Beyond Everlight: an Urban Fantasy Novel (Fearless Destiny Book 1) Page 13

  What the heck just happened? I turned to Sabriel with the question on my lips to find him calmly sipping a cup of tea. Where the hell had that come from?

  Aiden cleared his throat. “Despite his impudence, Samson does raise a valid point.”

  Erebus scraped back his chair and pulled himself to his full height. “She was Fearless. A protector of humanity. That kind of commitment does not change overnight.” His eyes were on me now and it was a little harder to breathe. “Come with me.” He turned and walked toward an archway that, until a moment ago, hadn’t even been there.

  I stared at his retreating form and gained an elbow in the ribs from Sabriel that galvanised me into action, and I quickly followed.

  CHAPTER23

  T he arch led to a balcony similar to the one outside my room, but much larger. Erebus was at the railing.

  Was this some kind of ploy? Did he intend to throw me off? Nah, if he wanted to kill me he would just kill me. He didn’t strike me as the type to play games, and he’d said there was something he wanted to show me. I joined him at the stone barrier and looked out into Evernight. The breath whooshed out of my lungs. We must have been miles away and several miles above ground level, and yet the shimmering gaping maw of the portal was clearly visible to us.

  “Is that the gate?”

  “Yes.”

  And there was an inky mass converging on it. It surged forward to batter against, what looked like, a wall of flame, before being driven back over and over again.

  “Oh, god, what is that?!” I pointed toward the mass.

  “That is the hoard,” Erebus said, “and those bright flames are the ceaseless warriors, my clan, that fight day and night without food or rest to prevent the gate from being breached.”

  I visualised our guards, our weapons on the human side of that gate, and a dry bitter laugh bubbled up my throat. What could a few puny guns do against this hoard, what would a few everlight swords do against this deadly mass? I looked up at Erebus but he remained fixated on the spectacle far below us.

  “The ceaseless are a part of me,” he said. “They gain their strength from me, and I gain mine from the flame that you saw above the pool of dreams. The flame thrives off the souls of the tithe. If the flame dies, my clan dies, and if that occurs then the human realm will be overrun.”

  The denizens weren’t the only threat. This hoard was the real danger. And the tithe . . . how could I begrudge him those souls if it protected humanity as a whole?

  Danny’s face came to mind. I had to ask. “My friend was selected as a tithe last year.”

  He glanced down at me. “I know this may be of little consolation, but he does not suffer. He floats into death on a beautiful dream.”

  “I’m sure he would have preferred to live his life for real.” I couldn’t help the bitterness that tainted my voice. “Would it really matter if you spared one soul?”

  Erebus sighed. “He belongs to the flame now; to remove him from the pool would kill him instantly.”

  A weight settled on my chest. If only there was a way to get a message to Brett, to give him some closure, but I was stuck here for a year. At least I was alive. Questions seethed in my mind—what was this flame? How could it have so much power? Why had it reacted so strangely to me? I opened my mouth to ask Erebus all this, but he turned his head to pin me with his gleaming eyes.

  “I do not enjoy taking life, and I will spare yours because I know, as a Fearless, you will do nothing to jeopardise the safety of humanity. Our anonymity is what allows us to protect the human realm. In my experience, given too much knowledge, humanity has a tendency to jeopardise its own existence.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. Hadn’t it been the scientists with their fountains of knowledge, new technology, and arrogant assurances that had landed us in this mess in the first place? Yeah it made sense, but what didn’t make sense was why? Why was Erebus helping us? Why did it matter so much to him? I’d always assumed he was getting something in return, but from what he’d just told me there was no benefit in this for him except his ability to fuel his ceaseless army.

  “Why are you helping us?”

  He swallowed and looked away again. “Because I have a debt to pay.”

  Well that told me absolutely zero. “What kind of debt?”

  Erebus’s brows snapped together and he slowly turned his head to look down on me.

  I held up my hands. “I’m just trying to understand, that’s all. It must be a pretty huge debt for you to have protected us for . . . what, the better part of a century? So what happens when you feel the debt has been paid? Do you just stop protecting us?”

  Sabriel’s dulcet tone cut off any response Erebus may have deigned to give me. “If you’ve finished frightening the girl, maybe I can show her to her room?”

  Erebus nodded. “Take the north stairs.”

  I glanced over my shoulder at Sabriel, then back at Erebus. I really wanted an answer to my question, but Erebus’s downturned mouth and drawn brows told me he was done talking.

  I left the balcony and moved back into the dining room with Sabriel. The other djinn were gone and the table had been cleared.

  Sabriel led me to the door I had eavesdropped at, but I couldn’t resist a peek over my shoulder for another glimpse of the monolith who I now knew to be less of a monster, except the archway that led to the balcony was gone.

  ***

  I stood at the foot of the northern staircase and gazed up at a flight that had to be more than a hundred steps. Tears of anger and shame pricked my eyes. This was gonna hurt like a bitch—both my pride and my body.

  Sabriel was watching me. There was no way I was showing any weakness.

  “Kenna, are you all right?” he asked.

  “You know, for a moment on the balcony I actually felt sorry for him. I actually attributed a little humanity to the guy but this . . . this is just cruel.”

  Sabriel’s smooth brow crinkled. “Why would you say that?”

  I reached down and lifted the hem of my trousers just enough to show him the prosthetic.

  His pressed his lips together.

  Not to be beaten, I began to climb. One, two, three, and here I was outside my room. “What the hell?”

  “Maybe you should trust your instincts more,” Sabriel said.

  Yep, this fortress was most definitely enchanted. Erebus had sent us via the easy route because he knew about my leg. Funny how easily I’d been able to hate him when I’d thought he wanted me to climb a bunch of steps, but how much harder it was to accept that he’d done me an overt kindness by sending me on an easier route. Years of believing him to be some kind of monster were going to be hard to overcome.

  I reached for my door handle and paused. “Do you know what Erebus’s debt is?”

  Sabriel’s eyes lit up. “I thought you’d never ask!” He took my hand again. “Come with me.”

  He led me down the corridor the opposite direction from where we had come, passed several closed doors, all of which looked very similar to mine except that mine had a fancy doorknob and these were all plain. We took a left at an intersection and stepped into a library.

  I didn’t have a great love of literature, but Bella would have loved this. She devoured books like candy, and this room was one big candy store. It reminded me a little of the library in the fairy-tale Beauty and the Beast. Ironic, considering I was in an enchanted castle, held sort of prisoner by a djinn who was pretty beastly. I did like the idea of being a beauty, except I knew I wasn’t all that to look at, aside from my freaky silver-blonde hair and eerie eyes there wasn’t anything special about me. And can you imagine me twirling around the room with this leg?

  I chuckled to myself and elicited a raised brow from Sabriel.

  “What did you want to show me? I’m not much of a reader.”

  Sabriel moved to the fireplace and pointed to the painting above it. I moved close enough to study it. A man with crimson skin and amber eyes sat on a throne. No. Not a man . .
. a djinn with the sternest expression I’d ever seen. He had the same savage features as Erebus and his sidekicks.

  “Who is that?”

  “That is Ibris, the lord of all djinn,” Sabriel said. “He was ferocious, ambitious, and stubborn to a fault, but he was also fair and loyal. Under his rule the fifth dimension thrived.”

  There were other djinn too. Crimson just like this Ibris dude, and then I spotted a small figure—a dark djinn with midnight blue skin and silver eyes.

  I pointed at the child djinn. “Is that—?”

  “Erebus? Yes, it is.” Sabriel’s features softened, making him look even more feminine than usual. “Ibris’s first spawn, his adopted son. Ibris knew that his people would never see Erebus as a true heir, and so he gave him the next best status and promoted him to Man at Arms. He became Ibris’s right hand, his confidant. More than a son, he became Ibris’s friend. It was Erebus and his clan of dark djinn that protected the realm. It was Erebus who failed to prevent the assassination of his beloved father and his bloodline. The fifth dimension is now a place of anarchy, and the hoard a by-product of that anarchy.”

  “That’s his debt? He feels guilty?”

  “Erebus continues to try to make up for his mistake; his singular most epic failure, because if mankind falls that will be another realm whose destruction he will be responsible for.”

  The tiny djinn boy with a smile on his face was a far cry from the hulking beast of a djinn that Erebus had grown to become. Djinn lived many lifetimes—a century in our world could mean two or three in their dimension. I finally understood the depth of his guilt.

  “But when does it stop? When will his debt be paid?”

  Sabriel sighed. “I said the hoard was a by-product of the anarchy in the fifth dimension, and only an end to the anarchy will stop the hoard.”

  “Why? I don’t get it. What is this hoard?”

  “The hoard is hunger and greed manifest. It is the rage and grief and ambition of every djinn; think of it as the mental trash of the fifth dimension. You think the otherworld denizens are a problem? They’re nothing in comparison, in fact I suspect they’re simply trying to escape from the hoard and find somewhere safe to hunt and feed. If it gets into the human realm it will infect every man woman and child. Your world as you know it will cease to exist. The problem is it’s getting stronger, and the flame . . . it grows weaker with each passing decade.”

  The flame that had flared when I had moved too close . . . Erebus said that it was fed by human souls, but if Sabriel was correct and I had Twilighter genes, that I was some kind of mish-mash of human and inhuman, then maybe . . . maybe my soul could sustain it for longer?

  No. I couldn’t step forward. Not now. If I did then I may never leave. I would never see mum or Bella again.

  I didn’t want to die.

  I wasn’t a sacrifice.

  I turned away from the painting, eager to change the subject, eager to think of something else, anything other than the fact that I may be able to give this flame a boost. Sabriel was studying me with a strangely intense expression on his face that made me want to wring my hands. My scalp prickled and my brain itched. I asked the first question that came to mind.

  “A week in the Twilight is a couple of days in the human realm, but how does time run here in Evernight?” How long would I have to wait to be free?

  “Time runs the same in the Evernight and in the human realm. The fifth dimension is another story entirely.”

  “And you, where do you fit into all of this?”

  Sabriel winked. “Wherever I wish to.” He clapped his hands. “Well, it’s getting late and I have errands I must run, but please feel free to enjoy the library, and when you wish to return to your room just retrace our steps precisely.”

  He’d been eager to chat a moment ago, but as soon as the questions got personal he had somewhere he needed to be? Definitely fishy in my book. I watched him leave, even his walk was graceful, and then I took a seat by the fire. There was a ton of information to absorb, and the fire was warm and soothing. I stretched out my aching leg and settled back in the huge plush armchair. It was selfish not to say anything about the flame, to hide the fact that I may be able to help, but hadn’t I given enough? Hadn’t I suffered enough? My eyelids felt heavy. Just one moment . . .

  My eyelids fluttered open to a dying fire and a throbbing leg. The library was a tapestry of shadows, but one shadow, larger than the others, stood out. It moved toward me, horrific and twisted. Something had made it into the fortress. Something Fargol had failed to stop.

  A denizen.

  CHAPTER24

  A scream bubbled up my throat.

  “You’re awake,” Erebus said.

  Oh shit. It was him . . . on the floor by the bloody fire. Embarrassment made me short. “And you’re observant.”

  Erebus crouched by the fireplace, stoked the embers, and the monstrous shadow he cast taunted me, jumping and dancing in time with the rejuvenated flames.

  “Are you always this derisive?” His body was angled away from me, hunched over and massive, he could crush me with a fist, and here I was getting snippy with him.

  “Yeah, sorry about that.”

  He stood and placed the poker back in its stand by the fire. “You’ll be my . . . guest for a while, so I’ve asked Vale to show you around the fortress tomorrow. This will be your home for a year, and I want you to be comfortable.”

  I waited for him to tell me I could go anywhere except the west wing—that’s what happened when you let your little sister rope you into watching Beauty and the Beast thirty times.

  “Why?” What was wrong with me, dammit? Why did I have to look a gift horse in the mouth? But the words just kept coming. “Why are you being so civil to me?”

  His eyes flashed and, then his lips twitched. “As opposed to disembowelling you like the horrific beast I am?”

  I swallowed. I really needed to learn to keep my mouth shut.

  Erebus moved toward me until he was towering over me. “I kill when I must. I do not kill for pleasure. If you posed a threat then I would kill you, have no doubt about that. Now you should get some proper sleep, in a bed.”

  “I’ve had enough sleep. I need to do something, be of some use. What about out there, in Evernight? If you get me an everlight blade I can help fight, maybe not the hoard but there’s other crap out there.” Like the thing that tried to climb into my room.

  His gaze dropped to my leg, it was a brief look but it was a look nonetheless, and my cheeks grew warm. I opened my mouth to unleash but he cut me off.

  “Have you had any training since you lost your limb?”

  I blinked up at him. “What?”

  “I see the way you move, you still haven’t accepted the prosthetic as a part of you and that would make you a liability out there, but I appreciate your offer.” He made to turn away but I wasn’t done.

  “Then train me.”

  He paused. “Why? Why would you want to go out there? Why risk your life?”

  I opened my mouth to spin him some bullshit but the truth tumbled out, unbidden. “Because this isn’t living. Living is fighting for a cause, living is being of some use to the people I care about. One less denizen on this side is one less denizen who might press through to the human realm.” I paused, surprised at my own candour.

  “Go on.”

  I licked my lips, the truth sandpaper on my tongue. “When they sent me here, I was forced to accept that my life was over, but now . . . I have a chance to live again, and I’m not going to spend it sleeping.” I realised how contradictory my words sounded. Hadn’t I just turned my back on the idea of giving my soul to the flame, even though it could have contributed toward the survival of mankind? Yes. And the worm of guilt had been born. This was a way to assuage it, to give something back that still offered me a hope of survival.

  Erebus studied me for a long beat and then inclined his head. “Very well. We will begin on the morrow, but I warn you my methods are
harsh.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

  He turned his back on me. “Now sleep, you will need your strength.”

  This time I didn’t argue, but slipped out of the room, retracing my steps just as Sabriel had instructed.

  ***

  “And this is the library,” Vale said, leading me into the room I’d fallen asleep in last night.

  I nodded, pretending to be enthralled by the prospect of all the books.

  “You don’t like reading do you?” he asked.

  I wrinkled my nose. “Not really my thing. But give me a good film and a bowl of popcorn and I’m all yours.”

  His eyes lit up. “Yes, I’ve heard of these . . . films. Humans enjoy them very much.”

  I couldn’t imagine not watching a movie ever again. And here was a creature that had never seen one. “What about plays?”

  His brows knitted.

  “You know, like the theatre? Do you go to the theatre?”

  He moved toward the tapestry, his face averted. “I’ve never been anywhere but at Erebus’s side.”

  Okay, dedicated much? “But surely you’ve travelled? Or dated?”

  He glanced over his shoulder, a wry smile playing on his lips. “Our duty is to Erebus, to the flame and the gate.” He dropped his gaze quickly, tightening his lips to kill the smile.

  Okay, so not such a doormat then. “Vale, what do you djinn do around here for fun?”

  He looked up, his lips curving in a lethal smile. “We kill things.”

  “Nice.”

  “Come, I’ll show you the kitchens. Food is prepared and the table set three times a day, but if you should get hungry in between, you can request a meal directly.”

  I followed him out the door, down the corridor, past my room, and up a flight of ten steps. We stepped onto the upper floor and into a vast room filled with cast-iron stoves, long wooden work surfaces, and heavy looking pots and pans dangling off hooks on the wall. The whole room was wreathed in steam emitted by several bubbling pans sitting on the black stoves.