Dark Legacies (Book Four in the Brenna Strachan Series)

by Hadena James

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  We used the entrance that Jack had led us out of earlier in the day. For the first time, I realized I was exhausted. It had been a very long day. I had seen Pegasus twice and for some reason that made me tired.

  Inside the catacombs, I sat down on the stone floor and waited. My mother and the others were checking tombs, looking for a name.

  “Found it!” Ba’al called to us. I considered standing and decided I didn’t want to be there when a living witch, entombed for eons, emerged from the small space. If I were a betting demon, I’d say he would be nuttier than Jack was.

  “Well?” My mother looked at my father. My father opened the tomb, but no living witch sprang from it. Instead, a foul odor that had nothing to do with decay or death emitted from it. I gagged twice before gaining composure.

  “No witch,” my mother answered.

  “No body,” my father sighed and his shoulders drooped. “There should be traces of him in here.”

  “Who is it?” I asked.

  “His name was Henri and he was a Great House Witch with a house that is now gone,” my mother answered. “He also liked to stop time and insert extra souls into humans. Not a single extra soul either, but three or four or five and see what happened. Legend says that he really liked to experiment on the mentally ill.”

  “Like Stephen?” I asked. My voice echoed in the halls.

  “Like Stephen, who housed seven souls at once,” my mother said, “If you believe the legends.”

  Spring-Heeled Jack peered into the empty crypt. He shook his head and for the first time in ages, he giggled. So much for intelligence. He rolled the stone back into place and bound into the anti-chamber that lead to Cerebus’ lair.

  “Do we follow?” My mother asked me.

  “I don’t know,” I said as I stood up. Levi was suddenly beside me, helping me to my feet. “I don’t think you should be assisting me.”

  “Someone should,” Levi said. Once again, alluding to the cryptic secret that was held within him. I hoped to live long enough to figure it out.

  I followed Jack and everyone else followed me. We entered Cerebus’ lair. Two of the heads of the hellhound were sleeping. The third was watching us. His eyes moved with us. Jack was giggling at Cerebus.

  “Okay, so, here’s a disturbing thought. Let’s say this asshole ancestor of ours really did cast the double soul spell on Jack, multiple times and got himself banished. Then Jack, who is Jack, opens the crypt and whether alive or dead, feeds him to Cerebus,” I suggested. “That might be why Cailleach finally warmed up to Jack. She realized the damage her breeding partner had caused and took Jack under her wing. Being a witch, she might have been able to help Jack with some of the side effects of the spell. I’m sure the crazy half-breed’s soul won out on keeping the body, but I also imagine his mind was fractured even more in the process.”

  “That would explain a lot,” Lucifer nodded. “I’m still unsure about witches using the catacombs as a place of banishment.”

  “It was once, thousands of years ago,” I said.

  “As far as I know, it was only once,” my mother reassured my father. “And no one alive had a hand in it. Cailleach and another matriarch, Henri’s mother, did it. Henri’s mother was premier at the time.”

  “Why put his name on the tomb?” Mammon answered.

  “Have you ever noticed?” My mom asked him. “How many dead have you entombed in these walls?”

  “I see your point,” Anubis answered. “We wouldn’t have noticed an extra stone being used and it would have allowed them to check on Henri until his death if he wasn’t immortal.”

  “Which probably wasn’t long,” my mother added quickly.

  “Great, the mystery of Jack is solved. Let’s go find the canopic jars,” I said, as I headed out of Cerebus’ lair. Jack walked on one side, Levi on the other. Their attention was starting to freak me out.

  “We should wait until tomorrow,” Lucifer said. “Going past the prison after dark isn’t a good idea.”

  “I’ve already faced Cerebus, Pegasus, and wendigos. How much worse can it get?” I asked.

  “Much,” Pendragon spoke for the first on this misadventure. “Well, maybe not Pegasus or Cerebus, but worse than wendigos.”

  “If I was sure there would be a tomorrow, I’d agree with you,” I said, “but I’m not sure. As a matter of fact, I haven’t a clue whether the sun will even bother to grace this wretched little planet tomorrow, because of all the weird and evil shit going on. So, while I’m sure there are things worse than wendigos, for example, horsemen, I’m also sure that if we don’t go check, it will bother me all night. That means tomorrow, if the sun bothers to rise and I manage to crawl from the prison cot, I will be just as tired and cranky and irritated as I am tonight, possibly more so. And yes, I believe there are badass beasties on the other side of the island, beasties that I don’t want to deal with, but I’m no slouch. I’m a very pissed off demon with witch powers who intends to put a stop to this chaos and horror before the horsemen cut another of my uncles in half. Pegasus might have helped once, but I don’t think he’ll help a second time. You can either accompany me or not. I really don’t care at this point.”

  “How very eloquent,” Anubis snickered.

  I didn’t glare at him; instead, I started forward. They would follow or they wouldn’t and honestly, I didn’t care which. I had to know whether those damned canopic jars were on the island and if so, I was going to rid my house of the first horseman and sleep in my own bed afterwards. If I woke up, I would deal with the rest of the world.

  Jack giggled and leapt a few steps ahead of me. As I caught up, he leapt backwards to be a few steps behind me. This continued for about twenty feet.

  Leviathan joined me after letting out a loud, long sigh that expressed his displeasure and resignation to follow me to the depths of the island’s hell. I smiled as I walked. The others would come. I just needed one to get the entire group moving.

  Sure enough, the clomping of feet started up. Jack continued his strange jumping walk; moving in front or behind me. The others gave him room.

  The lights faded as we passed the prison, as if it was afraid of the darkened shadows on the other side. Lucifer did something and flames appeared between his horns. His brothers joined him, lighting the way. This was a neat trick that I had never seen them do before. Eli attempted a spell, but it sputtered and the meager light it produced barely let him see his hand in front of his face.

  “Your magic is weaker here,” Mammon told him, so Eli let the spell go.

  “When the time comes to use magic; Brenna, Sonnellion and I will have to help,” Pendragon told him. “Until then, conserve it as much as possible. You might open yourself up to siphon off whatever is available in the air.”

  I didn’t feel like I had a lot of extra magic in me. My reserves still hadn’t recharged very well. However, I didn’t dwell on the thought. Instead, I took Pendragon’s advice and opened myself to magic.

  It was all around me: raw, natural magic that came from the beings, darkness, and everything that dwelled on this part of the island. My mind and body liked raw magic, preferring it to the magic that my siblings held within them. It was part of the reason I had so many problems casting spells. My magic was wild and my spells showed it. My siblings could harness it and make it useable. I was a vessel for them to use. I had accepted that while in the aether. I made them stronger and they made my magic usable. It was somehow perfectly harmonious in this time of chaos and disaster.

  “Can we do that?” My brother, Samuel, asked.

  “Do what?” Mammon asked.

  “Create fire between our horns?” Samuel continued.

  “Some of you can, some of you can’t. Daniel could probably set all the trees on fire and light the way, but the trees would probably retaliate,” Beezel told him. “You, personally, are not a fire demon, you’re like Levi.”

  “And what is Levi?” Rachel asked.

&n
bsp; “A fertility demon,” Levi answered.

  “What are we?” Rachel asked.

  “You are a fire demon,” Beezel answered. “So are Daniel and Eli. Samuel is a fertility demon as is Jasmine.”

  “What about Bren and me?” Nick asked.

  “You are a necromancer,” Beezel told him. “You can talk to and control the dead.”

  “And Bren?” Rachel asked, her voice hesitant.

  “Brenna is,” Beezel stopped, “Brenna.”

  “So, no cool special powers reserved for me,” I said, trying not to sound depressed.

  “You’re a nature demon,” Abaddon said. “The first of our kind. It’s why you feel most at home with wild magic.”

  “Okie dokie,” I said. I didn’t know what a nature demon was, but it didn’t sound very cool.

  “Naturals of other species can call animals, wake up flora and use the earth to help them,” Abaddon said. “You can do all that and so much more.”

  “I did wake up a bunch of trees who ate zombies,” I snarked.

  “You joke, but...” Beezel stopped talking.

  “Nature demons don’t exist,” Lucifer said. “We don’t know what else you can do. Naturals of any species are rare and we don’t know what they can do because they don’t practice the magic. It is scary.”

  “A fey conjured up an army of minions once from the earth when she sneezed,” Beezel said.

  I considered that. I was good at conjuring. It was about the only thing besides healing that I was good at. I wondered if I could conjure minions and wondered what minions looked like.

  “I don’t see anything,” I told them.

  “Count your blessings,” Levi answered as something darted past the very edge of the firelight.

  “But I can feel it,” I told him.

  “Then don’t count too fast,” Levi looked at me, “because if you can feel it, they are hovering just outside the light.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The attack came from above. Something large with leathery wings and a sharp beak snapped at me, catching my ear. The beak shut with such force, it deafened me in one ear for a few seconds.

  “Thunderbirds,” Pendragon announced rather calmly, considering I was pretty sure my ear was completely gone.

  Most of the group looked upwards. Anubis, Pendragon, Levi and Abaddon created a circle that looked out at the darkness. The demons spread apart, stretching the protective light. The coppery scent of blood filled my nostrils as it ran down my neck and soaked into my shirt, making it stick to me.

  I was torn between looking up and looking out. A second before I was hit by another thunderbird, I heard the rustle of its wings and ducked. It flew over me so close that the breeze it created blew my hair back from my face.

  Daniel aimed a fireball that zoomed past my head. My hair smelled like it was burning. I patted my hair. It was dry and brittle. The ends were crispy and broke off under the weight of my touch. Eli joined the fireball shooting. One raced into the darkness, illuminating the gaunt white face of a wendigo. I shuddered at the thought of another one. It was far creepier than the thunderbirds that flew over me.

  I began to feed magic to my siblings. My mother did the same, unwilling to cast dangerous spells while pregnant. The fireballs got bigger, hotter, and faster as they whizzed into the sky.

  A thunderbird was struck. It drifted to the ground in a slow, lazy spiral. It crashed into the earth a few feet from Anubis. He kicked it, but it didn’t move. He seemed satisfied with this and went back to looking at the darkness in front of him.

  The thunderbird had a baldhead and grey feathers that only covered its back and leathery skin everywhere else. Large eyes shined in the dark, despite being as black as obsidian. The beak was long, hooked at the end and white, but it had teeth. It shared features with both dinosaurs and birds.

  Another one came down from the sky, landing outside the lighted circle. Within moments, sucking sounds emerged from where it had crashed. Rachel shot a fireball in that direction. The creature feeding on it stood on two legs and had blue skin. It looked like a miniature troll with large ears. It hissed at Rachel and as the dark returned, so did the sucking sounds.

  My mind debated whether the miniature troll or the wendigo was worse, as something rushed us from the dark. The thing was large and ran on all fours. A long muzzle covered in scraggly fur snapped at Anubis’ waist. He kicked out, striking it in the face. It ran back off into the dark.

  “We need more light!” Anubis shouted.

  “How much?” I asked.

  “Lots,” Levi answered. He kicked at something smaller that ran at him.

  “Let there be light then,” I stopped funneling magic to my siblings. Small pinpricks of light began to float around us. They grew in number and intensity. Wisps feed off magic in the air once they are conjured and there was plenty of magic around. The bright wisps never got bigger than the size of a grape, but their illumination began to rival the fire being produced by the demons.

  A few creatures swatted at them or tried to bite them, but the balls of energy just pulled themselves back together. The problem with wisps was that they tended to drift away. As they moved further into the darkness, they brought light to foreign landscapes. It might as well have been another planet. The trees looked like iron and their trunks were twisted and gnarled. The plant life was stunted and the soil looked grey.

  A wisp passed over an intersection of multiple stone pathways. We would have to figure out which way to go when we reached it. For now, it might as well have been miles away.

  The thunderbirds were thinning out. The fireballs that sent them plummeting to their death were enough of a deterrent to make them search for easier prey. The stuff on the ground didn’t seem as ready to go away. Every so often, a wisp would catch one its light, illuminating it for a few seconds. The animals here were different. The book I had read a year ago didn’t cover them. Most appeared to be deformed, and all had oodles of magic that oozed from them in an odd mist. Their magic wasn’t like that of the other animals or even Cerebus and Pegasus. It was closer to Elder magic than animal magic.

  “Don’t wander,” Anubis said as the circle pulled back together.

  “I certainly wasn’t planning on it,” I peered into the light of the wisps.

  “How many of those can you conjure?” Gabriel asked.

  “As many as needed,” I shrugged. “I don’t think I ever ran out of wisp magic.”

  “What are they?” Levi asked.

  “Energy balls,” Elise gave the answer quickly, “they might be alive.” The second part was added much slower. “Wisps can appear and disappear at will, but for the most part, they remain invisible.”

  “Unless conjured,” Anubis said.

  “Sure,” I answered, mostly ignoring him, “Now, if you were going to hide canopic jars, where would you put them?” I turned to Pendragon.

  “Not here,” Pendragon answered.

  “Okay, but if you were going to hide them here, where would you hide them?” I pressed.

  “There’s a henge back here, I’d put them inside it. Most of the mythics avoid the henge,” Pendragon told me.

  “Is it always night on this part of the island?” I asked.

  “No, daytime is better, but not much,” he frowned hard.

  “Who built the henge?” I started forward again.

  “Him,” Pendragon hooked a finger at Spring-Heeled Jack.

  “Then I guess I won’t bother to ask why it was built,” I conceded my curiosity. It would be lost if Jack was involved. He certainly wasn’t going to volunteer any answers.

  Moving forward was slow. The wisps floated away, guided by whatever guided them. I kept having to stop and conjure more.

  Occasionally, they fell on some animal and the group was called to a halt. Most of the time, the animal fled into the darkness as the wisp approached. Sometimes they stared at us, defiantly daring us to come closer, before giving in and skulking away.

  Ano
ther of the miniature trolls ran towards the group. A wisp, for whatever reason, was chasing him. He was more terrified of the wisp than the firelight or us. He shrieked shrilly as he ran through the circle, dividing us, and into the darkness from whence we had come. The wisp continued its slow, bouncing pursuit of the terrified thing.

  “Why is it chasing that goblin?” Pendragon asked.

  “I’m not sure it is,” I answered. “Of course, I’m not sure it isn’t either. Maybe to siphon magic off it. Maybe because it thinks it’s fun or maybe it is just fleeing in the same direction that the wisp is determined to go.”

  “Isn’t it dangerous to conjure things you don’t know much about?” Ba’al asked.

  “I know a lot about wisps,” I answered, “They are earth energy; a living force from within the ground itself. They are the equivalent of trees uprooting themselves and walking around. The difference is the ground has a lot of trouble doing that, so instead it releases wisps. The energy is highly concentrated, so it produces light. They are magical spirits of the earth for lack of a better term.”

  “Oh,” Ba’al answered.

  “Sometimes they are released as small pinpricks of light, like a wisp. Sometimes, it’s a large ball of light, like spook lights. Sometimes, the release of energy is so great that it illuminates the sky, even at night. I believe they call them earthquake lights. We sometimes forget that the magic is just energy and the earth has a lot of it. If we stand next to an erupting volcano, we can harness some of that energy and it becomes magic,” I told everyone.

  “Only witches can do that,” Eli said. “Then only some witches. Jasmine can’t draw magic from the energy of the earth.”

  “True,” I said. “So, only some witches can do it, but energy is energy to most of us in the Strachan clan. I can harvest it from just about anything. My siblings are more modest about their abilities, but they can do it as well.”

  “Modest,” Daniel said the word with a giggle. This set Jack into a giggling fit. We stopped to wait as he bent over with the force of his laughter. When he righted himself, I half expected tears to be running down his cheeks. There were no tears.