Kissed by Eternity (7 page)

I had no salt on me. That would banish a demon in a hurry. But I had something else. Carefully I pulled my amulet from where it always remained tucked beneath my shirt, close to my skin. I'd never used it to banish a demon before, but Eddie had told me the amulet, like my powers, was Atlantean in origin. Power was something a demon could understand. If it was a demon.

I stood, bracing my feet a couple feet apart. The stone in the center of the amulet was already glowing a soft blue, as it always did in the presence of Sidhe magic. I was still lightly channeling Earth, for all the good it was doing me. I reached down into myself and chose Fire. After all, that's where a demon returned to. I breathed in, breathed out, and pulled out the Fire. It ripped down my arms, a wild, living flame. Almost sentient. I burned with it, but it did not consume me. I felt nothing but warmth. This was my power, although it was the one over which I had least control.

Using the grounding influence of Earth and the wild hunger of Fire, I drew a ball of flame into my hand. The burning orb spun a few inches above my palm, the heat sizzling against my skin.

The stone in the Atlantean amulet now blazed like a blue sun, giving my flame a bluish tinge. Its power pulsed through me.

"Out of the way, boys," I shouted. They glanced at me. Haakon's eyes widened, and he quickly backed off. Inigo didn't move, just gave a dragon roar. Right. My Fire couldn't hurt him.

I flung the ball of Fire straight at the Minotaur demon. Clearly not as dumb as it looked, the beast whirled to the side. My fireball caught it in the backside instead of the head, but if the howl was anything to go by, I'd definitely caused it pain. A thick haze of smoke covered the creature's back, then it cleared. Holy hell, there was a gaping hole in its hide. I'd burned down to gleaming white bone. It stumbled sideways, falling on the uninjured side, though it still scrambled toward me, pulling itself along with its hands while dragging its rear. More smoke billowed from its nostrils.

I formed another fireball and lobbed it at the thing's head. It tried to duck, but it was too late. It let out a gods-awful shriek, and then the courtyard fell unnaturally silent. The beast was nothing more than a smoking ruin. I stared at it, trying to wrap my head around what I'd just done.

Inigo flapped down to the courtyard, landing with the screech of talons on stone. A shimmer of blue, and he was back in human form. Haakon kept his blades at the ready, eyes narrow, focused on the remains of the demon Minotaur, but the creature didn't move.

"What the Hel was that?"

I shrugged. "Demon of some kind, I think."

"In the Otherworld?" Inigo frowned. "I didn't think they could survive long here."

I hadn't realized he knew so much about the realm of the Sidhe. "No clue. All I know is it's here, and it's dead. Let's go find Alister." And my bet was that someone had brought it here just for us. Lucky us. The others nodded, and we crossed the courtyard and entered the palace.

Things had changed since my last visit. The halls had twisted and warped, resembling a fun house at a carnival. The marble, once black shot with gold, was simply flat black and oozing the same muck as the walls outside. Everything stank, the stench intensifying the deeper we traveled into the castle. Rot had set into fairy land. But why? Was it because Alister was here? Surely not. He was only human, after all. Doubtful he could affect the Otherworld in such a way.

"It's her," Inigo whispered. "The Queen." I noticed he didn't speak her name out loud. Wise man. "She's turned bad, and it's effecting all of faerie."

Haakon nodded. "It happened once, long ago. When her father was still on the throne. They say he went bad. Nearly took the Kingdom with him."

"Crap. And now it's happening again." Why wasn't I surprised? Oh, yeah: because Morgana had lost her ever lovin' mind and started a war with the djinn. "Well, we're not here to fix the Otherworld. We're here to find Alister and get back the grimoire."

"This would go faster if we spread out," Haakon suggested.

"Said the first guy to die in every horror movie ever made," Inigo mumbled.

I rolled my eyes. "This isn't a horror movie. And he's right. The palace is huge. We'll cover more ground this way."

"I'm not leaving you, Morgan," Inigo said firmly. "Not again."

It was no time for my heart to get all squidgy on me. "Fine. Inigo and I will take the south side of the castle. You take north," I told Haakon.

He gave me a snappy salute. "Yes, ma'am."

# # #

The wide corridors echoed with our footsteps, magnifying them until the sound made my ears ache. With every step deeper into the twisting heart of Morgana's castle, I felt eyes on us, watching our every move. I swore I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, but when I turned to look, there was nothing there. I would have sent out my Darkness, but I was afraid of what would happen in such an evil place. What if the Darkness liked it too much, and I lost control for good? A sick feeling roiled in the pit of my stomach. I hadn't felt this way at all the last time I'd been to the Otherworld.

"You sure are jumpy," Inigo said, his voice low. He never took his eyes off the hallway, scanning every nook and cranny for enemies.

"Aren't you? This place gives me the creeps."

His eyes darted to and fro, taking in everything around him. "There's nothing here. Nothing alive."

"Surely you can't sense the whole castle."

"No, but I can sense everything near us, and there is no one watching us. No one following us. We're alone."

Alone. Now there was a word to send shivers down your spine. If only we weren't rambling around a castle in the middle of the Otherworld. A castle whose owner had my name on her hit list. Not that she wanted to kill me, exactly. She would rather use me. And kill everyone I loved. Not my idea of a BFF.

"I swear someone's watching us."

"If there is someone, I can't sense them."

Freaking fantastic.

The long corridor had only a single door at one end. No other doors or windows. No staircases. Nothing. Just endless black walls oozing stinky goop. It seemed like hours before we reached that door, but it was probably only a couple minutes. At last we reached it and I pushed it open. It led into another corridor, but this one was lined with high windows on one side overlooking the violent river beneath. The other side was more blank wall.

"This isn't right," Inigo murmured.

"What do you mean?"

"The route we took should have led us back to the entrance of the castle. It's like the corridors have rerouted themselves."

"This isn't an episode of your favorite sci-fi show," I said. "Not a blue box in sight. Corridors just don't reroute themselves. There are laws of physics, you know."

He shook his head. "This is the Otherworld, remember? They've got their own laws, and they've nothing to do with our version of physics."

Damn Morgana. This was her doing. "Let's try going back the way we came."

But the door we'd come through was gone. "Up to her old tricks, I see," Inigo muttered. "Now what?"

"Why don't we fly?"

He eyed the windows. "I won't be able to fit through in dragon form. I'll have to jump out human and change mid-flight."

I felt a little sick at the thought. "Holy shit. You can do that?"

He gave me a nonchalant shrug. "It's a dragon thing."

I snorted. "Please don't kill yourself. I only just got you back." When in doubt, pretend everything's cool.

"I have no intention of dying," he said huskily. "I've got too many plans." He leaned forward and gave me a quick, hard kiss. "Bust out the window, love."

I nodded and pulled my gun from the waistband of my jeans. Using the butt, I smashed it hard against the window. The glass cracked but didn't break. Another couple of good smacks, and it shattered to bits. The tiny pieces of glass fell to the stone floor, glinting like diamonds in the weak sun.

"Here goes nothing." Inigo climbed up onto the windowsill and then stepped off like he was going for a stroll. Heart in my mouth, I rushed to the opening and looked down. There was no sign of him. Then I heard a triumphant howl.

Glancing up, I saw Inigo silhouetted against the greenish sky. He swooped and dove through the air, happy to be flying.

"Down here, you big lug," I shouted. I couldn't help the grin plastered across my face.

With another bellow, he dove toward the open window, pulling up a split second before he smacked his face into the side of the castle. Flying beneath the window, he hovered in place. I carefully lowered myself onto his back, grabbing onto the fold behind his neck with all my might.

Easy, love, you're going to strain something.
His voice in my head was amused. How long had it been since we had been able to mind speak? My heart gave a painful lurch.

Shut up and fly, dragon boy.

Inigo dropped like a stone. My heart flew into my throat, and I let out an embarrassing squeal. Then he zoomed up high into the sky until the castle shrank to the size of a dollhouse behind us.

Show off.

I swear I heard him laughing in my head. He wheeled and began a leisurely flight toward the castle. I glanced below. All around lay wide green fields and thick forests, wide rivers and small lakes. Only instead of gleaming blue like water should, it was brown and brackish.

Wheeling again, Inigo swooped down over the castle. He circled it once.

Do you sense Alister?

Inigo waggled his big head back and forth in the negative. Damn. I hadn't seen any sign of Alister either. Inigo slowed as he spiraled toward the courtyard, landing with a slight jar. I tumbled off him onto the pavers as Haakon exited the building.

"Any sign?" he asked, not even blinking at the sight of me flying a dragon. Or more accurately, me falling off a dragon.

"Negative. We even circled the building from above. Inigo sensed nothing."

Inigo shimmered back to human form. "There's no sign he was ever here. The only humans I smell are the two of you."

I started to argue for three, but realized what I was saying. Inigo was only half-human, after all. "This was a trap. Morgana set up some dipshit fairy to lead us here, then placed that demon Minotaur thing to kill us." I ignored their flinches at the mention of the bitch queen's name.

"Didn't do much of a job." Haakon didn't relax, swords at the ready.

"Maybe she only expected me to come."

"Even so, she knew you could kill that thing," Inigo pointed out.

"Exactly. But she wants me alive so…not a trap so much as a distraction. But from what?"

"The war?" Haakon suggested.

"But she knows I won't involve myself, regardless of what she wants. Keeping me away from the battlefield accomplishes nothing."

"Unless she's got something else nasty up her sleeve," Inigo pointed out.

He'd made a good point. "Whatever. The beast is dead, and there's no sign of Alister or that damn grimoire. It's time to go home." And figure out what Morgana was up to.

"Can you open the portal from here?" Inigo asked.

I shrugged. "No idea. The last time I didn't need to create one from scratch. It was already open."

"So you have no idea if you can get us back," Haakon said. Well, it was more of a snap, but I didn't want to be uncharitable.

"Don't panic yet. Give me a moment."

I called the Earth power, pulling it out to shimmer along my body. I coiled it into my hands, imagining it forming a ball much like my fireballs. It spun in my hands, an orb of glowing green. I focused as hard as I could, picturing it turning into a portal. Nothing. The orb spun in lazy circles, waiting.

I reached deeper into my power, trying to connect it to that of the Otherworld. I visualized the power surging through me, connecting to the orb, creating a portal. Sweat popped out on my forehead, but otherwise, nothing happened.

Taking another breath, I tried again. And again. I called on my power until I was shaking with exhaustion and dark spots danced in front of my eyes.

"Look. Something's happening," Inigo shouted.

The orb had risen about two feet above my hands and turned more silver than green. It flattened out into a disc which stretched and twisted in midair before finally
poof
ing out of existence. I stared at the empty space and felt like I was about to cry.

"Try again," Haakon urged.

"I can't." I said, swiping my hair out of my face. "I'm just not strong enough."

We were trapped.

Chapter 9

"What do you mean, 'we're trapped?'" The look on Haakon's face was definitely not one of giddy joy. "Trapped, as in we can't leave the castle trapped? Or trapped, as in we're stuck in the Otherworld for the next thousand years trapped?"

"Kind of the latter," I admitted.

"You said," he practically hissed in my face, "you could reopen the portal."

Boy, he was pissed. I couldn't say I blamed him. I had claimed I could open the portal. I'd more or less done it once before. Sort of.

"Listen, this isn't some magic wish thing. Wave my wand and voilagrave;, portal!" I snapped back. "I'm doing the best I can."

"Well, your best isn't good enough," he snarled.

"Children," Inigo interrupted calmly. "Might we argue about this elsewhere? As Morgan pointed out earlier, this castle gives me the creeps."

Haakon glanced around the place like another demon might pop out and drag him to a Hel dimension or something. "Fine," he reluctantly agreed. "Let's get out of here. But we need a plan."

Inigo looked to me. "Morgan? You're the only one of us who's been here before."

I sighed. "I guess we go back to where Emory's portal opened. Maybe there's, I don't know, some residual energy left, and I can reopen that one."

"Why didn't we do that in the first place?' Haakon grumped.

"Because," I said, "it's faster to open a new one. Or it would be if I could have opened it," I admitted.

He snorted.

"Don't be an ass," I snapped. "The point is that theoretically you should be able to open a portal anywhere. Especially one to the Otherworld. They have a tendency to roam around. I should have been able to activate one right here with no problem." I shrugged. "But clearly that isn't happening."