vital to our mission.”

  Mox regarded him for a moment, as if trying to pinpoint any shadowy secrets, then glanced back at the other seated elders. There was a long moment of unspoken conversation, and I sensed that they were deliberating over something. Each looked from one to the other until Mandola, twisting his finger around the end of his beard, nodded slowly.

  “We will allow you to use our route,” Mox said, her voice loud after the weight of the silence. “We will ask our allies, the clan of aquatic wildlings, to ferry you through the Gray Ravine.” Her gaze fixed onto Roxy and me. She hummed pensively. “We will also, perhaps against our better judgment, give you the location of one of our safehouses near the city that our scouts use during feeding missions. It will allow your humans to hide until some method of disguise has been arranged.”

  “If your team gets caught and tortured for information, you will almost definitely end up giving them the safehouse location, so please understand the sacrifice we are making,” Glim piped up behind her in his thin voice. “The wildlings will give you no information to find your way back, so you won’t be able to give the hunters directions to us. If you return, you will need to call the wildlings to get back here again.”

  “But you understand that this is still dangerous for us,” Mandola said. “You know enough that, should you be captured and compelled by a hunter to speak, you could endanger us.” He looked from Dorian to the rest of our team standing by the wall. “I do not say this to frighten you away from your task. What you intend to do is noble, and that is why we will help you as much as we can while retaining our safety.”

  I remembered some of Kono’s comments, and the elder’s reasoning made sense to me. The Hive had to think about the safety of all those who lived here, even if as individuals some of the vampires supported us. But something about Dorian and our goals must have convinced them enough to provide us with this amount of help.

  “We will not give you this information if you intend to go deep into Itzarriol, however,” Mox added, her tone rising to a stern volume. “If you recklessly endanger yourselves by attempting to spy on the Immortal council or poke your noses into the heart of the city, you’re on your own. It’s already dangerous enough to send scouts out to feed in secret.”

  Pyma cocked her head to the side, her braid not moving an inch, held in place with a thick wax. “In fact, if you get caught… I would advise you to find a way to take your own lives rather than allow yourselves to be interrogated.”

  Roxy scoffed under her breath, but whether it was at the suggestion of suicide to protect the Hive or that we would get caught, I didn’t know. If the elders heard, they ignored it. Arlonne stiffened beside me but said nothing. I wondered if she was remembering her last experience of capture at the hands of the Bureau.

  “Delightful note to end on,” Roxy mumbled next to me. “But they gave us a safehouse, so I guess I’ll consider blowing my brains out if we get caught.”

  I was only half listening. I was too busy watching Dorian.

  “Thank you for your advice,” he said. “We deeply appreciate being shown the way and your provision of a safehouse. I hope that we might work together… some day.”

  The elders acknowledged his final words with a bow, then dismissed everyone. Just like that, the meeting was over.

  I hung back while Arlonne and Roxy joined Dorian to discuss matters. Laini stayed beside me, perhaps guilty about my exclusion from the group. Her eyes darted toward them.

  “Laini, you should go listen. Can you just let Dorian know I need him to meet me afterward?” I asked her. “I’d appreciate it. I’ll head out and will be waiting for him in the conference room you guys used yesterday.” It was excruciating to stand idly by while my group made plans without me. Powerlessness was no friend of mine.

  Laini hesitated but nodded in the end. “I’ll tell him. Just… be careful not to hurt one another again, okay?”

  “We’ll be careful,” I promised.

  She worried for us. I imagined the rest of my teammates did the same, but I had to speak with Dorian.

  I needed to discuss things with him in private before one or both of us headed out on what might be our most dangerous mission yet.

  Somewhere out there, the Immortal City of Itzarriol waited for us.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  I waited for Dorian in the medium-sized chamber of the conference room that I had been excluded from before. It was thankfully unoccupied, with nothing inside it but a large round table made of white wood and several matching chairs. I hoped the room would be big enough that we could keep a safe distance between us. A distant hope, considering I didn’t yet know what a safe distance was for us.

  Here I am, reduced to hoping a room is big enough that I can stay far enough away from my vampire boyfriend that we don’t end up in comas.

  I kicked sorrowfully at the crinkling floor and got over it. As much as I hated this situation, I had no desire to pass out again. We had to keep our distance to protect ourselves from each other. That was just the way it was.

  My eyes traced the natural grooves of the amber moss above me. What details were they talking about in the council room? I wished I could be there instead of resorting to this, but I would have to wait. The universe rewarded my patience after a few more minutes.

  Dorian took a cautious step into the room, staying at the edge.

  “Lyra.”

  He hovered there and took a few more steps, testing the distance with slow movements. Under the golden light, the sharp lines of his handsome face appeared deeper than usual. The shadows beneath his skin teemed with dark energy. I fought the urge to run up and throw my arms around him. It was impossible.

  He reached out his hand, then dropped it when he realized what he’d done. There was no heartburn… yet.

  “Thank goodness we’re able to use one of the rooms in the Hive that actually has doors,” I joked, suddenly shy. We hadn’t spoken since we both passed out on the shore of the lake.

  The corner of his mouth quirked. “I’m very thankful for the shred of privacy. Doesn’t anyone in this place have uncomfortable conversations?”

  I laughed, my nerves immediately melting away. “Apparently not.”

  “I’m glad to see you up and about after your coma,” Dorian said. “I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to find a moment to talk to you in person. Letters were a good way to work around our problem, though.”

  I smiled, but the fact that we’d needed to resort to letters was a cold reminder of our circumstances. A letter could never be as good as seeing him in real life.

  “If you’re trying to charm me, it’s working,” I informed him. “But I haven’t wasted our time apart. I’ve had a few adventures of my own.”

  “Sike mentioned that,” Dorian said. “But he said you should be the one to tell me details.”

  “Echen, the scholar I mentioned in my letter, told us a story about a vampire-human couple,” I relayed. I paused, swallowing a surge of dread as I debated how to frame the story. I wasn’t sure how I felt about it myself. “We have a potential cure for the curse, but it’s not guaranteed. It’s just a theory.” In as much detail as I could, I explained what Echen had told us about the couple and their alleged method for escaping the curse.

  Dorian’s eyebrow rose with interest and hope as I spoke. The tired lines of his face lightened.

  “There’s a catch, though,” I added before he got too excited. “In their case, the vampire killed the human by
overfeeding from them.”

  He froze for a moment as he processed the news. I knew what he was thinking—I’d gone over the same thoughts in my head as Sike and I had walked back from Echen’s chambers. We had no other leads, no other theories on how to stop this pain. The stakes were high. Possible death, if we tried the method of a couple that had possibly never existed. Constant pain and comas if we continued as we were now. Separation—either on the mission or if he went ahead while I stayed at the Hive—in a dangerous land ruled by creatures intent on our capture and destruction. There was no easy answer.

  He was quiet for a long time. Then, slowly, the stormy shadow of concern faded from his face, and he took a deep breath. “If you’re willing, then I want to try it.” He stared at me expectantly, eyes burning with determination.

  I felt the pull of his conviction, the intoxicating power of it that set alight my own resolution to not give up. But… two fires only created double the destruction. Right now I needed to be the cooler head.

  “I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” I said. “Not when we know so little. It could be a fairytale.”

  “Or it could work,” Dorian countered.

  “Or we could die,” I said. “There’s too much to do in the coming days for us to rush into this. For all we know, it’s just a story.”

  Dorian furrowed his brow in thought, shaking his head. “No. You’re right… I want to try, but we’d need to be smart about it. If I got close enough to feed off you, we might both pass out again.” He began pacing, keeping a healthy distance between us. “I could get the other vampires in the Hive to drain my energy off. Maybe I could attempt feeding on you after that.”

  All the times I’d seen Dorian in his out-of-control, primal state flashed into my mind.

  “And what about the other risks? What if you—” My mouth refused to offer up the words. What if you kill me?

  A touch of humor lit Dorian’s gaze. “I wouldn’t worry about that. Your blood is so light, I’ll have to force myself to choke it down. I certainly won’t take more than I have to.”

  He said that now, but he’d never fed on anyone light before. What if it didn’t work that way, once his teeth were in? After all, that human hadn’t died because their partner had gagged on their blood.

  “What if I bled into a cup?” I asked. “Just to be safe. And that way, we can measure how much is needed.” I warmed to the idea; it would take care of the distance problem, prevent overfeeding, and we could even be scientific about how much blood was necessary to have an effect.

  So of course, Dorian shook his head. “Once blood leaves your body, it won’t contain your aura,” he said. “It has to be a direct feeding.”

  I frowned. “I’ve watched you feed from blood bags,” I pointed out, remembering the party at the facility, after we’d returned from the Amish mission.

  “The stain of darkness is harder to get rid of,” he said. “But while we were able to nourish ourselves from the blood, it wasn’t a true feeding. Because the blood was disconnected from the human, cleansing the blood of darkness didn’t affect their auras. We only fed that way because we were starving, and it was better than nothing.”

  I shook my head, trying to get my thoughts in order. This was such a big decision, and he’d only taken about ten seconds to consider it. “In that case, it’s too risky. I don’t want you to weaken yourself right before a mission because of an urban legend. We need to research more. Find out if this couple even existed.” I sucked in a steadying breath. “I’ll stay behind and research with Sike and Bryce and Arlonne. The rest of you need to go to Itzarriol and do what we came here to do, which is gather information that will help us close the tear. Doing that will be easier without the worry of incapacitating each other, and by the time you get back, you should be weak enough that we can get close enough to each other to try it.”

  He scowled. “As if I would ever accept that.”

  My frustration bubbled to life. While his insistence on not leaving me behind was touching, it was starting to feel like he was putting feelings before strategy.

  He tapped his foot. “Us standing here shows that it’s unnecessary for us to be that far apart, Lyra. The group needs you. I need you. Not just for your insights into battles and your skills, but for your human perspective on the Immortal conspiracy. You’re the one who has been the deepest within this Bureau mess. You offer a perspective that nobody else has, and you might be able to recognize clues and see what we can’t. Even Kane agrees, and you know how prickly he is. You don’t have to sacrifice your involvement in the mission for my sake. We can find a way, just like we have before.”

  His logic mollified me, showed me that he hadn’t been thinking entirely emotionally, as I’d thought. But I was still annoyed by his refusal to consider my points. “Is that what you think this is?” I asked. “You think I’m sacrificing my involvement just for you?”

  “Don’t you want to go?” Dorian asked, a stitch of confusion between his eyebrows.

  I huffed, slightly disappointed that I was distracted from my line of thought by how adorable his look of slight vulnerability was. “Of course I want to go! I want to help. But I have to think about whether I’m going to jeopardize the mission. You should, too.” I paced away from him, hoping I could make my point clear. “We didn’t think through how the curse might change and affect us in the Immortal Plane during this mission. We should have. It was irresponsible for us to assume that being in a different plane and having you back at full strength wouldn’t change things. We didn’t make any backup plans for the curse flaring up, and now we’re stuck in an impossible situation.” I looked over at him with a wry grin. “I wish I could go back in time and give myself a kick in the ass. Maybe give you a kick, too, while I’m there.”

  “We’ve handled it,” Dorian replied smoothly. He took up his pacing again. “Fighting for things that shouldn’t be possible is how we got this far in the first place.”

  Something in his energetic walk reminded me of how many groups and teams and individuals he had talked into supporting him and his ideas: the Bureau, his clan, my team, the Hive council to a certain extent, and most definitely me. He was always the heroic leader in the room—a smooth and powerful figure who knew how to bargain, manipulate, and sway. It was captivating to watch.

  He stopped, staring at me. “It’s how you and I have gotten this far. We’ve spat in the face of the impossible.”

  Oh, he’s good. I felt myself drifting into his point of view, like I’d just finished the end of an inspiring book. That was his skill. It was how he had survived for as long as he had. He was a trailblazer, out of necessity and dogged determination. Just as quickly, however, I took a mental and physical step back, focusing on what he wasn’t acknowledging.

  I pointed an accusatory finger at him, but there was no heat to my voice. I wasn’t angry at him, not really. He wanted to fight for what he thought was right for both of us, and I felt only fondness toward him for that. But he wasn’t hearing what I was trying to say. “Stop. I don’t want to hear moving speeches right now about how we’ve beaten the odds before and can do it again. I know you’re good at them.” I paused, the root of my underlying issue with his actions coming into focus. “You’ve been pushing through so many decisions lately without truly thinking about them. You decided to run into the Immortal Plane to go to Itzarriol without any help from the Bureau, barely taking time to gather supplies. You went to the press conference in Edinburgh while starving so you would avoid hurting me at all, when you could have fed a little. You demanded we were brought to Moab to help with the empty swarm without discussing the plan with any of us, not even me. You can push through your crazy schemes all you want, Dorian, but you can’t force the universe to side with you because you say so. You push to make things happen. It’s what I like about you, and I also find it intensely frustrating.”

  “Lyra, I—”

  “Listen,” I said and sucked in a breath. I’d finally hit my stride, and I
was worried that if he knocked me off course, I’d never find the words again. “Please listen. You can’t keep pushing me, Dorian. I’m not a strategy to be executed. I’m a person. Leave your inspirational speeches at the door. I need to hear what you’re really thinking so I can support you, even if those thoughts are hard. I have to be able to talk to you about my concerns without feeling like you’re trying to manage me.” I closed my eyes for a second, struggling with my next words even though they were true. “I probably shouldn’t have come to the Immortal Plane with you. Which is why I’m trying to step back now. In going to gather evidence of the Immortal rulers’ involvement with the Bureau, you have greater advantages here than I do. You have a better knowledge of the dangers, greater speed, stealth, and strength. All of which are useless if you can’t stay conscious when I’m close by, but I have to be close by because it’s too dangerous for me to be too far away from you. I’m a good soldier, but here I’ve had to be coddled and protected and guided almost every step of the way. A good soldier in the Mortal Plane doesn’t necessarily translate to a good soldier here.”

  Dorian’s nostrils flared angrily. “You’re an excellent soldier.”

  “In most circumstances, yes,” I agreed confidently. “Here? I’m not so sure, but what I don’t need is for you to treat me like your personal soldier. If we weren’t in a relationship, it could be different. I could shut up and follow your orders. But if we are going to work together, as partners and as soldiers, then I always have to have a choice. I can’t shut up and follow while you bulldoze through every decision.”

  He stilled, not saying a word.

  “We have to think about the difficult things… like sometimes having to be apart from each other,” I reminded him. “Not forever. Just sometimes. It’s unavoidable.”

  Dorian crossed his arms. My hands longed to reach out and brush away the pensive lines on his forehead.

  “Everything you said is true,” he confessed with a sigh. “I’m tired of feeling like I have to push everyone around me into action. Sometimes, I just want to lie down and curl up next to you for as long as I want. If I can’t have that, I at least want to know you’re nearby, and not just for sweet and gentle reasons. I trust your skills. I want to know that you have my back.”