by John Corwin
I grinned. "You're got it!"
"I'll go tell my father," Elyssa said. "I think he'll be too busy to join us, but you never know."
"Meet us at the ship?" I said.
She pecked me on the lips. "See you soon, pizza boy."
I headed toward the Falcheen where it was parked near the entrance to the Northern Pass and undergoing more repairs after our last battle. Alysea hooked her arm in mine. "It's good to see you again son."
Her voice broke a little, and I knew why. "Thinking of Ivy again?"
"Always." She took a deep breath. "But this is a happy reunion, so let's not drag it down with talk of things we can't control."
"Tell me more about Atlantis," David said in the voice of an excited boy. "Do they have lasers and flying cars?"
I snorted. "They have a few futuristic weapons." I told them about Elyssa's light bow and the armor they'd worn for the fight against Kaelissa. "Otherwise, the best thing about Atlantis is that it's beyond Kohval's reach."
David clapped me on the shoulder. "And it has the ingredients for making pizza."
"And hamburgers."
"I'd just like a nice salad," Alysea said. "I used to love glurk when I was a child, but living in Eden corrupted me."
As we walked up a rise toward the ship, I stopped and looked back over the valley. People scurried about like ants. Flying carpets and brooms whizzed back and forth, and lights began flickering on in the civilian sector as Tarissan refugees settled into their temporary homes.
"I can't believe we're going to have to pick up and move again," I said. "Thomas said Kohval will probably march north to get rid of us once and for all."
"What's this I heard about Kohval being an impostor?" David asked.
I grunted. "Did you meet Issana?"
"Nightliss's fake daughter?" David nodded. "Yep, but only briefly." He grimaced. "She's a strange one."
I bit my lower lip and shook my head. "Dad, we think Aerianas is behind this."
The smile on his face died in a heartbeat. "You're kidding me, right?"
"No." I told them what the real Kohval had told us before he died, and explained more about the demon golems.
David's jaw hung open. "That's insidious!"
"It's awful," Alysea agreed. "How in the world are these demon bodies not disintegrating?"
"They have souls in them." David let out a low whistle. "Victus is a damned genius." He flinched as if just realizing what he'd said. "I mean, he's sick in the head, but still—I never would have thought up something like this."
"Aerianas can apparently only make near-identical golems in some cases," I said. "Otherwise, we'd really be in trouble."
"They don't even smell demonic." David's brow furrowed. "We need to come up with a way to detect them. Make sure we haven't been infiltrated."
"The odor of brimstone is usually the only giveaway," Alysea said. "If Daemos can't sniff them out, then no other person can."
David snapped his fingers. "You're right!" He pecked a kiss on her lips. "What would I ever do without you?"
Alysea frowned. "Did I miss something?"
David's grin returned with a vengeance. "Hellhounds." He looked back and forth between the two of us. "They can sniff a demon fart from a hundred yards."
"Wonderful analogy, David." Alysea gave me a hopeless look. "I'm glad you didn't inherit your father's scatological sense of humor."
I looked at David. "Demon farts." Then we both burst into laughter.
Alysea let out a sigh of the long suffering. "Over two thousand years old and still makes poop jokes."
"Hey, poop and fart jokes are eternally funny," David said. "If you can't laugh about bodily functions, you might as well hang it up."
"I'll keep that in mind." Alysea folded her arms over her chest. "So, we'll talk to Kassallandra and the others about sniffing out the army with hellhounds tomorrow?"
David stifled a laugh and nodded. "Yeah. We have a lot of people to go through."
"That's a lot of farts to sniff," I said with barely restrained mirth, and then the two of us burst into howls of laughter.
Alysea slapped David on the shoulder. "I'm going to fart on both of you if you don't take this situation seriously."
That only made us laugh harder. Alysea bit her lower lip, but couldn't hold back a laugh of her own.
I took a deep breath and tried to sober my attitude. "Mom's right. Demon farts are all fun and games until we have a demon golem army marching up our collective asses."
David followed my example and put a hand on my shoulder. "True."
"Provided we clean our forces of impostors, what then?" Alysea said. "We certainly don't have an army capable of withstanding two Darkling legions."
"Maybe we could replace Kohval with an impostor of our own," David said. "Take control from the top."
I shook my head. "We don't have any of his soul to make it with. Even if we did, making an identical clone seems difficult."
"We also have the impostors in Meera's army to deal with," Alysea said. "If we took control of one legion, that might cause the other one to attack it."
David frowned and put a hand under his chin. "In other words, we'd have to make two clones and take over both armies at once."
"Impossible," Alysea said. "Kohval and Meera are certainly on high alert and surrounded by their armies. You'd have a better chance of—oh, I don't know"—she gestured north—"going to Zbura and kidnapping Kaelissa."
David went still for an instant then turned toward me. I did the same exact thing as an insanely stupid plan flashed into my mind.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" David asked me.
Alysea put herself between us. "No."
I nodded. "There's only one army in Seraphina big enough to take down Kohval."
"The Brightling army," David said.
"You'll never get her," Alysea said. "She's probably sitting in her crystal palace planning revenge on Justin."
I paced back and forth, letting my thought process mow through the weeds of doubt springing up in my mind. "What if we simply lured Kaelissa here and let her take on the legions?"
"Bad idea," David said. "She'd take over Pjurna and that's game over. We probably wouldn't live long enough to swap her out with a copy."
"In other words, we have to catch her while her guard is down." I stared at the Northern Pass where the crystallized aether from the malaether bombs filled the bottom. "If we're lucky, she's still in Zbura licking her wounds after the Battle of Atlantis."
An amused grin spread across David's face. "Is that what they're calling it now?"
"They will, once I tell everyone the cool official name I came up with."
Alysea grabbed David by the front of his shirt and gripped my arm with her other hand. "Let's get one thing straight," she said in a deadly serious voice, "you are not going to Zbura in some insane quest to replace Kaelissa with a clone so you can take over her armies."
"We'd need you too," David said. "You know how to help us blend into Brightling society."
She slashed a hand through the air. "None of us are going, David." Alysea looked at me. "Justin, forget this idea."
I pulled free of her grasp. "What are we supposed to do? Run off to Atlantis and hide until we luck out and find a way back to Eden?" I shook my head. "If we sit around with our thumbs up our asses, then Kohval will close off the pass and rule Pjurna, or Kaelissa will barge in and kill everyone."
"Not necessarily true," David said. "We overlooked the most important person in this equation."
"Kohval?" I said. "Meera?" I shrugged. "Who else could there be?"
"Victus is in Eden, so I assume his surrogates here control the demon golems." David motioned toward the foundry. "I'd be willing to bet that Victus replaced Kohval first then left Aerianas in charge and went back to Eden. It probably took her months to kidnap Meera's top lieutenants, but once she did, she marched on Tarissa and united her forces."
His reasoning hit me like a ton of bric
ks. "I never even thought of it that way."
Judging from the horrified expression spreading across Alysea's face, she was coming to the same realization. "Blocking the pass was just a delaying tactic," Alysea said. With her new legions united, Aerianas will probably set her sights on the Brightling Empire."
I filled in the final blank. "Unless we do something, Seraphina will have a demon spawn queen."
Chapter 16
"Queen Aerianas." David spit on the ground. "For all we know, Aerianas already has imposters in Kaelissa's court." He blew out a breath and rubbed his stomach. "Man, all this thinking makes me hungry." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder toward the Falcheen. "Let's go make those pizzas."
By the time we reached the hold of the Falcheen and started looking through the ingredients, Elyssa showed up with her entire family in tow.
Her mother, Leia, greeted me with a hug. "I'm relieved to have you both back safe and sound."
Elyssa's sister, Phoebe, formerly long-lost and brainwashed by Daelissa, also gave me a warm hug. She resembled Elyssa so closely that the two might have been twins. "I hear Elyssa kept you mostly out of trouble."
I chuckled. "Just barely." I hadn't really gotten to know Phoebe all that much and wasn't sure where to take the conversation next. Michael stepped up next to her and saved the day, engulfing my hand with his and gripping it hard enough to remind me that he could kick my ass any time he wanted.
I pretended not to notice. "Hey, Michael, good to see you."
Michael and I had a complicated history, but it was long past being awkward. He'd made a deal with Underborn to protect me despite wanting to kill me for dating his little sister. Fighting side-by-side in the Seraphim war had changed that dislike to respect, though it hadn't turned him into a loveable fuzz-ball. He only seemed truly at ease around Elyssa.
"Alysea, David, I need some help grinding the wheat," Elyssa said. "Phoebe, can you help peel vegetables?"
"Well, duty calls," Phoebe said, and turned to go help her little sister, leaving Michael behind.
I nodded toward Thomas. "I'm surprised he actually came. He's not usually one to take time off when there's a war that needs planning."
Michael shrugged. "Everyone needs a break." He let go of my hand and looked at the array of ingredients on the table. "Even the Templar commander."
"Doesn't seem like that long ago we were celebrating the end of the Seraphim War with pizza." I sighed. "Never seems to end, does it?"
"Almost enough to make me think there's something driving this chaos, but we don't have enough information to see it." Michael ran a hand through his close-cropped hair. "Elyssa ended up undercover at your high school because of a new vampire drug. That drug led us to Maximus who was building a vampire army for Daelissa. That helped us uncover another conspiracy and another."
"You think this is a similar pattern?" I asked.
"On a larger scale, perhaps." Michael looked at his sister while she showed Thomas how to cut the tomatoes for the sauce. "For example, is Victus working alone, or with someone? How did Cephus and Victus originally connect so they could stab us in the back, cripple our army, and strand us here?"
I'd made a few efforts to connect those dots, but hadn't exactly broken out the push pins and yarn. "Those are excellent questions. Any theories?"
"That Apocryphan who got loose during the war is one theory." Michael gave me a sideways look. "I have to wonder if any of them were able to somehow communicate with others in the outside world."
"Kind of like kingpins running their business empires from prison?" I said.
"Exactly." He shrugged. "Then again, Daelissa was probably acting on her own and everything that's happened since then has simply been a symptom of the war."
"I've seen enough conspiracy movies to know that it doesn't take an Apocryphan to pull the strings," I told him. "Victus wants to rule Eden. Cephus wanted to rule Seraphina. Someone who knew their true goals had to introduce them shortly after the Grand Nexus was repaired and travel between the realms was restored. That's the mystery."
"Agreed," he said in a grim tone.
"Yo, bro," Elyssa called. "I need you to knead the dough."
A faint smile curved the edges of his mouth. "Duty calls."
"Aye, yai, yai!" Bella stood in the doorway, eyes lit with excitement. She rushed over and kissed my cheeks before backing away to look me up and down with brilliant violet eyes. "Justin, did you grow another inch?"
"Maybe in the stomach," Shelton said with a grin.
"God, it feels like forever since I've seen you." I gave Bella a big hug and backed away. "I could swear you've gotten taller since the last time I saw you."
Bella giggled. "Oh, I wish." Her Spanish accent sounded even more exotic when paired with the Cyrinthian language. "I get such a neck ache looking up at all you tall people."
Elyssa jumped into our small circle and the two women cried out and cooed like two sorority sisters who hadn't seen each other in a decade. "Bella, I'm so happy to see you again!"
"I am just happy you're all safe and sound," Bella said. She kissed Elyssa on each cheek. "Que linda. You are looking beautiful as ever."
I preened my hair. "Yes, well that's because I moisturize daily."
Bella slapped my arm. "Oh, Justin, you're not looking too bad either."
Elyssa hooked her arm in Bella's. "Shelton brought back a lot of fruit and wine. Do you think you could make us your award-winning sangria?"
"You mean real fruit and wine?" Bella's violet eyes lit up with excitement. She turned on Shelton. "Harry, why didn't you tell me you had this?"
Shelton frowned at Elyssa. "I was gonna spring that surprise in a few minutes."
Elyssa smiled sheepishly. "I'm sorry, Shelton. You should have told me."
"Meh." He waved it off. "She looks plenty surprised to me."
"Aw, baby." Bella stood on tiptoes and kissed his nose. "You're so sweet, papacito."
Shelton's face turned bright red, but he kissed her back on the nose. "Anything for you, mami."
I felt my mouth dropping open in conjunction with a huge grin. "Shelton, I knew you had a sweet side buried in there somewhere."
Elyssa burst into laughter. "He's been suppressing it so long, I guess he can't help himself."
Shelton bared his teeth and growled. "Hey, I'm a sensitive guy, okay?" He took Bella's hand. "Come on, babe. Let's go make some sangria."
The next person through the door made my heart skip a beat. Tall, square-jawed, a silver mane of hair hanging to his shoulders, Cinder looked every bit like his creator, Fjoeruss, and maybe even a little bit more badass. Then he had to ruin it with one of those frightful leers he called a smile.
"Justin, it is a pleasure to see you again." Cinder crooked an arm around my shoulder and another around my back in a hug so awkward, I didn't even know what he was doing at first.
"Great to see you too," I said, backing away as quickly as possible without tripping.
"Cinder!" Shelton clapped the golem on the back. "How's the hammer hanging?"
Cinder stared at him unblinking. "I have not used a hammer recently, Harry." He turned to me. "I studied the foundry, Justin. Though it represents exciting potential for advances in golem making, I am not certain consorting with demons is safe."
"Did you learn anything?" I said.
"I determined how they infused the soul and spark, and found some gems with records of their early experiments," Cinder replied. "I have not had time to review them all." He chomped down on his lower lip and cradled his chin with a hand in a ridiculous attempt to look thoughtful. "Issana was disturbed to discover her origin as a demon construct."
I felt a pang of sympathy in my chest. "I can imagine. Why did you tell her?"
"It is only right that she knows." He dropped his hands to his sides. "She went into the foundry with me, but if she was created there, she remembers nothing about it."
"She told me she was working for Cephus, not Kohval." I sorted through the jumb
led puzzle pieces in my head. "It's possible Cephus had his own foundry in Tarissa."
"Our theory is that Cephus was Victus's original partner," Cinder said. "Victus probably needed Aerianas's expertise with demons to make the foundry work. Without Cephus and Victus to guide her, she has, as they say, gone off script and is now doing her own thing."
"That'd be my guess," Shelton said. He looked around. "Where's Issana now?"
"She came onboard, but did not feel comfortable coming to see you all." Cinder looked genuinely downcast. "Issana feels like an imposter."
Shelton pressed his lips together. "Yeah, well, she can't help what she is."
Cinder nodded sadly. "It is not how we were created that matters, but what we do with our lives. I have not been successful imparting that wisdom to her."
"Dude, that's deep." I squeezed his shoulder and decided to change the subject. "By the way, how did your hair get so long?"
"Ah, yes." Cinder stroked his lustrous mane. "I experimented with artificial hair growth."
Shelton snorted. "Oh, brother. You growing pubes now, too?"
"I have not attempted hair growth on my nether regions," Cinder said. "Do you think pubic hair is a worthy endeavor?"
Everyone burst into laughter.
Adam and Meghan showed up when the pizzas were cooking in the magic-powered brick ovens he and Shelton had constructed during our time in Atlantis. Meghan wore her blond hair in a tight bun, indicative of her reserved demeanor. She gave Elyssa a quick hug and turned to me.
"Hello, Justin." Meghan held out her hand for a handshake. "I'm glad to see everyone is back safely."
"Meghan!" I gripped her in a hug and felt her reluctantly pat me on the back as I held on for an awkwardly long time. I winked over her shoulder at Adam, who barely repressed laughter. "It's so good to see you."
She sighed. "Okay, Justin, I'm uncomfortable now. Will you let me go?"
I released her and backed away. "You're no fun."
Meghan brushed at the hem of her gray skirt. "I suppose I'm too introverted to be your sort of fun."
"Believe it or not, I used to be an introverted little nerd," I said with a smile.
