33. Lexa

Chapter 33

Lexa

I fought Sava's surprising strength as we abandoned Arim to fight Sin Garu and those demons alone. Cursing and struggling, I knew a fear I'd felt only once before in my life. Arim was alone. Without me, he'd fall as surely as my Light Bringer family had died. Bloodied at the hands of evil.

When we settled down into a dark room with rock walls and a stone floor, filled with the stench of death, I ripped away from Sava and readied to return but found myself unable.

"Not yet, Lexa. We're here for a reason."

"What did you do?" Black fear fed the rage growing like a disease inside me. I fed the emotion, growing powerful as I watched Sava with an unblinking stare. Worry strengthened me, and I couldn't stop the panic.

Seeing Arim lunge between me and that demon blast reminded me of the pain all over again. The bite of demon flame from my previous altercation with Sin Garu had been soul-crushing. And now I knew my lover felt it. A wound he wouldn't have felt if he hadn't been so hell-bent on saving me .

Why had he done that? The stupid, foolish, loving idiot. If he died before I returned to him, I was going to follow him into the Next and berate him for the rest of his life…after death.

"Look, Lexa. We're never going to defeat Sin Garu with all those demons, not when they're feeding on Tanselm's energy. We have to stop them in order to save Tanselm."

What Sava said made sense, but I still socked him in the gut, pleased when he doubled over in pain. "Fine. But you didn't have to drag me here to do it. Someone needs to save Arim from himself. That overprotective lout." Nerves jumbled, and the thought that even as we argued, he might be dying killed me inside. "Do your thing while I go back."

"Not yet." Sava coughed and grabbed my fist. "I left Arim some protection, but we have to make this fast."

I had to believe Arim would still be there when I returned to kick his Light Bringer ass. "Fine. Let's hurry though." I took two steps into darkness and stopped. "Where are we?"

"In Orfel. This is where Sin Garu planted the foundation for the demon bridge. I was going to destroy it, with your help, of course. Then Arim reminded me we can't, not yet."

"Why not?" I glanced around. My vision immediately adjusted to filter the slim bands of light from the clinging darkness of the place. The Dark Lord in me reveled in the negative energy all around, even as the woman within forced myself not to gag at the reality of decay holding fast to the air I breathed. I saw nothing more than black and gray rock on the floors and ceiling. There were a few visible walls, but mostly, the Darkness of the space bled out into the vague empty/fullness of the Between.

I narrowed my gaze. "There." I pointed, glad I'd come with Sava, a Shadow dweller who could see in the dark as well as I could. Arim would have been as blind as a bat.

"I know. I've been here before."

"What are you talking about?"

"While you and Arim were getting reacquainted in Seattle, having all those carnal relations, I was traipsing around the Between searching for Sin Garu. I found him here in Orfel, surrounded by eviscerated bodies. The stench in the next room is overpowering. And the sight… Let's just say this rivals some nightmares I've had for sheer brutality."

"Great." I didn't want to see what he was talking about, but we had to find and destroy that demon bridge to free Tanselm, so that the land might lend Arim essential energy. "Let's go." I took a few steps before he stopped me again. "Damn it, Sava, we don't have time for this."

"Make time." His implacable tone made me pause. "We can't destroy the bridge until you use it to get your soul back. Because once you're in, you'll need a way out. With so many of the demons up here powering Sin Garu, there will be less in Mount Malinta for you to deal with. Just hurry."

I stared at him in astonishment. How could I have forgotten? "My soul."

"Yes." Sava swore under his breath and pulled me toward a narrow corridor, barely visible despite my enhanced sight. Flaming torches illuminated the area but at long intervals. "Arim will have my head if we return without you intact, not that I could blame him. We need to move. I'll distract the enemy here while you use the bridge. And Lexa, I don't have to tell you that time is as much our enemy as the demons."

He looked worried, and my heart raced with trepidation. He was right. This would be my best shot at finding that part of my soul. But what about Arim?

"Lexa, now . I told you I left Arim protection, but it won't hold forever. Hurry up so we can get back to him."

I still wanted to crush Sava for tearing me from Arim, but this plan would help my Light Bringer. That didn't mean I had to like it.

I followed Sava through the corridors of this Dark retreat, uncaring about what or who might hear me. At this point, the demons would have to be both blind and deaf not to realize their sanctuary had been breached. Our arrival had been extremely loud.

"I can handle the Netharat. It's that demon flame that throws me." I suppressed a violent shiver, clearly recalling the last time that venomous green blaze had eaten at my flesh and spirit. As it was now doing to Arim.

"Leave the demons to me." Then Sava whispered and suddenly clutched a small black satchel in his hands. He opened it and removed what looked like a small gray rock from a pouch that promptly disappeared. "Trust me on this."

He closed his eyes and swallowed the stone. For a moment, silence surrounded us.

Sava opened his eyes. Their color had shifted from a warm brown to a cold, hard black. He nodded at me, and we moved swiftly toward a hazy spot that looked like an archway leading to another room, but I couldn't see through the sudden density before us. Once we breached what felt like an icy wind, demonic shrieks filled the air and echoed in the cavernous area now lit with an eerie, green glow.

I glanced at Sava to see what he made of it all. What lurked in his gaze froze me in fear. My friend, a man I'd known nearly my entire life, abruptly resembled the possessed, much like Sin Garu and his many demons. The Shadow in the Aellein king drained into a monstrosity far worse than Dark wraiths or evil Shadren.

"Use the ladder to get to the bridge," Sava commanded in a horrifying blend of pitches and echoes. He grabbed me by the arm and dragged me after him.

I instinctively sought protection, burning him with a Dark Lord's blue flame before I could stop myself. But it had no effect. Instead, the energy in Sava — the many souls pushing at one another for control — turned his pale, perfect skin a sickly green that began to blister and burn with something much worse than blue flame.

I forced myself to focus, to remember that Sava did what he had to in order to help us defeat Sin Garu. He wasn't setting me up to fail and hadn't separated me from my lover to kill us both, but to save the future for us all.

That in mind, I swallowed around the lump of fear in my throat — a fear I molded into a useable anger — and broke from his grip, flying right into the maw of the demon stronghold.

Though the demons reigned in Mount Malinta on my homeworld of Malern, to affect Tanselm the way they had, they would have had to move closer.

Orfel, situated in the Between, was an ingenious hideaway. A crossroads for those moving from magic to the mundane, or from Light to Dark, Orfel provided the perfect sanctuary for a Dark Lord bent on domination. Or a demon world wanting to control life itself.