Shadows & Flame Complete Boxed Set: Demons of Fire and Night Novels

by C. N. Crawford

  At last, as they neared the bottom, new voices echoed off the metallic walls—the voices of young women.

  “What is going on?” someone was shouting.

  Another answered. “It’s Wiglaf. He tore out of here hella fast.”

  Ursula slowed her pace, listening to the voices from below as the stairwell reached a large hall.

  “Why would Wiglaf tear everything apart like this? It must be the girl, don’t you think?”

  “He’s coming!” someone shouted.

  Ursula stopped walking, peering over the railing. Just below her, twenty women stood on a concrete floor, surrounded by makeshift cots. Despite the shabbiness of their surroundings, they were all dressed glamorously—short gold cocktail dresses, black strapless gowns—each one as gorgeous as a supermodel, most nearly six feet tall. A dragon’s harem of sorts.

  Ursula gripped the railing, surveying the danger. An enormous guard, his shoulders the width of a refrigerator, stood guarding a door, gripping a battle-axe. His muscled body oozed menace—but the dragons were nowhere to be seen. She could almost feel their power, their ancient, primal magic vibrating through the building, and she needed to find them. More importantly, her sword needed to find them.

  Another screech of shearing metal echoed through the hall as the dragon tore at the statue.

  An idea sparked in Ursula’s mind, and she turned to Zee. “Can you glamour us to look like supermodels and movie stars?”

  Zee chewed her thumb. “I think so. I’ll just need to fix your clothes and makeup. Your face is good enough, I guess.” She frowned at Cera. “But I’ll need to change nearly everything about this one.”

  Ursula stroked the hilt of Excalibur. “Just don’t change the sword.”

  Cera glared at Zee, who lifted her hands, her body glowing with a pale, pearly light. With her eyes closed, she muttered under her breath. As the pale light curled around her, Ursula felt her leather clothing transform into silk that slid against her legs, and she stared down at a plunging neckline. From the waist down, folds of tulle and silk hid her sword. From the corner of her eye, she could see that Zee had darkened her hair to a deep brown.

  She glanced at Cera, who grew taller—her hair now a long, platinum blonde, her eyes changing, now almond-shaped and hazel. Cera straightened, flicking her long hair over her shoulder.

  Zee merely gave herself a few more inches, transforming her outfit into a short cocktail dress, her eye-makeup glittering, lips a deep blood red.

  Ursula touched the sheath under the folds of her gown for reassurance. “Let’s go.”

  Standing tall, they walked down the final turn of the stairwell. While the guard stared up at the destruction above—the dragon tearing through more of the statue—Ursula and her friends slipped into the crowd of women.

  The guard gripped his battle-axe, his eyes blazing red as he stared at the women. Dark, shadowy magic curled off his body. “Get to the warren, now!” his voice boomed. “All of you!” He flung open the door into a dark hall.

  A dark smile curled Ursula’s slips, and Excalibur hummed by her side. The warren. Exactly where she needed to go.

  The women scrambled around, hurrying, and in the chaos, Ursula slipped into their ranks right behind Cera. She kept her head down as she moved toward the guard by the door. But before they could go through the threshold, the guard’s hand shot out, and he grabbed Cera’s arm, his eyes blazing red.

  “I don’t remember you.” He growled. “Did Lucius bring you here?”

  Cera smiled at him sweetly. “Yes. Of course.”

  The guard slowly looked her up and down. “You look like one of his.”

  Cera winked at him, and his grip on her arm eased up. Ursula kept her head down, passing through the door into a dark hall. All around her, the dragon’s magic thickened the air, a shimmering, metallic glow. Her sword seemed to vibrate by her side.

  Here, in the bowels of the statue, the dragons had dug a large tunnel. As they moved closer, a low growl vibrated off the walls. Ursula shuddered as a dragon’s head appeared in the opening. A ray of sunlight pierced the hall, sparking off the beast’s shimmering scales. Its magic grew sharper, and the dragon seemed to glow as if lit from inside like a lantern, eyes beaming with pale light. An icy shiver of fear snaked up her spine. But this time, she had the sword.

  The dragon blinked slowly, then nodded once.

  From behind them, the demon guard stepped into the hall. “Follow me, captives!” His voice boomed.

  As the dragon turned and moved into the tunnel, Ursula and the other women filed after him into a passage the size of a subway tunnel.

  With the dragon’s back toward them, Ursula considered drawing Excalibur from its sheath under the folds of her dress, and she ached to carve its blade into the reptile’s flesh. She could probably get in a good swing or two before the dragon turned around, assuming she didn’t kill it outright. Still, she hesitated. It wasn’t time yet. She needed to get into the warren itself.

  Its movements serpentine, the dragon slithered through the hole, further into the warren’s interior. Among the women, a nervous energy buzzed—almost terrified.

  A tall blonde woman by Ursula’s side was staring at the ground, muttering under her breath as she walked, her entire body shaking. “The Drake. The Drake was here... He has complete control over everything.”

  What was she talking about? Ursula cleared her throat. “The Drake?” she prompted.

  The woman’s eyes widened, her beautiful face smudged with mascara, and she put a finger to her lips. “Shhhhh...”

  From Ursula’s side, Zee grabbed her arm. “Ursula,” she whispered. “This isn’t good. Drakes aren’t supposed to exist. King Oberon killed the last one.”

  “What the hell is a Drake?” Ursula whispered back.

  “In fae lore, they were the leaders of the dragons. Immensely powerful, imbued with the magic of gods—”

  The blonde glared at them, raising her finger to her lips again. “Shhhhhh. Don’t speak of him.”

  Behind the dragon, they rounded a corner, and the tunnel expanded into a cavernous hall. Carved from the bedrock, it was shaped like an amphitheater, with giant concentric platforms of stone that led down to a stage. Three sleeping dragons reclined on the stones, their scales shimmering in golden torchlight. A metallic scent hung in the air, so thick she could taste it on her tongue.

  The demon guard led them down the stone ramp, and Ursula glanced at the massive dragon bodies, their hides slowly expanding and contracting as they slept. Her fingers went to the hilt of her sword. Not yet, Ursula. The Drake was the dragon she needed to defeat first. Cut off the head of a serpent...

  As they moved down the ramp, a man stepped from the shadows. He was gigantic, at least eight feet tall, and clad in a suit of armor. He gripped a massive broadsword. But it was his hair that drew her eye—a bright red, the color of poppy flowers. It glowed with an inner light, shimmering even in the dim light of the warren.

  And here he was—the Drake. Ursula reached for her sword.

  Chapter 25

  “Thank you for coming down on such short notice.” The Drake spoke in a deep baritone, his voice oozing with power.

  Battle fury began to race through Ursula’s blood, making her body tremble—and yet something about his presence stilled her, willed her to obey his unspoken commands. As if drawn by a magnetic pull, she stepped forward.

  The Drake’s eyes glowed with an amber light, and he lifted his hands. “I am Lucius Artorius Castus. The last Drake. Leader of dragons.” His eyes blazed with magic, and they locked right on Ursula. “And I do not remember seeing you before. Or have I?”

  His eyes flashed, and her mind clouded. The words kneel before me rang in her mind, and Lucius drew his sword.

  Zee elbowed her in the ribs. “Ursula!”

  Lucius’s eyes darted to Zee, and as soon as his gaze was off her, Ursula’s mind cleared again. Her body blazing with power, she drew Excalibur, and she could feel her bo
dy humming with ancient magic. By the time the Drake turned back to her, she was ready for him.

  Snarling, he lunged for her, but she parried his blow. Their swords clashed, echoing off the stone walls, and the Drake’s eyes burned into her. “Do you think you can invade my home?”

  Around the hall, sleeping dragons began to stir.

  “I command a clan of dragons,” his voice boomed.

  “Is that right?” As she fought, Ursula summoned her fire magic, channeling it into the blade. She could feel Zee’s glamour fading, as her body began to glow.

  Lucius’s eyes widened, flashing for a moment with fear. “The mystery girl.”

  “You can call me Ursula.” Ursula slashed at him with Excalibur, her limbs blazing with a primal surety, as if she knew where each one of her muscles needed to be, each precise stroke of her blade.

  “Where did you get that blade?” The Drake slashed at her, but she parried. Emerazel’s fire seared the sword, igniting it with power. Around her ribs, her armor began to materialize, spreading around her torso, then moving down her arms. With this power burning through her body, she wanted blood and vengeance, slaughter and victory. She wanted to feast on stars, to grind monsters into dust. “You mean Excalibur? Viviane gave it to me. Did I mention that I know how to wield it?”

  Lucian’s eyes blazed. “That whore.”

  As he backed away, Ursula pressed in on him. “Where is Bael?”

  “Bael?” Confusion flickered across his features. “Oh, you mean that monstrous demon that was creeping around here? He’s been dealt with.”

  From behind her Zee shouted a warning, but it was too late. A dragon’s talon slammed into her side with a loud crack. Ursula flew across the floor, slamming into a stone bench. Pain splintered her body.

  “Good girl, Esther,” said the Drake as he crossed to Ursula’s crumpled form, his sword ready.

  Ursula moved her legs. The blow should have killed her—and yet, after an initial flash of pain, she felt fine. The magical armor had protected her. Best not to let Lucius know that.

  He pointed his sword at her head, a grim expression on his face. “The prophecy cannot be fulfilled. As protector of Mount Acidale, it is my duty to destroy the Darkling.” He lifted his sword for a strike, but as he brought it down, she rolled to the side, and his sword rebounded off the granite.

  Ursula crawled to her feet, raising Excalibur, her blade burning brightly, now ten feet of fire.

  “I don’t give a shit about your prophecy, and I’m not sure I’m your Darkling. I have no interest in destroying the world.” She slashed at him, not entirely sure if she meant it. “I asked you nicely before. Now tell me where Bael is!” she roared.

  Lucius retreated, his face paling. Slowly, a dark form rose behind him, then two more. The dragons stared at her with yellow eyes.

  “Kill her!” the Drake screamed.

  The closest dragon lunged, fast as a cobra. Ursula leapt back, and the dragon’s jaws snapped the air where she’d been standing.

  She brought up Excalibur, channeling more of Emerazel’s fire into the blade until it burned like a super nova.

  The dragon lunged again, but this time instead of dodging, she slashed at its head. The beast screamed, rearing back, blood pouring from its neck.

  And yet it was hard to think clearly, hard to focus on death and destruction when her mind kept turning back to one thing—those pale gray eyes. “Tell me where Bael is!”

  In the chaos, she’d lost track of Lucius. It seemed he’d slipped into the shadows. When another dragon lunged for her, she slashed her blade through its chest, feeling the hot thrill of victory as her sword found its mark. This was what she was meant to do, her destiny. And yet she couldn’t keep her mind off Bael. What had the Drake meant when he’d said Bael had been dealt with? What the fuck did that mean?

  When the next dragon lunged for her, Ursula wasn’t quite ready, and the creature caught her in its jaws, violently jerking her into the air. The dragon’s mouth closed over her head, and it shook her from side to side. Her head slammed against the inside of the beast’s mouth like a bell clapper, her bones rattling within her.

  The armor protected her from the dragon’s teeth, but the movements rattled her body. For just a moment, the shaking stopped and its slimy tongue brushed over her, pulling and sucking her into its gullet. Gravity shifted and suddenly she was upside down in a narrow fleshy passage, in complete darkness, struggling to breathe.

  Panic set in as she clawed at the dragon’s esophageal lining, and she lost her grip on Excalibur. Instantly the magical armor surrounding her disappeared. Around her the dragon’s throat constricted, like the coils of a snake, squeezing the air from her lungs. She squirmed and wriggled, but the clenching motion of the monster’s muscles pushed her downward, toward its stomach. Swallowing hard, Ursula closed her eyes, her heart thundering against her ribs.

  Fear claimed her mind. She’d imagined how she might die any number of times. Since Emerazel had conscripted her into service it had become almost an obsession. Usually in these morbid fantasies she was locked in combat with a particularly lethal demon, and she’d missed a parry. The resulting sword thrust severed an artery. Given her profession, bleeding to death was the most logical outcome, and death by magic was a close second. Never in her most disturbing visions had she imagined dying of suffocation and stomach acid inside a dragon’s gut.

  Her body pushed through some sort of internal draconic sphincter, and she was able to move again—but this freedom came with a big splash of stomach acid. Ursula screamed, expelling the last of the air from her lungs. She thrashed in the beast’s gut as bile and acid burned her skin, her mind ripping apart with panic, lungs blazing with pain.

  She was hardly conscious when her fingers brushed Excalibur’s hilt, but she grabbed it reflexively. The sword seemed to draw the magic from her as if of its own accord, and it cast a glowing light over the folds of the creature’s stomach lining. What had the words on the side of the blade read? Take me up. Her fingers tightened around the leather grip.

  Golden light radiated up her arm as magical armor spread over her skin with a rush of power. Once the armor covered her face and head, she found that she could breathe again. As flames began to lick along the blade, the beast’s stomach muscles convulsed. She was thrown back and forth as she slowly brought her free hand to the sword’s grip. As soon as she did, the sword lengthened into a fiery pillar.

  Around her, stomach acid hissed and steamed, spraying over the visor of her armor. She was thrown around again as the fire charred the monster’s stomach lining. She pushed the blazing sword forward, burying it in the dragon’s entrails. Then she carved to the side with all her strength.

  With a hiss of burning flesh, the sword cut effortlessly through the dragon’s guts. Ursula continued to be tossed violently, but she kept the sword moving until, above her, light pierced through a gap in the lining.

  As the gap widened the spasms grew fainter. When the gap was big enough for her to fit through, she slowly climbed to her feet, her body glowing with magic armor.

  The dragon lay dead in a pool of blood and bile. She stepped from its steaming carcass onto the stone floor, her eyes focused right on Lucius. A mix of draconic stomach acid and blood hissed along Excalibur’s flaming blade as she leveled it at the Drake and the two remaining dragons who crouched behind him.

  She arched an eyebrow. “Which one of you fuckers is next?”

  “Impressive,” said the Drake. “No one but the Darkling could have survived that.”

  His eyes burned with cold fury, but with Excalibur’s magical armor surrounding her, they seemed to have lost their ability to command her. She needed to block out everything—everything now—but the Drake.

  She took another step closer. “Now tell me where my friend Bael is.”

  “No.”

  It was then that Ursula noticed Zee standing next to him, Lucius’s sword pressed to her throat.

  “You will put dow
n that infernal weapon.” His voice was pure ice, and his sword twitched. Zee yelped in pain.

  Zee stared at Ursula, her jaw clenched with determination, a few drops of blood stained the steel blade.

  Pure, molten fury burned in Ursula. She wanted more than anything to carve Lucius’s skin from his bones, but there was no way she’d be able to do that with Zee as his hostage.

  “Drop the sword,” said the Drake.

  Slowly, she lowered her blade, dropping it on the stone. Sorrow and regret threatened to crush her chest as she let go. Was this it? As soon as her fingers left the sword’s hilt, her magic armor vanished from her skin in wisps of pearly smoke.

  The Drake grinned, kicking away her sword. “That was far too easy. You should really take care not to let your emotional attachments get the better of you. You just lost a battle that you could have won, if only you hadn’t been hampered by human weakness.”

  He flicked his sword away from Zee, pointed it at Ursula.

  Ursula folded her arms. “Well. You have your Darkling. Let my friends go.”

  “I cannot do that.”

  Emerazel’s fire licked at her ribs. She might not have the sword, but she still had hellfire in her veins. Fire began to ignite her torso, blazing down her forearms.

  The Drake shook his head. “Oh, dear. Without Excalibur you cannot hurt us.” He nodded at one of his dragons, who crossed to her. The monster snatched her up in his hand, claws piercing her ribs. Hellfire erupted from her, but the dragon ignored it. The beast lifted her into the air, then turned and presented her to Lucius.

  The Drake stood only a few feet from her now. He’d dropped his own weapon. Now, he leveled Excalibur at her head. “This is a fine weapon. I can see what all the fuss is about.”