by Lan Chan
“I’ll stay.”
That conviction wavered when the afternoon sun sank low in the sky. His distraction was palpable. “I told you that you can go back.”
“My duty is to guard you while you’re at the Academy. Do you need to do this right now, though?”
“Yes.” It was all I said as I skim-read yet more pages in the Druid’s Grimoire about the possibility of retaining your soul when performing blood magic. Every time I ran into the same thing. Supernaturals had their own cause-and-effect rules, but their magic was powered by a source that had once gifted them with immortality. I was a weak human who would die after a short lifespan. It was a trade-off, really. The power of the human soul as it was unmade versus the power of magic in the everyday. I knew which I would choose at this moment.
My stomach grumbled, but I ignored it. Knowing that I was sinking into a research rabbit hole, I grunted when Noah shifted in his seat yet again. “I know this isn’t fun,” I said. “I really don’t need protection here. Tony’s outside, and Marshall and Curtis are probably circling the perimeter. There’s no need for you to hover.”
When he didn’t say a word, I glanced up to find the wolf in his eyes. “My duty is to–”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re very dedicated. I get it.” Sighing, I breathed through my nose. “Sorry. I know I’m snapping. I just get like this when I keep coming up against a brick wall.”
“Why are you doing this?” He leaned in to get a closer look at the topic of the paragraph I was reading. “‘Life essences cannot be replaced through artificial...’ Sophie. What are you trying to do?”
He slid the book away from my line of sight. “Nothing!”
“Then why does it seem like Agatha is right. You want to take the power without paying the price.”
I gritted my teeth. “The price is unfair!”
In my head, I replayed a conversation I’d had with Lex over and over again. That this mission of hers to destroy Lucifer wasn’t worth her life. That there were other alternatives. At the time, I hadn’t known that she was already unravelling because of the Angelical. Biting the inside of my cheek, I rationalised that I would still have preferred her alive than to stay in this limbo where she was lost. But in that alternate universe, Lucifer would be free, and we would be dead or enslaved. Was Agatha right? Was I just too weak to make the sacrifice?
“The price is the price,” Noah said.
I snatched the book back. “What did my great-grandfather do to stay intact?”
He shoved a hand through his hair. “Don’t start down this road again.”
“Are you trying to protect me or everybody else?”
“Both,” he hissed.
I flipped pages furiously. “Maybe that isn’t a choice!”
“There’s always a choice!”
“Not a good one.”
He slapped his hand down on the book to stop me from turning the pages. The pressure caused me to tear one corner. I winced. “Good or bad, when you make a choice, you live with the consequences. You want to have a do-over when you can’t!” As I watched, red flickered in the depths of his eyes. When he spoke again, it sounded as though his mouth was filled with cotton. His sharp teeth had descended. “There are a million things I would love to go back and change. But I can’t. So I’ve made my peace with it. Otherwise, it would have destroyed me.”
Swallowing, I placed my hand on his. “I wish I could go back and change things for you too.”
He peered at me for a moment, his gaze unwavering. I didn’t take my eyes off him. Now wasn’t the time to be skittish. After a few more beats, he sighed. “Sometimes I think it would be easier if you were the spitting image of him. Then I could just kill you and be done with it.”
“Isn’t this cozy,” Anastasia’s voice cut through the dim of the library.
Realising that I was still holding his hand, I pulled away and picked up the Book of Beasts.
“What are you doing here?” Noah asked her. The boots and military cargos told me that she had probably just come off a guard shift.
“Am I not allowed to leave the Reserve?” she drawled, coming up to us. “Or am I disturbing a private moment?” I badly wanted to scoop up all the books before she could read the titles, but shifter eyesight was impeccable. She’d probably already spotted them from a mile away. The way her top lip curled said she’d be memorising the titles for later use.
Noah gripped the edge of the table. “A straight answer would be nice.”
She wagged a finger at him. “You need to get a sense of humour. You’re supposed to be with Max at the border, remember? He’s meeting with the lone wolves tonight to settle the territory disputes. Or did she flash her doe eyes and scramble your brain?”
Noah swore. He glanced over at me. “I told you that you don’t need to be here,” I said.
Hesitation gripped him. Anastasia gave him an out that displeased both of us. “I can stay if you need to run off.”
She rested her cheek on her fist and gave him a lazy grin.
“Come back with me, Sophie,” Noah said. “You can finish this up another time.”
“What’s the problem?” A dangerous edge slipped into Anastasia’s tone. “You don’t trust me?”
“No.” Brutal honesty. “You’re not thinking straight at the moment. Come, Sophie.”
His hand closed around my wrist. “Are you serious?” I asked. “I really need to do this!”
Anastasia’s lips pulled back. I stopped struggling and moved closer to Noah. “What are you saying?” she said.
“I’m saying that you feel slighted that Max is choosing Sophie, and you’re not able to separate duty from personal feelings.”
She reeled back as though he’d slapped her. Even I knew they were harsh words. Duty and honour were everything to the shifters. “You...” she started but couldn’t finish. Her eyes flashed in my direction. They went wolf at the sight of me. Her canines elongated.
Noah slammed his fist on the table. Her focus didn’t waver. “This is a perfect example. She hasn’t done anything and you’re ready to rip out her throat. What’s wrong with you, Stacey?”
Her tone was full of loathing. “What’s wrong with me? You’re the one who has forgotten who you are. Her great-grandfather murdered your entire pack and all you’re doing is following her around like some lapdog.”
“Watch it.”
She stood up. “Whatever. I came here to help you out. Not to be insulted. You’re already twenty minutes late.”
I bit my lip. “I didn’t know you had something else to do. Why didn’t you say anything?”
Instead of answering, he just stood there growling silently while I shoved all the books onto the returns trolley, grabbed my things, and followed him out. The awkwardness as we trailed behind Anastasia to the portal field was monumental.
She wouldn’t acknowledge him at all. But when we arrived, she snapped at him. “Do you want to port right to the meeting site?” Her teeth were gritted so hard I could barely understand what she was saying.
Noah looked to me. “I don’t mind,” I said. He’d waited forever for me. I could return the favour. My tongue felt too big in my mouth at the thought of being so close to Max, but I’d figure something out.
A shadow darker than the night itself drew up on my left. I flinched as I recognised Agatha’s coat. She didn’t say a word, but her pinched lips said she hadn’t gotten over my announcement.
Noah gave the portal mage the new coordinates. I braced myself to come face-to-face with Max on the other side. Just as I stepped forward to follow Noah into the mouth of the portal, Anastasia moved in front of me and blocked my way. She pressed her hand back and shoved me into Agatha before disappearing through the portal.
Agatha’s bony hands caught me around the upper arm. Something warm but abrasive snaked up my shoulder. “Shifters,” she spat. “Worthless creatures enslaved to their emotions.”
When she let me go, I turned around and glared at her. Hugh stood
just behind her back. Not wanting to be in their presence any longer than I had to, I walked through the portal. Expecting to come through the other side in the border of the Reserve, my stomach dropped out when the first hint of brimstone and stagnant water hit my nose.
27
A cold breeze swept across my cheeks but did nothing to dispel the repulsive stench of the fens. Unlike at Ravenhall where the smell was constant but not debilitating, here it was like sludge in the air that drew into my lungs. It coated my throat and made me cough.
“Noah?”
I blinked and the world fluctuated around me. The solid earth of the portal field suddenly sank a few inches. I glanced down and my sneaker was wedged in sand. Voices murmured above me. Before my eyes, a solid brick wall enclosed around me, leaving space the size of a basketball court. The wall flowed higher into tiered seating where one by one, mages and sorceresses were teleporting into their seats. Between the top of the wall and where they sat, a shimmering barrier of mauve light rose into the sky.
“Agatha!” I screamed, knowing this had to be her doing. “Let me out!”
Members of the crowd grinned, their opulent clothing amongst the stink made me think there was some major glamouring going on.
As more and more of the seats filled up, I tried to approach the wall to find where I had come through. The bricks were solid and reinforced by magic. A sweep of what felt like electricity zapped me when I touched it for too long.
“Agatha!” I screamed again.
She appeared in a wash of magenta-purple light. The crowd cheered for her. “What is this?” I said.
She smirked. “This is your destiny. No more hiding behind that sweet disposition. You will become what you were meant to be.”
“You’re insane!” I screamed. Magic blossomed all around me as more portals opened. “Let me out of here!”
“Perhaps,” she said, referring to my assessment of her mental health. “But better to be insanely who I am than fighting to be something I’m not.”
“You can’t do this!”
She waved a hand dismissively at me. “I would save my strength if I were you!”
“If they knew–”
She sneered at me. “Oh, they know.” She swept a hand to the left of the arena where a space had been cleared for a full-length mirror to be set. Through it, I could see the reflection of the people on the other side. Every few seconds the scene switched but they never repeated. The MirrorNet.
Agatha clicked her fingers to get my attention. “Unlike you, we don’t hide behind worthless rules. We’re not afraid of what we can do, and we’ll stick to it no matter what the consequences.”
My eyes dragged back to the mirror. My heart leaped into my throat. Angus and Ivan were on the other side. Angus’s lips moved but no sound came from the mirror. The way his face twisted said he was probably barking out orders. I waited with my breath held tight, but nothing happened. No elite guards showed up to bust the door down. Instead, more spectators kept appearing in their seats. Before too long, the stadium was full to bursting.
The scent of brimstone became so strong that my eyes watered.
Like a stunned fish, all I could do was stand there looking into the crowd. What had my palms turning sweaty was that there were demons in the crowd. They were low demons on the smaller side, like big guard dogs, but demons, nonetheless. They sat at the foot of a mage or sorceress or stood guard beside a supernatural on the aisle.
Most were gilded to their masters through a spell that leashed them with magic. Bound. That kind of magic was forbidden. The red tint in the eyes of the demons said that if the will of their masters slipped for even a second, they would break free and attempt to massacre us all.
Hugh appeared by Agatha’s side holding a small knife in his hand. My whole body clenched. “Here you go, little witch,” Hugh said. He waved his hand in a circular motion. A break appeared in the spell that held the barrier intact. He threw the knife onto the sand. “I’d pick it up if I were you. They’re a little bigger than rats.”
Apprehension had the circle drawing around me before I even turned around. Though I wanted to spit in his face, instinct had me staggering towards the knife. Over on the far side of the area, a portal was beginning to open. As it gaped, I saw through to the other side. It shone with the dull red light of the Hell dimension.
Crouching, I didn’t hesitate to pierce my skin with the knife. Blood trickled from my hand onto the sand. It soaked through instantly as I used it to draw a blood circle to reinforce my protection.
And then what, Sophie?
A knife this small would be less than a pinprick on the hide of a demon. Nausea and hysteria clawed at my throat. Useless. When it came down to it, I was defenceless. Without blood, I had nothing at all.
Except I did have blood. Fear locked me in its sights.
Good, that heinous voice echoed in my head. You’re learning. As long as there is blood, you will be safe.
Safety was the last thing on my mind as a thunderous roar whipped from the mirror and filled the area was shockwaves of anger. No, dear Gaia.
My attention dragged to the mirror where the head of an infuriated lion looked out at me. Max’s eyes were two simmering balls of rage. The streaks of blue and pink in his mane were glowing as though lit from inside by something not of this world. He rammed at the mirror. If he were indeed in front of glass, it would have shattered into a million pieces already. But I had a feeling what I was seeing was Max attempting to force the portal behind the mirror to open up. At his back, Charles stood with his head bowed, the glow of yellow bathing his face in a jaundiced light that made him appear sick.
And then I heard a scraping sound behind me, and everything else disappeared. “We wouldn’t leave you there without a way to protect yourself,” Agatha simpered. My heart shredded altogether when four silver poles appeared at even interval inside the circle of the arena. They were the width of the telephone poles used in the human world. Each one was constructed of pure silver, the metallic tang somehow transferring to me as a sour taste in my mouth. Shackled to each one of the poles was a supernatural. Ash coated my mouth.
Noah was strapped with his back to the pole on my left. Chains of silver latched across his chest and neck. His head lolled. Where the silver touched his skin without a barrier, it smoked and sizzled. There was already a cut weeping across his chest.
On my right, Anastasia had been given the same treatment. Her shackles were wrapped around her wrists and secured to the pole behind her back. Somebody had taken her boots off, the silver making the bare skin of her ankles swell and singe. Unlike Noah, she was conscious, though the thing snapping its teeth at me could hardly be considered alert. Her eyes were a mottle of red and yellow. Her teeth had bitten into her tongue and her bottom lip, making blood coat the inside of her mouth.
Around the base of where they stood, a patch of blue-flowered shrubs pushed from the sand. Wolfsbane. The scent of the plant sent Anastasia into a frenzy. She clawed at her bindings. When she was unable to get free, she instinctively raised her head to the open ceiling and howled at the moon. The mournful quality of it had my chest locking. She was calling for aid.
Over in the far corner of the arena, the portal to the Hell dimension completed itself. At the same time, another figure appeared strapped to the pole. As Celeste’s body touched the pole, it changed from silver to iron. She cried out as the sting of poisoned metal touched her cheek. Unlike the others, she was strapped facing the pole. Her burgundy wings snapped out in distress, her blonde hair clinging to her scalp where blood was also seeping out. Screaming, she tried to pull herself from the iron shackles.
Celeste came from a long line of Fae royalty. The roots of her ancestry dated back to the Wild Hunt in the old dimension. She never shut up about how she was distantly related to Angus and something to do with Oberon, their fallen king. Thanks to her pedigree lineage, Celeste was predominantly an earth Fae, but she also dabbled in the other elements as well.
>
Her lips formed a spell in the old Fae language, but as soon as she tried to speak them, a swarm of magenta light engulfed her body, pressing it flat against the iron pole. Her scream was silent behind the cloud of Agatha’s magic. Celeste’s face contorted into such agony that I couldn’t watch. Instead, I dragged my attention to the remaining pole in time to see James’s wings being snapped out of shape as phantom hands curled themselves around him. The joint of his left wing was hanging by a thread.
Sweat poured from his brow as he sank to the sand in an effort to relieve the pressure on his wing. He gave a hideous groan and passed out when the wing touched the sand and was pushed into an unnatural angle.
“Stop it!” I screamed at Agatha.
“What’s the matter?” she said. “Surely you don’t feel sympathy for these people. Have they not tormented you? Why not use them the way you should?”
She pointed to the portals. Desperate and uncertain, I found myself looking to the mirror for hope. All I got in return was the disbelieving but riveted faces of some random supernaturals I didn’t know.
Something stomped in the mouth of the portal. My time was up. Turning, I dropped down into the sand again and drew another four circles. Each one denoted a blood circle to protect the supernaturals.
Anastasia snapped her teeth at the sight of the circle. Foam bubbled at her mouth. Making my decision, I flipped the knife in my hands and rammed the handle into the side of her temple. On a good day, I wouldn’t be close to strong enough to knock out a wolf. But she was so weakened by the silver against her skin and the wolfsbane invading her senses that she passed out cold.
A spear appeared through the portal first. For a second, my brows drew together at the odd sight of a weapon. Demons didn’t usually carry them. They had no need for it. The reason for the spear became apparent when the long-limbed demon pushed itself into this dimension. It must have been involved in the skirmish at the border of the dwarf hills. The spear itself was actually attached to the hand of a solid-looking dwarf with reddish-brown hair and a moustache that trailed almost to his knees. The demon clutched the dwarf like a toy in its clawed hands. The dwarf was unconscious, with arrows sticking from his back.
