Dragan

by Plum Pascal

  The dead Succubus tumbles to the floor as I free myself from the confines of the fine silk bedding—bedding which was once the color of a peacock’s plumage but is now as red as Glodonia’s hair.

  Speaking of the red-haired witch, her horrific screams fill my ears, rattling around my brain and causing me increased agitation. She attempts to flee, but I easily grab her wrist and yank her towards me. Her eyes are wide as the blade enters her sternum, and I rip it upwards, puncturing one of her lungs and her heart.

  The bloodlust within me is thrilled. Yes, I want her to suffer, I want her to feel the same pain she, her mother, and her sister inflicted on me all these endless fucking years.

  Lamia throws the bedroom doors open wide and screams when she realizes I’ve murdered her daughters. Fury colors her features, followed by dread, which is quickly replaced with sharp focus. She approaches me as she begins to spin her beguiling sexual web, all the while venom drips from her eyes.

  Before she can touch me and lay waste to my plan, I throw the blade at her. It sinks into her belly with the sound of a knife carving into a melon. She falls to the ground and reaches for the hilt of the sword, attempting to free it.

  I approach to stand above her before throwing all of my weight into my right foot as I slam it down atop the pommel of the blade. The sword further sinks into the Succubus and blood begins to drip from one side of her mouth.

  I feel a smile take hold of my mouth as I watch Lamia die and with her, all of the memories, the shame, the humility, the pain. A laugh escapes my lips as she splutters, choking on the blood coming up her throat. And when she turns her lifeless gaze to the side and focuses on nothing, I step away.

  Scarlet liquid spreads across the floor, connecting the three corpses in a triangular shape.

  I laugh harder and the sound echoes through the room, loud enough that Thoradin appears in the doorway. His eyes widen momentarily as he takes in the scene of devastation. He says nothing but simply nods for he understands.

  “The last of the Succubae,” I manage on an exhale, steping away from the river of red. “The extinction of a vile, demonic race,” I finish. And that extinction has come to be at my hands.

  That bitter numbness that’s lingered for so long finally begins to fade. And in its place, I feel hunger. A hunger for Variant’s blood, for retribution of my own.

  I raise my arms, allowing the blood on my hands to drip down the lines of my arms. I open my mouth wide and yell: “I am the King of The Realm of Shadow... and now, I am free!”

  ONE

  Baron

  Mortal Realm

  My companions’ legs are weak and their stomachs rumble.

  Luckily for the two gargoyles, they don’t turn to stone even though they’re no longer in the Shadow Realm. As I understand, the angel is the reason they’re able to travel through the Mortal World and not succumb to what would otherwise be a stone imprisonment. But, though they don’t surrender to the curse Variant placed upon them, they do play prisoner to their own growling stomachs.

  As I am vampire, I don’t feel the pain of hunger or muscular exhaustion. The only hunger pangs that call to me are of the bloodlust variety. But, even my bloodlust has been and remains silent. I imagine this feeling of satiation has everything to do with the woman, Eilish. I’m feeding off her somehow…yet, I’ve never sampled her blood. It’s her life energy that somehow fuels me. I can’t pretend to understand, so I don’t.

  Before setting off on this quest to create a Transmutation Stone, I’d taken a few provisions from Master Ash, but the tart apples and stale bread have done little to sustain my companions. Still, I’m grateful to the man.

  A century ago, when I was roused from my grave, Master Ash was the one to find me in my half-awakened state. With no knowledge, no possessions, and no connections, I was helpless.

  I still don’t know how he found me. He only ever cryptically replied, “I have a knack for finding those who need me.”

  In payment for his long-ago service, I acquire medicine and antidotes for his patients. Debts are not something I like to keep, and I’ve also come to try to avoid calling on Master Ash. But, in this case, it was necessary.

  Even with Master Ash’s donation in the bellies of my companions, we reach the new realm hungry and tired. Well, they are hungry—I, strangely, am not, which is perplexing considering I have not fed in quite a while.

  I find my gaze shifting to the angel crossbreed but I’m not surprised. She is beautiful. But she is far more than her pretty face and voluptuous body. The angel, as I mentioned, is a crossbreed as revealed by the fact that perhaps twenty minutes earlier, when she was coming back from the brink of death, large and hooked wings escaped her back, as black as the dark of night.

  Succubus wings.

  “Cambion, what do you require to craft the Transmutation Stone?” I ask the elf king as I look around warily. We’ve cloaked ourselves in disguise, but it does little to reassure me of our security. Variant’s emissaries will no doubt expect our masks and their perception will be improved as a result. It’s an uncomfortable feeling to not have stealth on my side. My weapon of choice, before any poison or blade, is my ability to remain hidden. Traveling with this group, I feel far more exposed than I’d like.

  Truth be told, I’ve questioned the intelligence of my decision to remain among them. In general, I prefer my own company and I rely only upon myself. Regardless, this quest is an important one: the Transmutation Stone could be the answer to my missing memories…

  While the crossbred angel is also unaware of her past, it would seem her memories may be more easily restored to her than mine to me. There appears to be a block of some sort within her head that disallows her from recalling her past. I’m fully convinced this block was orchestrated on purpose, and that purpose could have been to protect her from knowing too much about herself—information which could prove dangerous when in the hands of the wrong people.

  My own missing memories are a bit more… complicated. As a Revenant, I escaped the bonds of death when I was brought back from the grave. My life, as I know it, began at the point I dug myself out of my splintered wooden coffin.

  I wonder if my memories have been denied me, never to be resurrected again. Perhaps they are simply nothing more than vignettes of another life, one that is long gone, never to be returned? I sorely hope not for I’ve wanted nothing more than to understand who I was, so I can better understand who I now am, and the reason I was returned to this bitter existence.

  “Serren Wood, Riverine, Kheferu, and Hizagkuur…” Cambion says, his voice trailing off until he grows quiet once more.

  Already, I feel a cold sense of dread begin to leach the feeling from my fingers. Two of the metals are currently in my bag, but the Serren Wood and the Riverine will be difficult to locate. Serren trees grow only in the Fae Realm. And Riverine, a rock, can only be collected from enchanted streams that exist in the Mortal and Fae Realms simultaneously—the nearest of which, the Mirror Stream, is perhaps two hours away.

  “Flumph, do you remember when Cambion said you have yet to be useful?” I ask, turning to the sprite.

  He does nothing but prattle on endlessly and I’m at my wit’s end.

  “I remember,” he grunts.

  “Now is your opportunity to prove your usefulness. It will take us too long to collect the Riverine by foot, and we must limit our time in this realm as much as possible.”

  “So what am I ‘sposed to do ‘bout it?” he asks in that grating manner of his.

  “You possess wings,” I respond with little humor. “Fly to the Mirror Stream, collect the Riverine and return with it. Post haste.”

  “Do I gotta?” His small voice is heavy with dread.

  “Yes,” I answer simply.

  “Crafting the stone will take nearly a day once we secure the materials,” Cambion adds. “The longer we remain in the open, the more we’re exposed to Anona. We must get the supplies as quickly as possible and return to the Shadow Realm w
here we can more easily hide.”

  “They’re right,” agrees Dragan, nodding his head and giving the sprite an expression that warns the creature not to trifle with him. “Flumph, you have your mission.”

  Flumph shudders at the mention of Anona. With good reason—Anona is a demon who answers to Variant and is heavy on our heels. The last thing we need is a row with her and her henchmen. In our weakened state, I doubt we’d prevail.

  The heavy sprite appears reluctant, but as he turns to face the angel, his expression changes into something that resembles determination. His usually slumped shoulders straighten, and he rises a little taller in the air.

  “I’m gonna do it!” he announces.

  After the sprite departs, the remaining members of our party start back along the road toward the Tree Of Shadows, which will lead us back to the Shadow Realm. We walk in silence, anxious that we’ve sent our least reliable and most incapable member to his potential doom. No one voices their concern, but the general attitude is one of anxiety.

  I find my attention consistently returning to Eilish. She’s Succubus. Of that, I’m convinced. I recognized her wings the moment I saw them. Yes, Succubae have been extinct for decades, or so I’ve been told. But I’ve also studied dark magic, and I’ve seen enough drawings to realize just what I was looking at.

  As a Succubus, she’s also a demon—but she’s a particular type of demon. Her strength is in her ability to seduce. And without even realizing it, she’s been seducing the three of us since we came into contact with her. A Succubus derives her strength from the life energy she leaches from men by having sex with them. I can only wonder if Dragan has already had her, which might better explain his foul mood. Nothing like expecting to fuck an angel and finding yourself with a demon instead.

  I, myself, find the whole situation quite comical, actually.

  As regards the question of whether or not Dragan has intimate knowledge of the girl, I had witnessed Dragan and Eilish in a state of undress only recently when they shared a bedchamber at Master Ash’s, but seeing them thus wasn’t proof that anything carnal happened. Not that it even matters, I suppose. I don’t care whether he’s bedded her or not.

  The only thing I do care about, the only purpose that drives me, is revenge. Revenge against Variant. And I believe this angel crossbreed is the answer to defeating Variant, because she has power within her that none of us has yet to fully understand. Even Eilish doesn’t understand just who she is and what she’s capable of.

  My thoughts return to the moment I followed Cambion into Eilish’s bedchamber. As soon as I passed through the doorway, bright, white feathered wings burst from her back, proving she was an intact angel—and intact angels are and have been outlawed for quite some time, according to one of Variant’s many edicts.

  Interesting that not only does she possess white, angelic wings but she also possesses dark and rubbery demon wings, I think.

  She’s clearly a crossbreed. And as a crossbreed, I’m convinced, she’s all the more powerful, able to draw on the powers of light and dark. Furthermore, I must also admit this darkness within her appeals to the darkness within me. I knew there was something about her that called to me. Something that existed beyond the glow of her lightness.

  Unlike Dragan, I’m not attracted to her angelic nature. Her lightness might entrance him, but it does nothing for me.

  It’s her shadows that pull me in, I tell myself. She’s a creature of the darkness as much as I am. And yet, she also exists in light. She’s able to travel both realms.

  Then why did she appear to be dying when she was in the Shadow Realm? I wonder. I don’t have an answer just yet, but I ponder the question all the same.

  I must admit I find the girl to be quite fascinating…

  For a long time, the only sound comes from our footsteps crunching the dirt and rocks underfoot. We encounter no other travelers, but my ears stay piqued for thieves and others looking for trouble. Occasionally, Dragan or I stop and strain to listen to the wind, hoping for clues as to what may lie on the road ahead.

  “Regardless of what Eilish wants,” Dragan starts in a low and confidential tone as he catches up to me. He faces me with a dour expression. “Do we have an agreement that you’ll find your own way once Cambion creates the stone and your memories are returned?”

  I smile at him but my smile is hard. “I want out of your company just as much as you want out of mine,” I assure him.

  “Very good,” he says and drops back, presumably to walk alongside the girl.

  Dragan doesn’t trust me and, more specifically, he doesn’t trust me with regard to Eilish. I believe he can detect the connection between the two of us and he doesn’t like it. I can’t say I like it much either, but it’s there, all the same.

  I remember the first time I laid eyes on her in Grimreap. Although I was bathed in shadow and as such, invisible to the naked eye, Eilish was able to detect me anyway. We locked gazes and it was at that moment I realized there was something quite… remarkable about her.

  When she channeled a vision of my rebirth, in which she watched me crawl from my grave, I was further stunned. And once I learned she, too, heard the voice of Morrigan, the Midnight Queen, it only cemented our connection. At least in my own mind.

  Yes, I will be on my way once Cambion attempts to restore my memories to me. Regardless of the pull I feel towards Eilish, I prefer my solitude.

  The sound of an engine echoes in front of us.

  “We need to hide,” I announce, spotting an unkempt graveyard not more than ten feet away. The headstones are old but still erect. They’re large enough to conceal a grown man.

  “Whoever it is, they yield to us,” says Cambion proudly.

  As a general rule, I seek to avoid confrontation. Furthermore, it’s paramount to know who or what I’m dealing with before I find myself in a bad situation. I tell him as much.

  The sound of the engine is followed by the crunching of tires traveling slowly along the dirt road. Whatever the vehicle is, it’s old and heavy. The engine sputters and then dies. Moments later, we hear it rev back to life.

  Dragan’s low growling voice rises in contradiction to Cambion. “Baron is right. We need to get off the road.”

  “They won’t see us,” Cambion argues, waving away our concern with a disinterested hand. “I’ve magicked us to pass without notice.”

  “Your magic isn’t immune to other magic,” Dragan says simply but his tone is one of acid. In general, Cambion and Dragan have been at each other’s throats since we began this merry adventure.

  “And Variant’s emissaries will be very aware that all of us possess magic,” I add.

  I see Cambion’s face flush in annoyance and I turn toward the curve in the path. Our visitors are still shielded by the outcropping of poplar trees that line the road, but it won’t be long before we come face to face. We don’t have time for another ego war. We need to move out of the way, and we need to do so quickly.

  Cambion’s voice rises, drowning out the approach of the vehicle. “We are kings; we don’t hide from threats.”

  “We are kings, yes. We aren’t fools,” growls Dragan.

  Cambion laughs. “Is that your plan moving forward, then? To shrink away from anything we may encounter?” He shakes his head and scowls at the larger man. “You’re weak, Dragan. I never thought the day would come that my courage would surpass yours. Don’t forget who and what you were.”

  “There’s no room for pride here,” Dragan lashes back at him. “Only strategy. No one doubts you’re a fucking king, you stupid son of a bitch.”

  “If we fail now, all of this will be for nothing!” Eilish whispers, her eyes wide.

  “You say nothing!” Cambion rails at her with fuming eyes. It’s no secret he doesn’t trust her and never has. His dislike seems overdone though, and I believe it merely hides something else. I imagine that something else is simply the fact that he lusts after Eilish as much as we all do.

  He ret
urns his gaze to Dragan. “And I’m sick of taking orders from you!”

  Before I can say a word, Cambion lunges at Dragan, his arm pulled back to deliver a blow. Dragan’s wings are fully extended, his powerful legs pushing against the ground as he attacks the elf, in turn.

  Thoradin and I are there in an instant, fighting our way between their intertwined limbs and trying desperately to separate the men so we can talk sense into them. They are mere children, and I hope to hell their foolishness doesn’t incapacitate us all.

  I can hear Eilish’s voice over the loud crashes and grunts, but it takes some effort to determine what she’s saying.

  “We have to get off the road!” she finally shouts loudly enough. “I hear someone coming!”

  But it’s too late. I turn just in time to see a man behind Eilish, a large demon dressed in the traditional black leather of Precinct Five, Anona’s territory. As I watch, he hoists a burlap sack above her head and brings it down with alacrity.

  I don’t waste any time, disappearing in a blur and reappearing just within the limits of the graveyard. I thrust my hands into the rich earth and summon my shadows forth.

  “Raise Dead.” I whisper the enchantment as I envision the corpses arising from their forever sleep and rejoining the world of the living. I stand and watch as my vision comes to fruition. The dirt above each grave begins to shift as the inhabitants below crawl out of their enclosures, according to my will.

  A minute or two passes before the dead are fully separate from their caskets. Some are merely naked skeletons while others still wear their flesh, old and rotted, falling from their bones. I invoke the zombies forward, to attack our aggressors. No, these dead won’t do much damage, but they’re a distraction all the same. And they’ll allow me more time to devise a secondary attack plan.

  Looking back at the scene I’ve just vacated, I see Cambion fighting two demons. Dragan, Eilish, and Thoradin are nowhere to be found.

  The world around me suddenly grows blurry when I feel the stinging pinch of a needle in my neck. Unable to stay upright, I drop down to my knees. It feels as if my surroundings are spinning.