Chapter 17

 

 

 

The cold midnight air blew right across my face, and chills crawled on my skin. I cuddled tighter in my wool jacket, praying time could move faster. Raphael next to me gripped his arms tighter around my waist, his wings fluttering around us, draping across my body like a blanket. To be honest, I didn’t think his wings made much of a difference in keeping me warmer, otherwise I would have summoned mine. Even though summer was around the corner, the weather remained cool in the evenings, especially in forsaken and lonely places like my town’s local graveyard. Darkness shrouded the whole area, stretching to the mountains that surrounded our small town. Only the occasional screeching of a raven or a bird disturbed the otherwise eerie silence.

I squeezed myself in the archangel’s hug, standing between an imposing, tall pine tree and a cherub’s stone statue over a tomb. Drogo had chosen this place, demanding I come here alone and wait for his signal. I patted the back of my backpack where we’d stuffed the fake skull. Durga and Shiva had created the perfect replica. Even I as the life-long owner of Leia couldn’t distinguish the real from the fake skull. Moreover, when I activated this replica, its eye sockets flickered to life, glowing in the same crimson color as Leia’s. It was only when I began conversing with the skull that I could see this wasn’t Leia. But then, Drogo had never talked to Leia, and I doubted she would ever want to converse with him, either. I believed he’d need some time before he could figure out that we cheated him. I suspected it’d be upon conducting his nefarious ritual to inflict war on earth. When that didn’t work, he’d realize that I’d given him the wrong item. But it’d be too late for that.

“Rest assured, the trick will work like a charm,” Durga had instructed me back in the basement as she’d handed me the glowing white crystal skull she’d just summoned by joining forces with Shiva. I bit my lip, trying to banish from my mind all mental images or scenarios that involved the evil Nephilim, Drogo, exposing my deception and roasting me to death. The graves around me didn’t help banish the fear at the base of my spine.

“Don’t picture negative stuff, you’ll pull it off, we trust you,” Shiva’s smooth, yet deep voice had caressed my ears and his warm yet powerful energy had eased the bundle of nerves that had formed at the pit of my stomach.

Now, almost half an hour later, a set of strong arms closed around me, pulling me closer, the pleasant signature of vanilla and strawberry caressing the tip of my tongue. Raphael whispered into my ear, “You’ll do great, just like last time with the Scroll of Lies.”

While Raphael and I were waiting at the graveyard, I started to doubt the probability of success of the present rescue mission. I had to go on my own wherever the place might be, as per Drogo’s instructions. The sick bastard had threatened to kill the council members if his portal detected another person’s presence. Raphael had teleported us over here, but he wouldn’t come with me. Drogo had said to look out for “the eyes of death coming to life.” How charming and twisted, in typical Drogo fashion.

Another gust of wind blew through my clothes, chilling my bones. I strained my eyes. Everything was still in here, death permeating the whole space, the graves closing in on me a testament to that; silent trees towered above me and the archangel like watchful, silent sentinels. I began counting the seconds, and cursing my bad luck. Raphael handed me a few transportation and communication charms and made me promise to mentally call him if I needed help. I’d do my best, of course, if Drogo and his cronies hadn’t disabled mental communication at whatever place I’d be meeting them. I had no idea what the destination was, but here lay the entry to it—a magical portal. Any place could theoretically serve as a magical portal, but there were special portals specifically chosen by the White or Black Court for particular purposes, like the ones at Stonehenge, the Great Pyramid of Giza, Chichén Itzá, and many others.

The chiming of the local church bells threw me out of my reverie, reminding me my body would freeze if I didn’t summon fire. I was about to create a fireball in my palm when a scarlet beam of light caught my eye. A tall tombstone across from me glowed in bright red colors. As I looked it up, I saw the shining came from a small stone figurine placed on top of the grave. The figurine was too small for me to take a good look at it from a distance. A stream of light from above seeped into the soil and dispersed around, creating something like a veil or mist. I glanced at Raphael and he nodded at me. I approached the eerie light and saw the tombstone figurine depicted a fierce dog, his mouth wide open, revealing a set of pointy fangs. The dog’s head looked as if someone had set fire to it; crimson light, resembling steam, came out of the hound’s nostrils while his eyes glowed in bright greenish flames. Just looking at this figurine sent a wave of repulsion down my spine, making my skin prickle with disgust. Shivering dread wrenched my gut, but I tried to numb the sensation. Now it wasn’t the time to be a sissy girl; I was a frigging Nephilim, the one who’d thwarted and beat Drogo Rothstein’s evil plan. Except back then, he hadn’t held three of our guys as hostages. Curse this asshole for eternity! Karma was a bitch and I hoped she’d give him special attention when his turn came.

I steadied myself, calling all the gods to assist me, and reached out with my trembling hand. I did what the sick asshole had instructed me to do. I grabbed the dog’s head with my palm, ignoring the big red alarm that my mind screamed at me, telling me to get outta here. My gut wasn’t helping either, telling me to run away from this place as fast as I could. But it was too late; the beast’s eyes flickered to life, and with a cracking sound, the dog’s head twisted, moving sideways. A gust of whirlwind blew across my face, the air element growing as a powerful circle formed, resembling a vortex. The wind force mounted and a medium-sized hole gaped in the middle of the vortex, magic sizzling on its edges, tempting me to enter through this gap. My magic tugged on my center, growing stronger and pulling me toward this gaping hole of a portal. Dark flames engulfed me while dancing runes blazed in the dark night, twisting around my flesh or occasionally whipping me. They sent scorching pain down my skin, the crazy whirlwind growing in size and sucking me in. The world turned black as I screamed at the top of my lungs.

***

The vortex spat me out in a dark and dank place. The humidity was unbearable and I had to take off my jacket, wrapping it at my waist. Dark magic swished in the air, coiling at the center of my thread, and nausea assaulted my senses. Holy hell, this place literally felt like burning hell. I summoned a fireball in my palm and found myself in a vast, cavernous space. A multitude of tunnels ran above, left, right and beneath my feet while the steady sound of dripping water and distant underground movements disturbed the ominous silence. Where did I land? I’d thought it’d be Drogo’s castle or another of his properties, but surely I didn’t imagine this. Unless I’d arrived in his co-conspirators place, in Hades’—

“Hello, Aiyana Carter. Lovely to see you again. I’m sure the feelings are mutual.” A deep and husky voice cut the stale air, interrupting my train of thoughts. I turned around to see Drogo Rothstein in the flesh. His familiar fit and massive body stood before me a few feet away. He was in his human form, his crimson eyes gleaming with a distinctive bloodthirst and unadulterated loathing.

Fear coiled at the base of my spine, but I clamped down on it, suppressing the instinct to use the teleportation charm. I would fight to the death. If I’d pulled it off last time, I’d do just fine now, too. I silently tapped the communication charm Raphael had slipped into my pocket and mentally called the archangel. We had negotiated with Shiva and Durga back in my living room that I’d keep them in the loop as to how the rescue mission was going. Another advantage of this charm was that Raphael could overhear my conversations and the other side’s talking. A moment of silence followed and I wondered if Raphael could hear me at all. Last time, in Drogo’s castle, I hadn’t been able to mentally connect to the gods and archangels because of Drogo’s protective charms and spells. Had he cast them here as well? That’d be most unfortunate. Damn you, Drogo Rothstein. Another reason to kick his slim ass.

I turned to him. “You wanted me here, and here I am. Let’s deal with this quickly! I hate seeing your ugly face,” I said impatiently. Even though objectively speaking, Drogo had the face and body of a GQ model and a Hollywood heartthrob, his magical signature rolled over me, giving me the smell of rotten meat and the taste of some bizarre, poisonous chemical concoction that someone had thrown together with no idea of what ticking time bomb they’d created.

“Always so rude, tut-tut,” he said, bemused at my arrogance. Had he expected me to bow down to him? “Did you bring what I asked you for?”

“Hi, Aiya, I can hear you. Where are you?” Raphael’s deep voice startled me with its sudden appearance and I nearly jumped from surprise. Drogo noticed my quiver but said nothing. Perhaps he attributed this to me parting with Leia the skull.

“Don’t know yet, have to ask him,” I replied and turned to the Nephilim before me. “Yes, I brought my crystal skull.” I took off the backpack from my shoulders, holding it by the left strap. I carefully took out the skull, allowing him to get a good look at it. Drogo’s lips twisted into a smirk as his eyes fell on the skull. He reached out for it, but I snapped it back, shoving it again into my backpack. “Not so close, champ. I’d like to see Michael, Enki, and Loki before I give you this.” I patted the backpack.

Drogo’s crimson eyes sparkled, gleaming with an emotion I wasn’t sure how to read. Dark circles glimmered in his irises and he said, “Okay, fair enough. “He motioned for me to follow him as he pushed forward, bending over to pass through a small gap.

As I bent and wriggled myself, passing to the other side, a broader space revealed itself before me. The ceiling stood higher, the walls from all sides towered steeper, and a greenish lake lay pressed at the far wall. Tiny bubbles stirred in the middle of the green waters; steam and invisible sigils fluttered in the air, floating above the lake. The air was charged with a heavy burden. The sensations of despair, hopelessness, and doom pricked my senses, my mind running high on these negative emotions. I tried to calm my racing heart. What was this place?

“Where are we?” I asked Drogo, hoping he’d shed some light, but he simply ignored me. Why did a peasant like me deserve to be informed? Mentally I described to Raphael what I was seeing before my eyes.

“Oh, my. It can’t be,” the archangel blurted.

“What? Where am I?”

“From what you just told me, I’m afraid you’re in Hades’ Underworld kingdom.”

The air sucked out from my lungs and my lips froze, rendering me unable to articulate even an exclamation. Just then, Drogo’s deep voice cut the oppressive atmosphere: “Shadow man, bring the prisoners!”

A ghostly figure barely resembling a human man stepped forward, dragging three people bound by a rope. I held my breath as my mind screamed the skin-walker’s name. A growing desire to kill this motherfucker overwhelmed my senses. I wanted to shout “Mukkhi Bernett!” at the top of my lungs and see the monster rot to death. I wanted to punish this slug in the same cruel way he’d let the poor council shifters die. I remembered Landon’s wife, Laura, and her suffering when her husband had gone missing. I could only imagine her sorrow when she’d learned about her husband’s horrific death. I hoped the investigators had spared her the most gruesome details. No one deserved this end, let alone high-profile Magic Council shifters. I’d derive immense pleasure from slaying this abominable creature.

Said creature must have sensed my intense glare and hatred, because he bared his teeth, which I realized were way longer and sharper than humans’.

“Now satisfied?” Drogo turned to me, his grin back on his ugly face. “Give me the skull!” he flat-out ordered.

He never asked, the bastard! He only gave commands. I unzipped the bag and took out the skull.

“Let him free our people first,” Raphael ordered in my mind.

“Free Michael, Enki, and Loki, and then the skull is yours,” I said, withdrawing the fake skull from Drogo’s reach.

He cursed under his breath and, glancing at the skin-walker, gave him a silent nod. The skin-walker untied the captured guys. As Enki, Michael, and Loki dropped on the cold ground, he tapped on their foreheads, his lips silently chanting something. This was weird.

“Hey, what is he doing?” I pointed at the shadow walker’s movements. Drogo narrowed his eyes and ignored my question.

“This is not good, Aiya, that ass is marking them,” Raphael raised his voice, concern overlaying his words.

“Give me the skull and the losers are yours. I don’t need them,” Drogo snickered and came over to me, his breath hot on my cheek. The sensation of scorching flesh and corpses infested by worms overwhelmed my senses and I fought the bile in my throat that had formed, trying not to throw up. Seeing my discomfort, Drogo brushed my neck with his forefinger, sending warm tickles down my body, tasting of poisonous red wine. Desire mounted between my legs before I could suppress it. What an asshole! Had he just turned me on? Before I could slap him with my magic or at least yell obscenities at him, he snatched the skull from my hands.

“Finally!” He snickered, his crimson eyes gleaming with triumph as he raised the skull before his chest, and an evil laugh escaped his lips. “You little fool, take your stupid men. That is, if you can.” And with these words the air around his shoulders sparkled; his wings appeared, glowing in the dim space in dark shades, beautiful, yet dangerous. His wings draped down to his buttocks and he spread them, showing all their feathery beauty. He took off, rising in the air, vanishing in the cavernous space. What the hell? Had he flown away like Superman? As I observed Drogo’s flight, the shadow walker before me let out a low, nasal growl, reminding me of his presence. Within seconds he transformed into a black coyote, his eyes gleaming with beastly zeal, his fangs out and glistening menacingly.

Before he could pounce on me and feed off my flesh, I said out loud, “Mukkhi Bernett.” My voice thundered in the space, the echo ricocheting among the walls and then coming back in waves. The coyote’s body froze, rapid convulsions tearing his fur and limbs. He fought for a few long seconds, his body thrashing as if he wrestled against an invisible enemy, then collapsed on the ground with a hollow thud as if someone had dropped a piece of meat.

I got him! This was my grandma’s cousin. I’d found the leader of the shadow walker community. I drew nearer to him before he could scramble off the ground and retreat. I said, “You must pay for your crimes. No one can feed off and slay shifters. My grandmother, Onawah, asked me to tell you that she forgives you.”

The coyote’s body kept spinning around, thrashing and twirling on the ground like the barrel of a revolver in a Russian roulette game. A dark mist spread across his corpse, engulfing every inch of his body. A sudden dark explosion erupted and debris, flames, and dust filled the air where the coyote lay. When the mess began clearing, the flames and dust subsiding, the coyote was gone. Instead an old and wrinkled man lay on the same spot, his face deformed, with many warts; the skin was peeling off his face and a horrible odor permeated the space around us. I gagged and had to summon a protective barrier to shield myself against this smell.

“Did Onawah the fool send you? You stupid girl, you don’t know anything,” the deformed man hissed at me and, staggering, he stood up, trying to keep his balance on his crooked legs. He brushed off the dust and dirt from his rags and threw me one last, murderous glare before he limped off, retreating into the dark space. Eventually he disappeared from my sight.

“Okay, that was textbook. You beat the creepy shadow walker,” Raphael chimed in my mind gleefully as if he was somehow responsible for my victory. “Now, get our boys back and teleport home. But hurry up! Do it before Drogo figures out we cheated him.”

That was sound advice and I rushed to the guys. Problem was, Loki, Enki, and Michael looked totally brainwashed. Their limbs hung limp in the air, their stares empty as they sat on the cold ground cross-legged. A wave of powerlessness and despair rippled through my skin, churning the pit of my stomach. I shook Michael; his body felt strangely loose in my grip. I slapped him, but he barely acknowledged my presence. I shouted at the guys, but even Loki didn’t respond. I hurled a multitude of slurs at him, calling him names in the vain hope that he’d get offended and get moving, but he barely blinked with his teal eyes.

“I can’t awaken them! It must be the spell that shitweasel skin-walker put on them,” I cried to Raphael, this time out loud. There was no point hiding who I was talking to. I was alone, or so I thought. Just when I thought that things couldn’t get any worse, fate proved me wrong. The bubbles in the unnaturally greenish lake stirred as if in response to my despair. Their movements mounted and drew my attention to them. What a strange lake!

“Don’t worry. Durga can awaken them. Just activate the teleportation spell and get the hell out of there. We’ll take care of the rest. Understood?”

I could only half-listen to Raphael as an enormous flood of lava surged up from the lake’s depths, bursting out of that eerie water in a red-hot tsunami. A dark figure peered through the lava-fall, human features shaping themselves out of the formless wave of molten rock. The red substance solidified, the color vibrating and turning white. A guy over eight feet in height sprang from this substance, towering high above me, all draped in black robes. He stared down at me, his face bearing the characteristics of a predator, a sharp chin, prominent jawline, and murderous eyes the color of a blazing sun. The stench of death and decay wafted off him. He floated in the air, swiftly landing on the ground next to me. The deadly odor mounted and I wrinkled my nose in disgust.

“Aiyana Carter, welcome to my abode,” he said, his tone flat. He didn’t even pretend like Drogo had that he was pleased to meet me. I guessed Drogo’s pleasure derived from the fact that we shared the same supernatural species.

“Let me guess, Hades?”

“Yes, that’s me. Did you meet my guardian familiar, Cerberus?” He delivered those lines, too, devoid of any emotions.

I only arched my brows. Except for Drogo and that skin-walker, I didn’t think I’d seen a familiar here.

“The fierce dog at the cemetery, the one which you activated in order to arrive here,” he clarified.

Ah, that one. Pretty disgusting, but I said nothing. I didn’t think he’d like my assessment of his nasty looking dog.

“I need to have a few words with you.” The guy’s baritone voice whipped the air, his eyes menacingly gleaming at me. I had to raise my head to take him in full view. I reached his belly, so tall was he! His statement sounded more like a warning than a welcoming invite for a chat.

“Aiya, what’s happening? Who’s that guy? Hades?” Raphael’s panicked voice rang in my mind like a belated alarm. “Get out of there! ASAP!”

I clutched the transportation charm so hard that my knuckles crunched. I was about to throw it on the ground, but Hades made a step toward me, closing the distance between us.

“Get out of there! Teleport—”

“But first, let’s have some privacy.” And with that the giant snapped shut my mental connection to Raphael and the gods. The charm fell in two, dropping on the cold ground. Holy hell!

“Leave me alone! I have nothing to tell you.” My voice croaked and I cursed my trembling feet, giving away my weakness. It was always bad to reveal your fear to your enemy.

“Yes, you do, sweetheart. We need to have the talk,” he said, chuckling, and drew even closer to me.