The Midnight Strider (The Chronomancer Chronicles Book 2)

by Reilyn J. Hardy

  I just hope we don’t run into him first.

  Inhaling deeply, I keep my hand resting on the handle of my dagger. I don’t want to use it. I don’t want to show whatever strength I may or may not have now because of the blood I drank. But I’m not sure what courage remains.

  “Well, well, well…” A disembodied voice emits from the darkness. I close my eyes. “Look who’s come to visit.”

  “Artemis is that —”

  No. I don’t want to open my eyes. I don’t want to see the creatures that have haunted me for years; that killed my guardian. That kidnapped my brother.

  “Artemis,” Jace says, nudging me.

  I shake my head.

  “Don’t look into their eyes,” Nova says.

  I don’t want to face it — her — them — I don’t.

  “Aw, you’re scaring him, Stheno,” another voice joins in. “What a little, itty bitty baby.” I flinch when she cackles.

  I’m eleven again. Eleven and helpless, cowering at the feet of my brother. Cowering over the dead body of my guardian.

  “Artemis, snap out of it!” Nova says, I shake my head as I take a step back.

  I refuse to open my eyes. I refuse to believe they’re standing in front of me. I take another step back.

  I back into something.

  “Oh, where do you think you’re going?”

  I have to open my eyes now. I look down as I turn around and see her large, scaly body — top half of a woman, standing on a large snake tail. Just as I remember.

  The ground shakes again, rocks drop from the ceilings, and the gorgons look around.

  “What was that?” One of them hisses to another.

  “We can take them,” Jace whispers to me while they’re distracted by the rumbling of the Underworld.

  I shake my head. “We can’t.”

  The three gorgons direct their attention back onto us as they slither around, circling us. We’re prey.

  I keep my hand on my dagger.

  Medusa recognizes it. “Is that David’s blade?” she asks, she sounds amused. I grip the handle tighter and she cackles. “And you’ve kept it all these years — how sentimental of you — how darling.”

  “And what are you?” Euryale slithers around Nova, examining the arm he’s just extinguished. “Some kind of fire creature. I’ve never seen your kind before.”

  Stheno grabs me by the neck with her claw and holds me up. My feet lift off of the ground. Jace lunges toward me but Nova holds him back. I grip at her claw, but she’s too strong for me. I shut my eyes and I kick her in the stomach. She groans, and tightens her claw on my neck, digging the tips into my skin.

  “Do that again, and I will snap your head right off. We can show them what you saw us do to your guardian, hm?”

  I gasp for air, but I can’t breathe. I wheeze, trying to get air into my lungs.

  “Let go of my brother, Euryale.”

  I drop to the ground, gasping for air as I back up against the wall, clutching onto my neck. I look up and see Euryale hunched forward, her claws are at her own neck as she struggles for air. Jace and Nova pull me off of the ground. The gorgons move away from us, but then they suddenly come to a stop. They’re all tossing their heads back now, struggling to breathe. Their hair snaps for air too, before going limp around their heads. In front of them, I see him standing there.

  His eyes are black.

  Apollo's arms are held out, gripping onto their necks, suffocating them, without touching them at all. He moves one arm toward the wall, and Euryale flies toward it, her head knocks against the sharp edges and she falls on the ground, unconscious. He does it again with his other arm and the other two go flying. The same thing happens.

  His arms drop to his sides and he looks directly at me.

  His eyes return back to normal when he blinks, back to gray. “I warned you, Artemis,” he tells me. The scratch on his face has healed, scarred, joining the many others that have cut through his freckles. “You never did know how to listen,” he says weakly.

  Those are the last words that leave his mouth before he collapses to the ground.

  I want to move toward him, but my vision blurs. I take a step forward, and I fall. The last thing I hear are people saying my name, before everything goes silent.

  *****

  “Why did you come here? I told you not to.”

  I try to sit up. Apollo is standing over me, crossing his arms. “Well, like you said,” I say, “I never did know how to listen.” I reach my hand out to him. “Can you give me a hand?” I ask, and he starts to clap. “That’s not what I meant.”

  He smirks and pulls me to my feet.

  “Where are we?” Jace and Nova are nowhere to be found. “Where’d they go?”

  “I like to call it the in-between,” Apollo says. “I don’t really know how it works yet, but it helps me walk around without my body. I wasn’t really there,” he continues. “Against the gorgons.”

  “You’re that strong?”

  He shrugs. “I wouldn’t call it strong. I see you in danger, and well, it’s just what I do.”

  “Stop protecting me,” I grumble. “You keep —”

  “Really? You’re gonna argue with me right now?”

  I rub my face. I frown, and I hug him tightly.

  He grips me tighter. “I’m glad they didn’t take you.”

  I pull away from him. “I’m not.”

  “I don’t blame you, Art,” he says. “I never did. If what you need is forgiveness then I do, okay? I forgive you. But I don’t think it matters if you don’t forgive yourself.”

  He crosses his arms again.

  “How did you even get here?” He reaches for the collar of my jacket and I move away from him. “A genie helped me,” I say, which is actually half true. “I told you I was gonna come and I’m here. Who cares how.”

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he says.

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re a chronomancer! Do you know what your presence is doing?”

  “What?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” he grabs my shirt and we start walking. “You have to go.”

  “But my body —”

  “Right,” he says and stops. He releases his hold on me. “Go back the way you came,” he tells me. “Before the hellhounds come and before the ship leaves.”

  “What will happen if I don’t?” I ask. He can’t think I came all this way only to give up. I’m not about to. Though this isn’t exactly how I thought a reunion with my brother was going to go. I guess I really didn’t think about it. I thought he’d be happier to see me, not trying to rush me back out. “I don’t want to —”

  “Promise me you’ll go.”

  “But what about you? I’m not leaving without —”

  “Promise me!” he shouts at me this time.

  I nod finally. He shoves me and I fall right back into my body before I can say anything.

  I wake up to Jace and Nova hovering over me, and when I look to the side, Apollo was right. His body is gone.

  “What happened? Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, but I think I know which way to go,” I say. I get up and dust myself off. I point in front of us.

  “You mean we’re gonna go in the direction the gorgons came from?”

  “Yeah, why not? I need to find my brother.”

  Apollo told me to promise I’ll go. I am going, just not in the right direction, or the direction he wanted me to go in.

  I turn to Jace.

  “Since I couldn’t, maybe he’ll be able to help Rhiannon. Maybe he’ll know where we can find her. He is the Reawakener.”

  He nods. He agrees. “Okay,” he says. He hits Nova’s arm with the back of his hand. “Light up.”

  Nova outstretches his arm and shakes his h
and. It turns to lava rock from his elbow and down his wrist, lighting up between the cracks.

  “Don’t say that again,” he says. “I’m not a pipe.”

  Jace just shrugs. He steps to the side and moves his hand forward. “Lead the way,” he tells me.

  I step in front of them and start walking. Our surroundings start to look familiar. I look to the left, remembering where I saw the Reaper torturing my brother. Just a little forward, will be the Reaper’s throne. I stop in my tracks.

  Jace nearly walks into me. “What’s wrong?”

  The floor shakes again. There’s tapping in the distance.

  “Do you hear that?”

  Jace nods. “It sounds like —”

  They start to growl. “Hellhounds.”

  “What is taking so long!” Nadia’s voice grows louder as she emerges from the lamp. “I hear hellhounds.”

  “No shit,” he says.

  I step between them.

  “Can you sense Apollo?” I ask her. “Can you — I don’t know — sense what he desires?”

  She closes her eyes. Nadia doesn’t say anything for a few seconds, longer than we need.

  “Yeah —” she starts, but then there are growls. Barking. It’s getting louder. She looks around. A hellhound jumps at her and Jace grabs it by the neck, ripping its head right off. “Thanks,” she squeaks, her eyes are wide with terror.

  “That isn’t the only one,” Nova says. He cracks his knuckles. “I have an idea.”

  Dozens of hellhounds emerge from the darkness, all running straight toward us from the direction we were just headed in. They’re growling, barking, and biting at each other as they try to get to us first.

  Nova jumps up in the air, and punches the ground with his fist as he lands. The ground cracks, and the hellhounds are thrown backward from the force.

  There’s clapping in the distance.

  “Nice trick, Nova.”

  He freezes. “Drarkodon.” The name barely escapes his mouth.

  “You know Drarkodon?” Jace asks.

  “I was there the day he was born,” he says. He clenches his fists tightly. “You can’t come any closer. You’re stuck.”

  “Actually,” Drarkodon moves out of the darkness, stepping into the light illuminating from Nova’s fists. “I can.” He grabs Nova by the neck, gripping him tightly. “You see, when a chronomancer stepped foot in the Underworld, when he stepped off of that ship, he freed me.”

  I take a step back.

  Drarkodon notices. He gives me a nod.

  “Oh, yes.” He drops Nova onto the ground and walks toward me. “You undid all of your father’s hard work to keep me trapped here. All the work of the Immortal Ones, came crashing down because of one silly, little child. Proud of yourself, boy? I am.”

  He pats my cheek, harder each time.

  I turn away from him.

  “Where’s my brother?”

  He scoffs. “You’re going to cause the end of the world, and all you care about is your brother?” He grabs my face and forces me to look at him. “Where’s mine?”

  “He’s missing,” Nova says. “Alekoth’s been missing for the last thirteen years. I don’t even know what happened to him.”

  Drarkodon tosses me to the side and carefully studies Nova. He paces back and forth, not taking his eyes off of him. He stops. “Perfect.”

  “Where’s Apollo?” I ask again.

  He ignores me. He turns to Jace instead.

  “How’s Dad?” he asks. Jace narrows his eyes.

  Finally, he turns back to me.

  “You want to see Apollo?” he asks, taking a step back away from us. The hellhounds have gotten back up, growling at us again. But they back up the way Drarkodon does and seemingly disappear into the shadows. Drarkodon lifts his scythe and the ground shakes.

  Turning his wrist, he scratches the wall with the toe of the blade, cutting through the uneven rock. He’s carving an ouroboros symbol. He turns his scythe, and smashes the bottom of the pole through the middle hole.

  The wall cracks, crumbling into the ground.

  Dust lifts in the air from the destruction. Once it begins to settle I can see him, chained to the wall. He’s barely conscious.

  “He’s been right there, on the other side. The whole time.” Drarkodon puts his scythe back onto the ground. “If he wanted you to find him, he would have told you.”

  “Apollo!” I dash toward him, but fire comes up, blazing up toward the ceiling. Every time I try to move close, it comes again.

  “Pathetic,” Drarkodon says.

  “Apollo!” I shout, he lifts his head, but it falls back down. He’s too weak. He’s hanging from the cuffs that keep him chained. I cup my hands around my mouth. “Apollo!”

  “Silence!” Drarkodon waves his hand, and suddenly I can’t speak. I start to cough. I fall onto my knees. My stomach is starting to do flips. Something’s in my throat — I can feel it.

  The feet. The crawling.

  “Artemis, what’s wrong?” Jace kneels beside me.

  This time I don’t have to reach in the back of my throat. The spiders spill out of my mouth like they’ve been growing in my body. Jace falls backward from the surprise and starts to kill them with his hands.

  Drarkodon chuckles.

  “I saw the ouroboros symbol on the back of your neck,” he says. “Trying to be like your dear, old uncle?” he asks, tapping my shoulder with the back of his scythe.

  “Leave him alone,” Jace says and stands.

  “Don’t —” I can’t finish my words. The spiders get caught in my throat, clogging the passageway. I reach my hand in my mouth and grab as many as I can, to pull them out so I can breathe. “Don’t change.”

  Jace lunges at him and Drarkodon throws him into the wall by waving his hand. His head knocks against a sharp edge, and he falls to the ground.

  The side of his face begins to bleed out.

  “So much stronger,” Drarkodon says, curling his fingers into a fist. He moves his hand toward me, and opens his fist. “Get up.”

  He forces me to my feet.

  Spiders are still crawling out of my mouth.

  I cough, and a large one, bigger than the rest, crawls out. I don’t bother looking at Nova or Nadia. I just stand there.

  I don’t look up at Drarkodon either.

  “Silly, little boy,” he taunts as he circles me. The gorgons emerge from the darkness behind us and grab hold of Nova and Nadia. Out of the corner of my eyes, I can see the small snakes snapping at their faces.

  I spit out the last spider and wipe my face.

  “Why don’t you just kill me?”

  Drarkodon steps back, pressing his hand against his chest. “Why would I do that? We’re family,” he says. He almost sounds convincingly offended.

  “Why wouldn’t you? Look what you did to my brother!”

  “But I didn’t kill him,” he says. Using his scythe, he shoves me against the wall, pressing the pole against my body. I glance down at Jace, who’s still immobile. “I didn’t kill him either. He’s still alive. I’m a good person, Artemis. I’ve just gotten the shorter stick in life.”

  “I know the Time Keeper didn’t care about you,” I say, looking down at him.

  “Artemis, what are you —” Nova starts, Stheno covers his face with her claw.

  Drarkodon narrows his eyes. “What do they call you?”

  “The Time Traveler,” I say, shoving his scythe away from me and I drop back to the ground. I slowly stand up, not taking my eyes off of him. “I saw it. Your dead mother, the Enchantress. The Spellbinder who cursed our family.” I take a step forward. “I saw what you did to —”

  He shoves me against the rock wall again, piercing my chest with his scythe. I struggle to get it out and I cut my hand against the blade.
<
br />   “You’re weaker than your brother,” he says. “I don’t know how that power hasn’t destroyed you.” He leans forward toward my wound, and inhales deeply. “Your blood is… compelling.” He pulls out the toe of his scythe from my chest and scratches my neck with it.

  I groan, clenching my fists. I inhale deeply and close my eyes. He presses the smooth of the blade to my neck, just beneath my jaw, forcing me to wheeze when I breathe.

  “You’re scared,” I manage to say, hoarse.

  He narrows his eyes. I stare at the roach that crawls out of his beard, back into his hollow cheek. “Of what?”

  “You don’t know who your real heir is,” I say. “You thought it was Apollo, but I have an ouroboros symbol on my neck too. If you kill me, you could die, and you’re too much of a coward to chance it.” He presses his scythe harder against my neck. “I’ve been a coward my whole life,” I tell him, “and we have the same eyes.”

  The side of his nose twitches. He pulls his scythe away from me, and cracks me in the face with his boney knuckles.

  My head knocks against the wall, and everything goes dark.

  *****

  I wake with my hands and ankles both restrained. I look to the left and notice I’m stuck right beside my brother now. Jace is still knocked out where Drarkodon left him, and to the right of me, is Nova and Nadia, both of their heads are hanging forward. I start shaking my arms, but the cuffs are tight around my wrists.

  “Nadia,” I say, shaking the chains. I try to get her attention. “Nadia! Wake up!”

  “Artemis? Is that you?”

  I turn my head in the other direction. “Apollo? You’re awake?” I ask, he still hangs there, immobile.

  “You idiot.” One of his fingers twitch above the cuff.

  He sighs. He doesn’t turn his head to look at me so I look forward instead. “You shouldn’t've come.”

  “Well how was I supposed to know I was gonna accidentally let him out? Becoming a chronomancer didn’t exactly come with instructions. Dad didn’t exactly tells us — me — what not to do when I became one.”

  “Stop arguing, you two are giving me a headache,” Nadia grumbles from beside me.

  “Nadia!” I say, “get Kina out of the lamp!”

  She snaps her fingers, and Kina comes tumbling out.