Dominion Rising: 23 Brand New Novels from Top Fantasy and Science Fiction Authors

by Gwynn White

  5

  It had been after midnight when we got to the bar, and despite its intensity, the fight with the wolves had only lasted about ten minutes, so we probably only walked through the dark for about five hours. Long enough for Coit to develop about half the hangover he deserved.

  But we were covered in blood mist and exhausted, so it seemed much longer.

  We spoke only rarely. I was still listening carefully to make sure the wolves were going to give chase again.

  Coit’s misery rendered him silent.

  I didn’t know why the wolf didn’t speak. Not exactly. But I caught him looking at me out of the corner of his eye more than once, so I was certain it had something to do with the way I’d apparently pulled magic out of him.

  Every so often, I’d remember that calm, deep pool of blue, and the way it had erupted into pure power.

  His aura stayed bright blue for a long time—so long that I wondered how it could be possible that Coit didn’t see it, too.

  But slowly, it faded.

  The closer we got to Brochan City, the more closely together the towns and villages were spaced. We passed through two or three of them are way to Rafe’s secret tunnel entrance.

  It was to one of these villages that Rafe led us. Like the others, it was deserted. Unlike the others, it seemed to have escaped the worst of the Rift ravages. Many of the buildings were still perfectly intact.

  Coming up out of his drink-induced misery for a moment, Coit turned around, taking in our surroundings. The streets were narrow, the paved, and some of the former businesses that lined the central thoroughfare still have glass windows.

  “I ain’t seen anything this kept together since I fell through that hole in the world,” Coit said.

  “If it were any farther away from the Rift, it would’ve already been taken over,” Rafe agreed. “As it is, I still sometimes have to do a little defending of the territory—though I mostly leave the scaring off to the invaders themselves. People are more afraid of the rumors and the stories than they are willing to stay someplace so close to the Rift.”

  “Why do you stay here?” I asked.

  “I’ll show you.”

  He led us through a few more streets and into a small neighborhood of two-story houses that must have once belonged to the town’s wealthier residents. Rafe marched up to one made of a pale brown stone, then around to the back, where he unlocked a door with a key he carried around his neck.

  “Drop your bags there.” Rafe gestured at a table to one side of a large fireplace with a cook-pot hanging above it.

  “Nice kitchen,” Coit observed. “Got any food?”

  Rafe nodded. “Yeah, I’ll feed you. But first, let me show you where we’re going. Then baths, then breakfast, then sleep. We can head back out after that.”

  “In all this time, you haven’t even asked where we’re headed.” I watched the werewolf carefully for his response, but he simply grinned.

  “Don’t have to ask. If you were headed anywhere but the Rift, you would’ve said.”

  It made sense, but I spooled just a little magic in my hand, anyway.

  It would be rude to hit him with the magic you stole from him. I shushed the tiny voice inside my head.

  Coit dropped his bag, but he didn’t unload any of his weapons from their sheaths.

  We followed Rafe deeper into the house. When he opened a door to a dark staircase leading down to the basement under the house, I paused.

  “You really expect us to follow you down there?”

  Rafe shot a glance at me. “I did tell you I was taking you through tunnels.”

  “Do you have a torch?” I asked.

  “Better.” He reached inside and took an item hanging from a hook. “I have a flashlight.”

  “No, man, really?” Coit asked, breathing the words out.

  “Hardest thing has been finding batteries for it.”

  He flipped a switch on the item and a bright beam illuminated the steps before us.

  A flashlight.

  I repeated the word to myself.

  More Rift-trash, brought through by people who didn’t make it, or perhaps following through on its own to a world that didn’t know how to use it.

  We made our way down the steep stairs and into what looked like it had been a wine cellar. The far end was another door, and it was to this that Rafe lettuce. He opened it with yet another key, and when he spoke his voice echoed differently, in a way that suggested that the empty space behind the door went on forever.

  “This is at. Go straight ahead until you hit the first junction. Turn right to head toward Brochan city. Turn left to go… well, away from the Rift.”

  “How did you even find this?” I asked.

  Rafe closed the door again and locked it. “Come upstairs for breakfast and I’ll tell you.” He flashed a smile at me, showing just enough of his canines to give the grin a lupine edge.

  “I ain’t going nowhere in no tunnels until I’ve had some sleep,” Coit complained.

  “Agreed,” I said. We need to be fresh when we get to the Rift.” We all tripped up back stairs with Rafe closing up behind us. By the time I got to the kitchen I was yawning widely. But I wasn’t willing to fall asleep until I tried to figure out a little more about why this particular werewolf was helping us.

  And what it was I’d experienced with him during our battle with the wolves.

  It made sense to go with them when he was our only option. And we didn’t have much other choice—the route to the Rift that I had planned to take was too heavily infested with Rift monsters, according to everything we’d heard on the road. The rest of the werewolves were too angry with Coit to help us out at all, and I had no idea how to get to the Rift from where we were.

  That left Rafe and his tunnels.

  6

  This house was when the first things I found after I came to the Rift,” Rafe told us as we sat around his kitchen table eating toasted bread and strips of some kind of salted meat that he had made over a low fire, along with a strong, dark tea.

  He’d offered us showers with real running water. It was the first real shower I’d had since leaving home on this quest to find my brother. The water was cold, but it was indoors and sluiced the wolf-blood splatter down a drain. I considered spelling the water to heat it, but decided that truly would be a waste of my stolen magic. I did, however, take the opportunity to wash the clothes I’d been wearing, scrubbing at them with soap and stomping the blood out of my shirt and pants on the bottom of the shower stall.

  Then I wondered how long this town’s plumbing would last without a resident mage to keep it going.

  Was Rafe the one keeping it going?

  My mind spun off in a dozen different directions.

  Where had Rafe gotten his magic?

  Was Rafe also a mage? Could a shapeshifter be a mage? Or could a mage be turned by a shifter?

  There were no answers to be had in the shower, I’d finally decided, and dried myself off, joining the two men in the kitchen for breakfast.

  “Where did you come here from?” Coit asked Rafe.

  “Right outside Denver, originally, but I got pulled into the Rift on a camping trip in the Rockies. You?”

  “Dallas. Got pulled in driving late one night. Damn thing just opened in front of me. Suck me up car and everything. Rough ride, too. Being in the car probably saved my life. Cars probably somewhere still in Brochan city, too. Not that it’d do us much good.”

  Rafe nodded. “I got dropped down right in the middle of the city. I had no idea where I was what was going on. I sure as hell didn’t know that there were monsters to watch out for. I don’t think it would’ve mattered, anyway. I wasn’t here for 24 hours before I walked right into the middle of Wolf territory. The short version is one of them bit me and left me to survive or die. I survived.”

  I frowned, chewing and swallowing my bite and taking a drink of tea to wash it down. “And the tunnel?”

  “I was pretty feverish
for a few days after the bite. I reeled through the city without getting into anymore trouble, God knows how, and in one of the neighborhoods, I stumbled into one of the old high-rise buildings. That’s where I found the first tunnel.”

  “First?” Coit asked. “There more?”

  “If you. I would’ve ignored it, except I finally figured out that there were things that could be hunting me. So I stumbled into it, and kept going until I came out the other side.

  “And that was here?” I waved my toast in a circle indicating the whole house.

  “Not quite.” Rafe leaned back in his chair and hooked one arm over the back as he regarded me. “No, I came out on the banks of the river. Lucky for me I did—I don’t know that I could have cooled the fever on my own. When I came to myself again, I realized I need to cross the river if I was ever going to figure out what had happened to me.”

  “When did you figure out you were a werewolf?”

  Rafe laughed. “That’s a story for another time. In fact,” he said as I yawned yet again, “the rest of this can wait, too. Suffice to say having found one tunnel, I knew what I was looking for. So once I made my way across the river I started hunting for more. Found them, and they led me here.”

  He took the last bite of his food. “Let me show you where you can sleep.”

  We followed him upstairs, where he pointed at several bedrooms. “You can take any of these.” He gave me another one of those sidelong looks. “You can share, of course, though there’s plenty of space…”

  “Oh, hell no,” Coit said. “My own room with my own bed and a door I can close on it? I am all over that.” He began opening doors and examining the available rooms.

  I tilted my head, and smiled just a little as I answered Rafe’s unspoken question. “We’re not a couple.”

  The werewolf nodded once, a glint in his eye. “Glad to hear that.”

  I dropped my gaze and chewed lightly on my bottom lip.

  The werewolf lowered his voice. “Back on the road, when we were fighting the other wolves—you felt that, too, right? I didn’t imagine it.”

  “No. You didn’t imagine it.”

  “I think it might be worthwhile to…” he paused and bit his own lip. Something about the gesture almost undid me. “To explore that,” he finished his sentence.

  I reached out and ran my thumb along his lip. A blue spark arced between us, and we both shivered, our gazes locked on each other.

  It had been a long time since anyone had shown any real interest in me. Or if they had, I’d been too busy in my search for Brodric to reciprocate.

  The werewolf was attractive, muscular and wiry in that way of shifters. His black hair had tiny waves in it, and his dark eyes sparked with intelligence.

  Plus, it didn’t hurt that he had saved us and offered to help us complete our Rift quest.

  Under any other circumstances, I would have seriously considered taking him up on his implied offer.

  Given my current situation? I wasn’t sure it was a good idea.

  “Not tonight,” I finally brought myself to say.

  Coit poked his head out of a room. “I’m taking this one. It’s got the best bed.”

  Rafe and I jumped apart, a little guiltily, as if we’d been caught doing something inappropriate. I was sure there was more to say to Rafe—but I couldn’t think of what.

  In the end, I simply thanked him for helping us and for the room.

  And then I locked the bedroom door behind me—as much a reminder to myself as a deterrent for anyone else.

  Just in case.

  7

  I dreamed Rift-dreams that night.

  The Rift sucked me in, making me part of it, pulling me into its reality until I wasn’t even myself any longer…

  The footsteps following me wouldn’t be an issue at any other time, anywhere else in the entire city of Basnave.

  After dark in Blood Heights, though, they’re a problem. Not necessarily because I can’t take down whoever is following me. I almost certainly can.

  But I’m walking alone at night in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the whole city (second only to the Catacombs, and even I wouldn’t go down there without some heavy-duty backup).

  I don’t look dangerous. I’m a medium-sized woman with long red hair and pale skin, dressed for comfort rather than style—tonight I’m wearing a white t-shirt, black leather jacket and blue jeans, along with motorcycle boots.

  I have no visible weapons, no obvious protective symbols, no clear magical aura.

  Anyone with any sense would take one look at me and make a wide berth. Hell, if I saw me out on these streets this close to midnight, I’d turn around and head straight the other direction.

  Whoever this is, though, is trying to match their steps to mine to cover the noise. I pick them up on the echo, just a tiny bit off. My pursuer doesn’t have a tag-along charm, or I might have missed the ricochet of the sound off the buildings rising up around us.

  Dammit.

  I don’t have time for shit like this.

  I never have time for shit like this.

  Somehow it always seems to find me, though.

  The problem with being followed at night in Blood Heights is that the sort of person who would ignore the obvious signals broadcasting “I’m dangerous” to the regular Heights denizens is one of three things: 1. desperate; 2. crazy. 3. really, really scary.

  I suppose “carrying a death wish” is a possible number four on that list, but those types can be taken down easily enough, so they don’t worry me. Numbers one through three, though? They can do some real damage before they go down.

  So I skip a step, hopping over a pile of broken glass to catch the syncopated beat of my would-be hunter’s stumble, then let the footsteps match mine again.

  I know how far back he is now. And with that information, I can stretch my senses out just a little, catch the flavor of his intent.

  He thinks he’s a hunter.

  My nostrils flare and I flash a sharp grin at the thought.

  Johnny’s expecting me tonight, as usual half-hoping I won’t show up to pay on the debt I owe. Some night I won’t—and when that happens, the self-proclaimed King of the Heights will put a bounty out on me.

  Tonight, though, I’ll be there.

  After I take care of the wannabe hunter who’s on my tail.

  I don’t have time for this.

  But I’ll make time.

  I take a quick right into a nearby alley. It’s got better lighting than a lot of them, sharp shadows striking the walls on either side, but like most of the Heights, the character of the passageway changes quickly. I move from the well lit portion into a slightly darker section. The shadows here seem to crawl, lingering against the ground for a while before sliding up the sides of the buildings.

  Right where the alleyway narrows, a single dim bulb flickers in a cage-like light fixture over the back entrance to some shop, casting its weak light in a circle. The light probably means something—that the owner is in, or out, or available for sex or blood or magic—but I don’t know this part of the Heights very well, and I can’t decipher its message.

  What I do know is that when I pass by the door, the light will illuminate me to anyone around.

  I can’t have that.

  Although I topped off my reservoirs before I left my one-room apartment, I don’t want to use what I’ve got stored before I get to Johnny’s. No telling what he’ll ask for tonight.

  Best be prepared.

  Something new, then.

  I bite down on the inside of my bottom lip, hard enough to pierce the skin with my tooth. Magic requires a sacrifice, and for this magic, a very little blood will do. Only a tiny thrust of will, fed by blood and powered by magic, serves to pop the bulb, creating a pool of black. I slide into that darkness and pull a see-me-not out of my jacket pocket. The copper taste in my mouth tells me I still have enough blood to activate it, so I slip the metal disk into my mouth.

  The char
m fizzles against my tongue when it goes live, letting me know it’s working.

  The fizzle isn’t necessary, but it’s a good indicator that the spell is working, and I’m glad I decided to spring for the extra.

  Now I wait, allowing my eyes to adjust to the darkness.

  The erstwhile hunter slides into view, a darker form among the shadows in the alleyway.

  He moves well enough for a novice, but it’s clear to me that he’s never tailed anyone in the Heights before. He doesn’t know how to use the darkness to his advantage, and even now that he’s lost the sound of my footsteps, he hasn’t stopped to reconnoiter.

  The see-me-not is short-lived—I can already feel its tingle starting to fade—but I’m fairly sure I’ve got time for one more glance inside him before the charm stops working and he becomes that much more likely to see me.

  I breathe in, focusing my own desire to know his intent into a pinpoint laser-beam designed to slice through to the truth, rather than the broad net I cast earlier to get a general sense of him.

  He’s blundering on, convinced that I’ve gotten ahead of him, too far away to hear or be heard by him.

  The sense of himself as a hunter does not go deep.

  In fact, this time I can taste the edge of dread on it, so I probe just a little deeper, cutting away all the extraneous hopes and drilling down to the fear.

  Sheer terror.

  This is one of the desperate ones.

  I can use that.

  Tensing the muscles in my hands, I roll my fingers closed. With an audible snick, my weapons pop from between my knuckles—four curved, sharpened blades on each hand.

  When I went to the shaman-doctor for a weapons outfit, I specifically requested them. I saw them in an old movie, though the man who had the bladed hands in the film worked hard to stay human, to avoid becoming a monster.

  That’s where we’re different.

  I don’t care if I’m monstrous.

  And I’m pretty sure I’m no longer human.

  For just an instant, I wish I had on better shoes, something lighter that would give me the advantage of speed. But I chose these for their durability—and their metal toes. I don’t have knives in my feet, but a good hard kick with these boots will sometimes leave an opponent gasping on the ground.