Umbra, p.14
Umbra, page 14
Theo shoved his hands into his black cashmere coat, toeing the pebbles once more, and digging deep to fashion the façade of vulnerability he needed.
Sergio stepped closer, his voice gentler, “That’s not to say that I’m not personally pleased that you know, my boy.”
The older man was close enough that Theo could feel his body heat in the chill air. The man was trying to reassure him, responding to his uncertainty by stepping closer. Theo looked up, his gaze brushing Sergio’s with a touch of hopefulness.
Come on, old man, your boy needs a hug.
When Sergio responded with beautiful predictability, Theo stepped forwards, too. But he jerked his scian from his pocket, thrusting it into Sergio’s chest. The older man stumbled backward, dumbly looking down at the hilt buried there. The sense of deja-vu tripped through Theo. He wondered if the nightmarish scene Sergio had dreamed of the night before also played across his thoughts. Theo’s smirk was on account of the similarities. He stepped closer again, drawing out the blade in one fluid movement.
Sergio’s face fell slack. He clutched at his chest, his gaze darting around as if expecting to find help in this frozen wilderness. As if there was time for that.
Theo admired the precision of his aim, watching as each of Sergio’s respirations grew more difficult.
Sergio keeled over, his mouth open and closing like a fish gasping for air.
I looked much prettier dying.
Theo leaned down over the wounded man and whispered, “Look, you finally did something worthwhile. By dying at my hand, I’m going to be able to tether your soul. And the things you’ll do with me, Dad… Well, let’s just say they’re things you couldn’t even have dreamed of in your measly little life…”
Theo relished watching his father bleed out. And with Sergio’s last breath, watched the heliotrope glow collect on the shore around his body. His gaze raked over the man’s shining silhouette. There was no fight left in Sergio’s soul because the most important thing Sergio had accomplished, that he was proudest of, had annihilated him. Sergio dissolved into Theo’s sluagh horde with total submission.
Yet, its effect on Theo’s horde was magnificent. Theo was only aware of the crackle and hiss as Sergio and the hundreds of sluagh he’d tethered in life fired through his own soul. Engulfed by the power thronging through him, Theo lost touch with his physicality and surroundings. It wasn’t until he felt the deliciously cool air against his face that he realized he was on his back. Steam billowed off of him and from the circle of blackened ground around him, so stark against the rest of the snowy landscape. Feeling the cashmere coat, warm against his skin, Theo marveled that the soulfire hadn’t ignited his clothes. Sitting up, he pushed his hair back and gently touched the blackened ground. Heat simmered in the dirt; he’d directed the excess heat into the earth. A grin stretched across his face.
Tethering an Enodian—a soul with a sluagh horde is a rush I could get used to.
With Theo’s power magnified anew, he portaled through the icy lochan, coming out into the lower hills of the Cairngorms. His followers were already waiting. All twelve of them. His eyes slid over their profiles around the campfire. Their pale, zealous faces penetrated the murk like skulls in a tomb. Theo was reminded of the bright-eyed witchlings and magelings in his father’s dream. It was poignant to think that his followers’ illumination into the mysteries of para souls would happen on the very plain where his own had all those years ago as a mageling.
On this plain that had once been a battlefield, where Caledonii and Roman warriors had fought and fallen, Theo had first come face to face with a remarkable Caledonian warrior. One who had looked like his fellow warriors, except that his soul emanated with that purple vibrancy. Theo experienced a sense of rightness, of surety, as he went to his followers, who were like children compared to him, uninitiated in the delights and potential that he alone could show them.
He waltzed closer to the glowing circle. “Sorry I’m late. I was spending some quality time with my darling father.”
A few hushed whispers flew from the circle. Bad Ju-Ju alone let out a knowing chuckle. Theo noticed she was already sipping from a bottle of Triodian wine, and that the other bottles had been distributed around the circle. Clearly, she was eager to do what Theo had just accomplished. To create and tether a blood sluagh. The creation of which required family to slay family.
What are parents for, right?
His attention traveled farther around the circle. His bright-eyed followers watched his lips fervently for his instruction. Tonight, he would share the key to tethering para souls with them. Through the Triodian wine, they would divine their parents’ identities. Then by taking their parents’ lives, they would tether their own blood sluagh, too.
Over the next few hours, the plain that had accepted the blood of thousands in ancient times took in the intoxicated blood of twelve Enodian witches and mages. In return, the Earth gave back visions of their parents.
Out of all twelve Enodians, there was only one genuine surprise for Theo.
When a mage, Aaron, returned to lucidity from his waking vision and exclaimed, “It’s the High Mage. My father’s the fucking High Mage!”
“You’re sure?” Theo blurted, his shock rasping in his own ear. He hadn’t expected Jorah to have sired any children. The mage seemed far too calculating in his quest for power to have a tie with a witch that generally bound one to another. Then again, inferring timings from Aaron’s eighteen years, his conception would have occurred only a few short years after Jorah was inducted into the Enodia as a full member. As Theo well knew, the first few months alone of being a fully-fledged member of the coven were filled with pleasurable firsts, when one experienced what being intimate with another Enodian was truly like. It was easy to imagine even Jorah getting carried away during those first few heady years, forgetting the far-sighted vision of the future. Or, perhaps, whoever Jorah had allied with back then had helped him rise in his sphere to High Mage. Although, Theo didn’t think so. Jorah’s rising had been more about the sheer magnitude of his sluagh horde; he’d tethered tens of thousands of souls.
The ramifications of Aaron’s parentage crashed through Theo. Jorah’s soul with its vast sluagh horde was up for grabs. If Theo played his cards right, tonight, it could be his.
“I saw my mother, too,” Aaron added quickly. “I know her. She’s Lila, a Hydromancer based in Vicenza. She’s been back here since Jess took the Rem Alphahood. I’ll go for her, of course.
“No, you’re coming with me,” Theo commanded.
“I can’t tether the High Mage!” Aaron exclaimed, his voice rising incredulously.
“No, you can’t.” Theo locked eyes with him. He watched as Aaron gulped, clearly wondering what he wanted from him. Theo had tethered Lorenzo’s para soul from Jess. Similarly, Theo could capture the High Mage from Aaron. But only if Aaron—Jorah’s blood—landed the killing blow.
Theo’s attention went to the circle at large. “You will all succeed in creating a blood sluagh this night.” His words rang out across the desolate winter moorland. Once more, he felt that sense of conviction rising. Here, where he had first seen that Caledonian soul with an amethyst glow. Here, where he’d taken his first steps upon this path, his followers were going to go forth. And with the most powerful witches and mages the world had ever seen, he would take the Enodian Coven as his own.
Theo’s voice lashed the night, full of the dark desire and hunger he’d nourished for so long. “This night, every one of you will return to Castle Nox enshrined in power like no other Enodian before us has harnessed.” His silhouette became enflamed with a violet glow. He drank in the awe and wonder etched on his followers’ faces. He let the silhouette of Lorenzo’s wolf prowl around the circle, their own looks becoming hungry as if the wolf’s spirit were infusing them with savagery.
“And with our united power, no one will be able to defy us. We will usher in a new era for our coven. Once we have defeated those who would stand against us from within, we will conquer the Triodia utterly, claiming this Earth for Lady Night and Lord Netherworld.”
As he finished, the witches and mages answered by opening the Depths portal with the combined power of their sluagh hordes. Soulfire enshrined the water, illuminating the white moorlands as if day had torn through night’s veil.
Theo was the first to stalk through the Depths portal with Aaron in tow. He was quick to tell the mage that all he required from him was for him to follow his instructions and that once they’d successfully dealt with Jorah, he’d allow him to go to his mother and tether his own blood sluagh.
The two mages portaled out from the Naples Triodia fountain—through fire and water—like princes of Hell. There were Enodians on guard, outside the entrance, but they let Theo pass without question. The guards flanking the fresco-lined corridors didn’t bat an eye either as the two Enodians strode on into the hallways.
It wasn’t until they were only a few feet from Jorah’s door that Theo withdrew his scian from his belt and shoved it into his chest. Aaron gasped as Theo grunted at the self-inflicted pain.
“What the–” Aaron gasped.
“He’ll question your presence otherwise,” Theo ground out.
Flustered, Aaron complained, “What do I say?”
“I’ll do the talking.” Theo looked down at the bloodstain across his torso. He’d deliberately missed anything important, he’d get a vamp to heal him later, but he was damn well going to make it look worse than it was.
Theo leaned on Aaron more, using their closeness to whisper the directive in Aaron’s ear. “When his attention is fully on me and you’re behind him, stab him in the back. You must be the one to deliver the killing blow.”
Theo shifted his arm on Aaron’s shoulders, gripping at the mage’s hair, and gave it a yank.
“Ow!” Aaron protested.
Theo smirked, feeling the strands of hair that he held in his grasp.
Aaron knocked on the High Mage’s door, pale and tense. Theo felt him shaking like a leaf and hoped he would hold his nerve.
If this little shit fucks up and wastes Jorah’s power, it won’t just be the High Mage who dies…
The High Mage opened the door, taking in Theo draped over Aaron. “What happened?”
“Astra attacked me,” Theo announced, drawing Jorah’s attention.
Aaron awkwardly hobbled into the room, unsure of where to put Theo. Jorah gestured to the sofa before the fireplace. The younger mage helped Theo to ease into the seat.
“Astra?” Jorah questioned. “Where’s Jess?”
“That’s why I’m he—re,” Theo slurred.
Jorah stepped closer, throwing a look at Aaron. “In the en-suite. Get bandages.”
Theo’s head dropped to his chest, feigning light-headedness. And as banked on, Jorah kneeled in front of him. “Look at me. What happened?”
Theo lifted his head, and as if exerting all of his will, met Jorah’s eyes. “Jess, she…” He ignored the movement behind the High Mage—not Aaron bringing bandages but the mage bringing his scian down.
Theo watched Jorah’s eyes darken as the blade pierced his lower back. The High Mage cried out as Aaron drew the scian out only to plunge it back in again. Another thrust to his kidney Theo identified as he edged forwards on the couch, leering at Jorah on his knees. Theo held up his hand to Aaron, who was quivering in the background, his face and body tense as if his muscles had locked.
Jorah bent over, clutching the couch.
Theo could feel Aaron’s anxiety choking him through the strands of his hair that he held. “You did well,” Theo said, looking at Aaron. “I’ll take it from here.” Remembering what taking in Sergio’s soulfire had done to Theo’s surroundings earlier, he added, “Stand well back now.”
Aaron retreated to the other side of the suite.
Jorah’s algae-colored gaze slid over Theo, his eyelids already looking heavy; he was losing blood quickly. Aaron had been more efficient than Theo had expected him to be. Theo admired the quiet steadiness within Jorah’s eyes, even now, at the threshold of death. Where Theo had felt contempt for Sergio, he felt no such thing for Jorah. There was even a sense of admiration for the man who had accomplished so much as High Mage. But ultimately, Jorah had been misguided in his focus. He’d been blindsided by the mystery of the Unseelie Court. Too eager to possess Queen Mara’s secret to immortality through this too-good-to-be-true alliance with Jess.
Theo grinned at the High Mage. Because he felt the scales tilt with stunning certainty in his favor. His success at tethering Jorah was guaranteed. There was nothing more that Jorah feared than his own mortality.
So, when Jorah’s stilted breath failed, and his head dropped to the couch, Theo taunted the heliotrope silhouette that stained the air. Pushing Jorah’s body to the floor, its dull thud echoing through him, he let the High Mage’s fragility ring out.
“Only the sturdiest is worthy of the sluagh horde,” Theo mocked, recalling the High Mage’s words from Theo’s induction ceremony. “But even the sturdiest vault can come to an ignoble end.”
Jorah’s glowing features burned brighter with hatred and rage.
But Theo pushed his fingers into his self-inflicted wound, smearing his blood onto Jorah’s corpse and across the strands in his hand. “Fear not, Jorah, this is not your end. Sanguis mei sanguinis—blood of my blood, I will house your soul.”
As Jorah’s soul realized the magnitude of Theo’s power, everything that the High Mage had almost possessed—the potential of immortality and the conquest of the Triodia—skittered through Theo’s being. Theo saw Mara’s court, the ancient glades of Triodias, all become swallowed as if by a void.
Jorah’s soul hemorrhaged into Theo.
And Theo plummeted into an infinite well of amethyst soulfire.
14
EVERYTHING’S A CHOICE
On the fourth day ascending the mountain, Jess found herself near a shallow pool before dawn; thus finally able to check in with Dearbhla. The pools had been dwindling the higher they climbed. They’d already started rationing their water supply due to its scarcity. From what Skiron had shared with them, Jess knew they wouldn’t reach another mirror pool for at least two days.
“You guys go ahead,” Jess said to the group at large as she settled down by the shallow pool, restless for daybreak. Agitation pulsed through her as she anticipated being able to talk to her second again. She was keen to give the go-ahead to Dearbhla to make the trade with Fern. Matteo in exchange for Jess’s word that she wouldn’t attack anymore Triodias. Jess knew how much Theo had wanted to keep his secret from Jorah concerning his ability to tether para souls, and thought it unlikely that he’d dared to flash his power around with her—his smokescreen—in a different world.
“I’m going to scout the route ahead from above,” Skiron agreed. He was already looking skywards, every inch of him primed and eager to be up there.
Astra was hardly less so. It was only under the cover of eventide’s light that she was able to fly. During the full light of day, she took to the woods with the rest of them. Jess had known full well how much Astra had suffered not being able to fly while confined in prison. Their love of movement had been the first thing they’d bonded over.
Yet, despite her eagerness, Astra’s russet gaze lit upon Jess. “I can stay.”
Jess’s lips twitched. “Fly my Fitness Freak.”
Astra raised an eyebrow. “Fitness Freak? Takes one to know one, Booty And The Beast.” She delivered with a grin.
Jess laughed and watched the two fae beat their wings, climbing effortlessly above the craggy outcrops in the half-light. She hadn’t quite grasped how much of a natural state being airborne was for the fae until coming up the mountains. There was something perfect about seeing them here. Like huge birds of prey, their majesty seemed completed by the mountain’s own. Jess watched as they rose up and up, a whirl of black and white feathers until they disappeared from sight.
The pucca were taking a final drink from the pool while Sunny secured the packs to them. But… he was loitering.
Jess stared at him.
“Would you like me to wait?” Sunny offered.
Jess shook her head. “I won’t be long.” She looked out at the horizon, at the lightening sky, gently placing the ebony orb, the twin to Dearbhla’s in the shallow pool.
Jess’s shoulders relaxed as Sunny led the pucca away, starting up the mountain path. Rune’s words from yesterday had been playing about her head. “…You are utterly mistaken if you think you’re any safer from Sunny now than the day he chased you through the woods.”
Jess didn’t trust Sunny any more than she did Theo, but working with both of them had got her this far, hadn’t it? As she fretted over Rune’s warning from yesterday, she scowled at how much he’d managed to get under her skin. Rune…conspicuous in his absence. When she’d reached camp last night, he’d refused to even look at her. Then, this morning when she’d got up, he’d already been gone. Clearly even being around her was hateful to him.
Jess raked her hands through her hair.
Gods, I fucked up big time.
She knew it was her fault. Yesterday, she had put out her idea about dissolving the blood bond between them too quickly. But she’d only put it so clumsily because she was so preoccupied by the guilt and shame squirming through her. The fact that he’d sensed her disquiet and coaxed her to open up about it had given her a false sense of security. It had almost felt like old times as he’d encouraged her to tell him what troubled her. In hindsight, she should have opened with a straight-out apology for using the blood bond against him.
Then, on top of everything that was messed up between them, he’d managed to set off her doubts about working with Sunny. All their “chat” seemed to have done was deepen the insurmountable gulf that lay between them and made her question her path again.
