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But the magic drains faster. The dim light fades, sputtering, then with a pop it’s gone and with it all the power I was using to fuel it.
“Ugh,” I pant, feeling empty.
Dugald fumbles close and puts an arm around my shoulders.
“It’s okay,” he says.
“No, it’s not.” I shake my head. “There has to be a way out of this. Something we’re missing. What the hell is it?”
“I don’t know, Quinn,” he says. “We’re far from anything I’ve experienced before. I don’t know what to do.”
My stomach roils as waves of nausea wash over. My knees are weak after expending all that energy and all for what? Nothing.
“She can’t have died in vain,” I whisper. “This isn’t how it ends. There must be a way.”
Inside my head is a blackness every bit as deep as the dark surrounding us. In that darkness is despair. If I let that in, one thing is certain; it will be over. I’d lose and I can’t do that. Duncan needs me. The world needs me.
“This is a dark moment but believe me we’ve survived such before.”
“What did you say?”
“We’ve survived such before?”
“No,” I say, squaring my shoulders, latching on to his words. They tug at a something, a memory. “Before that.”
“Dark moment?” he asks, confused.
“Dark moment, exactly!” I exclaim.
Excitement bubbles in my stomach. This is the answer, I’m sure of it. Fumbling to find the edge of the shawl my fingers tingle when I grasp it. Unnecessarily, since I can’t see anyway, I close my eyes and clear my head. This is the leap off the cliff moment, all or nothing. It must work because if it doesn’t, I don’t know what to do.
I wrap my arm in the shawl then raise it so that it covers my face. As the wispy thin material rises over my eyes the utter black disappears and I can see. It’s now clear as if there is a bright light. Dugald and I are on a landing, standing close to the wall. The stairs continue ahead but now I see that this is the last flight.
The open sky shows through the opening at the top of the stairs and Duncan’s screams of pain and anguish aren’t soft and distant, but loud and present. Demonic creatures stare into the opening of the stairs, gawking at the two of us and making chittering noises. Their faces are blackened as if burned, with heavy scarring showing between what looks like scales on their faces. They have sharp teeth that are yellow with rot. They clack their teeth as they make sounds to one another. Their eyes are bloodred and glow with an inner light that seems to smoke as it leaves their skull.
“Dugald, we’re here,” I say.
Dugald turns to the sound of my voice. His eyes are milky white as if they’ve developed late-stage cataracts. I reach my hand out and hold the shawl over his face, then place my palm across his eyes. Above, the demons screech but I ignore them for the moment. I’ll deal with them once Dugald can see.
He jerks away from my touch then realizes it’s me and stands still. I press my hand down and then he gasps. I pull my hand away and his eyes are clear. He sees my face and smiles. Then his eyes widen.
“Look out!”
ChapterNineteen
Dugald grabsmy shoulder and pulls hard. I stumble and hit the wall, scraping my face and knocking my head. The coppery taste of blood fills my mouth as I bite my tongue. I grunt in pain and surprise but the screaming screech from behind leaves no doubt the demons are attacking.
I feel the swing of Dugald’s sword before I see it. The sound and sense of it slicing the air is electric. An awareness that doesn’t seem to fit anywhere in my five senses but is still acute and certain. I turn, keeping my back to the wall, letting magical energy gather in preparation.
The demonic figures pile down, fighting each other as they struggle to fit through the final set of stairs. Two of them are pushed over the unrailed edge and screech as they fall out of sight. The sound of their screams fades long before there is any sound of impact.
Dugald fights with a fluidity of motion that is stunningly beautiful. It gives me pause and an intensity of pleasure watching him. Each stroke of the sword is exact, stopping precisely at the top of its arc and reversing.
Each swing connects, not a single swipe is wasted, leaving destruction in the wake of its passage. No matter how cliché it might be, he truly is poetry in motion. I’m watching a master of his craft. A dancer, and his partner is his sword. His opponents are background, secondary to the dance between him and the sword.
The demons continue rushing in as they attempt to overwhelm him with sheer force of numbers. Body parts and thick, gooey green blood fill the air and splatters on the small landing or drop off the side into the darkness, never to be seen again.
It seems, at first, the demons stand no chance. Dugald is a force of nature. Unstoppable, and he shows no sign of tiring. There is not a single misstep, until it happens.
