Page 7 of Tell Them That I’m Coming

I’ve gone to Brille Rouge so many times, it’s almost instinctive. Holding up my hand, I call the shadows near my boots to me. Within seconds, there’s a large rectangle shape woven of impenetrably black shadows, even darker than the patch I’m in.

Focusing on Brille Rouge, one of the realms touching ours, I step forward. As soon as my boot hits the ground again, I see the deep purple sky and glittering silver moon and know I’ve arrived.

That, plus the familiar voice tinged in the accent that tells me she’s speaking Brilliant calling out to me⁠—

“Alana, thank the gods you’re here. You have to help Rafe!”

I spin around so quickly, Binx’s claws tear into my skin as he moves with me. I ignore it as I see the terrified look on Katrin’s face.

A demoness born on this plane, she has dark brown skin, pretty pink eyes, and soft blue curls that bounce around her spiral horns. They’re at least six inches long, shockingly white, and pointed at the end in a way that her ears are not.

Her eyes are huge, and as I frown, they fill with tears.

I don’t see Rafe. Looking past here, there are at least four other seamstresses with the same Brilliant coloring as Katrin, but I don’t see a red-skinned, fair-haired, purple-eyes halfling from Sombra anywhere.

“Rafe?” I echo. “I don’t see… where is he?”

“They took him. The fire demons took him!”

“Fire demons?”

“The ones from Noctavara.”

Noctavara. Of course it has to be Noctavara.

I have to separate Katrin from the other demonesses to get the story of what happened. Through soft sobs and frantic breaths, she tells me how another cadre of fire demons appeared walking down the path that leads to the building where the local seamstresses gather to weave fabric and create coverings for the inhabitants of Brille Rouge.

While Sombra is heavily male, Brille Rouge is nearly all demonesses. It isn’t unusual for demons to find their way to the world, searching for mates, but the last time the fire demons had arrived, they seemed to be looking for something else.

This time, though, they decided they would gather up three of the seamstresses to bring to Noctavara with them—including Katrin. As soon as Rafe realized they were threaten the demoness he was wooing, he used his unique gift to build a protective shadow barrier around the females.

Unfortunately for Rafe, he assumed he was safe. The fire demons had come for females, and now that Katrin and her kin were out of the soldiers’ reach, he believed they would move on or return to Noctavara.

And they did… but not before the soldiers surrounded Rafe, dragging him through the portal with them.

Rafe’s gone.

What makes it even worse is that I could’ve saved him. Katrin confessed that the fire demons had left with Rafe mere moments before I arrived, intent on taking him back to Sombra. If I hadn’t spent so long, hiding in the shadows, dwelling on what I overhead, he wouldn’t have been in Brille Rouge to be caught.

Does that mean that the demonesses might’ve been captured instead? Probably, but while I think Katrin is nice enough, it’s Rafe I’m worried about.

He’s in Noctavara. The same realm that features into the second prophecy I way-too-coincidentally only heard mention for the first time today—and the world that refused to allow me entry the first time I tried.

I have to try again. There’s no other choice. This is my fault. No matter what happens to me if I visit Noctavara, it doesn’t matter. I promised Rafe that I’d return for him and bring him home. That might just take a little longer, but I’m determined.

If fire demons brought my friend to another world, I’m going to go and bring him back.

That’s what I tell Katrin. She seems relieved, as though grateful that she can pass the responsibility of worrying about Rafe’s abduction to me instead of it weighing down her shoulders. I know then that she was only playing with Rafe’s attention. She was never going to offer him her essence or take him as her bonded mate. If she was, she’d insist on joining me on the trip to Noctavara.

Assuming my shadows will work this time, that is.

I ask her to tell me the direction that the soldiers came from, hoping they left enough of a trace of their portal that I can use my shadows to break through it. And, okay, maybe I didn’t want an audience in case Noctavara blocked me again. With a dainty point of her fingers, I set off with Binx, not even surprised when Katrin and the remaining seamstresses all flee into the structure behind them as though ready to hide.

If only I could. But, no… I did my hiding already today. What did that get me? My best friend is missing—and I’m going to do whatever it takes to get him back.

Oh, I shouldn’t be doing this.

Though I’m determined as ever to rescue Rafe, the thought repeats as I stand at the edge of the road, shadows pooling restlessly around my boots like they’re waiting for permission I haven’t quite given them yet. Binx is still perched on my shoulder, his small body warm against my neck, his tail flicking in sharp, agitated swishes that mirror my own unease.