Infernal Father of Mine (15 page)

Keeping a careful eye as we went, we made our
way down the road without seeing any sign of Timothy. The vortex of
cloud and lightning grew larger and larger. We climbed a rise that
gave us a good view of the road ahead.

"Look at that," David said, pointing out
several more of the strange tornadoes. "I don't think those are
dreams."

"Not unless someone is dreaming about the end
of the world." I noticed some of the storms were larger than
others. A monstrous tornado to the south had completely engulfed
downtown Atlanta. A smaller whirlwind sprung up in the part of town
we'd just come from. I noticed shapes within the clouds and peered
at it before realizing what those shapes were. "The storm is full
of minders."

"Definitely not dreams."

With great effort, I switched to incubus sight
and immediately shielded my eyes from the light. "Those aren't
clouds." I peeked between my fingers at the brilliant light storms
scattered across the landscape. "It's aether. Lots and lots of
it."

"Magical energy?" David said. "I thought it ran
through ley lines in the ground."

"It does. I've never seen this much in the
air." I looked down at the street and saw tiny ley lines like
capillaries running through it. They faded to darkness over several
seconds before pulsing bright white and repeating the cycle. I drew
in aether like Shelton had taught me, and felt it gathering in my
well—the reservoir where Arcanes held aether for casting
spells.

Try as I might, I couldn't muster even a simple
spell with all the magical energy I'd absorbed.

Why were the ley lines fading in and out? I'd
never seen them do that before. A cold shock hit me in the chest.
"What if they're draining aether from the earth?"

"And sending it where?" David looked skyward.
"To aliens?"

I switched back to normal sight. "How come I
can use my incubus senses, but I can't use my supernatural strength
or speed?"

"That's a very good question," my father said.
"It's a struggle just to use minor abilities. It's as if this place
puts a bottleneck between us and our powers."

"That would explain why it's like sucking
through a bent straw." I regarded the light storms, chewing my
inner lip as I thought. I remembered the first time I'd used my
incubus sight to look through the fog and sense minders. I
remembered how bright the fog had been.
Gray fog
. "Holy
crap."

"What?"

"The fog isn't fog. It's neutral
aether."

David put a hand on his chin and seemed to mull
it over for a moment. "So the Gloom is full of aether."

"It's invisible in the real world," I
explained. "But here it's so thick you can't even see through
it."

"The minders feed off dreams," he said. "What
if the minders are creating aether from dreams?"

"Whoa." I let my brain process the thought.
"You think dreams are the source of magic?"

"Maybe not
the
source but, quite
possibly, one of many sources."

"Then why does the aether fog exist when people
are awake and not dreaming?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe we're just
jumping to crazy conclusions."

I turned my view back north. "We need to get
moving."

David surveyed the area around us for a moment.
"I'm trying to use my senses to find Timothy, but there are so many
minders, it's impossible to single him out."

"Hopefully he gave up the chase."

He met my eyes. "I highly doubt
that."

We headed northward. Within what I estimated
was an hour, we reached the outskirts of Buckhead. The aether storm
in the area had grown to such epic proportions, it claimed a huge
chunk of the residential areas. Thankfully, the road leading
through the business sector looked clear.

"I wonder what'll happen if we wander inside
that," I said.

"Let's not find out."

We stopped at the top of an overpass and took
another look at our surroundings. The scene looked like something
out of an apocalyptic movie with magical tornadoes all across the
landscape. Unlike real tornadoes, however, they didn't seem to
cause physical damage. All the same, I didn't want to chance
walking into one. For all I knew, the concentration of aether might
short-circuit my brain.

While we walked, I saw dreamscapes popping up
with greater frequency. Many of them lasted much longer than the
ones we'd seen earlier. As a result we ended up waiting in safe
areas for the Gloom to morph back to normal. I tried to use the
free time to consider what the minders were doing with the aether,
but it was hard to concentrate with the insanity going on around
us.

I lost count of the number of women I saw
frolicking with unicorns or riding on the backs of glittering
vampires. For every one of them, there seemed to be a dozen men
dreaming about saving women from danger. Zombies seemed to be the
most popular theme.

"I don't know how much more of this I can
take," I said after dodging a bipedal shark chasing a young boy
down the street.

"Almost there," David said. He looked as tired
as he sounded. It was as if the journey had drained all the
smartass out of him.

My feet ached. My back hurt. It felt like I had
blisters in places I never knew existed. Even though I hadn't
possessed my supernatural abilities for that long, I'd obviously
forgotten what it felt like to be a nom—a normal human. Despite all
my aches and woes, hope glimmered in my heart as I saw Phipps Plaza
just down the road. Beneath it lay the Grotto.

I heard a distant rumbling and looked up in
time to see a flying saucer crash into a skyscraper, sending debris
and glass billowing out in a dark cloud. Thankfully, it was far
enough away to leave us unaffected. Gathering up my remaining
willpower, I jogged down the road toward the mall. The parking lot
was nearly empty, which made sense given it was nighttime in the
real world. We walked down several ramps into the parking garage,
and made our way to the far back where an illusionary wall hid the
entrance down into the Grotto, except the illusion wasn't there,
just an opening leading down the winding driveway.

I guess the illusion doesn't exist
in the Gloom.

We exchanged looks, shrugged, and headed down
the ramp.

Aside from the hollow echo of our footsteps,
the place was quiet as a tomb and pitch black.

After several tries, I managed to flick on my
night vision and gave thanks when it worked, revealing the
descending corridor in a bluish tinge. We reached the vast cavern
at the bottom. My night vision only granted vision about thirty or
so yards out, so we headed toward the center where the arch should
be. An Obsidian arch towered over us. Though it was black,
something seemed off about it.

"Do you notice anything different about the
arch?" I asked.

David looked it up and down. "There is
something different about it, but I can't put my finger on it." He
pointed in the direction of the doors leading into the Grotto
pocket dimension. "I want to see something else."

We traipsed across the cavern. The ticket booth
was there. The stable sat in its usual place. Cars even populated
the parking lot, including a zebra-striped Ducati motorcycle with
orange tires. The doors to the Grotto came into view. David walked
over and opened them. Beyond, a niche ended in a rock
wall.

"Very interesting," he said. "The pocket
dimensions don't work here even if the landscape mirrors the mortal
realm."

"The illusionary wall hiding the Grotto
entrance wasn't in place either. Maybe the spells in the mortal
realm aren't active here." I ran a finger down the wall to verify
it wasn't an illusion, and sighed when I found cold stone. "What
now? Do we just wait for Gloom fracture—or would that be reality
fracture?—and hope we can get through?"

"It won't be quite that simple," David said.
"When the Gloom opens in the mortal realm, it causes a vacuum to
form. Without preternatural strength, it'll be very hard to push
our way through it and into the real world."

"I could hardly fight the gale it created, even
with super strength." I could chalk most of that up to not having a
good handhold. Even so, we'd have to fight past the vacuum to
establish a grip in the real world. Since I couldn't use magic or
manifest into demon form, I really didn't see what we could do on
the off-chance a Gloom rift formed.

"If a fracture forms," David said, "we'll need
to signal people on the other side that we need help."

"Ah hah," I said, holding up a finger. "There's
a sporting goods store across the road. Maybe we could grab some
flare guns. Heck, maybe they have crossbows or something we could
use to shoot a rope into the real world and anchor it on the
arch."

"Great idea, Justin." He slapped me on the
back.

I looked at his hand. "I'm going to have your
handprint embedded on my back if you keep doing that."

He gave me an apologetic look. "Well, I suppose
we should head over there now before the fog rolls back
in."

"Yep."

We went back up the winding ramp, left the
mall, and headed across the road for the three-story sporting goods
store. We kept our guns at the ready, vigilant for any sign of
Timothy, but he had either given up the chase or been squashed by
bricks. Chuck's Sporting Goods was part of a complex of other
stores, so we had to go through a parking deck to find the front
entrance. I groaned when I saw it. A sliding metal barrier covered
the glass doors behind it.

I knelt to examine the bottom of the
obstruction. There weren't any latches I could see, but an
electronic key lock set into the doorframe appeared to be the only
way to raise the door.

"Crap!" I shouted. "How are we supposed to get
inside now?"

David tested the metal door with a foot. "It's
too thick to blast through with guns."

"Maybe we can pry it up," I suggested, looking
at the bottom seam.

"Where will we find a crowbar?" he
asked.

I stood in silence as I contemplated the
problem. Finding a crowbar probably wouldn't be an issue, but it
meant exposing ourselves to dangerous dreamscapes. I imagined most
of the stores in the area were locked down as tightly as this one.
I glanced across the parking deck and saw similar metal plating
covering the entrance to another store.

I heard a faint clicking noise and looked at
David. He seemed as lost in thought as I was. I heard another
click, and another. I wondered if a dreamscape had formed inside
the garage and looked around for the source. My search revealed
nothing except a mostly empty parking deck. I was just about to
give up when I realized how familiar the clicking sounded—like
claws on concrete.

"Oh, crap," I said an instant before Gloria
Richardson burst around the corner.

Elyssa

Unsure what to believe, Elyssa glared at
Jeremiah Conroy, fear and anger forming a poisonous mixture in her
stomach. "Daelissa told you where Justin is?"

He nodded. "She called not long
ago."

"You tell me not to go after Justin because he
has a purpose in the Gloom, but admit you're still friendly with
Daelissa." Elyssa's hand itched to draw steel, but she knew it
would be a futile gesture. "How can I believe a word you
say?"

Jeremiah closed the door to the vault and
walked down the hallway. "My relationship with her is far more
complicated than you could imagine." He entered his office and
picked up the glass of amber liquid. "I have no intention of
divulging more about the subject, so you'll simply have to take my
word for it."

"How can I take the word of a traitor to the
human race?"

His hand visibly tightened on the glass.
"Traitor?" For once, emotion colored his voice. "I will have you
know I've done more for Eden than you could dream."

"Like how you helped Daelissa sway the Arcane
Council to her side? Or armed vampires with weapons enchanted to
penetrate Templar armor?" She folded her arms. "The list goes on
and on, Jeremiah."

He seemed to regain control of his emotions and
waved his hand as though her words didn't matter. "As I said, you
know nothing."

"It sure sounds like something," Ivy said. She
stood in the doorway, eyes narrowed. "You seem to do a lot of bad
things. I know you've sprinkled some good in there, but why won't
you tell me the truth?"

Jeremiah chuckled. "The truth, my dear?" He sat
down as if the weight of the world suddenly rested on his
shoulders. "The truth is a very difficult thing to pin
down."

The girl shook her head. "Not really. Either
you did something bad or you didn't. You want me to be your
granddaughter again? Well stop lying to me!" Her last sentence was
the shout of someone desperate to be heard. "You and
Bigmomma—Eliza—and Daelissa told me all this stuff and then I find
out from my brother that you were using me! I hate the lies and I
hate being used. I'll never be your little girl again unless you
stop lying!" Ivy's fists clenched, eyes blazing with white
fire.