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Back then, I’d had no idea what I had been brought into. It was the first time I’d been summoned in over fifty years, and unlike most of my summoners, Morpheus didn’t make any mistakes. He was careful, calm, calculated. He made every order clear. By all accounts, at first, he’d treated me fine.
Until the God got Its tentacles deeper into his head. Whispered in his ear. Turned his mind from simple curiosity to greed.
“The tunnels are all flooded down there,” I moved along the shelves, covered in so many trinkets I could recall bringing up. “I spent weeks swimming through them, finding this shit, bringing it up. And the longer you’re down there, the louder the God becomes. The more interest It gets. It tries to get in your head.”
Bowls, tools, candles. Books, statues, jewelry. Anything and everything I could get my hands on was kept here from the deepest inner chambers, the ones the miners had broken into by accident. Other people had worshipped the Deep One too, long ago, and it was their artifacts that Morpheus had wanted.
It was these artifacts that I’d feared Kent would figure out how to use, and turn against me.
We reached the far end of the room, where a glass display case held a series of black daggers. Their handles were intricately carved, wrapped in knotted red string, and the closer I got to them, the more certain I was that I couldn’t touch them. They vibrated with an energy powerful enough to turn my stomach, some old magic that had fermented with the years, growing stronger and more vicious until just the sight of those blades sent a shudder up my back.
“Those,” Rae said, “I need one of those.”
The case was locked with a good old-fashioned metal padlock, so it required an old-fashioned method of getting in. I slammed my elbow against the glass, shattering it, and Rae yelped in surprise.
“JesusChrist, Leon,” she hissed. “You could have warned me!”
I chuckled, stepping back quickly from the case so I wouldn’t have to be near that unpleasant magical humming. “Take your pick, doll. And don’t call on Christ as if the bastard is going to come anywhere near me.”
She rolled her eyes at me, stared curiously into the shattered case for a moment, then carefully selected a knife from among the glass shards. She pulled it from its sheath, revealing a straight blade black as ink, as was the rope wound around its handle. She brandished it toward me playfully, and looked shocked when I jolted back. To her eyes, it would have looked as if I teleported six feet back.
“Woah.” She stared at the knife, then back at me. “Does this...does this actually scare you?”
“It’s unpleasant,” I grumbled. “There’s old, feral magic in it. Don’t get any ideas—if that thing cut me, it wouldn’t heal quickly. But it would be the same for the Eld.” I grinned. “Keep it close, but away from me. It smells bad.”
“I don’t smell anything.” She frowned in confusion, sniffing at the knife as if her human nostrils could somehow pick up that magical smell. I gave her a tap on the arm.
“Away, Rae. Tuck it away, shit.” She quickly tucked it into the band of her skirt, under her sweater. “We need to get out of here. The Hadleighs can’t possibly be happy that you’ve been out of their sight for so long.”
She nodded enthusiastically, as pleased as a kid who’d been given a piece of candy. She’d gotten what she wanted, but I didn’t feel any better. I didn’t want her to have to use some old knife, I didn’t want this small human fending off monsters. I was more than capable of protecting her myself.
Except I’d locked up my protection behind stipulations and deals, and she was determined to DIY her safety.
“I’d like to see the Eld come for me now,” she said, as we made our way back up the stairwell. I could hear the music pounding, drunk humans laughing and shouting. Too much noise to isolate out any individual conversation, which made me nervous. Even down here, the scent of cigars was strong. Perhaps even stronger than it had been in the bedroom. I hoped that knife was worth it, because lingering here was a risk we really shouldn’t have taken.
Rae reached the door first, and pushed the metal plate to slide the bookshelf open. “I’d like to see them try to get their claws in me and get a face full of—oh.”
Herohdropped like a stone in my stomach.
Kent Hadleigh sat there, a cigar in his mouth, waiting for us.
Kent didn’t look angry, he didn’t even look surprised. He sat in a thickly-cushioned leather chair, puffing his cigar, the vanilla-mahogany scent of it wafting around the room. His pale gray suit was unbuttoned, as if he’d just settled in for a relaxing evening.
He wasn’t even supposed to be here. The smile he gave me was like ice sliding down my spine. My heart began to thump painfully hard. I glanced back, just to reassure myself of where Leon was: close, just to my side, still as stone.
The ice running down my spine settled solidly in my stomach. My palms began to sweat. The knife I’d stolen was digging into my hip and I was certain the guilt would show all over my face.
“Miss Raelynn, my, my, what a curious little lamb you are,” Kent mused, carefully ashing his cigar in a small stone tray on the table beside him. He must have cameras in here. He must have been watching the whole thing. “And you...pull the mask up, boy.”
Leon didn’t move. His tension was palpable, a physical force emanating from beside me. Kent tsked in disapproval, and spread his hands innocently. “No one’s in trouble here. But considering you both snuck into my private quarters, it’s only polite that I know who you are. Now…” There was a glint,a flash of steel—and Kent had a pistol in his hand. My pounding heart stilled completely, aching in my chest. “The mask, boy. I’m not playing games.”
This time, Leon moved. I didn’t need to look at him to know he’d uncovered his face: Kent’s expression told me everything. For the first time, he did look surprised.
Then angry. So angry that his finger twitched on the gun, and a sound somewhere between a sob and choked gasp was wrenched out of me.
“Demon,” he nodded slowly. “And here I thought you would have left Earth after you nearly killed my son, but no. Still here, still meddling in my affairs.” Leon had tried to kill Jeremiah? For a brief moment, my curiosity tried to override my fear, only for the ominous click of the gun’s hammer cocking back to slam my terror back into place.
“It won’t kill me,” Leon said quickly. My head felt light, and I desperately wanted to lean up against something so I wouldn’t fall. But I felt certain that one wrong move would result in a bullet through my brain. “How many bullets do you have, Kenny boy? Five? Six? Enough to slow me down before I rip you apart?”
