An explosion shook the ground beneath them, and Fourteen’s smile turned cocky, making an impression on Cym’s mind he would keep for the rest of his life.
The word MINE resonated throughout his entire being, and Cym redoubled his effort to get out of the cage.
“Please don’t do that,” Fourteen called over his shoulder as he threw Cym’s uncle into the new people flooding through the door. “It’ll be easier for me to get you out of here if you haven’t collapsed from blood loss.”
Grant stayed on the floor where he’d been thrown, his head lolling at an impossible angle. Fourteen was still fighting the two young men who had dragged him in, and it looked like a badly choreographed movie scene. They tried to magically throw random items from around the room at him, apparently having missed the memo about Fourteen’s shield. As soon as the magically charged item got within a yard of Fourteen, it dropped to the floor, robbed of its momentum.
Fourteen would strike out at their shields and be slowed significantly. Apparently his armor could only do so much. Everywhere his shield collided with one of Cym’s cousin’s shields, the air would distort and time would appear to slow down.
As Cym contemplated how helpful having a nervous breakdown would be, Fourteen reached for the hem at the bottom of his jacket and appeared to tear something out of it. Cym saw a glint of metal in his hand as Fourteen made to strike one of Cym’s cousins.
Instead of slowing down this time, Fourteen’s hand punched through the shield and connected, tearing a line of flesh off the man’s face. Cym’s cousin screamed in terror—he was young enough that it was probably the first time he’d been wounded so badly in a fight. Fourteen allowed him to turn and flee from the room.
Several more explosions followed the first one, and all the Blaikes except Hester ran out of the room, glad for the excuse to leave the five mercenaries behind to stabilize the situation.
“This is getting out of control.” Hester was behind Cym, tying a rope to the crate, presumably to drag him out of the garage while still keeping a safe distance.
Cym did the only thing he could think of, he grabbed Hester’s arms tightly with both hands.
“Why, you little…” His monster-mother’s face began to twitch as Cym held on for dear life.
As the creature twisted and screamed in his hold, he felt his body begin to heat up and the pinkness inside him flowed into Hester, much like it had with Fourteen, only a hundred times stronger. He felt incandescent as the power poured through his body, scouring away everything in its path.
If he had been able to scream he would have, but his jaw had locked tight along with the rest of his body. At this point, he couldn’t have let go of Hester if he wanted to. No matter how much it burned, no matter how much his injured arm and hand complained, he was stuck tight. As the pink inferno grew to intolerable levels of pain, he realized he was about to burn to death. Hopefully, at the very least, he would take his grandmother with him.
Without warning, he felt himself detach from his body, drifting away from it until he hovered over the scene in the garage. He could still feel the magic roaring through him, but it felt distant and unimportant. Idly, he noted that his body hadn’t actually caught on fire.
Wild.
He looked down at the woman trapped by his corporal body and felt the world around him change. The garage had vanished, and in its place was a cemetery on a hill overlooking a smog-covered city. What should have been a breathtaking sunset was almost completely drowned out by the smoke coming from the city below.
A horse whickered behind him quietly, and he turned to see an ornate carriage draped in black bunting coming to a stop several yards away. The driver of the carriage hopped down from his perch and opened the door of the carriage after letting down the steps. A woman, dressed in black from head to toe, held out a hand and allowed the driver to help her down.
“Leave me.” Her voice was cold and imperious as she ordered the driver away.
He hesitated, worried about leaving a lady alone in a cemetery at night.
“Go!”
His lady’s sharp rebuke was enough to convince him. Nodding once, he said, “As you wish, mum.” Tugging his hat, he climbed back up on his perch and drove the carriage away.
Cym couldn’t see the woman’s face under the heavy veil she wore, but something about the way she moved was familiar.
As soon as the carriage was out of sight, the woman strode over to a large stone structure, stalked up the stairs, and with a sharp gesture, sent the heavy doors flying open.
Cym followed her inside, curious.
A second gesture caused the lanterns on the walls inside the mausoleum to burst into flames. For a time, the woman stood in the center of the room silently. Slowly her shoulders began to shake. At first, Cym thought she was crying, until a loud peal of laughter rang out from the woman’s small frame.
“I finally did it.” Her voice was raw with triumph. “I beat you, you bastards.” Her laughter grew wild and unhinged, continuing far longer than any sane person would.
“You know, you weren’t what I was expecting.” A harsh, confident voice spoke from a corner of the room, halting the woman’s bout of mania in its tracks. “Not at all.” In the darkness, a pustulant, oozing wrongness radiated outward, filling the room. Cym recognized it as the same nightmare that had set up shop inside his mother’s body in the present day.
The woman held out both hands, crackling with red fire. “I’m a match for you, nightmare. Go find someone smaller to feed on.”
Laughter rolled out from the dark corner, slow and rumbling. It was a tangible thing that crawled over Cym’s skin, leaving him feeling like he needed a bath.
“My sentiments exactly, my dear.” Part of the shadow in the corner broke away, writhing and undulating toward the woman, growing brighter until it was the shade and consistency of bread mold. It stopped at a respectful distance. “I’ve been watching you, Hester. You lost much of your family in the revolt, so you should have been an easy meal for me. Nothing is more tempting, more delectable than the pain and guilt of a survivor. Imagine my surprise when there was little sustenance for me to feast upon.”
On hearing the name Hester, Cym realized he had somehow managed to recreate the effect he’d experienced with Fourteen when he’d stumbled into the memory of Fourteen’s past. Cym had been able to affect his surroundings there, so perhaps he could do the same here. He watched as his grandmother lowered her hands slightly, intrigued by the creature before her.
“What do you want, nightmare?”
“I want what all of my kind wants when they get to the Real, a chance to feed and grow strong without interference from the Guard.” The creature spat out the word Guard like an epithet. “I desire to do more than live on the edges of society, feeding only when I am so hungry that the danger of being unmade is worth the risk. I want away from this world. It tempts me with its bounty but denies me the ability to slake my hunger.”
“You want to go to the Demon Realm.” Hester circled the nightmare thoughtfully, the red fire from her hands leaving trails in her wake. “What’s stopping you?”
“It isn’t difficult to get there, it’s true, but I want more than to be a pawn or a snack for one of the lords there. When I enter the Demon Realm, I want to go there in style. I refuse to claw my way up, like the sniveling demonlings all nightmares become when they arrive. When I go there, I will go there to rule.”
“Draining me won’t get you the power you’re looking for, nightmare. And even if it did, you wouldn’t survive the encounter. I didn’t get this far to die by the likes of you.” The energy around Hester’s hands blazed brighter.
The creature gave off the impression it was smiling, and Cym’s guts felt like they were filled with worms. “Don’t waste your power, my dear. You mistake my intentions. I want a partner, one ruthless enough to destroy half of her family to get what she wants. One with a desire for power equal to my own and willing to do anything to get it.”
The power in Hester’s hands dimmed as she took in the nightmare’s words, showing only small lines of energy crackling around her knuckles. “Partner.” It was a whisper on her lips.
“Why settle for ruling one family when you could be the queen of an entire realm—one even the Guard fears to enter?” The disgusting shadow closed the distance between them, reaching out a fuzzy tendril, pale and rotting, to caress Hester’s face.
A wall of red fire sprang up between them before it could touch her. “How do I know this isn’t a trap? You could be lying to get me to let my shield down so you can possess me.”
