Chapter 25
twenty-five
DANTE
Everyone was silent while the packed elevator descended far more shakily than I remembered.
"Should we worry about the state of the magic?" I asked Ophelia silently.
"Not really. Since it's functioning, I don't think Reaper could've done too much damage to it." She didn't sound completely convinced.
River moved his hands through the air, weaving the shield we may need when we faced the remaining prisoners.
As much as I would've liked to take Reaper down myself, that wasn't what I was there for.
The woman tucked tightly to my chest, with her cheek pressed to my shirt, was the only thing that mattered.
Everyone was tense when the elevator dinged.
Ophelia squeezed her eyes shut.
Violent magic thudded against River's shield as soon as the doors slid open. The sound echoed loudly through the elevator. No one jumped, but a few of the fae exchanged wary looks.
The hallway was packed with prisoners. Some were in rough shape. Others were the reason some were in rough shape.
It would've been nice if Ophelia had a shield of her own, but she didn't have the power reserves for it. We'd be sticking with the group until she'd gathered enough power to branch off, or until Reaper had been killed.
Darius sent a burst of fire toward the prisoners in front of us, and a gap quickly appeared between us and the prisoners. Hands were raising in surrender. Growls and whispers were echoing down the hallway, moving from one person to the next.
If they hadn't recognized the fae royals before, they did now.
"This floor of the penitentiary is being shut down," Liv, the spring fae queen, announced loudly as she and Callum stalked out of the elevator at the front of the group.
"You're all being moved upstairs. Get in a single-file line, against the wall." Callum gestured stiffly toward the wall to our right. "Anyone who makes a move against my people chooses a slow, painful death."
The prisoners fell into line.
Immediately.
There were dozens of glares and an endless supply of hatred being sent our way, but Callum's torture magic scared immortals more than most other threats.
Our people started vacating the elevator. I took Ophelia's hand when she stepped away from my chest, not willing to let her out of my grip. Everyone left in the penitentiary knew who she was, at that point. And all of them had a damn good reason to want her dead because of that.
"Where is Reaper's gang holed up?" River asked one of the prisoners near the front of the group. He scowled, but answered.
"They took over the solitary confinement hallway. The prison doesn't hold them anymore. We've been completely at their mercy since Inferno and his fucking angel left."
Ophelia tensed immediately.
"You did what you had to do. Let it go, and focus on ending this," I said into her mind.
She tried to relax, but I still felt her guilt through the bond.
A group of men fell into step around us. Four security guards. I was under no impression that they were there for my sake. At the moment, I was just Ophelia's fifth guard.
River and Jazz pointed the fae in the right direction.
"We need to be closer, to be inside River's shield," Ophelia murmured to me.
All six of us covered the distance that had grown between our group and theirs, and we did it just in time.
More magic thudded against the shield. It sounded different, and I could feel the power reverberating through the air when it did.
It was significantly stronger than the last magic.
And it undoubtedly belonged to Reaper.
Everyone around us looked grim as we made our way down the hallway.
The first door we passed burst open as the fae in front of us reached it. A group of two men and two wolves lunged at the fae in front of the group. All four of them screamed, falling to their knees as Callum's harsh, icy magic wrapped around them.
Energy followed it, flinging them back against the wall.
Fire followed the energy, and they were dead before they could scream.
"Thank god the fae are on our side," Ophelia said into my mind.
"No kidding."
Two more doors burst open together, and the men who came at us were dead just as quickly as the previous ones.
The guy furthest from our group recognized the fae and threw his hands up in surrender, instead of coming at us.
The spring fae queen threw him into the wall, and he slumped to the floor unconscious, but alive.
"I'm going to throw up if this keeps going," Ophelia muttered. "And I'm supposed to be unraveling magic right now."
"Do what you can. If you can do it while we walk, I can keep you on your feet."
"There's not much left in this hall, and it's really messy. You'll have to hold me up."
"Somehow, I'll manage."
"Don't sass me when our lives are in danger." Her voice was a little playful. It was a good sign. I knew how much guilt she carried about the prison situation.
"How are you going to stop me, Angel?"
Her amusement curled between us before fading as she lifted her hands. "Maybe I'll just fuck you in revenge if we ever get back home."
"We'll get home, and I'll welcome the revenge fuck."
"Alright. I have to focus."
More magic collided with River's shield.
I grabbed her waist to keep her moving just before her pain leaked through the wall between our minds.
My stomach clenched.
Instinct demanded I fix her hurt, but there was no way to do that.
I followed the fae, keeping Ophelia upright as we moved further down the hallway.
As more of Reaper's gang members died, more surrendered.
When we finally reached the end of the hall, the mood was grim.
The final door didn't open itself, and the prisoner inside didn't come out.
The fae exchanged looks, before River finally opened it.
He peered inside before turning back toward us. "It's empty."
Their foreheads creased, and they looked at each other.
Jazz's eyes widened. "He's going for the elevator."
"Oh, fuck," River swore. "If he takes down the elevator's magic..."
Liv was sprinting away from the rest of us before River finished speaking.
Her mate was snarling, shifting into a massive panther as he tore after her.
Darius and his dark-haired mate were at their heels.
Callum groaned loudly, and started walking.
"Do we need to worry?" Jazz asked Callum, her and River jogging slowly.
"No. Darius and Liv can contain him together, and Rae's shadows are alarmingly strong."
They slowed down.
The mood darkened as we reached the other hallway, and found more bodies scattered. They were covered in blood, evidence that the fae royals weren't behind the deaths.
This time, it was Reaper.
Ophelia lowered her hands, blinking away surprise as she looked around.
"What happened?" she asked.
"Reaper went for the elevator."
"Oh god. If he wrecks the magic there..."
"Liv and Darius will take care of it," Callum said, still calm.
"How long did he have?" she asked.
No one answered.
None of us knew.
"Probably the whole time we were in the hallway. Shit. Fuck. He probably had enough time to reach the ladder, if—"
"There's a ladder?" Callum demanded.
"Yeah."
"Of course there's a ladder. We're too deep underground for there not to be a—" Jazz started.
Callum took off at a sprint.
I threw Ophelia over my shoulder and ran after him. River and Jazz were with me.
We skidded around a corner, and ran straight into a fucking battle.
Magic, claws, and fur flew around us.
A wave of icy magic rolled through the air, and the fight ended in a heartbeat.
Everyone who hadn’t come in with us suddenly hit their knees or staggered backward to grab the wall for support.
Screams and shouts of pain flooded the hallway, echoing off every surface, filling my ears and every other sense I possessed.
Ophelia buried her face against my shoulder as we followed a still-sprinting Callum to the elevator in front of us.
Inside the metal box, Liv threw a group of incapacitated prisoners backward with a pulse of her magic.
Still in his panther form, her mate tore through a massive werewolf who’d been lunging for Liv before Callum's magic hit.
The screaming didn’t stop.
Callum did, when he passed Liv and reached the center of the metal box. Then looked up.
We finally joined them, and I stared up through the hole in the metal along with them.
A few feet above us, Rae's shadows snapped around her while she took a massive male to the ground.
Redd. The violent dragon shifter no one had managed to kill yet, including the other prisoners.
Before he could fight back, he started screaming.
There was a massive bruise on Rae's cheek when she gave Callum an irritated look. "I had that covered."
"Merrily couldn't even kill that fucker. No one has him covered," Callum countered.
Rae stood up, her eyes immediately lifting to the fight above her head.
There were three other bodies piled off to her side, but my attention followed hers.
Halfway up the elevator shaft, fire, shadow, and icy tendrils flew wildly.
Darius, and Reaper.
Tortured screams still echoed behind us, but we couldn't see a damn thing through the flames and steam.
River took a step forward, like he was thinking of going up there.
Liv stopped him with an arm in front of his chest.
"Darius won't lose," she said firmly.
The fire and ice stopped, suddenly.
A body plummeted.
Another followed.
Thick shadows caught them both, moving faster than I could blink. The shadows lowered both men to the elevator.
Reaper was dead.
Darius was grinning wildly.
"You and your dramatic entrances," Rae tossed out, as he dusted himself off.
Redd was still screaming, but neither of them acknowledged him.
"I knew you'd save my ass. You'd miss it too much if I was dead," Darius teased.
"We're not talking about dying." Rae stalked over to the edge of the hole and peered down, meeting Ophelia's gaze. "I don't think your elevator's going to work again."
Ophelia grimaced. "The magic's a mess anyway."
"The ladder looks like fun, though," Liv said cheerfully.
The screaming behind us finally started to quiet down. Callum must've been easing up on his magic.
"We're going to take Redd and Arthur up. Mer wants to make sure Artie's dead, and we all know how Redd is," Darius added. "You guys good down there?"
"We're fine. Enjoy." Liv gave him a thumbs-up.
“I need to get to Kat,” Callum said, already eyeing the hole in the elevator's roof with a deep frown.
“I’ve got you,” Rae said, and her shadows grabbed him around the waist.
His frown deepened as her shadows hauled him through the hole, setting him on his feet at the bottom of the ladder.
“We’ve got the prisoners,” Liv called out, looking to Niall, River, and Jazz for backup. They agreed.
Rae's shadows wrapped around the prisoners' bodies, slowly lifting them off the ground as she started climbing.
Darius followed Callum to the ladder. “I’ll spot you on the way up.”
“Fuck you,” Callum grumbled in response.
Dare snorted. “I love you too.”
They started climbing. Callum, first, with Darius behind him.
"We'll deal with the elevator last," Ophelia said, her gaze moving slowly over the magic I couldn't see. "That's going to hurt like a bitch."
"Unlike the rest of the unweaving," River drawled.
She gave him a tiny smile. "That'll be a walk in the park, compared to this. And the magic around Reaper's cell. Last time I saw it, it was totally fucked up."
River grimaced. "I'm sorry."
"It's fine. I've made it through worse."
I couldn't translate the look they shared, but River finally nodded once.
Ophelia took my hand, and led me back down the hallway. "Let's finish this."
"Everyone, get back in line!" Liv yelled, as we headed away with our group of guards.
After the hell Callum had just put them through, no one said a word as they followed the command.