Descent (The Infernal Guard Book 2)

by SGD Singh

  One of the men brought him a hose to clean his hands, and they all spent the next hour unpacking the fruit and arranging it onto the tables under a web of hanging lights. Nidhan learned the names of the fruit he didn’t recognize—caju apple, graviola, carambola, maracuja—and the men seemed to enjoy his butchery of their language. They also had nearly every fruit Nidhan recognized, and once they all finished stacking it into artistic towers and neat rows, the men insisted Nidhan eat more.

  Within twenty minutes, he was full. Returning the empty crates to the truck, Nidhan washed his hands, retied his hair, straightened the cloth around his feet, and checked the cell phone. Three o’clock in the morning.

  Which meant nothing since he’d forgotten to check the time when he first called Lexi.

  Lexi.

  That something began to squeeze his chest again, and Nidhan took a deep breath, determined to focus on his immediate situation.

  “Thank you very much,” he told the men, preparing to leave.

  A small boy rushed toward them from an alley, and Nidhan noticed he was holding a pair of tennis shoes as large as his arms. He gave the shoes to the men, and one rattled off something in Portuguese that sent the boy running back into the darkness. The driver, who seemed to be in charge, pushed a bag of what looked like black grapes into Nidhan’s hands with a nod, saying, “Jabuticaba.”

  “Zah-boo-tea-caabah,” Nidhan said, and everyone laughed.

  And then the whole group surrounded him, speaking over each other in rapid Portuguese, pushing the giant shoes into his hands. He was astonished to find they actually fit.

  Nidhan looked around at the men’s smiling faces, and felt more touched and humbled than he had in a long time. Here he was, a complete stranger, a foreign giant with wild hair and torn clothes, appearing in the middle of the night, and these men who had so little themselves had not only fed him, but, seeing his need, had offered him gifts.

  Nidhan folded his hands and bowed his head. “Thank you,” he said. And still, they let him leave only after he insisted he didn’t need a ride anywhere.

  Nidhan waited until he was far from the fruit market and hidden on the roof of a darkened building before calling Lexi again.

  “Nidhan. We’re almost two hours away. What’s the—”

  “No vegetarian options, you say?” Nidhan chewed loudly, realizing too late the fruit had much larger pits than grapes. “I happen to be enjoying quite delicious zabootie-caba at the moment.”

  “Fine,” Lexi said. “Excellent. Just don’t get kidnapped while you’re eating bootie. Try to get to the roof of the Windsor Atlantica Hotel. It’s about twelve kilometer’s from your current location in Favela da Rocinha. We’ll be there soon.”

  “Fah-vella da Ho-seenya…” Nidhan said. “I’m assuming that’s what this out-of-control pind is called. Other than the language, it’s like a Punjabi village on steroids. Now that I’ve discovered means of sustenance I could totally live here.”

  “Just stay out of sight and get to the Atlantica, all right?” But he knew Lexi was smiling again. “And for God’s sake, don’t try to speak Portuguese to anyone. You’ll scare the locals.”

  “Ma’am, yes ma’am.” Nidhan chewed. “Copy that.”

  “Are you armed?”

  Nidhan spit a pit to the ground. “You wound me, Lexi.”

  “Okay, okay… sorry.”

  “It’s going to be okay,” Nidhan said softly. “Everything will be all right.”

  “Will it?” Her voice was a whisper.

  “Yes. It will. Once we know mo—”

  The aroma of cauliflower frying in spiced batter filled the night, and before he could react, Nidhan’s limbs went numb, and he felt himself floating off the roof toward to the ground, completely helpless.

  They must have been tracing the old woman’s phone. Was she a Familiar after all?

  He could hear Lexi’s voice shouting something over the phone as he struggled to stay conscious.

  Lexi…

  He felt like smiling and crying all at once, but couldn’t move his face.

  You bastards are gonna be so sorry when she gets here.

  As he began to lose consciousness, he heard Mamono speaking to the phone.

  “Lexi, Lexi, Lexi.” The Goblin leaned in close to Nidhan, speaking loud enough to be heard over the drug. “Never mind our deal, Lexi. We have your precious Asha right where we want her.” The Goblin smiled then, his sharp teeth standing out against his intricately tattooed face. “And this one will make a wonderful present for The Empress. Bye now.”

  Everything switched off.

  Chapter 23

  “Motherfucker!” Lexi threw her phone against the wall of the jet, where it shattered.

  Kai turned in the pilot seat to look at her. “We still bound for Rio, Lex?”

  Lexi sank down into the first recliner, leaning her elbows on her knees, and lowered her head into her hands. “Can’t this piece of shit go any faster?”

  “Hey,” Kenda called. “It takes a normal plane fifteen hours. This beauty gets us to Rio in seven. Only two hours to go.”

  “We don’t have two hours,” Lexi snapped, feeling tears of frustration fill her eyes.

  “Talk to me,” said Ariella, crouching in front of her. “What did Nidhan say?”

  “He had gotten away. He was free. And then that bastard took him again.” Lexi ran both hands through her hair, looking out the window. I distracted him with this fucked-up situation, and they took him. “Mamono says he won’t negotiate anymore. He’s taking Nidhan to some Empress. Asha walked right into a trap, apparently.”

  Ariella was quiet for a long minute. Then, “You know what you have to do, Lexi.”

  “Don’t.”

  “Call him. It’s the only way to get to Nidhan fast enough. They materialized right in front of us in Arizona.”

  Lexi continued to gaze out the window.

  “Hey,” said Ariella. “It could be that this is what Asha saw…”

  Standing abruptly, Lexi stalked to the back of the aircraft. “Spare me your psycho-babble bullshit. I’m not in the mood.”

  But Lexi knew Ariella was right. She needed to ask Zaiden for help.

  Taking a deep breath, Lexi closed her eyes and tried to picture the Upperworlder. It wasn’t difficult.

  Hello? Hewitt to Steampunk Royal Highness Prince Zaiden Kartikeya Agurzil, or whatever the hell your name is. Come in. Over.

  Lexi, I’m here. Uh… over.

  Zaiden’s voice was as clear in her mind as if he were standing right in front of her. Lexi turned away from Ariella’s sharp gaze and gritted her teeth against its beauty.

  They used your weapon again. Which you should already know unless more shit has gone wrong. They took my fiancé. Again. We are currently two hours from his location. We need you—I need you to get to Nidhan before this scum take him into the Underworld. Please.

  We’re on our way.

  And if you’re too late, you’re taking us down there after him.

  Lexi, I—

  You’re taking us down there. You got here, so you have a way to travel between realms.

  It’s not—

  Over and out.

  Lexi sat at the back of the aircraft and began sharpening her weapons.

  No one spoke to her until they could see Rio.

  Chapter 24

  Asha felt as if she’d been slapped. The certainty that if they didn’t go right now, they would never reach the palace in time to save the Seer hit her so clearly that she almost tripped with the force of it.

  “We can’t wait for sunrise,” she gasped, jumping up to face the group. “We have to move now. Jax? Avinash? Lead the way.”

  You mind explaining what’s going on?

  Asha could feel the effort it took Aquila to speak with his mind, even as she sensed his emotions more strongly in this realm. The others wore matching questions on their faces.

  She reached for Aquila’s hand. “If we don’t get past the ci
ty soon, we never will. I just know it.”

  Less than three minutes later, they entered a deserted street, and Jax and Avinash took a few steps away from the group. Avinash shook his head at something Jax said.

  Asha watched Jax look around again, the civilian’s eyes taking in every detail of the destroyed buildings beneath her dark glasses. Kelakha moved to stand protectively behind her, and Jax ignored him, oblivious to the drastic change his friends had begun to notice in him since the day he met the civilian.

  Finally, Jax turned to the group, nodding once to herself. “We move silently,” she said. “Stick to the open as much as possible. Stay out of confined areas. Let the suits do the rest. The Underworlders like to stay hidden, so if we do the opposite, and move quickly, we should be able to avoid contact. Stay calm, detached, and yes, I mean myself most of all.” She met Ursala’s gaze defiantly. “Let’s hope to hell these suits block our scent as well as they claim to.”

  Ursala gave her a mock salute, and Asha elbowed Aquila in the ribs until he gave Jax a nod.

  Jax looked at her compass/watch. “If we jog for twenty minutes, and rest for three, we should cover ten miles in two hours and forty minutes.”

  Asha grinned at her, then motioned everyone to cover their faces with hoods of the same mystery material as their suits.

  Jax turned and began jogging silently down the center of the street with Avinash at her side and Kelakha right behind her, and the rest of them fell into step behind them. She scanned every alleyway they passed.

  Twenty minutes later, they stopped. Asha motioned that they had three minutes, and everyone drank water. The Jodha were struggling to catch their breath.

  Then they were off again, jogging for another twenty minutes, resting and drinking for three.

  And again and again, four times, before they turned to avoid a particularly dense section of the city just as an unmistakably human scream rang out against the silence of the night. Ursala cursed, turning toward it.

  Asha? That’s human. She could feel Aquila was forcing himself to stay at her side, fighting the urge to rush to help whoever screamed.

  Asha shook her head, motioning them onward, but Ursala had already stopped, looking through tangled shrubbery of what looked like giant red lettuce. Reluctantly, she motioned the group to stop and gather around him.

  Asha followed Ursala’s gaze and cringed in horror. A female figure, vaguely human, lay across some kind of stone table. What was happening to her could only be described as being dissected and eaten alive. As The Guard watched in frozen repulsion, one of the Underworlders moved forward. Asha thought it was a Bhaksaka, or eater, a humanoid creature with octopus-like legs, fiery eyes, and fingers with extra digits. Huge, gaping jaws opened its face almost in half, and a sound like tinkling glass reached them as the thing plunged its clawed hand between the human’s legs, causing her eyes to roll in pain and blood poured from her mouth.

  “Asha!” Ursala hissed. “What the fuck are you waiting for? Kill them. Kill them right fucking now, or I’m going in there.”

  Asha flinched, blinking back tears as she raised her hand. A moment later, the human was still.

  With an impatient oath, Ursala lunged forward, and Kelakha and Aquila jumped to grab his arms, dragging him kicking and cursing into the alleyway.

  “What. The. Fuck, Asha,” Ursala growled, twisting out of their grip. “You’re just gonna let them live? After what we just saw?”

  Asha could feel everyone’s gaze on her, and even Aquila’s face showed his barely concealed confusion. Her temper flared. “What would you have me do? Kill every Underworlder in that restaurant? Would you walk into a steak house or seafood joint and slaughter everyone?”

  Ursala took a step toward her, but Aquila blocked his way.

  “That’s not the same thing, and you know it,” Ursala’s voice was more animal than human as he pointed around Aquila at Asha.

  Asha noticed Jax glance nervously up and down the alley and open her mouth to say something, then fix her eyes on the ground.

  “All right.” Asha crossed her arms. “A slaughterhouse, then. Would you walk into a slaughterhouse and kill everyone unfortunate enough to be working there?”

  Ursala looked as if he were seriously considering that a righteous pastime.

  “They’re only doing what they do,” Asha told him. “You know this. And that woman could never have survived her injuries.”

  “Still…”

  “We’re not here to change their world, Ursala.” Asha placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, but he shrugged her off. “We’re here for one thing, and one thing only. To bring our Seer, the Seer, home. If we can rescue civilians while we’re at it, great. And if not…” She waited for him to meet her eyes. “Don’t blame me. Now, we’re wasting ti—”

  A symphony of screams—this time decidedly not human—seemed to fill the entire city at once, and Aquila took a step toward Asha. Kelakha’s hand hovered toward Jax, and Avinash tensed, throwing a protective arm around his wife.

  Asha looked up and felt her stomach drop. The sky was closing. Dark tendrils reached up to form a dome over the city. A dome that would close everything and everyone within it.

  Oh, shit. Time’s up.

  She closed her eyes against fear that threatened to choke her, and sprinted down the street. “This way. Move move move!”

  Asha… She could feel Aquila fighting the urge to hold her, to protect her, and Asha’s sudden desire for him was enough to make her fear evaporate.

  You look extremely sexy when you run, did you know that?

  Uh, thanks. But if we’re about to die, it would be nice to have a heads up. Also, I’m not sure how well your civilian is coping.

  Asha turned and winked at him, regretting it the second she realized Jax had seen her. The civilian tried to hide her disgust with what she obviously took to be callous indifference, and Asha saw that Jax was struggling to keep up and remain calm as the sound of thousands of panicking Underworlders rose higher.

  “We need to get to the edge of this thing before…” Asha shook her head, knowing Jax wasn’t ready to hear what was happening. Maybe none of them were. “Just before.”

  Glancing up as she ran, Asha watched the sky transform to inky darkness, blotting out the purplish stars, reflecting the dim light of the city as shrieks of fear escalated to the point of pain. Rounding the corner of a bombed-out building, they came face-to-face with a wall of shimmering, roiling darkness.

  Aquila sucked in a breath, his fear spiking as Asha reached her hand out and touched the wall.

  “It’s solid,” she said. “But… alive. Sort of. It’s… the Urnayu spin this stuff like a web.”

  Jax said, “So if it’s alive, you can kill it, right? You can open it before we’re poisoned.” Asha realized that the civilian had known what was coming all along, and she wondered why she was surprised.

  Asha smiled at Aquila. “Exactly right, Jax. Beautifully put.”

  A wave of true-form Vampires flew at the wall, shrieking in terror, and tore off to the left, frantic for escape. Ursala shouted, “Any time now, Commander.”

  Motioning the others back, Asha spread her arms wide and focused on draining the life from the living dome. She felt a stab of nausea as the Urnayus’ blind lust for controlled chaos filled her, and then their strength began to fill her every cell. Her eyes reflected against the shining material with alarming intensity, and a hole began to form in the shimmering mass, as if acid was eating part of it away, widening as Asha felt her strength increase.

  The seven of them dove through the wound.

  The instant Asha dropped her concentration, the wall began to seal itself, dark tentacles of oily fabric stitching back together, and the shrieks of Underworlders faded. Just as the hole was about to close, Asha saw the wave of Vampires fluttering past the screen-like opening again.

  She hesitated.

  She felt Aquila’s hand on her back, his urgency for her to get to safety contagious.


  “I can’t just leave them, Aquila…” she whispered. “Do you know what the Zombie weapon does to them?”

  “I’ve read what the books say, yeah.”

  “Wait, what?” Kelakha said, “They’re detonating Zombie poison? On their own city?”

  “Did you see? There were babies.” Asha’s throat tightened. “I can’t leave them.”

  Aquila’s arms were around her and she felt him kiss her gently on the forehead. “So save them,” he said. “Save as many as you can.”

  Asha raised her arms again.

  † † †

  Ten minutes later, everyone sat in the ash-like dirt surrounding the shimmering dome that covered the city. Even Avinash seemed to be a little out of breath. But he had carried Kairav, Asha reminded herself as she rested a hand on Jax’s arm, giving her the Underworlder’s energy.

  Jax glanced up in alarm as her skin turned radiant in the faintly purple light.

  “Way to wait ’til the last second, Asha,” said Ursala, giving Kelakha a high-five.

  Asha fell back against the ground, closing her eyes.

  “It was impossible to save all of them,” Avinash told her. “Now we have twelve hours to get away.” He adjusted his watch.

  “Twelve hours until what?” Jax asked.

  “Until the poison takes effect on the Vampires who didn’t escape and…”

  “Manananggal,” said Aquila, Ursala, and Kelakha in unison.

  “What is a mah-na-nun-gul?” Jax took in the new word. “I’m guessing it’s even worse than a Vampire?”

  Speaking of Vampires…

  Asha jumped to her feet, followed closely by Aquila, Kelakha, and Ursala, just as a vision of perfection in black leather, with stylishly spiky hair, stepped out of the shadows.

  A Vampire, in re-animated human corpse form, staring right at the civilian.

  Asha felt Jax cringe away.

  But the Vampire didn’t attack her. Instead he crossed his arms, tilted his head to one side, and scowled at them.

  “That’s wacked, dude,” he said, his voice bored. His pants were at least two sizes too small, and Asha wondered how he got into them. He raised one perfect eyebrow. “Worse than a Vampire?” He took a another step, smiling. He ran a hand through his hair, then pointed at Jax. “You need to be cool, man. You sound like a cheese-weasel, coming here to insult the locals.”