Darkness Fair (The Dark Cycle Book 2) (6 page)

“For good.”

“For as long as the angels stand guard. When a human calls up a demon from the other side of the Veil, the creature will only get a small window of time to become molecular before slipping back across. But if a demon ever managed to break through a
doorway
, it would have no time restrictions. It would cross as a beast and would remain in a corporeal state, and have no use with being coy.”

“And so, you think this goop,” I point to the black ooze on the wall, “is a sign that one might’ve escaped.” A terrifying thought by the sound of it.

Sid nods.

“But, wait a second, you started all this by mentioning my sister.”

“Her link to the cave, her blood being the key to open those gates to Sheol, it’s obviously a factor. Don’t you imagine we should consider her as a possible reason for any new shifts in the power of the doorways?”

“Ava could have done this?” I ask, icicles creeping through my veins. “She might’ve let something loose?” I think about the claws I saw that night in the cave, when the gates opened for only a few minutes. Those claws belonged to some beast, trying to escape.

“If not her, then someone using her blood.”

EIGHT

Aidan

I grip the steering wheel of the Camaro and try to focus on the road in front of me, not letting the frustration take over. Sid promised me that the spell he cast had hidden Ava. He said
hidden
, specifically. Like, no one should be able to find her, see her. How the hell could someone use her blood to open the doorway?

Before I left the house, I reminded him of his promise. But then
he
reminded
me
that he’s not as powerful or smart as he once was. Like it’s some kind of excuse for why he just
whoops!
left the key to the end of the world out in the open. It doesn’t give me a lot of hope for how helpful he’ll be waking Ava.

And now with Kara . . . damn, I need someone with half a brain to give me a hand here. Makes me wonder where Eric—my absent guardian angel—is for the millionth time.

I can only hope Sid is wrong about the black stuff running down the walls of his shed. Maybe a demon hasn’t come through at all. Maybe it’s the gross casting magic in that shed that’s gooping up the walls. It’s fairly thick with nasty in there.

I pull off PCH and turn down the parallel street, parking several hundred yards up the road from Mrs. O’Linn’s house. I take a side path that I found last week. It’s a bit of an awkward descent to the beach, but this way I can avoid seeing my great-grandma; she still isn’t aware of the blood connection, and I plan on keeping it that way, so the less contact, the better.

The fog is thick, the noonday sun not warm enough to break through. It never is here. Even now, with July in full swing, this section of shoreline is always shrouded in fog. It settles on the beach, coating the water in a thick grey mist. The sound of the water pushing slowly up the shore is muffled, but I can feel the stillness of it. Everything seems to be waiting. Just like me. Waiting for Ava to wake up.

Once I’ve made it to the sand, I walk down the beach. The damp air is sharp in my lungs. The familiar smell of salt and sea sticks to my skin. I shiver and tell myself it’s from the cold, but when I approach the cave, I know right away something’s wrong. There’s a strange vibration in the ground. Like the sand is transmitting some sort of pulse. I enter slowly, with my inner guard up, locked tight into place.

The walls glisten like black onyx in the shadows, highlighting the white stone of the archway inlaid in the wall on the opposite side of the room. I step closer to the altar, the pale form lying atop it a waiting sacrifice.

My sister.

I breathe a sigh of relief. She’s still there, the same as yesterday morning, a fragile sleeping beauty. There are no fresh wounds on her arms or anywhere that I can see. Her blonde hair spills around her head like a halo. Her hands are folded over her chest, covering the hole the dagger left behind. Her face, her bare arms and legs, sparkle like alabaster from the flecks of sand that settle in a thin coat over her skin. Perfectly preserved. Still no decay. No change.

I will her to open her silver-blue eyes. “I’m not giving up, Ava. I won’t.” I know what she would say. I know she would want me to move on and pretend like everything could be normal. But that’s all impossible now.

I close my eyes and try for the hundredth time to reach her mind with my own, but there’s only a strange stillness answering back, as if the air is holding its breath. It’s unsettling and my gut doesn’t like it. Moving closer, I touch the neck of the violin that’s on the altar, resting at Ava’s feet. I pluck a string to break the energy up a little. The note bounces off the cave walls, high and mournful.

And it’s followed by a growl that rumbles around me.

I go still, all senses keying in to the feeling in the air and the vibrations under my feet. The sound came from the wall. Or, more accurately, the doorway. I watch the black stone and pluck the violin string again.

The growl rumbles once more. Louder.

I step back from the altar and move to the other side. My shoe slips on something slick. I look down—

Oh, God
.

I cover my mouth with the back of my hand. It’s a bloody piece of
something
. Skin? Fur? There are more pieces scattered over the sand. Whatever the carcass is, it’s totally unrecognizable. And the pieces of torn flesh are actually organized. The limbs and organs are set in a pattern of some kind. A triangle, with other bits laid out in a sort of upside-down V.

Then I see the head. It’s placed facing the gateway. A dog. Its snout points straight at the center of the archway.

My stomach rises.
What the hell did this?

No, I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see what made that twisted piece of artwork, taking such care with each scrap of skin and intestine.

A noise comes from the opening of the cave. Sand grinding against the stone, like dragging feet. Or claws.

Scratch, scratch, scratch.

My pulse hammers against my ribs, beating inside my head so hard it’s all I can hear for several seconds. And then the sound of heaving breath begins echoing off the cave walls, noises of sinus and teeth and phlegm in the throat. It’s not the thing that was growling a second ago, I’m pretty sure. The noise is coming from the wrong direction, by the cave opening. Something grumbling under its breath, the sound of skidding. A shadow moves along the wall, coming closer, until the thing appears from behind the altar.

The creature is small, shorter than the stone slab my sister is lying on. It has thin, bony arms and legs, wings more like a third set of limbs, linked with webbing. It has a long, pointy nose and large bat-like ears.

And it’s dragging something behind it.

Part of a human leg.

I jerk back in horror, hoping my eyes are wrong.

The tiny beast comes into full view, and I reach up to grab my amulet, reassuring myself it’s still there. The demon can’t see me. It can’t see. I bite my lips together and try not to gasp, not to gag, not to make a sound.

A human leg
.

The creature stands beside the pieces of the dog, like it’s observing the demented artwork. The mark on my chest begins to burn, but I can’t act, not with Ava so close and vulnerable. I argue with myself:
kill, wait, kill, wait
. Until it looks up to study the wall where the doorway is.

And that’s when I see what it’s really looking at. A crack about a quarter inch wide and four inches long, running across the center of the opening. How did I not see that before? That’s where the growl was coming from. Black tar-like liquid oozes from the fissure. A bleeding wound.

The demon is staring at it, as if willing it to open, holding that human leg in its claw like it’s a log. The toenails on the foot are painted pink with a daisy on the big toe.

A gurgle comes from the creature as it lugs the chunk of human flesh in front of the dog head, dropping it unceremoniously to rest along the base of the doorway. Then it clacks its teeth and scuttles out of the cave, into the foggy sunlight.

I gasp in air, realizing I’ve been holding my breath. I have to focus. On not losing it. I have to force my gaze away from the blood and the death at my feet. And make myself think. Think, I have to think. That thing could be back any second with some other horrifying object.

I study Ava more closely, worried. Because if I didn’t see the crack in the wall, maybe I missed something else. But she still looks untouched. I go to the spot in the cave where I hid her things and grab her bag and dump everything out, hoping to find something useful. A half-burnt smudge, a lighter, our mom’s grimoire, Ava’s stuffed rabbit, Mr. Ribbons, a Rainbow Brite pencil box, a bottle of powder, and a Ziploc bag filled with what look like dried chicken feet.

Nothing. Nothing here I can use to block the entrance to the cave so the demon can’t come back in. Dammit.

I open the pencil box and empty it onto the sand. Chalk!

I scramble to the cave opening and brush the inches of sand away from the threshold. I uncover the stone floor and find a small circle of embedded rocks, four of them, each one etched with a symbol for a season and its elemental pairing. Summer and water. Autumn and earth. Winter and air. Spring and fire. I’m not sure why they’re here or how they’re embedded so securely into the cave floor, but the formation is obviously not to dissuade demons from entering or leaving. Maybe they have something to do with how the doorways work.

I take the chalk and begin writing the names of God in Hebrew, the first three that come to mind:
El Emet
—The God of Truth;
El Elyon
—The Most High God;
El Yeshuatenu
—God is our Salvation. I write each one three times, all in a row, marking a line across the threshold. My instinct says that the names will burn a demon’s flesh on contact. Hopefully that’s right.

I cover the writing back up with a thin layer of sand, and feel that the cave is somewhat secure, at least for now. I hurry back inside to gather all of Ava’s things, shoving them in her bag again. Except for the smudge. I go ahead and light that, then I set it close to the opening, so the smoke fills the entrance; it won’t scare the beast off, but it’ll annoy the hell out of it. I slip the bag over my shoulder and approach the bloody mess of remains. I stare down at the pieces of dog and human in horror before gritting my teeth, holding my breath, and kicking it all to scatter the bits randomly, hopefully ruining whatever spell the creature was attempting to cast.

I wish I could take Ava with me, but I know I can’t. Still, just because the demon didn’t seem the least bit interested in her doesn’t mean another one won’t be. I need to get help.

I pull out my cell and hunker down in the farthest corner of the cave, where I can still watch the opening. The line rings and rings. Sid picks up at the last minute. “Hello, LA Paranormal Investigative Agency. How can I be of service? No job is too—”

“Sid!” I hiss, trying to whisper. “I’m at the beach cave. You need to get your ass here. Now. Something’s wrong with the doorway.”

“Oh, my. I was correct?”

“Just get here. I don’t want to leave Ava alone. There’s a corporeal demon making some sort of spell in here—or it was, I don’t—”

A beep sounds as he hangs up.

“Okay. Don’t bother asking any questions or anything. Shit.” I shove my cell back in my pocket and settle in to wait.

NINE

Aidan

A half hour passes and the little demon hasn’t come back with any new parts. I listen over the rhythm of the waves, trying to hear if anyone’s approaching. Every sound could be either the demon returning or Sid coming to help, and waiting here for either one is making my nerves raw.

Several horrifying questions occur to me as I wait, the smell of blood and sulfur like acid in my nostrils. Whose leg is that? And where’s the rest of her? My great-grandmother lives right at the top of the rise; the leg is too young to be hers, but it could belong to her nurse, Fa’auma.

Panic sets in then.

What if I’m here, hunkered down, while my own grandma and her nurse are being ripped to shreds only yards away? My insides begin to unravel as I wait. But I can’t leave Ava, I can’t—

“Aidan!” Kara’s voice comes from up the beach.

I scramble to my feet, to the cave entrance, panic turning to anger at the realization that Sid brought Kara here to this horror. He knows about the weird energy exchange between us, and she was bleeding from her eyes only twelve hours ago. But there she is, walking beside our slow-moving mentor.

“What the hell?” I hiss at him when they reach me. “Why did you bring her?”

“Screw you,” Kara says, looking annoyed. “I came because I wanted to help. And Sid needed a driver. He’s not feeling well, or haven’t you noticed?”

He seems his usual self to me, wide eyes looking around, and calm as always—even though he should be freaking out. I’m freaking out.

“Don’t be silly, I’m fine,” Sid says, patting Kara on the arm like an old man would. Except he’s twenty-four.

“You’re supposed to be checking the camera feed from the hospital with Connor,” I say.

She rolls her eyes. “We finished. Stop being a spaz. I can take care of myself.”

I bite my tongue until I can say, “I’m sorry, Kara, but this is bad.”

“Just explain what happened,” Sid says.

I turn back to the cave and they follow. “The wall is cracked and the same black goop, like in your shed, is seeping out. The demon seems to be attempting to cast a spell.” We go around the altar and I motion to the floor, at the sand-coated massacre.

“My God,” Kara breathes. She covers her nose with her hand and points at the leg.

“Yes, that part’s human,” I say, my stomach rising again. “Like I said, I think it all must be for some sort of spell.”

Sid sighs and runs a hand over his face. “They were probably attempting to look for the key their leader promised them. Demons are a gossipy bunch.”

I stare at Ava, my throat tightening. “But why would they be looking when the key is right here?”

“They don’t know that, obviously.”

“They’re seriously that stupid?” I ask, doubtful. “They can’t figure out the thing they’re looking for is right in front of them?”

“Not if they can’t see her.” He shrugs, like it’s all so obvious. “The spell I did is still fairly solid, from what I can tell.”

“The spell? Obviously the cave isn’t hidden, Sid. The demon waltzed into this place like it lived here. It killed a dog and possibly some woman! Ripped it to shreds right there!” I point at the pile of remains.

“The spell is on Ava alone, not the cave, Aidan,” Sid says. “No one would believe a cave suddenly just up and disappeared. It’s been here far too long for a spell to trick the minds of those who know right where it is.”

Relief floods through me. And annoyance. “This would have been great information to know an hour ago when I called you in a panic! My fucking grandma could be in danger, but I didn’t want to leave Ava because I was worried the demon would come back.”

“Well, perhaps we should check on Mrs. O’Linn, too, then.”

“Ya think?” I brush past him and rush up the beach, yelling behind me, “Wait there.”

I reach the front door of my great-grandmother’s house and pause before knocking, trying to catch my breath. I can’t let it show that I’m upset; the woman has no idea what’s going on, and I have no plans to tell her. What was I thinking, not secretly placing wards around this place, too? I should’ve realized this could happen, that this area would be a hub of activity, even with Ava being invisible. Thank God she’s still hidden, at least.

The door opens before I can knock and my grandma’s nurse, Fa’auma, is there in the entry. Both legs intact.

“Are you just going to stand out there, sweating?” she asks. She smiles wide and in my relief to see her safe, I answer with my own goofy grin. “I can get you some lemonade, you know.”

“Sorry, I was just looking for Mrs. O’Linn to ask her a question,” I say, then sputter, “I found this spot in the garden, off to the side, that seems to be dying, and I just wondered if Mrs. O’Linn wanted me to take the bushes out altogether, or something . . . Maybe water it by hand?”

Fa’auma waves me inside the house. “You are just too helpful, young man. I’m going to have to try and convince her to start paying you for all your help.”

I begin following her into the entry, but as I step over the threshold an odd sense of the ground tipping makes me hesitate. I know that feeling. I haven’t felt it in a while, but I recognize it instantly. An angel is close.

And as I walk into the living room, I can’t help saying his name in surprise. “Eric!”

Mrs. O’Linn looks up from a
TV Guide
crossword puzzle and frowns at me. “What? Did you just call me a ferret?”

I gape at Eric, who’s standing right behind my great-grandmother’s chair. Neither of the ladies realizes he’s there.

He’s in the form he was in when he came to me after I died, during my Awakening, when I discovered he’s my guardian. The burns or markings or whatever they are on his upper chest and neck seem almost violet against his pale skin, as does the long scar on his scruffy jaw, which appears to have come from a knife or a fight of some kind. His hair is so golden it glints in the sunlight, making him a little blinding to look at. And he’s wearing those odd clothes again, made out of something like handwoven wool, instead of his usual five-thousand-dollar Italian suit. He stares back at me, obviously seeing me in spite of my amulet. But he stays still, silent.

“Aidan wants to talk to you about a dead spot in the garden,” Fa’auma says to my grandma. “You be nice now.” Then she wanders off to the kitchen, likely to get me something to drink.

Mrs. O’Linn huffs and then points at the flowery couch. “Sit. You’re distracting me from my crossword puzzle.”

I lower myself slowly onto the overlong couch along the wall. I give Eric a questioning look, but he just shakes his head and frowns.

Annoyed, I mouth at him,
What the hell is going on?

Before I can see his response, Fa’auma sticks a drink in my face and I have to smile and act normal. Ice clinks in the glass as I take it, my limbs still shaking from everything that happened on the beach.

“My word, boy, wake up!” my grandma barks. “Are you on some kind of gang-banger drug?”

I shake my head. “S-sorry. I was . . . I thought, um—”

“Well, spit it out!” She waves her
TV Guide
at me. “It’s almost time for my show.”

I clear my throat, trying to find my focus again. “I mean, um . . . I saw some dead, uh, plants is all.”

Her brow goes up. “Well, you’re acting as if you’re about to confess to killing them.”

“No, ma’am.” I look over to Eric and glare at him. Where the hell’s he been? And why is he suddenly showing up at my great-grandmother’s house, of all places?

“Then take a break,” she says, as if I’ve actually been working in the yard all day. “Drink your lemonade and watch my show with me; it’ll be on soon, after
Judge Judy
. It’s a good one; the woman kills people for a living. Quite unrealistic but she
is
spunky. I could have played that role, you know. In my younger years, I was much more adept at being spunky than most. The young these days, they just don’t understand . . .” She keeps going on but I tune her out. She does this a lot, the rambling. Most of the time I find it endearing, but right now it’s like a fly buzzing around my head.

Eric seems to take her distraction as some sort of cue and walks over to me. It’s oddly fascinating to watch, almost like he’s in slow motion. As he moves, gold flecks catch the light, falling from his shoulders and hair, and there are small flames at his feet where he steps. He motions for me to stand and I obey, unsure if I even have a choice.

“What’s happening?” my grandmother asks, sounding flustered. “Are you ill?” I must have an odd look on my face because she appears genuinely concerned, which is totally unlike her.

Before I can answer, Eric is reaching out to me, touching my temple with his gold-tipped finger. And then everything stops, the world is suddenly frozen. My grandma is stock-still, halfway to her feet; Fa’auma is standing in the entry, with a hand raised to her throat, completely immobilized. Like shocked wax statues. It’d be funny if I couldn’t see the horror on their faces.

They’re staring at something on the floor behind me.

I turn and look down, and see . . .
me
. My body is lying there, pale as a ghost, the limbs oddly askew. I’m staring down at myself even though I feel like I’m still standing on my feet.

Damn. It’s happening again. I’m dead?

I step away, creeped out. “What the fuck did you do, Eric?!”

“You’re not dead. Just asleep.”

I glance back at my body and realize my head is bleeding, like I hit it on the coffee table when I went down.

“You will return to your body in a moment,” he says.

I scoff, turning back to him. “I’m so relieved. I’ll also have a concussion, from the look of it.”

“Your new body heals quickly. You’ll be well.”

Yes. My new body. I look him over, his old-world clothing, his proud chin. He seems a little different than the last time I saw him—besides all the gold and angel stuff, I mean.

“Much has happened on the other side,” he says, answering my unasked question. He sounds tired.

Well, I have a whole lot more to ask. “What the hell is going on, Eric? Where have you been? I have no idea what I’m doing, or how to fix anything with my sister. I’m totally lost. I need help—”

“Enough. Other things needed my attention. You were capable of taking care of yourself for a few days.”

“It’s been weeks,” I snap. “Everything’s a mess. I’ve been digging into everything I can to figure out how I can bring back my sister and I’ve found all of nothing. Now Kara’s sick and I’m totally clueless. I need help with my sister, to find her and bring her back. I have no idea what—”

“Your sister is why I’ve come,” he interrupts, his voice grave.

“What do you mean?”

“A seal has been broken and I believe your sister’s soul is to blame.”

“What seal?”

“A seal over the Realms. There’s been a breach. Shortly after your sister was placed into her between-state by the Heart-Keeper, a cry rose from the East and there was talk of a revolt under the archangel there, Rafa’el. The spirits have become scattered among his ranks and it’s causing chaos on both planes. I believe Ava’s father is attempting to find her. He will soon discover she’s no longer in her body, if he doesn’t know this already. He’s not a creature to be trifled with, and we cannot allow him to find her if he’s broken ranks. Nothing good will come of it.”

“Her father.” Ava’s angelic father, who bought time with my mother like she was a common whore. Not someone I ever want to meet. Or meet again, since I probably knew him as one of her “boyfriends” once. “Who is he?”

“One of the dominions, or
Hashmal
, a midlevel eastern spirit; his name is Jaasi’el. He is the keeper of fire, spirit, and spark in those lands under Rafa’el. Or he
was
. So much has gone wrong so quickly.” His features sink with concern the more he says.

A dominion. That’s really not good. I’ve only seen one of their kind once in my life, when I was nine, and it was more a blink than a real look. But even from that small peek I know that I never want to run into one and be on its bad side. They’re huge; more than seven feet tall, and they have wings that span a good twenty feet. There are vines growing up their arms and legs like armor, and what look like thorns growing from their knuckles.

“So, you’re here because of Ava’s father?” By the tense look on his face, I can tell Eric knows how bad it could be to cross a dominion. But I don’t see why we’d have to cross this one. What’s so terrible about an
angel
finding Ava? Eric should be focusing on the Darkness. “You do realize there’s also a demon down on the beach, making artwork out of the insides of a dog in front of the gateway, right?”

“Of course. I sensed a witch call it up and felt it become corporeal. It won’t cause any trouble, though. It’s merely a scout.”

“A scout for what?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps one of the generals waiting on the other side of the gateway. Or it could merely be seeking its master.”

That doesn’t sound good. How can Eric not be sure? And the memory of the growl I heard coming from the wall isn’t making me feel any better.

“As long as one of these scouts doesn’t figure out how to open the doorway, they’re harmless. The smaller scouts will be drawn here and to other doorway locations by the vibrations, by the calls of their generals, but they won’t find a way to complete their task as long as your sister remains hidden.