A Shade of Vampire 84: A Memory of Time

by Forrest, Bella

  We knew Lyriana had a shelter in one of the small villages deep within the mangrove forest. We also knew that she wouldn’t be alone, since she always traveled with personal guards, uniformed Aeternae trained to kill anyone who tried to touch her. By that logic, we didn’t expect this encounter to be easy, but I was confident with three Reapers and my white werewolf by my side. Something had to give.

  Making our way up the wetland’s coast, we inched closer to the forest to get a better view. I could see the lights flickering across the wooden cabins, and the silhouettes of people moving around. A slender system of bridges connected homes above the water, and a couple more served as paths into other villages. This was not a friendly environment. Everything had been built to keep strangers out.

  “Time to zap on over there,” Widow announced, reaching out to me.

  I was about to take his hand so the Reaper might help us get closer to the village when several boats left the small islands. They were headed toward us, and I wasn’t sure what to make of that.

  “Kale, what are they doing?” Hunter asked, his brow furrowed as he watched them. “I’m counting twenty.”

  “Five per boat,” Widow added. “My guess is they spotted us.”

  “From there? They must’ve been watching, then,” I said. “They must’ve known we were coming.”

  “How could they have known? We were careful on the way here,” Dream replied. “Nah, something else is going on here.”

  “Well, if they were Darklings, surely they would’ve used death magic to get here faster. The boats don’t make much sense,” Nightmare said.

  As they drew closer, the boats gave me a strange feeling—an uneasiness that latched on and refused to let go. Chills traveled down my spine, ice crystalizing in my veins as I realized none of the Aeternae on the boats were moving. They were less than a hundred yards away now, and I had no idea what made the boats move, since none of their occupants were rowing. I didn’t hear any type of engine, either.

  “What is going on here?” I mumbled, trying to find an answer before it might be too late. The uneasiness built up inside me, pressing down my stomach as beads of sweat covered my temples. “Something feels off.”

  Hunter gripped my hand firmly, and I was compelled to look at him. “We’ve got this,” he whispered. It prompted a scoff from Nightmare.

  “Do you, though?”

  The boats reached us, and they were even stranger from up close. Carved from a bluish type of wood, they were long and slim, their bottom curves dipping into the water. The twenty Aeternae in them were dead, their hearts torn out through gaping wounds in their chests. They hadn’t died that long ago—the blood had yet to congeal. Their clothes were drenched in crimson.

  “Oh dear,” Dream murmured, her galaxy eyes widening.

  “What the hell is this?” Widow croaked.

  The Aeternae had been bound to spikes mounted in the boats, giving the impression of standing, living people for those watching from afar. That wasn’t even the worst part. The water rippled behind the boats, so I looked closer until I spotted a Knight Ghoul. There were four of them, one for each boat.

  “Ghouls pushed the boats over,” I said with a gasp, terror nearly suffocating me.

  The fiends hurriedly swam away, leaving their cargo at our feet. Upon a second, more detailed inspection, I spotted the boxes at the Aeternae’s feet. Fifteen wooden boxes, each carved and painted with familiar-looking runes.

  “Death magic,” Nightmare said. “Not the good kind, either.”

  Suddenly, the runes began to light up red. I had a feeling something would happen once they were all activated, and that it wouldn’t end well for us. Without warning, Dream grabbed me and threw me back.

  I tried to scream in protest, but the loud, eardrum-crushing bang that followed rendered me speechless. I landed on my back with enough force to knock the air out of my lungs. For a moment, it was nearly impossible to breathe. The explosion covered most of my field of vision with blinding flashes of red and yellow and white. The sound of wood cracking and splintering. Water splashing. Flesh tearing and falling everywhere.

  “Hunter!” I cried out.

  Once the bang subsided, an eerie silence took over. Even the Visio cicadas had been rendered mute. I heard a grunt and Dream cursing to my right. Nightmare groaned to my left. And Widow’s footsteps crunched in the tall grass as he walked over and pulled me upright with one swift movement.

  The whole world shifted around me as I tried to regain my balance. “Hunter!” I shouted again. His voice came through, and relief washed over me like a hot, steaming bath that made every muscle in my body soft and tender.

  “I’m okay, honey,” he said. I turned my head and saw him, partly hidden beneath Dream. She’d made quite the leap to get to him in time, but she’d managed to protect him. The forcefield she’d generated had a plethora of sharp nails and black crystal shards embedded in its translucent surface. None had gone through.

  “What just happened?” I asked, holding on to Widow for balance. My knees were too weak to hold my weight for the moment.

  “A death magic bomb,” Nightmare said, getting up with slow and pained movements. Unlike Dream, he hadn’t protected himself from the blast. There were hundreds of projectiles lodged in his back, each glowing red as they pierced his—for lack of a better word—undead flesh. Widow seemed okay, from what I could tell. “It was directed at us.”

  “Oh, really? I’d thought they were aiming for the Reapers we left behind in Roano,” Dream shot back, anger sharpening her voice until she got up and saw his injuries. “Brother!”

  Hunter reached me in a single breath and took me in his arms. For a moment, all I could experience was gratitude. We’d survived another incident, though I wasn’t sure how many such free passes we had left, considering the kind of enemy we were dealing with.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, his voice low as he cupped my face and pressed his lips against mine for the briefest, sweetest moment.

  “Mm-hm. Dream pulled me and threw me out of harm’s way,” I said. “You?”

  “She did the same with me, only the blast projected us both into the ground. She’s heavier than she looks, let me tell you,” he added with a chuckle.

  “I heard that!” Dream snapped while she checked Nightmare’s wounds, plucking some of the projectiles from his back. Every extraction made the Reaper whimper and curse under his breath. “Hold still, and it’ll hurt less.”

  “A death magic bomb?” I asked. “Seriously? You guys make such contraptions?”

  Widow nodded as he surveyed the still waters. There was no sign of the ghouls who’d delivered the cargo or anyone else, so this whole episode didn’t make any sense to me. Had they been sent by Lyriana, in a bid to keep us away from her hideout?

  “They’re not easy to manufacture. The boxes are filled with whatever sharp objects one has on hand. The runes on each box help convert them into projectiles that can cross beyond the physical space and cause damage to entities like us,” he said.

  “And the dead Aeternae?” I asked. “Their hearts were missing.”

  “The hearts were inside the boxes. They’re sacrifices, meant as the actual explosive,” Widow explained. “Think of each heart as a stick of dynamite. In combination with the shrapnel and the runes, they can do a nasty number on Reapers. Given what it takes to build such contraptions, surely you understand why this knowledge is dangerous.”

  “Do you know how to build one?” Hunter asked.

  Widow shook his head. “I know of them. I know how they work, but I don’t have the words and sub-words to put one together myself. None of the First Tenners do—except, of course, for Spirit. This is definitely within his wretched realm.”

  “Then it had to be Lyriana,” I concluded. “She probably knows we’re after her. This bomb took time and planning. I don’t suppose you can just whip one up in a matter of minutes?”

  Widow shook his head again.

  “Okay. What now?”
Nightmare asked. He hissed from pain as his sister extracted the last of the crystal shards and carefully analyzed it.

  “This is obsidian. Volcanic material. Odd to come across it in these parts,” she said. “If this is Lyriana, she probably has more of this stuff.”

  “Which means she could’ve built other bombs, right?” I asked.

  “I shudder at the thought of taking another hit like this,” Nightmare grumbled.

  Hunter checked the explosion site. Not much was left of the boats. Charred pieces of wood and bloodied chunks of Aeternae flesh floated in the green water, but he did manage to fish out a metal tube the size of his palm. Frowning, he checked it from top to bottom until he discovered a lid.

  “What’s that?” I inquired, reaching him quickly.

  “It opens,” he said, unscrewing the lid with careful movements of his fingers. Inside, there was a scroll. He plucked it out and handed it to me. My hands were still shaking, but I managed to unravel it.

  Words had been scrawled in blood. At the bottom, a signature with swirly letters and a wax seal. It was a skull framed by a scythe blade. “This has to be the Darklings’ seal. It’s a little too on the nose, in my opinion, but it’s definitely them,” I replied.

  “Is there a message? That thing must have been on the boat, protected by its metal tube,” Widow said, joining us.

  I read the text aloud. It wasn’t much, only a couple of paragraphs, but each word drilled holes into my soul as I understood their weight and significance.

  “‘Dear Whoever, if you have survived the explosion, congratulations. I doubt you’ll fare so well in the future, however, for I have made more than one Death Boom. Rest assured, all were designed specifically for you and your Reaper friends. Sooner or later, one of them will get the job done. Consider this message not a warning, but rather a promise. You will not kill me. You will not capture me. You will never outsmart me. I left the swamp a while ago, but if you still wish to search for me, by all means go right ahead. I doubt you’ll find much except for more Death Booms.’” I paused, scrunching my nose. “Okay, first of all, who calls a bomb ‘Death Boom’? What, is she in kindergarten or something? Second, holy crap, she rigged the entire mangrove village with bombs.”

  “Keep reading,” Widow urged me.

  “‘But if you do wish to find me, do not worry. I will find you first. I am Lyriana Amos, not the first nor the last of my dynasty to loyally serve the Darklings. And if it will be my turn to give my heart to the Spirit Bender before I can kill you all, I shall pass that sacred duty on to my other brothers and sisters in arms. They will gladly finish the job for me. If you think you have any chance of stopping the Spirit Bender’s return, think again. We’ve survived for millions of years. We shall prevail, and we shall dance on your graves. Yours truly, Lyriana.’”

  “Ah, good to know that if Danika gets to her before she gets to us, she’ll send her sons to kill us.” Nightmare scoffed. “What a bunch of psychopaths!”

  “Devoted psychopaths, and therein lies the problem,” I said. “Someone told her we were coming. The bomb wasn’t designed for just anyone who came to this shore, and Lyriana obviously expects Danika to get to her via other means; otherwise, this letter would’ve been worded differently.”

  Hunter sighed. “Petra. She must’ve given Lyriana a heads-up, somehow.”

  “If that’s the case, then Ridan’s team might be in danger,” I breathed, dread taking over once more. “We have to get to them… now!”

  Dream pointed a thumb over her shoulder, toward the mangrove forest. “What about the bomb or bombs Lyriana hid in there?”

  “We don’t have time to clean up after her,” Widow said. “Kailani is right. Ridan’s crew has yet to check in, and if Petra warned Ramus too, they might be in serious trouble.”

  Nightmare gave Widow a perky smile. “Would you do the honors then, dear brother? I’d love to do a long-distance jump myself, but I’m slightly incapacitated at the moment. It’ll take a few hours for these injuries to heal, I’m afraid.”

  “Take my hand,” Widow said.

  Once we were all physically linked, the world warped around us and disappeared into a glimpse of utter darkness. As we drifted through the vacuum of nothingness, I felt my heart skipping beats in anticipation of what we might find on the other side. If Petra had been playing us from the very beginning, then she couldn’t be allowed to stay in Roano for another second.

  I hadn’t trusted her from the very moment she’d reached the ancient city and offered to help in exchange for her sons, but this was a whole new level of devious, even for her. The Darklings were sacrificing their own people—those they claimed to protect—to build death magic bombs against us. They had to be stopped.

  Amane

  All hell broke loose in the blink of an eye.

  Ridan and I emptied our pulverizer clips first. We missed a couple of times, destroying parts of a wall and some of the furniture, but we managed to take out several of the Darklings who’d surrounded us.

  Trev went straight for Danika’s head. Despite her metal hands, the Lady Supreme was still fast and agile, moving like a shadow as she avoided his attacks. He lost the pulverizer weapon the moment he aimed it at her, so he only had his claws and fangs left. Danika was not the type to accept physical offense, and she was swift in her retaliation.

  I tried to reload, but two Darklings came at me, so I took out my twin blades and started cutting left and right, drawing blood wherever I could. They were faster than I was, but I could at least slow them down before going for their heads. My time spent in the jungle wilderness of Cerix had taught me a thing or two.

  Kelara and Soul fought back to back against the rest of the Darklings, but the cabin was getting crowded fast. The ghouls circled each of the skirmishes, their beady eyes wide, their fangs ready to snap and chomp at whatever crossed their paths. One by one, the Darklings fell, heads rolling across the floor.

  Danika set Ramus’s heart aside, and I kept my eyes on it as I fought off a Knight Ghoul. It was a big creature that hungered for my flesh, but I hadn’t come to Visio to die in this forsaken cabin in the middle of some snowy woods. I’d come here to protect my sister and my friends, and to make sure that no one took advantage of death magic ever again. The Darklings had plunged this world into chaos, and its natural balance had to be restored. Too many people were in danger, including those I loved and respected.

  “If you think you’re walking out of here alive, you’ve got another thing coming,” Danika hissed, casting a spell against Trev. He tried to dodge it, but the shimmering pulse hit him in the abdomen. He was thrown into the wall, and I could hear his bones breaking as he collapsed.

  She sauntered toward him, eager to finish the job, but I couldn’t let that happen. I swerved past the ghoul and directed my blades at Danika. She saw me from the corner of her eye and pointed the scythe at me, metal hands firmly gripping its handle. The ghoul hurled itself at me from behind, so I ducked. The pulse from Danika’s scythe shot over my head and hit the creature. Danika cursed under her breath before going for another attack, but I brought one of my blades up. Metal hit metal, and sparks flew. I didn’t do much damage to the hand, but I managed to shove it to the side, releasing the third pulse into the floor, which blasted into bits and pieces to reveal the cellar.

  Before I could react, Danika sneered and kicked me in the stomach. I fell into the room below, landing on my back. Every bone in my body hurt, and I stilled on the cold stone and tried to catch my breath. I listened to the sounds above. Roars and growls, whispered spells, and glass breaking. Trev snarled. Shadows moved in the limited view I had from my prone position.

  “Amane!” Ridan shouted. Fire roared, and its blue light flooded the cellar. Several Darklings screamed in agony. Their bodies rolled on the floor above, thumping and squirming, desperate to shake off the strange, azure flames. That had to be Reaper mojo, since Ridan’s fire was natural, and it only came from his dragon form. He’d yet to make su
ch a move, but I doubted he’d hold out as a human for much longer.

  “I’m okay!” I yelled.

  Moments later, I managed to get myself back up. A ruptured structure beam was within my reach. My long knives were nearby, so I grabbed and sheathed them. I climbed back up, my joints aching as I struggled to grip the floor above to leverage my way out of the cellar because it was coated with blood and hellishly slippery. The fight was getting worse.

  Trev could barely move. Two of the ghouls had fallen, along with a dozen Darklings. But Danika was dangerously close to taking Soul down, and we had to stop her before it was too late. I pulled out one of my knives and threw it at her. Danika heard the whistling of metal in flight and stepped back. My knife got stuck in a wooden pillar, and she set her sights on me once again.

  “Amane, get the heart!” Ridan said, veins throbbing in his neck.

  “Oh snap,” I managed, realizing what was about to happen. “Kelara! Soul! Trev! Duck!”

  Danika gave me a confused look while I listened for a familiar sound of bones snapping and clothes tearing. I’d called it. Ridan went full dragon, and I hit the floor as he expanded into a massive beast with thick dark scales and an amber underbelly. The cabin exploded from within, wood and iron beams and glass and chunks of furniture flying in every direction.

  “Holy moly!” I heard Soul exclaim, laughing with delight at what was probably an awe-inducing sight.

  Ridan was huge in his dragon form, and he couldn’t exactly control who he stepped on with his massive claws. Several Darklings were crushed, their entrails splattered and spread across the broken floors. The cold air from a suddenly open space seeped into my bones, kicking my blood into motion.

  Danika had fallen in the snow, dazed by the sudden appearance of a dragon. She hadn’t seen this coming, and the thought gave me tremendous satisfaction. I scrambled back to my feet and searched for Ramus’s heart in the last place I’d seen it. A place that no longer existed, unfortunately. Ridan couldn’t have anticipated this particular hitch.