Haven Divided (The Dragon's Brood Cycle Book 2)

by Josh de Lioncourt

  “No,” Mona whispered, but her mouth was full of blood.

  Mother.

  She felt her son’s fear before his cries began, long and shrill in the stillness of the house.

  Mother… Mother… Mother…

  I’m so sorry, she thought desperately, tears stinging her eyes. Beneath her, she could feel her blood pooling around her. I’m so sorry.

  The world was going gray again. Desperately, she fought to stay conscious. Desperately, she tried to think of something—anything—she could do to help her son.

  Garrett’s face filled her mind then, as well as Corbb’s. With all the will she could muster, she sent the images hurtling out toward her son.

  Your father, she thought. Your uncle. Remember them. They’ll come for you.

  She closed her eyes, praying for some answer…some way to know that the images had reached her son.

  Mother…

  “I love you,” she whispered to the empty room, but the words were lost in a mouthful of blood.

  ***

  Haake came back to consciousness to find Jack still leaning against the mantle, watching him.

  “I did what you wanted,” he said, and it seemed he had been saying that again and again for hours—maybe days.

  “Indeed, you did, Mr. Haake,” Jack said. “Thank you.”

  Slowly, Haake became aware that he was no longer bound. He stretched out his limbs, wincing at the cramps in his muscles. It was cold, too. The fire had died long ago, judging by the cold stillness of the room.

  He rolled away from the hearth.

  “I’m not at all certain you know the full extent of what you’ve done,” Jack said behind him. “Have a good look, Mr. Haake.”

  And Haake did.

  There were two forms lying still on the floor. One was a Karikis Haake had never seen with the bloody dagger sticking out of his chest; it pointed like an accusatory finger toward the heavens. The other was Mona.

  “What…happened?” he whispered as a sudden rush of nausea washed over him. “I didn’t do that.”

  “Oh, but you did, Mr. Haake. You played it just right—just the way I asked.”

  Haake got to his hands and knees and crawled toward the bodies.

  “But why?” he asked stupidly.

  “Why? Why did she have to die? She was his mother, of course. She wasn’t going to let him go without a fight. The boy needed to be with the people who would know what to do with him.”

  Haake sat up, staring down into Mona’s pale face. Blood had pooled around her and was starting to congeal, but it was still wet enough to seep into the knees of his trousers.

  “No…” he said. “No…no…no…”

  “Oh, please, Mr. Haake. Spare me the theatrics. You hated her as much as any of them. Why should you care that she’s dead?”

  Tears stung Haake’s eyes, and he lowered his head to stare at his hands.

  Between his palms was the crumpled remains of a three-eyed sparrow. It was broken and crushed, and blood ran between his fingers.

  “And now,” Jack went on behind him, as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening, “it’s time for your payment. I did promise, after all.”

  Haake thrust the dead bird away from him with a grimace of disgust, and it fell to the floor and vanished.

  “Yes,” he whispered, but the voice did not sound like his. There were too many tears running down his face. “My family…”

  “Indeed,” Jack said. “A family for a family.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, come now,” Jack said, tutting. “You’re not that slow, are you, Mr. Haake? A family for a family…that was the deal.”

  “That wasn’t the deal!” Haake wailed.

  “Oh, but it was.”

  “No.”

  Haake’s eyes returned to Mona. She seemed so much smaller now than she had in life. He remembered the stories then, stories that had rippled through the Dragon’s Brood as they’d fled the safehouse in Hellsgate and moved into the library.

  “The girl—”

  “—the little blond one—”

  ”—she healed Mona, you know. Mona was at death’s door, and the girl just touched her, and she was healed—”

  “—she’s an angel, that one—”

  And now she was gone…she was gone…and it was his doing. He’d killed a woman who had been touched by an angel…

  “Does this mean you don’t want your payment then?”

  Haake didn’t answer.

  “Because there is one way to fix it all, Mr. Haake. A very simple way to fix everything you’ve done.”

  “No.” Haake didn’t know what he was refusing; the simple denial seemed like all he had left in the world. “No…”

  “Just take the dagger.”

  At first, Haake didn’t know what Jack was talking about, but then his eyes fell upon the fallen Karikis warrior.

  It was surprisingly difficult to pull the weapon free, and the feel of its blade as it scraped against the dead man’s ribs made his gorge rise. The dagger was coated in blood so dark it was nearly black, and the dying light of the setting sun that filtered in at the window glistened from it.

  “There,” Jack said.

  Haake just sat there staring at the weapon in his hand. It was cold and felt far heavier than it could possibly be.

  “I recommend one quick plunge,” Jack went on. “Get it over with swiftly. No point in suffering. The eye is the best point of entry. The blade will go neatly into your brain and end it all at once…perhaps even painlessly.”

  “Yes,” Haake said mechanically.

  For a while, he only went on staring at the dagger as the light drained out of the room.

  At last, he looked away, back at Mona’s face. He could almost imagine she was sleeping…almost.

  Without taking his eyes from her, he raised the blade to his face.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  With one fast motion, he drove the point of the blade through his eye.

  He fell backward onto the floor, and there was a metallic “chink” as a gold coin clattered to the hearth. It spun on its edge for a moment on the bricks, and then fell over and lay still.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Emily lay on her stomach among the jumble of bodies at the bottom of the net in which they hung suspended. To her left, she could feel Celine’s tiny frame huddled against her for warmth; on her right, the slow rise and fall of Corbbmacc’s chest. Not that his sleep was easy, but at least he was sleeping. She, on the other hand, had only dozed. The thick cords of the net biting into her cheek and a steady stream of nightmares had kept any sort of real rest at arm’s length.

  Somewhere, beside one or the other of her friends, Maddy slept as well, but Emily could no longer remember where the girl had tried to find comfort in this hell. She only heard her soft snores, echoing without direction in the dark.

  The last few days—fuck, even this very moment—were dreamlike and ephemeral in a fog of pain and despair. What had they been thinking? Had none of her companions known what the Reavers were capable of? She, Emily, could be forgiven. This wasn’t her goddamned world.

  But the truth was that none of them had known. Emily doubted if any back in the comparatively civilized confines of Seven Skies could have.

  After taking them prisoner, the Reavers had carried them to their camp. It had reminded her of scenes from old western movies with the covered wagons arranged in a circle around a bonfire. Even the desert terrain fit the picture. The cloth stretched over the tops and sides of the wagons glistened in the firelight, reflecting the flames in brilliant reds and oranges—frontiersman toys in hell.

  They were dropped to the ground, face down, and Emily twisted her neck, trying to see what had become of Galak. He must have been taken somewhere else, though, because she saw no sign of the Sarqin. Beside her, she heard Celine’s labored breathing, but she couldn’t turn enough to see more than a sliver of any of her friends. Wind gusted, kicking up dust and
sending a cloud of grit into her face. She closed her eyes, grimacing against the pain. Bound as she was, she couldn’t even wipe the dirt away, and so the tears just continued to stream down her cheeks.

  Rough hands, covered in those cloth wrappings, seized her around her hips, and she felt her bonds fall away. Before she could react, she was being hoisted through the opened back of one of the covered wagons, tossed like so much kindling. She tried to get her hands up in time to break her fall, but she wasn’t fast enough. Her face connected with the rough boards of the floor, making pin-pricks of light flash before her eyes. Blood filled her mouth as her teeth bit painfully into her lip, and her nose and forehead stung as skin was scraped away.

  The others were hurled in after her, one by one, and she scrambled to her hands and knees, crawling toward the far side and trying to get out of the way.

  With a snap, the back of the wagon was closed, and she heard a snick of what she assumed was some kind of lock being engaged outside.

  The wagon was a cage of sorts, only the bars were made of thicker versions of those same strange translucent cables that they’d been tied with. Heavy cloth covered the wagon entirely, apparently woven from thin threads of the same stuff. It made it impossible to see anything outside, save for vague shadows and the light of the flickering flames. The material looked almost like plastic, and it seemed strange and alien in this world of stone and wood. At least it let in some light to see by.

  “We should’ve been keeping a better watch,” Maddy was muttering mostly to herself. “Then they couldn’t have snuck up on us like that.” Emily wasn’t sure if that was true. The Reavers had carried them at least a mile—probably more—in near total silence, despite bearing the weight of their captured humans and, somewhere, Galak’s massive bulk. Even their feet, covered like all the rest of them in those mummy-like bandages, had glided soundlessly over the dirt and sand.

  Ultimately, it didn’t really matter. This was their way to get to Daniel; Derek, deep inside the knowing, had told her so.

  Beside her, Celine sat up and took in their surroundings. She looked pale in the dim light, and her expression was calm. One hand, gnarled and twisted, moved automatically toward her shoulder, then fell back into her lap. Rascal wasn’t there.

  At least they weren’t tied to the top of one of these wagons, Emily reflected, as Daniel had been in her vision. Where was he? Here in this camp? She didn’t think so. This seemed like a much smaller congregation of Reavers than she’d seen. No, this group had been sent to investigate the fire at the ghost town, she thought.

  A flap opened in the wagon’s covering and four crude wooden bowls were shoved between the bars.

  “Food,” one of those inscrutable, rattling voices said, its owner a silhouette against the firelight outside, and then the flap was closed again.

  The “food” was little more than raw gristle in bloody water. Tiny insects—fleas?—floated on its surface, dead and slowly disintegrating into the broth. None of them ate it.

  The hours slipped away. Corbbmacc tried pulling at the cables that made up the bars of their prison, and Emily and Maddy joined him. But they were as strong as steel and as smooth as glass. Perhaps, if they had something to saw at them with, they could escape, but the Reavers had taken their weapons. With a pang, Emily thought of the crystal sword Maddy had carved and which she had been using as a trigger for the knowing. What had the Reavers done with it? Left it behind at the cave? She didn’t think so. The leader had called it her “channeler”. She didn’t know exactly what that meant, but she could guess.

  At dawn, the wagon began to move, though Emily couldn’t imagine what was pulling it. She’d seen no sign of any animals the night before, and the only sound they heard from outside was the crunch of the wheels on dirt—no pounding of hooves or brays of donkeys.

  Judging by the position of the sun, Corbb and Maddy thought they were heading north and east, up into the mountain range that stretched beyond the lake where they’d made their final stand against Marianne. There were monsters to the east, she remembered someone saying. The Reavers were monsters enough. Were there worse things out there? She found it hard to imagine anything worse.

  At noon, bowls of the same slop were again pushed through the bars, joining the uneaten portions from the night before. Still, they did not touch them.

  As the first afternoon wore on, the temperature began to fall, and Maddy said she was pretty sure they were climbing into the higher elevations now.

  At dusk, the Reavers made camp again. More slop, thin sleep, on the move again at dawn.

  And so it went for two days. The days grew cold and the nights colder. Hunger consumed Emily’s thoughts, but still she could not eat, even when the others broke down at last and choked down some of the hunks of fatty, hardly-cooked meat. Emily found herself remembering cheeseburgers, chocolate cake, and Coca-Cola. Decent meals had been few since landing in this new life. The memories sharpened her hunger, and it clawed at her insides. Angrily, she pushed the thoughts away.

  Finally, around noon of the third day, the wagon came to an abrupt halt. Outside, they could hear the dry rattling scrape of the Reavers’ voices, but they didn’t seem to be using words—not in any language that Emily could recognize, anyway.

  She and Corbbmacc exchanged a look. They were both thinking the same thing, she knew. This was their destination. If there was to be any chance to get free and search for Daniel, it would be when the Reavers came to get them out.

  It was a vain hope, of course; there were far too many Reavers out there. Emily could tell that simply from the number of throats issuing those terrible sounds. Even if by some miracle they found themselves alone with fewer guards, the Reavers were inhumanly strong and fast. At best, maybe one of them could get away, but certainly not all of them. And she would not—would not—leave Celine behind. Still, what did they have to lose? Maybe they’d get lucky.

  As one, she and Corbbmacc moved toward the back of the wagon, positioning themselves on either side of the door. Maddy watched them impassively, then moved closer to Celine. If Emily and Corbb were going to try to make a fight of it, someone would have to help Celine. Emily shot Maddy a grateful smile, but she doubted it reached her eyes. She was too tired; too tired and too hungry by half.

  There was no warning before the door was opened. She and Corbb were ready to lunge forward, hoping the attack would catch the Reavers by surprise.

  It didn’t.

  The two Reavers who had come for them seemed to know exactly what they were doing before the door was even halfway open. Emily tried to scramble back, but the one closest to her reached out with a twitch of his arms as fast as lightning and yanked her out by a fistful of the chain mail across her chest. Corbbmacc faired no better, and within seconds the four of them were sprawled in the snow.

  This time, they were lying on top of thick netting, similar to that used by fishermen, she thought, but made of those same translucent cords, which nearly disappeared into the white of the snow. The ends of the net were pulled up around them, and they were first dragged, then hoisted into the air, and carried away like a fishermen’s catch.

  Higher up the mountainside they went, and then down into a massive crater of black rock at its peak. Through the netting, she could just make out stone steps roughly carved into the side of the crater. A long dormant volcano, she thought, judging by the glass-like stone and its sharp and jagged contours, but the cold and the wind were biting into her flesh like steely knives, and she was finding it hard to focus.

  She could make out other Reavers carrying nets like theirs, presumably laden with more unfortunates they had scavenged. She tried to shift to see more, but Celine moaned and one of the captors kicked her through the netting.

  “Lie still,” one of the Reavers said.

  Slowly, they descended into the crater.

  The rest of what happened was a blur of images and cold. The bottom of the crater was a smooth bowl glistening with mounds of snow and patches o
f ice. On its walls hung dozens—hundreds?—of nets like the one in which they were trapped. They hung in neat rows up the crater’s curved walls, the lowest some ten feet above the bottom.

  Somehow they had been attached to a rope—probably another one of those cables—and hoisted upward beside the others.

  And that was where they’d remained as the daylight drained out of the sky and night fell, along with the temperatures.

  What time was it now? It was impossible to tell. All Emily could see was a vague suggestion of snow and ice some twenty feet below her reflecting the pale light of the stars.

  There had been plenty of Reavers guarding them during the daylight hours, and she supposed they were still out there somewhere, but their alien chatter had died with nightfall. The only sounds now were the creak of the nets as the other prisoners moved restlessly in their sleep…and the moans.

  Was Daniel out there somewhere? He must be. She willed for the knowing to come—wished for it with all her heart—but it did not come. All she felt was the cold, the pain, and the warmth of her friends around her.

  Her friends…who had chosen to come with her instead of going on with Michael.

  “But I promised,” she whispered into the dark.

  Desperately, she pushed her stiff fingers through the netting, gripping the cords and trying to pull them apart. Just like in the wagon, it was useless. The stuff felt as soft as velvet, but it was as strong as steel. It bit into her fingers, and she supposed she was making them bleed; they were too cold and numb to know for sure.

  Perhaps she dozed…perhaps she merely lost consciousness for a while. The night dragged on.

  When she came back to herself again, something had changed. There was something more than just the shadows at the bottom of the crater—though those had grown thicker. Now, even the suggestion of the piles of snow below her were gone. But there was something else.

  A pair of small silver circles glowed in the darkness beneath her. They grew larger, and her tired mind tried to make sense of them.