by Jaci Miller
A world of dark magic, torture, suffering, and death.
The world around her began to fade as Lucien pulled her back to the present. She gasped as something inside her broke. The light giving way to the dark. She knew now what she had to do, she needed to survive to ensure they all did.
Lucien held her in his arms for a long time afterward. Showing her the death of all she loved was the final push she needed.
“Do you understand?” he whispered. “There is no other way. If you go against the beast, he will destroy all you love. He will kill every one of them and their deaths will have no meaning. But we can save them, I promise. You just need to do as I say.”
She looked into his eyes and nodded obediently.
The dark green of her irises disappeared replaced by an inky black as darkness snuffed out the last remnants of light inside her.
Dane had finally broken.
He kissed her, his lips softly brushing hers.
Soon his queen will emerge, the only one who can keep the beast at bay. The blood pact he made gave him immortality and power, but it also made him vulnerable. She would be his savior. With Dane by his side, the beast will be contained.
He brushed a hand over his tousled hair.
The mortal world would end but from its ashes, a new one will rise, one which he will rule—the time of magic has returned.
The doorbell rang jarring him out of his thoughts. He wasn’t expecting anyone, and no one knew he and Dane had left the city and were back in Brighton Hill. He had been careful.
“I’ll be right back my love.”
He reached the door, his bare feet soundless on the hardwood floors, and peered out.
Two females stood on the porch. Although they had never met, he knew who they were. Their distinct energy was unmistakable. It reeked of the ancient worlds.
Without pause, he opened the door.
“Lucien Beck, I assume?”
He nodded and asked with a husky and alluring voice. “What can I do for you lovely ladies?”
“Don’t bother,” the brunette said. “We know all about your seductive tricks, incubus and came prepared. Your magical charms won’t work on us.”
Lucien raised a brow. His new powers were no longer a secret. Celeste, he thought. “Well, then you must also know your powers won’t work on me.”
The brunette’s eyes narrowed. “I’m Stevie and this is Kai. We’re friends of Dane, and we came to see her.”
“I’m aware of who you are, but I’m afraid she is not feeling up for visitors today.”
“Dane,” Kai said. Her gaze shifted from his face to over his shoulder.
He turned to find her standing a few yards behind him. Her black eyes flashed with anger, but she stayed mute.
Before he could stop her Stevie pushed past him and grabbed Dane in a hug.
Lucien moved toward them, but Kai placed her hands on his chest—a warning. Her blue eyes flashed, and he could feel the icy coolness of her fingertips. He relented. It was too late anyway. Dane had already succumbed to the darkness. Nothing they could say or do would undo it.
He watched Dane prudently. She hadn’t returned the hug. Her arms stayed by her side and her face remained passive, void of any emotion.
“Are you OK?” Stevie asked.
No response.
“She’s fine,” Lucien said, his eyes never leaving them.
“She doesn’t look fine,” Kai said. The cold in her fingertips increased and he flinched.
Dane’s face was ghostly pale and dark circles had formed under her eyes. The brilliant green of her irises had disappeared, and an inky black had appeared in its place. He supposed to them she looked ill but to him she was beautiful.
He smiled arrogantly at the woman in front of him.
Kai wanted to wipe the smug look off his face, but they were here for one reason and Lucien mustn’t suspect anything after they leave.
Distraction.
Her eyes searched the foyer until she found what she was looking for. On an entry table beside the stairs sat a tall glass vase containing fresh hydrangeas, and water. Keeping her left hand decisively on Lucien’s chest she cupped the fingers on her right willing the water in the vase to move toward her. It strained against the side of the impenetrable glass vase. Unable to pass through the barrier, the water began to slosh back and forth. The momentum inched the vase toward the edge until it toppled off and smashed unceremoniously onto the floor.
The sudden impact diverted Lucien’s eyes for a moment but that was all Stevie needed to push her lips against Dane’s and blow into her mouth. Just before Lucien’s gaze tracked back to the two of them, Stevie pulled back.
“That startled me,” Kai said, motioning to the shattered vase on the floor. “You must have put it too close to the edge of the table.”
Lucien frowned. “I think it is time for you to go. Dane needs her rest.”
Like a robot, Dane moved away from Stevie and disappeared back into the depths of the house.
Stevie’s cabernet eyes shone with contempt for the man in front of her. “You won’t win Lucien. We will get her back.”
Lucien smiled. His handsome face lit up, but he didn’t utter a word.
Kai shook her head. It was disappointing how someone so attractive could be so evil. “Come on Stevie. We’ve taken up too much of Mr. Beck’s time.”
As Stevie passed Lucien, she raised her hand. Swirling gray smoke appeared in her palm and sparks of fire spit from its wisps.
“This isn’t over Beck,” she hissed.
Kai grabbed her wrist pulling her reluctantly out the door.
As they got in the car, she looked at Stevie. “Really. That was inconspicuous?”
“I couldn’t help it he’s so irritatingly smug.”
Kai laughed. “I get it. I wanted to wipe that look off his face myself.”
Stevie glanced back at the house. “Let’s go, there is nothing more we can do. It’s up to Adaridge now. Let’s hope he can reach her through the portal we just opened inside her.”
“Did you get it all in?”
“I think so.”
“And did she swallow it?”
Stevie hesitated and glanced at the house. “I hope so, or we’re all screwed.”
Chapter 31
The moon hovered low in the night sky—a harbinger of their coming fate. Its spherical size was particularly large for this time of year and in two days it would be full, and the prophecy or some form of it would come to pass.
Stevie’s skin prickled as she gazed upon it adding to the foreboding feeling that seemed to hover over Brighton Hill since their return.
The car jerked as the wheels fell into potholes that littered the driveway to the old flour mill. Stevie rolled down her window and turned off the ignition. It was eerily quiet and the air stagnant. The mill was nothing more than a bulky silhouette in the night sky oozing nothing but black shadows from its windows.
“I want to check the pods before we cast the protective dome,” she said looking across the car at Kai sitting in the passenger seat.
“OK.”
They exited the vehicle just as another set of headlights turned onto the mill’s property.
“This should be Mr. Callan.”
Stevie opened the trunk and removed a pair of bolt cutters.
A dark sedan pulled up beside them. The tinted windows obscured the occupants’ faces, but when the doors opened Mr. Callan, Jon and Alistair emerged.
Kai smiled, hugging Mr. Callan. “It’s so good to see you.”
“You too Kai.” He pulled away and held her by the shoulders at arm’s length. Her pale skin shimmered in the moonlight. “A mermaid,” he stated. “Unbelievable. Not once in all these years did your father tell me about your mother. I had no idea.”
Kai smiled affectionately at
her friend’s father. “I guess we all kept secrets.”
Mr. Callan nodded. “But destiny finds a way to pull those who need each other together.”
“My mother used to say that.”
His eyes twinkled. “Where do you think I got it from.”
Kai’s eyes shone with tears as she squeezed Mr. Callan’s hand. “I’m sorry about Mrs. Watts.”
“Thank you.”
His eyes darkened at the mention of his wife, but he turned away quickly and motioned to his companions. “Stevie you remember Jon and Alistair. Kai, meet two members of the Syndicate. Their talents will be useful this evening.”
Kai and Stevie nodded their greetings.
“And the others?” Stevie asked.
“The city witches will arrive tomorrow. The eve of the 22nd, as instructed.”
“Good,” Kai said. “We should have the perimeter up by then and be ready for the wards and magical barriers. If we contain the daemons to this area and defeat the ancient dark and his minions under the cloaked dome, then no one in the town will be the wiser.”
Stevie sighed. “If we are unsuccessful, I suppose mortals knowing there are magical beings in the world will be the least of their worries.”
Mr. Callan tensed as Alistair moved toward the mill his golden eyes glowing in the ambient light. A frown wrinkled his brow, his nose twitched, and he flexed his hands. He followed him recognizing the daemon’s posturing. “What do you sense Alistair?”
“Death,” he said calmly. “There’s a fresh scent of death coming from the mill. The imprints trapped within the veil can sense it as well. They’re confused. Their energy is erratic” He hesitated as he sniffed the night air. “It comes from the bowels of the structure and is mixed with betrayal and fear. There is something in the mill that shouldn’t be.”
“You mean besides the daemon pods?” Kai asked raising a brow.
He nodded. “New blood. New death.”
Stevie raised the bolt cutters. “Let’s take a look.”
Mr. Callan nodded. “Jon will begin the cloaking spell and I will prepare the four quarters for the protective dome. It will take us some time so, the three of you find out what you can.”
Alistair, Stevie, and Kai entered the mill through the side door after cutting off the massive, new padlock Lucien Beck had installed. The dark interior smelled musty.
Turning on the flashlight, Kai swept the beam across the mill. The pods were dark and silent but as the light found them, they began to pulse.
Stevie placed a hand on the nearest one. She could feel the daemon inside, curious and impatient. They’d be released on the world soon and hundreds of these creatures would need to be contained within the mill’s property. The task was daunting.
“Why can’t we just burn these pods and kill them before they hatch?” Kai asked.
Stevie removed her hand. “It wouldn’t destroy them. These pods are impenetrable. They were created by dark magic and summoned from the depths of a torturous hell. Fire will not hurt them. The daemons must be allowed to hatch before they can be destroyed.”
Kai’s eyes narrowed. “Still freaks me out how you know so much about these creepy things.”
Stevie shrugged, giving her friend a small smile. The knowledge they were given through their birthrights was vast and it still surprised her how much she and the others knew about things they previously thought were a myth or didn’t know at all.
They moved without pause through the mill to the back staircase. Alistair led the way with his knife drawn. He stopped on the bottom step and tipped his head, listening.
“There’s a faint but distinct dripping sound coming from somewhere down there.” He pointed to a small shadowy hallway off to their left. As they passed through the lower level the smell of sulfur and blood assaulted their nostrils.
“What’s that stench?” Kai asked.
Alistair held up his hand to quiet them as he moved toward a thick wooden door. “Dark magic.”
He pointed toward the door’s surface where a pentacle was carved hastily into the wood. As his hand closed around the doorknob, he cast them an uneasy glance.
Kai raised the flashlight as the door swung in and the beam lit up the small room’s interior. “What the heck?” she said.
The area had been turned into a shrine.
A marble altar sat in the middle with a few dozen unlit pillar candles surrounding it. Spread on the ground in a circle was a white powder with sigils marking the four quarters. A black cloth covered the marble altar, a corner of which dripped blood onto the stone floor.
Laying on the altar—the skin of her naked body, a pallid blue—was Lilith. Her lifeless eyes stared straight up at the ceiling. The ceremonial athame protruded from her chest where it’d been plunged deep into her heart.
“She’s been ritually sacrificed,” Alistair said his golden eyes surveying the scene.
Kai nodded. “Gabby said Lucien needed the blood of his own kin to enter the blood pact. She probably had no idea he was her brother.”
Turning her dark merlot eyes toward Kai, Stevie said. “Let’s see what she knew.” Before Kai could object, she grasped Lilith’s limp cold hand in her own.
The images came fast and furious as her vision dimmed and Stevie began witnessing everything as it happened.
Fear seeped from Lilith’s pores as Lucien lay her on the table. She’d been unable to move but was aware of what was happening. Fear and betrayal were evident in her eyes. The end was near yet in her final moments she experienced a sense of relief, of peace. As the ceremonial knife pierced her skin and the cold blade punctured her heart, a single tear ran down her cheek. No longer would she be in pain, he’d set her free. As her life essence left her body and spiraled upward toward the veil Lucien leaned over and kissed her forehead.
The moment was oddly tender, but it was his final words that surprised her.
Stevie released Lilith’s hand and her awareness came back to the moment.
“Lilith is not just Lucien’s sister,” she said trying to catch her breath. “They were twins.”
Alistair raised an eyebrow. “That’s the most powerful sacrifice there is. Familial blood is one thing, but to sacrifice the blood of a twin requires also giving of oneself.”
“What does this mean for the blood pact?” Kai questioned.
“It means Lucien has essentially created a barrier. One which will be difficult to break. It won’t be easy to sever his connection with the ancient dark nor will he be easy to kill. It was what I feared after my conversation with the alchemist. With the blood of a twin and the blood of a healer, Lucien Beck might just be invincible.”
Lucien put her to bed and kissed her forehead.
“Goodnight my love,” he said in a hushed voice.
Turning out the light he closed the door.
Dane would drift off soon and her mind would take her to places dark and sinister. It would feed the darkness within her and help create the weapon he required to change the course of the prophecy.
Blood surged through his body. His power strengthened the closer they came to the full moon, and in two days when the beast rose to cleanse the earth, magic would return to its rightful place and his family name would once again be restored to its former glory. He would be indomitable.
His thoughts drifted to Lilith, her body lying on the marble slab in the basement of the old mill. When the world was his, he’d build her a crypt. A final resting place worthy of the sacrifice she’d unwittingly made—worthy of a Tierney.
His twin sister deserved at least that.
An endless soothing darkness shrouded Dane in its dark embrace. The violent images had faded a few days before leaving her alone in this dark abyss. Its aching silence had become a part of her, and she relished its company and the solitude of the pitch-black nothingness.
Somewhere off in the distance, a noise drifted toward her interrupting the cocoon’s visceral silence. At first, the sound was indistinguishable but as it continued it became recognizable—the sound of fabric tearing. As she floated aimlessly her senses searched for the source.
A pinhole of light flashed.
Then another.
It beckoned her toward it and as she moved closer the tear expanded and a searing brightness came from the other side.
As the rip grew the darkness vanished, and she was pulled through the void into another time and place.
Chapter 32
A man stood before her dressed in brown wool robes. Thick wooden toggles closed the fabric at his neck. The sleeves were bell-shaped and hid his hands as his arms sat folded across his chest. Long hair peeked out one side of the deep hood covering his head and a scraggly, unkempt beard covered his chin.
His amber eyes held a heavy sadness as they stared at her.
“Adaridge?” Dane asked.
The last Druid of Thanissia bowed his head. “At last we meet.”
With fluid and unencumbered movements as if he were gliding, he came toward her. The wool robes swayed noiselessly around him and as he moved the energy of the All Souls rippled outward like water in a pond.
“Where am I?” she asked, her eyes scanning the small rocky landmass they stood on. It was surrounded by water and in the distance stood another rocky landmass, a tree at its center, its branches empty. Nothing else seemed to exist in this place just them and the tree. The sky above stretched upward into endlessness and everything in this environment was an analogous shade of deep purple. Adaridge, in his brown robes, looked oddly out of place. Only the brown bark of the dead tree offered him any parallel.
A warm wind blew around them, but she noticed everything remained still. Her eyes flicked back to his strong face as she waited for his answer.
“The All Souls.”
Her nose wrinkled. “How?”
“An ancient form of astral projection used by the Druid sect of olde. I was able to call your spirit through time and space by calling home the energy of the All Souls, which your friends were able to get you to ingest.”
