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But some experiments have been done and some bonds have been formed. They were successful at first, the powers doubled and the rewards reaped in full. They fought wars for us and won them, bringing balance to a world that was threatened by its stability.
Secret wars? There had been no wars as of late, nothing grand scale. She relaxed and read the rest.
But harnessing that much power comes with a price, and demons can’t be controlled for long. When the time came, and they became too violent for the world, they were destroyed and never seen again.
She closed the book and felt better knowing this had to be centuries ago, and her kin would have known if their ancestors had ever fought wars. Curiosity led her to gather more books about demons in Edmund’s cache, all of which pointed to the same thing: that they were old creatures that bore no presence now. When her studies returned to Fae, one particular group caught her interest.
“All Fae are naturally cunning, but the shadow Fae and death Fae were the most cunning of the bunch. Stealth was their weapon as they killed and maimed enemies in the dark while trying not to succumb to their insanity. Only a few remain now…oh, this is biased,” she muttered at the end. “We are shadow Fae, but we leave our goddamn enemies alone. And we arenotinsane.”
Unless there was a curse involved, which had long ago been removed. Yano was the sweetest person she knew, and Marx was so honorable and so protective of the people he loved. With a scowl, she proceeded to read about other topics until she finished the set Yano had brought and felt her eyes crossing.
Daria intended to sleep in her bed, but her tired brain had other ideas. She inclined her body on the floor, relying on the power nap to boost her energy so she could going for the rest of the night. Silence became her blanket, interrupted when whispers flitted in her ears.
Get out of there. Hurry. There’s trouble.
Daria, there’s trouble.
It sounded like her voice, puzzling her as she stayed stuck in that dream. But she could also feel herself in it, and it wasn’t long until the urgency of the tone hit her, and she was following its demands. She walked out of the library with the utmost caution, floating through familiar floors and hallways. The voice stayed by her side, an invisible map.
You are near it. You have to be careful. You have to stop it before it’s too late.
Evil?
There was no time to analyze it as the urgency now snapped in her bones until they hurt. She rounded corner after corner, expecting to stumble upon some monster at the end, but everything was empty.
Keep going. Hurry.
She went on and on, circling until she spotted a hunched figure ahead. She braced herself, energy waking up at the sense that something wasn’t right—that this figure wasn’t right. Like a snap, it woke her up, and Daria could only stagger when she found that she was no longer in the library but had been sleepwalking all along. The hallway from the dream matched the hallway in reality, and the hunched figure.…
It was still there, but now it was familiar.
“Sona?”
Tears fell from Sona’s eyes, and a pool of blood was at the woman’s feet, thick and flowing. The cloying scent baffled for a second when the woman had no wounds, urging Daria to move closer. That was when she glimpsed the second figure in her arms, cut up to pieces where the blood was coming from…lifeless, his eyes no longer in his sockets and his limbs bent at unnatural angles.
“Sona?” Daria repeated, stumbling back. Then recognition burned. “Oscar. Oscar!”
She moved, then stopped when she locked eyes with the scaled woman. Fear clouded Sona’s features even while sharp nails dug into Oscar’s ribs and sharp teeth glinted red. The woman didn’t move. Somewhere in the background, she felt a crowd gathering and the resulting gasps.
“Let him go, Sona,” Charlie said, quiet voice infused with so much tension. Like a trigger, it had the unmoving woman finally stumbling back, choking for breath, and shaking her head violently.
“I didn’t mean it. It happened too fast.”
There was an agonized roar interrupting her words.
Then Malifeskos lunged for Sona.
Chapter 15
It took Diego using his body to block Malifeskos’ attack to get Charlie into motion, too, his astonishment over the incident needing to take a back seat. When the two managed to get the bigger guy out of the room, Charlie took over and whirled towards Sona. To his surprise, she was already on her feet, her arms held out and trembling. She didn’t say a word, but the defiance in her expression told him that she would not be running away.
“I will take her,” Riva announced, stepping in as he had earlier and firmly taking Sona’s bloodied wrists. She avoided the woman’s gaze. “We can lock her room until—”
“The prison chambers,” Charlie cut in. “Not her room.”
“You both stay here while I take her,” Daria announced. Unlike them, she stayed where she was, but her energy flared and created a glow wrapping around Sona. “Just to be sure.”
Her voice shook, and her eyes were filled with sorrow, glancing at Oscar’s figure from time to time. Reading her agony, he nodded and took Riva’s hand, reading the latter’s resistance. When Daria and Sona were gone, he met Diego’s watchful gaze.
