Dream Magic

by Michelle Mankin

  “Thyme,” I returned. My heavy boots sank into the soft soil as I hurried toward her. Unable to disguise my relief at finding her unharmed, I opened my arms wide for her to walk into and immediately wrapped her inside them.

  Tight.

  Wings, too.

  She’s uninjured, I told myself. You made it in time. Relax. I exhaled an uneven breath.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked sensing my anxiety from within our temporary cocoon. “You’re shaking, and your heart’s beating a mile a minute.”

  I eased back swiping the coating of mud from her cheeks with my thumbs as I studied her. “There’s more mud on you than on the river bank,” I decided, evading her question. “Have you ridden an ATV before?”

  “No. I was a little afraid at first, but not anymore. It’s fun.” Her violet eyes sparkled reflecting the full moon’s light as she grinned. “Billy and I are planning to race after dinner. There are three ATVs. Want to join us?”

  “I’d like nothing more.” I wanted to allow her this day, these memories from the party that Billy had worked so hard to arrange. Everyone she loved was in attendance, a fact that I knew made her happier than anything else. I lowered my wings. My gaze met my brother’s over Thyme’s shoulders. He saw the concern in them I couldn’t hide. His hands tightening on the handlebars, he sat up straight my tension transferring to him.

  “What’s happened?” he asked hopping off the vehicle and moving closer.

  “It can wait a single moment.” I gently turned Thyme around to face him. “Pose your question first.” I gave him a meaningful look.

  “What’s this about?” Thyme swiveled to glance up at me. I set my jaw and shook my head. She turned back to Billy gasping when he dropped to one knee. “What are you doing?” Her astonished hands flew to her cheeks.

  “Thyme Avens Bellerose.” He flashed a white smile from within his mud spattered face. “I love you. I want an eternity with you. Will you…”

  He didn’t get to finish the proposal because the ground suddenly exploded beneath their feet. Thyme screamed. Billy went flying backward in one direction, she in the other. Dirt and debris rained over us. I lunged for Thyme as Billy scrambled to regain his footing and reached for her too. But both of us ended up with only handfuls of empty air. The primordial beat us to her. The creature though humanoid in shape appeared to be comprised completely of earth from which it had emerged. Locked in its embrace, Thyme’s lids closed. Her head lulled back against its shoulder. The creature only had black holes for eyes, but they seemed to flash with triumphant glee as it leapt into the air and dove with Thyme in its arms back into the ground.

  “No!” Billy shouted diving after them. His body jarred to a stop when it came into contact with the broken earth the primordial had left behind. The elemental had disappeared beneath the surface as smoothly as if the ground had been made of liquid. Without speaking, Billy and I started digging at the spot where we had last seen them. My heart beat so fast that my pulse drowned out the frantic sounds of our combined efforts. I tore into the ground with my talons carving a six-foot hole into the earth within minutes but there was no trace of her or the primordial to be found.

  Dirt encrusted from my fists to my thighs, I sank back on my haunches trying to calm my chaotic thoughts so I could decide on a new course of action. Billy continued to claw at the mud with his bare hands. The look of terror on Thyme’s face when the creature had grabbed her threatened to abolish every coherent thought.

  Would the primordial’s embrace allow her to pass through solid earth unscathed?

  Apollyon wants her alive, I reminded myself. Panicking will not help Thyme.

  “Cease digging,” I told Billy. “It’s futile.” I was out of breath. The exertion combined with lingering fear made it difficult to slow my heartrate. “No doubt they are miles from our present location.”

  Speaking quickly, I relayed to Billy all that Shane had told me earlier, including a brief explanation about the primordial that made his eyes grow wider. When I was finished only raw fear remained on Billy’s face. I probably looked much the same though I also had regret roiling in my gut like a toxic stew. I shouldn’t have delayed telling him about the threat. I should have spirited her away the moment I’d had her. I should...

  “Billy!” I grabbed him by the shoulders gripping him tightly. “Your harmonica,” I reminded him. “Use your harmonica. Call the dead to our aid.”

  “Shit! Your right. Dammit to hell.” His hand was so thick with mud that he had to wipe it repeatedly on the leg of his jeans before he could get his fingers around the instrument. Withdrawing it from his pocket, he brought it directly to his lips. The tune he played was urgent and unfamiliar, but it served its purpose.

  Spirits materialized out of the ground all around us, rising like steam from a boiling pan. Twenty at least perhaps more. Their ghostly grey forms flickered the way Thyme’s once had like a monochromatic hologram. Those whose deaths had been violent still wore the disturbing stigmata of their demise.

  Expression hard, Billy spoke to them out loud instead of telepathically as he sometimes did. “Find Thyme,” he ordered, his voice rough. “Bring her back to me. Now.”

  They winked out obeying his command instantly. The ground. Objects. Walls. Those things were no deterrent to a shade. “They’ll speak to me in my mind if they find her,” Billy informed me. “But I’m not going to stand around here and do nothing. Take me to the Underground, Morpheus. To Apollyon’s castle. Maybe we can intercept that thing before it reaches him. We can’t let the Destroyer have her.”

  “We will recover her,” I declared after I landed and set Blade down in front of the drawbridge that led to Apollyon’s castle. Shrieks from the other side rent the air making my feathers stand on end.

  He responded with a tight nod, his expression somber. “Morpheus.” He swallowed. “I can’t feel her anymore.”

  “Perhaps it is only because the creature has sedated her.” Still, a trickle of unease slithered down my spine. “The shades say she was brought here. Surely when she awakens you will sense her again.”

  He shook his head. “When she falls asleep at home, I watch her.” His tone was bleak. “Grateful for my good fortune, you know. But even when she sleeps I can feel her spirit in here.” He thumped his chest. “But since we entered the Main Concourse, there’s been nothing.” His gaze misted. “I can’t lose her, Morpheus. Not again. I can’t.”

  “You won’t,” I insisted. We won’t, I thought. My muscles were knotted with tension. I couldn’t give into despair. I had to maintain my composure for all our sakes. “You are Fated, Billy. Think, brother. Would you still live if she did not?” That was how the magic worked with Fated couples. “She is within that castle and she is alive.” I refused to consider any other possibility. “And we’re going in to bring her out.”

  He nodded, and we started over the moat together, the old warped wood of the bridge creaking beneath our combined weight.

  “Morpheus!” Shane hissed, stepping out from the shadows behind the gated portico. Animosity like a flash fire flared between my two brothers as they took measure of one another for the first time. “I warned you,” Shane accused through gritted teeth before turning his wrath on Billy. His moss green eyes glowed. “And you,” he growled shoving Billy backward. “She was in your care. You should have protected her.”

  Billy’s face hardened. He knocked Shane’s hands away. They were nearly the same height with matching fuses that circumstances had ignited. Billy leaned in. “You’re one to talk, asshole.” His eyes flared a bright burning blue. “Your so called protection got her killed.” His voice was low and more raspy than usual. “She loved you. She died just for a chance to be with you. And you abandoned her. How many times over a decade did you walk by her as she waited on that bench by the ferryman’s dock? Yet you never let her know you were alive! Never gave her a chance to move on. Did it stroke your ego watching her pine for you all those years? And why the hell are you here tod
ay anyway? Huh?” He lifted his chin confrontationally. “Don’t you think you’re a little late coming to her rescue? The way I see it you don’t give a shit about anybody but yourself. She doesn’t need you now, neither do I…” Billy trailed off, his head snapping toward the castle as a particularly grating scream split the air.

  I took advantage of his distraction, positioning myself between the two of them. “Whoa,” I cautioned as they glared at each other. “We share a common cause.”

  A muscle ticked in Billy’s tightened jaw. I didn’t think my words were registering. He wanted someone to pay for Thyme’s predicament and Shane was a convenient foil. “Accusations do Thyme no good,” I told him. “We must work together. Three united have a better chance than two.”

  Anger slowly draining from his drawn features, Shane took a step back, conceding first. “You’re right, Morpheus.” He nodded curtly at me once. “She’s in there.” His voice was gruff. What he had seen had obviously shaken him. He pointed with his head toward the castle. “They took her inside only a few moments ago.”

  Billy exhaled shakily as reason rose again in him.

  “The primordial had her,” Shane continued. “Her eyes were shut. She was covered in dirt. She wasn’t moving at all.” He shook his head as if wanting to dispel the image from his mind. “The creature crossed the drawbridge sniffing her like she was some tasty snack. I confronted it, but it was stronger than it looked…When I got to my feet someone had lowered the gate.” He grabbed a fistful of hair. I noticed the long jagged angry red gashes along his arm, the additional rips in his clothing. The primordial must have had some serious claws. “I warned you not to delay, Morpheus.” My older brother’s eyes were swimming with frustration. His accusing words hit their mark like flaming arrows in my chest. He shifted his narrowed gaze to Billy. “Why didn’t you hide her away? Was getting that ring on her finger so important that it took priority over her safety? Pretty selfish of you, if you ask me. You worried that if you gave her a chance to breathe she might stop to reconsider? After all, you’ve certainly got a reputation with the ladies. And she might begin to wonder if you would take better care of her than you did your first wife.”

  “You don’t know anything, Lamar. I’ve kept no secrets from Thyme. I’ve been honest with her from the beginning…Unlike you.”

  Shane flinched.

  At another time Billy might have taken pleasure in getting the upper hand on his rival, but not now. His expression grim he returned his focus to the castle. “Thyme will only be safe,” he pronounced like a vow, “when Apollyon is dead. And that’s what is going to happen right the fuck now.” His eyes were as firm as his resolve. He withdrew his harmonica. “Now my only question for you two is are you with me or not? ‘Cause if you’re not you’d better get the hell out of my way.”

  “Of course I am with you, brother,” I said.

  “Count me in as well.” There was residual anger in Shane’s tone but he had harnessed it for the moment. “For Thyme’s sake.”

  Nodding once to acknowledge both of us, Billy withdrew his harmonica and waved it over his head. “Apollyon!” he shouted. “You sorry-ass bastard. You want this, I’ll let you have it. But you’ll have to open the gate first, motherfucker.”

  The shrieking immediately stopped. A prolonged moment of dead silence followed, and then a loud clang as the gate started to move. We ducked under it as soon as it was lifted high enough. Three determined brothers united by a common purpose striding side by side shoulder to shoulder. I wanted to take comfort in their presence on either side of me. I wanted to believe the three of us being together like this was the way it should have always been. The way it might be from then on. I wanted to think seeing us like this would have made our parents proud. But I knew in my gut that it was only temporary.

  On the other side of the portico, a saggy eyed gargoyle intercepted us. I scented Thyme on him. So did my brothers. My talons extended. Shane growled. Billy’s fingers curled into fists.

  “Bast,” I intoned. I was familiar with all of Apollyon’s minions. “If you have harmed even a single hair on Thyme’s head I will reduce you to rubble with my fists.”

  “Not one hair on the muse has been harmed, though you are in no position to make threats, Morpheus. You are in the Master’s abode. You have no authority here.”

  I reached out to grab him by his thick neck. My obsidian tipped claws were perfectly capable of doing some serious damage even to a gargoyle’s stone hide. But Billy stayed me with a cautionary hand on my arm. “Save it for the demon, brother,” he warned.

  He was right.

  I nodded, though I noted the reversal of our usual roles. But then again I knew that he would do what he must do. Thyme belonged to him, beyond the Fated magic that had linked them. I knew Blade well enough to understand that he would stop at nothing to save her. I knew that I would shed the last drop of my immortal blood on her behalf it need be. I had no doubt that Shane felt the same way.

  “Come along then. The Master waits.” Bast lumbered ahead. As a group we followed him toward the castle. The ground was grey and cracked like a dried up lake bed. A wide set of stone steps led up to the entrance. The facade of Apollyon’s lair hadn’t changed in all the years I had been in the underground. Built into a towering rock face, the castle itself was twelve stories tall with arched windows and scythe topped spires. I did note one one disturbing difference. Today two severed heads sat atop spikes on either side of the door.

  Shane pulled up short. I turned to look at him. He seemed to recognize the demon with the gaping jaw on the left. He paled beneath his tan.

  “Who is it?” I asked him.

  “Someone who convinced me he could do the impossible,” he mumbled shaking his head sadly. “Someone as delusional as I was apparently.”

  “No time to admire the decor.” Bast waved an impatient marble hand over his shoulder and disappeared inside. Once again, we followed each absorbed in our own troubled musings. Our shoes scuffed up dust from the floor as we hurried through several winding stone corridors. It had been a long while since Apollyon had entertained visitors, willing ones at least. Prisoners I knew were taken in by a different route.

  Sconces on the walls held flickering torches that made our shadows seem abnormally long, and the horrific shrieks we had heard outside became louder the deeper we journeyed into the Father of Lies’ lair. My feathers bristled.

  Surely, none of those tortured voices belonged to Thyme.

  Bast suddenly came to a stop in front of a set of tall ebony doors. He rapped on the entrance to Apollyon’s throne room with one of the iron knockers, then pushed the door to admit us.

  A blast of humid heat like a sauna washed over me as soon as I stepped into the large chamber. But it was the faint scent of lemon and not the sudden rise in temperature that set my instincts on high alert. I scanned right to left, searching for her. On either side of the long room shadows darker than those in the corridor seemed to slide in and out between the limestone columns as if of their own volition. When I tried to hold them in focus, they slipped away as if they didn’t wish to be seen. Vaporous gases hissed at irregular intervals through cracks in the opaque floors. Thyme was nowhere to be found.

  “Thyme!” Billy shouted his voice echoing off the walls. “Where are you?”

  “Bebe,” Shane called searching along the outer edges of the room. “Make a noise so we can find you.”

  There was no reply except for the sound of a pair of hooves clopping against the floor. The Prince of Darkness appeared on the terraced hill of travertine at the far end of the room. Garbed in his usual below ground attire, a pair of tailored leather trousers, he oozed confidence, accompanied by a woman in a floor length crimson robe embroidered with the runes of a spell caster. She stopped beside his obsidian throne resting her slim hand on the armrest while he continued moving toward us.

  “Well, well, well. I can’t say that this visit is unanticipated.” His obsidian staff clanged against one sto
ne step after another as he descended them. “Only I must say I wasn’t expecting all three of you at the same time. But then it seems that the muse inspires us all in her way.” A pair of hot thermal jets shot up into the air from the floor in front of him, but quieted at a wave of his hand.

  “Where is she, you sorry son of a bitch?” The demand spewing venomously through his gritted teeth, Billy quickly closed the distance remaining between him and Apollyon. I followed wanting my younger brother to know that he had my support however he decided to let this play out. His hands were opening and closing clearly in anticipation of wrapping them around Apollyon’s throat. Blade was holding it together, but only barely. On the other side of me Shane didn’t seem to be faring much better. His inner demon emanated a threatening growl.

  “Shane Lamar,” the ruler of the In Between acknowledged, his thick lips forming a cold calculating grin. “Did you see my present at the front door? The resurrection act of yours was impressive. But I think it would have been better for all those involved if you would have stayed dead. Why keep coming back for more abuse? Perhaps you wish to undo the unholy bargain that you realize now should never have been made, eh?” Shane’s low throated growl got louder with each taunt. Apollyon’s black eyes glittered dangerously.

  What bargain? I wondered. What was he talking about?

  “Foolish boy,” the Prince of Darkness kept at him. “You just don’t seem to appreciate how woefully inadequate you are. How many times must you fail her before you realize the futility of it all?” He made a tsking sound between his teeth.

  Shane lunged for Apollyon. I grabbed for him getting only a fistful of shirt, but it was enough. I pulled him back. Apollyon chuckled while Shane yanked and twisted attempting to loosen my grip.

  “Be still.” I had hold of his arm firmly now and dug the edge of my talons into his flesh. He wasn’t angry but gave me a side glance that was shockingly open and raw revealing that his current state of desperation might actually have surpassed Billy’s.