Grave Intentions (Darkling Mage Book 3)

by Nazri Noor

  I squinted at him. “You’re being awfully nice to me for some reason.”

  Sterling shrugged, wearing his most winning smile. His fangs glinted. “Hey. I’m a swell guy.” He cracked his knuckles. “Also, if anyone asks, it’s way less complicated if we just pretend you’re both my thralls.”

  He said that in one breath, and way too quickly, like he didn’t want me hearing. “Whoa, wait, what?”

  “Awesome,” Asher said. “I’m a thrall.”

  Kid’s sweet. I never said he was very smart.

  “Just shut up and follow my lead.”

  Sterling rolled his shoulders, his leather jacket squeaking as he did, and he smoothed back his hair. Suddenly he seemed taller, and maybe a bit stronger. Asher and I followed as Sterling led the way to a short flight of steps, down to a door that was hidden just below street level.

  “Password,” said a voice on the other side.

  “Your mom’s chest hair,” Sterling said. He pounded on the door with one fist, though not nearly strong enough to break it down the way I knew he could. This was his idea of being polite.

  “Sterling?” the voice said. “Is that you? Come on, you know the rules. I’ll get in trouble if you don’t say it.” The voice was trying its hardest to be authoritative, but mainly just came off sounding pitiful.

  Sterling rolled his eyes. “What feeds in darkness grows ever stronger,” he droned.

  “Awesome,” the voice said. The door cracked open, revealing an exceedingly tall and exceedingly pimply youth, dressed in what must have been his idea of vampiric attire. He was fair-skinned, but not quite pale enough to be one of the undead. “Thanks for playing,” he said, ushering us in.

  We stepped through and continued to a bare cement corridor, the ceiling lined with industrial piping, the walls lined with a whole lot of nothing. That distant music kept playing, though, and I imagined it coming from the secret underground sex dungeon-cum-dance club that I’d seen in, like, basically every movie about vampires, ever. I chuckled to myself.

  “So that guy,” Asher said. “I’m guessing he wasn’t a vampire.”

  “Rudy? Nah. Just a hanger-on. Keeps hoping he’ll get turned some day, but that’s up to the vampires in Diaz’s coven to decide.”

  I raised an eyebrow, walking faster to keep up with Sterling. “Whoa, whoa. A coven? Is that what you call a gang of vampires?”

  “We call ourselves what we like. A clan, a pack, a murder of vampires. Does it really matter? The distinction is that Diaz is a blood witch. It’s why he refers to his family as a coven.”

  “Family, huh?”

  Sterling stopped at what seemed like a random point in the hallway, turning to me with half a grin on his lips. “When everyone you know and everyone you love is dead and gone, you don’t have much of a choice. You pick and gather your allies, your friends. It’s both a perk and a curse, but when you’re undead – you get to choose your family.”

  “Am I part of your family?” Asher asked, all unabashed innocence. He took the words right out of my mouth.

  Sterling smiled, ruffling Asher’s hair. “If you want. Sure you are, little buddy.”

  Huh. So we were his family? The Boneyard. Carver, Gil, Mama Rosa, even me. Asher chuckled, running his hands through his hair in an attempt to fix it. Sterling turned towards the wall, then rapped his knuckles against the cement. It made a hollow knocking sound.

  “Ah. Some things don’t change.” He rested his hand against the wall, and it slid open.

  The room beyond was barer than I expected, like the inside of a warehouse, only underground. It looked like a bunker, or an industrial basement. Cement walls, cement floor, cement ceiling, but done up in luxuries that I could only describe as plush.

  Nirvana had thick rugs, comfy sofas, and even several tastefully placed potted plants. I admit, I was sorely wrong about the S&M dungeon I was expecting. The only real indication that vampires inhabited this place was the decorator’s overwhelming proclivity towards the color red.

  Well, that, and all the coffins. At least the ones that I could see. The absence of windows meant that the vamps living in Nirvana – or unliving, rather – didn’t really need closed caskets to sleep in, but I guess old habits die hard. I didn’t realize that Sterling’s preference for sleeping in an actual bed, you know, the kind meant for human beings, made him more modern and progressive than his brethren.

  All of whom were stunningly beautiful. You could tell they were human, once, if only in shape and name, but I was caught like a deer in headlights. Asher was similarly enthralled. Everything about these creatures was heightened, from the sharpness of their eyes and their cheekbones to the perfection of their bodies. Skin, whether black or brown or white, was supple, flawless, lustrous. Turns out that becoming one of the undead was better than any moisturizer.

  The vampires milled about, chatting, laughing. A couple were playing video games. One sat in a corner, reading. Among them were humans. Thralls, I assumed, but no one was chained, put on a leash, none of the stereotypes I would have expected from mortals who would serve as human cattle for their vampire companions. There was something, I don’t know, consensual about it all. I guess Sterling was right all along. I did have some prejudices about vampires.

  I spotted Connor, the big, bald vampire who’d attacked me in the alley, towards the back of the room, working on weights that no one should be capable of lifting. Salimah turned her head towards us as we entered, balancing a glass of something that could have been blood, or could have been a very rich wine in one hand. She nodded at us, then towards the center of the vast underground apartment.

  Sitting there like the still, unmoving eye of Nirvana’s storm was Diaz, a lean, swarthy young man in a loose tank top and fitted jeans. As he approached us, I noted that he was barefoot – vulnerable, yet comfortable in what I could still only perceive as a den of apex predators.

  “Sterling,” Diaz said, his smile warm and welcoming. “It’s been a while.”

  “Diaz. These are my – companions.” He gestured at us. “This is Dustin, and this is Asher.”

  Diaz’s smile went even wider, his eyes crinkling. “Ah. The shadow mage. And this one must be the necromancer. Younger than I expected.”

  “Can’t help it,” Asher said, shrugging and offering a smile of his own.

  Diaz chuckled. “Come. We have things to discuss.”

  He led us towards the back of the room, to a table close to where Connor was still bench pressing what must have been the equivalent weight of a loaded refrigerator. His eyes flitted nervously between me and Sterling. I smiled, but he only gave a grunt. Or maybe that was just from the strain of lifting. Who knows, really.

  Diaz gestured at the shrouded object spread out on the table. I skidded to a halt when I realized that it wasn’t just a bunch of stuff with a cloth thrown over it. There was a body underneath.

  I was aware that the room was still humming with activity, but there was a different quality to the bustle now. The vampires were going about their business more reservedly, as if they were straining to listen.

  “Now,” Diaz said, folding his hands. “Dustin, was it? I must apologize for my colleagues’ earlier behavior. My undead companions are very protective of me, you see. That sense of responsibility extends to my collection of curiosities, the Heartstopper among them.” He clapped me on the shoulder, squeezing with a firm touch. “Let me be the first to apologize for how crudely Connor treated you.”

  I heard one or two restrained snorts go around the room. The vampires were keeping tabs on us after all. Connor grunted even louder, and this time he set his weights down on the ground, as if to pay us his fullest attention. The earth moved the tiniest bit as his barbell clanged to the floor.

  “You know, don’t worry about it. No harm done. I gotta admit, I admire how you guys can interact so harmoniously.” I chuckled and nudged a thumb over at Sterling. “I can barely get along with this one. It’s a work in progress.”

  Sterli
ng hissed. I shrugged. Diaz chuckled.

  “I confess, my abilities play some part in that. The dynamic I maintain with my twelve undead companions is wonderfully symbiotic. They offer protection, strength, and – entertainment.”

  He turned his head so subtly when he spoke, as if to display the series of scars on his neck, around his clavicles, on his shoulders, little raised dots where fangs had punctured his skin. I tried not to swallow.

  “In return I offer magical support, the many gifts brought by my artifacts, and to an extent, wisdom.” He held his hand out to Sterling. “You said you had a sample for me to examine.”

  Sterling riffled through his pockets, then extracted one of the phials of blood that he had taken from the homunculus at the warehouse.

  “How the hell did you manage to keep that fresh?” I asked. “You have a fridge in your bedroom?” I blinked, then turned to Asher. “Dude, do you have a personal fridge, too? Am I the only one who – ”

  “Shut up,” Sterling said. “The phial’s special. It’s from Diaz.”

  “The vampires of Valero come to me with their needs.” Diaz took the phial, holding it up and examining it in the light, then letting it roll around in the palm of his hand. “These phials hold a very minor enchantment that helps preserve the organic matter contained within. The same enchantment that allows the Heartstopper to preserve dead flesh.”

  He uncorked the stopper, then tipped a couple of drops of blood directly onto his tongue. Around us, the vampires were transfixed, their eyes glued to the phial in the blood witch’s hand. Diaz smacked his lips once, twice, savoring the blood.

  “Sterling was right. This is horrible. Inorganic, and thin. Very much the same quality of blood as we found on this corpse.”

  Ah. So it was a corpse after all. I held my breath, even though I fully knew what to expect when Diaz threw the sheet off the body. Spread over the table was a perfect copy of Dustin Graves, pale in death, stark naked, with a teardrop-shaped ruby in the hollow of its chest. Sterling gave the corpse a once-over, then made a low whistle.

  “Not bad, Graves.”

  Asher murmured his assent.

  “Sterling. Stop perving over my dead body. And Asher, just – you two need to shut up.”

  “On the contrary,” Diaz said, “we’d very much like for Asher to use his communicative talents. This creature stole my Heartstopper, one of my own signature enchantments, then returned within a matter of days, doubtless with the intent to steal another one of my artifacts. But we were ready for him this time.”

  I didn’t ask how the homunculus died, but the puncture marks on its neck and chest should have been a clue.

  “I’m amazed you managed to preserve it this way,” I muttered, reaching out to press on the thing’s forearm. It was cold, and stiff to the touch. I tried not to think about how I would look very much the same if I was dead. This was how I must have looked the night Thea sacrificed me, splayed naked across an altar.

  “It’s the Heartstopper’s doing. The artificial quality of the homunculus’s blood was a clue that something was not quite right. Its form lacks a firmament, something fundamental to bind its body together.”

  Asher piped in. “You mean a soul?”

  “Exactly. Without it, Dustin’s clones can barely hold the threads of their sordid lives together. That they can exist at all suggests that there is a glimmer of something that keeps them alive. Asher. I’d like for you to commune with this creature’s spirit – or whatever vestiges that could be considered its spirit.”

  “Oh, wow. Yeah. I could certainly try.”

  “And then maybe it can show us where to find the others,” I said. “Stem the tide at its source.” Find Thea, and kill her.

  “Yes,” Diaz said. “Precisely what I had in mind.”

  He stepped aside, beckoning Asher to approach. Sterling nudged him encouragingly, pushing between his shoulder blades. Asher took his place at the end of the table just above the homunculus’s head. He laid a hand on each of the corpse’s temples, then shut his eyes. Everyone in the room – mortal or vampire – fell into complete silence.

  It didn’t take long for his talent to manifest itself. Through his lessons with Carver, Asher had further refined his ability to communicate with the dead. It was part of his portfolio, after all, this historically sought-after talent to exert power over death itself. That rarest of gifts made Asher a valuable asset to the Boneyard, and someone I was glad to have on my side.

  Green tendrils of energy curled like snakes from Asher’s elbows down to the creature’s head, wrapping and writhing until they slithered into every exposed orifice. I fought the bile rising in my throat as filaments of emerald power wriggled their way into the corpse’s eye sockets, its nostrils, its ears. I watched, waiting for the thing to speak through Asher, or perhaps for Asher to hear its voice in his head and convey its message to us.

  I didn’t expect for Other-Dustin’s dead eyes to flicker open and stare directly at me, for it to speak in my own voice.

  Chapter 25

  The homunculus smiled at me. There was none of the characteristic malice I’d come to expect from its breed, just an odd expression I could only describe as serenity. I’d go as far as to say familiarity.

  “Brother,” it whispered.

  My blood froze. This thing wasn’t my brother, not by any means, whether natural or paranormal. When the creature said it again, I wondered why my heart twinged with an emotion I couldn’t name.

  “We need answers,” Diaz said, with all the gentleness of a doting parent.

  Something in his demeanor went even looser, and as calming as his presence was before, it made him radiate even more of his unusual charisma, perhaps the same kind of magnetism that allowed him to pacify and even befriend an entire brood of the bloodthirsty undead.

  The homunculus brought its black eyes to gaze at Diaz with something approaching fondness. It blinked slowly, and nodded. Asher kept his hands on the creature’s temples, maintaining a steady flow of necromantic force to keep the channel open.

  Diaz’s voice was whisper-soft. “How many of you are there?”

  “Many,” my voice answered. “Very many.”

  Somehow, that felt more chilling than any concrete number the creature could have given us.

  “I don’t think it’s lying,” I said quietly. “They have very basic intelligence. They can only really parrot information. But many could mean anything.”

  “Many could mean anything,” the homunculus echoed, smiling at me with my own lips, the wrinkle beside its left eye crinkling the way it would on my own face.

  “Your brothers,” Diaz continued. “Are they like you? Are they stronger, or do they hold the same power?”

  “Same,” it said lazily, blinking again, its eyes caught in an odd kind of distant reverie. “All the same. All brothers.”

  “Then we know that they have the same level of strength. The same talents.” Sterling gave a slow, relieved sigh. “At least we know they aren’t all like you, Dust. Imagine an army of these things that could use shadow and fire.”

  Dread twisted in my stomach, as if anything about this doppelganger situation could possibly be any worse. For a fleeting moment I saw copies of myself roaming Valero, flinging fire and conjuring blades of night to slaughter and kill.

  “Yeah,” I said evenly. “Good thing.”

  “Guys,” Asher said, sweat glazing his forehead. “I can’t hold the connection much longer. Its life essence is slipping. Last questions, now.”

  “Very well.” Diaz stepped closer to the table, bending to look into the homunculus’s eyes. “Where are your brothers?”

  “A field. With grass. And stones. Big, flat stones, and bones below. Buried bones.”

  “A graveyard,” Sterling said. “It’s describing a graveyard.”

  “Latham’s Cross?” I folded my arms, staring at the ground as if it could give me the answers I needed. “That’s the biggest graveyard in Valero. Their base couldn’t be th
at far out of the city, or the attacks wouldn’t have come so frequently.”

  “Sounds about right,” Sterling said.

  “Guys,” Asher grunted. “Last question. The body’ll break down any moment.”

  He got that right. The homunculus began to twitch, its face twisting with what first looked like discomfort, then pain. Diaz placed his hand on its forehead. For a moment, the homunculus stilled and settled.

  “Dying?” the creature said, in a plaintive voice that wrenched at my chest. Why was I feeling for this creature? All we shared was our blood. I owed it nothing, not even sympathy.

  “I’m sorry.” Diaz nodded, his eyes lowered, his mouth drawn. “Before you go. Who made you?”

  “White Mother,” it answered, its eyes glazed with a mix of fright and reverence. “White Mother tells us where to go. What to take.” It blinked again, its eyes flitting about the room, the ceiling, as if searching for something. “White Mother sends us again and again. She sends so many brothers tonight.”

  Many brothers? Tonight?

  “Where are they now?” Diaz asked, his voice so soft that I nearly missed how it was trembling.

  The homunculus writhed and twitched on the table, as if wracked by some hideous agony. It was in the throes of death. Its head slammed against the table as its neck bent back. Then, like a rubber band released, the tension left the thing’s body, and it collapsed against the table again, soft, loose, languid. It smiled, then it whispered.

  “They’re here.”

  Diaz stepped back, his face a mask of shock, and Asher yelled as he tore his hands away, the necromantic energy receding into his fingers. The homunculus screamed as its body dissolved into goo, its skin and meat and bones sloughing and dripping to the ground. I watched as the Heartstopper rolled off the table and clattered into a puddle of gore.

  Then the door burst open. Heads spun as we turned to face our attackers. My heart pounded like war drums, and the tension caught in my throat.

  First five, then ten, then at least two dozen men who looked just like me poured into the room, each wearing the same gleeful leer, each mouth locked in an expression of demonic ferocity. They tore through Nirvana, savaging the human thralls, breaking bones and faces with makeshift clubs, planks of wood, lengths of pipe. The homunculi fought with inhuman brutality, and with terrifying precision, expertly singling out every mortal in the room, prioritizing their injuries and deaths.