King Of Flames (The Masks of Under Book 1)

by Kathryn Ann Kingsley

  A man sitting with a young Asian woman looked up as they approached. The man was in his early forties, maybe, and had a harried look about him. The woman was cowering, her knees pulled up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them tightly in an attempt to make herself as small as possible.

  “Your friend is awake,” the older man said with a smile. “Hello! You must be Lydia. I am Gary.” Gary stood and nearly fell over as his foot slipped on a rock. He quickly steadied himself against the wall with one hand then extended his other hand to her. Maybe not the most coordinated man in the world, but with decent reflexes and more energy than Lydia expected. He was dressed in a button down and a pair of slacks—business casual. “Wonderful to meet you.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Lydia replied with a smile and shook his hand. She instantly liked the man. He had lively green eyes and friendly, if incredibly British, mannerisms. “I wish it were under better circumstances.”

  “Agreed, agreed,” Gary said with a sigh. “This is Kaori.” Gary motioned to the Asian woman still cowering on the floor. Dark, saucer-like eyes were staring up at her in wary fear. “She does not speak much English, I’m afraid.”

  Lydia smiled sympathetically at her. She knew exactly how the girl felt. She was doing on the inside what Kaori was doing on the outside. “Hey, Kaori. Nice to meet you.”

  “You also,” the girl muttered and tucked her chin into her knees. She was shaking, clearly beside herself in fear. Poor thing.

  Gary saw the girl’s distress and sat next to her again. He put his hand on Kaori’s back, trying to console her. “She’s taking this all rather hard.”

  “I guess we all should be.” Lydia looked around the cave. Some people were hunched into groups, and she heard sobbing from one corner. “None of this makes any sense.”

  “Nicholas told me what happened to the two of you. Very brave, trying to run. I am afraid I merely let it all happen without much fuss.” Gary sighed. “I was too astonished to do much else.”

  Lydia had to laugh at Gary calling Nick by his full name. Nick hated that, and she saw the look on her friend’s face when he couldn’t quite bring himself to correct the Englishman.

  Looking around the room once more, she saw everyone was handling their situation differently. Some were trying to sleep, while some were huddling into groups. Some were crying, and some were standing by themselves. One guy was pacing. They were prisoners, or hostages, too afraid to try to figure out what was happening for fear of what they might find.

  “Fuck this.” Lydia’d had enough. This was stupid. They were owed explanations.

  “Where’re you going?” Nick asked.

  “I’m trying the door.”

  “And if it opens?” Gary asked.

  “I’m getting answers,” she said assertively. Lydia felt a likely temporary surge of confidence and turning to start walking.

  “No. No, seriously, I think we should stay put. I’ve heard about what’s been grabbing people, and what’s out there…they aren’t friendly,” Nick warned.

  “I don’t care. Someone’s going to tell me what’s going on. And if I get eaten, fine.” Did she really mean she’d be fine with being eaten? Probably not. But it sounded good when she said it. “Are you coming?”

  “Yeah, okay.” Nick sighed and shoved his hands into his hoodie pockets. “This is a stupid idea.”

  Lydia shrugged. “Door’s probably locked, anyway. Come on.”

  “Oh, do be careful,” Gary interjected.

  “You should come,” Lydia said with a smirk back at the Englishman. “Maybe we’ll find someone who’ll talk to us.”

  “I think someone should stay with Ms. Kaori. And I do not think she wishes to go anywhere at the moment,” Gary observed correctly. “Truth be told, I think I too may faint if I see another monster the likes of what brought me here,” he admitted, unashamed, once again sheepishly smiling at her.

  “Well, hopefully, we’ll be back,” she said with a smile. Yeah, Lydia instantly liked the guy. Then again, she’d always been a fan of British anything.

  Walking to the door, she picked up the large metal ring. It was roughly hammered iron, fed through a bracket that attached it to the door with heavy forged bolts. It squealed loudly as she tilted it upward, clearly not having been moved in a long time, and gave it a tug.

  Lydia hadn’t expected it to move. She’d assumed it would be locked. Yet it swung open slowly about an inch before she stopped pulling. What kind of idiots would keep prisoners in an unlocked chamber?

  Ones who know you’re in a larger cage anyway.

  Or worse…

  Ones who plan on eating the stupid ones who leave the room.

  There was a hallway on the other side, long, rocky, and lit with torches the same as the cavern they were in. The corridor twisted and turned and went on for about a hundred feet before Lydia couldn’t see down it anymore as it disappeared around a bend.

  The cavernous hallway was also—thankfully—empty. Nobody was standing there waiting, no monsters lurking. Not that they could see, anyway.

  “C’mon,” Lydia said as she pulled the door open a few more inches to slip through the crack and into the hallway.

  “What’re we trying to find?” Nick asked her in a whisper as he stepped out into the hallway with her.

  “I have no idea.”

  “I get the feeling we’re going to get chased again.”

  “Probably.”

  Complaints and nervousness aside, they started down the empty hallway. Nobody seemed excited to follow them. As they walked away, the door behind them swung shut. Whether it was because somebody closed it behind them or that the door itself was offended at the idea of being left ajar, she had no clue. She just added it to the list of mysteries and unanswered questions.

  “So, Kaori’s cute,” Nick said still in a whisper as they made it halfway down the hallway.

  “Seriously, dude?” Lydia whispered back at him and glanced at him narrowly. “You’re gonna do this now?”

  “Might die soon,” Nick said with a shrug. “And I just said she was cute, that’s all.”

  Lydia shook her head and went back to focusing on the hallway that may or may not contain monsters. But that didn’t stop her from whispering, “You’re an asshole, Nick.”

  “Yup.”

  Lydia and Nick continued, trying to move as quietly as they could. Peeking around the corner, they wound up standing in an intersection.

  “Huh, that’s weird,” Lydia observed quietly.

  The weird thing about the intersection was how the two spaces joined. One hallway met the other and just seemed to melt out of stone and into a carved, finished area. As soon as the cavern touched the intersection of hallways, it became a polished marble. But what was really peculiar about it was it didn’t look like the stone hallway had been carved out of the cave. It looked more like the cavern was trying to eat the building. Like lava flow, oozing over a preexisting structure.

  The structure in question looked like a medieval cathedral. Some sort of gothic, ancient building, the likes of which weren’t anywhere in America. This was old—very old. Arched windows, detailed in quatrefoils and framed in stone, ran along one wall, looking outward from the cave-like structure. Whatever was on the other side, it was too dark to see. The hallway stretched in both directions.

  It was eerie and made more so by the silence that seemed to fill the hallway. It was lit by torches and candles in sconces in the walls.

  Still, no answers to be had yet, so she grabbed Nick by the sleeve of his hoodie and tugged him to the right. Nick came obediently, and they walked down the hallway in silence. They had gone about twenty feet before something caught their attention.

  A statue in an alcove, tucked into the wall. Candles were laid out at its feet in rows and tiers. That cinched it—this was definitely a church. Some strange, messed-up, perverted church. Because what stood on the pedestal was not a statue of a saint or an angel, but of a demon.

  At leas
t, that was the only thing Lydia could come up with to describe it. It was a twisted, warped creature with wings of bone and claws that were far too long for its hands. Its face looked like a mask or a skull—or both. Its body looked like the carapace of an insect. Large, empty, gaping eyes and a fiendish, toothy maw that was threatening and gloating over a victory at the same time.

  It had six arms. Four were held out at its sides at various angles, sharp claws in careful poses that seemed almost reminiscent of a statue of Shiva. It held a goblet in one clawed hand and was tipping it on its side, pouring its empty contents out into a waiting upturned talon. The flickering uplight of the candles added to its unnerving appearance.

  “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” Nick said quietly.

  Lydia had to agree and only nodded as they looked up at the monstrous statue.

  An unexpected voice from behind them broke them of their awe and creeping dread.

  “Hello, again.”

  Chapter Seven

  “Hello, again.”

  Nick and Lydia screamed at the voice from behind them. In sync, they whirled, nearly toppling over each other.

  It was that tall, pale vampire who had attacked them in Boston. Lydia remembered his name had been Lyon, the Priest, as Aria had called him. He stood there watching them, his hands clasped behind his back, expression as calm and yet mournful as he had been before.

  “Shit!” Nick swore loudly. He looked ready to crawl out of his own skin in terror. He backed up into the shelf of candles, causing them all to rattle against each other. He had to step away from it again for fear of setting his hoodie on fire.

  “When I was told two of the marked had wandered out of the chamber, I had suspected it might be you,” he said idly. Lyon was standing five paces away from them. “I apologize for upending you in such an undignified manner earlier,” Lyon continued, his ice-blue eyes fixing Nick to the spot.

  They should run. Would it even do any good? She had no idea where she was. If Maverick and Aria were to be believed, they weren’t even on Earth anymore. Nick seemed hell-bent on trying, at least. He took off running without a word, tearing down the hallway without looking at her. Either he’d assumed she’d follow, or he was too scared to care.

  When she went to follow him, a hand clasped her upper arm. Lyon had firmly taken hold of her and kept her from making any progress. “Please, do not run. They greatly enjoy a hunt, and it will only exacerbate matters.”

  “They?”

  “The Hounds.”

  That was like cold water running down her spine, and she felt her body go tense at the two simple words. The Hounds. Two words that kept her from struggling and trying to go after her friend.

  “Oh, god, Nick.” She looked down after her friend as he rounded the corner of the long hallway and was gone. The sound of his heavy footfalls faded off into the distance. “Please, stop them,” she begged Lyon, and he merely looked down at her with all the expression of a cemetery angel.

  “He will be returned with a few scratches for his trouble. They will not damage him overmuch. But an escape attempt was foolish, I must admit.” Lyon released his grasp on her arm, seeming to trust her not to repeat her friend’s mistake. “Come,” Lyon began to walk in the other direction, “I will make some tea.”

  Stay here and be hunted by Hounds, go back to the cavern, or…drink some tea with a monster and maybe get some answers. That was why Lydia came out here, anyway, wasn’t it?

  Lyon stopped, turned halfway to look at her, and waited to see if she would follow him or run after her friend. Or maybe he expected her to collapse into a fit of hysterics. She kind of wanted to do all three.

  Panic later.

  So she hiked up her proverbial breeches and headed after him down the hallway. He watched her approach without moving. Suddenly, she realized why he was so eerie. Everybody shifted a little, even when they were holding perfectly still. Breathing, blinking or moving unconsciously. But Lyon just…didn’t. More and more, he looked like a statue.

  Lydia swallowed the rock in her throat. “Promise they aren’t going to eat Nick.” Promise you aren’t going to eat me.

  Lyon’s eyes creased in a gentle expression as he bowed his head to her just barely. He extended a hand to gesture down the hallway, where he intended to take her. “I give you my word.”

  What the hell was happening to her life?

  Here she was, wandering down a dark hallway of a marble church or gothic castle—or whatever—walking beside a tall, stoic freak of nature. The more she watched Lyon, the more apparent it became he wasn’t human. She couldn’t help but stare and then had to pull herself away from trying to figure him out to watch where she was going.

  The white, tattooed writing that ran down the one side of his face started up in his hairline, ran down from his temple, down to his jaw. It then picked up again on his neck and ran down under the collar of his white shirt. His skin tone was only a bare shade darker than the white writing, making it almost impossible to see.

  “Go on, then,” Lyon prompted. “You are nearly boiling over with the need to speak.”

  “What are you?” she asked and found herself glad she had brought her fall coat along with her, if only to shove her hands inside her pockets, wondering if she could climb the rest of herself in there to hide. “You’re just like the thing that attacked me.”

  “Ah, yes. William. I apologize for his manners. He was overcome with hunger when he found you.”

  “Hunger?”

  “We vary quite drastically in this world. William and I are creatures not still living yet not quite dead. While all in this world may consume blood for pleasure, he and I are of a kind that requires it to maintain our strength. Especially young ones such as he.”

  “Are you seriously a vampire?”

  “Hm?” Lyon looked at her curiously, as if he wasn’t quite sure what that word meant at first. Recognition dawned on him a second later. “Ah, yes, forgive me. I forget all the names in all the languages. No, I am not a vampire. Not as I believe you think of it.” He paused. “Yet mayhap my kind are the wellspring from which those legends call their origin.”

  It took her a second to figure out what he meant. “Do you drink blood?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you have fangs?”

  “Yes,” he said reluctantly.

  “Then you’re a vampire,” she concluded. “If it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck…”

  Lyon looked as though he was amused, if begrudgingly so. “It is not nearly as simplistic as you may think.” Lyon paused for a moment and shook his head. “I am detailing this to you out of order, I fear.”

  “I don’t think there’s a right order.” Lydia looked off. The logical follow-up question begged to be asked. “How old are you?”

  “Nearly two thousand years old.”

  Her steps hitched, and she almost stumbled over herself. She pulled up to a stop and couldn’t help but stare at Lyon, wide-eyed.

  Lyon stopped and turned to look at her with a barely bemused expression. “I say that I am a monster who drinks blood, and you do not falter. I tell you my age, and that frightens you? You are an odd one.”

  “This is all bullshit. This all has to be bullshit. You’re lying to me. Nobody is two thousand years old.”

  “I am not lying to you. Nor am I the eldest who lives in this world.”

  Lydia put her hands through her hair, combing her fingers through the blonde waves. “I want to go home, please.”

  “Not even Master Edu could grant such a wish.” There was pity in his voice as he watched her grapple with what he was saying.

  “But why? Why are we here? Why have you hunted us down?” she shouted, feeling fear start to build in her chest again.

  Lyon raised his hands gently, trying to insist that she calm down.

  Lydia took a step back and leaned against the wall, feeling the cold marble at her back. This guy was telling her what she wanted to know. Screaming a
t him wasn’t going to help. “Sorry,” she said quietly and forced herself to breathe.

  “It is quite all right. This is no small matter, and you are not acting out of turn.” He continued to lead her down the hallway. She followed him, having no real other option. “We do not mean you harm. We do not intend to hurt you in any way.”

  “Then what do you intend to do?”

  Lyon paused speaking for a moment, as if plotting out his words. The sorrow in his features had returned. “No souls are born in this place.”

  That took a second for her to process. It seemed like a jump in topics, but she would follow where this went. She was sure it connected somehow. Lyon didn’t look like the kind to lose track of a conversation. “You guys can’t…make more of yourselves?”

  “No. Nor do we die by normal means. We can be killed, but it is more difficult.”

  “That’s why when I shot Edu, he just…came back?”

  “Yes. You killed King Edu, but in such a way, it is a temporary state for us.”

  “Wait. I shot the king?”

  Lyon chuckled and looked at her with a thin, barely there smile. “Yes. You did. One who has not been felled in many centuries. He was quite impressed, if begrudgingly so.”

  Lydia walked beside him in silence as she considered what it must be like dying and coming back. “Does it hurt?”

  “Of course.”

  Lydia winced. “That’s awful.”

  “Yes, I suppose it can be.”

  “I suppose I should apologize if I see Edu again,” Lydia muttered.

  That brought a small chuckle out of him. “No, do not bother. He is a warrior, the most distinguished one to ever come from our world. He sees your act as something over which you should be proud, not ashamed. You caught him unaware.”