Dangerous, Diabolical

“You can raise the dead?” My brain backtracked a little. “You’re the one that’s behind the murders?” I mean it fits, but I’d never seen the guy without a tie in the real world. Even now it felt like he was lost outside of the fruit aisle. “You?” It was difficult not to laugh now that it was his face finally hovering above the majestic cloak.

“Shut up.” David snapped. “We can finally stop pretending.” His voice was full of malice.

Pretending?

“After all this time, you were the final piece of the puzzle. Our dreams will finally be realised.” David raised his fist, clasping it shut on the final word.

I nodded in appreciation. Who was I to stamp out someone else’s ambitions? “David, listen, that sounds fun, but first, I kind of need a favour.”

In unison, both of them barked a cough of air in laughter. “No.” David snapped. “I have been waiting years to be rid of you. If it weren’t for the soul,” he pointed his chin towards the bone creature behind him, “I wouldn’t have given you the time of the day. He said you had power, more than even he could comprehend.”

The ghostly shadow behind him clacked its jaws in agreement.

“We have been trying to deduce what you are for years.” The man dragged out the word years, a vein almost bulging on his head. “And after all this time, it turned out you were the final key to our spell.”

He began to laugh, pushing a hand through his hair as his shoulders shook.

“The attack yesterday,” I concluded. The same maniacal smile as Davids had grown onto Joannes’s roommate once I’d revealed scales.

“And to think!” He wheezed. “I’ve been trying to find a way to kill you for years!”

He had?

My face was a mirror image of my thoughts.

“The shelving collapse?” He prompted.

I shrugged, gritting my teeth apologetically as I tried to recall.

“The TV crush of ’96.” He expanded.

I shook my head.

“The poisoned lunches?” David added. “Now you must remember that the whole workforce needed replacing. The local news channel made a report!”

That kind of sounded familiar. “Last month, right? Before Joanne started? I thought my stomach felt off.”

David turned beet red. “It was about a year ago!”

“Then... no.”

“The man I sent to shoot you!” He shouted.

That had happened several times, so I wasn’t sure which one he meant. I took a stab in the dark at it. “The one that died of a heart attack?” I answered, eyes crinkled in thought.

“Yes!” David exclaimed, jumping up and down. “I promised him eternal life in return.”

“He did a terrible job.” I pointed out, flapping a hand to show me still in one piece.

“Yes,” He agreed pensively, “I had hoped he would at least leave a mark... Hey, wait a minute!” He threw back his cloak, quickly repelling towards the floating creature. The Dybbuk swerved, placing its bony hands on the man’s shoulders.

The air shimmered with a dark hue, and a bead of sweat trickled down my spine. “I have the number of a great priest if you need one.” They were both intensely focused on me, and I was rapidly needing to draw more magic to keep myself warm as the room temperature continued to drop.

“This soul is bonded to me by choice.” David snapped.

Well, there was no need to be rude. “Suit yourself, I was asking that.” I nodded my head to the creature, who gripped the shoulders of his host even tighter in reply. “Fine,” if they were happy with the current situation that was their problem, “can you at least reincarnate the dead bodies downstairs? I would totally owe you one.”

“We are not of the Fae-realm. We do not bargain in favours.” He drawled.

Too bad. “Then I’m gonna head off. I’ve got places to be, you know, people to eat.” Slowly, without letting them out of my sight, I tried to inch toward the door.

“I’m afraid I can’t allow that Andy.” His voice became distorted, crackling from afar. “Or, should I just call you... Dragon?”

A sharp intake of breath masked my internal flinch. For a few seconds, I forgot to let it out; the word embedded itself into my bones. There was no point denying it. “Actually, I would just prefer Celandine.” I sounded a lot clearer than I was expecting in contrast to the alarms raging a crescendo inside my skull confines.

From around me, his laughter began to echo from every crevice, the popping and whining returning with a screeching chorus. The chill in the air plummeted into a frost, snow exploding from the rafters. All around the walls began to warp, their colours intertwining into smudged canvases.

My limbs immediately started to forget to comply, stiffening in the extreme frost. Greedily I drew in as much magic as possible, quickly converting the energy into heat. In a jagged circle, the small surrounding area began to sizzle, the flecks of snow melting into droplets.

From the distortions, hands in different states of decay pushed their way out into the current world. This time, I looked at the magic. As each body emerged from the portal, the corresponding energy in this world began to pull towards them. There was a balanced amount of sources; the colours weaving through the snow. Any magic that met with the newcomers then flowed straight back out as thick tendrils, straight towards David.

Unlimited magic sources.

Ha, told you so! Take that SPCC.

Any celebrations were quickly cut short as it dawned on me that whilst I may be able to stock a lot of power from the Fae realm, they were starting to look like they had a hell of a lot more. Fixating on the window I’d entered, I bent my knees ready to jump. The black power lines shifted. Instead of a slow languid pace they pulled taught.

From behind there was a hard series of bone cracks, and an unmistakable groan, sending the hair on my arms to stand ramrod straight. Squelches followed, with a low buzzing and the rancid smell of decay filled the room.

Window in sight, I jumped.

“Veoulsa.” Davids’s voice now overlapped the raspy calls of the Dybbuk as he uttered a summoning of magic. The black tendrils exploded, launching towards me with a series of decaying limbs as the emerging figures concentrated their efforts on fulfilling whatever David had commanded.

Caught mid-air without wings, it was impossible to change my trajectory. As the spread of magic began to enclose I exploded out flames in a rush of a magic-rich inferno, the enchanted fire intercepting the darkness in a flash of light so I could pass unaided.

A large shape bludgeoned into my side, sending me crashing back down to the ground. Throwing out my arms to break the fall, at the last moment I saw the awaiting hands that quickly their grip on my arms. Using my falling momentum the puppet pulled me straight into the waiting portal.

Falling into the realm of the Fae, was simply like stepping into another room, albeit full of angry pointy-eared folk. This was akin to how I imagined dust in a vacuum. For one it was the coldest place I’d ever been. In reflex, I gulped in oxygen; only to realise there was none to be had. Unsure of which way was up or down, the thick darkness held with a crushing pressure. The light of the opening portal was rapidly sealing closed.

Slapping a clawed hand against my captor I peeled them away with a sharp palm to their head, slashing out at everything and anything in reach. Fuelled by adrenaline I could no longer keep the human form in check. Beginning to fight the use of my misshaping limbs, I used the assailant as a pushing point to launch toward the slither of light before it was too late.

My fingertips brushed the seam, and then the whole realm seemed to realise I was there, and as a rush of the strength of rapids; rejected me.

Bursting back into the human realm the crisp air greeted half scales, and I greedily filled my lungs. Sprawled on my hands and knees every limb shook as I almost cried at the solid brickwork under my fingertips. The ground was wonderfully firm.

And oddly marked…

Scrambling to my feet it, was too late to escape the trap drawn into the floor.

“Sayirair!” Possessed David barked, and the rune burst into life.

My consciousness tried to claw far too quickly back into the land of the living, mostly fighting eyes that wanted to remain tightly closed as sore lungs struggled to recover from the bruising of being chucked into an airless realm. For a moment I was unsure where ‘here’ was, and that jolted my eyes groggily open to the harsh answers of reality. Upon observing my surroundings, the only course of action was to shut it back out by closing my eyes.

Quickly.

Maybe if I ignored it, it would go away.

Of course, the obvious problem with that logic was I seemed to have been restricted to where I could go. Suspended ankles first upside down, arms held prisoner splayed on either side of my body on a stone backing, the blood thumped in my ears as it pooled in my brain.

Furthermore, the burning agitation to simply bite off everyone’s head was unparalleled. I had been bested! Me! Celandine Doukas. More than the cut on my cheek, the pain in my head, the aches in my bones; the fact that I’d lost smarted the most. The crushing realisation of what happened made my stomach feel as if it were upside down.

That thought made me pause. Since I was already upside down, surely that meant my stomach felt the right way up? Wiggling each toe experimentally, the prick of pins and needles has slowly begun to creep in.

David was the last face I’d seen. A hiss escaped as the crawling of burning hatred rolled the span of my spine. Of all things, to have fallen into a dirty trap! It hadn’t even been a fair fight!

“Ah, Andy you have awoken.” The voice drawled. Having heard him speak a hundred times, the resistance to not glare was too great. I conceded to the urge and opened my eyes to survey the frosty surroundings. As he spoke, crawling hollow undertones of the creature possessing him intertwined with his voice, sending a tremor down my spine that didn’t stem from the chill.

Lo-and-behold, it was the man of the hour. The cloaked Sorcerer, the necromancer of the dead, David.

“David, I am officially handing in my notice.”

We were now in what appeared a huge cavern with sprawling ceilings, the recesses illuminated by soft candlelight. The church long gone. Wooden beams branched tall into the darkened canopy with netting hung strewn between them. Weights of loose brick rested suspended. Stacks of black chiselled rocks supported the lower areas around the edges, and frozen pools of liquid reflected the dim light.

The lack of breeze held the smell of decomposing bodies; strewn everywhere I looked. Some were standing, staring abandoned into the tunnels of darkness. Others were sprawled across the ground as if they were rubbish, and each of them rotted in a different state of decay. As I attempted to concentrate on the magic around the cavern, it became apparent that the flow ran into the corpses, before their mixed sources of power streamed into the man in front of me.

This was not my kind of party, and I would be taking my exit very quickly.

Taking a deep breath I inhaled, pushing magic into my chest ready to light the fire and burn these suckers to the ground. Only to feel it slip out of my grasp. I tried again, only to feel it infuriatingly sink away further. It was as if a greased sludge coated it. I could feel my magic slithering under my skin, clambering to try and find its way out. Still, I was unable to access it. The metal around my wrists grew hot and for the first time in my life, they burnt, my skin reacting to the heat. The breath I was holding gasped free in a rush.

David emitted an empty rattling sound as he began to laugh, the rumble devoid of the essence that made laughter joyful. The bodies around joined in unison but stopped mid-noise when he spoke.

“I have waited a lifetime for this moment.” He pushed his hood away from his face.

My brain thought one thing, but my mouth went ahead and acted on its own accord. Brain: I can’t access magic, this is bad. Try and find a way out. Mouth: “That’s a bit sad isn’t it?”

I wanted to blame it on the blood pooling inside my head, and as David’s grin eroded at my words I hastily skimmed for any means of escape. Neither my hands nor feet could budge an inch, and grasping my magic remained an elusive task.