Oblivion Heart (Darkling Mage 4)

“Fuck you,” Mona spat. “Fuck you and your Lorica.”

“Now, now, siren. That’s going too far. We said that we’d let you go if you spilled everything.” Royce held out one hand, then clenched it, his knuckles cracking. “But you didn’t. You claim not to know the spell that killed all those normals. And in the end, we still don’t have a name for this alleged perpetrator. The voice in your head.” Royce grinned. “Maybe I shouldn’t have used such a light touch.”

Mona shuddered.

He brought two fingers to his temple, speaking into some invisible device. “Note to self. Allow PR department to demonstrate creativity when extracting information from detainees. Foster innovation and reward initiative.” He smiled again. “See? I’m managing.”

I grimaced. “The other Mouths? It’s not enough that you personally corrupt your prisoners the way you do?”

Royce raised his hands. “Harsh words coming from someone who couldn’t even pull off an infiltration. You never stood a chance, Graves. You only made it this far because we let you.”

I really, really shouldn’t have underestimated them.

“Last time you’ll ever underestimate us,” Royce said.

Damn it. He was seeing the inside of my mind, or maybe it was one of those cold reading tricks. I sincerely hoped it was the latter, because at least then I’d have a fighting chance of pulling off my next move.

Royce pulled back the sleeve of his coat, peering at his wristwatch. “The Hands should be on their way.” He spread his arms. “You’re welcome to try and run. Both of you. We’ll just catch you again.”

The air streamed out of my lungs, like the oxygen had been sucked into the swirling vortex of heat building in my palm.

“Catch this, asshole.”

I lobbed the fireball directly at Royce’s chest, expecting him to feint left – clearing a path for Mona and I to run through. I tugged on her even as the searing ball of flame left my hands, as it soared, crackling and sputtering. Mona gasped as she dashed after me, a noise that I echoed when, instead of feinting, Royce disappeared completely.

“Wing,” I muttered to myself. “Damn it. Come on, Mona.”

I pulled her along, keeping to plan A, sprinting towards the same corridor where the entrance crystal was. Watchers whirred, clicked, then shrieked into life as their piercing stares followed us down the halls, turning the inside of the Prism an impossibly more alarming shade of red, sending a steady siren sounding out through the crystal. A pounding began in response – a loud, increasingly desperate thumping from the exterior wall, from the occupied prison cells of the red sector.

The huge creature imprisoned in that one cell had finally struck so hard that the wall had cracked. I looked over my shoulder, panic rising in my throat. Wrong move. The wrongest in the history of wrong moves. Mona tugged against me, resisting as she shouted in warning.

I looked where she was pointing – down the very corridor we were running – but looking behind me had given Royce the precious few seconds he needed to teleport right into our path and deliver a savage punch to my chest.

I crumpled to the floor, rolling away from Royce, wheezing and heaving, scowling at the horrible, dull pain in my chest, at the agony of taking in every breath. Royce hadn’t just teleported in. He’d used his magic to deliver velocity behind his punch. It was like being hit by a truck. He’d knocked me out of the way, enough to give himself an opening to reach for Mona.

“Get away from me,” she shouted, her feet slipping against the slick crystal floor. It only gave Royce even more of an advantage.

I couldn’t let him grab her. That was all it would take for him to teleport her somewhere out of my reach. No time to form another fireball either, so I did the next best thing. I opened my backpack.

Vanitas flew screaming out of the pocket dimension, sword and scabbard bursting apart in a furious screech of metal. Mona threw herself to the ground, her hands clasped across the back of her head, keeping herself low. Good move. She knew to protect herself. I watched, scrambling back to my feet, as Vanitas’s two halves zoomed unerringly for Royce’s body. He snapped his fingers, then disappeared again. Vanitas zinged through thin air.

And the wind left my body again when a foot appeared out of nowhere, kicking into my stomach. I collapsed to the ground, doubled over, retching. My palms pushed into cold crystal, my ears pounding with the low, polite, horrible siren of the Prism, my chest and my insides burning with pain. Fuck, but how much more punishment could I take?

Somewhere above me Royce chuckled. “That sword’s in your dossier, too. Interesting, isn’t it, how we know all this? It’s how the Lorica keeps tabs on you.”

I grunted when a huge, strong hand pulled me up by my hair, when Royce forced me to look him in the face. The taste of metal spread across my tongue. Maybe I’d bitten it, or even my lip during one of the multiple times he’d clobbered me.

“Interesting picture, isn’t it?” Royce said. “You, on your knees, like the good little Hound you once were. Once a dog, always a dog, eh?” He placed one huge palm against my forehead, and I quailed under his touch.

“V,” I thought, sending a silent, telepathic distress call to Vanitas. “Help.”

As one unit, sword and scabbard came zipping back down the corridor.

“Ah,” Royce said. “Is that how you control the sword, then? With your mind? I wonder what would happen if I made some – adjustments.”

A voice pulsed somewhere deep in my brain, in the same place where I went to speak to Vanitas. It was Royce. He was murmuring something, but I couldn’t tell whether his words went through my ear or directly into my head. I couldn’t understand what he was saying, either. Somewhere down the corridor I heard metal clattering against crystal as Vanitas fell to the ground.

“No,” I muttered. “What have you done?”