Mentored in Fire by K.F. Breene

Five

Penny’s eyebrows sank low.“What… What?”

The creature’s face turned a little, and adrenaline beat a drum in Penny’s veins. People were gathering on the beach now, looking their way. The magic just kept on unraveling, the sand turning into hard rock and then some sort of green-gray plant matter. The water that had once been concealed by fog rocked and swayed, a decided contrast to the smooth river beneath the boats. Far, far above, the sky was starting to peel away and lose its light. Her simple action was somehow undoing the whole magical façade.

“Who are you?” the creature said as Penny tapped the side of the boat.

“We need to go,” Penny said. The other creatures were all turning to look at their boat now. “We need to go now.”

“Black Sheep,” Emery said beside her.

“Black Sheep,” the creature repeated, as though saying hello. Its sightless gaze came to rest on Penny. “Who are you?”

A creature came jogging out of the rocky path whence they’d come, heading straight for them across the rapidly unraveling sand.

“Sparkly thongs,” she swore, tapping the boat harder now.

“Sparkly Thongs,” the creature repeated. “Where do you go?”

“We have to immobilize those other boats,” Emery said urgently as Darius rattled off some name across the river. “Otherwise they can just follow us.”

A drop plunked down on the top of Penny’s head. She absently wiped at it as she analyzed the magic she could feel. Transport. Safety. Steady.

“The boats are designed to get people to and from the area safely,” she said softly, looking over the side. The tranquil waters didn’t stop the boat from rolling and rocking, but there was magic attached, which seemed to lessen the impact. “I can’t generate rapids or anything. I’m not an elemental.”

“You’ve gotten mighty good with magical explosives, though,” Darius mused, as though there wasn’t some guy pointing at them as he loaded into a boat. As though the rest of the people or creatures in the area weren’t watching them in surprise. There went their freaking cover. There went sneaking in!

“I did this, and I didn’t even mean to,” she murmured, magic crowding around them, Emery forcing it to take shape. “It wasn’t even a spell that I did.” A thread of doubt wormed through her. Or had it been? Maybe she’d accidentally used a sort of spell to give the fog what it had been seeking.

“It doesn’t matter, Turdswallop,” Emery said, his face closed down in concentration, his fingers moving. “This isn’t the only thing that will go wrong. We need to rebound.”

“Yes, exactly. Something was always going to go wrong. Now it has. Adjust,” Darius said.

“How can you be so calm?” she ground out, taking stock of Emery’s spell. Looking back the way they’d come, she felt her chest tighten. Two boats had taken to the water now, drifting after them. They might not be following, but they definitely knew who’d caused all the mayhem.

“My dearest always said that you are the most effective when you are running for your life,” Darius replied, and had the gall to entwine his fingers over his knee. Penny had the presence of mind to notice he didn’t say Reagan’s name. She needed to remember that. “And now you are. Make miracles.”

“Yeah. Sure. Fine.” Penny threaded fire power, magic borrowed from the creature in the boat, through Emery’s concoction. Letting Emery handle the rest, she turned to the creature. It would need to be magically gagged. It would be asked who’d eroded the fog, and she couldn’t chance it spilling its guts.

A swell of power left Emery’s hands, but Penny didn’t look up to see. The bank on the right drifted closer, the creature magically aiming for whatever place Darius had requested.

She pulled ingredients from the magical cloud that constantly traveled above her, weaving the most potent of the gag spells she knew. It might kill the thing but…well, this was life or death. It was time to get serious.

A distant peal of thunder made the boat rock and roll, just barely stopping before it took in water on the right side.

“Do that spell again,” Penny said, letting the gag order dissipate and now working on the spells attached to the river. They kept the boats safe, kept them going to certain locations, kept them from capsizing. The magic was all connected, grounded, like Reagan had described the magic in the Realm.

She peered over the side. Her stomach rolled with what she was about to do.

“Flaming farts, hold on.” Another peal of thunder reverberated off walls and a ceiling she couldn’t see. A ceiling that kept dripping. She ignored it and formulated the spell that deadened Reagan’s magic. She elbowed Emery, and he helped out, making it bigger. More expansive. More potent.

The riverbank drifted ever closer. The boat rocked and rolled some more. The thunder died away, and she glanced around. One boat was sinking fast, two bodies floating away from it. The other was in pieces amid some sludge that probably used to be demon parts. Emery’s spell had taken them out in short order.

“Right, okay, good work.” She breathed deeply, and he worked quietly, accustomed to being around mayhem and carnage, and also causing it. You’d think she would be too by now.

She released the spell and then immediately faced front again and restarted the spell for the gag order. Emery jumped in quickly as Darius waited patiently, watching the bank, the point at which they needed to have all the spells done.

“Wait…” Penny stilled as her and Emery’s spell ate through the Underworld magic like it was nothing. Breaking it apart. Sizzling it. Eroding. The illusion in the river dissolved, and now the torrid current jibed with the rocking of the boat. “We don’t have oars.”

“We do.” Emery continued to work on the gag spell.

Penny glanced downward as the boat caught a current that pulled them back to the center of the river. Darius bent to his feet.

“No, Walrus. That is not your job,” the creature said, still mostly placid.

Penny stilled for the second time as the magic wafting toward her changed. This wasn’t the magic creating the illusion, but that of the creature in the boat. Restrain. Capture. Question.

“Hold on there, Darius,” she said softly, feeling Emery tense. He must’ve caught the tone in her voice. The something is about to go very wrong here tone. “Just take it easy.”

“I’ll handle it,” Darius said, and he all but launched forward, the speed and ferocity of his movements making Penny jerk back and cover her chest. If she had a string of pearls, she’d be clutching them so hard her knuckles would turn white. Even Emery jerked back.

In a display of unbridled violence, Darius reached the boat man and slashed his throat with his lengthening claws, raking them down the gray flesh of the creature’s chest. He punctured the sternum and then wrenched off its head, tossing it aside. The quickly decaying body followed.

With wide eyes, frozen stiff, Penny watched as Darius pulled down a sweater sleeve, adjusted a strand of hair that had gotten out of place, and then bent for oars that had been tucked along the floorboard.

“Now you won’t need to rely on a gag spell,” the vampire said, holding an oar out to Emery.

Emery shook away his reaction and took the proffered instrument. Penny continued to stare.

There was one thing she would never, ever say: Darius wasn’t vicious enough to date a girl like Reagan.

There was one thing she would never, ever do: pick a fight with him.

She’d seen him in battle, but they’d never exactly fought side by side. She’d never watched as he…handled things. It was jarring, to say the least. Reagan had found her match.

Penny licked her lips as the guys put their oars into the water and started paddling quickly. “How did you know he—it—was about to…cause a problem?”

“You advertise your reactions, and Mr. Westbrook…has certain tells when he feels danger coming,” Darius responded. “My solution was easier and quicker, though we need to put some muscle behind these oars or we’re going to miss our point of entry. The sect beyond isn’t as…savory as the one I’m aiming for.”

“Very eloquent speech after that display…” Penny murmured.

“I didn’t see our lives in danger,” Emery said, speaking of his special magical ability to get a mental picture of his demise right before it happened. It allowed him to change things up and avoid death, something that had saved them both a million times, it seemed like. He pulled harder on his oar.

“No, the Boatmen do not resort to extreme violence very quickly or very often,” Darius said. “They are not programmed for offense or even defense. Lucifer could’ve changed their roles to keep people like me out, if he’d wanted, but instead he created the fog. It did its part but left ample room for error. I have not figured out why this decision was made. Possibly one day I’ll be able to ask him about it.”

“After you steal back his daughter and work to thwart him in battle?” Penny huffed. “Fat chance.”

“Yes, there will be that issue lying between us. Can’t be helped, I’m afraid.”

“No, it cannot,” Penny mumbled, leaning to get a look around Darius. The river buckled in places and rolled in others. Rocks marred the way, forming eddies. No plants grew. Nothing floated along the surface, not even the ruins of the other boats or the bodies of the passengers and Boatmen, as though something had sucked them under.

Penny looked down into the murky depths, not able to see very far, wondering if something lurked in these waters. “Don’t tip us over,” she whispered.

“How did you know about the design of the Boatmen?” Emery asked, and Penny knew he was trying to figure out this world, similar to Darius. He’d want to understand the rules, the better to survive. It was a skill Penny needed to learn in case she was separated from them. She’d been helpless under her mother’s care. And although Reagan had a habit of pushing her into dangerous situations to make her shine, she never attempted to take control when traveling with Emery or Reagan, always happy to go along with the stronger personalities. Well, time for that to change. She’d be damned if she’d lose another person she cared about like she’d lost Reagan.

“I’ve tested them. I have never killed one before, but I did have to thwart an attack. No punishment was doled out for my misbehavior. I am not sure if actually killing one will change matters.”

“Three, and their passengers,” Penny corrected him, seeing the guys strive harder, trees on the bank whipping by. They were going faster now, the river picking up speed. Darius’s movements increased pace and fervency to match, but Emery wasn’t able to keep up. Darius looked back at him with obvious irritation.

“I’m not a vampire. I don’t have the same abilities,” Emery responded.

“So it would seem.” Darius turned and looked farther down the bank. “We’re going to miss it. Pull for all you’re worth, Mr. Westbrook. The next sect over isn’t ideal, but we can make it work. The one after…”

Penny hated when Darius was formal like this. It meant bad things. Dangerous things. A vampire holding on to his fleeting control, tooth and nail.

“What happens if we land there?” Penny asked in a small voice, trying to think of a spell that might help. She just didn’t want to rock the boat too much. She didn’t want to misjudge the amount of magic that was needed and send them flying into the water. Something told her a dangerous sect, whatever it was, was better than what possibly waited in these waters.

“Then we must use all our speed and stealth, and hope that you do indeed work best when your enemy is closing in.”