Thrall

by Jennifer Blackstream

  “Arianne, we aren’t alone,” I said, my voice louder than I’d intended. “There are a lot of creatures who’ve been waiting for that house to give up its master. And I don’t think they’d turn down a couple unexpected side dishes.”

  Arianne glared at me, but this time she looked around.

  My first glimpse of the night hags turned my breath to spiky shards of ice in my lungs. The first breath I took hurt, and I shuddered and tried again.

  “Night hags,” I rasped.

  “And a hellhound,” Arianne murmured. She flexed her hands into fists at her sides. “Blood and bone.”

  One night hag was a problem.

  Three was a disaster.

  Three night hags riding cauchemars was a slow death and soul imprisonment waiting to happen.

  The hellhound was superfluous. But still terrifying.

  The night hags sat on their emaciated mounts, grinning as they stared down at us. Each of them was seven feet tall if she was an inch, their frail bodies draped with clothes that might have once been fine silks and furs but were now as worn and ragged as the women themselves. Their mounts, the cauchemars, were inky black beasts that exhaled poisonous black smoke. Their flaming eyes rolled wildly in their sockets as they pawed at the ground, eager to give chase.

  I put my respirator back on.

  For all the good it would do me.

  Chapter 28

  “Arianne, we need to get out of here.” I put a hand on my stomach, imagining I could feel the bond between me and the astral plane. “Prower bound me here when he brought me, I can’t return to my body until it’s broken. Can you—”

  “I’m not going anywhere without him,” Arianne spat, jabbing a finger back at the pit where Prower’s screams still poured forth. “Don’t tell me you can’t break the anchor yourself?”

  I gritted my teeth. “I could, if I could see it. But using a spell that breaks magic isn’t something I want to use when I can’t see the spell I’m trying to break.” A lump rose in my throat as the growling of the hellhound grew louder. “We’ll summon him into the soul jar. He’s weak, we can—”

  “Does he sound like he’s managed to get free of the shadow spike?” Arianne glared at the night hags. “If they get to him before my spell ends, they’ll take his soul for themselves.”

  “And if they do, they’ll stuff his soul into a gem and barter it around the astral plane until some other hag ends up using it to power her magic,” I pointed out. “Seems like a very fitting punishment.”

  “Unless he bargains his way out of it. I cannot let that happen. I won’t risk it. Iman will never be safe as long as he continues to exist.” Arianne glanced back at the pit, and I swayed at the disorientation of having someone else move my point of view. “He will suffer and he will die. By my hand.”

  I closed my eyes, further disoriented when I still saw what Arianne saw. It was just our luck that we’d face three night hags working together. Night hags were not known for their cooperation, and were as likely to kill a fellow night hag to steal her magic as greet them good morning.

  “Arianne, I have an idea,” I said suddenly, opening my eyes. “Can you influence one of the hags to attack the others?”

  “A night hag’s will is strong, it would be a gamble,” Arianne said grimly.

  “I can help. If you—”

  A spell struck me. The scent of lavender exploded in the air in front of my face, and my eyelids fluttered. For a split second, I felt as if I were falling, collapsing into a comfortable bed, a downy comforter and fluffy pillow. A sleep spell.

  Arianne tossed her hair over her shoulder and glared at the night hags. A sleep spell meant little to a dream sorceress. She threw off the enchantment with the same ease someone else might flick a piece of lint from their clothing. The bond between us flexed, and I felt her will force the spell off me as well, like a shot of adrenaline right to the heart.

  I sucked in a sharp breath and took a step forward without meaning to, in time to see the third night hag urge her mount into a run, heading straight for Prower and the pit, the hellhound at her side.

  “Retrieve him!” she screamed to the hellhound.

  The black-furred beast with the blazing coals for eyes obeyed its mistress without hesitation. It leapt into the air and sailed into the fiery pit, the flames as threatening to the animal as the spray of a warm shower.

  The first two hags realized their spell had failed, and they gathered the reins of their mounts, preparing a charge. I stared at them as hard as I was able considering I wasn’t the one controlling my line of sight. With one last deep breath, I laughed. Well not laughed, exactly.

  Cackled.

  My magic stirred inside me like fog disturbed by a fleeing thief. It swirled and shifted, flowing upward with the sound falling from my lips. Notes of misfortune drifted through the air to curl around the night hags. Arianne took my lead, and her hands moved in a complicated pattern before hurling her spell.

  The first two night hags threw off the spell with a snarl and a wave of their bony hands. Their eyes twitched to Arianne, and they bared their teeth in sharp smiles.

  The third hag was not so lucky. The hellhound had just dragged Prower out of the pit, freed from his shadow anchor by the hag, and the woman held out her hand where she sat on her mount, eagerly waiting for the beast to deliver her prize. Suddenly, she stiffened.

  “They want to take him from you!” Arianne shouted at her.

  The hag blinked, but it was too late. Arianne’s spell clouded her thoughts, and she shrieked in fury as she jerked on the reins, sending her mount reeling to face the charging hags.

  “Get them,” she shouted to the hellhound, pointing one gnarled finger at her fellow hags.

  The hellhound hesitated, but only for a second. They weren’t mindless beasts, but they also weren’t terribly picky about what they victimized. Attacking a night hag could be every bit as fun as attacking a sorcerer, so the hellhound took the change in direction in stride.

  Arianne ran after Prower, grabbing his arm just as the sorcerer attempted to flee. He howled in agony as her hand closed around an arm blackened by flames, wet with blisters that had already burst. My stomach rolled from the vertigo of having my view point forcibly changed, along with the carnage that new viewpoint revealed. I continued to cackle, trying to keep the third hag from shaking off Arianne’s confusion. My ears filled with the shrieks and growls of the first two hags fighting the third and her hellhound. Every nerve in my body warned that they could turn on us at any moment. And I wouldn’t see them coming.

  I wasn’t wrong.

  A spell struck me in the solar plexus, driving the wind out of me, and sending a spout of pain through my body like a bolt of lightning. I hit the ground, the impact jarring my shoulders and elbows, my skull bouncing off the hard earth.

  “Retrieve him!” one of the hags ordered the hellhound.

  Despite the fact that my eyes were fixed on the sky above, I still saw through Arianne’s eyes, still saw a roasted Prower as a hellhound’s jaws closed over his arm. Arianne tightened her grip, started to pull. Then she cried out and fell to her knees. Her grip on Prower fell away, and she collapsed to all fours.

  I heard her snarl under her breath, and her hand groped for my shoulder. Another burst of magic struck my body, but this time it didn’t hurt. A pressure I hadn’t even realized was there suddenly released. I sat up with a sudden inhale, eyes wide as I realized she’d severed the magic holding me to the astral plane.

  Beside me, Arianne grunted. She collapsed to the ground, and my vision went dark. She’d closed her eyes.

  Blind again, I couldn’t see the night hags. There was nothing for me to do, nothing that would make a difference. The hellhound growled again, and it sounded closer this time. Instinct made me twist to face the direction of the sound and I hurled one hand out.

  “Frio!”

  Cold shot from my palm, and the yelp of the beast told me I’d hit my target. Unfortunately, I didn�
�t get to enjoy my success.

  The smell of burning human flesh—which regardless of how morbid it is, does smell like any other cooking meat—filled the air around me a split second before something touched my ankle.

  “Umbra ancoris!”

  “Take…her!” Prower’s voice was a wheezing rasp, so weak I was amazed he’d managed to anchor me to the astral plane again at all. But that was small comfort. Because he had renewed the anchor. And if the feminine sound of protest was any indication, he had caught Arianne.

  Arianne forced her eyes open halfway, giving me a nightmarish glimpse of Prower. He looked as if he were made of wet ash and blood, burned so badly he was almost unrecognizable. But still, he lived. And he was dragging Arianne closer, holding her against his body.

  The hags charged forward, the pounding hooves of their mounts drumming inside my head, warning me of my impending doom. Through Arianne’s eyes, I saw Prower jerk as if another spell had struck him, then Arianne’s eyes slammed shut. I knew she’d lost consciousness.

  For a moment time slowed down. I had a moment of perfect clarity. Prower had Arianne. He could leave the astral plane, and take her with him, returning them both to her body. Arianne was unconscious, so he would have control, at least temporarily. If he could fool the others on the physical plane, he might escape.

  I was anchored here. I didn’t have time to free myself and escape. I had time for one spell. I had to make it count. I groped for the sorceress, and my hand closed around her ankle.

  “Fight, Arianne,” I whispered. I called my magic, and with a final flex of will, I shoved it into her. “Benedicite.”

  Arianne roused, her eyes opening to give me one last view of my fate. Charging night hags. Cold-enraged hellhound. Prower’s crusted blackened face curling into a sneer as he prepared to return to the physical plane with Arianne. I liked to think I felt Arianne’s will harden. That her determination swelled like a physical force, a sign that Prower’s return to earth would not be the salvation he’d thought it would.

  I frowned. I did feel something.

  Warm energy washed over me. My spirits rose, and I felt myself smiling without meaning to. I let the smile spread over my lips, allowed myself a chuckle.

  Arianne gasped. And as she raised her eyes to the source of the warmth, I saw something glorious.

  Plan B had worked.

  I heard Prower suck in a choked breath, heard the horror, the disbelief in that one sound.

  “No. No, it can’t be you.”

  Through Arianne’s eyes, I beheld a glowing silver light. Humanoid in shape, with twin sets of powerful feathered wings. One arm rose, and I realized she held a sword. The weapon swept down toward one of the night hags, slicing her head from her shoulders to be crushed under the pounding hooves of her mount. The other two night hags fled without so even a backward glance at their fellow’s corpse. One of them vomited as she was carried away, sickened by the positive energy rolling off the angel.

  “Hello, Richard Prower. It is time for your reckoning.”

  I didn’t recognize the voice. But I knew the feeling of something holy when it touched me. And I knew who it was.

  “Jamila,” I whispered.

  She reached down with one glowing hand, and when she touched me, I felt the anchor holding me to the astral plane snap. I fell back into my body with a thud that vibrated up through my tailbone and outward into my entire skeleton. My teeth clacked together, sending a sharp spike of pain into my jaw. But I kept smiling. I smiled, and I blinked, trying to clear my vision.

  I didn’t want to miss this.

  I didn’t even care that I’d been tied up with rope that hummed with a magical binding. My wrists were bound in front of me, and I raised them just long enough to remove the mask from my face and let it fall to the ground. As had Arianne and Iman. Liam and Blake stood guard, with Rue and Peasblossom hovering over their shoulders, and Sonar standing guard between them. They watched us with the wary gazes of those who understand the faces they could see may not match the spirit inside them. I looked around, relieved to finally be in charge of my own vision.

  Jamila was much larger than she’d been in the human world. She towered over us, two sets of wings fanning gently against her back. She held a curved blade in her hand, and like the rest of her, the blade looked as if it had been carved from moonlight.

  I glanced at Iman and the summoning circle beside her. “You did it,” I murmured.

  Iman didn’t take her eyes off Jamila. Together we watched the angel raise her sword, pointing it at Arianne’s body. “Richard Prower. You have sinned against Allah and his children. You have sought to rule over that which was not yours. You’ve taken lives that were not yours to take. Will you repent? Will you beg Allah’s forgiveness, and seek to make amends for the wrongs you’ve done to his children?”

  “I repent nothing,” Richard snarled with Arianne’s voice.

  Jamila’s face was serene, her smile gentle and a little sad. “Very well. Then go to your judgment.”

  “You can’t kill me in Arianne’s body,” he sneered.

  Jamila put her sword away, sliding it into the hilt at her hip. She smiled at Prower, and I was surprised to see sadness in her eyes. She bent down and picked up the soul jar, then held it out to Iman. “If you would?”

  Iman took the jar. Even with her hands bound, she could easily hold the jar and still put her hands on Arianne. Prower struggled, but Liam and Blake stepped closer, each taking hold of one of Arianne’s shoulders. They held her body still so Iman could press her fingertips to Arianne, the bottle squeezed between her palms.

  Jamila stepped forward at put one hand on Arianne’s forehead. “May Allah be with you,” she whispered.

  “No!” Prower fell to his knees, bowing his head. “Forgive me!”

  “I will give you a choice. Just like the choice you gave others.” She waggled the jar. “You can go to your judgment, suffer the fire and the torment. Or you may take shelter here. In the caring hands of another.”

  “That’s not what I offered!” Prower snarled.

  “You offered a choice between death or enslavement. And that is what you must choose between now.” She tilted her had. “I trust you will be grateful. Enslavement is so much better than death. Is it not?”

  I didn’t know angels were sarcastic.

  I couldn’t see what happened then. But I didn’t need to see to know. Arianne’s eyes squeezed shut, and she grunted, her head bowing. Sweat broke out on her temples. Her lips moved, but no sound came out. Iman’s hands trembled as they fought to hold the soul jar still.

  Then Arianne collapsed to her knees. Iman jerked back, one hand covering the soul jar, the other rubbing the rune on the front of the glass jar. My ears popped as the magic sealed. Trapping Prower in the jar.

  Iman handed the jar to Jamila, startling the angel. Then she fell to her knees and pulled her wife into her arms. Tears flowed down her cheeks, and she spoke in Arabic, her voice low and hushed. Arianne murmured her response, too quiet for me to hear even if I wanted to. Iman kissed her, long and sound, then went back to crying and gathering her wife into her lap.

  Jamila smiled down at both of them. She started to retreat, to give them privacy, but Arianne rose quickly, stopped only by the ropes that bound her. Blake moved forward to untie her, but Arianne’s attention was all for the angel.

  Tears streamed down her cheeks. “Jamila, forgive me,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

  Jamila shook her head, the smile never leaving her lips. “You have nothing to apologize for. Allah has welcomed me home. He has reminded me of my purpose, and I am at peace.” She tilted her head. “You save lives, Arianne. Do not let your anger stain your beautiful soul. Every choice counts.”

  Arianne hung her head. It wasn’t until that moment that it occurred to me I’d never asked what happened to Kurt and Toby.

  Liam untied me as Blake moved on to release Iman. As soon as she was free of her bonds, Iman stepped forward to
stand by her wife in front of Jamila. “Thank you for answering my prayer.”

  “It was my pleasure.” Jamila raised her face to the moon, sighing as the light caressed her face. “I must go now. There is someone waiting for me.”

  She turned and her wings rose. I jumped forward a step. “Wait!”

  She paused and looked over her shoulder.

  I wrung my hands in front of me, heart pounding as I asked myself one last time if I really wanted to know the answer to the question on the tip of my tongue. Yes. Yes, I did. “Renee, Rima, Mariam, and Kaila. Are they… Are they all right?”

  Jamila smiled and tapped the side of her nose. “Have faith, Ms. Renard. Never lose faith.”

  With that, she leapt into the air. The night breeze carried her higher, as delicate as a flower petal on the wind. I watched her fly off until I couldn’t see her anymore.

  Arianne embraced her wife, the two of them once again lost in their own world. I knew an opportunity to sneak away when I saw it.

  I backed away, giving the couple some privacy to reassure one another they were all right. I must not have been as steady on my feet as I thought, because Liam’s hand came down on my shoulder to steady me as I ventured farther into the trees. I stopped beside a fallen tree that provided a convenient resting spot, half-sitting, half-leaning to take the weight off my feet. As I relaxed, I noticed Liam was standing beside me wearing his jeans but no shirt.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  I nodded, trying to lift my gaze from his broad shoulders all the way to his eyes. “My third eye is throbbing, but that will fade in a few days.” I fished my cell phone out of the side pocket of my pouch.

  “Still no word from Scath?”

  I put the phone back in my pocket. No missed messages, no texts. “Nope.”

  He shifted to stand in front of me, studying my face. “You really okay?”

  “Yep. At least I know there’s a good chance when I go back to the apartment, Flint won’t be there. I don’t know what he’s really up to in Europe that’s keeping him so busy, but I hope it keeps going.” I hesitated. “I appreciate you working this case with me. I know you’d have preferred to keep your distance.”