Cast Into Darkness (20 page)

A long staircase, wood creaking with her every step, descended from inside the Old Bear down into the shadows at her very center. Step by step, she went down, the darkness around her growing, until she reached the bottom and the bolted cast iron doors that awaited her.

She opened the doors. This time, something lay on the other side.

The shore of a vast, black sea stretched for miles in every direction. The water pulsed and writhed hypnotically, its waves rippling against her feet and then washing back into the viscous sea. In the sky above, storm clouds rumbled, emerald flashes lightening the darkness within them. In the distance, a constant stream of pitch-black liquid poured from the clouds into the sea, replenishing it. Heat rose from the surface, heat pulsing with power in its rawest state.

The jet-black sea made her stomach clench with disquiet. Another flash of green shot from the crest of a wave as the black tide washed toward her feet. Everything here felt like the energy she’d seen when she’d used magesight to look at the stone in her father’s office.

But the stone was nothing compared to the raging sea of power in front of her. Merely an ambassador from its vast sovereignty.

She wrenched herself out of her trance, falling backward into a pile of leaves, her legs shaking. Was this endless black
thing
inside her something the stone had created? It couldn’t be a normal part of being a caster. That ebony seascape wasn’t in any of the books she’d read. Grayson had never described casting as feeling anything like this.

She realized she was holding her breath and let it out. Maybe she was crazy to think this way, but could she use this…stuff inside her? What had it said?
You can do what you want.

Focus your will,
the rippling energy inside her seemed to add,
and make it so.

The sea, the power—it talked to her now? What the hell was that? Was the stone controlling her again?

Calm down. Just calm down.
She had to get a hold of herself.

Think, don’t react. This…thing inside, whatever it is, isn’t the stone. It’s connected somehow. It sure as hell wasn’t there before the stone changed me. But it isn’t forcing me to do anything. It isn’t asking me to touch it. More like offering me a choice.

She should ask her uncle if it was safe. But if she asked Grayson, he’d tell her to let him take care of the cache, the same as the stone. She would lose her chance to find out what Brian had been doing.

She had to try it herself if she wanted what Brian had left for her.

Kate stared at the symbol written inside the entrance to the cache. “Go away,” she said.

Nothing happened. She rubbed the back of her neck.
Idiot.
Whatever that black stuff was, it wasn’t going to obliterate the spell inside the cache for her.

Focus your will.
The impulse came up strongly from the dark power inside her. She closed her eyes and descended through the tree and down the staircase in her mind again. She unbolted the metal door. The sea lay before her, waves spilling against the shore with a dark hunger.

She steeled herself.
Go away
, she willed at the spell inside the cache, and she opened her eyes.

The symbol had faded. The spell was gone.

Reaching into the cache, she pulled out a small notebook, covered in a brown leather binding. A watch sat inside with the journal—their grandfather’s old timepiece, bequeathed to Brian in his will.

She flipped open the notebook. It was filled with Brian’s handwriting. A journal?

There was only one way to find out.

An hour later,
legs cramped and back sore from sitting against the tree, she closed the journal, disappointed. It contained nothing but a collection of memories of Brian’s life: notes on when he passed or failed a test, when he won or lost a basketball game, and who he was dating. No info on his missions at all.

She stood up and shoved it and the watch in her back pocket. There must be something more to these things. Otherwise, why would he have taken such care to hide them? But for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out what.

As she left the grove, she nearly slipped on a pile of dead butterflies, their wings still wet from emergence from their chrysalides, lying on the leaf-strewn ground. No more blue butterflies flitted from tree to tree in the grove.

Huh. What was up with
that
?

Kristof floated in
darkness. His bloodshot eyes could see nothing. His ears, tender from the sound of his own screaming, could hear nothing else. The smell of sweat filled his nostrils, and the blood in his mouth tasted sharp on his tongue from where he’d bitten it over and over.

All he could feel was pain.

The white-hot energy from another spell ran over his torso and up his back. The muscles that connected to his spine spasmed as a thousand needles of agony jammed into them. The base of his head felt like an inferno, every nerve raw with hurt.

His hands jerked against his spellcuffs, the silver bindings fastened tight enough that they cut through the skin of his wrists. His father liked his victims to feel their helplessness.

Another jolt of anguish shot from the base of his spine up to his neck and exploded through his skull. He screamed—a wail that he couldn’t stop, couldn’t turn off even if he tried. There was no point in being stoic; it never won him a reprieve. His torturer could care less if he cried out, begged, or threatened.

By this point, he didn’t care, either.

He had done his time running the Pit, just like every family member. Carry out the program Papa prescribed or take the victim’s place.

Simple. Effective.

It went on forever. It ended as unexpectedly as it began.

Light erupted around him, searing his eyes with bright pain. He fell several feet to the center of the circle stones set in the concrete floor of the Pit, the levitation spell holding him up ending with no warning. The extra bruises on his knees and elbows were gratuitous, but they helped identify his torturer.

Dmitri.

Kristof squinted, trying to let enough light in to see without overloading his nervous system. Arms crossed, Dmitri leaned against the black jewels studding the wall of the Pit, a smug smile lighting his weasel-sly eyes. The tension in his cousin’s wiry body—his hand still cocked with a spell, ready to throw—suggested that the torture had ended far too soon for his taste.

“I said let him down
gently
.” Melina, somewhere near.

“I don’t take orders from you.” Dmitri’s low voice snaked across the room.

“They’re Papa’s orders.” Melina’s footsteps sounded on the floor. Her form became clear through Kristof’s wavering vision as she crossed the circle stones and tossed his clothes down next to him. He couldn’t tell anything from the set line of her mouth, her neutral gaze.

“Uncle Nico doesn’t care how nicely I let his little boy down. Not after Kristof stabbed him in the back,” Dmitri said, smirking.

And who told him about my betrayal? Dmitri? How did he find out?

Kristof picked up his clothes.

Melina slid a pair of sunglasses on his face, and the pain in his eyes receded. “Get dressed. Papa wants to talk to you.”

He pulled his jeans and shirt on. Each time the cloth touched his skin it burned like a demon’s kiss. He knew better than to ask Melina to heal him, though. If his father had wanted him healed, she would have done it. He ignored the pain.

“How long?” he asked.

“It’s Wednesday morning.”

Damn. He’d lost time. Hamilton security might have detected the conch-shell talisman by now. But he had other issues to deal with first.

“How did Papa find out about the stone?” He kept his voice low, aimed only at Melina.

She glanced at Dmitri, still leaning against the wall of the Pit. “I don’t know. Papa didn’t say.” Kristof didn’t know whether to trust her, but he didn’t have any other options.

Melina led him up the long, stone staircase and into the strong Mediterranean sun. Every step hurt like daggers being pushed through his tortured muscles. The tile of the pathway burned his bare feet, but he welcomed the warmth. He was out of the Pit.

They walked down the travertine steps from the outer buildings and approached the courtyard of his father’s estate. A terrace of granite tiles set with colorful mosaics surrounded a pool that disappeared from view off the edge of the high cliff where the house perched.

The scent of fig, apple, and pear blossoms wafted down from the rows of fruit-laden trees that surrounded the estate. Sweet smelling, Kristof supposed, but they always brought to mind his father, who enjoyed taking his breakfast at one of the weathered cedar tables at the edge of the grove. If the weather didn’t cooperate, some of the younger members of the family changed it. They spent hours with their mouths gagged to silence their ravings, their hands bound to stop them from tearing their eyes out from the backlash of such a strong spell. But that was a small price to pay, in Papa’s view. Papa liked his sunshine.

His father sat by the pool, a bowl of figs and yogurt in front of him. Kristof’s aunt Elena, dressed in her habitual widow’s black, her short blond hair stirred by the ocean breeze, sat across the wooden table, along with his uncle Stavros, his talismans shining against his dark-red uniform. They leaned forward to catch what his father had said.

The Synedrion. Two of the three members, anyway. What did the council want with his father? They let his father do what he wanted and only got involved in major decisions: matters of inheritance, policy, and occasionally, punishment. They gave his father the authority to govern, and one shake of his aunt’s head could take everything away. But they would never exercise that power without good reason.

He couldn’t give them one yet, but he needed to think about playing a longer game.

Kristof paused at the vine-wrapped pergola framing the entrance to the courtyard, Melina a step behind. He needed a strategy before this confrontation. Otherwise the meeting would be entirely on his father’s terms.

He considered his options. Then he walked over to the table. His father’s bodyguards, lurking in their Doberman stances a few paces behind him, scanned Kristof with a flicker of their unfocused eyes. Magesight—looking for signs of a spell or a weapon. Like anything he tried could get past his father’s ever-present personal shield, glowing a tranquil blue-green, like the Aegean lapping at the rocks a few meters away. He ignored them and waited to be acknowledged.

His aunt and uncle stood, pushing back their chairs. His aunt nodded to his father, then turned to leave, his uncle following. As she passed Kristof, she gave him a gentle pat on the shoulder, and the sting of her hand on his aching flesh matched the sharp disappointment in her dark eyes.

Had his father been talking to the Synedrion about him?

His father beckoned to Melina, who came around to his side and kissed his cheek. He whispered in her ear. She gave Kristof a cautious glance, then walked toward the house, joining their aunt and uncle inside.

So much for her support. He’d have to manage on his own.

“Well?” His father’s piggish eyes stared up at him. “What have you learned from your punishment?”

“Never to keep secrets from you, Papa.”

His father frowned, and tapped the table. “If that’s all you learned, you can go back to the Pit.”

What more could he admit without damning himself? “And to control my ambition.”

“That’s right. Your time will come eventually. Well, yours or Dmitri’s. But not for a good, long while. Sit.” He pointed to the chair in front of him, then clapped for a servant. “Breakfast for my son.”

Kristof took the seat his father indicated. One of the servants appeared next to him with coffee, some feta and olives, and a large hunk of crusty bread. Kristof broke off a piece of bread and started in on the feta. The bread was warm and rich with the smell of yeast and wheat, and the feta was sharp and tangy. He’d forgotten how long it had been since he’d eaten. At least a day.

But the bright flavors turned to ash in his mouth.

His father never ended a torture session early, and as long as the pain seemed to last, Kristof knew it hadn’t been long enough for his offense.

His father waited for a moment, leaning back and drinking his own coffee while Kristof devoured breakfast. Then he spoke.

“We have to get the stone from the Hamiltons. Now. No more delays, no more screwups. That’s why I am overseeing the operation.”

His father leaned forward and told Kristof his plan.

Kristof tore off another piece of bread and chewed with a mechanical thoughtlessness. He kept his eyes focused on his father—cold eyes, professional, considering. Anything to cover the turmoil inside. His father’s plan sounded simple, effective, and likely to get them the stone. Also brutal, unnecessarily risky, and illegal as hell. And it put Kate right in the line of fire.

The plan required two operatives on the ground, at a minimum. And one of them had to pull off a high-risk, complicated maneuver at which one person in the Makris family would have the best chance of success.

Him.

He knew now why his father had pulled him out of the Pit. And why he’d been talking to the Synedrion. Breaking this many rules required their buy-in. At least if his father wanted their support against the inevitable blowback from the Hamiltons.

He could have come up with this plan himself. He and Melina could have executed it. But he’d gone with a different one instead—using the conch-shell talisman to break through Hamilton’s security grid and get the stone, leaving Kate out of danger and putting all the risk on his back.

He needed the stone. But the thought of pulling off his father’s plan made his stomach twist into a knot.

He set down his bread and brushed the crumbs off his shirt.

“There’s another way to run this mission,” he said. “We don’t need to break as many rules or rely on the Synedrion for backing.”

“You have a different proposal?”