Date: 2021-07-30 04:00:00+00:00
Description: When Emma finds herself face to face with her father, a man she hasn’t seen since she was a girl, she’ll find her emotions all over the place. But when Emma realizes her father isn’t alone and that the Unseelie Fae, Black Annis, is by his side, she realizes things are about to go from bad to worse. Meanwhile, Rowan is stuck at Kinloch Kirk where Nyx is busily trying to open a portal to Faery so Mathilda can be saved from certain death. Making the process even more difficult is the fact that everyone at Kinloch Kirk is under attack by the Vryloka. But, what Rowan isn’t betting on is the arrival

WHISPERS OF THE MOON

Book 24 of the Underworld series

by

H.P. Mallory

Whispers of the Moon

Published by Rain Press

Copyright © 2021 by H.P Mallory

All rights reserved.

Ebook Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents:

Foreword

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Reading Sample: Hell on Earth

Other Books by H.P. Mallory

About Author

Foreword
by J.R. Rain

Dear Reader,

I’m very excited to introduce you to the New York Times bestselling Underworld Series!

The Underworld Series is written by my good friend and co-author, H.P. Mallory, and if you haven’t read her books yet, I really think you’ll enjoy H.P.’s flare for writing twisting and turning plots, all with plenty of action, comedy and emotion.

What’s even more exciting is that the Underworld Series features three series in one: the first five books tell the story of psychic turned witch, Jolie Wilkins. The next nine books continue the saga, focusing on reader favorite, vampire Sinjin Sinclair. The final books are the most epic as they feature narratives from old and new characters, while introducing exciting storylines that will leave you on the edge of your seat.

So, if you’re looking for a bestselling series to sink your teeth into, you’ve just found it!

Happy Reading,

—J.R.

Whispers of the Moon

ONE

Emma

“Dad?”

It really was a question.

I mean… I knew the man standing before me, looking as guilty as he did shocked, was my father and yet this wasn’t the man I remembered. At all. Sure, it had been years since we’d been in the same room together and time only runs one way, but this was   more than a physical change.

From time to time while I was at Elmington, people had asked about my father. Thankfully, his identity was kept secret so most of the people I went to school with didn’t know I was the daughter of Duine, the Dark One—that would have been a tough reputation to drag around, and school was hard enough to start with. But a few teachers knew (and didn’t keep it to themselves as much as they should have). Also, there were a few close friends whom I’d decided to tell because carrying a secret like that all by yourself could be a heavy load at times. And so people asked—some directly, others more casually—what was he like?

The truth was that I didn’t really know. Yes, I could tell them what he’d been like as a father, as someone who raised me, and he’d been wonderful. But, I couldn’t tell them what he was like now. Since my mother’s death, my father had been a different man, one whom I didn’t recognize. Furthermore, it’s not like I’d had much of a chance to get to know him as I’d gone to live with my Aunt Bryn and my cousin, Rowan. And Aunt Bryn didn’t like my father—something she tried to hide, but the truth was always clear in her facial expressions. So, I knew Rand Balfour, but I didn’t know High Mage Duine.

And yet I still answered the questions. Partly because people persisted in asking, insisting I must know something about him. I still answered the questions and I gave him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe it was an advantage to me that I hadn’t spent any time with him since that terrible change that had occurred in his personality, seemingly overnight. An advantage because not seeing him had enabled me to preserve my memories of the man he once was and to assume that everyone else was lying or exaggerating about the awful things he did. I’d heard the stories of course—everyone had—the stories of the horrific things done by the new leader of the King’s Alliance, of the atrocities he’d perpetrated and the diabolical plans he had for the future. I’d heard them, but in my mind, I wrote them all off as lies. After all; they were rumors. Where had they come from? Who’d first told them? Who knew what my father had really done and what he was planning to do? No, they were all just stories and the stories didn’t sound like the man I knew.

So when people asked, I told them about the Rand Balfour who had been a gentle and loving father, and I told them everything else was nonsense.

And then I saw him.

“Emma.” I felt Stone’s hand on my shoulder and I drew strength from his touch.

We’d entered the headquarters of the King’s Alliance without any great difficulty because if you’re the High Mage’s daughter, then guards are too scared to give you any shit. But as we got closer to my father’s private quarters, the guards got a bit bolder—they were clearly on high alert for something, only they seemed to be confused as to what that something could be. They might not have wanted to risk giving me any rough treatment, but they had no such qualms where Stone was concerned.

I had to admit a certain quiet pride when I watched him fight them off. Stone fought as if someone had crossed dancing with boxing. He had the toughness and strength of a raw street fighter, and the grace of a dancer. His vampire speed allowed him to easily avoid the swings of the guards, but the way he moved was all him. I knew more than a few vampires and none of them moved like Stone did. I wasn’t someone who was turned on by violence, nor was I the sort of girl who expected her man to punch someone to prove his love, but watching Stone fight? Yeah, that was sexy as hell.

As we’d moved through the building, I’d been composing in my head what I was going to say when I saw Dad for the first time. I was going to be hard on him—something I thought was fair given the circumstances—but I’d also be eloquent and fair, because I didn’t know what the truth was. I didn’t know if the things people said about him were true. What I did know was that he knew why werewolves, Druids, and Vryloka (oh my) had all come after me in the last week, and I wanted to know why he hadn’t at least given me a warning! Something which seemed like the least a father could do, knowing his daughter was in danger.

It was a good speech; it was measured and fair, it made cogent points and allowed him to respond. It encapsulated what I’d been doing for the last ten years; it gave him the benefit of the doubt, because, for all that had happened and for all that he might or might not have done, he was still my daddy.

And then I saw him.

Without having to ask, I knew it was all true. All the stories, all the rumors, all the gossip. The truth was there in the guilty hunch of his shoulders and the dark aura he carried around him like a shroud. To me, who still remembered the tall, bright, and utterly handsome man who was haloed like a hero by the sun, who had been my personal god (as every father is to his daughter) it seemed as if that aura had crushed him. He seemed weighed down by the weight of his own deeds, like a wealthy king who doesn’t realize that the gold in his pockets is what’s weighing him down. I saw in his red-rimmed eyes a history of blood, and the lines etched into his face seemed to number the screams of his victims. He wasn’t the man I remembered. He wasn’t the man I knew. But he was still my father—and that was the worst of it.

“Emma…”

He was surprised to see me and I wondered what he might have done if I’d given him advanced notice. Would he have hugged me? Would he have said something fatherly? Would he have disallowed me to come here in the first place?   I supposed I’d never know because I hadn’t given him the chance.

“What have you done?”

The words seemed to force themselves from my throat and they came out raw and strangled.

“What’s… what’s happened to you?”

I was trying to talk at the same time as I tried to hold back my tears, but putting my thoughts into words broke a dam inside me. For a decade I’d kept all the fears and suspicions bricked up and I’d denied what everyone said about my father, even as I probably knew the stories to be true. Now that dam burst and the realization crashed into me on a tidal wave of emotion that I couldn’t control. I was in pieces and the words came tumbling out. “I didn’t believe it, I wouldn’t believe it, I told everyone ‘no’, I told them I knew you better, that you wouldn’t do the things they accused you of doing, that you couldn’t have done them, would never have done the things they said you had, but you did do all those things, didn’t you? You did all of them and probably worse still.”

“Emma…”

But, I shook my head, refusing to allow him to speak. Not until he heard everything I had to say. Not until I got out what I needed to. “I missed Mom just as much as you did and maybe I would have been a better person if she’d been around, but if I’m not perfect then at least I’m not a monster!” I could feel the hot, salty tears dripping down my face and it felt like there was an enormous toad in my throat, but still the words kept coming. “Mum would be ashamed of you!”

In the rush of emotions tumbling out of me, caught up in my rage and grief, I barely noticed the spasm of confusion that twitched on his face every time I mentioned Mom. He looked like two different men, and perhaps if I’d been less overwrought in that moment, then I would have noticed that one of those men could actually be the father I remembered.

“I loved you, I looked up to you, I defended you—through everything! I… I stayed on your side and you couldn’t even tell me when there were things… awful things… coming for me.”

“Emma…”

I held up a hand. “But that’s not even the worst of it! The worst of it is that now I know. Maybe before I could kid myself that you sent me to live with Aunt Bryn after Mom died because you genuinely thought it was the best thing for me. I could kid myself that you cut me out of your life because you were an important man and you were doing your bit to hold the factions together after Mom died. I could kid myself that you were making a sacrifice by giving me up; that you were putting duty before your daughter and that it wasn’t an easy choice for you to make. But now I know! Now I can see what you put before me; yourself! Your own ambitions and your own hatred and spite and bile and selfishness! You put your own love of cruelty, your desire to inflict pain on other people before your own daughter! I always knew there were things you cared about more than me, but to find out what those things are—power, greed, and sadism? Now I know where I rank in your eyes. You’d rather torture an innocent man to steal an ounce of magic than make one damned phone call to your daughter!”

Suddenly, I realized I’d been wanting to say all that for a long time.

“Emma.” I couldn’t interpret his tone. His eyes flicked from me to Stone and back again, and I realized that, even now, a part of him was assessing us both in terms of how much a threat we posed. That realization should have been a brutal one, but by now I was numb. For a young person, there’s nothing worse than indifference from a parent.

I glared at him, hot tears pouring down my face. “I lost both parents the day Mom died.”

Dad glanced down at something on the bed which he’d dropped when Stone and I had entered. It looked like a jewel or crystal of some sort. I noticed Stone looking at it too, and from the expression on his face, he knew what it was. I didn’t care. But then, I didn’t care about much right then. I was done.

“Let’s go.”

Stone was there beside me, his arm instantly around my shoulders, comforting, strengthening, and loving. If I had no father then at least I had a wonderful boyfriend.

“Emma…” my dad said again. It was the only thing he’d said since we’d come. And no, it wasn’t enough. It was far from being enough.

“We’ve got nothing to say to each other,” I interrupted   before he could get any further. “We’re done.” Then I reconsidered. “Actually, no, you and I do have a future; as enemies. I know there are people who want to stop whatever horrible things you’re trying to do… things I don’t want to even think about… and I’d like to be quite clear about this; I am going to help them. I am going to join one of those rebel groups you despise so much. And once I do, I will help them do whatever it takes to bring you down.” I paused, anger and hatred fueling me, giving me the strength I didn’t think I’d otherwise possess. “And I know it won’t be easy. You’re still my…” I couldn’t finish the sentence. “But what you are now is a betrayal of the father I loved and I won’t let you tread all over his memory.” I took a deep breath and then turned on my toes, intending to walk out the door. On the way, I called over my shoulder, “Goodbye Duine.”

I walked, Stone with me, still holding me—he hadn’t said a word, clearly feeling it wasn’t his place to do so, but I felt his support just by his presence.

“Emma…”

This time it seemed as if Dad was going to say something more, but what those words might have been I’d never know.

“I’m afraid that in the circumstances, it will be quite impossible for you to leave.”

From the shadows by the door, a figure stepped out; an elderly woman, shriveled and wrinkled and yet with piercing black eyes and an air of threat that seemed to waft before her like perfume. I couldn’t tell if she’d been there throughout my entire diatribe and I’d somehow failed to notice her (though surely Stone would have seen her?). Maybe she’d just sneaked in or materialized in the room somehow. Yet, she didn’t have the aura of a vampire.

“If Emma says we’re leaving, then we’re leaving,” said Stone, putting himself between the old woman and me while still moving towards the door.

“No.” The old woman raised a hand.

“No…” I heard my father speak from behind me.

The old woman smiled. “Worry not, High Mage, we are here to help you.”

“But…”

The woman clutched her raised hand into a fist and suddenly, my feet wouldn’t move. It was as if they were stuck to the floor.

“Stone…?”

Stone didn’t say anything but looking down, he yanked his feet upward, or tried to, but his feet seemed to be as stuck as mine. He rounded angrily on the old woman. “Let us go right now!” The woman cackled a laugh like a broken twig. Still, Stone tried to pull against her magic but he was stuck. Just as I was stuck.

“Who are you?” I asked at the same time as Stone yelled to her. “What have you done to us?”

She cackled again. “What have I done to you? I would think that answer was obvious to a magic teacher, Stone Draper—Professor Draper—I should say… Though you’re a pretty poor sort of educator, considering you’re sleeping with your student.”

My father looked at me and despite everything that had passed between us, I felt my cheeks burn.

“I’m in love with Emma and what I do with her is none of your concern!” Stone railed at the old woman, who just shook her head and cackled again. “Now, answer my question, crone!”

“Your granny would have known the magic necessary,” the old woman went on and Stone’s face hardened at the mention of his grandmother who had taught him magic… gypsy magic. “As for who I am, I have gone by many names in my days… but the one by which most know me and the one you may recognize is Black Annis.”

Stone drew in a breath at the unveiling of the old woman’s identity. She, meanwhile, rapped her stick hard on the stone floor as if to underline her point and I realized the stick was a human femur bone.

“What does a Fae of the Unseelie Court want with us?” asked Stone. He was trying to keep pace with her, as if to say; you know who I am? I know you too.

But Black Annis just smirked an unpleasant smile full of long, narrow and yellow teeth. “With the girl? Much. With you, Stone Draper; not a damn thing. You are simply in my way.” She cackled again. “And being in my way isn’t a place a person wants to be, nor one in which they’re likely to remain long.”

“Wait.” My father seemed to have recovered himself enough to speak, and a thin shred of hope shone inside me. Maybe, just maybe, there was enough of my true father left to save the day, to make everything alright—that was what fathers did, wasn’t it? They rode in on their white horses and saved their daughters from the evils of the world? That was how I remembered my dad, anyway—in my memories, he’d made the sun come out on every cloudy day.

Black Annis’s hard eyes turned on my dad. “What?”

The tone of her voice was a challenge as much as a question, daring him to defy her, and I wondered what had previously passed between them. Surely my father could have no connection to this creature. But then again, she was standing here, in the center of the room, and he didn’t seem startled by her appearance. No… she seemed… familiar to him. And that was when I realized that whatever my dad was embroiled in… it was far worse than I’d imagined.

“Don’t hurt her.”

The words seemed hard for my father to say, as if saying them was a physical effort.

Annis smiled that nasty smile again. “Anything you say, High Mage. This is still your realm and your wish is the rule here. No harm shall come to her. Is there anything else?”

Again I saw the struggle in my father’s face, but this time his better angels seemed to lose the fight. He simply shook his head and I felt my stomach drop. He wasn’t going to protect Stone and that meant…

“Thank you, High Mage.” Black Annis bowed mockingly, pretending to show respect to someone for whom she obviously had none. “Take them.”

Dark Fae poured from the shadows as I turned around in shock. This time, I was sure no one had been there before, and yet, here they were—as if they’d been the shadows, themselves. Our feet were released as the legion of the Dark Fae reached us and Stone instantly fought as they tried to grab me.

“Touch her and you’ll lose an arm!”

With swift lefts and rights, he laid out two of the Fae and a spinning kick took down the third.

“This is futile, Stone Draper.” Black Annis shook her head.

She might have been right, but futile or not, Stone wouldn’t let the Dark Fae come near me without a fight. More of them slunk out of the shadows, ugly and distorted, evil mirrors of the light Fae I knew.

“When there’s an opening, run,” Stone whispered to me.

“I won’t leave you.”

“It’s you they want,” he insisted. “Emma, please do as I say.”

Stone charged them.

By now, there were at least ten of the Dark Fae and he cannoned into them with all his strength.

I hated to leave him, but I knew I had to do as he said. The trouble was that, hard as he pressed, he couldn’t clear a path to the door. And that meant I couldn’t get through. All I could do was stand and watch as the Dark Fae pushed him back, overwhelming him, piling in on top of him, punching, kicking, scratching at him.

Desperately I whirled around and faced my father. “Daddy, please don’t let them hurt him!”

My father had the power to stop this. He was High Mage Duine of the King’s Alliance, he had the magic to throw them back.

But he did nothing. My father’s face was blank as he stared at the fight in front of him. There was nothing there—no emotion. It was as if he were asleep with his eyes open. Although… the more I looked into his eyes, the more I could see something bubbling just beneath the veneer… horror.

The Dark Fae pinned Stone to the floor. He reared up again with a cry and I could see his muscles straining as he pushed against them with every sinew of strength he still possessed.

“Capture them both,” Black Annis said. “Take the girl to the dungeon.”

“You won’t touch her!” Stone yelled as he was overcome by my father’s soldiers. There were just too many of them and Stone must have realized as much because a moment later, he dropped his head, his lips moving quickly as if in prayer. He was going to try a spell.

“There will be none of that.”

I shrieked as Black Annis’s bone stick cracked against the back of Stone’s head, knocking him unconscious to the floor below.

“Take him away,” snapped Black Annis as her smile grew. “Let the vampire watch the sun rise.”

I raced forward, my rage and worry for Stone fueling me, but it was a futile gesture. The Dark Fae caught me and held me tightly. Closing my eyes, I willed whatever magic I had to come. That magic had saved us when we were pursued by the Vryloka back in the States. It was powerful magic, white hot and wild, and it had thrown back the whole horde, but I’d had no idea where it came from or how to summon it when I needed it. Now, when I needed it most, it refused to come.

“Now,” Black Annis sneered, “let’s find you a nice comfortable cell to sit and cry in while the vampire burns.”

“Dad!” I screamed. “Don’t let her do this!”

But there was no response.

As I was dragged from the room, I managed a final glance back at my father. His eyes looked like prisoners in the mask of his face; anguish held inmate by blank passivity. It told me that something of the father I’d known still remained, but maybe there wasn’t enough to matter.

The truth was that he’d fallen victim to himself.

Rand Balfour was too weak to fight High Mage Duine.

TWO

Rowan

My heart sank.

Just as it seemed Nyx was successfully re-opening the portal between Kinloch Kirk and Faery, utilizing energy she’d transferred from the last remaining open portal somewhere in America, the familiar shapes of attacking Vryloka appeared in the sky above the sea.

“Shiiiitttt…” she muttered.

Though she was totally focused on what she was doing, clearly even Nyx had noticed the approach. Not that there was anything she could do about it. Right now, she was acting as a human conduit for the unstable portal energy. While her body seemed to be here, in front of us, her left arm was, in fact, stretched between Scotland and the US, while her right thrust through into distant Faery. If something went wrong now, then half of her would be scattered across the Atlantic, and the other half would be fractured across the dimensions between the worlds, and if she was very lucky, she might not feel it happening.

Nyx closed her eyes, bowed her head and I was sure she was hoping everyone else could protect her, because right now she had no other options; this wasn’t something she could quit partway through.

For my own part, all I could do was stare, standing as if rooted to the spot, somewhere between terror and fascination. I’d hoped I’d seen the last of these creatures, but clearly that hope was useless. And no prizes for guessing who they’d come for. How did you deal with something like that? With knowing that all the destruction was happening because of you—not because of something you’d done but because of who you were.

But if I was incapable of doing anything more useful than staring slack-jawed, contemplating the whims of fate, others were more proactive.

“Come on!”

I heard O’Rourke’s words and a split-second later, I was being dragged up the beach by the vampire hunter, tripping over my feet as I went and making her turn in irritation.

“Rowan, are you anxious to die or would you like me to carry you?”

She would have    carried me, I was pretty sure of that. I coaxed my legs into activity and was soon running after O’Rourke, who still half-dragged me as she was quicker than I was. As we went, I saw a look pass between O’Rourke and the Daywalker, Freya. I understood what it meant; Freya was checking to make sure I was safe, before tackling the Vryloka. For her and her fellow Daywalker Crispin, for the vampires back in the house waiting for the sun to rise, and even for O’Rourke herself, my safety came first. Just as it was crazy to me that the Vryloka were here to kill me, it was equally crazy that all these people were here to protect me and would die to do it. I just had the hardest time wrapping my head around that truth because it was nuts; I wasn’t important, I was nobody. I couldn’t help feeling that the whole world would be better when everyone realized I wasn’t a big deal. At least then quite a few lives would be saved.

“Get inside, stay inside,” said O’Rourke firmly, pulling the bow from her back as she turned back towards the fight.

“But…” I started to object.

“No argument,” snapped O’Rourke. “If you don’t do as you’re told, then I have to stay up here and protect you rather than going down and fighting with the rest of them, and then someone else might die. If it makes you feel better, then tell yourself you’re staying here to protect Mathilda.”

“Okay,” I finally agreed.

I turned to the door just as it sprang open, so hard, it smacked against the outside wall. Laucian, Bella and Xander had been waiting indoors, unable to help because they were vampires and it was still daylight, but the sun had just dipped below the horizon and they could now join the fight.

“Go!” shouted O’Rourke as she tore after the vampires, notching an arrow to her bow as she went. She aimed as she ran and let fly, the arrow picking a Vryloka out of the sky with unbelievable accuracy so it fell with a splash to the sea below. She was amazing—truly amazing. And yet, why was someone like her risking her life for someone like me who couldn’t even defend herself? It was messed up. They would all be much better off if I just allowed myself to be killed.

But I’d said I’d follow O’Rourke’s instructions and I fully intended to do so. I even had the door handle in my hand when I glanced around again, and what I saw froze me where I stood.

To the south-west of the beach, two more people were rushing down the dunes, apparently to join the fight. They were a distance from me and yet I recognized them both instantly. Even so, I had to take a second look because it was too unbelievable to be true, too much to hope for. But, as I squinted out along the beach, I knew what I was seeing.

And I was seeing… my parents.

My parents?

I had to remind myself to breathe.

It had been ten years since I’d seen my dad and we’d barely even spoken much since then. Now he was here, running to my aid. And there was no doubt in my mind that it was him. Even over all the years, I’d never forgotten what my father looked like. I’d kept his image firmly implanted in my head and now to watch him run down the beach, it felt like a dream.

If I’d had a doubt in my mind that it was my mother and father I was watching, that doubt vanished as I saw them fight against the Vryloka. They moved like one person, always having the other’s back, seeming to read each other’s minds as they fought. If Mum was in trouble, then Dad was right there; if Dad needed help finishing off one of the Vryloka, then Mum was right there.

Years of training together meant they always had chemistry when they fought and clearly a decade apart hadn’t changed that, and yet… maybe I was being overly optimistic, like any child of separated parents, but that chemistry between them seemed so easy and flowing. Was it possible they were back together? Had they worked out their differences? Had Mum finally forgiven him? They’d shown up together—that had to mean something? I was scared to even hope for as much.

The melee on the beach was an impressive one. The members of the Samhain who had come with Nyx, and who were led by her huge friend (I think his name was Conal), were fighting like demons with a mixture of magic and brute force. The vampires and Daywalkers set to watch me (or to spy on me) by my dad worked together, their speed and strength hugely impressive. At the edge of the group, O’Rourke wielded her bow to deadly effect, picking off Vryloka out of the sky, never seeming to miss, targeting any who looked as if they might try to get up the beach to the house and to me. Not far from her was Laucian, managing to seem suave and collected even as he fought, never a hair out of place and yet he was able to leap into the air and drag down Vryloka to the ground with    unexpected brutality.

Out of all of this violence and chaos, I couldn’t keep my eyes away from my parents. And the more I watched them work in unison, shouting commands and smiling over small victories, it seemed to me I was watching a love story. According to Mathilda, the relationship between my mum and dad had always been a spiky one; they’d enjoyed throwing insults at each other, challenging one another, and arguing as if it were going out of style, and yet all of those differences came from a place of love. That’s what Mathilda always said anyway. To hear it from her, you’d think my mother and father were made for each other. And Mathilda said she never lost hope that they’d work things out and be reunited.

Now as they fought, it looked like they were dancing. Fighting was how they let off steam together—one of my earliest memories was of them training on the beach.   M    om laughing as Dad tossed her over his head and she landed on her feet in a fighting stance just behind him. And the look of pride in his eyes… I didn’t want to get my hopes up, but I couldn’t help it. Watching them now was as if I’d gone back in time.

From the center of the fight a woman’s scream erupted—Nyx. Seconds later came a bright flickering of multi-colored light, and a ripple of power you could taste on the air, which made the ground tremble. My hair rose with the crackle of it. The portal was open again.

“Nyx!” I heard the bellow of Conal, and he caught Nyx as she dropped. Lifting her with ease, the big man ran back towards the house.

Suddenly it felt as if I had a purpose. As Conal ran, I held open the door so he could carry Nyx in, stooping as he went.

“Put her on the couch,” I said. “I’ll get her some water.”

“And a cloth!” called Conal. “She’s burning up.”

In the kitchen, I quickly filled a bowl with cold water, folded a dishcloth and soaked it, then rushed into the living room where Conal was waiting. Laid out on the couch, Nyx looked smaller than ever before. Her porcelain skin looked even paler. Her eyes were closed and her hands…

I gasped and bit my lip. Her hands looked as if they’d been burned.

“Ice,” said Conal bluntly, and I hurried back to the kitchen.

When I returned with two more dishcloths filled with ice to cool the burns, I found Conal hunched over Nyx.

“Don’t you dare go, you arrogant bitch,” he growled at her but there was true fear in his tone. “Use that infinite power of yours and fight, Nyx,” he whispered. “Stay with us.” So much love in a man who looked like a bear.

“Here.”

Conal took the ice from me and placed it on Nyx’s hands. As he did, I saw the burn marks move and writhe, twisting her scorched flesh. These weren’t ordinary burns, but magical ones. I didn’t know what it would take to heal them.

“Thank you,” I whispered to her. She’d risked her life and given so much to help Mathilda. I didn’t know what else to say.

Whether it was my gratitude, the cold of the ice, Conal’s obvious love, or something else, Nyx’s eyes flickered open. They were low-lidded but the vibrant green still sparkled like an emerald.

“The portal is open?” she managed.

I nodded.

“Then what are you waiting for, you stupid girl?”

I still wasn’t sure if I liked Nyx as she was quite abrasive, but I was grateful to her and she was right. I nodded and then turned around, raced for the stairs, running up them two at a time, and crashed through the door into Mathilda’s bedroom.

For a moment, I thought I’d come too late and all of this was for nothing. Mathilda lay so still, her skin ashen, her cheeks sunken and her eyes closed. Then I glimpsed the fractional movement of her chest.

“Mathilda!”

Those old eyes—eyes that I’d known every day of my life—opened and Mathilda smiled at me. “I can smell… home.”

I smiled down at her. “The portal is open.”

“Well,” she spoke as casually as if she was hearing about the weather, “quite a miracle.”

“You have to come!”

Mathilda looked at me. “I don’t think I can, Rowan.”

She was too weak.

“Wait here.” Which was a stupid thing to say in the circumstances. I dashed back downstairs to where I’d left Conal.

“Mathilda can’t walk. She can barely move. You have to carry her out.”

“I’m not leaving Nyx,” said Conal firmly.

“Oh, for the love of fuck!” Nyx snapped weakly, glaring up at him as best as she could. “I’ve just damn near fucking killed myself to save the fucking Fae and you won’t fucking carry her? Get your fucking lazy ass upstairs.”

“Nyx,” he started, but she shook her head.

“I promise not to die till you get back.”

Nyx swore more than any person I knew, but it did seem to get results. Conal grudgingly stood and followed me up to Mathilda’s room, the stairs creaking under his weight.

Mathilda looked up mildly as he entered. “You’re a big boy, aren’t you?”

With ease, Conal picked up Mathilda (he could probably have picked up the bed as well) and headed back downstairs.

“Wait,” I heard Mathilda say as we passed the living room. “I can feel her pain.”

“Mathilda…” I hurried forward but the elderly Fae shushed me.

“I won’t have people suffering for me.”

Conal carried Mathilda into the living room and knelt beside Nyx. Mathilda reached out a pale, wrinkled hand and I held my breath. She was so close to being cured and now she was risking her life by using some of the limited power she had left to heal Nyx. But, of course, she was right; what else did I expect from her? I liked to hope I might have done the same thing in her place.

“Don’t waste your energy,” Nyx said as she looked at Mathilda.

But, the old woman shook her head and gripped Nyx’s wrist even harder. After another second, Nyx’s eyes widened. She sat up and taking a big breath, held up her hands. The burns were gone.

“Fuck me.”

“Mathilda?” I could feel tears rising in my eyes. She looked very still.

“She’s still breathing,” said Conal.

“Go.” But by the time Nyx spoke, Conal was already on his feet, moving fast, out the door and down the beach, running with me on his heels.

Outside, the battle was all but over, and this time for good. There were bodies of Vryloka strewn all over the sand and I was sure even more were now becoming fish food in the sea. It was clear—the Vryloka wouldn’t be back, at least not for a little while.

My mum and dad looked up to see me, but for the moment I was more worried about Mathilda.

“Take her through the portal!” I yelled.

As I spoke the command, I looked beyond Conal to the portal itself and saw, to my surprise, people waiting on the far side, headed by a man I’d known when I was younger but hadn’t seen for many years. He was huge and looked like a lion with the broad planes of his face and the mane of blonde hair that flowed behind him. He was the King Odran. He strode through the portal to meet Conal, with his arms outstretched to take Mathilda.

“Ah’ll take her from here,” said Odran. “She’ll bide best with her own.”

Gently, Conal passed Mathilda to the Fae King, and Odran carried her back with him, through the portal into Faery.

My eyes remained glued on the portal and the shimmering indistinct image beyond. As the bright daylight of Faery touched Mathilda, I saw her stir. She raised her head and smiled at me. Although I couldn’t hear her, I saw her mouth move to say ‘Thank you’.

We’d done it, we’d saved her. I could have broken down in tears where I stood.

“Rowan?”

I turned to find my mum and dad behind me, holding hands.

And the dam of my emotions finally burst.

I flung myself into their arms, tears of happiness and relief streaming down my face. No doubt the threat wasn’t over yet, more Vryloka would be coming, but it no longer seemed to matter. I believed in my heart that we could face anything because… we were a family again.

And the news only got better, as Mum whispered to me.

“Your Aunt Jolie is alive.”

THREE

Jolie

“There was once ah man. Nae ah bad man but… flawed.”

Morse paused, as if collecting his thoughts, as if trying to decide the best way of telling this tale.

“Morse?”

He’d paused so long, I felt compelled to fill the silence.

He blinked, as if coming out of sleep. “Ye see… the problem is that it’s nae jist mah story. ‘Tis several stories intersectin’—yers as much as anyone’s—comin’ together an’ leadin’ to me endin’ with Luce (at least, whit’s left o’ Luce) inside me. So many stories.” Another silence, shorter this time. “Life’s all stories, isn’t it? Only nae neat like the ones in books, with a beginnin’, a middle, an’ an end. In life, the story doesnae end. The road goes ever on an’ on.”

“Down from the door where it began,” I added, knowing the quote well.

Morse smiled. “Tolkien.” I nodded as he continued. “Mah road… Well, it started pretty wild. Actually—nae true—it started pretty conventional, then Ah fell in with a ‘bad crowd’ (as they say nowadays). Ah suppose many kids do the same an’ some grow out o’ it while others dinnae. Ah was somewhere in the middle. Ah grew out o’ it but it left its scars on me an’ every now an’ then Ah’d do somethin’ Ah shouldnae have done. If Ah could speak to that child now an’ tell him what he was getting’ himself intae…” he shook his head and there was a wistfulness that filled his eyes. “But ye cannae go back.”

“You’re not a warlock or Fae or anything are you?” I guessed.

“Nah. Just Morse.”

I’d spent so long wondering which faction Morse belonged to, it had never occurred to me that he was just a human.

“Ah’ll give ye the short version,” said Morse. “Ah was often light in the pocket back then an’ when times were tough, then Ah wasnae above theft. Ah dinnae make excuses for it—there were many worse off than me that dinnae turn to crime, an’ Ah could have worked harder, made more an effort if Ah’d wanted. But Ah took the path o’ least resistance. That was mah way back then.”

“And you robbed the wrong place?” I suggested.

Morse was right; life was stories and that was an old one: the thief who breaks into the wrong house and winds up with more than he bargained for. Sometimes it seemed as if such things were destined to happen over and over again, as if narrative had a sort of gravitational pull that insisted everything play out as it had a hundred times before. Or perhaps we were all just stupid enough to continue making the same old mistakes.

“A friend o’ mine told me about a place—‘twas rumored to be owned by a cult,” Morse went on. “Rich as you like. He wouldnae go near it an’ told me nae to—that Ah’d be riskin’ me life with a dangerous bunch, he said. But Ah was young an’ headstrong an’ stupid an’ in Ah went. Ah know now there was a protection spell on the door, but at the time, all Ah knew was that somethin’ knocked me on mah ass. Ah remember…” He paused, groping through old recollections. “Shapes mostly. Some faces. Lights and colors. Magic Ah suppose. Ah dinnae know how long Ah was out, but when Ah came to meself again, Ah knew something had changed. Ah was different, an’ Ah heard a voice in me head.”

“Luce.”

Morse nodded. “Ah still dinnae know why his followers picked me to play host. Was Ah jist convenient because Ah broke in? Or did they see somethin’ in me? Ah rather hope it was the latter—if ye’re goin’ to ruin yer life, then at least have it be so because ye were special.”

“And then?” I wanted to know it all.

Morse shrugged. “Ah went back to me life. Ah knew somethin’ was different but it didnae seem to stop me from livin’ as Ah had before. There were mornings Ah woke up with nae memory o’ what Ah’d done the night before, an’ people said ‘Morse, what were ye drinkin’ last night? Ye were out o’ control.’. Ah suppose that was when Luce came through me, took control of me. But it didnae happen often, an’ Ah learned to live with it.”

“What about Luce’s followers?” I pressed. “They just let you be?”

“Nae exactly,” Morse admitted. “Ah was… aware o’ them. Ah was aware there were people watchin’ me. But they didnae trouble me. So again; Ah learned to live with what Ah started to consider… me condition. Ah suppose ‘twas to their advantage that Ah lived a normal life. They were tryin’ to hide Luce an’ inside o’ me was the last place anyone would think to look.”

“Except someone did look.”

He pulled a rueful face. “Aye. Orzik found me. Or maybe ‘twas the Fir Darrig that found me, but Orzik was the one who came for me. Ah have little memory o’ that too, but Ah woke up in the Abyss.”

From the look in his eyes, he was reliving the horror of realization that his whole life had been taken from him and he was doomed to that living Hell. I wondered how he’d survived. Morse might not have been magic, but there was no doubting his bravery and tenacity.

“‘Twas a livin’ nightmare,” said Morse. His eyes flicked up, “Until the day Ah met you.”

He meant the words, I knew he meant them. And looking at him now, I wondered how much I might mean them back. But I didn’t dare say anything, not until I saw Rand, not until I fully understood the man he had become, the man Bryn warned me about. As far as I was concerned, Rand was still the love of my life and he always had been. As long as there was a chance… I loved Morse, but Rand was more than my love, he was the other half of my soul.

“And now,” Morse stood. “Ah must leave ye.”

“What?” I sprang up too.

Morse shrugged and grinned a humorless grin. “Ye know the score, Jolie. Ye know the way Ah feel about ye, but ye also know the danger that lies within me. Ah cannae put ye an’ yers in danger. An’ while Ah’m with ye then ye will always be in danger. The only answer is that Ah have to go.” He paused and smiled sadly. “The road goes ever on.”

“No.” I hadn’t been expecting him to say that. Because he was right. Neither of us knew how the spell worked that kept Luce within him. It could break out any time and for all we knew, it was just waiting for the right opportunity. We had freed Luce from the Abyss. Truth be told, we probably should have left Morse in there for the good of the world—what was the sacrifice of one man to save so many? But I never could have done that to Morse. For the same reason that I couldn’t leave him now.

“Whit do ye mean ‘no’?” Morse remonstrated with me.

“I can’t leave you.”

“Jolie, ye know this is the way it has to be.”

But I shook my head. “No. I mean, yes, you’re probably right. But you saved me, Morse. And I don’t mean that you saved my life (although you did), I mean that you were a friend when I needed one most. I couldn’t have survived down there without you.”

“But now Ah’m the one puttin’ ye in danger.”

“Then we’ll deal with that danger together,” I said, resolutely. “The same way we dealt with all the danger we faced when we were down there.” A thought struck me. “By all accounts, Rand has some pretty serious power now, maybe he can help you. We’re going that way anyway.”

“Ye’re goin’ that way,” Morse corrected.

“You’ve got somewhere else to be?”

Morse sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Let me get this straight; ye want to go to London to ask yer estranged husband, the magical dictator that everyone is terrified of, to help me.”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

He shook his head. “Ye’re crazy.”

“Quite possibly, but it could work and it’s the only idea I have so far. If Rand is half as powerful as people say he is, then he’s the only one who can help you.”

“Aye,” Morse looked unconvinced, “but if he’s half as big a bastard as people say he is then… Ah’m sorry, Jolie, an’ Ah’d be the first to admit that Ah am biased in this matter, but Ah dinnae trust him.”

“Do you trust me?”

His eyes met mine. “Do ye even have to ask?”

I didn’t, and I felt guilty every time I thought about how much he cared for me. “Rand is  a good man, the best I ever met. We don’t know what he went through that made him turn out like this.”

“‘Twas the same thing ye went through.”

I shook my head. “Everyone deals with their grief in different ways. And sometimes it can break the strongest of us.” I took a deep breath. “I have no doubt that when he sees me and realizes I’m alive, then everything will be alright.”

His mind was changing, I could see it. “Alright. Ah hope Ah dinnae have to say Ah told ye so.”

“I hope so too.”

Was I just making things more difficult for myself? Seeing Rand was going to be hard enough, especially given all I’d been told about him. It sounded as if I was going to see a man I wouldn’t recognize. And going to see him with Morse? What sort of shit storm was that going to stir up? Was I leading Morse on by keeping him with me? That was a worry too. He could easily think I wanted him to come with me because I didn’t want to be without him, that I wanted to help him because I loved him. Both of those thoughts were true to an extent, but it was also true that I would never love him as much as I loved Rand. If there was anything left of that Rand, of the man I had loved so fully, then this was only going to end one way.

***

There were now three reasons I was going to see Rand. First, because I had to see him; because he was my husband and the love of my life. Second, I needed to ask him to help Morse, another man I loved very much (how much I wasn’t even sure myself), and finally, I needed his help to find Emma.

That last reason was of course the most important one. Not knowing where Emma was, especially after learning of the attack at Elmington (not to mention the possibility that my daughter was dating a teacher!), was like a constant clawing at my insides. Even if she wasn’t with Rand, I had confidence he would know where she was. I couldn’t believe Rand had changed so much as to not know or care where his daughter was—the Rand I’d known adored Emma more than life itself, and I was more than sure that such things didn’t change, no matter how grief contorted you.

Of course, what I would say to Emma when we finally came face to face was another thing entirely (‘Hi honey, Mommy’s not dead!’). But that was a problem for another day, and a problem I was happy to face.

***

The flight to the London Heathrow was a pleasant one, with Morse doing everything he could to keep my mind off things I couldn’t change and the constant anxiety that ate at my gut. There was no denying the chemistry between us and I again found myself wondering what life with Morse might be like. Happy, I suspected. But, would Morse ever be able to fill the void that Rand had left in my heart? That was less easy. But, was it possible? I wasn’t sure. Potentially.

Morse was really a wonderful person, and the feelings I had for him were very real feelings. We’d just… been through so much together and we’d had to rely on one another to survive—bonds like that didn’t just easily disappear. I imagined we would feel those bonds for the rest of our lives, no matter if we ended up together or not. That was what made it all so complicated—I knew Morse. But, I didn’t feel like I knew Rand. Of course, I knew the old Rand but the old Rand seemed to be day and night different to this new one.

“Do ye think he’ll agree to see ye?” asked Morse.

I hadn’t thought of that. As far as Rand knew, I was dead. So what would he think of some woman arriving unannounced, claiming to be his long-   lost wife. Hmm… “I think so.” I had no idea but… this was Rand we were talking about and… I couldn’t imagine he wouldn’t want to at least see who such a woman could be.

I remained sure of this line of thinking, without any doubts, right up to the moment we stood outside the imposing headquarters of the King’s Alliance.

“Quite a place,” commented Morse.

“No kidding.”

The looming edifice towered over us and in its shadow, I felt three inches tall. It reminded me of all those Norman castles dotted through Wales, designed to look down on the villagers and remind them who was in charge. It was a building that was meant to threaten, that was meant to make you feel uneasy and unworthy. More than that, it was meant to make you feel intimidated, scared. It was the first hard evidence of a change in Rand and for the first time, I began to wonder whether he might be too far gone to be saved.

“You okay?” It was funny how, even now, knowing what I knew, I still found Morse’s presence so easy and comforting. There was no one I would sooner have by my side.

“It’s not the friendliest building.”

“Aye, well, if ye’re goin’ to call yerself ‘High Mage’ then Ah dare say, ye have to live in a place like this. It probably comes with the job.”

I smiled. Morse could always make me smile.

“Let’s go.”

The guard on the door scoffed when I told him who I was.

“Queen Jolie is dead and has been for many long years. Try another lie.”

“Do I look dead to you?” I asked, glaring at him. My anxiety was at an all-time high and although I’d imagined I’d have trouble getting entrance, I’d come this far and to be stopped by this guy… it was too much to deal with. “It’s a long story, and I’d like to tell it to my husband, your boss.”

But the guard wasn’t interested in what I had to say. “I admire you for trying, but you aren’t welcome and you aren’t coming in.”

I’ve never been one for using magic indiscriminately, but some people just rub you the wrong way.

“I’m going in and you’re staying out here.” The spell froze the guard solid and Morse waved a hand in front of his eyes.

“He alright?”

“He’ll be fine in a few minutes,” I replied. “And he won’t remember anything which will be quite helpful for us.”

Morse grinned. “Seems like the magic might be comin’ back to ye.”

It was. It would be a while before I was able to do more impressive spells and maybe I’d never be as powerful as I once had been, but it felt good to have any magic at all after years in the Abyss—it was nice to know I still had something.

Once inside, finding Rand was as easy as I’d hoped it would be; I felt his presence and simply followed the sensation. I didn’t think of it as magic; it was simply the connection Rand and I had always shared. It was a feeling of oneness—and sometimes we could even guess at what the other was thinking. Most times we were wrong but there were those moments when…

“Ye ready for this?” asked Morse, as I froze another pair of guards who were standing in front of the door just around the corner and down the hall from us.

“As I’ll ever be.”

“Would ye prefer me to wait outside?” He was always thinking of me, putting my needs first. It was one of the things I appreciated about him so much. Yes, Morse was an amazing person and an exceptional man. If Rand had never been in my life…

“I’d prefer you to come with me.” I’d never imagined I’d feel scared about facing Rand. He was my husband, for God’s sake! But so much time had passed and so much had changed and so much had changed within him. Yes, he’d changed but maybe I had too? The more I considered it, the more I realized Morse now knew me better than my own husband did. “Is that okay?”

“Whitever ye need.”

I knocked, and didn’t wait for him to answer before I entered.

“Who’s there?!”

The sound of his voice caused a chill to run through me because it was his voice but it was so… different. The room was dark as Morse and I walked in and the voice burst from the darkness, edgy and ragged. Still, it was a voice I recognized, even if it sounded as if it had come from a stranger.

“Rand?” I started and my voice wavered as a wind of emotion hit me and tears started from my eyes. “It’s… it’s me.”

“Lights!”

The lights around the room sprang to life at Rand’s command and after blinking against the sudden assault, I finally found myself facing the man I’d loved from the moment I’d met him. Suddenly, it was as if all those memories came flooding back—first seeing him as he entered my store in Los Angeles, the moment he taught me how to take the shape of the fox, the first time he ever kissed me, the moment I’d gone back in time and met him at Pelham Manor when Pelham was still alive, the moment we’d first said ‘I love you’, the moment he learned I was pregnant… the moment we first held Emma…

And yet… he was different. This wasn’t the Rand I’d known and loved so thoroughly.

He was changed.

He was older, of course, greyed at the temples (though warlocks age slowly), heavier set in the torso and yet his face looked thinner. His clothes were rich, but he clearly had been wearing them a while, in fact, it looked like he hadn’t left this room in days. His eyes weren’t as I remembered them. Where once they had been soft, kind and loving, now they were wild, staring, filled with fear and anger.

He twitched uncontrollably as he stared directly at Morse.

He never once looked at me, even as I stood right in front of him.

“Who are you? How did you get in here?”

“Ah had help,” admitted Morse, looking at me.

“What do you want? Guards!”

“Rand,” I said, still shocked that he hadn’t so much as even spared me a glance. “Won’t you look at me?”

He twitched, shooting a look in my direction that seemed to pass straight through me. It was as though… he hadn’t even seen me.

“What did you say?” He was still addressing Morse.

“Ah didnae say anything.” Morse appeared to be as confused as I was, as confused as Rand was.

A guard hurried in.

“Take this man away!”

The guard’s eyes flicked between Morse and me.

“Just the man, High Mage?”

Rand’s eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about? Of course just the man, there’s no one else in the room!”

And that was when it dawned on me—Rand couldn’t see me. I didn’t know how or why, but he couldn’t see me!

“Rand?”

He twitched again and looked irritably around the room as you might when you hear a fly buzzing somewhere but you can’t find the insect, itself. Apparently, he couldn’t hear me either because he refused to answer. Or maybe he was afraid he was hearing things? I wasn’t sure.

“Rand!” I tried again.

This time he did look at me, squinting as if he could see something, but wasn’t sure what that something was, or even if it was really there. He shook his head and rubbed his eyes, clearly dismissing me as an illusion.

“What are you waiting for?” he insisted to the guard. “Get him out of here.”

“Rand… I mean, High Mage…” Morse began, holding up his hands as he looked from Rand to me and I could see the absolute shock and confusion in his expression. “Can ye nae see who’s with me?”

Rand’s face resolved into a venomous glare. “Don’t try to trick me! I have more magic in my toenail than you have in your worthless body, you fool. I don’t know who you are or why you’re here, but your parlor tricks won’t work on me.”

“Ah’m nae tryin’ to trick ye,” Morse kept his voice level as he held up his hands in a show of submission. “Ah dinnae know why ye cannae see her, but standin’ beside me… directly in front of ye, is yer wife, Jolie.”

The venom boiled over and Rand thrust out a hand.

“No!” But my scream probably wouldn’t have made any difference even if Rand had heard it. A thick stream of magic burst from Rand’s palm, knocking Morse back into the wall, the pulses of Rand’s magic flickered across Morse’s body, making him jolt and flinch.

“Morse!” I ran to him.

“That’ll teach you,” snarled Rand. “And you’ll get worse before I’m done with you for daring to barge in on me like this, weaving such ridiculous tales. Take him away!”

This wasn’t the Rand I knew and I stormed towards him, my own anger taking control of me. I didn’t give a shit if he could hear or me or not, my rage wouldn’t stay quiet. “What are you doing? Who are you? Who have you become?” Then the anger simmered as I realized I wouldn’t get anywhere with it. “Rand,” I started in a much softer voice. “If there is any decency left in you—if there’s any love for me left in your heart—then you will release this man!”

Again, Rand looked straight through me. His furrowed brow and the twitching of his narrowed eyes revealed he was aware of a presence, even if he could neither see nor hear its source.

“You can’t see her can you?”

I turned back to look at Morse. His voice had changed; it was colder, sharper and there was a mocking tone. He’d also lost his accent.

A cold horror seized me when I looked at his face and saw his expression set in a cruel sneer, quite unlike the man I’d gotten to know so well. Please, no. Not this. Not now. Not him.

“Stop lying!” snapped Rand. “There’s no one there.”

Morse peered hard at Rand, his eyes piercing, seeming to see into my husband’s soul.

Then he began to smile as he nodded. “I understand.”

“You understand what?” Rand insisted.

Morse laughed. “You are missing something within you and you’ve been missing this bit of yourself for quite a long time, it seems.” He paused for a moment and took a deep breath. “Perhaps… perhaps I should help you.”

Morse flung out both hands and I tasted the magic on the air, though I saw nothing. My attention was immediately caught by Rand’s body as it was drawn tautly upright. His eyes flickered as if images were passing before them and his mouth opened as words passed through his lips but they were so soft, I couldn’t understand them.

“UNGH!” His whole body jerked and then fell limp, his head hanging down. He just stood there for a few seconds, as if he were asleep but standing upright. And then he jerked again and when he looked up, I saw… I saw my husband. I saw Emma’s father. I saw the man I’d loved from the moment I’d first met him.

His eyes immediately settled on my face and in them I recognized shock first and then hope—no doubt hope that what he was seeing was real, that I wasn’t just some figment of his imagination. “Jolie…”

There were tears in his eyes as he stood there and stared at me. I couldn’t say anything. He couldn’t say anything. We both just stood there as if time stood still and each of us was sobbing. It was another second before he lunged forward and grabbed me in his arms, pulling me into his chest and holding me so fiercely, I could barely breathe. But I didn’t care that I couldn’t breathe. All I could care about was that I was here, back in my husband’s arms.

I hugged him back as tightly as I could and together we sobbed into one another’s hair, faces, skin. In that moment, I was happier than I could remember, and the world suddenly made sense again.

Rand’s tight embrace started to loosen. “Oh no…”

He almost fell away from me, his whole body shaking, his face filled with    visceral horror. “Oh no… Oh gods… Jolie, what have I done? What have I done?!”

He dropped to his knees, his head in his hands, clawing at his face.

“Rand!”

I knelt beside him and tried to put my arms around him, but he roughly shrugged me away, as if my touch was scalding hot.

That was when I heard the laughter. Looking up I saw Morse, still slumped against the wall, cackling in a way I’d heard before, but never from him.

That was when I realized this was no longer Morse.

Though he still wore Morse’s body like an ill-fitting suit, this was now Luce.

FOUR

Bryn

In the quiet privacy of Rowan’s bedroom, our family was reunited in a loving embrace. There was no need for words, none could have been as eloquent as the tears of happiness we all shed—even Sinjin, who had once told me vampires don’t cry. But, in that room, everything was exactly what it needed to be, and the love we had for each other was enough to hold our bit of the world together. Outside that room was another matter, but one thing at a time, for now it was enough to be a family again.

“So,” Rowan wore an expression of ‘too much to hope for, but hoping just the same’, “Are you two back together?”

Sinjin looked at me, clearly not wanting to make the call himself. “We have not talked about that… exact subject… in so many words.”

I frowned. “Yes we damn well did. On the ride back to Kinloch.”

“That was more talking around it, my dear, saying everything but.”

I rolled my eyes. “It was a beautiful moment between two people in which words weren’t necessary.” He smiled at me in that boyish way of his that made me want to kiss him. “At least I thought words weren’t necessary but now you’ve gone and ruined the moment.”

“Forgive me for not wanting to put words in your mouth and for thinking that perhaps our daughter should be part of any discussion pertaining to our shared future.”

“Bullshit, you’ve just got no romance in your soul.”

His grin widened. “I am a vampire, Bête Noir. Thus, my ‘soul’ is not to be trusted at any price.” Then he pouted. “And further, I must quite disagree with you as to my lack of romanticism. I am most certainly the most romantic man I know.”

Rowan giggled at that and I couldn’t help my own smirk.

“Okay.” Rowan held up her hands then and looked at both of us with a big smile. “You’ve answered my question. You two are back together.”

“So now you’re deciding for us?” I shook my head as I faced Sinjin again, who was staring at his daughter with the expression of absolute pride on his face. “She gets this attitude from you.”

“Oh, yes,” Sinjin nodded sarcastically. “Because attitude could not possibly come from the Wilkins side of the family.”

“I’m not making any decisions for you,” Rowan continued to grin, “but if the two of you are fighting tooth and nail then all is well. It’s when you go silent that things are bad. I’m pretty sure it’s a sign that you’re never more in love than when you’re tearing each other a new one.”

“I resent that implication,” said Sinjin. “I am a vampire. Tearing your mother a new one is beneath my dignity.”

“Regardless, my point still stands,” Rowan replied.

“And so it does,” Sinjin responded. “And for my part, I am pleased to admit that my love for your mother is just as strong as it ever was. In fact, there has not been a day that has gone by since our separation that I have not thought of her and of you. And to find myself in this situation in which I now stand, I can only admit to the truth—my hopes and dreams have come true and I am happier now than I have ever been, in my very long life.”

“Ah, Dad,” Rowan said as she leaned in and hugged him even harder.

It was quite a little speech, and one that hit me right in the heart. Sinjin had never been one for simple declarations of any sort. Dramatic ones, yes; he was the type to tell you he loved you to the moon and the stars and back—all that crap—but never to put such words into meaningful terms. It was the little, real world stuff that really touched me. He had never stopped loving me, or Rowan. And to know we had been in his heart all this time—it made me sad. Sad and angry with myself. Because I’d misjudged him and where I’d blamed him all those years ago, I should have given him the benefit of the doubt.

“Bastard,” I muttered, feeling a lump in my throat as I spoke.

“What have I done now?” Sinjin asked.

“I could never say anything that would sound half as good as that. You win.”

“Love isn’t a competition, Mum,” Rowan pointed out.

Sinjin and I both looked at her.

“Not a competition?” Sinjin asked as I laughed.

“Are we sure she’s really our daughter?”

“Everything is a competition, my dear,” Sinjin finished. “That should have been the first lesson you ever learned.”

Rowan laughed and threw her arms around both our necks, dragging us into another three-way hug. I wished it could last forever and that the world outside could be put on hold. But that wasn’t an option, no matter how hard I wished it was.

***

In the aftermath of the Vryloka attack, after we’d gathered as many bodies as we could and burned them far from Kinloch, I took a walk through the woods. Though I’d lived here a long time, this was not a direction in which I’d often gone in the last ten years because it made me too sad to take this exact route. And too angry. And too… everything—it was a boiling point of my emotions. But now things had changed and I felt as if I owed it to myself, as if I needed to take this path again.

Things grew fast at Kinloch Kirk and the wood had shot up, thickening and expanding in the ten years since the Underworld had fallen, following the disappearance of Jolie. The path was overgrown now; saplings had sprouted from between the stepping stones that still marked it; lichen, moss and grasping ivy had colonized everything; the grass was so high it felt like I was wading.

I didn’t see the building until I was almost on top of it, the trees had grown up so high around it. Maybe the magic that was heavy in the air had made them grow faster, or maybe they’d grown like that to hide the sad remnants of what had once been.

There it was; the old manor house of Kinloch Kirk. It looked smaller than I remembered, but then it had always been smaller on the outside than it was within—magic at work there too. From outside, it was a big house but once you went in, you seemed to be in a castle. Back in the good old days (and there had been such things), this had been the seat of power for the Underworld. It had been from here that Jolie had ruled and within these walls that she held council meetings. It was here where I’d first been brought as a prisoner, back in the days when I’d been loyal to Luce—that seemed a lifetime ago now. Back then, I hadn’t even known I had a sister, and Sinjin had been my hated enemy. Now my sister was my life and Sinjin was my other half.

But the old house had been more than the palace of Queen Jolie, it had been her home and mine too (well, before Jolie gifted me with the guest quarters in which Rowan, Mathilda, and I now lived). Here, in the manor house, our children had played together as they grew up, here we’d shared good and bad times. It was grand, but it was also a home and had been everything a home should be. Love had permeated the walls. I wondered if the love had gone out of them the day Jolie vanished. It had seemed that way to me. For as long as my immediate memory could recall, I couldn’t stand to even look at this place, and yet now I was very happy to be back.

Passing through the doors, I entered the grand hall and listened to the echo of my footsteps. Nature had started to reclaim the room as its own; leaf litter blown in across the floor, tendrils of ivy pushing through shattered windows and under doors. I could see a birds’ nest in one corner and no doubt there were generations of mice living in the walls. But all that was right in a way; I didn’t feel as if nature had stolen it from us, I felt as if nature was the house’s custodian, keeping this place alive until Jolie returned.

It wouldn’t be long now.

Closing my eyes, I pictured the place as it had been in its heyday, busy with Underworlders from all the factions going about the business of court. I’d never had much interest in how the Underworld was run—that was Jolie’s thing, not mine—but now I would have given anything to see that bureaucracy return. This was what we were fighting for: the Underworld; that idea, that dream, that lost paradise in which the supernatural races worked together. We were fighting for a court with Jolie returned as Queen. We were fighting for our families and for ourselves, for the world in which we wanted them to live.

There was a shitload at stake and that shitload couldn’t wait until Jolie returned to start work, to start bringing back the ways that were.

I turned and left the house, walking with quick, resolute steps. I knew what I had to do.

***

The makeshift council chamber was my kitchen, with chairs moved in from other rooms. Sinjin stood behind me, leaning against the counter as if he’d never left. Rowan sat to my right—probably too young for this, but she was too heavily involved to exclude her.

Around the table sat the rest of the rag-tag group that had assembled here in my absence; the vampire Laucian, who Sinjin had vouched for (‘I cannot say I like him, but he is a Master Vampire and a decent man and he has certainly proven himself’); two more vampires and two Daywalkers who had been Sinjin’s spies, set to watch Rowan and me, but were now basically living here; the vampire hunter who went by O’Rourke (although everyone knew such wasn’t her name); the revolutionary, Nyx, a powerful magic user and leader of the group called the Samhain; and Nyx’s lieutenant, Conal, who took up two seats. Ten more of the Samhain were here as well, but Nyx had deemed them not important enough to attend this meeting and they’d appeared pretty relieved. I got the impression that the Samhain was not an organization that went in for much organization.

I took the head of the table, a position I wasn’t comfortable with, but I saw myself as a seat-warmer until my sister arrived. Whenever that might be. That was the first topic of discussion.

“She went to see Duine?” Nyx looked aghast.

“In this house, we call him Rand,” I corrected.

“Call him whatever the hell you want, but the High Mage is a vicious bastard without a single redeeming feature. I would cut out his heart and feed it to my dogs if I had a chance. And if I had any dogs,” Nyx responded.

“He’s my Uncle,” said Rowan, pointedly.

“Fine,” nodded Nyx, unabashed. “Your Uncle is a vicious bastard without a single redeeming feature. I would cut out his heart and feed it to my dogs if I had a chance. And if I had any dogs.”

We all owed Nyx for what she’d done for Mathilda, almost losing her life in the process, but I had no idea why she was still here. This didn’t seem to be her fight. And I wasn’t sure what to think of her, in general. She was certainly crude and rough around the edges, but she was also fearless and I could tell she was an incredible leader.

“Rand is Jolie’s husband,” I pointed out. “She doesn’t know what’s become of him since she’s been gone.”

“You didn’t think to tell her?” asked Nyx.

I faced her and frowned. “Of course, I told her what to expect, but she only believed so much. Things like that… they require someone to see for themselves.” I found myself in the odd position of defending Rand Balfour whom I hated for what he’d become. “Rand was the love of Jolie’s life. He was a good man before she disappeared and everyone thought she was dead. Something… happened to him that went way beyond grief—something I can’t explain, but if anyone can bring back the good man he was then that someone is Jolie.”

“And we all just forgive him for what he’s done?” asked Nyx, shaking her head. “After all the violence and death and the awful things he’s done?”

I shrugged. “I can’t tell you what to do, Nyx, any more than I can tell my sister not to go and see her husband. But if he changes back to the man he was, however impossible that might be, then I believe he’s owed a second chance.”

“And you’d be the only one,” Conal retorted.

I looked at him. “As I said, I can’t and don’t intend to try to change your mind.”

“The way I see things,” Nyx started, “Is that Duine is Duine and he must be put down.”

“Put down?” Rowan repeated, clearly confused.

“Killed,” Nyx affirmed.

“If Rand is returned to himself and he’s now the same decent man he once was,” I answered. “And you still intend to kill him, you’ll find yourself standing against Jolie and everyone who supports her. Trust me, you don’t want that.”

Nyx was an extraordinarily powerful magic-user, she had proved that, and I thought she was about to snap back a sharp response. But she held her tongue. Going up against the old world order of the Underworld was apparently enough to make her think twice.

“There’s Emma to consider as well,” put in Sinjin. “We don’t know where she is.”

“I think she’s with her new boyfriend,” said Rowan, speaking tentatively as girls will when betraying the confidence of a close friend, even for the best of reasons.

“Boyfriend?” I frowned.

“His name is Stone.”

I happened to be looking back at Sinjin as Rowan spoke and saw his expression. Sinjin usually had an exceptional poker-face, but the skill had clearly deserted him. It was immediately apparen   that he knew Stone.

“Something you’d like to tell us, Sinjin?” I suggested.

“I am aware of a man named Stone,” Sinjin was trying to weasel out of something and I didn’t yet know what, but I would find out. “But it is a very common name.”

“No it’s not.”

“Never the less, I would prefer not to jump to conclusions. If it is the Stone of whom I am thinking then he will certainly keep our Emma safe.” Then he cleared his throat and said this last bit more to himself: “Though he may need someone to keep him safe when I next see him.”

Clearly Sinjin and I were going to be having a chat but that would have to wait. “Okay, so we know Jolie was looking for Emma and that search led her to Rand. We don’t know what’s happened since.”

“We can damn well guess,” muttered Nyx.

I hated to admit it but she might have been right; Rand was not the man he had been and if not even Jolie could save him from his own demons, then who knew what he might do to her, or even to his own daughter. I didn’t put anything past Duine.

“Let’s put a pin in that,” I said, “at least until tomorrow—we should give Jolie time to make contact with Rand.” How did Jolie run these meetings? This was already giving me a headache. “Other problems we need to discuss next… the Fir Darrig.”

“What’s that?” asked O’Rourke—she struck me as a taciturn sort who only spoke when doing so was necessary.

“One of the Unseelie Court leading an army of Dark Fae,” replied Nyx. “I thought Duine was a dangerous adversary but if those Unseelie Fae bastards have their eyes on us, the whole damn world should be worried.”

The Fir Darrig was a shapeshifter and had planned to take Emma’s place after she acceded the throne of the Underworld—that plan was now defunct since we knew about it and since Jolie was free from the Abyss.

“Too much to hope that the Fir Darrig won’t still be gunning for us,” I said, grimly. “It’ll have a new plan and one we don’t know anything about.”

“Maybe it will take time to come up with the plan,” suggested Conal.

Nyx shook her head. “If people don’t know you’re coming, then stealth is the best plan. But if they know, then all-out assault is the way forward and that doesn’t take much planning.

Again, I hated to admit it, but she was right.

“What about the Vryloka?” asked Laucian. “Were they working for the Fir Darrig?”

“Apparently not,” I replied. “Jolie heard the Fir Darrig complaining that the Vryloka had ruined its plan. There’s something else out there that’s not on the Darrig’s side but not on ours either; they both want Emma and maybe Rowan too.”

Nyx shook her head, green eyes flashing with what might have been admiration. “You people know how to make enemies, I’ll give you that.”

“The Vryloka are gone,” said Sinjin, earnestly. “But whatever sent them is not simply going to vanish. It will be back in some other form. It will come for Emma, for Rowan, for all of us.”

It was time to bring this council meeting to a conclusion. I wasn’t sure how Jolie would have done so (how I wished she were here now) but I wanted to bring the main point home.

“Nyx is right, we have enemies. Some we know, some we don’t, but they’re all coming for us. We don’t know what’s happening but something is and it will be coming to a head sooner rather than later.” I looked around the room at the collection of disparate individuals who had turned up here. “Stay if you’re staying, go if you’re going—I won’t ask anyone to stay who doesn’t want to. But if you’re staying; there will be blood.”

FIVE

Jolie

“Rand…”

I tried to pry his fingers away from his face, but my husband couldn’t even bring himself to look at me, as if by hiding his face he could hide whatever he’d done in the past. He looked as if he wanted the earth to open and swallow him whole.

In that moment, I knew everything was all true—all the stories Bryn had told me, or at least, enough was true to confirm Rand—or ‘Duine’—as the monster that Bryn had warned me about.

All I knew was that if Rand had done half of those awful, unspeakable things—even if he’d done one hundredth of them—then he wasn’t the man I’d known and loved. Something had happened to him. I just wasn’t sure what. Yes, I was sure my disappearance must have been agonizing for him, but I wouldn’t accept pain as the whole story. Something more had happened, probably something magical, something that had changed him in a real and terrible way.

But now he was back, he was Rand again. But, in being Rand again, he was now facing and would have to live with all the things he’d done, which was horrifying. Not only that, but everyone else would have to live with the things he’d done as well, and ‘Sorry, I wasn’t myself at the time,’ seemed unlikely to cut it.

“Jolie…”

His eyes remained tightly closed, but he reached out for me with a hand and I took it without hesitation—whatever he’d done, he was still the man I loved. Once I gripped his hand, his eyes burst with tears and he began shaking his head as rounds of sobs gripped him, causing his entire body to shake.

“She forgives easily, doesn’t she?”

I was so focused on Rand, I’d almost forgotten the other presence in the room. I couldn’t call the man who stood by the door ‘Morse’ any longer. It looked like Morse superficially because the abominable creature within him wore Morse’s skin but the voice wasn’t his and the creature didn’t move like Morse did, nor did it have his mannerisms. Even the face was different somehow, as if Luce’s face had been forced into Morse’s, stretching it out, changing the shape, giving Morse a permanent scowl.

“Luce,” I said the word as the weight of the truth settled in my stomach.

“I like this body,” he commented, as he stretched his arms forward and looked down at them. “It’s young and strong. He takes care of himself.” Luce looked up at me then. “And he likes you, Jolie. I can feel the residue of his emotions.” He chuckled as he shook his head. “But, fear not, those emotions of his will fade with time until there’s nothing left of them and nothing left of him.”

He laughed to see the shock on my face as I realized this was it—there was no forcing Luce back, now that he’d come to the forefront. I could only hope there was still time to save Morse, to force Luce out of his body, or at least into remission.

Luce took the steps that separated us and paused just before my feet, looking down at me with that haughty expression I’d grown to hate so well.

“Which man do you love, your Majesty?” Luce used the title mockingly. “Which of these two men is your heart’s desire? The one who houses your worst enemy within him? Or the one who has done such terrible things, he will never be able to face himself again? What extraordinary taste in men you have.”

He reached down, as if to affectionately stroke my cheek, but I pulled away.

“Don’t you touch her!” Rand’s eyes sprang open and he pointed a threatening finger at Luce.

Luce knew how to bluff but I was sure I saw him flinch. Rand might have been in a terrible state, but he’d amassed an extraordinary level of magic over the last ten years, maybe even enough to threaten our old enemy.

But before any advantage could be taken, another player entered.

“Calm yourself, High Mage, he will not harm her.” It was the guard who spoke, but he did so with an ease and confidence that didn’t seem like they would belong to a mere guard.

In the next instant, the Guard’s body twisted, his face contorting as he changed shape, leaving the Fir Darrig standing before us. I swallowed hard, realizing my predicament. I was now in a room with the man I loved and my two worst enemies, one of them wearing the skin of another man I loved.

“You.” Luce looked at the Fir Darrig as the pair faced off. Maybe they’d kill each other and two wrongs could make a right. But, then I thought of the fact that Luce was still wearing Morse’s body and I wondered if Luce were killed, did that mean Morse would be too? I hoped not.

As Luce and the Fir Darrig continued to converse, I knelt beside Rand and put an arm around him, all the while trying to plan some sort of escape. He looked at me, frowning and confused.

“Where are we?” he asked.

“In your bedroom.”

“This isn’t Kinloch Kirk.”

“No, it’s not.” I hesitated and offered him a consoling smile. “That was a long time ago, Rand.”

“But you’re here.”

“Yes,” I smiled.

“How? You were… you were dead.”

I smiled more broadly, all the while encouraging him to stand up. “I found a way back.”

He shook his head. “I’m dreaming. Jolie is dead.”

“Would your dreams include them?” I pointed at Luce and the Darrig.

Rand nodded. “My dreams are full of death, full of awful things.”

I kissed his cheek. “Not any    more. Everything is going to be alright.” I knew the words for the lie they were, but I said them anyway, needing to try to keep Rand calm and needing to figure out a way out of our predicament pronto.

Luce laughed and as I looked over at him, I realized his attention was ours once more. “Don’t promise more than you can deliver, Queen Jolie.” His attention snapped back to the Fir Darrig. “And you… You betrayed me.”

“I betrayed you?” the creature returned.

Luce nodded. “You stole the child of light and dark and then you locked me away in your Abyss.”

The Darrig shrugged its thin shoulders. “You’d have done the same in my place.”

Luce was quiet a moment and then taking in a big breath, he nodded. “That is true.”

“Regardless, my plans are in tatters because of you,” the Darrig pointed out, its eyes narrowing into fiery little pits. “Your damned Vryloka got in the way of my Druids.”

“Had you not stabbed me in the back, perhaps we could have worked together,” Luce answered on a shrug.

“Had you not released the queen from the Abyss, perhaps we could have worked together!” the Darrig responded furiously.

“I had nothing to do with that,” argued Luce.

“You had everything to do with it! A wizard of your strength and capability!”

“I had limited control in that awful place,” Luce responded. “This body,” he started as he looked down at himself, “Served as an incubator—I could not live without my host but until Duine’s magic incapacitated my host, I was unable to take full command of this body.” His smile broadened. “But now that I have full command, I’m not letting go.”

“Yes, I was coming to the subject of the High Mage,” snarled the Darrig, thinly. “He was a useful ally. Powerful—even given his limitations—and the commander of a vast army. Now look at him.” They both looked over at Rand. “Doesn’t even know where he is. He’s no help to me now.”

“No, indeed,” nodded Luce, thoughtfully. “You find yourself down one ally. Quite interesting.”

“Thanks to you,” the Darrig snapped.

“Our interests were divergent,” pointed out Luce with a faux yawn. “Now, correct me if I am wrong, but those interests now seem to be aligned.”

I had heard enough and while the two were in eager conversation, I had been moving Rand, step by step, towards the door. As soon as I reached it, however, Luce brought his extended arm in my direction, and without bothering to so much as look at me, he simply froze me to the spot. I tried to move my feet but it was as if they were stuck in cement. Glancing down, I focused on myself and closing my eyes, tried a spell to reverse Luce’s power but it was no good.

“There are wards here that disallow magic,” Rand said as he looked up at me, clearly realizing what I was trying to do.

“But, Luce,” I started.

He shook his head. “I don’t know how he got past them.”

“I offered the High Mage,” the Darrig continued, looking at Rand and me with an expression of disinterest. “The one groveling over there, trying to remember his name—I g    ave him dominion over this plane of reality, in return for his help in bringing down the supernatural factions once and for all.” I swallowed hard as I realized the extent of Duine’s duplicity. This was going to be an incredibly hard situation to live down… if we even survived it at all.

“You still have some devoted followers out there,” the Darrig continued as it brought its attention back to Luce. “And enough magic to make you useful. Would the same deal be of interest to you?”

I was watching my nightmare unfold in front of me; the two people who had done me and mine the most harm were teaming up and there was nothing I could do about it. Literally—I was frozen in place.

“I believe we can reach an accord,” replied Luce, an oily smile on Morse’s face.

“NO!” I shouted, knowing it wouldn’t do any good, but I was fresh out of options. “Morse, please, I know you can hear me,” I said, facing Luce as I tried to focus on the man inside him. “Please, Morse, listen to my voice and fight him with everything you’ve got! I know you can do it. I know how strong you are! Fight him!”

Luce laughed. “Is that what you’ve been reduced to, your Majesty? Trying to give a pep talk to a man who no longer exists?”

“Please, Morse, I know you can hear me,” I answered, refusing to respond to Luce. “Fight him!”

“Then is Morse the one you prefer?” Luce continued to mock me. “If so, then I’m afraid you’ve chosen poorly because you’ll never speak to Morse again. Morse is gone.” He flicked his fingers in the air. “Blip, simply gone as if he never was.”

I couldn’t bear the thought. Maybe I’d never feel for Morse as I did for Rand, maybe I could never fully return the feelings Morse had for me, but I did still love him and I wouldn’t let this happen. I couldn’t let it happen.

I threw out my hand, summoning what magic I had, Rand’s wards be damned. If Luce could break them, then so could I. But the Darrig was ready and the spell died on my fingertips.

“Don’t you try anything either,” the Darrig addressed Rand. “You may be powerful, Rand Balfour, Duine, High Mage—call yourself what you like—but you know where you stand in comparison to me.”

Rand blinked sharply, as if trying to focus on Luce and the Darrig, still not sure if they were even there. Maybe none of this seemed real to him. Maybe my return had been as big a shock to his system as my ‘death’ had been all those years ago. He had power, but right now, that power was useless because he lacked the self-control to use it, and against the Darrig, whatever power Rand still possessed might be useless regardless.

I had to try something else. If we couldn’t attack Luce from without, then maybe Morse could attack from within, and there was only one thing I could think of that might rouse Morse, that might make him fight harder than he otherwise would. That is, if he was still even inside his own body. I had to believe he was—if not, there was nothing else to believe in, no other way out of this.

“Morse,” I called out, staring Luce straight in the eyes, Morse’s eyes. “Morse, I love you.”

I couldn’t look at Rand as I said the words because I knew he would see the truth in them and I couldn’t face that reality. I could only hope Rand was currently too disconnected to understand, to process.

“Please, Morse, if you love me, then show me by fighting him back! Show me you love me by taking control of yourself again! Please!”

But Luce just went on laughing. “Was anyone ever as unlucky as our friend Morse? Can’t catch a break his whole life and then, when the woman of his dreams says she loves him in return, he’s already as good as dead.”

“Bastard!” I hissed through gritted teeth.

“Get them out of here,” said the Fir Darrig dismissively.

“Shall I dispose of them?” Luce asked as if he were asking if he should take out the trash.

The Darrig shook its head. “They may yet be useful to us, but keep an eye on them.”

“Wait.” It was Rand who spoke, and he looked suddenly more focused than before. But he didn’t even glance at me as he spoke, as if he couldn’t bear to look at me, and it was at that moment that I realized he’d understood everything I said. I felt my heart drop down to my toes, even as I told myself I had spoken the truth. I did love Morse. But, I also still loved Rand. I’d never given up loving Rand, even after knowing what he’d become.

“What is it now, High Mage?” asked the Darrig. “Our deal is over.”

“Let the man, Morse, live.”

That was the last thing I expected Rand to say and I wondered whether he fully understood the situation before him.

“Why would I do that?” asked Luce. “Especially since I need his body to live.”

“You need a body,” corrected Rand. “Morse is convenient to you, but hardly ideal.”

“You have an alternative in mind?” asked Luce.

“Yes. Me.”

I breathed in my shock and sudden panic. “Rand, no!” Maybe he thought he was being noble by giving himself up to save Morse, a man I’d just said I loved, but in doing so, he would only be gifting victory to Luce and the Darrig.

“Rand, you can’t do this!” I whispered to him.

“I have a store of   magic unequalled by anyone else you could choose,” Rand continued, clearly ignoring me and went on. “I have the army of the King’s Alliance at my disposal and once you inhabit my body, then it will be at your disposal. Morse can’t offer you any of that. He can’t offer you the power I have at my fingertips.”

“Why are you doing this?” I demanded but Rand ignored me. I just… I didn’t understand how this was possible. He fully understood what he was doing—giving Luce and the Darrig the upper hand. He fully understood they would squash us all and yet… yet, he didn’t care.

Luce looked interested but unsure. “Separating my essence from Morse’s body is no easy matter.”

Rand stood and walked over to the bed. With a gesture of his hand, he revealed a magical safe which he opened and took out what I instantly recognized as a lodestone.

“This lodestone could do it easily.”

“How?” Luce demanded.

“The lodestone can create a pathway between Morse’s body and mine,” Rand responded.

“No, Rand, what are you doing?!” I shouted at him, still stuck where I was.

Luce’s eyes were now hungry. “Very well. I accept your generous offer.”

My heart sank to my shoes. “Rand, don’t do this! Please, don’t do this!” It was then that I realized the damage to Rand had been too much, too big. He’d been Duine for so long, Duine had to have polluted him for good. Even though he’d apparently had his wits returned to him, he was still so damaged inside, there was no coming back for him. And this realization made me almost want to throw in the towel, to give up. But then an image of Emma appeared inside my mind and I steeled myself for the fight ahead. I would never give up. I would fight for my daughter, no matter how hard I had to fight or who I had to fight.

I looked to Rand again. “Rand, you still have the chance to prove yourself noble! You still have a chance to fight them!”

“Quiet!” snapped the Darrig.

Rand looked at me, and that face I knew so well seemed suddenly unreadable. “It’s for the best, Jolie.”

The lodestone in his hand flashed.

“NO!” I shrieked, but there was nothing I could do.

Morse tumbled to the floor, free of the creature that had leeched off him for so many years. I was happy for Morse, but his freedom had come at a cost to the world.

Once I found my feet freed from Luce’s magic, I hurried to Morse’s side, intent to make sure he was really back in control of his own body.

“Jolie…” he murmured and I heard the comforting burr of his accent, returned to him now that Luce was gone.

As for Luce himself… I looked across to Rand, and the man standing before me was as unlike my husband as the stories I’d heard of Duine, the Dark One. Luce rolled his shoulders back and forth, twisted his head side to side and looked at his hands.

“There is power here. Power I can use.”

I could only stare as tears freed themselves from my eyes and rolled down my cheeks. He was lost to me.

Rand, what have you done? I thought, feeling my throat choking off my air.

And to my surprise, I heard an answering voice inside my head; Trust me.

***

Just because Luce and the Darrig had agreed to let Morse live, didn’t mean they were going to treat him well and they were certainly not about to let either of us go. The soldiers of the King’s Alliance now obeyed Luce (for all they knew this was their leader, High Mage Duine) and the guards took us down into the dungeons, separating us and locking us in different cells.

I collapsed down into a corner and stared at the darkness of the opposite wall.

I should never have come here. I should have listened to Bryn and to everyone who said Rand was too far gone to help. Then again, it wasn’t Rand who had done this to me. Or at least, it wasn’t all him. There had been a moment, after Luce’s magic had returned Rand’s lost soul and Duine had been forced out, when Rand had been himself again. I’d seen the truth in his eyes, the way he looked at me, the confusion in his voice. If only things could have remained that way.

But then Rand had given himself up to Luce and I was still wracking my brain to understand why. I could only assume that he’d heard and understood what I’d said to Morse, that I loved him. And maybe that had been enough for Rand—maybe it had been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Regardless, Rand had decided to sacrifice himself for Morse. Was that it? Had he hoped Morse and I would survive and end up together? Or had Rand made this decision to doom us, knowing by donating his body to Luce, Luce would be victorious. Was it the ultimate slap to my face?

Yet, I couldn’t forget those parting words inside my head, which I knew had come from Rand; Trust me. What had he meant by that? Maybe it was just as simple as doing exactly that? Trusting him. I always had in the past. But so much had changed in the last ten years. I didn’t know what to think any    more.

So many questions, and down here, in this dungeon, there were no answers to be had, only darkness.

I didn’t think there was anything that could have alleviated my depression, and the longer I dwelled on what had happened and what might happen in the future, the worse it became. But then, I felt something in my mind—a little push, almost like a small knock on the giant door of my thoughts. I closed my eyes and honed my attention, focusing on that little knock, that little push.

There was another sensitive nearby, reaching out mentally, trying to make contact with me.

Who’s there? I asked.

Are you being held prisoner? The voice was familiar and yet not, as if I’d known it in another life.

Yes. Who are you?

I’m… I’m another prisoner. I think I’m just down the hall from you.

I’m sorry to hear that, I said, thinking I should be focusing on more important things, like some way out. Any way out. But, my mind didn’t want to lose the connection with this person—she sounded young. Maybe there was something I could say or do to help her. Maybe just encouraging her to speak to me like this was comfort enough?

What’s your name? I thought back to her.

My name is Emma… Emma Balfour.

And, at those words, my heart leapt.

SIX

Laucian

Vampires come in two types. The first is the gregarious ‘party vampire’, and while young vampires tend to think they invented that type, there have always been such vampires, even before the word ‘party’ was coined. In the villages of medieval Europe, in the temples of Ancient Greece, all the way back to the plains of Central Africa where humans originated, there have been vampires who hunted together, fed together and played with their victims together—as though doing so was all a big game. Modern party vampires are less bloodthirsty (so to speak) but they still congregate and place a large emphasis upon enjoying themselves. The second type of vampire is the ‘solitary vampire’, and that is the typography to which I subscribe.

Of course, the above is vastly oversimplified. There are many different ‘types’ of vampire and those, such as myself, who count themselves as the solitary type continue to be solitary in the company of other likeminded vampires. What we really mean by the word  ‘solitary’ is that our brand of vampirism has a quiet dignity; olde worlde vampirism vs leather jackets, dark glasses, loud music and puffy silk shirts.

Sinjin Sinclair was the vampire type who bridged the two groups—as perhaps befits a Master Vampire. He gives off a strong vibe of the solitary vampire; strong and silent when he needs to be. And yet he was the creator of the Vampire Coalition, the largest group of vampires ever formed, almost exclusively composed of party vampires. Yes, Sinjin is an interesting specimen—   a social animal but naturally quite solitary, too.

As for myself, I have spent centuries in the quiet company of a handful of like-minded friends and followers who still believe in the nobility of the vampire. In fact, I had spent so long in this isolation that I was widely believed to be dead (deader, I should say). In my seclusion, I had scorned the Underworld ‘experiment’ as something that put vampires on the same level as other, lesser species like werewolves and Fae. Now I had been thrust into the forefront of a group striving to recreate the Underworld and, though I did not like to admit it, I was having to eat my own words.

Humble pie has quite the odious taste.

From the window of the little house at Kinloch Kirk, I watched the portal flash open to admit new arrivals in preparation for the fight that everyone acknowledged was coming. I had been instrumental in getting that portal open again. It had been a somewhat convoluted road but I had brought Nyx here and she had—all credit to her—managed to perform the necessary magic, almost killing herself in the process. We had wanted the portal open to save Mathilda, but it was now serving another purpose. More than one in fact, as well as allowing Fae through to join the coming fight, the open portal made Kinloch Kirk once again the focal point of the supernatural factions. Queen Jolie was yet to return, but this place was already regaining its status as unofficial capital.

The late afternoon sun sparkled on the rolling waters of the bay and seemed to shimmer on the undulating edges of the portal, making it ripple with a rainbow effect where natural light touched magic. From the world beyond, figures emerged. They were led by the tall, broad-chested figure of King Odran. The quite foppish king was wearing a kilt, his shock of blonde hair haloed by the sunshine. I could not have put names to the Fae he led, but they might as well have had the word ‘Warrior’ tattooed across their foreheads.

Odran had spent some time subduing the pockets of the Unseelie Court in the outer fringes of Faery, reclaiming that kingdom as his own, and he had assembled an impressive group of fighters to do so. It must have come as a great disappointment to him to find that the Unseelie Court had been resurrected once more, but probably not a surprise. The Unseelie Court would always survive in some form, its members were too wily and gifted in trickery to just vanish. Perhaps it was even necessary as a dark mirror to the Seelie Court.

When he had first become king, Odran had been a wild, dissolute wastrel of a monarch with a taste for women, wine, food, women, gambling, women, brawling, sporting, singing, dancing, women, and more women. His personal quest against the Unseelie Court had given him something to focus on and something to care about, and so it had made him into a better king. Now he was a noble monarch and a great leader, with a taste for women, wine, food, women, gambling, women, brawling, sporting, singing, dancing, women, and more women—because some things did not change and some things I suppose shouldn’t. Odran was who he was, a huge character who wore his flaws like badges of honor—they did not make him less of a man or less of a king.

As the afternoon wore on and Fae continued to arrive from all the disparate realms of Faery, I saw another familiar face. There was a stir amongst Fae and other races alike as the Prophetess, Mercedes, stepped through the portal onto the sands of the place she had called home long ago. Odran went to meet her; he bowed and she curtsied, each acknowledging the importance of the other.

Something was happening here. If it had not been clear before, or if anyone had thought Bryn was exaggerating, then it was now very clear indeed. All you had to do was look out the window. The portals had been closed for a decade and in that time, barely a single Fae had visited this realm in which they used to be almost as at home as they were in their own. King Odran had written this world off as doomed and wanted no part of it. Mercedes had been in self-imposed exile for even longer. No one knew where she had gone—to one of the Faery isles was the rumor. But now she had returned.

Everyone knew what was coming; a final reckoning. One last fight to determine the future of the world. Even a solitary vampire, such as myself, could happily invest in such a fight. I could not one hundred percent justify my being here, but I was staying and I was fighting, all the same.

The Fae moved up the beach in stately fashion to the place where a large camp was being set up to house them. Odran and Mercedes were deep in earnest conversation. The Prophetess might well be asking after the welfare of her old friend Mathilda, and I took quiet pride in the fact that Odran would be able to give her good news on that front. I doubted the Fae witch would be recovered sufficiently to join us for the final fight, but she was safe and healthy and getting better by the day.

As the portal winked its brilliant eye closed again, I allowed my gaze to drift across the beach to the windswept dunes to the left of the house. On the ridge, stood a lone figure, the wind whipping her long hair as she stood there, waiting.

It was O’Rourke, and I somehow knew she was waiting for me.

Once the sun had set, I strolled out from the house, heading for the dunes, glancing at the Fae camp as I went.

“Have ye nae pitched a tent before?!” The voice of Odran carried like a foghorn across the bay. “Give me the mallet. An’ if ye are very lucky, Ah will use it on the peg, nae yer head!”

O’Rourke had not moved, standing still and alone on the highest dune, careless of the wind. The timing could hardly have been worse, but I could not help admiring her by the light of the setting sun. She had a hard beauty that I have always found irresistible. No make-up marred her face, her clothes did not accentuate her athletic body. She made no effort to look ‘good’, she simply looked good without trying. Perhaps it was because she was so at home in her own skin, so comfortable with who she was. I admired that too, as well as her tenacity and her bravery. She had come here to kill me and still intended to do so, but she had also risked her life to protect Rowan, because someone had to. How could you not admire that?

“Thank you,” I said, as I joined her on the dune. “For upholding your part of the bargain, and looking after Rowan and Mathilda. Thank you for waiting.”

O’Rourke inclined her head. She was uncomfortable with praise. In her mind, she had just been doing what was necessary.

“Now that the threat to Kinloch Kirk is relieved for now,” she started. “You and I have our own business to attend to.”

I nodded. “I deeply regret that fate has placed us on separate sides.”

O’Rourke’s eyes narrowed. “Fate, Master Vampire? Is that what you call it?”

“It was hardly by design,” I pointed out. “We seem to be on the same side and yet here we are—about to fight to the death.”

“Not what I meant,” corrected O’Rourke, her voice as unyielding as her face. “You call it ‘fate’. But that hardly reflects reality, does it? What places us on different sides is the blood you have spilled. The lives of the people you killed. Your victims, Master Vampire. Their deaths were not fate, they were your decision.”

Hard to argue with. “I am a vampire. I must feed or die—such is nature.”

“You don’t kill now,” O’Rourke pointed out. “Yet you still live.”

“Times have changed.”

“But the dead stay dead.”

I nodded. “Yes. That is the vampire’s curse; the times change and even if we change with them, we can never escape our past.”

“How terrible for you.” She did not sneer, but there was no change in the granite hardness of her tone.

I thought for a second. “Yes. Yes it is. I have lived through violent times, O’Rourke. Through ethnic cleansings and inquisitions, slavery and massacre. And during those times, no one questioned the rightness of what happened. People feared the bloody-handed warlords of the past, but no one said ‘This is unethical’. I have seen humans do things to each other that even made me sick, and so much of it was done in the name of virtue, justice and decency. Such people would be baffled by the way in which we regard them today. The vampire must endure the same. The past never leaves us. We fed. We had to eat to live. We made no distinction between our killings and humans slaughtering cattle for food. At least we only killed humans to live, not indiscriminately as they killed each other. And now we must live with the memory and with the knowledge that it was wrong.” I looked over at her and found her attention completely mine. “Right and wrong are not absolute, O’Rourke. One day, your acts and those of your ancestors will be viewed as genocide, even though you don’t consider killing vampires as such now. I know this, though, for I have seen it happen before. But you will not live long enough to have to bear that guilt.” I shrugged. “Not that it changes anything. Do I deserve to die? Yes, I probably do. Do you deserve to kill me? No. But you have to. As sure as I had to kill back then.”

“Are you finished?” asked O’Rourke and she seemed irritated.

“I suppose so. Forgive me, if I ramble, it’s what we old people do.”

O’Rourke’s eyes never left me, but she had made no move on me yet. “There is a contract out on you.”

“More than one I am sure.”

She shifted slightly, her feet finding better purchase in the sand, ready to spring on the instant if I made a move.

“Have you fought vampire hunters before? A true one, from one of the Four Families?”

I nodded. “I have.”

“And killed them?”

“No.”

She looked as if she did not believe me. “You didn’t kill them, they didn’t kill you? That seems unlikely.”

“I kill to eat,” I explained. “Or in self-defense. Never out of vengeance or spite. What do I gain from killing a vampire hunter? As long as there is a contract on me, then one or another will always be coming, so killing them gains me nothing. And if I did kill them, then all the weight of the Four Families would be down on my head. You are too young to remember (by about two hundred years), but the Families worked together if one of their own were killed. I never knew a vampire who survived such a team effort. Thus, I spared the hunters out of self-interest.”

“There are no Four Families anymore,” said O’Rourke, without even a tremor of fear in her voice. “You may kill me with relative impunity.”

I shrugged. “I doubt Rowan would forgive me if I killed you.”

“She has a crush on you, she would forgive you anything.”

“Indeed?” Sinjin’s daughter had a crush on me—what a world we lived in. “Never the less, I would not underestimate the attachment she has formed toward you.”

“So one or the other of us is going to have to upset Rowan.”

“Indeed.”

“Unfortunate,” said O’Rourke. “But unavoidable.”

I took a chance. “Surely not entirely ‘unavoidable’?”

Her stare never left me—did this woman never blink? “My family has never reneged on a contract, Laucian. I am the last of my kind, I don’t wish to be the first to break that trust.”

I nodded. “I suppose Rowan will get over it. She has her parents back after all.”

“Then we fight.”

Could I beat her? Undoubtedly I could, the vampire hunters were highly trained and I had seen O’Rourke fight—she was extraordinary—but I had not lived five centuries (plus change) without learning how to defend myself and how to kill when properly motivated. And someone trying to kill me was excellent motivation; I did not want to die.

But I did not want to kill O’Rourke either.

There was the problem.

When she attacked, I would certainly defend myself and, in the course of the fight, a moment would come when her guard was down. But I did not think I could strike. And so the fight would continue, and eventually a moment would come when my guard was down, and she would strike. Perhaps in the heat of the moment my vampire instincts might win out? But, no. It was not just that O’Rourke was one of the good guys, nor that I did not kill humans any longer. There was something about her, something I had not stopped to examine too closely because ours was a difficult situation, to say the least. But, the truth of the matter was that I liked her. I liked her enough that my feelings overrode my killer instincts.

And that meant she was going to kill me.

O’Rourke lashed out so quickly, I barely had time to react. I took a bad step and tumbled down the dune. O’Rourke sprang after me, landing with the agility of a monkey, poised ready for the fray. I rolled clear, back onto my feet, ready to defend myself—if I were going to die, then I was at least going to make a show of it. We traded blows and I was astonished again by her speed and power, combined with such grace and agility that she sometimes seemed almost to be in flight, as if gravity had less of a pull on her than other humans. It was close; blow for blow; breath for breath.

And the moment came.

But I could not take it.

I saw the momentary surprise on O’Rourke’s face; she knew she should have been dead.

Ducking and sweeping with her leg, she sent me flat on my back and sprang on top of me, wooden stake in hand. This was it.

“Do so quickly,” I said.

She remained seated astride me, stake in hand, ready to strike, but no strike came. I am not certain how long it was that we remained like this.

“Damn it,” O’Rourke muttered at last.

“I can’t help but notice,” I said, tentatively, after another few seconds had passed, “that you don’t seem to be killing me.”

“I’m aware!” snapped O’Rourke, then she narrowed her eyes at me. “There was a moment when you had me.”

“You let your guard down.”

She nodded. “Then why didn’t you finish it?!” She seemed almost upset, and I suddenly realized that letting her guard down might not have been a mistake.

“O’Rourke…”

“If I don’t… go through with this, I will be letting my family down,” she slumped.

“Is that so terrible?”

She glared at me. “Do you know how much a hatred for vampires has been drummed into me all my life?”

“I can imagine.”

“It’s kill or be killed.” Then she narrowed her eyes on me further. “Why didn’t you kill me when you had the chance?”

I sighed. “I don’t want to.”

O’Rourke got up, leaving me lying in the sand. “Well I do want to kill you, but I can’t seem to do it.” She offered a hand to help me up. “You were a horrible vampire, but damn it all you seem to have become a good man and… killing you isn’t bringing anyone back to life.”

“That is sadly true.”

“In fact, it may cost lives.” O’Rourke’s eyes shifted to the little house by the beach as she inhaled deeply. “Something is happening here. I can’t pretend to understand all of it, but it seems important.”

“I would agree.”

She looked back at me. “I don’t want to deprive them of a fighter like you.”

“That is generous.” But I did wonder if it was the whole story. Was it possible she was using that as an excuse for not killing me? Was it possible that she liked me as I liked her?

A vampire hunter and a vampire. Of such relationships are great novels written. Or at least some trashy online fiction. Maybe it was all in my head, but a vampire can dream.

“I’m going to stay and fight,” said O’Rourke, after a while.

“It’s not your fight,”

“It’s not yours either.”

“True. Although I suppose, in a way, it’s everyone’s fight as it impacts us all.”

“If you say so,” O’Rourke shrugged. “I’m still not totally clear what’s going on.”

“Nor am I, actually.”

“Why are we fighting?”

I half-smiled. “Because, even if we don’t know the details, we can tell the good guys from the bad.”

O’Rourke’s gaze lingered on me. “Yeah. I think we can.”

“Then… what will you do?”

She nodded. “I’m staying and I’m not going to kill you. Yet. Once all this fighting business is over… I guess we’ll see.”

“I guess we will.”

Love and death—both were on hold until the war was over. I was interested to find out which of those two was in the cards for O’Rourke and myself. Even though O’Rourke was certainly different to the virgin maidens I usually hungered for, she intrigued me. Truth was, she intrigued more than any other woman had in centuries.

“Good news for Rowan, anyway.”

“For now.” She turned on her heel and began to walk away from me, down the dune towards the house.

“O’Rourke?” I called after her and she turned. “What is your name?”

For a long time, O’Rourke was silent, looking at me as if she were assessing me and deciding something, until, finally, she said, “Clara.”

I felt a slight tremble pass through me, as if someone had breathed across my skin. It was a more intimate moment than a kiss ever could have been.

Clara began walking again.

“What about your family name?” I called again. “Did I guess right?”

Clara turned her head back with what I decided was a coquettish smile. “A girl has to keep some secrets, Master Vampire.”

SEVEN

Stone

Good news, bad news.

I’m a bad news first kind of guy. So, the bad news was that I was a vampire who had been tied, spreadeagle, on a rooftop. More bad news? It was just before dawn, so I could ‘see the sun rise’. It was the traditional way of executing captured vampires back in the old days. The good news was that, while Rand’s guards had known I was a vampire, they hadn’t known about my gypsy blood.

The sun rose.

It was pretty bright (clearly it was going to be a nice day) so I had to squint a bit, but other than that, the sun did me no harm at all. I wasn’t sure if even Sinjin understood why gypsy blood had this extremely useful side-effect, but the history between vampires and my people is a long and complex one. I was happy to leave the details to the historians and just be grateful I wasn’t currently bursting into flames.

Of course, I was still tied to a roof which wasn’t ideal. But, the guards had been confident enough in their knot-tying abilities to leave me alone up here and that was most certainly good news. But, there was little worth in surviving the dawn if I was just going to starve to death. That was probably a worse way to die than burning; certainly a slower one.

For at least the twelfth time since I’d been tied up, I yanked at the ropes holding me. Vampires are strong by nature and I was in pretty good shape, but the ropes refused to give, no matter how hard I strained my muscles against them. If I was going to get out of this, I’d need to rely on my brain, not my brawn. Yet, being tied to a rooftop isn’t exactly conducive to clear thinking.

Reaching out, I ran my fingers along the edges of the tiles beneath me. Wasn’t there supposed to be a sharp edge I could rub the rope against? That was always the way in the movies—it was like a rule. But I could find nothing sharp enough to fray the ropes. Maybe I could attract a bird—a raven or the like—to peck away the rope fibers. Or maybe being stuck here was making me lightheaded and delusional.

It occurred to me that in a few days I was going to be attracting ravens anyway. No reason to alert them ahead of time.

If I’d had a magnifying glass, I could have used it to direct the sunlight and burn the ropes away. But of course I didn’t have a magnifying glass or even a pair of strong prescription glasses. Damn my great vision!

In normal circumstances I would have used magic to burn the ropes or untie them or even make them vanish, but the Dark Fae witch who called herself ‘Black Annis’ had done something to me and magic was not currently coming when I called on it.

Speaking of Black Annis, the old bitch had also hit me over the head with a human thigh bone, and I could still feel the sticky patch of blood at the back of my head as it started to drip and dribble down my neck, onto the roof tiles.

“Think!” I told myself. It was hard to focus with the sun in my eyes, a pain in my head, my limbs stretched and the smell of burning in my nostrils.

My best chance seemed to be that Black Annis’s spell would wear off with time and I would regain my magic. But how long would that take? I was very aware that anything could be happening to Emma while I was up here. Rand had not wanted her hurt but it had been very clear that Rand was not the one in charge. The longer I was up here the more danger Emma was…

Wait a minute… Smell of burning?

A wisp of smoke drifted in front of my eyes and I turned my head to the right to see white plumes rising from a small patch on the tiles beside my head.

“What the hell?” I muttered. What was burning?

And then I realized; it was my blood.

My blood was burning in the sunlight.

Panic seared through me. If the fire followed the trail of blood, like a line of gasoline, then my brain would burn from the inside out. How could I possibly not have known my blood burned in the sun like that of a normal vampire?

I paused. I couldn’t have gotten this far without knowing that. Certainly not with the life I’d lived. I’d definitely been cut before and I was confident those cuts had seen daylight and it wasn’t as though I’d blown up in a conflagration. Hmm, curious.

Awkwardly I managed to turn my head so the sunlight landed on the spot where Black Annis had hit me. I could feel the warmth of the sun on the bloody mark, but it didn’t burn.

I put my head back down again. I was thinking more clearly now and I realized that what I’d just done had been a tremendously stupid thing to do and could have easily led to my death by flaming head.

Fortunately, my guess had been right; as long as the blood was on me—part of me—then I was safe, but when it left me, then it burnt just as a regular vampire’s did. Another intriguing quirk of the vampire/gypsy bloodline.

It was also something that might help me.

Gritting my teeth, I dug my fingernails into the palm of my right hand. The pain seized me but I ignored it and pressed harder, gasping as the skin broke and I felt fresh, warm blood flowing onto my hand.

Twisting my hand in its rope bonds, I managed to daub the rope with my own blood, smearing my palm along it.

“Come on, you son of a bitch.”

It took a moment, but then the blood started to smolder in the bright sunlight. Would it burn hot enough? It always looked pretty spectacular when vampires combusted—and the level of heat generated was massive. If my blood had the same properties, then surely that would be enough.

“Yes!”

The rope started to catch, I could see the individual fibers starting to blacken and curl. Desperately I tried blowing on it to keep the fire going. The rope singed and smoked, at one point a small, sorry-looking flame flickered into life before vanishing again, but it kept smoldering, weakening the rope.

“Come on…” I growled, tensing my muscles as I tugged at the rope. It stretched, pulling at the weak point where it had burned. “Come on…”

I pulled harder, straining every sinew, my wrist screaming with pain where the rope cut into it, until…

“Yes!” I couldn’t help shouting in triumph as the rope snapped, the free end lashing back elastically.

With one hand now loose, I was easily able to untie the other.

I was free, and I had only one object in mind: Emma.

My immediate instinct was to go racing into the King’s Alliance headquarters, fight my way down the dungeons, kick open the cell door, carry Emma out, fighting off the entire army of the King’s Alliance as I went, find a quiet bedroom and make love to her for twelve straight hours. Not the best plan I’d ever come up with, I’ll admit.

Right now, with adrenalin surging through me, all that seemed perfectly possible, but I still had enough caution to check my enthusiasm. There were a lot of guards down there and I was only one man. As such, I probably couldn’t fight off more than ten to fifteen of them at a time.

If I was going to rescue Emma, it was going to be by stealth and a solid plan. The first step was going to be getting down off this roof without being noticed by anyone in the building. My limbs ached from being stretched, but I still had enough strength to hang down from the overhang of the roof and swing myself to the wall.

The exterior of the King’s Alliance headquarters wasn’t covered with convenient hand and footholds, having more of a blocky quality, but if you had a good enough grip, it was climbable. Steadily I made my way down, dropping between window sills, trusting my whole weigh    t to one hand to swing myself onto the next ledge, until finally I reached the ground and could rest my arms.

Now I would have to wait until night to sneak back in again. I hated to leave Emma where she had no doubt been thrown into the dungeon, but there was no sense in charging in and getting myself captured as well. If I was going to save her (and I was going to save her) then I needed to be patient.

“Who are you?”

Of course, the best laid plans can hit a snag and before I had a chance to look around, I was aware of a wooden stake being pressed against my back.

“I said, ‘Who are you?’,” the voice from behind me repeated. “And before you tell a lie please bear in mind that I’ve had a bad week and am just looking for an excuse to take it out on someone.”

I tensed and prepared to fight.

***

Emma

I was talking to my mom. I didn’t know how it was possible.

It was more than I could ever have hoped for and more than I would have dared dream to be possible. At first I worried she was just a trick of the Dark Fae that had locked me up here, or even of my father (which was a horrifying thought). But then we began to talk (telepathically of course) and any doubts I had evaporated. I hadn’t seen my mom for ten years. I’d been a little kid when we spoke last, but the feel of her in my mind brought her back to me on a tide of nostalgia. Magic could do all sorts; it could create doubles and change appearances, it could accurately fake voices and even speech patterns, but it couldn’t replicate a mom.

I’m not sure either of us heard a word the other said for the first five minutes, we were both so choked up with tears. I would have given anything to touch her, I wanted to tear down the walls with my bare hands to reach out and hug her, but even without physical touch, just hearing her voice inside my head again was more wonderful than I could put into words.

Finally, the emotions became less overwhelming, at least to the extent that we managed to speak clearly to each other.

How did you end up down here? Mom asked.

I think something’s wrong with Dad, I replied. He got caught up with some bad people. You?

Pretty much the same reason.

There’s something missing inside him, Mom. Something different. I could feel it—or maybe not feel it—but I don’t know what it is. There is something wrong with him though.

Yes. I could hear the fear and despondency in Mom’s voice. I’m afraid your dad may have gone and done something very stupid.

He was devastated when you… I mean, when we thought you died.

I’d have given anything to get a message through to you.

And you’ve been in the Abyss all this time?

Yes.

That must have been awful.

I had help surviving it. There was something about her tone of voice that made me want to press her further about this ‘help’.

I’m so glad to hear that, Mom. What was it like…

Instead of talking about unpleasant things, can we talk about you, Emma? She interrupted. Tell me more about you.

More like what?

Like… Everything! I’ve missed so much. You’ve grown up without me and that’s something that has plagued me everday of my life. But, enough sad talk. Tell me how school was.   Did you enjoy your studies? Did you have boyfriends and lots of friends?

She couldn’t know about Stone. Could she? My mom was Queen Jolie and that came with a certain amount of magical insight. When I was a kid she had seemed to know everything, but isn’t that how all kids see their parents?

It’s all fine, I guess. School is okay. I’ve made some good friends. I’m not brilliant with my magic. In fact, I’m pretty crap at it. Although I’ve found lately that the magic seems to be there inside me, I don’t know how to bring it out.

It can be like that sometimes. I was grateful that she latched onto that, not noticing how I had side-stepped the ‘Did you have boyfriends’ conversation.

Magic doesn’t necessarily come when you call it,”she continued. “Or even when you need it. Think of it like a dog. A well-trained dog will come when called and do as you tell it but you’ve got to train it first. Some dogs take longer to train than others.

I sighed. My ‘dog’ has been peeing on the carpet for years and I can’t seem to get it to do anything else.

In my head I could hear Mom’s laughter—such an incomparably wonderful sound. You’ll get there. You’ve been through a lot in life and you’d be surprised how that can affect your magical development. Sometimes it can be more about the people around you than about yourself.

Really? I jumped on this explanation. Because the one time the magic really came was the morning after…

I stopped before I got to the part about what Stone and I had done the night before. I really was my own worst enemy. I’d got so carried away talking to Mom as if she was my friend, I’d forgotten she was also my mom.

After what?

I was puzzling over how to get out of this particular conversation when I heard a sound.

Mom, there’s someone at the door!

Don’t panic. But if it’s your father then don’t trust him, he’s no longer who he appears to be.

What the hell did that mean?

I scrabbled back into the darkness at the fringes of the cell as the door opened and a man walked in…

“Stone!”

I raced across the cell and threw my arms around him, gasping out words between kisses. “I was… worried… I might… never… see you… again.”

He kissed me passionately, holding me tight against him. “I’ll always come for you.”

“Very touching, but perhaps we could now get the hell out of here.”

Until I heard the voice, I hadn’t noticed Stone wasn’t alone and now felt slightly embarrassed.

“Emma, this is Pagan and his friends from the Order of the Templar.”

“Hi,” I said to the young man with sandy blonde hair and a mask of Celtic knots tattooed around his eyes. Oddly it didn’t make him look menacing, more like a hero.

“Pleasure,” Pagan nodded back. “Now let’s go.”

“No, wait!” I grabbed Stone’s arm as he started to lead me away. “My mom is down here!”

“Your mom?” he answered with a frown. “I thought she was dead.”

“So did I.”

“But you’re Emma Balfour.” Pagan joined the conversation. “Are you saying that Queen Jolie is down here?”

“I just call her ‘Mom’, but yeah, same person.”

Pagan looked at his followers, including a hard-faced girl and a giant of a man. “We can’t leave her.”

“But how do we find her?” asked the hard-faced girl. “It’s not like there are   names on the doors and there are   so many cells down here.”

“I can find her,” I said, with more confidence than I felt.

Being a sensitive wasn’t like magic, it was an area where I’d always been more comfortable, and although I was only half sensitive on Mom’s side, I’d always had the gift. That said, I hadn’t used it much for a while and was a little worried I might be rusty.

I needn’t have been concerned though because as I closed my eyes and focused my mind, the path to my mom stood out before me like a trail of shining lights.

“I can lead the way,” I said with a big smile.

***

At one point, we ran into a pair of guards who ran towards us. Magical dampeners prevented prisoners from using magic down here, but the Templars didn’t need their magic to fight. Pagan took out one and his huge friend the other.

“Carry on,” said Pagan, and we did.

Finally, the shining trail brought us to a door. “This one.”

Stone brought out a bunch of keys they’d obtained from the guards earlier and quickly rifled through them until he found the one he needed.

My heart seemed to be pounding at the back of my throat as he unlocked the door. I was going to see Mom again. Also she was going to meet Stone—I hoped he’d make a good first impression. Of course, I couldn’t imagine a better first impression than rescuing someone from a dismal and most uncomfortable jail cell.

“Queen Jolie?” Stone peered into the cell, addressing my mom respectfully by her title.

And then, out of the darkness, I heard the voice of my mother. “Emma?”

She could sense me. And as they had earlier in the cell, my emotions overwhelmed me completely. I rushed passed Stone into the darkened room and threw myself into my mom’s embrace.

“Emma,” she whispered through her tears. “Emma, Emma, Emma.” It seemed to be all she could say, but I didn’t need to hear anything else.

As for myself, I tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t come, my throat too choked with tears of joy. As a family we’d been through a lot, more than seemed fair, but for moments like this it was all worthwhile. I buried my face in my mom’s hair like I was a little girl again, remembering the smell of her and the sound of her voice whispering comforting nothings in my ear. Here we were—in the dungeons of an evil organization, threatened on every side, and I could not have been happier.

Pagan cleared his throat from behind us. “I don’t like to interrupt, but the last time I was in these dungeons, it went very badly for me and I’d like to get out in case this time it goes badly for all of us.”

Reluctantly, I detached myself from my mom who looked at Pagan with those kind yet wise eyes I knew so well. “Quite right. My deepest gratitude to you for what you’ve done for me and my daughter.”

Pagan nodded smartly with a smile. “Thank me when we’re out of here, your Majesty.”

Mom held up a finger. “I will. But we can’t go just yet.

***

I had no idea who the man was that we rescued next. Mom called him ‘Morse’ and she clearly had considerable affection for him. But that was nothing compared to the way he looked at her. I felt sorry for him, because to me it seemed all the love was on his side, and all the good companionship on hers.

“Ah’ll never be done thankin’ ye, Jolie,” the man said with a pleasant Scottish accent.

“You did the same for me,” Mom reminded him.

“Anyone else?” It was hard to tell if Pagan was being sarcastic because he was so polite, he might have been asking genuinely.

“Dad?” I asked Mom.

She took a deep breath and shook her head. “We can’t free your father yet, Emma. He’s not… who you think he is.” She took another big breath. “The day will come, and soon, when we clear out these dungeons and set every person free and we… come for your father, as well.”

I don’t think that as a child I’d appreciated just how like a queen my mom was; that air of command. The Templars looked at her in a kind of quiet awe. I think they would have followed her anywhere.

We made for the exit, but just as it seemed we were out and free…

“Whit the hell?” muttered Morse. “Kids?”

“They’re not Kids,” said Stone, grimly. “They’ve been possessed.”

“Don’t hurt them,” I urged.

Between us and the exit stood my school friends from Elmington, led by Clarke, the boy who had been my sort of boyfriend before Stone and before Clarke had been possessed by the disembodied spirit of a long-dead Druid, as had the rest of them. They still had the ethereal blue glow around them.

“Hello, Emma.”

“Cormag,” I replied, recalling the name of the Druid who wore Clarke’s body like a skin suit.

“Our master says you are not to leave. And you are certainly not leaving with Queen Jolie.” He then faced her. “Hello, your majesty. You will not remember us, but for a time we were in that infernal place with you.”

“I remember you,” said Mom, sternly. “I never saw you, but I remember the sense of you. I remember the cries at night and the howling on the wind.”

Clarke’s face lit up so he almost looked himself again. “You do remember. How flattering. Perhaps we can catch up when you’re back in that nice warm cell.”

“Out of our way, or face the consequences,” growled Pagan, his hands raised—up here, out of the dungeons, his magic would work.

But Mom laid a hand on his arm. “The children are still in their bodies, Pagan. I can feel them. You can’t hurt them.”

Pagan grimaced. “I can’t get at the spirits inside without going through their bodies. What do we do?”

People naturally looked to Mom, but I saw the fear on her face.

And as I saw that look, I felt something rising in me, a feeling I’d only felt once before—when Stone and I had been attacked by the Vryloka, when it seemed like they might catch us.

White fire sprang from my body. I had no say in it nor any control over it. It leapt in a crackling arc from my chest to my possessed friends, wrapping them in its flickering tendrils. I could only watch and I was petrified that my wild, uncontrollable magic would rip my friends apart. But that didn’t seem to be the case; instead, they were lifted from the floor and started to convulse midair, but then they dropped again, leaving behind the blue aura that had surrounded them which remained, enclosed by the white heat of my magic.

As the final person dropped, disoriented but unharmed, the magic vanished as suddenly as it had appeared and the blue spirits of the Druids dissolved into the air like mist. I wasn’t sure if the spirits were now seeking new bodies, or perhaps a place to hide or maybe they’d just dissolved out of existence.

“Get them!” Pagan leapt into action, commanding his Templars, who wasted no time in gathering up my dazed friends.

“Guards are coming!” warned Stone, as soldiers of the Kings’ Alliance raced towards us.

Stone and Morse fought them back, fighting side by side until the Templars were able to get my friends to safety beside us.

Mom raised a hand to the ceiling, dropping her head, and calling on magic of her own. The guards flew back and Stone and Morse joined us in running out the door.

I paused on the threshold, looking back. “What about Dad?”

But Mom took my hand, drawing me on. “He’s chosen his path.”

EIGHT

Pagan

“So that’s Queen Jolie, huh?” Nyx asked.

We were hanging out upstairs in the house at Kinloch Kirk, after having watched the emotional reunion between the families of the two Wilkins sisters. I wasn’t sure how long they’d all been apart, but it had been at least ten years since they’d all been together like this—complete except for Rand Balfour, whose name everyone was studiously avoiding.

“That’s her,” I confirmed.

I’d been able to talk to Jolie (she insisted I call her ‘Jolie’, saying anyone who rescued her daughter would call her by her first name, rather than ‘queen’), and she’d been all I might have hoped she would be; strong and sensible but with a quirky sense of humor. For all the power she’d once wielded and might yet wield again, she was down to earth and approachable. A remarkable woman as well as a queen.

Nyx shrugged. “She doesn’t look like all that.”

I was happy to see Nyx again and delighted to hear how she’d used her powers to save Mathilda, but I wondered if she felt a bit sidelined now that Jolie had returned. Nyx was used to being the biggest and best game in town, thus it was probably offputting for her to play second fiddle to someone else (and to another woman at that).

“You ever have a family like that?” Nyx asked, watching the beach from the upstairs bedroom window. “All about love and people who would put their lives on the line to save yours?”

“Not quite like that.”

Family for me was… complicated. Perhaps that was why I’d created my own family in the Order of the Templar. Perhaps it was also why I’d gravitated to Nyx and to the Samhain. I felt a need to be part of something because I’d never been a part of anything before. Watching the family on the beach, a group of people who loved each other, supported and protected each other unquestioningly was… well, it made a person think.

I looked at Nyx, who was still staring out the window. I wondered what was going on in her head. I knew nothing about Nyx’s upbringing, she kept her past a closed book, and I couldn’t imagine what sort of childhood had led her to become the person she was today. If I’d had to guess, I would’ve said hers was a similarly displaced childhood to my own.

Maybe it was natural that the two of us should have found each other, albeit in a strange and roundabout way.

Perhaps the same things were going through her mind because she turned to me now with a wicked gleam in her eye. “Whose room is this?”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted, looking around the little attic room, which had a bed, a chair and table, and a few bookshelves gathering dust. “I’m not sure it’s anyone’s. I’m not sure this house has a definite number of rooms or if it just grows new ones when it needs them.” That was mostly said in jest.

“So no one’s likely to walk in on us.”

Before I could answer, Nyx took the steps that separated us and threw her arms around my neck. Then she kissed me, aggressively, pulling me to her with one hand while her other went to the front of my pants, squeezing roughly, demanding and getting a response.

With an arm around her back, I tugged her against me harder, feeling her body crushed to mine. My other hand was on her ass, groping at the soft yet resilient flesh. Nyx liked to be in charge, but she also liked a man to push back, to show his strength. She liked to be taken.

I winced slightly as she bit at my lip, but I felt little pain as her fingers worked me through the material of my pants. Tired of the obstruction, Nyx shoved her hand down past my belt and her cool fingers closed on my hard shaft, yanking on it vigorously. She liked to test a man, to torture him, to make him prove he was good enough for her. I growled into her mouth as she worked her hand furiously up and down my aroused cock, twisting the loose skin around the shaft, scratching with her long nails. The glancing pain just turned me on more; I bit back at her mouth and tugged her more firmly against me.

“I’ve missed you,” she murmured between fierce kisses.

“It’s not as though you don’t have other men at your disposal,” I growled back.

Nyx chuckled, enjoying the slight frisson of jealousy she always got from her partners—Nyx was never without at least two lovers; often three, sometimes four. Maybe it was another symptom of her desire to be in control, maybe it just took more than one man to satisfy her.

“Have you missed me?” Nyx’s hand pounded away at me. “You have, haven’t you? I can tell.”

In answer, I began to drag up the loose dress she wore—no woman had ever turned me on as Nyx did, and by now I was ravenous for her.

“Oh yeeeesss,” drawled Nyx, abandoning what she’d been doing to undo my belt and open my pants so my cock sprang out like a tiger, eager for what was to follow.

With a curt shove, Nyx pushed me towards the bed, but I had other ideas and I resisted. I could see the anxious excitement in Nyx’s eyes, not knowing what I’d planned and liking it.

By now I was holding her skirt up around her hips and with my free hand, I grabbed her panties and tore them from her, making her gasp.

“Hey!” she hissed at me, her voice thick with desire and mock anger. “Those were expensive.” She slapped my erection hard but it was, by now, so stiff it barely even moved.

I grabbed her ass with both hands, lifting her onto the window sill.

“You can’t be serious,” she argued. “There’s a whole Faery encampment out there. Plus Bryn and Jolie and their families.” I could hear the thrill in Nyx’s voice. Even though she feigned judgment, she loved it. She wanted it to be taboo.

“I don’t care.” I thrust into her, unable to wait another moment so I was simultaneously overcome with both pleasure and relief.

I had missed her.

Nyx bit her lip as I penetrated her to the hilt in one thrust, stopping herself from crying out and drawing attention to something that was already pretty obvious to anyone outside who happened to look up.

She clung tightly to my shoulders as I retreated then thrust forward again, falling into a hard and aggressive rhythm. Nyx gasped into my ear with every shove, working her hips against mine as she wound her legs about me, biting at my ear and begging me in frantic whispers for ‘more… harder… make it rough’.

Driving her closer and closer to her climax, I clung to my own control as best I could, gritting my teeth. I knew Nyx would be disappointed if this ended too quickly.

Grabbing my hair, Nyx dragged me into a ferocious kiss, mainly to muffle her screams as she hit her first orgasm, her body rocking against me as she came.

I lifted her off the window sill, her body still limp and shaking from the force of her climax. We kissed again as I held her up, still impaled on me, and she wound her limbs around me, starting to move again, eager for more.

On an impulse, I lifted her off me, dumped her on the bed and stood over her, stroking the angry, red length of my erection.

Nyx looked up at me with challenge in her eyes. “Get down here. I’m not done with you yet.”

It was a good hour later (a very good hour) when we both lay back on the little bed, naked, bathed in glossy sweat, and just starting to get our breath back.

“That was excellent,” smiled Nyx, stretching out her limbs like a cat yawning.

“So glad you approve.” Honestly, I was happy to hear it. It took a lot to satisfy Nyx and I’d given all I had.

Nyx’s head lolled over to look at me, smiling self-indulgently. “You’re fantastic in bed.”

“You too.”

She shrugged. “Obviously.”

Though I tried not to, I did wonder if there could be anything between Nyx and me that went beyond mere sex. We were good at it and we definitely enjoyed it, but I did also think there was something about her; something special. Probably every man who slept with Nyx thought the same thing: that he might be the one who could change her into a one woman man. We all hoped it, even Conal (perhaps especially Conal). But Nyx was Nyx, and much as we hoped she might change, we didn’t really want her to change because then she might not be so special.

Probably not worth thinking about.

***

Nyx

I’d seen that look in men’s eyes before.

Sooner or later, all men want exclusive rights to a woman. Sometimes its male ego, sometimes it’s genuine feelings. Pagan was all feelings. He liked me. I liked him too, as much as any man I’d been with—maybe even as much as Conal. But just because I liked him more than other men didn’t make those other men vanish. I still wanted the other men. There had been a time when I’d wondered what was wrong with me and I’d tried to be like other people, but then I realized I wasn’t being true to myself. Maybe it was everyone else who was screwed up, denying the animal nature of mankind (and womankind). I liked who I was and I liked my approach to sex and relationships.

I hoped Pagan would remain one of my lovers, despite that longing look in his eyes. Some men, like Conal, could deal with my need for sexual variety. Others, like Braden, couldn’t. Pagan and I had something that went beyond sex though (incredible though the sex was). There was no question about it, and in his eyes, I could see he felt monogamy was the next logical step. But I didn’t think that way. A relationship didn’t have to be exclusive to be special. There were friends you would die for, but you still had other friends. Why did sex have to complicate things? In my world, it didn’t.

“What do you think will happen next?” I asked.

Pagan took a breath. “Well you’ll have to give me a minute, I’m only human.”

I laughed and gave his flaccid organ a playful tug (damn that thing had done good work today). “I mean here. At Kinloch Kirk. All these people are arriving. It’s not our fight. And yet…”

“It somehow all seems like part of the same fight,” Pagan concluded.

“Yeah. So, what next?”

He shrugged. “The final fight between good and evil.”

“Where the fuck does that leave me?” I asked—I’d never had much time for those tedious black and white distinctions.

“Good,” replied Pagan. “If only by association.”

Pagan, the boy scout, always seeing the best in me.

“That’s going to take some getting used to.”

We lay there a while longer, and I wondered; what could be more natural? Two people who cared for each other lying side by side after a lovely romp in the sheets. To me, that was what we were fighting for; that naturalness.

Maybe I was one of the good guys, after all.

Things happened fast at Kinloch Kirk. At my fortress of Glyderau, I’d cut the Samhain off from the world so we couldn’t be attacked, so we’d be safe. These people seemed to invite the attack. Then again, that fight was coming whether they wanted it or not.

I remained on the periphery of meetings, councils, and discussions—no one seemed to know what role I played or if I was part of all this at all—but I kept abreast of what was going on.

Queen Jolie had brought back word that Duine (everyone here called him ‘Rand’) had been taken over by a warlock named Luce, who was an old enemy of the Wilkins sisters and the Underworld. It was from this Luce that the Vryloka threat had originated, or at least from his disciples. I’d heard of Luce, but I still wasn’t sure he represented much of a greater threat than Duine himself. That was not a popular viewpoint around here, though. It seemed everyone was sorry for Rand, something which I didn’t really understand. They believed Rand had lost his ability to love by some act of magic which had turned him into the horrid person of Duine—causing him to turn his back on his own daughter and to become the tyrant I’d come to know so well.

Anyway, this Luce, wearing Duine’s body, was now High Mage of the King’s Alliance and had allied with the Unseelie Court under the control of the Fir Darrig—another creature with a grudge against all Wilkins’. They were coming for us with everything they had, and that might turn out to be a lot. Word from spies in London (members of my old friends, the Masked Magistrates) said that dark magical forces were massing the likes of which hadn’t been seen since the age of Fable.

That was one side of the coming war.

The other side (the side on which I reluctantly found myself) was also preparing. The return of the queen had precipitated the rebirth of the Underworld, and it was amazing to see the level of enthusiasm that had resulted. Thinking back on it, I didn’t think    Queen Jolie had ever said ‘Alright I’m back, everyone as you were’. It wasn’t as though she’d announced the resurrection of the Underworld; everyone had just assumed it was so. And they’d been so pleased about it, it had just sort of happened. My word was law in Glyderau, but Queen Jolie didn’t even have to speak here. That was real power.

And if that power wasn’t clear already, the Masked Mercenaries had disbanded and the factions pledged their allegiances to the queen and to the Underworld. Again, Jolie hadn’t asked them to do it, she hadn’t needed to. I wondered if everyone was just happier to defer to her because the world was heading for a shitstorm and they were grateful for it to happen on someone else’s watch.

Either way, Jolie was in charge again. Which was great, but all the organization of the Underworld, all the red tape and the minutiae of who gives orders to whom—that would take time to put back in place, and time was something we didn’t have.

King Odran was another man quite happy to defer to ‘mah once and future Queen’, re-allying Faery with the Underworld and putting all his forces at her disposal. Which, again, was great, but there was only one portal to get them all through—and doing so would take time. He’d ordered the other portals re-opened, but that too would take time.

It was all time.

Jolie, Odran, the Underworld, the lot of them were not ready for war. But, ready or not, war was coming.

“You know, not so long ago I was planning to bring it all down.” I reached across Pagan’s naked torso to take him in hand, feeling him instantly begin to thicken at my touch. “The Masked Mercenaries, the King’s Alliance, all the factions, the Underworld too if it had existed, good and evil (if you like those descriptions), the lot of them—I was going to bring the whole lot tumbling to the ground. Not to rule it, you understand.” Pagan grunted as I stroked him more firmly, his arousal growing again. “Just to be rid of it all—to be rid of all the red tape, the bureaucracy. Because it was organization. Magic shouldn’t be organized.”

“You still think that?” Pagan’s hand stole down my body with a very definite destination in mind.

“Yeah. Maybe. I mean…” I paused. “I don’t like it. Magic should be wild. But maybe you need a little organization at the top so the rest of us get to be wild with impunity.”

“I do like the idea of you staying wild.” Pagan kissed his way up my neck. “But you’re here still. Are you staying?”

“Yeah.”

“To fight for something you don’t believe in?”

I shrugged and kissed him. “Sometimes you need to look at the alternative to know which side you’re on. I might not believe in the Underworld, but one look at the other bastards tells me who I’m fighting for.”

“Maybe you’ve been good all along and didn’t know it.”

“Either that or you’re rubbing off on me.”

Pagan laughed. “I don’t think I could change the great Nyx. Nor would I want to try.”

That was good to know.

“Anyway,” I pushed him flat to the bed and climbed atop him, “I don’t ever walk away from a challenge.”

Pagan grinned up at me, his hands smoothing across my skin. “I’ve noticed.”

NINE

Morse

Perhaps it was fate, or perhaps it was the magic of the place working through the air. Regardless, I now found myself walking down the path through the wood. The path was overgrown as if it hadn’t been regularly walked in years, but from the wear on the stones, it had, at one time, been an important route. At the far end, I came out in front of a huge house. It wasn’t a palace in the traditional sense, but some inner instinct told me that a palace was what it was—or at least what it had been and might yet be again. This was the palace of Queen Jolie of the Underworld, and as I looked up at it, some things I hadn’t wanted to think about came rushing in on me.

‘Rand’.

I was sick of the name. I’d heard it everywhere since I’d come to Kinloch Kirk. Those who discussed him didn’t talk about about him as their current enemy, nor did they speak about him as their former enemy under the name ‘Duine’. They spoke about him because he was the one missing; ‘Oh, isn’t it a shame Rand isn’t here’, ‘But of course that was back when Rand was here’, ‘This tree was planted by Rand, what a pity he’s not here’.

They spoke about him as if he were a victim; ‘Isn’t it terrible what happened to Rand’. He seemed to have been absolved of everything he’d done as Duine because he hadn’t been himself at the time, owing to a magical curse that had been thrust upon him. Whatever this curse was, though, no one seemed to know. That had made me ask myself—was there really a curse at all? Had he really lost a part of himself which had caused him to become the tyrant, Duine?

The commonly accepted truth regarding Rand was that he’d sacrificed himself to save me. I didn’t buy that mode of reasoning, though. And, furthermore, if I looked about, I could find enough people (notably the woman Nyx) who still thought Rand was a dick who should be strung up, and I was siding with them.

But, of course I was. Because I was in love with Jolie and Rand was my rival. I hadn’t realized before that Rand had in fact, always been my rival. Even in the Abyss, when he wasn’t even there and there was no suggestion that Jolie would ever see him again, he’d still managed to come between us. Now he’d volunteered his body to be the home to our arch-enemy and he was still between us. And this act had been viewed as a sacrifice?

I wanted to laugh. It wasn’t a sacrifice. He’d given himself to our enemies in order to ensure their advancement. It was the final act of treason, as far as I was concerned.

I could have hated him for the fact that he continued to come between Jolie and me, but the truth was that even if Rand was dead, he probably would have still come between us. It wasn’t about Jolie and Rand getting back together, either. It was about the fact that they’d been together at all. Rand was Jolie’s great love, and nothing could ever change what they’d had; their love had survived the Abyss, it had survived Duine, it had survived Luce, and it would survive death.

The hall beyond the door was impressive, even in its dilapidated state. The palace seemed bigger on the inside than the outside. It also seemed to have deteriorated more than it ought to have in ten years, as if Jolie’s absence had weakened it structurally.

Through room after room I walked, pushing through undergrowth that had forced its way in. As I moved, I startled the occasional bird or squirrel that had taken up residence here, wood mice scattering before me. Again, I wondered if it was magic or fate that led me here, but somehow I came to a bedroom and heard a sharp crack on the floor as I entered.

I’d stepped on a photo frame, lying forgotten on the floor. Picking it up, I looked at the picture beyond the broken glass. Jolie and Rand. It was a picture of a queen and her consort and yet there was nothing austere or regal about it. They weren’t looking at the photographer, but at each other. My stomach dropped because the truth was suddenly so clear before me: if I’d ever wanted to know what love was, it was in the look that passed between the two of them. Pure unconditional love.

Perhaps it was that love, more than Jolie herself, that had held the Underworld together and made it work. Everyone credited Queen Jolie, the wise and kind, but maybe it was more a team effort than anyone let on. Not that Jolie needed to check anything with Rand, she was the one in charge, but their love had given the Underworld something honest and true around which to base everything else. Jolie had brought the factions together and held them together and she’d been able to do so because she believed in something. That something was Rand. Their love made her believe all things were possible.

Maybe.

It was just my private theory. Maybe I was just torturing myself in coming up with things that Rand was to Jolie that I could never be to her. And I knew I could never replace this man in her heart. No matter if she and I ended up together, which we very possibly could. I would never be able to mean to her what this man had meant to her. And I would forever be trying to fill a pair of shoes that were simply the wrong size. That was a future I suddenly wanted no part of, regardless of the love I had for Jolie.

I couldn’t criticize Rand for becoming the host to Luce—I’d held that role before him and so I knew what the draw to true power could do to a person. Whatever his thought pattern, he thought he was doing the right thing and I suppose I wasn’t the person to throw stones. I couldn’t criticize him for losing his mind after losing Jolie either—I would probably have done the same.

In the end, none of it mattered.

I’d thought I had a chance with Jolie because she genuinely cared for me and at times it seemed as if she cared for me more than just a bit. She had, and she did. I genuinely believed she loved me. But that love didn’t matter, because I wasn’t Rand. I didn’t think Jolie even understood the hold he still had on her—maybe she was beginning to realize it.

I had thought the situation between Rand and me was a competition, a race I could win. And now I was beginning to realize there was no competition and the race had already been won. I was not the victor.

I put the photo back on the floor where I’d found it and wandered back through the decaying remnants of the palace. Depending on what happened in the coming days, this place might yet be a palace again. Would I be there to see it?

Passing out into the woods again, I took one last look back at the palace. It was special. It was worth preserving and I wouldn’t be the one to stand in its way.

You can’t miss what you never had—so they say. I didn’t know about that, but I had no complaints. Being in love with Jolie was almost as good as her loving me back. For all that I’d fucked up in my life, I had loved well, and I knew I was a good man at heart because only a good man could love Jolie.

***

“Morse!”

Just seeing Jolie’s smile as she came to meet me out of the woods was enough to make me think twice about the decision I’d made.

“Where’ve you been?” she asked, as she came to join me.

“Went for a walk,” I replied. “Needed some time to think. Ah ended oop findin’ yer old palace.”

“Hardly a palace anymore.” Jolie brushed this off.

“Ye are a Queen, Jolie. Ye deserve a palace.” I took a deep breath and looked all around me, enjoying the sound of the birds singing in the trees and the hum of insects in the bushes. “The Abyss seems a very long way away.”

Jolie shook her head. “Not to me, it doesn’t. It will never be far enough away, and yet I’ll always be grateful that I met you.”

She was making this so difficult. She didn’t mean to, of course, that was just the way she was, so open and loving.

“Have ye time tae talk?”

She frowned at me. “That sounds serious.”

“Isnae everything serious these days?”

“I guess, but I rely on you to be my sunlight on a cloudy day.”

I smiled. “Right back at ye. But even the sun gets serious from time to time.”

She knew what I was talking about, I was sure of it, but she nodded, suddenly quiet, and we strolled down towards the bay.

“You’ve done so much for me, Morse.” She spoke first. “I wouldn’t have made it out of the Abyss alive without you and I wouldn’t have stayed sane without you and your kindness.”

I was trying to keep smiling even though I didn’t feel much like it.

“I owe you everything, Morse.”

“Ye owe me naethin’,” I stressed, before she could go on. “An’ Ah dinnae want ye to feel any obligation to me.”

She looked shaky and uncertain. “I… I don’t want to let you down.”

“Let me down?”

There was a long pause during which she looked at me and then at the sand at her feet, then at me, then the sand and so on, back and forth several times.

“I know how you feel about me, Morse.”

I shrugged. “Ye are a sensitive.”

“Yeah but… I don’t need to read your mind to read your mind, Morse.”

“Ah guess Ah havenae played mah cards close to mah chest.”

She laughed and I tried not to dwell on the loveliness of the sound. “Maybe not. But I liked that. Where your emotions are concerned, you were always an open book. Not so much with your past.”

“Probably a mistake.”

Jolie pulled a face. “If you had opened with ‘I’ve got Luce living inside me’ then I don’t know how I would have reacted. By the time you told me, I’d gotten to know you well enough that…”

“That ye kept trustin’ me when ye probably shouldnae?” I suggested.

Jolie nodded. “I’d rather be damned for being too trusting than for a lack of it. And it’s not like I was so open and honest myself.”

I frowned.

“You were always upfront about your emotions,” Jolie explained. “I maybe… wasn’t.”

“Maybe ye werenae so sure o’ yer emotions,” I said, unable to look at her.

“Maybe.”

More had been said than the words suggested.

“I do love you, Morse.”

“Dinnae say that.”

“But it’s true.”

“Aye,” I acknowledged. “But not the whole truth.”

“It could be.” I dared to look at her and saw Jolie’s face, smiling and yet somehow desperately sad. “I’ve made so many mistakes in my life. But the thing I’ve done right is the choosing of my friends. I don’t want to lose another person who matters to me the way I’ve lost… so many.”

She couldn’t bring herself to say the name of the one she had lost that mattered the most to her.

“We could be happy together, Morse,” she continued, looking up at me with those beautiful blue eyes.

I almost laughed. “Do ye think ye would lose me if ye dinnae marry me? What sort of a man would Ah be if such were the case? Whenever ye need me Jolie, Ah will be there. But… as to marriage… we wouldnae be happy.” Her frown grew and she appeared confused. I nodded and took a deep breath. “Ah love ye more than Ah can say, but Ah couldnae be happy knowin’ ye would rather be with another man.”

“Morse,” she started but I shook my head.

“Allow me to finish.” She nodded so I continued. “Ye would never be happy with me either, Jolie. We both know that. Ah’m yours, Jolie, as a man, as a friend, as whitever ye will have me but a husband, a lover, Ah cannae be.”

When I had the strength to look back at her, I saw Jolie’s face wet with tears.

“You’re the best man I’ve ever met.”

“Then ye should get out more.”

She laughed, and somehow that made everything all alright.

The incoming tide began to lap at our feet as we walked along the shore.

“When will you go?” asked Jolie. She always was so knowing, so full of intuition.

“Are ye tryin’ to get rid o’ me?”

Jolie rolled her eyes. “There’s a war coming, Morse.”

“Aye, Ah had noticed.”

“You should get out when you still have the time.”

“Look.” I stopped her, taking her hand. “Ah’m nae goin’ anywhere.”

“Morse, this isn’t your fight.”

“It is me fight. Ah had Luce inside me for a long time, an’ although he was on the inside, Ah felt as if Ah was his prisoner. Then Ah became a literal prisoner in the Abyss. This is mah first taste o’ freedom in many years, and this is what Ah want to do with it.” I held up my hand as I saw her open her mouth to object. “It’s mah decision, Jolie. Or at least Ah’d like it to be. Without Luce inside me… Ah’m naethin’.”

“You aren’t nothing.”

“Well, Ah’m human, that’s me point. An’ here Ah am—surrounded by magical fairies and vampires and the like and Ah’m jist me. But if ye’ll have me Jolie, then Ah want to stay an’ fight, because there’s naewhere else Ah’d rather be than by yer side. If ye have a place for… jist Morse.”

Jolie smiled. “Just Morse has always been enough for me. But you could be putting your life on the line and it… will be dangerous.”

“Aye, but it’ll be dangerous for everyone, magic or nae, so maybe bein’ human will be an advantage,” I pointed out. “After all, Ah couldnae be less o’ a threat to them.”

Jolie laughed again, but the smile fell off her face an instant later and I could tell something was bothering her. “Morse… I don’t want you to think that…”

I suddenly realized what was bothering her. She thought I might be doing this to win her over; one grand gesture to make her love me.

I shook my head. “Ah’m here because Ah want to be. Because Ah want to help if Ah can an’ because there’s naewhere else Ah can imagine meself bein’. That’s all,” I finished. “Whatever exists between ye an’ Rand—Ah know Ah cannae be a part of it.”

Jolie hugged me and I allowed myself to relish the moment.

“Nothing exists between Rand and me anymore,” she whispered to me.

I tried to smile as I looked at her. “Jolie, if Rand loves ye, then this isnae the end for ye, nae matter his choices an’ decisions. In the end, true love wins out.”

“Only he’s no longer in control of his own body.”

I nodded. “I dinnae know whit he has in mind, but Ah dinnae think yer story is over yet.”

Jolie smiled. “You always make me feel better.”

That would do. I would take that.

TEN

Rowan

“It’s so good to be back, and so good to see you again!” Emma said as she hugged me again and I hugged her back.

“It seems like forever.”

“I know. Time passed slowly at school and then… well then the world exploded.”

“Here too. Did you hear what happened with Mathilda?”

She nodded and her smile still beamed. “I heard you were the hero of the hour.”

I scoffed. “Then you heard wrong. Everyone else was doing stuff—magic and fighting and all-around heroism—I could have been competing for the Olympic ‘standing there’ medal!”

“That’s not what I heard. I heard you were looking after everyone,” Emma pointed out. “You held it all together here.”

“Well I made breakfast,” I acknowledged with a shrug. “Not sure that qualifies for hero of the hour status. But what about you? I heard you drove back the Vryloka horde with magic and then saved all your school friends from undead Druids! That’s crazy!”

Emma pulled a face. “I guess. But more by luck than judgment. Both times I didn’t have any say in what I was doing, it just… sort of happened. That’s not how magic is supposed to work, is it?”

“You’re asking me? You’re the one who goes to Elmington.”

Emma shook her head. “Yeah and prior to everything that happened recently, I was totally useless when it came to magic. Daughter of Queen Jolie of the Underworld and the most powerful warlock in the world and I couldn’t even pull a rabbit out of a hat. I was totally and completely unmagical. I always wanted to be like my parents. I always wanted to be magical.”

“You are, Emma.”

She took a deep breath. “It turns out I am, but I have no control over whatever magic is in me. Right now I couldn’t even levitate a pencil, then, when I least expect it, great lightning bolts of pure magical energy come shooting out of me with no rhyme or reason!”

“Well, that’s better than having no magical abilities.   ”

She sighed. “I want to be helpful. With everything going on, I want to be useful and I seem to have some magic but I can’t do shit with it. It doesn’t come when called and for all I know, next time it’ll attack the wrong people. I’m not sure I can trust it. And what’s the use in magic if you can’t point it at something? I’m still completely useless.”

I rolled my eyes. “Well, you aren’t useless but I understand your feelings. Look at me—the ‘Child of Dark and Light’, the daughter of a vampire and an elemental; the first of her kind; mystical energy; great destiny; who knows what she’ll grow up to be? And all I’m good for is taking breakfast orders. Although I do make a great bacon sandwich.”

“That’s not nothing,” agreed Emma.

“Yeah but… Not exactly the destiny I’d been led to expect,” I sighed. “I mean… There were times when growing up, knowing you were meant to be special, was kind of a pain. Like an anvil around your neck.”

“Yeah,” agreed Emma. “Like; ‘your parents are all that so you’re going to be all THAT’.”

“Exactly. And when you mess up…”

“Which kids are allowed to do.”

“… then it’s not like ‘Rowan broke a plate’, it’s like ‘The Child of Dark and Light has let down the world’.”

“It’s pressure.”

“So much pressure.”

There was a pause as we both thought about it.

“I think they tried hard not to make it too much pressure,” Emma said finally.

“I guess. My dad always said I could be anything I wanted to be.” Then I smiled more brightly as I remembered the fact that I had both my parents returned to me. And Emma had… well, she had one of hers. “We have pretty cool parents.”

Emma said nothing, and I realized that might not have been the smart thing to say given her dad’s recent behavior. Then again, Rand had been pretty cool, right up until Aunt Jolie ‘died’.

“I never wanted to be ‘chosen’,” I went on. “Never wanted to be special. But then you reach a certain age, after years of being told you are special, and it’s starting to look like, against the odds, maybe you’re not. And you think: Oh.”

“Being special sucks,” Emma agreed. “But being told you’re special and finding out you’re just you. That suuuuuuccccks.”

We were seated on the porch outside the house, the house in which we’d both lived a while, looking out at a view that ought to have been familiar but no longer was. To our left was the Fae encampment, and every now and then we heard Odran’s voice booming out above the noise and bustle of the Fae preparing for war. To our right, Aunt Jolie was going to meet a delegation of werewolves who had just arrived. They appeared to be saying the same thing everyone before them had said; this is everyone we could get together on short notice but if you could postpone your war for a few weeks then we can have a whole lycanthropic army here.

Vampires would be arriving tonight but, again, not in large enough numbers. In a month this might have been a close fight, but as things were… What we wouldn’t have given for a bit of time.

What we wouldn’t have given for a bit of talk instead of war being presented as a fait accompli.

“Do you feel,” asked Emma, her eyes lingering on a group of Daywalkers getting archery lessons from O’Rourke, “like maybe we’re being pushed into war?”

“Yeah,” I agreed. It was good to have Emma back; someone close to my own age with whom to commiserate.

“Doesn’t feel like we eliminated a whole heap of other options.”

“My mom says nobody wants war but sometimes that’s all there is.”

“Mine said the same and I said ‘Are we sure this is one of those times?’.”

“What did she say?”

“She said ‘yes’. Didn’t really fill me with confidence.”

I sighed. “You can ask and ask but it changes nothing. Nobody listens to us.”

“They still treat us like we’re kids.”

Which I kind of still was but I didn’t relish being treated like one, all the same.

Again we looked at the scene. My dad was surveying ranks of hastily assembled soldiers like a general—the only one of the vampires who was able to exist in the sun, as drinking Mom’s blood allowed him out in daylight. Back in the day, the Underworld had had a standing army, trained and equipped, all answering to their Queen (my Aunt Jolie). Now our army consisted of whoever showed up to volunteer, armed with whatever we could find in the closet (our closets were magically extensive, but still).

As for the other factions, the Vampire Coalition had no army and Laucian was fond of saying how soft they had all gotten under Dad’s lead. The werewolves had several standing armies who had spent a decade fighting each other, had no idea how to fight anyone else and who, in times of panic, turned on each other rather than the enemy. The Elementals had no army but could tell you very clearly how pleased the enemy was about that. Warlocks, witches, mages, and other magic users didn’t like armies but were trying to learn how to use their magic in unison, as they had used to—it was uphill work; at the moment their spells were interacting in unpredictable ways, creating pockets of unreality and turning unsuspecting passers-by into frogs in what was being called ‘amiable enchantment’ (like friendly fire but magical). The only genuine army was that of the Fae, under Odran, and it didn’t feel as if that would be enough.

But what   was the point in Emma and I worrying about it? Nobody listened to us anyway. We were just kids.

“What about Stone?”

“What about him?” she asked.

“Well, you haven’t really told me much about him.” Stone was currently training with some of the other recruits.

Emma blushed but she did so with a great big grin on her face. “He’s amazing.”

“He looks it.” Though I didn’t want to say it, I was burning with jealousy; Stone was tall and strong and handsome and a vampire (but one who could go about by day). He was smart and funny and sexy and clearly adored Emma.

Emma was older than I was and so there were always things that she was going to do before me, like school, getting her ears pierced, and… other stuff. Though I’d said nothing at the time, it had upset me hugely when Emma went off to school. We’d been home-schooled together by my mom and Mathilda, but Emma had reached a point when she needed to learn things that couldn’t be learnt at Kinloch Kirk—things like how to live somewhere other than Kinloch Kirk, how to make friends, self-reliance and, of course, how to have a boyfriend. When she left, I’d felt a gulf between us that was more than physical distance. I hoped now that her increased experiences wouldn’t create another gulf between us, that she wouldn’t now view me as just a little kid.

“He’s everything I ever wanted,” said Emma, dreamily.

“And…” I wanted to know and at the same time didn’t. “Did you… you know… sleep with him?”

Emma blushed even more deeply.

“Oh my God, you did!” I said, my mouth dropping open. “Details!”

“It was…” Emma sought words. “So… right. He knew it was my first time and he was so gentle and didn’t push me or anything. And I was sort of scared but… I don’t know; less scared because it was him. And then it just… It was wonderful. I mean it was fun and exciting and,” she shook her head and giggled, “mind-blowing and exhausting—all that stuff it’s meant to be. But mostly it was wonderful. Sort of small and quiet and intimate and… just us. You know? It was us.”

I looked down at my toes. “Jealous.”

To my surprise, Emma didn’t laugh or say ‘Your time will come’ or anything like that. She looked at me very seriously and said, “Make sure it’s the right guy, Row. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that it was Stone. I mean, I know how you must feel now—that it’s like this big, daunting thing. I felt that way too and there were times when I wanted to do it because—you know—everyone else was doing it and talking about it and it seemed like everyone around me was doing it. And I just felt… like a kid or something. Like I wasn’t in on the big secret.”

“I bet I will feel that way too.”

She nodded. “All I can tell you is that it really does matter that you don’t rush it, that you make sure it’s the right guy when you decide to do it. When the time comes, make sure it’s with someone who you love and who loves you.” She gave a sigh and shrug, “I guess I’m not super-experienced where sex is concerned, but it seems to me the line between awesome and awful is the guy you do it with. Both ways can change your life, one for the better, one for the worse.”

This was why I had missed Emma; she talked to me like no one else did and gave me the benefit of her experience without ever being condescending.

A pause as we again watched the massing ranks prepare for the coming conflict. Magic filled the sky with colors, clouds of sparks, and billows of smoke. The clouds boiled, bubbled, and melted, flashes of fire burst and vanished, patches of unreality wavered uncertainly and whirled away into nothing. The moon and stars briefly appeared as time was accelerated or slowed in discrete areas.

“Will it be enough do you think?” I asked.

Emma shrugged. “It is what it is.”

“We’ve got a lot of great fighters,” I nodded. There was my mom and dad of course, but also Laucian and O’Rourke. The sweary woman, Nyx, and one of her boyfriends with all the tattoos. That was another curious subject—Nyx and all her boyfriends. But, I didn’t feel like bringing it up yet. Regardless, the Samhain seemed to know what they were doing and the same went for the Templars. All great magic users and there were a lot of them. But ‘great magic user’ came with the caveat ‘for this world’. They’d be facing Dark Fae and creatures from other dimensions where ‘great magic user’ meant something more.

“Any guys in your life?” asked Emma, casually, probing for information but changing the subject at the same time.

“Not so much,” I admitted, feeling suddenly very young.

“Hard to meet guys around Kinloch Kirk.”

“There is a cute guy shortage.”

“Well, when you get out into the world, you’ll be tripping over them,” smiled Emma. “You’re so pretty.”

I looked at her. “Don’t do that. Don’t be like other people.”

Emma nodded. “Sorry. You’re right. You are so pretty and you will be tripping over guys.”

I laughed and then decided to let her in on a little secret. “I did have a bit of a crush on someone,” I admitted. “At least, for a little while.”

“Who?” Emma asked, keenly.

“I… I thought I liked Laucian.”

“The vampire?” Her eyebrows reached for the sky and then she cocked her head to the side, as if liking Laucian made sense. “I mean… he’s really good looking. Kinda old for you though?”

“I’m over it,” I said firmly. “I think. Mostly. Anyway, I’m pretty sure he likes O’Rourke (which is kind of weird, although also romantic). Anyway, like I said; I’m over him.” I took a big breath. “I just hope O’Rourke doesn’t try to kill him.”

“Kill him?” Emma looked horrified.

“Yeah, she’s a hunter.”

“Oh,” she frowned. “I thought they were together.”

“Yeah, they both totally have the hots for each other, I think,” I admitted.

“But, you’re over your crush on him?”

“Yeah.” I paused. “I realized that… he’s kind of like my dad.”

Emma considered this for a minute. “Yeah; older man (much older man), master vampire, good dresser, good fighter, good leader, limited people skills.”

I nodded. “I may have some father issues.”

Emma sighed deeply. “It’d be a miracle if we both didn’t!”

At the far end of the beach, the portal to Faery opened again to admit more Fae warriors.

“This is really going to happen isn’t it?” I asked.

“Yes it is,” nodded Emma.

“And we can’t do a damn thing to help, can we?”

“Not one single thing.”

ELEVEN

Sinjin

Bryn and I made love that morning.

Then we heard the bells ringing.

Outside, the sky was darkening.

They were here.

It had begun.

Bryn looked at me and there was sadness in her eyes. “Shall we go?”

I smiled and took her hand. “One more battle, Bete Noir. Where else would we be?”

“I was thinking the Bahamas.”

“If only you had said something earlier.”

We left our room, and I wondered if it would be for the last time.

***

On one of the rocky hills that lay to the north of the main settlement, Bryn and I stood, looking over to where the morning sky had been plunged into an inky darkness, shot through with midnight blue, deep purple, and blood reds that swirled within the black. The combined forces of Luce and the Fir Darrig had not yet taken physical form, remaining an insubstantial mass of smoke just past our borders.

Yesterday, once they had managed to get their heads around the concept of working together, some of our most powerful magic users had erected a barrier around Kinloch Kirk. Nyx was now more or less recovered from her Herculean effort in moving the portal, and she stood, flanked by Conal and Pagan (there was more to that trio than met the eye if I did not miss my guess), all three drawing power from the natural world around them and pouring it into the barrier.

Conal was a werewolf and not a great magic user, but his place was at Nyx’s side and he did his best. Around them had been other magic users from all the factions (including Mercedes, who I had not seen or spoken to in years), working together under Jolie’s instruction, though she herself kept her magic back for the fight to come, as did Bryn. It had been a sight to see, and I had watched in wonder as a shimmering dome, miles across, had formed around and above us, sealing us in, protecting us, fueled by more magic than I had ever seen discharged in one place and at one time. It crackled and glowed with power.

“How long will it buy us?” I asked.

Bryn shrugged. “An hour if we’re lucky.”

All that energy and sixty minutes was the best we could hope for? That was the scale of what we were up against.

Was it worth it?

Expending so much magic on a wall we knew would not hold? Jolie thought so, and the council had agreed. The dome would give us an early warning. It meant there would be no surprise attack and that we had time to assess their forces and array ours to meet them. It was not much of an advantage when you compared their forces to ours, but we would take any advantage we could get.

Last night we had had a family dinner, just Bryn, Rowan, and me, giving Jolie and Emma some alone time of their own. It had been nothing special, and that was what had made it so special. Perhaps you have to be isolated from your family to realize what you really miss are not the huge moments, but the everyday stuff. How many dinners had I missed in the last ten years? How many times had my daughter fallen asleep in front of the television and I had not been there to carry her to bed? How many bad jokes, beautiful sunsets, and good books might have been shared among the three of us? I could never get back those lost moments, but stretching out ahead was a potential future of similar moments I was not about to give up.

That was our advantage.

We were not fighting for power or money. We might claim to be fighting to save the world, for good, for light over dark, and for the future of the Underworld, but we were not, not really. Each and every one of us was fighting for something different; for a hundred thousand different things, little things. We were fighting for a future of family dinners, for every misunderstanding followed by a quick smile, for being caught in a rainstorm or getting a scraped knee playing football on the beach. To the people we were fighting against, it would sound as if we were fighting for nothing, but that was their failure. They did not see the little picture, or how those little pictures came together to create the biggest picture of them all.

Our biggest advantage in this war was that we were fighting for something.

“Still rather be in the Bahamas?” I asked Bryn.

My hellion looked at me and smiled. “You’re crazy if you think there’s anywhere I would rather be than right here.”

“And no one you would rather be with?” I added, hopefully.

“No one I would rather be with.”

I felt as if we had a chance.

***

Brynn

Without really thinking about it, I took Sinjin’s hand and felt the comforting squeeze returned. I’d missed that. He had large hands and mine always felt small and feminine in his grasp. It was similar to the feeling when he held me in his arms, making me feel protected and as if nothing could ever hurt me. Even back when I hated him, I’d missed the feel of him so much. Thank the goddess he was back. And I wasn’t going to let this reunion be cut short by something as inconvenient as the end of the world.

My eyes flicked momentarily back down the hill to the little house where Rowan was being looked after by Mercedes, filling in for her old friend Mathilda.

“I thought Mathilda would be here,” Mercedes had said when I caught up with her.

“She had been, but… events.”

“I heard.” Mercedes shook her head. “I can’t believe she stayed here all these years. I can’t believe you did. To stay in this place after all we lost (and you lost more than any of us), knowing what had been here before.”

“It wasn’t easy,” I admitted. I’d never really thought it might have been equally hard on Mathilda. I’d assumed she stayed with Rowan, Emma, and me because this was her home and where else would she go? Now that I thought about it, she had probably remained because if she hadn’t I would have fallen apart. And of course, she’d known as much. The old Fae was the most selfless person I’d ever met. “I wish she was here now.”

“Me too,” nodded Mercedes. “Even if I’d have to tell her she was right.”

“About what?”

“About everything,” Mercedes replied with a shrug. “About this place. About the battle not being over yet. About you.”

“Me?”

“I was sure you wouldn’t hold it together,” said Mercedes, as carelessly as if I’d not been in the room. “I never thought you’d be able to raise one child alone, let alone both Emma and Rowan. Mathilda knew you could and I do hate it when she’s right.”

“I couldn’t have done it without her.”

Mercedes level    ed her hard stare at me. “That’s not how she told it.”

The Prophetess had changed over the years and I wondered if such was by decision or if the years had caught up on her. Perhaps it was recent events rather than the toll of years that had left the streak of grey in her hair and the lines in her face. Still, there was a power and directness to her presence that hadn’t changed with time and I knew she wouldn’t compliment me for any reason other than because it was true.

“Thank you. You’ll look after the girls?”

“With my life,” said Mercedes. And again, I knew it was true. “Perhaps they’ll look after me too.” I wondered what she meant by that. The Prophetess saw much that she kept to herself.

Maybe I should have made more of my goodbye to Rowan, but I hadn’t wanted it to be like a ‘goodbye’. That would have upset her. But the truth was that I might not be coming back and maybe the more casual ‘goodbye’ would end up hurting her more. How did you judge something like that?

She was still just a girl.

Well… she was a girl but she was also fast becoming an adult. Emma had gone away a child and come back a woman. A woman who now had a boyfriend who she was sleeping with, and Rowan was not so many years behind Emma. But, I couldn’t think of Rowan in the same way—to me, she was still my little girl and always would be.

She was a miracle.

In fact, she was a literal miracle. Vampires weren’t supposed to father children and there Rowan stood; the Child of Light and Dark. I supposed… I’d expected Mathilda’s prediction about what Rowan would grow up to be to have come true in some larger and more noticeable way. I wasn’t disappointed, to be sure. To me, she was Rowan, my daughter, and nothing else mattered. But now I wondered if she’d ever get to fulfill that potential she’d been born into. Would she ever have the chance to be who she was?

“They’re changing.” Sinjin’s dark voice cut into my thoughts and drew my gaze back to the magical barrier and the darkness beyond.

Closer to the ground, I could see the billowing dark cloud that had formed the forces of our enemies now beginning to coalesce into more recognizable shapes, some humanoid, some much less so. They were taking solid form ready for the battle ahead, and when they were finished, then the barrier would be torn down and the fighting would start.

I recognized Veits—the Dark Fae we’d tackled in the Abyss—which were no great adversary but came in hordes, swarming over their opponents and never backing down, careless of their own lives. There too was the growing army of the King’s Alliance, resplendent in their uniforms as they emerged from the smoke—did they even understand who they were fighting and why?

I saw members of the Unseelie Court; boggarts and bogies. Some I knew like Black Annis, the Fae witch, others I hadn’t met but recognized by reputation, the Phooka and Glanconer, and there were still more whose natures I couldn’t even guess at. The numbers of the Court had swelled despite Odran’s best efforts, growing underground, becoming more and more corrupted until they barely resembled Fae at all.

“What are those?” asked Sinjin, as new shapes emerged from the darkness of the cloud.

“I think those must be the Druids Emma and Stone were talking about. Look at their blue glow. Apparently, they’ve found new bodies.”

Sinjin’s face remained hard. “Well, they did not find those bodies around here. Looks more as if they built new ones, or went back to the Abyss. Maybe both.”

The spirits of Cormag and his Druids had come back to this world as werewolves, before giving up their bodies to possess the more magically inviting ones of the Elmington students. Now they had rehomed their spirits once more. The bodies they now wore, as Sinjin had implied, weren’t human, or at least not fully, nor did they seem fully alive. They looked to be a patchwork of the dead, not stitched together Frankenstein style, but grown organically as you might graft bits of plants onto each other. They had too many limbs or too few; fingers sprouted from cheeks, eyes winked from chests and above them, the miasmic stench of death like a heat haze in the air. It was as if someone had planted zombies and this was what had grown.

The Druids of Avebury was an old story I’d read in Jolie’s library at Kinlock Kirk, years ago. The Druids had been persecuted by the Romans, owing to their insistence on performing human sacrifice as part of their rituals. That persecution    led to the Druid Revolt, led by Cormag, a Druid leader with genuine powers—a warlock in all likelihood. He was said to be in communication with the Celtic deities of the other world. Chances were that those deities were just Unseelie tricksters like the Fir Darrig, going by different names and exploiting human gullibility for their own entertainment.

How far ahead did the Darrig plan? Had it always intended to use the Druids like this? Or did it just put people aside in one hell dimension or another for a rainy day—you never knew when undead Druids would be useful.

It was a large and ugly army that stood beyond the barrier, but the army wasn’t fully accounted for yet, and as the Fir Darrig itself materialized to lead its troops, things got suddenly and massively worse.

“Hell’s breath,” murmured Sinjin, who sometimes used outdated curses from past centuries when he was really taken aback. “What are they?”

“I don’t know,” I answered honestly, and for the first time, I felt real fear trembling through me. What was I seeing?

The creatures now being disgorged from the clouds, the smoke congealing to form their bodies were huge and like nothing I’d ever seen before. They weren’t of this world—that went without saying—but they weren’t from Faery either. I couldn’t even imagine such beings existing in a Faery province like the Abyss.

They were all eyes and teeth, twisted bodies and serpentine appendages. Bloated bellies hung low to the ground and razor-   sharp spines protruded from their stretched skin, dripping pus-yellow poison from their points. One, with a casual flick of its tentacle, took out twenty or so Veits, then popped them into one of its mouths like they were popcorn. Another raised its head to the sky and brayed out a howl that made the ground tremble.

“Pagan talked about a lodestone,” I whispered, as if raising my voice would alert these impossible things to where we were.

“Assume that I am unfamiliar with such things,” replied Sinjin, frowning at me.

“Old magic,” I answered. “Lodestones can be used to open doors between realities. In the wrong hands—hands that don’t know how to use them or can’t control magic of such intensity—they can rip worlds apart or turn them inside out.”

“And in the right hands?”

“In the right hands, they can call creatures forth from other dimensions where our rules of reality do not apply.”

Sinjin considered this. “I might question your definition of ‘the right hands’.”

I could feel whatever slim hope I had fading within me. “How do we beat something like that?”

Sinjin shrugged, as apparently unconcerned by a hideous, giant monster as he was by practically every other opponent he faced. “I find that most things go down if you hit them hard enough in the right places.”

I almost laughed. “Are you suggesting I knee that thing in the happy sack?”

“Could not hurt.”

“Yeah, but where do I start? It looks like it might have evolved beyond the need for a groin.”

I was relieved Sinjin had pulled me back from the brink of despair, but one final enemy now emerged, one that was much less impressive than the pan-dimensional creatures but which made the pit of my stomach drop another foot.

It was Rand.

It wasn’t Rand, of course. It was Luce wearing Rand’s skin, and whatever was left of the man I’d known—of High Mage Duine or of Rand my brother-in-law—was buried inside, helpless and forgotten.

I could only imagine what Jolie was feeling on seeing her husband like this, leading an army of the damned against her with a horrid grin on his face. It was more than I could have stood in her place, but Jolie was strong. I was grateful that Emma and Rowan had been kept from seeing this, safe under Mercedes’ care.

“I never liked the man,” said Sinjin, grimly, “but this is not a fate I would have wished on him.”

As we watched, the Darrig raised its spindly hand.

It was a signal, and one of the impossible creatures roared directly at the magical barrier. I saw the wall shake, ripples of magic undulating across its surface, but as the roar continued, striking magical notes, it became clear our barrier would not hold.

Moments later, the magic shattered like glass, the broken shards evaporating into the air. The way was clear. The Darrig signaled the charge.

They were coming through.

I looked at Sinjin and he looked back at me, his face calm but firm. There was, as ever, no need for words between us. We were Sinjin and Bryn. We would live together, fight together and die together.

It was what we did.

TWELVE

Jolie

Was there anything I could have done to stop this?

It was Emma who had made me start wondering. Life had taught me (repeatedly) that however much you try to avoid bloodshed, there are times when you have to draw a line in the sand and say ‘this is my limit’. You can always find a route to a non-violent solution, but oftentimes those solutions come with compromises, and compromises can equate to eventual body counts as high as any war might have been. When evil rears its head, good people have to stand up and fight. Anything else is appeasement. Although I seemed to have spent my life fighting for one thing or another, I still thought of myself as a peaceful and non-violent person. But sometimes circumstances left you with no other choices.

That would have been a satisfying conclusion except I wasn’t the only one fighting. I’d made the decision and now I’d involved myriad other people. Their lives were in my hands. On very short notice I’d raised an army of Fae and Elementals, vampires and werewolves; all the creatures of the Underworld. They trusted my judgment and what I said was now the rule of the land. This had to be worth it.

The magical barrier, into which we’d placed so much energy, had failed, and the dark forces of Luce and the Fir Darrig were now coming through. Looming behind them were the vast, hideous beings summoned from other dimensions. They hadn’t attacked yet, perhaps the Darrig was holding them back, for now, letting his regular forces soften us before delivering the final blow, or perhaps they were still getting used to our world.

I was no expert on other dimensions except for the Abyss, but that was enough to teach me that the rules were different. The Abyss was pretty close to our world as it was more a province of Faery than an actual different dimension, but there were still big differences in how things worked here and there. Other dimensions could mean gravity worked in different ways (or not at all); magic could be weaker there and devastating here (or vice versa). Regardless, I imagined it would take these creatures a little while to grow accustomed to our world. Perhaps that would be to our advantage?    Perhaps we could deal with them now, while they remained disoriented by the dimensional shift inflicted on them by the lodestone, though we’d have to reach them first.

I wasn’t the only one who had this idea. Nyx fired a blast of energy magic directly at one of the monsters—more a test shot than anything else, to see how it reacted. At first, the creature barely seemed to notice and so Nyx tried again, gathering more power and getting Pagan to join her. Together, they fired a fierce stream of magic directly into the face of the biggest of the monsters.

My heart sank.

It wasn’t that the magic had no effect on the creature, no, it was much worse. As the blast hit it, the creature leaned into the stream of magic and its bloated flesh glowed and pulsed. It wasn’t being hurt by the energy, it was absorbing it. The damn thing fed on magic.

Though I couldn’t hear her at this distance, I saw Nyx’s mouth moving and could guess at some of the swear words coming out. If magic wouldn’t work against these beasts, then what would? We had little enough in our arsenal already.

What now? I heard Bryn’s voice in my head and took comfort in it.

Focus on the others. These creatures didn’t come here of their own accord and they don’t have any grudge against us, they’re under someone else’s control. If we take out Luce and the Darrig, then maybe they won’t come after us.

You think they’ll just go back where they came from?

I don’t know. One step at a time. Pass the word.

Will do. I love you.

I love you too. Always nice to hear and to say, but right now it felt like we were saying it because we might never get another chance.

“Whit’s happenin’?” Morse was beside me.

“We need to target the commanders.” I’d told him he was most use to me here; truthfully I just didn’t want him out there, where I’d feel the need to protect him. And as a human, that’s exactly what I’d have to do. He was least in the way here.

“Do ye want me to go tell the others?”

“Yes, that would be helpful.”

It wasn’t as if he was completely useless. He was a great fighter in his own way, and he was the bravest man I’d ever met; a human who’d faced the terrors of the Abyss and lived to tell of it.

He hurried away to convey the plan to those on the battlefield. All I could do was watch and hope.

Under Odran, the Fae charged. They were the most experienced fighters we had and so targeted the largest and best trained force on the other side; the army of the King’s Alliance. The Fae magic met that of the Mage warriors and I almost felt like smiling when I saw the Fae persevering. The King’s Alliance might be battle-hardened from fighting rebels like Pagan, but Odran’s warriors had honed their skills battling the Unseelie Court—there was no comparison. This was a day at the races for them.

In the thick of it was Odran himself, bare-chested, his kilt swinging around him so wildly, the last thing seen by a few King’s Alliance soldiers was probably the Fae King’s junk (Odran didn’t bother with underwear). As befit a Faery King, Odran wielded a two-handed magical sword. It had a name, but the Fae tradition was that warriors never told anyone their sword’s name—that was part of the magic. Of all the friends and family I’d made and lost over a turbulent few decades, Odran was the one who had changed the most, and mostly for the better. He was fighting as much for his own Kingdom as for mine.

The Samhain and the Templars fought together, side by side, taking on the misformed and undead remnants of what had once been the Druids of Cormag. The Druids had certainly looked better in their heyday, and some had clearly never had any great magical skill to begin with, but their transformation had been more than physical. Just as the students of Elmington had been a step up from the werewolves as host bodies, because they were more magical, so these new forms also had a greater capacity for magic. At their head was Cormag himself. I’d heard the stories of the Druid leader and even now in this warped form, he was still recognizable as the firebrand religious leader who had fought back against Rome so long ago. His eyes burned like fire, he roared at his comrades, urging them on, and the magic burst in brilliant blue flames from the staff he carried.

It was no surprise to see Nyx and Pagan both making a beeline for Cormag—cut off the head and the body will die. The Druids were only a small part of the force we faced, but every victory helped. The two skilled fighters and magic users, Pagan and Nyx, caught Cormag in a pincer, firing at him from both sides. But Cormag repulsed the magic, laughing as he pushed them back.

Elsewhere, I saw Laucian fighting with the small group of vampires who had arrived from the Coalition ships. The Coalition vampires weren’t a force to be reckoned with in the way they once had been, but Laucian seemed to inspire them. They focused on holding back the snarling hordes of Veits—easy to beat one on one, but there were so many of them.

Laucian was like a whirlwind in the center of the fighting, his fists seeming to be everywhere at once. Like most vampires, he didn’t rely on magic, but he also didn’t need it, his strength, speed, and skill were all he needed. Flanking him were O’Rourke and Stone. I knew Emma had pleaded with Stone not to join the fight and to stay at the house with her and Rowan, but she had to have known he wouldn’t listen. To be honest, I thought Emma would have been a little disappointed if he’d backed away from the battle. Though he hadn’t the age and experience of Laucian, Stone was almost the equal of his elder as a physical fighter, plus he could call on his gypsy magic, sending the Veits running. As for O’Rourke, she alternated picking off Veits with her bow and arrow and running them through with her sword. She had been bred for combat, and it showed.

The only vampire not with the Coaliton was, of course, Sinjin, who fought alongside Bryn, and I could only wonder at how they fought together. Seeing them, you wondered how they could ever have been apart.

The forces of the Underworld fought desperately; they fought like people with a just cause to fight for; they fought like people who had fought all their lives.

But, it didn’t matter. It felt as if all the skill and all the passion was on our side, but we were outnumbered and outgunned. Every now and then, a blast of magic would erupt from the hill, pushing back our forces. On that hill stood two figures. One was the Fir Darrig and the other…

I swallowed hard.

It’s not Rand, Jolie, I had to remind myself. That is not the man you love.

No, it was Luce.

I had to keep telling myself it was Luce. But every time I looked at him, it felt as if my heart was in a vice.

***

Rand

Somewhere buried deep inside the body that had once been mine, I stirred.

To an extent, I’d been aware as Luce took up residence inside me, pushing my consciousness aside to a small corner of my mind and claiming the rest of me for his own. From this uncomfortable vantage point, I’d ‘watched’—not literally of course, but I’d been vaguely aware, like a clouded dream, of what was going on around me. I’d seen the battle preparations, the evolution of the undead Druids, the calling forth of the inter-dimensional entities (as Luce called them). I’d heard my two greatest enemies plotting to kill the woman I loved and had never stopped loving and destroy everything I’d ever believed in. I’d heard and seen it all as if it was happening to someone else, and I’d been powerless to do anything.

But now, finally, things were starting to change.

Perhaps I’d left it somewhat late, but I hadn’t known the timescale for the attack, and Luce and the Darrig had moved more quickly than I’d expected. But there was still time to make my move and to change the outcome of things.

As my muted consciousness began to reawaken—quietly so as not to alert Luce to my growing presence—I wondered what Jolie thought of me and more pointedly, what I’d done. I’d seen her face when I volunteered my body as Luce’s new host. She’d been devastated, first by the thought that she’d lost me again but then there had been something else in her eyes—betrayal. She’d thought I’d made such a decision to give the win to Luce. And seeing that had hurt me immeasurably. I’d had to promise myself she’d understand in time. It had taken all of my self-control not to wink at her or give some other sign. Mentally I’d told her to ‘Trust me’, and I could only hope she’d heard it, because I had a plan.

It might have looked like self-sacrifice; giving myself up to save Morse—a man whom Jolie clearly cared about. And I had hoped that is exactly what it had appeared to be, but I wasn’t so sure that was how Jolie had taken it. I’d heard her say she loved him. And, yes, those words had burned me like the fires of hell, but they hadn’t been the reason I’d chosen this. I hadn’t made this decision to aid Morse in his quest to be with her. I’d made this choice to hopefully defeat Luce and the Darrig once and for all.

Yes, the choice had been self-sacrifice, but not in the way Jolie assumed.

When I’d gotten my mind and my soul back, courtesy of Luce’s magic (back when Luce was still residing in Morse), it had come with a rush of memories. Of course, I hadn’t forgotten anything that I’d done in the name of Duine, they were memories of emotion. All the feelings that had been suppressed over the last decade since I’d made the worst mistake of my life, rushed in on me in an instant.

And a memory of that dark moment when I’d brought the    se horrid ten years upon myself came back to me in a flash. In the wake of what I’d thought was Jolie’s death, I’d had all memory of her removed from my mind by a witch from Eastern Europe. At the time, it had seemed like the only way to deal with the hideous grief that was tearing me apart—I couldn’t live with the memories of Jolie while she, herself, was gone—dead, or so I’d thought. That decision in itself had been a mistake; grief is part of living and a way of keeping your lost loved ones alive. By removing Jolie’s existence from my mind, I’d denied her. But worse were the side-effects. The only way to remove Jolie fully from me had been to remove my capacity for love, even the understanding of that emotion. And in moving my ability to love, that was what had turned me into Duine and alienated me from my daughter. Memories of the absentee father I’d become continued to haunt me and it was all I could do to force them out of my mind. Without love in my soul, I’d become a slave to the worst of myself and the things I’d done since were beyond belief.

That was what rushed in on me in that moment. The memories of the emotions I hadn’t had at the time. For every heinous act performed by Duine, Rand now suffered the guilt. The force of so much guilt, so much horror, so much intense shame nearly tore me to pieces.

I could never forgive myself for what Duine had done—what I had done while wearing that name. I didn’t know if others would or could forgive me, but perhaps it would be better if they didn’t; I didn’t deserve their forgiveness—no matter that I was out of my mind and not the Rand I had always been. What it came down to is that I’d made the decision that had led to Duine and I would always be guilty of such. I’d been too much a coward to face losing Jolie that I’d caused this horror instead. And the fault in that decision would always lie with me.

But, however much I hated Duine and what he’d done, it had been done in the name of amassing power and that power remained with me after the transformation. Duine was the master of serious magic, and if I couldn’t undo the past, then I could use that stored power to do something good in the here and now.

In the moments before Luce had taken possession of my body, I’d cast a spell upon myself. It was a slow-acting spell, one that huddled like a toad in the shadows of my mind so Luce wouldn’t notice it until it was too late. Now, that spell was starting to work.

“Something…” In my growing awareness I heard Luce speak. “Something is wrong.”

“Wrong?” The Fir Darrig scoffed. “You have too little faith. They fight bravely and they fight well, but we knew to expect as much. We are carrying the brunt of the losses but we can afford to. What are the lives of a few Veits next to the power we stand to gain? And, frankly, I would be happy to see those damned Druids defeated—more trouble than they were worth. Keep your nerve, the battle will be ours.”

“No…” I could feel the panic rushing through Luce like a torrent. “Something… wrong… with me.”

The Fir Darrig frowned and peered at its ally, looking into Luce’s eyes. It started as it realized I was the one staring back.

“Damn you, Rand Balfour.”

“Right… back… at… you…” I growled as I regained control of my mouth.

I felt as if my consciousness was expanding, stretching out to fill the body around me, forcing the intruder, Luce, down into the corner I’d occupied. The effects of the spell wouldn’t last long, Luce would soon regain control, but the effects didn’t have to last long, because there was more to my plan. I would be the instrument of destruction.

The extraordinary power I’d amassed under the name of Duine was more than any single person should ever have, so much that it struggled to be contained within my body. Think of it like that Marx Brothers’ movie where all those people are crammed into a single room and then someone opens the door and they all come bursting out. I was about to open the door, the magic would burst out, and I was ready with a metaphorical match to ignite it.

I’d turned myself into a magical bomb that would consume Luce, the Darrig, and their damned army. And me too, of course, but no victory comes without sacrifice.

But the Darrig was no fool. Before I was fully in control of my body again, he read my intention in my eyes   and turned to run.

***

Jolie

Morse was the one I worried about the most. The others could take care of themselves—my friends and family were all fighters who knew this world and had done this sort of thing before. Morse was, in his own words, ‘Just Morse’. He wanted to be here, he wanted to be helpful, but in reality, all he did was split my attention because I constantly felt the pressure to make sure he was okay.

Morse, I reached out to him with my mind. I didn’t expect him to answer, but I thought I’d be able to locate him.

And I did. He was approaching the hill.

My heart leapt into my mouth. Because he wasn’t magic, because he didn’t seem like a threat (and probably wasn’t one), people ignored Morse, and he’d used that apparent uselessness to steal his way through the lines of battle to reach the hill where the two commanders stood.

All very well, but there was nothing he could do against the Darrig and Luce. They would turn him inside out. But, as the thought crossed my mind, I looked at the top of the hill. Something was happening.

Morse had spotted it too   and was now running forward.

***

Rand

The Darrig moved to run but a figure came out of nowhere, leaping onto the Fae and tackling it to the ground.

It was Morse, the man Jolie… I didn’t know what was going on between them, but I knew he was just a human which meant he couldn’t hope to defeat the Darrig. It had been distracted by my sudden arrival on the scene, so it hadn’t even noticed Morse’s approach—a  mere human didn’t warrant its attention. But Morse had the Darrig’s attention now as he rained down punches on it, the Darrig too stunned and panicked to fight back.

“Get out of here!” I yelled at Morse. “There’s about to be an explosion.” I didn’t want any more innocent deaths on my conscience.

Morse looked up. “Ah dinnae care.”

Somehow he knew. He knew that if he let go, then the Darrig would escape. He knew that holding it here was the most important thing he could do right now, even if he had to die to do it. I had Luce, he had the Darrig.

This was going to end now and all I could was think of the one woman I loved with everything inside me, the one woman I’d failed.

I’m sorry, Jolie. I’m so sorry.

I could only hope she heard me.

THIRTEEN

Rowan

“I don’t care! I’m going!” shouted Emma.

Mercedes held up a hand. “You aren’t leaving and I will use any means necessary to keep you here and safe.”

“But she’s not safe!” Emma yelled back, pointing in the direction where Jolie was, where everyone was. “None of them are.”

“That is rather the nature of war,” agreed Mercedes.

“I can help.”

“You can help best by taking care of yourself and staying alive.”

I watched the back and forth between them, knowing that, technically, Mercedes was in the right; she was doing as Jolie had told her, and Emma and I had no place on a battlefield. We would get in the way and then probably get killed, helping no one.

And yet… I was starting to feel something that went beyond a child’s desire to help her parents who were in danger. Something powerful was drawing me out and I didn’t know what that something was. I guessed Emma was feeling the same thing.

“Emma,” Mercedes was strict, “you need to sit down and behave or I will be forced to put you in restraint.”

Emma pulled herself up to her full height, looking blonder, more beautifu,l and more regal than I’d ever seen her before—she looked just like her mum.

“Try it,” she said.

Mercedes’ hands moved like lightning, describing a complex pattern in the air and magic threaded from her fingertips, snaking towards Emma.

I didn’t see Emma do anything. In fact, I didn’t think she had any say in what happened next. As Mercedes’ magic reached her, Emma’s chest glowed and pumped out a pulse of light that reflected the snaking ropes of magic, turning them back on Mercedes, who barely had time to gasp before the magic coiled about her, sitting her down in a chair and binding her there.

The glow faded from Emma’s chest, but I continued to stare at it in awe.

“Come on.” Emma grabbed my hand and I ran after her, out of the house. “You feel it too, don’t you?”

I nodded.

That seemed to comfort her. “Then let’s go.”

“But…” I stuttered, “what if it’s something… bad that’s drawing us? Like a trick or something?”

“It doesn’t feel like something bad,” said Emma. “And if it is then… What the hell does it matter if we’re all going to die anyway? I’d rather die with my family and Stone and my friends than huddle in a house hiding.”

I agreed.

Well, you know; sort of.

Maybe those few extra years she had on me made the difference, maybe I was just a coward compared to my older cousin, but I was a lot less gung-ho about the whole dying alongside friends and family thing. Still, I knew I had to go—this thing inside me demanded it. And it wasn’t as though I was just going to let Emma face whatever was out there alone.

It was night as we ran but night had been turned to day by the light of the magic from the battlefield. I tried not to think about the sounds that came from it. Maybe I wasn’t cut out for this. Someone else should have been the Child of Dark and Light, someone with more spirit and courage. Someone like Emma. I was just along for the ride, no use to anyone.

“Did you do that magic?” I asked, as we ran. “You turned Mercedes’ spell against her.”

Emma shrugged. “I guess it was me but… no. I didn’t have any say in it. It just happened. My magic just comes.”

“Mercedes is the Prophetess,” I started.

“I’m aware.”

I looked at her. “Emma, that’s incredibly strong magic—I mean, you turned The Prophetess’ power against her.”

Emma smirked. “I guess I did.” Then she shrugged. “Sometimes the magic in me senses what I want or what I need, but I don’t control it.”

“And other times?”

“Other times it just sits there useless inside me when I need it. I’m hoping that a big-ass battle will make it come out and hopefully it will pick the right side.”

That sounded like a lot of hoping.

How powerful was Emma? Powerful enough to end this war? That didn’t seem likely. On the other hand, nobody brushed off the Prophetess as easily as she had. There was something in Emma, something that came from her mum and her dad and combined to be greater than the sum of its parts. If only she could learn to use it then… Who knew? But it seemed like she was missing something; the thing that would make it work.

We crested the hill.

***

Emma

I reached for Rowan’s hand and squeezed it as if I was comforting her, but it was me who needed comforting as we approached the battlefield.

What had I been thinking? I couldn’t help here. I was just an inexperienced girl who was either so bad at magic that she couldn’t do anything or so good that the magic did whatever it wanted and didn’t bother with me at all. Neither was much use now.

The battlefield was alive with magic. Spells and counter-spells filled the air, colliding together, showering the surroundings with sparks and light. Burnished colors in all the shades of magic lit up the night. The sound was a cacophony of bangs and whooshes, alternated by the cries of people.

“How do you think it’s going?” asked Rowan, hopefully.

“I… I’m not sure.”

At first glance, it actually looked pretty good. We seemed to be winning in every fight. Odran and his Fae warriors were more than a match for the soldiers of the King’s Alliance; Pagan and Nyx, along with their respective groups were battling the undead Druids but were pushing them back; the vampires, werewolves, Daywalkers and others were cleaving a path through the Veits, Laucian and O’Rourke leading.

My heart skipped a beat as I saw Stone standing beside Laucian. This probably wasn’t the moment to be thinking it, but he appeared so brave, so heroic, so super-sexy. Co-ordinating all this from the back of the battlefield was my mom, also looking awesome though in a very different way, her mind reaching out to the various troops, giving mental instructions, and fending off magical attacks. I could hear her voice as she did so. The point was; it was all going well.

Except it wasn’t.

We were winning, but we were still losing. Looking harder, you realized for every soldier taken down by Fae magic, five more rushed up to take their place. The Druids were harder to kill, but they also didn’t seem to stay dead—which maybe we should have anticipated with the undead.

Pagan sent a fireball crashing into one of them and the Druid rushed around screaming for a bit before falling to the ground, motionless. But then, a few moments later, the charred and smoldering remains pushed itself back up to its feet, looking even more hideous than before, but still fighting, still able to do magic.

How did you fight against an adversary like that? The Veits weren’t difficult to kill, but they just kept coming, like a swarm of insects, pouring down the slope as if from some inexhaustible well. Laucian, O’Rourke and the others fought like demons, but the best they could do was hold their ground against the onslaught.

As I watched, I saw Stone kicking one Veit aside while firing magic at another and tossing a third over his head. He was in peak physical condition and he was gifted as a soldier, but even for him there was a limit, there was only so long he could keep going, while the Veits would just keep coming.

My mind went back to the lessons of history that Mathilda had taught Rowan and me (Mathilda thought it was important that we were versed in the history of humanity, not just the supernatural races). I recalled the story of Pyrrhus, the King of Epirus, who had come close to conquering Rome in the third century BC; he won every battle but took such heavy losses that, in the end, he couldn’t keep fighting. From him, we got the term ‘Pyrrhic Victory’.

And that’s exactly what this was turning out to be. A Pyrrhic Victory.

We were winning every fight but we were still going to lose.

And then I saw the things in the background…

***

Rowan

“What the actual fuck are those?” Emma stared out beyond the battlefield to the looming shapes. They were shrouded by night and by the shadows of the heavy clouds that hung above them, but by the stray flashes of magical light and the various fires that were now dotting the battlefield, we caught glimpses of vast creatures.

‘Monsters’ was the only word that came to my mind. By those breaks of light we saw stretched, warty skin, like an over-inflated toad; jagged, irregular teeth protruding over black lips; weeping sores as if the creature’s evil was overflowing from their mouths. For a brief instant, the bright blue flare of a nearby spell illuminated one massive eye that seemed to be staring directly at me (or at least that was how it felt).

“I don’t know…” I breathed back.

Emma shook her head and opened her mouth as if to say something but she couldn’t start the sentence and she didn’t need to; the picture of devastation was clear in my head.

“…” I had opened my mouth to say ‘We’re going to lose’ but the words didn’t come. They refused to come out even though I knew they were true. Even if, by some miracle, we could fight off the ground assault, we didn’t have a chance against those beasts—I didn’t even know how we’d go about fighting them.

For a long time, I couldn’t tear my eyes from the creatures, but when I finally looked back at Emma I saw her gaze had moved on. Her eyes were wet with tears.

“Daddy…” she breathed.

On the hilltop, beyond the battlefield, above which the monsters floated, their unreal mass seemingly unaffected by our puny gravity, stood two figures, and one of them was unmistakably my Uncle, Rand Balfour.

“He’s not your dad,” I said, squeezing Emma’s hand. “Luce has taken his body. That thing isn’t your Dad.”

Frankly, the words didn’t come out as comforting as I’d hoped they would, but that didn’t seem to matter. Emma’s brow creased into a frown.

She looked at me and shook her head. “You’re wrong.”

***

Emma

I could sense him.

When I was a child it had been clear I’d be a sensitive. Not quite to the extent of my mom because my abilities were diluted by my dad, who didn’t have the gift. But I was sensitive enough that before I could talk, my mom could listen to the scrambled chaos of my baby brain, and I could cry out to my parents in their minds when I was in trouble. As babies recognize the faces and voices of their parents   and know them to be safe and comforting, I came to recognize the minds of my mom and dad. That sort of thing never leaves you.

The mind I could sense now from the other side of the battlefield wasn’t that of Luce, it was my dad. And it was my dad, not High Mage Duine but Rand Balfour, the same mind that I’d known as a child. The same mind I hadn’t sensed since the change came over him after Mom vanished. He was back, he was Dad again. But what did that mean in the context of this battle?

“Emma…?”

I ignored Rowan and focused my mind.

I strove to get the focus necessary, closing my eyes and trying to shut out the noise and flare of the battle going on in front of us. I had a connection with Mom and Dad—I always had. Now, I hoped that connection was still there.

My dad’s mind stood out to me like a beacon, almost as strong as Mom’s, despite the distance. But it wasn’t the only mind there and nor, I thought, was it the dominant one. That other mind I couldn’t read and didn’t try to for fear it might recognize my presence. It wasn’t a friendly seeming mind and I visualized it like cold steel, closed in on itself, presenting nothing but sharp edges. It could only be Luce, and for the moment, it stood above my dad’s mind.

But Dad’s was growing. His consciousness seemed to be expanding, like he was getting stronger. Hopefully, even pushing Luce back?

I wasn’t sure what happened next, but the sudden shock of it made my eyes fly wide open.

“What’s wrong?” asked Rowan. She was holding me up. I hadn’t realized I’d almost fainted.

“My dad… he’s there. He’s pushed Luce down.”

“That’s great!” enthused Rowan, though I could see in her eyes that she knew it would make little difference to the outcome of the battle.

But I shook my head. “He’s going to beat them…”

“Emma, I know your dad is powerful but…”

“I don’t know how he’s going to do it, but he’s going to do it. I can… I can feel it.” There were tears streaming down my face as I spoke. And then it hit me. “He’s going to sacrifice himself and take them all with him.”

I could feel it in him. I could feel the intention and the pride in what he was doing. I could feel that he was doing it out of love; for me, for Mom, for all of us. He was happy to die to save us.

But…

“No…”

My fingers tingled. I could feel a cold flame burning in my belly, expanding, slowly at first but getting quicker.

***

Rowan

I stepped back from Emma as her body began to glow. Her face was tense and scared—she didn’t know what was happening to her any more than I did. I looked out across the battlefield to the hill and saw something else happening on the hill top. A figure—it looked like Aunt Jolie’s friend, Morse—had jumped the Fir Darrig. That was crazy! There was no way a human could hold the Darrig long. Maybe a human would have a brief advantage because a physical fight was the last thing the Unseelie Fae would expect, but it would only take a few moments to realize what was happening and he’d then annihilate the poor human with a blast of magic.

But perhaps a few moments were all that was needed.

“No!” Emma shrieked, her eyes wide with horror.

A brilliant white light was shining from Rand, and as we watched that light, it turned to fire, consuming him and expanding outwards in a rushing shockwave, swallowing everything around it: Morse, the Darrig, the monsters, and the hill itself, a magical explosion of unimaginable intensity. Not even the inter-dimensional monsters could survive it.

“NO!”

The glow exploded from Emma’s body, not in an aura, but in a shaft of pure magical energy, as powerful as anything I’d ever seen. I recalled watching Nyx move the portal energy from the US, thinking it was the most powerful display of magic I’d ever witnessed, but Emma’s magic now dwarfed it.

The shaft of magic burst forth and Emma screamed again. It seemed she was in pain as her body was being used as a conduit, I imagine. But, the power coming out of her was all power with no direction, veering this way and that, wild and uncontrollable.

I looked at my cousin. I looked down at her glowing hands. Then I looked at my own. It seemed so simple and obvious. The same pull from inside me that had urged me to leave the safety of the house now urged me to do something else, something that was the most natural thing in the world.

Emma howled as the magic cascaded uselessly from her, her staring eyes glued to the spectacle of her father being consumed by his own magical fire.

I reached out and took her...

***

Emma

…hand.

And suddenly the pain stopped.

A cool calm washed over me and the world seemed to spiral into slow motion as I felt Rowan’s soothing consciousness envelop   me.

Rowan had stopped the pain, but she’d done more than that.

She’d given me…

***

Rowan

…control. The control that she desperately needed over the powerful magic that burst up from inside her. Suddenly it all seemed to make sense, as if I was remembering something I’d always known.

The Child of Dark and Light was a point of…

***

Emma

…balance.

She stood at the tipping point between the natures, between realities, between good and evil. She found the point of balance in me, between the magic of my mom and my dad, and with barely an effort she allowed me to…

***

Rowan

… focus it.

The wild stream of magic pulled up like galloping horses called to rein, and then charged forward again, this time directly at the burning Rand. It didn’t hit him with that unassailable force it had displayed so far, instead, it swirled about the hilltop, enveloping it in golden light.

I looked down at the battlefield and saw that the battle had stopped as every pair of eyes was trained on the hilltop.

I saw my mom and my aunt, the Wilkins sisters, both looking back at their respective children with wonder in their eyes.

The forces of darkness, of the Fir Darrig and Luce, the dimensional monsters, the Druids, the lot of them were consumed in the ferocious fire unleashed by Rand, while the forces of the Underworld remained unharmed.

But what about…

***

Emma

…my Dad?

I wanted to save the day, of course I did, for a magical screw-   up like me, this was like a dream come true. But what I really wanted, what I needed more than anything, was for my family to be back together.

I needed my dad to be okay.

But the question still remained: was he?

FOURTEEN

Jolie

‘Aftermath’

When I was a child, I decided ‘aftermath’ was a happy word, although that may have been because I didn’t fully understand its meaning and I’d never been very good at ‘math’. Truthfully, it doesn’t have to be a happy word. The aftermath of a tremendous event, and especially a war, is usually a contented one, but most often, it’s edged in sadness…

***

“You’re leaving?”

Morse gave me a rueful smile. “Aye. Ah feel that somewhere out there in the world, there may be a place for a man lookin’ for life to give him a fifteenth chance.”

I smiled back—I’d known this was coming. I’d felt it in me all along. There were few things more precious in life than a good friend, and Morse had been exactly that to me. He’d given his life for the Underworld—well, very nearly.

“Tell yer daughter thanks again.”

I laughed. “You’ve thanked her a hundred times already.”

“How many times are ye supposed to thank someone who saves yer life?”

“I’ll keep thanking you ‘till the day I die for saving mine,” I replied, earnestly.

Morse shook his head. “We saved each other, Jolie.”

“We did.”

I would miss him more than I could say, but he was right to go. Anyone, human or supernatural, could make their home at Kinloch Kirk—I prided myself on that—but Morse had to find a place for himself, and here he’d always be defined by his relationship to me. He needed a fresh start, and I hoped he got one.

“You’ll come back and tell me about all the amazing things you do?”

Morse shrugged. “Ah dinnae know aboot amazin’. Ah was hopin’ to try a few painfully normal things for a wee bit.”

“I’d like to hear about them too.”

We hugged and shared a chaste kiss on the cheek.

“All the best, Jolie.”

“I love you, Morse.”

He nodded. “Aye. Ah know ye do.”

I couldn’t have imagined a better parting. It was doomed to be bittersweet, but I hoped it wouldn’t be goodbye forever. The world has a shortage of decent men and Morse was one of the best.

I headed back for Kinloch Kirk.

Much had changed there.

***

What every parent wants and fears is for their child to surpass them. We all want our kids to have more than we had, to do better and be better than we were, but do they have to grow up so damned fast?

As I wandered back to the house, where I was staying while the old manor house of Kinloch Kirk (what Morse had called my ‘palace’) was restored, I could hear the sound of children (not really children any    more) playing on the beach. Rowan and Emma had always played together, but now their games involved magic and had a more serious side.

I could only stand back and wonder at the power that my daughter was gradually discovering inside her, with a little help from her cousin. The time would come when Emma would be able to control that power without help from the Child of Dark and Light, but for now, it was best that the balancing influence of Rowan was nearby, assuming you wanted to wake up in the morning the same shape that you went to bed.

It was wonderful to see my daughter so happy, and to have her future so assured, but it was scary too. Fate had given her that power and I had to wonder why. What lay in store for her? But those were normal worries for any parent, and for now, it was nice to watch Emma and Rowan laughing together, because it meant there was still enough of the children in them to make those worries tomorrow’s problem.

Bryn was feeling the same range of emotions. I could tell. Rowan had always been on the quiet side, diffident about her own destiny (‘child of dark and light? What does that even mean?’) and now she’d blossomed with the discovery that it meant she could help. Where that gift would take her, I couldn’t say (and Mercedes and Mathilda wouldn’t say), but it was a gift she’d embraced. She was the same child she had always been; quiet, sensible, and loving, but with a new confidence of her place in the world.

I sat down on the sand dunes that overlooked the beach.

There was still work to do, decisions to be made, meetings to be had, alliances to be renewed. Restoring the Underworld to what it had once been wasn’t an overnight thing, and I wanted to put safeguards in place to ensure that if I were to vanish again, the same mistakes wouldn’t be made; this time the Underworld would be forever. It was a lot of work, but I could afford five minutes to sit and watch the girls, and to let my mind drift.

Bryn would be covering for me. Whether she was fighting or meeting a delegation from Faery, Bryn worked like it was an addiction. Sinjin had a more laissez faire approach and was forever trying to make her slow down, particularly in her current condition. Bryn had insisted initially that she’d fallen pregnant the first time she and Sinjin had made love together after that decade-long period of separation. Then I’d pointed out that, in that case, her child had been conceived in the Abyss, and she instantly changed her story.

I laughed as I thought about it. It didn’t matter; she and Sinjin had been making love like they were making up for lost time. No one had known if it was possible for Sinjin to father a second child—Rowan had been a miracle and it was unclear if that miracle could be repeated. Turned out it could. The prospective parents were over the moon, which, being Bryn and Sinjin, they expressed by arguing violently over names. The current lead candidate, if it was a girl, was ‘Mathilda’.

As soon as it had become clear that the Underworld would be reborn, Sinjin had disbanded the Vampire Coalition.

“That isn’t necessary,” I’d told him. “There’s no reason the two can’t co-exist. The Vampire Coalition could be part of the Underworld.”

But Sinjin shook his head. “My dear Jolie, the Vampire Coalition comprises three boats of idiots, drunk on blood, humping anything that moves, and so useless that we had four instances of people accidentally staking themselves. The one thing I accomplished as leader of this fleet of fools is that it kept them away from humans and out of trouble. They are your problem now. Congratulations.”

I laughed. “You did a good job. I don’t like to think about what all those vampires might have done without someone to watch over them. You saved a lot of lives.”

Sinjin shrugged. “I think you are giving undue credit to a floating playboy mansion, but thank you.”

Naturally, I asked him to be the Vampire representative at the new Court of the Underworld, but Sinjin demurred.

“I plan to focus on being a father.”

I smiled. “Plus, you don’t like sitting on committees?”

“That is true, of course,” acknowledged Sinjin, straight-faced. “But merely a coincidence. The fact that being a good father also gets me out of the onerous duties of state is neither here nor there.”

“Fair enough,” I accepted his decision. “Is there anyone you would recommend?”

“Anyone but Laucian.”

“You don’t think he’d be good in the role?”

“On the contrary,” replied Sinjin, “I think him admirably suited. He has authority, power, intelligence and is the second most respected vampire in the world. (Modesty forbids me to identify the most respected.) The fact that he was skeptical of the Underworld but was won over would give him added weight for those old-fashioned vampires still lurking in the cellars of their castles. Above all, he is brave, honorable and, even given our differences, I would trust him with my life.”

I frowned. “It sounds like you are recommending him.”

Sinjin shook his head. “I am very specifically not. I would never hear the end of it from him if I were to do so. I am stating, quite categorially, that I do not want you to choose Laucian; anyone but him. And if you choose to pick him anyway, then I will be able to tell him that it was against my objection.”

Naturally, I’d spoken to Laucian later that day and he’d accepted the role.

“Sinjin won’t like it,” he said with a smile.

“He told me to pick ‘anyone but Laucian’,” I replied.

“Did he?” Laucian’s eyes flared and his smile widened. “That is a relief. I do not think I could have accepted the position if Sinjin had wanted me to.”

I wondered if vampires were idiots or if it was just men in general. I had a feeling it was the latter.

“I should say,” Laucian added, “I will not be at Kinloch Kirk all the time.”

“You don’t have to be,” I nodded. “Representatives of the factions come and go as suits them. Are you going somewhere?”

“Nowhere specific.”

He remained cagy, but I could guess. After centuries of seclusion, Laucian was seeing the world and rather liked it. It helped that he’d entered into some sort of undefined relationship with the vampire hunter we were all still calling O’Rourke. It was an unlikely match to be sure, but they suited each other oddly well. Who knew what might happen between them, but I was sure O’Rourke wasn’t done with the action side of her life yet. Perhaps she was no longer a vampire hunter, but there were other quests out there for a young woman looking to experience life, and Laucian would follow, or maybe he’d lead—who really knew. Although he was centuries older than she was, he too could use some experience of life.

Another newcomer to the Underworld was Pagan, bringing along his Templar group. They were a welcome addition; great fighters, great magic users, and a powerful sense of right and wrong. Pagan himself had instantly become a shining light on the council, his charisma, and talent as a public speaker making everyone listen. You didn’t need to be the Prophetess to see great things in his future. A powerful warlock as well, he was going to be heading one of the factions sooner or later, and his connection with nature would make him a force for good in our community.

If Pagan seemed made for the Underworld, then Nyx was the exact reverse. The conflict with the King’s Alliance was over, there was no one left to fight, but Nyx was a born anarchist who strained against any sort of organization, but her own. Despite Pagan urging her to give the Underworld a chance, she left Kinloch Kirk soon after the final battle, having left an extraordinary impression on everyone she met.

There were so many people here who fought for a greater good, it was actually refreshing to be around someone who fought because she simply wanted to fight, because it suited her and because she didn’t like the people on the other side. She returned to her hidden fortress of Glyderau. With no one left to fight, the Samhain had shrunk, but those who remained were people who, like Nyx, preferred a wild way of living, by their own laws, their own rules, and their own morality.

Privately, I didn’t think Pagan had given up on converting her, and I was sure their relationship, strange and non-exclusive though it was, hadn’t ended. Pagan adored her, and she loved him too in her own way.

A breath of wind sent the sand skittering across the dunes and made strands of my hair blow loosely into my face.

“Everyone’s looking for you, you know.”

I turned to find my husband standing over me. And I smiled up at him as he smiled down at me and we just held each other’s gaze for another few seconds.

I’d spent ten years in a hell dimension, but I still considered myself the luckiest woman in the world, because, against all odds, I hadn’t lost this man.

The burn scars left by the magical fire were still healing on his face and body. Some would vanish completely, others wouldn’t. They could be hidden with magic, but I liked the fact that Rand preferred to keep them. He said they served as a reminder of what had happened, and perhaps an atonement. He didn’t want to forget what he’d done, what he’d become.

“I just wanted some time alone,” I said.

“I’ll leave you to it.”

“No. Stay. I’m only really alone when I’m with you.”

A strange thing to say perhaps and some might have interpreted it as an insult, but one of the wonderful things about Rand and I was that we knew each other so well. He always knew what I meant.

To be alone is to be with yourself, and I was only truly myself when I was with Rand. When he wasn’t there, then part of me was gone. I was never simply ‘on my own’, I was specifically ‘without Rand’. So I was only truly alone when he was there.

He sat beside me now and put an arm around me; my husband, my lover, my best friend.

“How did they grow up so well?” He was looking down at Rowan and Emma.

“Despite our best efforts to screw them up?”

“Despite… everything.”

“I put it down to good genes.”

Rand laughed. “I like that explanation. Let’s say that.” He looked at the beach again.

“What do you think of Stone?” I asked. Emma had formally introduced the two of us to her boyfriend and we’d all had dinner together last night.

Rand shrugged. “Not wild about her dating her teacher.”

“He was only a pretend teacher. He was really her bodyguard all along.”

“Not wild about that either.”

“Sinjin says he’s a good man.”

Rand pulled a face.

I couldn’t help grinning. “You’re such an overprotective dad.”

Rand smiled wistfully. “There’s a lot of worse things to be.” He regarded his daughter with pride. “If she likes Stone, then I guess he’s probably alright. She’s certainly smarter than I am.” Then his voice faded and his eyes glassed over. He was quiet for another few seconds. “She is a miracle.”

I nodded, my own eyes tearing up. “In so many ways.”

Rand had been brought back from the brink, but it had left its mark on him. Last time something bad had happened to him—my ‘death’—he’d had the event and everything connected to it removed from his mind. That decision had left him a shell, less than a person. You can’t abdicate from your own life, and he understood that now.

Now, he made no attempt to hide from what he’d done as Duine, nor did he ask forgiveness for it or assume that the sacrifice he’d been prepared to make absolved him of blame. Instead of returning to his old role on the Underworld council, Rand had decided to dedicate his life to atoning for the wrong he’d done as High Mage. He’d tried to put right the mistakes he’d made and to help those he’d hurt. It was a difficult road to walk because to face what he’d done and the people whose lives he’d ruined hurt him deeply, but it was the only way he could face himself, and with every act of contrition, he got back a little of the man he’d lost.

Outside of that, his only wish in life was to be a good husband and a good father. He was both—as good as he’d ever been, and there was no one else in the world with whom I would wish to sit in silence and watch the sun set.

The sun set on Kinloch Kirk, but it would never set on the Underworld. We would build something that would stand the test of time as a force for peace, for good, for equality between the factions. We couldn’t predict what the future might hold, but as I watched Emma and Rowan play, I knew that the future couldn’t be in better hands.

The End

To Be Continued!

Stay tuned for the next epic subseries in The Underworld series of books, featuring Rowan—all grown up!

~~~~~

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Hell on Earth

Chasind Demons Series #1
by J.R. Rain
and H.P. Mallory

(read on for a sample)

Chapter One

The running man skidded to a halt at the intersection and did a quick sweep–left or right?–then picked right and kept on running.

The fact that he even stopped to think about which way to run meant he was still thinking clearly through the panic. If he’d been operating on instinct, as most people did when they were being pursued, he would’ve just kept running. That might have been to his disadvantage–thinking could slow you down. It might also mean he wasn’t worried about being caught and thought he was a match for the man pursuing him.

That man being me.

I bounced off the wall as I took the right-hand turn (I’m not really built for maneuverability) and kept after him. He was quick and I could hear my heart pounding in my ears, but I wasn’t going to slow down. Not after I’d been tracking the SOB for days. He was mine.

His name was Edward Atkinson, and he’d killed thirteen women over a period of two years in ways I didn’t want to think about. Not only that, but Atkinson had died once already. His death just hadn’t taken.

Technically, he wasn’t actually ‘alive’ now, his body was just good at faking it. Once you’re on earth, your body sort of reverts to factory settings, so Atkinson appeared just like any other living human being. At least, to those who didn’t know better. To me, Atkinson had a blue aura around his body that marked him as a soul escaped from its proper place. Most people couldn’t see that aura, but I wasn’t one hundred percent human either. Although that percentage does seem to have shifted over the years.

The traffic screeched to a halt as Atkinson ran out into the road to an accompaniment of blaring car horns and native New Yorkers yelling a series of colorful suggestions as to what Atkinson could do with himself.

I pursued the killer across the road, and someone hurled a disposable coffee cup in my direction, but I paid no attention. All my focus was on Atkinson, now dashing into the next alley, still managing to keep ahead of me. He ran like his life was on the line; which, in a way, it was.

I followed him, vaulting the trash cans he shoved into my path (which is traditional in a chase through New York alleyways). One of his victims had been an undercover cop. She’d been well-trained, armed, and there had been people stationed nearby to help her if she needed it. None of that had helped, and the case was something of a scandal at the time for the NYPD. They’d underestimated Atkinson just like everyone else had. He looked normal. He acted normal. He’d been brought in for questioning twice, but had fooled everyone, able to lie convincingly, and he was quite at home with his own guilt because he had no guilt.

Entering another alley (this part of New York seemed to be nothing but alleyways), Atkinson ricocheted from door to door, trying to find one that had been left open or, failing that… finding a fire exit that rattled uncertainly on its hinges. My target backed up and charged, shoulder barging through and disappearing into the darkness beyond. I was at the doorway seconds later, following Atkinson in.

I should have been more cautious.

Caught up in the heat of the chase, I just kept going, not bothering to check whether it was safe. Rookie mistake, and not the sort of thing I usually did, but Atkinson was a wily customer. In the last week, I’d lost him twice already and I didn’t plan to lose him a third time.

That driving need was making me careless.

As I went through the door, I heard the breath of air as the bottle swung downwards and the glass shattered against my head. There was a blaze of pain across my cheek and the right side of my head, the impact bringing me to my knees. And there was lots of blood.

Now it was Atkinson’s turn to make a mistake.

If he’d kept running, then I probably wouldn’t have been able to catch him; he had a head start and I was dopey from the blow to the head. But Atkinson was more than a killer and less than a man.

Some people become killers through greed or a bad upbringing, then there are those like Edward Atkinson who are born that way. There’s something rotten and twisted inside them, and it would take something miraculous to get them off the path to Hell. Usually, those miracles never came.

Atkinson turned to face me and smiled as he realized there was a wounded and vulnerable person standing in front of him. I was more than sure every fiber of his being told him to take advantage of that fact, to finish the job and enjoy it. He fingered the broken bottle with a grin of relish, no doubt contemplating all the hideous things those jagged shards could do to a person.

The blow from the bottle would have knocked most people unconscious, but I have… let’s call it a ‘special set of skills’. Or maybe a very hard head. Either way, I was dazed, but not unconscious. I looked up at the grinning face of the psychopath I’d been tracking for too long now. He raised the bottle and I had just enough sense to duck back, so the sharp edges cut rather than mangled my face as he slashed again. The blood ran into my eyes, blurring my vision, I tasted it in my mouth and the sharp pain burnt a ferocious path along my nerves.

The hell with this.

Before the bottle could strike again, I launched myself up and slammed him back into the concrete wall behind him, knocking the wind out of him. Even though he was fighting to catch his breath, he continued to struggle frantically. It was probably at that point that he realized his mistake; he’d treated me as he would any other attacker.

You can’t turn off pain (not even I can do that), you can’t even turn it down, but you can get used to it. Which isn’t to say you don’t still feel it or that it doesn’t still hurt (it definitely does!), but if you’re used to getting hurt, then it doesn’t have to slow you down, you can push through it and just keep going. I’d had a lot of practice getting hurt.

It also helped to know I would heal.

I always healed.

Grabbing the hand in which Atkinson held that bottle, I smacked it repeatedly against the wall until the bottle dropped and shattered on the ground below. Now disarmed, he stopped struggling.

“Alright, alright! I’ll come quietly.”

I didn’t let go of him, but I stopped hitting him–it was always easier when they cooperated.

But Edward Atkinson wasn’t the type to cooperate. As I backed off a step, he stamped on my foot, and threw an elbow into my chin.

He was grinning again. He was enjoying this. Clearly.

Truth be told, escaping Hell isn’t as hard as it ought to be. No one ever really thinks about it, but Hell is run by Demons, and while Demons enjoy torturing the souls of humanity’s most wicked, they don’t have a great work ethic beyond that, on account that they’re Demons. Demons are happy enough to torture souls, but when it comes to the boring stuff like security, they’re less… eager. The walls that border the vast (some say endless) plains of Hell are poorly guarded, and the guards that are posted there don’t really care, but it’s not as if they can be fired; they’re Demons.

In many ways, it’s actually surprising more people don’t escape Hell; it’s easy to get out and it’s a famously unpleasant place (a reputation it really lives up to). In reality, Hell mostly polices itself. The vast majority of the Damned know they deserve to be there and are almost grateful to be absolved of the guilt that ate away at them in life. They want to be punished, because they feel they deserve it and they know their punishment is finite. They don’t enjoy it, of course, but once they’ve suffered enough to expunge their evil deeds, they’re able to leave, so they figure it’s probably best to just get their punishment out of the way. Simple human guilt guards the walls of Hell far better than its actual Demon guards.

Those who do escape aren’t just the ones who realize how long and unendurable their punishment will be, but also those sociopathic enough not to accept the fact that they deserve it. There are people who, no matter what terrible things they’ve done, just can’t accept that they’ve done anything wrong. They don’t understand the division between right and wrong, just and unjust.

To put it another way; only the worst people escape from Hell, and Edward Atkinson was one of those.

He ducked as I punched, grimacing as my fist smacked into the wall. Throwing his arms around my waist, Atkinson tackled me, shoving me back to the ground, pinning me and raining blows on me with a berserk fury. By this point, he probably knew he was going back. This was just Atkinson being Atkinson. I grabbed him by the wrists and twisted him over, spitting out blood as I went.

Atkinson reared up at me again, writhing like a snake. He wasn’t bulky, there wasn’t a whole lot to him in the way of muscle mass, but he was wiry and had no sense of self-preservation. He thrashed from side to side and lashed out, almost as if he was having a fit.

“This’ll go a lot easier if you stop that,” I suggested as he hissed and twisted beneath me like an inflamed wet cat.

In reply, Atkinson spat in my face and jabbed me in the kidney with his knee.

I was getting a little tired of this scumbag. “Have it your way.”

With Atkinson pinned down, I could deliver a proper punch with some feeling behind it. Atkinson’s head bounced off the floor, knocking him unconscious.

I settled back on my haunches to take stock for a moment and to catch my breath. I’d gotten him. He looked small and helpless now, with a glossy bruise already beginning to show around his left eye. He looked like a victim. But, he wasn’t. Oh, how he wasn’t.

The life of Edward Atkinson had ended in a fiery crash following a lengthy police chase. In the trunk of his car, the police had later found the remains of his final victim. She’d been dead when he dumped her into the trunk, which might have been a blessing given how the car chase had ended, but her death at Atkinson’s hand had been a sickening one. He deserved Hell. And I hoped all his victims had gotten entrance into Heaven.

Heaven…

Pulling the phone from my pocket, I hit a sequence of symbols not available on most phones.

“Claudia.”

The voice that answered was clipped but soft, as was the woman to whom it belonged. Claudia was my only contact with Heaven, a place I’d left some four hundred years ago under a cloud.

“Got him. Atkinson.”

“Your voice sounds odd,” she said. Her voice always sounded like bells ringing.

“Might be missing some teeth,” I admitted.

“Put up a fight, did he?”

“They always do.”

“Good job, Graham. I’ve got your position if you want to step back.”

I stepped back from the prone form of Edward Atkinson. Beneath him, the ground started to glow red, and a low rumbling sound made the walls tremble. Atkinson’s eyelids flickered and they opened a crack.

“Wuh…” he mumbled.

I said nothing, but I saw the look of terror cross his face as the ground split beneath him and he was swallowed up into the chasm, falling back to where he belonged. The ground joined again seamlessly, the rumbling stopped and the red glow faded.

Alone again.

I might have felt satisfied in a job well done, in seeing the man who’d cut me up and battered my face heading towards his deserved retribution; a man who’d caused so much pain and suffering in life. But I never really felt satisfaction as much as a blank numbness. It was just a job. It could be a difficult one at times, but it was mine.

***

Back in the bathroom of the sparsely furnished apartment which I currently called home, I tugged the light switch on and examined my face in the mirror. Atkinson had done a job on it. I didn’t even remember losing teeth, but they were definitely missing. Purple bruises had started to flower over my features, one eyelid was swollen, as were my lips. The worst of all, and what had guaranteed me a seat to myself on the bus ride home, were the marks of the bottle. The jagged glass had sliced my flesh open, and blood streaked my face.

I was a sorry sight, and I spent the next half hour cleaning and bandaging till the man in the mirror looked more like a mummy. Then I went to bed, sliding tired limbs between cool sheets, knowing the pillowcase probably wouldn’t be washable.

By morning, my body would be healed. The bruises would be gone, the cuts sealed (they probably wouldn’t even leave a scar), and new teeth would have pushed their way into the broken sockets.

That’s how it works for an Angel.

Even one condemned to live on earth.

Chapter Two

The light is almost unbearable, not just in its brightness, but in its beauty.

It would be hard to put into words what made light beautiful except to say it’s just… pure. And yet that beauty, and that purity, pales beside the beauty and purity of the woman whom the light irradiates, making her seem still more luminous than she already is. Her name is Liadhain, but I call her Lelia, and she loves me, which seems to me a miracle that surpasses all others in the realm of Heaven.

Of course, love is pretty common in Heaven–obligatory in fact, and easy. Love is everywhere and for everyone, it’s second nature and we never think about it. It simply is. But what I feel for Lelia–what we feel for each other–goes beyond that love to another place, a place that’s celebrated in Heaven as nowhere else.

Heaven loves love.

“You won’t ever leave me, will you, Grahamian?” she asks me in those chiming, bell-like tones.

“Why would I ever do anything like that?” I reply, staring into her eyes as we lie together in bed, holding one another close.

She smiles, which makes her even more radiantly beautiful, and she holds my head against her chest. I close my eyes and the world makes more wonderful sense than it ever can without her.

“Did you ever visit Ireland?” she asks, as I lie there, lulled by the gentle sound of her breathing.

“I never did,” I admit, only half-listening.

“I suppose I shall never see it again.”

And even though I’m only half-listening, I hear the tone of her voice, because it’s a tone that’s so unusual in Heaven. It would be too much to call it ‘sadness’, because how could sadness exist here? But I can’t think of another word. Perhaps ‘regret’.

“You wish you could go back there?” I ask.

“No,” she laughs and shakes her head. “That is; not to live. Of course not. But… Well, I suppose I would dearly love to see it again. To stand on the ground and feel the grass between my toes.”

“Sounds uncomfortable.”

“I suppose it would be,” she smiles. “You know your mother’s cooking?”

“Are we still talking about Ireland?”

“Bear with me,” she says with a tinkling laugh. “Technically, your mother’s cooking isn’t as good as what you’d get in a fancy restaurant or at a noble house. But nothing can ever replace your mother’s cooking. I suppose Ireland is like that to me. I know it’s not perfect, but it’s Ireland. I suppose most people must feel like that to some degree about their home. Here is better–of course it is–but you still miss it.”

I listen to her words, redolent with that tone of regret, and I wonder if there’s anything I can do about it. I would do anything to make her happy.

***

The screaming of a car horn outside woke me from the same dream I’ve had almost every night. I slept with my head resting on my arms, which meant every morning I was greeted with the sight of the tattoo on my forearm. The tattoo is a recreation of a quote from Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, and it read ‘All places shall be Hell that is not Heaven’.

Like I needed reminding.

It was odd that a human had written those words because it was a concept which most humans couldn’t be made to understand. Hell was a real place, but it was also a state of mind. Hell was different things to different people. To someone who had lived in Heaven, then everywhere else, anywhere else, was Hell.

You might consider earth a pretty decent place to live if it was all you’d ever known, but to one who’d known the bliss of Heaven, the line between earth and the eternal fires was a pretty thin one. Even those who, like Lelia, had lived a life on earth before finding their place in the eternal, swiftly forgot that life and found it brutish and ugly by comparison. That was why her longing for her old home had seemed so strange to me, and why I’d so wanted to help. It was rare for any in Heaven to long for earth because earth now seemed like something you’d escaped… and were happy to.

I sometimes wondered how Marlowe had been able to sum Hell up so well. Perhaps he’d been banished, as I had, from Heaven? Or perhaps he’d been divinely inspired to let mortals know that living well really was worth the effort? Or maybe he’d just gotten lucky and simply written words that were exactly on the mark? Who knows?

Not that I wasn’t glad to have avoided those eternal fires. They’d been an option. But my crime, serious though it had been, hadn’t been judged serious enough for me to be Damned. I’d been offered a way out in the shape of my current ‘job’. Heaven needed people like me, and if they could disguise that need as a kind of community service, then why not?

So, yes, I was in Hell, just not all the way in.

Sometimes, I wondered; if I’d turned down the job offer and gone to Hell, would I be out by now? You only stayed until your sins had been purged from you. But once you’d been in Hell, it stayed with you. It branded you. You were forgiven–Heaven was big on forgiveness–but the stain remained. Somehow this was better. Plus, I was doing good. That had to count for something, didn’t it? Maybe that was enough to make up for my life in this earthly Hell? I hoped so.

And yet…

It wasn’t something I liked to think about, but I was increasingly aware I was starting to feel–for want of a better term–at home. Not that I liked being on earth, but I was becoming accustomed to it, all the same. I no longer hated it the way I had when I first arrived. I’d become numb to it.

That, in itself, was a frightening realization. I didn’t want to end up liking it here. Eventually, I would have served my time, my sins would be expunged, and I’d return to Heaven.

What would Lelia think of me then?

That wasn’t something I would have to worry about for a very long time.

‘Did you ever visit Ireland?’

One little question that had led to so much. Weirdly, I still hadn’t visited. I couldn’t quite bring myself to.

Getting up from my little bed, listening to the angry sounds of New York in the morning coming through my window, I walked to the bathroom and looked in the mirror while removing my bloodstained bandages. Beneath, a few faint white scars remained, but other than those, the damage Atkinson had inflicted on me had healed overnight. Baring my teeth, I saw them all back in place. Flexing my fingers, I tried out my knuckles, which had been bruised and bloodied a matter of hours ago.

Now all good.

I looked in the mirror again. Not bad. The man who looked back at me was, more or less, the same as I’d looked in Heaven with less perfect features. They were the features of a man in his mid-thirties with dark hair (a dusting of silver at the temples), brown eyes, a strong jaw and cheekbones that showed no hint of how many times they’d been broken. There was the shadow of a few days’ stubble across my lower face. The body was similarly strong and I worked hard to keep it that way; broad with muscles that were formed more from activity than gym work. There were scars–those from injuries so serious, they left their mark even on me, but objectively speaking, it remained a good looking body. It wasn’t perfect, but it had character.

Over the years of my banishment I’d changed, but only to suit the changing of the times–I’d gotten taller, my features had subtly molded as evolutionary fashions changed–but I hadn’t aged. I didn’t age physically, only mentally.

Stepping into the shower, I felt the hot water scour my body. Even the water felt rough compared to that in heaven. How many centuries would it take before I forgot what things were like in Heaven? How many centuries would it take before I could stop making comparisons?

***

“I ordered you waffles and coffee.”

Claudia was waiting for me when I arrived at a nondescript diner down the block from the apartment. It was called Gabriel’s and I often wondered if the name was a coincidence or Heaven’s idea of a joke.

“Thanks.”

I took a seat opposite Claudia. She was a sharp faced woman in her early thirties with copper-colored hair piled in ringlets on her head, pale skin with a light dusting of freckles, and brilliantly green eyes. She wore a dark blue, tailored suit, as if this was a business meeting (which, in a way, it was). A pale blouse showed beneath the suit jacket, which was see-through enough to show her dark bra. You could also glimpse past a button hole where the swell of her breasts stretched the material. Her skirt had ridden up when she crossed her legs to reveal the white skin of her thighs. Though she radiated a no-nonsense air, she was a very attractive woman, with just a suggestion that beneath that prim façade, was a tigress waiting to get out.

Except, of course, she was none of those things.

When I was first sent to earth, Claudia had been Claude (women could not so easily meet with men back then), a black-haired, foppish noble with slightly buck teeth. In Heaven, she was female and probably looked not dissimilar to the woman I was currently opposite, but less obviously so. Everyone was beautiful in Heaven, but it was a different kind of beauty.

If I squinted slightly and concentrated, then I could see Claudia as she looked in Heaven–my angel eyes at work. But, even in this form, I could see the halo of light around her that marked her as an Angel. I wondered if she could see the same around me, or had the halo faded too?

“Good job yesterday,” Claudia said, as a man brought over my breakfast, not even looking at me because he was too busy trying to peep down Claudia’s top.

“Where’s Santoro?” I asked, ignoring the praise.

Claudia was usually accompanied by an assistant. I was never quite sure why she needed one or what it was that Santoro did–maybe he was just a status symbol–but he was always there.

“He got promoted,” said Claudia, wistfully. “Deserved it of course.”

Was that a dig at me? She knew the circumstances that had led to my banishment.

“Oh.”

She nodded. “I will miss him, all the same. He’d been my assistant for a thousand years or so. I haven’t had a chance to find a suitable replacement.”

“Some deserving soul,” I muttered.

Claudia cocked her head. “Of course. That’s how it works.” She sipped her latte. “As I said; good job yesterday. Atkinson was a bad one in every way.” She took another sip. “Are you busy at the moment? With work, I mean?”

I frowned. It was unlike Claudia to ask questions about my ‘day job’. Outside of tracking escaped souls, my time was my own, which was all very well, but Heaven didn’t pay me for my work, so my free time needed to be spent working and earning an income. Human bodies need upkeep even if you were an Angel–I still had to eat and rest and stay warm and all the other things I’d taken for granted as an Angel, but now costs money, which I have to earn. So I needed a job, and a job that was flexible enough for me to be able to chase escaped souls when I needed to.

“Pretty quiet,” I replied. “Pets aren’t escaping like they used to.”

Private Eye, was what it said on the door of the little office I rented. But, in reality, ninety percent of my work was missing pets. I would’ve liked to take on more ambitious cases, but there were rules regarding how an Angel behaves on earth if he doesn’t want his stay extended even longer or, worse, if he doesn’t want to find himself in Hell.

Number one among those rules was; don’t interfere. I could live my life (such as it was), but I couldn’t get involved too deeply in human affairs and I certainly couldn’t use my Heavenly abilities. If I was shot while investigating a high profile murder case, my miraculous recovery would draw attention and questions would be asked. So, missing pets it was, with the occasional ‘I think my wife/husband is cheating on me’ just for variety. It wasn’t steady work, but if you’re hiring a Private Eye to look for your pet, then you clearly have money to burn, so I felt comfortable charging silly amounts that allowed me to make a living. I didn’t live expensively anyway.

“Good,” said Claudia. “This one won’t wait.”

“So soon?” Souls escaping from Hell wasn’t uncommon, but nor was it an everyday occurrence; I usually averaged one per month.

Claudia’s green (but not really) eyes flicked up at me. “This one’s not a soul, Graham.”

I clenched my teeth. “Demon.”

She nodded, stirring her latte with a wooden stirrer then sucking the stirrer clean in a way that had every male occupant in the room (except me) staring, slack-jawed and wishing they were the stirrer.

“His name is Kraven. Have you heard of him?”

I shook my head.

Claudia snorted in exasperation. “Do you ever do your homework?”

“I read the books when I arrived.”

“You need to re-read them then. Your memory isn’t perfect, don’t forget. You’re human.”

It’s the little things that take the longest to get used to. Angels don’t forget things, humans do. When I arrived on earth, I’d done the required reading, the Who’s Who in Hell, the Demonology of Dante, the Demonography of Bosch. At the time, it had never occurred to me that the knowledge would fade over the centuries. In fact, it had faded far more quickly than that. Humans were so badly designed. I should have re-read the books long ago, but being a human also means you’re always busy; working, eating, sleeping, or performing some sort of bathroom ritual. It’s amazing they find time to do anything.

“Shorthand,” Claudia went on, “Kraven is one of the bad ones.”

“As opposed to the good Demons?”

“You’ve been doing this for long enough to know there are bad Demons and there are bad demons.”

“And Kraven is a bad Demon.”

“No, Kraven is a monster,” said Claudia, firmly. “Kraven is a Demon that other Demons steer clear of because they think he’s a bit unhinged. All Demons like chaos, but Kraven lives for it. Worse still, he causes it. Which should at least make him easy to find. He’ll gravitate towards violent people and just by being around them, he’ll make them more violent. Follow the gang war and you’ll find Kraven. Most Demons break out of Hell just to go on a bit of a spree; torture some people in the real world for a change, but Kraven…”

“Major spree?” I suggested.

Claudia shook her head. “I honestly don’t know, Graham. Demons aren’t sophisticated animals. They like causing pain and that’s about all there is to them. But once in a millennium, you get one like Kraven. A Demon with ideas. Word is he’s got delusions of Lucifer. Sees himself as the one in charge. That’s not going to happen, but when he’s let out without a leash then… We just can’t predict what’s going to happen. Could be anything.”

“What does he look like?”

“Can’t be certain, but…” Claudia reached into her jacket pocket and brought out a newspaper cutting which she passed to me. “This is Lloyd Horton, small-time crook employed by a local crime boss. His family died last night in horrifying circumstances. Lloyd is missing, presumed psychotic. There’s a chance Kraven is wearing his skin as a disguise. There’s also a chance that Lloyd is just a nasty piece of work, who will one day end up in the place Kraven escaped from.” She drained the last of her coffee and looked around the room with an expression somewhere between pity and disgust. “Sometimes I despair of humanity.”

“You’ve been doing this job too long.” I didn’t know how long Claudia had been looking after people like me, but it was a job that required an Angel to come to earth on a regular basis. Even though she spent most of her time in Heaven, you couldn’t spend that much time as a human without picking up bad habits like negative emotions. When faced with the way humans treat each other on a daily basis, it was difficult to hang onto infinite compassion. It was a problem I knew well.

“Well, when I’ve got my new assistant trained, then maybe I’ll take a break,” nodded Claudia.

“Anything else on Kraven?”

“Nothing much,” she admitted, shaking her head. “Except to say this is a big one, Graham. Get this creature back where it belongs and Heaven will be grateful. You’ll still be down here but… you’ll be a lot closer to not being down here.”

Part of me wished she hadn’t said that. Hope could make you crazy. It could make you rash. I got through the day to day of life on earth by not thinking about the future and what it might hold. However much I was driven by a desire to get back into Heaven, I still told myself over and over again that it would never happen, that it wasn’t possible, that I’d never be allowed to return, that I’d never see Lelia again. If I let myself believe it was a possibility, then every day would drag into eternity.

“How are the waffles?” asked Claudia.

“They’re pretty good.” Everything on earth tastes like ashes compared to Heaven, but I’d been here long enough to develop a taste for waffles. And Gummi Bears.

Claudia stood, smoothing out the creases in her suit. “Watch yourself, Graham. I don’t know how powerful Kraven is, but there’s a chance he can kill you. He looks human–never forget he’s not.”

I nodded. “Thanks for breakfast.”

Not all demons could take human form, but it made finding them a hell of a lot harder when they could. Some of them could change shape, others could possess humans. Then there were ones like Kraven who, according to Claudia, hollowed out a body and squeezed into the skin, like the big cockroach in Men in Black.

Fortunately, like Angels, Demons had a tell my Angel eyes could pick up; their eyes glowed red and there was nothing they could do to hide it. Better yet, Demons didn’t have Angel eyes, so I’d know what Kraven was, but he wouldn’t know what I was. That would give me the advantage–and, from the sound of it, I’d need an advantage. Of course, all this only mattered if I could find the bastard.

Where to start?

First things first, I had to stop off at the office.

***

“Good morning, Mr. Kincaid.”

I’d given up telling my secretary, Joan, to call me ‘Graham’. She wasn’t comfortable with it and I didn’t actually care what she called me. Joan was indispensable—to the point that I wondered if she was literally Heaven sent.

Joan worked for an almost absurdly small sum and never complained about it. She was capable of running the office while I wasn’t there; most importantly (and most bafflingly) she never asked a single question, not one, about the odd things she saw. She’d met Claudia on numerous occasions and never asked how one woman could have so many missing pets; she’d seen me bruised and bloodied and never asked how I was fine the next day. She also never asked why I vanished for days on end on some secret assignment she wasn’t privy to and which paid nothing.

Joan was the most perfect thing outside of Heaven.

“I’m not available for the next week,” I said. I hoped a week would be enough.

Joan nodded. “Right you are, Mr. Kincaid.”

Joan was in her mid-fifties, averagely heavy, and never showed up to the office without her hair neatly done in a style that made her look like a nineteen-fifties housewife. Her make-up was always severely but exquisitely applied. She always wore what looked like the same skirt and blouse, though I guessed she must have had more than one of each, and a rotating selection of cardigans in pastel shades. She wore big glasses on a cord around her neck or pushed up to her forehead. She typed at a mile a minute, but I had no idea what she was typing–I seldom asked for anything. Perhaps she was using her downtime to write the great American novel. Which was fine with me.

“I’m going out now.”

Though I could talk easily enough with Claudia, I’d never been very good at conversation with mortals. It was one of those things I’d expected to pick up quickly, but quick to an Angel is different to a human. Fifty years is a short time to an Angel, even though it drags appallingly for an Angel on earth. By the time I mastered human conversational style, that style had moved on. In the nineteen-forties, I talked like a nineteenth-century gentleman; in the nineteen-eighties I talked like a prohibition era gangster. Mostly, I just tried to keep my words brief and to the point. It was easier that way and it discouraged conversation–I didn’t want anyone to think I wanted to talk to them or that I might care what they had to say.

Empathy was another thing I had yet to master.

“Will you be in the office next week?” asked Joan, scribbling notes in the voluminous diary she always kept on her desk–another thing I liked about Joan was that the digital revolution was as anathema to her as it was incomprehensible to me.

“Probably,” I replied.

Either that or I’d be dead.

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Other Books by H.P. Mallory

Paranormal Series: (Writing as H.P. Mallory)

Wolves of Valhalla Series

Arctic Wolf Series

Here to There Series

Chasing Demons Series

Mermaid Midlife Series

Poppy’s Potions Series

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Lucy Westenra Series

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Lily Harper Series

Dulcie O’Neil Series (over 1 million downloads of the series!)

Underworld Series (New York Times bestselling series!)

NuLife Series

Reverse Harem Series: (Writing as Plum Pascal)

Happily Never After Series

Sacred Oath Series

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About the Author:

H. P. Mallory is a New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author who started as a self-published author.

She lives in Southern California with her son and two cranky cats, where she’s at work on her next book.

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Table of Contents

- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN