Empyrean witch demigodde.., p.24
Empyrean Witch: Demigoddess Chronicles Book 1, page 24
“Do you know if Evan ever went there?” I asked. “Maybe as part of his research?”
Simone shook her head briskly. “None of us go there. We know better.” Seeing our confused expressions, she sighed. “I know this sounds crazy, but the Monacan tribes believed that part of the mountain range to be cursed. They spoke of a place called—” She froze, her eyes going wide. “Oh, my God.”
“What?” I said.
Simone spoke softly. “The Cave of Fates. That’s what they called it. How could we not have seen it?”
Beatrice glanced at me, then looked at Simone. “Tell us about this place. Why do people think it’s cursed?”
Simone shrugged. “All we know is that, as far back as records go, there have been stories of people going missing there. Back in the eighteen hundreds, the Hawking Company tried mining those foothills. Eventually, they abandoned the project after a series of mysterious deaths. News accounts told of miners found mauled to death, eviscerated, some with their organs missing.”
We exchanged a quick volley of eye contact.
Simone didn’t miss it, of course. “Look, I know what you’re thinking, but our elders claimed those weren’t werewolf attacks. On top of that, we’ve lost some of our own out there too over the years. We stopped going there.”
“For over a hundred years,” Beatrice said.
Simone nodded. “Werewolves are creatures of the earth. Like those native to these lands, we respect the limits imposed by nature. We decided that if there was something out there strong enough to kill us, we’d be fools to challenge that power. So, yes. We left those lands to whoever, or whatever, had laid claim to them.”
Silence fell over the room following her words. I wondered if we’d reached a dead end. If even half of what Simone said was true, this couldn’t be worth it. Something truly dark and dangerous had made those foothills its home. A force that generations of werewolves had avoided out of fear.
On the other hand, one of our mages was dead. Five people had died in that fire, both police officers and others who’d simply gone out to enjoy themselves. Phoenix was alive only by a miracle—and if it wasn’t for Kiaran, I’d almost certainly be dead too. And now yet another had died as Baphomet, Andastra and Nepheras kept searching for the talismans. With unexpected clarity, my dream flashed before my eyes. I saw streets engulfed in flames and bodies piled beside the roads. Was that apocalypse what this realm would face if the dark goddesses regained control?
In that moment, only one thing seemed clear. So, I looked around at the others. Then, for the second time today, I spoke the words I least wanted to say. “We need to go there.”
Chapter 27 - Julia
Beatrice opened a portal to get us to where Simone had said we should go. Simone herself didn't come with us. Possibly out of fear, but just as likely due to wisdom. After all, this was her pack’s land, where generations of werewolves had grown up knowing better than to go where nature told them not to tread. Only time would reveal whether hers was the wisest decision.
We stood at a point halfway up the mountain, all of us wearing boots, jeans and jackets for our hike. Before us stretched an overgrown path that must be a remnant of some ancient logging road.
“We should be close,” Beatrice said. “According to Simone, this path should take us toward the cave.”
“Comfortingly known as the Cave of Fates,” Cassie added.
“Can’t wait,” Autumn said. “But let’s get this done. Ian and I have dinner plans.”
“Good to have priorities,” Cassie muttered.
Autumn scowled. “Says the girl who went AWOL in Faerie just to get some.”
Cassie narrowed her eyes. “Hey, back off. That had nothing to do with—”
“Ladies,” Beatrice said with a sigh. “Try to focus.”
Things had happened so fast that it was only now that I got to ask the question that kept nagging at me. “If there really is something in those mines, why would anyone choose it as a place to hide a talisman?”
“A damned good question,” Cassie said.
“Maybe the whole cursed mountain thing is just some old made up story,” Autumn said.
“Could be,” Beatrice said, not at all convincingly.
I looked to Kiaran, who met my eyes just briefly. He glanced up at the mountain. “I guess we’ll find out.”
Clearly, he wasn’t buying the made up story part.
So, we started climbing, following the path that might have been meant for goats or horses, but definitely not humans. The angle was steep, the trail overgrown and rocky, making each step an effort. To make matters worse, we weren’t used to the altitude and the air was decidedly thinner. As I kept struggling along, huffing and puffing, I knew I wasn’t the only one to feel the effects. When we finally ascended to a ledge, Kiaran was the only one of us not breathing hard from the climb.
I sucked in air and said, “Now what?”
Beatrice took a deep breath too. “Well, Simone said to follow this ledge east.”
I couldn’t help but notice that she seemed to be holding up fine. Pretty damned impressive, given that she had to be in her sixties. Then again, I wasn’t sure how much age factored in for a woman who could open magical wormholes and pop around the globe like a gremlin. Something told me that, for her, the rules of nature might not always apply.
“East being which way?” Cassie said, half bent over and panting.
Autumn wiped sweat from her face. “Try looking at the sun,” she said. “Hint. It sets in the west.”
“God, you’re such an—”
“Ladies,” Beatrice said.
“Right, try to focus,” Cassie muttered. “How about I focus on punching my sister?”
We’re going to die, I thought.
Evidently, Kiaran either remained oblivious to their antics or found them annoying. It was hard to say, since he simply set off walking again.
“Or we could follow him,” Cassie said.
That being our new plan, we set off after Kiaran, presumably heading east. Thankfully, the angle was more forgiving as we followed the ridge around the outside of the mountain. We kept going for about half an hour, at which point Kiaran suddenly stopped and squinted. After a moment, he pointed toward a small dark opening in the rockface that was all but hidden by vines and brambles. It was hard to be sure but, at best, it looked to be three feet high and maybe two feet wide behind that curtain of foliage.
“This must be it,” he said.
Cassie frowned. “Doesn’t exactly live up to its name, does it?”
“Presumably, the cave is on the inside,” Autumn pointed out. “That’s just the entrance.”
“Thanks for the geology lesson, professor,” Cassie said. “If you ask me, it looks like the mountain’s butthole.”
Kiaran raised an eyebrow at that one. If nothing else, Cassie was impossible to ignore. Still, he reached up and drew back the vines. “Autumn’s right,” he said. “There’s enough room to get through.”
Fantastic. Let’s head right into the Cave of Fates and see how that goes.
One by one, we stepped through. Autumn entered last, letting the vines fall back across the entrance to leave us in a muted half-light. We walked just a few feet before even that light faded, darkness stretching ahead of us toward an inky void.
Cassie sighed. “Well, that was fast. Time to break out the human flashlight?”
Presumably, she meant me. I shot her a look, not sure whether to laugh or to smack her.
“Actually, never mind,” Cassie added. “I don’t really feel like going blind just yet.” She conjured an orb, letting it rise to cast a shimmering glow upon the stone surfaces around us.
Any comeback I’d been considering died on my lips as I took in our surroundings. We stood within a narrow passage of stone that appeared to lead toward only more of the same. Wherever the actual cave might be, it sure looked like we were going to have to work to get there. The feeling I got wasn’t great. Kind of like we were about to be swallowed.
Only a moment passed before Cassie said, “Well, in for a penny and all that.” She issued an easy gesture and sent her orb floating down the tunnel.
How was she always so casual? Then again, she was an old hand at facing danger. She’d battled vampires, demons and the Vamanec P’yrin. She’d escaped from a caliginous pit full of soul-sucking shades. Silly me. I’d spent my time in grad school. There I’d been thinking the scary part was going to be finishing school and trying to find a job. Hopefully one with benefits.
We followed that light as we started descending again, this time making our way down a gradual, gloomy slope, the stone floor beneath us at times smooth and at others littered with rubble. Eventually, we reached a point where the shaft was so narrow that we could only progress forward single file, following Cassie’s orb. I’d never thought of myself as being claustrophobic before, but as the rock wall pressed in upon us I decided differently. Definitely claustrophobic. No doubt about it. And it didn’t exactly help that my nostrils were now lined with dust. I wiped my nose on the back of my sleeve, not caring in the least. If we lived, I’d celebrate by having my jacket cleaned.
Finally, the tunnel banked left, and it looked to be getting wider again. Thanks to Cassie’s orb, I could see that the walls were nearly straight.
Autumn’s voice echoed in the semi-darkness. “This must be one of the mine shafts.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” Beatrice said. “They must have tunneled in from some other side.”
“Good thing we chose the butthole,” Cassie said.
Actually, she had a point, since I wondered if our journey so far could have been easier. But more importantly, it seemed like there must be at least one other way out. Then it occurred to me that the other opening might have been closed long ago. These weren’t exactly surroundings that inspired optimism. So, I went back to thinking about my sinuses. Isn’t that what Cassie would do? Think about the small things to keep from worrying about the big ones? If it worked for her, maybe it could work for me. Why had that never occurred to me before? Oh, I know. Because I never once considered doing shit anywhere near this stupid.
But, of course, thinking about my sinuses only made me wish for clean air and sunlight as we kept descending through the tunnel, one that seemed to stretch on forever. I wasn’t sure whether to take comfort from the splintered support beams overhead, or at soon seeing what appeared to be a broken shovel haft and the crumbling remains of what must have once been an iron cart. Were those forgotten tools a sign that at least some people had ventured in here and lived to tell the tale? Or had they been abandoned for some other reason altogether?
“I’m not getting anything,” Cassie said. “What about you?”
At first, I wasn’t sure what she meant. Then I realized she was talking to Autumn. Right, veil witches. If there was any supernatural energy down here, they’d be the first to find it.
“Just ghosts so far,” Autumn said.
“Yeah, I saw them too. How many did you count?”
“Eleven so far.”
“Crap, I only saw eight,” Cassie said.
Wait, seriously? They said it so casually. Then again, for those two, seeing ghosts was a commonplace occurrence. In fact, they had to make a conscious effort not to see them.
But hearing them reminded me that my psychic shield might be limiting my ability to sense what was around us. I lowered my defenses just a little, then regretted it immediately. Physical claustrophobia gave way to a different sense of things pressing in on me. Suffering. Fear. Sadness. Regret and despair. Those emotions permeated the space around us. Bad things had happened here. Very bad things. And quite a few of them.
“Shit!” Cassie cried out.
I stumbled, caught off guard, my heart hammering in my chest. I searched out Cassie’s face in the gloom. “What happened?”
“Dropped my damned phone. Do you see it?”
I stared at her, my eyes wide. “Why were you looking at your phone!”
“What’s it to you, nosy? Flick on your flashlight fingers and help me find the freaking thing.”
Thankfully, Autumn intervened. “Find your own phone, dipshit. Besides, did you really think you’d get a signal down here? Fucking Facebook addict.”
“Hey, I was wondering if I might have heard from Esras,” Cassie tried.
“Yeah, right,” Autumn said. “He lives in freaking Faerie. God.”
“Ladies,” Beatrice said.
Kiaran chuckled. Finally, they’d broken him. I supposed it would have happened sooner or later. Still, I’d expected more from a god.
Cassie fired up another orb, retrieved her phone, and then said, “Oh, crap! Check it out. Sorry, we probably would have walked right past that.”
By “that,” she meant the skeleton which lay beside a pile of rubble. Presumably, the remains of a man, based on the size of the thing. Gaping holes in the skull, which had once held eyes, seemed to still be searching upward, the mouth left gaping in a permanent grimace of pain.
Gruesome? Yes. But I still couldn’t help but feel a wave of pity. I spoke softly. “I wonder how he died.”
Cassie actually crouched down to look closer. “Maybe he got lost down here.”
“How?” Autumn said. “It’s nearly a straight shot back to the entrance.”
I looked more closely too, then pointed to where one of his femur bones lay in two pieces. “I think he broke his leg.”
“I think he broke both legs,” Cassie said.
“Not to mention both arms,” Beatrice added.
A cold chill rippled through me, one that had nothing to do with our dark and damp surroundings. Definitely not good. True, so far Cassie and Autumn had only picked up on ghosts. Still, maybe there was something down here they couldn’t pick up on. It wasn't like their magic was flawless. And if there was something down here strong enough to kill werewolves, I definitely didn’t want to meet it.
I looked around at the others. “Should we keep going?”
“We came this far,” Beatrice said.
Despite my doubts about her line of reasoning, we started moving again as Cassie lit up another orb. Soon, that light illuminated other openings in the mine shaft—jagged holes that didn’t look manmade. At the same time, they didn’t look natural. More like something had clawed its way through stone. Could anything be that powerful? I told myself no, but in the past I’d told myself that many things weren’t real. Over time, I’d come to know better.
We kept going, the shaft starting to curve as we continued our descent. None of us spoke now, and Cassie definitely wasn’t fiddling with her phone. A quick glance showed the tension on her face. And if Cassie looked nervous, that was saying something. Which did nothing to dispel my growing sense of trepidation.
Suddenly, Autumn stopped. “Wait. You guys. Did you hear something?”
In the same instant, I jerked my head back to look over my shoulder. Not that I could see anything behind us, but I’d definitely heard something too. “Like a slithering sound?”
“Right,” Autumn said. “Like something dragging its feet.”
“Did you hear something breathing?” Cassie said. “I thought I heard something breathing.”
“Maybe we’re just getting paranoid,” Autumn said.
“Maybe we fucking well should be,” Cassie said.
Once again, both Beatrice and Kiaran stayed out of it. They’d come here for answers and it appeared that they weren’t going to be dissuaded. They were right, I knew. As much as I wanted to turn back, it wasn’t really an option. We either found the talismans or people kept dying—way more people, if my dream had been anything close to a premonition.
We descended along another curve in the tunnel, and then yet another, as I started to wonder if it might never end, or if we’d just keep wandering around down here forever. And that, maybe someday, it would be our skeletons who some other group might discover. Then, suddenly, Cassie’s orb—which had been floating along before us the entire time—floated upward. And kept floating upward. We stopped as she lit a new orb, in the same moment that Autumn lit one of her own. The light of their magic spread to reveal that we stood in a vast chamber. High above, bats circled in a frenzy brought on by the sudden light.
Beatrice spoke softly. “This must be it.”
Kiaran kept his voice low too. “It must be. Now, let’s see what this place holds.”
With Cassie and Autumn controlling their orbs to light our way, the glow of their magic seemed insufficient now in such an immense space. I was about to add light of my own when a vision bloomed before my eyes. Suddenly, without warning, giving me no choice but to see what it wanted to show me.
The images came fast, a flickering psychic barrage. A creature, large and looming. I sensed its ancient danger. It knew hunger, only hunger. It was hunger. Its shadow twisted against the wall as it turned to the opening through which we’d just passed, where two pale blue eyes stared back from that void. Eyes that I knew to be those of a wolf. Time stood still for a frozen moment, then the wolf darted away, the creature issuing a bellowing roar and lunging forward to give chase.
Next, a woman appeared before my eyes in this same chamber. She was fair, with light red hair. Light bloomed at her hands as she walked with deliberate purpose. She reached the wall and looked up to where a row of stalactites jutted down like jagged teeth, one broken in half. Somehow, I knew that she was committing this spot to memory. Her lips moved as she uttered an incantation, then she thrust out her hands and light leapt forth to create a seam in the face of the stone. Into that seam, she placed an object wrapped in cloth. She stepped back and spoke the incantation again as her hands pulsed once more with glowing light. The seam closed, and with another sudden flare she vanished. The chamber stood empty again, as from the distance came the howl of a wolf that had just escaped capture.
I stood frozen, the images fading, but somehow knowing what they meant. That woman had been Claire Spencer. The wolf, her cousin, Theodore. He’d drawn the creature out while she’d hidden the talisman. But why would she have chosen a place known for such danger? No sooner had I asked myself that question than I knew the answer. Instinctively, with no doubt in my mind. She’d chosen this place entirely because of the danger. She’d known that only the right kind of magic could possibly prevail.
