Chapter 13 #2
So Tane knew who Lanie really was. I couldn’t help but wonder when he’d found out—and if he would have ever told us. I somehow doubted it, given it would also reveal his bloody actions against Orion’s family.
“Where is my daughter, Orion?” Tane added, with just the slightest hint of anger running through the arrogance.
He did care, after all.
Orion didn’t reply, but a soft grating echoed as the shelving in front of Tane slid to one side, revealing another room.
I couldn’t see how big it was, but magic leached from its confines.
If I could sense it, Tane surely would. His fingers twitched, but he otherwise didn’t react.
He simply stepped through the gap and disappeared into the shadows.
Atticus?
On it, he replied, and padded forward, his form fading as he stepped fully into the spectral realms. I pushed to my feet and, with the knife still firmly gripped in my right hand, padded after him.
I didn’t enter the room, though, instead hunkering down to the left of the doorway.
Until I knew for sure what lay beyond, I was going to wait.
Sensible, for once, Atticus commented.
In the room beyond, footsteps echoed. There was no other sound or movement. Only the magic that swirled through the air gave any indication of Orion’s presence.
“That is far enough,” he said eventually.
“Where is my daughter?” Tane growled. “Show me, now.”
“As you wish.”
Light flared, and I jerked back as it leached through the gap and almost blinded me. Tane hissed. “What have you done to her?”
She lies naked on a table came Atticus’s comment.
Injured?
Yes, but the greater threat is the magic that twists within her. It drains her magical power, I believe.
Which explained why Orion seemed to have no ill effects or loss of power after the creation of a spell as powerful as the vortex. He was siphoning Monica’s power, using magic to do what I could do with a mere touch. Can you dismantle it?
I believe so, but the minute I try, Orion will become aware of our presence and react accordingly. I do not think that wise right now.
I don’t think it would be wise at any time, but I don’t believe we have a choice, either.
There was a long pause. Do you trust me?
You’re as annoying as fuck but yes, I do. Why?
Allow me into your mind.
What? You are in my mind.
No, I mean deepen the connection so that we merge more fully.
How will that help?
I am incorporeal.
I’m fucking not.
No, he said, a tad impatiently, but by merging, I can wrap incorporeal shadows around your form. It should allow you to get closer without either sensing you.
I hear a “but” in that.
Once you are close, Orion, thanks to the demon he is bound to, will feel your presence. You will have to react fast.
I sucked in a breath and then nodded. What do I need to do?
Drop all your shields.
Atticus, I can’t—
I am aware of your inner darkness. It cannot hurt me. Drop your shields.
I hesitated, then one by one, dropped my shields until there was nothing to restrain the darkness.
She stirred lightly, but the pulse of life was absent where I was currently hunkered down, and therefore there was nothing to draw her forth.
That would change once we got into that room.
Orion and Tane might be shielding their magical outputs but their life forces would be flaming hot, even if one was dark and one was light.
That didn’t matter to my inner darkness, of course.
And that scared me.
I might no longer be the teenager who’d unwittingly drained away the life of her boyfriend during intimacy, and my control was far deeper—far stronger—these days than it had been back then, but I still feared the nakedness that came without shielding.
And yet, what choice did I have?
None, because Atticus’s being swept into mine, a warm and reassuring force that was also resolute and unyielding.
His being might be very familiar, but it was filled with so much magical strength that my innards quivered in awe.
I’d always guessed he was powerful, but what I felt now suggested he’d likely been one of the most formidable witches of his era.
My inner darkness stirred ever so briefly, then quietened as a thick wave of disorientation swept over me.
Sweat broke out across my brow, and my eyes lost focus.
I blinked several times; the disorientation growing stronger as a weird sense of displacement crept through me.
It is the incorporeal world stepping into your state of being, Atticus said, his words a soft whisper that nevertheless rattled loudly through my brain. It will cease in a moment.
In the other room, Tane was saying, “You intend to kill her no matter what I do, don’t you?”
“I think we both know it is more than justified. But you can take some peace in the fact I grant her an easier death than you granted my family.”
“Nonsense. I—”
“I have talked to their souls,” Orion cut in harshly. “I know what you did. Where is the final runestone?”
“Release my daughter, and I will give it to you.”
“You say that like you have any choice in this matter,” Orion said. “Like you could alter the outcome here as easily as you have altered so many other—”
He didn’t finish. A thick wave of magic erupted, all but setting fire to the air. Orion’s magic responded, thick and heavy with corruption.
Now, Atticus whispered. Sneak in and keep to the left, following the wall around.
I obeyed, my grip on the knife so damn fierce my knuckles glowed.
Though the room was shadowed, magic spun like lightning through the air, silver and blood-red flashes whose threads didn’t quite light the shadows I padded through.
I could see surprisingly well, but maybe that was due to Atticus’s presence in my mind.
The two of them continued to fight, neither one giving way to the other.
But even from where I was, I could see the smile touching Lanie’s lips and realized then Orion was merely playing with the other man; he was intent on stretching the moment out, drawing Tane’s strength away before he brutally cut him totally down and let him suffer.
I had to get to Monica before then.
I continued on, moving quickly but as quietly as possible, my gaze on the supine figure whose blood slowly dripped into a bucket.
With my shields gone, her life force should have been a luminescent silver fire that shone so brightly it was almost blinding; instead, it was a dull gray that barely even flickered.
There wasn’t enough blood in that bucket to be the cause; it was likely Orion’s use of her as a magical battery.
Either way, death was stepping ever closer.
I had to get to her. I might not be able to save her, given how low her lifeforce now was, but I had to at least try.
I hurried on, ducking under the deadly flashes of magic and doing my best to avoid the various bits of litter scattered across the warehouse’s concrete floor, until I was level with the table that held Monica.
To get closer to her, I would have to get closer to the two men and the deadly shards of magic that continued to cut through the air.
Atticus, you need to leave my mind. I need you to run interference if they turn their attacks on me.
He immediately did so, and the disorientation was so damn bad that I went down on one knee. It probably saved my life, because a spear of dark energy cut inches above my scalp and exploded into the wall behind me, sending thick slabs of brick and grime flying through the air.
A heartbeat later, Tane grunted and fell to his knees. His face was bloody, and his stomach a smoking ruin of guts and blood and flesh; his life energy went from silver to gray between one heartbeat and another.
He was dying, and there was nothing I could do to stop that.
I scrambled upright and ran toward Monica. The man who was Lanie spun around, and a deeply unsettling smile stretched her lips. “Well, well, if it isn’t our persistent, terribly underpowered little witch. It was foolish of you to come here alone, you know.”
“That’s the thing about assumptions,” I snapped back, still running hard for the table. “They’re all too often wrong.”
With that, Atticus attacked, landing on Orion’s head and tearing into her scalp with his razor-sharp claws.
Orion’s magic rose in a wave, and Atticus leapt away from it, his own magic rising to counter the spell as he disappeared into the ether.
The two spells hit and exploded, sending threads of gold and red spearing through the air.
I shifted direction and lunged at Orion with the knife.
He must have sensed its presence at the last minute, because he leapt back and thrust out a hand, a thick ball of bloody energy erupting from his fingertips.
It swept me off my feet and thrust me hard against the building’s rear wall, pinning me there even as my teeth rattled and pain flickered through me.
Atticus reappeared, flung a spell at Orion, then melted away, only to reappear behind him and slash his razor claws across Orion’s calf.
He screamed in fury and spun, and the magic pinning me in place was wrenched away.
I hit the ground with a grunt, my fingers sweeping the concrete to keep balance, then thrust forward again.
Orion spun and cast another bloody spell my way, this one sharp enough to skewer.
I leapt to one side, but it followed me, and Orion’s laugh echoed.
I swore and threw the knife, aiming it into the middle of that bloody spear.
The spell exploded, spraying broken threads into the air, covering me in their violence and stinging like hell.
I swore again, drew the knife back into my hand, and ran on toward Monica. More magic exploded, Atticus and Orion doing battle, neither one seeming to get the upper hand. I reached Monica’s table, slid to a stop, and pushed it to the left so that the opposite end was aimed directly at Orion.