Mentored in Fire by K.F. Breene

Four

Penny grabbedEmery’s arm as they slowed in front of the gate to the Underworld. Dead flowers and twisted vines lined either side of the path before it descended into a hazy black maw that threatened to suck travelers in if they got too close. Intense magic seeped into the air around them, pulsing with menace, violence, sex, and love, the mixture not as pleasing as Reagan’s brew of magic, but darker and more sinister. Beyond that maw would be an incredibly dangerous place, Penny could feel it.

She did not want to willingly walk into that.

“You’ve been this way before?” she asked, gulping, resisting the urge to take a step back.

Darius unslung a pack from his back and pulled out a torch. “Yes. Many times. It’s the safest entrance point I’ve found into the areas I usually traverse.” He handed the torch, unlit, to Penny. His normal vampire swagger, the one she was as accustomed to seeing as his suits, had been replaced with the sort of ruthlessness he showed in battle. His magic swirled around him, heady and vicious. “You can magically light this, correct?”

“Yes.” She took the torch. “How many times have you been down here?”

“Through this particular entrance—two dozen or so. There are others I’ve used, including the first area I visited with Reagan. I have business in the Edges, as they’re called. Your magic has helped me make good connections. Connections we will need now.” He glanced down at her fanny pack, one of Reagan’s old ones. Scuffed up and beat to hell, it still did the trick, holding a small fortune in spells.

Emery had a similar pack, his being newer, a designer brand, and bright red. He’d made a case for using a satchel instead and lost the argument, and then lost another argument when he suggested wearing cargo pants and using the pockets for all the spells. He did not enjoy the fashion that had been pushed on him, and his sour expression, even here, proved it. In addition to the fanny packs, they had on leather pants and sweaters, all in dark colors, much like Darius.

“If you need to use those spells, do so,” Darius went on, handing Emery a torch. They all had backpacks, but Emery’s and Penny’s were full of supplies humans needed, like food and water. Darius held all the essentials for the trip. Anything they couldn’t bring, they planned on stealing. “Refraining is best.”

Penny nodded and did everything in her power not to back away from that black maw in front of them.

“Set?” Darius’s stare was still beating into Penny.

“I’ll be fine,” she said, gripping her torch much too tightly.

“Remember, you will need to follow my lead,” Darius said. “You will need to do as I say. Only strike out when I say so. Only strike out at whom I say to. It will take all of my effort to navigate this place. You need to take my commands and follow my lead.”

“Yes, yes, I know. I heard you the first eight hundred times,” she grumbled, losing the battle of wills with herself and taking a step back.

“Hunch for all you are worth, stay behind me and in front of Emery,” he continued. “Keep your hands down. Do not make magical clouds. Do not get startled and accidentally strike out. Use your magical concealment spell for sight, smell, and sound. Do not release it unless I say otherwise.”

“I said I know.” She scowled at him.

His stare pummeled her for another beat before he nodded and turned around, facing that horrible maw. She swore she saw him take a deep breath before starting forward. Any place that made Darius nervous was nowhere she wanted to go. But heading to a noose wasn’t appealing either, and she would’ve been pushed onto the platform if not for Reagan.

She reached back and clutched Emery’s hand as she stepped into the blackness, the two of them silently weaving a concealment spell that she then pulled around them. She squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath. An unnatural cold slithered over her skin and seeped into her blood, the feeling closer to fear than magic. Or was this magically induced fear? She couldn’t be sure.

Blinking her eyes open did no good. The world beyond was pitch black. She bumped into Darius’s muscled back and jostled against Emery’s front.

Something splattered against her forehead.

“Flipping flapjacks!” She released a plume of magic she hadn’t realized was ready to go. Or maybe it hadn’t been. It zipped into the sky and bloomed in the darkness, a flower of blues and pinks and purples, light in a dark place. It showered down like a firework, raining sparkling light.

She felt Darius turn, his breath dusting down on her face. She could feel his anger thrumming between them.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “Something hit my head.”

“Drops of water,” he replied, turning. “The ceiling drips. Do not do that again.”

“Once was probably plenty to get noticed,” Emery murmured.

Yeah, it probably was, especially since it was still streaking the ink-black sky.

“Light your torches.” The heat from Darius’s back dissipated, cold taking its place. He’d stepped forward. “These are stairs. Take caution.”

“Right, right. Stairs to go down,” she said, conjuring up some fire to cover the tip of her torch.

Emery stepped beside her as the flame slowly grew, illuminating the tiny bubble around them. Together they descended, Darius a few steps ahead and not needing the spell—he’d been down here before. Emery flinched.

“What?” she whispered.

“One of those drops. It’s disconcerting.”

“I have a feeling this whole place is going to be disconcerting.”

“You’re probably right.”

She stumbled at the bottom, expecting a step and not seeing one, having been looking ahead rather than down. As if someone had flicked a switch, low light flooded the area. The light skimmed the rough-hewn ground. Large walls made of sharp rock, twelve feet high or so, rose in sections, creating dry canals. Creatures crowded into the little pockets of darkness, their movement suggesting they were communicating in some way. This had to be the market.

Darius veered right, aiming for a large opening between one set of the walls. They passed three of the seller stalls, not unlike the ones that had populated the medieval village she’d worked at in Seattle. Only two were active, one with a crowd of hairy creatures and the other with a lone troll, watching them with a grumpy expression.

Darius slowed at the fourth stall, stepping to the side and out of oncoming traffic, which comprised of a few demon-looking creatures. They’d aimed to come at the low tide, as Darius called it, when the market was the slowest. Apparently he’d cataloged such things.

He bent to the stall owner, a goblin reminiscent of the Red Cap from which she’d inherited the boost of godly magic she now carried.

“I am seeking passage to the inner kingdom,” Darius said softly, his words barely reaching Penny even though she waited right beside them. “For three.”

“Can’t get you there right now,” the creature grated, its voice like a knife blade pulled across her bones. “They found the heir. She’s up at the castle. The Great Master has locked the inner kingdom down tight. Everyone coming in and going out is monitored. Can’t get you through.”

“I don’t need passage, I need a guide to get us there. We’ll get through. Send word.”

“Who is this we?” the goblin asked, his eyes narrowed.

“Someone the heir will want to see. She will repay you for your help.”

“Yeah, sure. But the Great Master will skin me alive if he finds out. That’s not worth it.”

“Everything has a price,” Emery murmured as Darius pulled the backpack around and reached inside. He came back with four filled casings and laid them on the flimsy table.

Penny recognized their special markings. It was an incredibly ancient and potent spell Darius had found in a spell book and copied down by hand, not trusting the light of a copy machine against paper or parchment that old. At least, that was what he’d said. As they’d done the spell while in the vampire lair, Emery suspected Darius had taken it down from someone else’s book. The spell was so robust that they’d needed four casings to hold it all.

She and Emery had taken two days to prepare a few of those spells. Days they could’ve been on the road to Reagan. But Darius had assured them that the time was worth it. Necessary, he’d said.

The goblin licked its lips. It clearly recognized the casings and coveted them. The spell would allow a creature to change into any form it desired and live in the human world undetected by anyone. Not even shifters or vampires would smell the magic on him. It was like witness protection for magical people. For a creature like this, who basically couldn’t blend in in the human world, that was apparently an incredibly big deal. For people like Reagan, with demonic magic that Lucifer could track if he had a close, personal object of hers (news to Penny), it might mean the difference between freedom and servitude.

There was only one person that seemed to have such a handle on ancient magic like that. Ja. Emery had mentioned to Penny that he wondered what Darius had had to trade to get it. It sure would’ve been nice if they’d had it before all this.

“For that”—the goblin pointed at the casings—“I can get you near it. Then you’re on your own.”

“I need someone on the other side,” Darius pushed. “Someone who can get us in and out of Lucifer’s castle. No deal until we are out of the Underworld.”

“Are you crazy?” The goblin leaned forward. “Do you know what you’re asking? Do you know what kind of heat me and my associates would be in if we were caught?”

Darius touched the spell on the table. “Once you take this, I will set you up for life. You can disappear forever. Live as a wealthy human. Visit the Realm whenever you like. With this spell and my resources, you can have the kind of life you’ve never dared to dream of. It would get you out of here.”

The goblin shook its head, leaning back, not taking the bait.

Darius pulled a vial of blood out of the backpack. The goblin’s head stopped shaking. Its eyes widened in recognition.

Unicorn blood, a secret the vampires had been keeping for generations. It was essential to their creation of new vampires, but it also imbued anyone who drank it with certain powers. The vampires kept it a closely guarded secret for obvious reasons, but they wouldn’t need to anymore if they were allowed to return to the Underworld. Something about this place awakened their ability to procreate, a secret that Cahal had blabbed to everyone on Darius’s island and now probably wouldn’t be much of a secret anymore.

“One spell and vial for you,” Darius said softly. “And one for whoever meets us on the other side. Plus disappearing into the human world forever. If you don’t, you’ll be on Lucifer’s front line. I doubt you will last. Take this offer. It’s the best you will ever receive.”

The goblin stared at Darius for a long time. Seconds trickled by, then minutes. Darius did not shift or fidget. He just waited.

“He has him,” Emery said softly, his voice concealed by the spell.

“Fine.” The goblin reached forward to swipe the spell off the table.

Darius was there first, infinitely faster. “You will get half of this spell now. You will get the other half, and the vial, when we pass through the Edges on our way out. Your associate will get the same deal.”

The goblin pulled back his hand, waited for Darius to deposit two of the casings, and then slipped them into his pocket. “Meet you beyond the river. Usual place. I assume you only want your most loyal allies knowing of this?”

“Yes. Don’t dally.” Darius packed his things away and turned, heading farther into the area.

“I knew he’d been setting up a magical trade down here,” Emery whispered as they followed, still walking beside Penny and not behind, like Darius had said, “but I had no idea he carried so much favor with these people. They must really trust him to agree to something like this.”

“Reagan is not going to be pleased he’s been keeping secrets of this magnitude. If he’s got this going on, what else is he hiding?”

“He’s an elder vampire—my guess is a lot.”

Darius didn’t breeze through this place like he always breezed through the Brink. He didn’t stroll or strut, confident and arrogant. He trudged along like a creature at the end of his rope and ready to snap. He walked like he might snap into violence at any provocation. Like he would kill if he did. Like the doomsday cloud he really was.

Shivers washed over Penny at the change. He was clearly a master at knowing what persona was needed in any given place, and she was seeing it carried out in the flesh. Thank God he was on their side. Or…Reagan’s side, anyway, and Reagan was on hers.

If Reagan ever had to break up with him, she’d need to kill him. That was all there was to it. He was too dangerous to be an ex.

The feel of the ground changed beneath her feet. Squishy now, almost. She swore she’d stepped on a clump of something. Looking down, though, it was still the rough rock.

The walls started to taper down and then stopped, another invisible clump catching Penny’s notice. And then the landscape changed entirely. One minute they were walking through a leaking sort of cave, and the next they were on a wide, desolate beach that went on forever.

“What kind of messed-up place is this?” Penny said softly, clutching Emery.

“Pull away the magic. I need to see you,” Darius said, an edge in his voice.

Emery did so without hesitation.

Darius grabbed her other arm, pushing in close. “Stay together. If we separate here, the illusion will change. We’ll lose each other.”

She’d already had a hand on Emery, but he adjusted it so they were more tightly pressed together. The guys clearly thought she couldn’t be trusted.

She flinched when a drop hit her forehead out of a bland gray sky.

“I hate this place,” she murmured.

“You will find that it gets worse. Try not to think about it, and it isn’t so bad. Come on.” Darius started forward, Emery reading his cues and moving quickly. Penny was dragged between them. “It’s an illusion. Much of the Underworld is. Like what Reagan does, only more detailed and on a much larger scale. We will be going through a sect that is going to…broaden your voyeuristic horizons. I doubt you will be embarrassed by much after it, and I doubt you will be comfortable during it. It is the safest sect we can traverse, however. They are enamored by my kind.”

“You better not have cheated on Reagan, or when this is all done, I’ll not only tell her, I’ll help her torch your body and bury your black sludge guts in the yard.”

“I would never bed another,” he replied, and he had better be telling the truth, or Penny absolutely would help Reagan do something awful. “I certainly would not bed a demon. But I am a predator of humans, gifted with traits this sect of demons covet. They can sense my magic. They delight in it. Merely being in their presence… Well, you’ll see. I passed through a similar sect on my first journey through the Underworld, but this one holds much more power. Their power draws out my gifts. When we come back through, they will delight in seeing Reagan by my side, and she’ll…probably give in to my enhanced predatory traits. You will get to see quite the show. I know how you delight in such things…”

Penny’s face burned at the reminder that she’d walked in on him and Reagan, twice, and Emery chuckled, the jerk! “Seriously, this has got to stop! I was not trying to catch you two! It’s not my thing, honest!”

“We shall see.”

“Oh my God, I hate you.” The squishy sensation beneath her feet turned into the hollow thunk of wood. It matched the look of the pier.

Emery looked around, his gaze coming to rest on the fog in front of them, near the end of the pier, if she had to guess. “And that’s the fog you want us to take down?”

“Yes, but not yet.” Darius stopped in front of it. “That would alert Lucifer to a breach.”

“Obviously.” Emery’s eyes were still moving across it, then coming to a stop. His brow lowered. “This is incredible magic. The weave is intricate and tight. It would take a while to get through it. Maybe we should’ve left Reagan here for longer. Let her learn first.”

“She’ll have time to learn.” Darius got himself situated, adjusting his jacket and then his backpack, as if he were gearing up for what came next. “Once we get into the sect, we won’t be rushing. Can’t rush. One wrong step, and we’ll be hunted. We need to play this safe.”

“We only have food rations for a week, though,” Penny said. “That isn’t a lot of time for her to learn.”

“There is human food here, as well as various animals to hunt. They probably won’t be appetizing to you, but if you’re hungry enough, you’ll eat them. I have a store of canned goods hidden away in various sects for just such an occasion. We are aiming for Reagan being in his care for another two weeks, making it three total. We can push to four, but any longer and I fear she won’t want to leave. She is an incredibly fast learner—even Cahal mentioned his surprise. It’ll be enough time for her to learn the basics. She can build her knowledge from there.”

“She’ll want to leave.” Penny nodded as she studied the fog. Emery was right: that thing was a beast. It wouldn’t take forever for them to rip it down, though. All it would take was the spell Penny had devised to cripple Reagan’s magic.

“Ready?” Darius spared them a glance, and then he was easing into the fog, his body tensing up. That meant it hurt, probably pretty badly for him to show it.

“Do you think it will hurt us that badly?” she asked Emery, a quiver in her voice that she couldn’t quite help.

“No.” He didn’t sound sure. “Ready?”

She took his hand and stepped up to the fog. It licked her front, stinging, questing, hunting for the key that would allow them through.

They kept pushing forward. Magical needles pierced her, and she gasped. It felt like it was probing, trying to get at her blood. Wanting a sample of what granted her admission.

Emery tugged on her, forcing her farther into the fog. The pain increased, digging into her now, ever searching.

She knew what it was doing—it was seeking out the godly power she’d accidentally stolen from that horrible little goblin. She offered up what it was seeking to help it along.

The fog sizzled, peeling away from her tiny string of magic and then her body, deadening the pain as it let her pass.

It slithered around Emery’s body next, now popping and hissing, before letting him pass too.

She frowned as they stepped into the area beyond, where Darius waited with a watchful gaze and loose posture. A single boat waited at the end of the pier, occupied by a solitary figure at the bow.

Despite Darius’s posture, the tightness around his eyes suggested that he’d wondered if Penny and Emery would make it.

The hissing and popping continued after they passed, the thick white fog turning black. The magic peeling away. Evaporating. The change in fog racing into the sky…but not stopping there.

“What’s happening?” Darius asked, alarm in his voice.

“I…don’t know.” Penny watched as the magic continued to sizzle and pop and eventually burn away, exposing other piers with boats waiting at the ends. “I just offered up the magic it was searching for…”

“It looks like it’s unraveling the whole spell,” Emery said, still holding Penny’s hand, looking back at the beach, and then the sky. “Did you use the spell that deadens Reagan’s magic?”

“No! That’s a complex one—you’ve seen it. This was literally just me allowing it to find the magic I got from that Red Cap. The godly magic. That’s it, I swear!”

“Reagan is of the Underworld,” Darius said softly, and the sudden hard lines of his body made Penny jolt with adrenaline. It advertised his alarm. “But she had a mage’s magic through her mother. She has a godly touch. The two halves must exist in her in a unique way. Godly magic doesn’t unravel her Underworld magic this way. Come. Quickly. This will be noticed and reported immediately. We must go. Hurry!”

Penny jolted backward as a drop splattered across her forehead. “How did he come up with all that so fast…” she said as Emery tugged her on, rushing to the boat at the end of the pier.

The people in the boats down the way were looking upward. Some had turned in their direction.

“Donkey balls dipped in milk,” Penny swore, allowing Darius to grab her other arm and help Emery lower her into the boat. This was not a great time to be clumsy. She did not want to fall into the stagnant yet murky river water. Lord knew what was in it.

“I’ve been thinking about her unique magic for a while,” Darius answered. “It has never seemed to fit with any other magic I have read about. The balance of the two magics within her is a logical conclusion. It fits a few of the pieces together.”

“Logical to whom?” she asked as Emery climbed in beside her. Darius took the middle.

Now nothing stood between them and the beach that seemed to go on forever. The boat rocked and pitched, as though actually on a quickly moving river. The man at the bow stared straight ahead, and Penny belatedly realized that he wasn’t a person at all but some sort of creature in a dark gray robe with a hood over its head. Grayish skin covered its kind-of-human face, but the eye sockets remained empty, bone divots more than actual holes.

“Ugh,” she said accidentally, clasping her hands in her lap.

“Plan B,” Darius said as the creature in the boat animated.

It looked at Darius. “Hello, Walrus.”