Darklands

Page 5

 

  “Oh, Hades,” Juliet said when she saw him. “That’s what you bring me? He doesn’t look like he’s got a full pint in him. Where do you find these norms?”

  The grim-faced Goons stepped into the apartment.

  The guy’s eyeballs bulged when he saw Juliet reclining on the sofa. His Adam’s apple bobbed. “You’re the vampire? Wow. ” He rushed inside, already unbuttoning his shirt. Then he paused. “Um, I’m sorry, but you’re wrong. ”

  Juliet looked at him like he was a bug she’d enjoy squashing under her stiletto.

  The Goons flanked the door, arms folded, and stared straight ahead.

  “My name,” the scrawny guy said, baring a chest that made me think of those novelty rubber chickens. “It’s not Norm. It’s Marvin. ” He rotated his hips in a circle, then winked. “At your service, baby. ”

  Juliet rolled her eyes, but her fangs extended.

  I fled into the kitchen. Before the door swung shut behind me, chicken-chested Marvin gurgled out an ecstatic moan. Eww. Maybe I wasn’t so hungry after all.

  3

  A BOOK LAY ON THE KITCHEN TABLE, EXACTLY WHERE I’D LEFT it hours ago. Its pale leather cover looked cadaverous under the fluorescent lights. No wonder—the book was bound in human skin. I walked by, trying to ignore the waves of malevolence that radiated from it, and went to the freezer. Nothing like a pint of chocolate ice cream to help you cope with a demonic book written in the language of Hell.

  I got a spoon and sat down at the table. I pried the lid off the pint and dug in. Rich, sweet chocolate melted on my tongue as I eyed the book. I didn’t want to open it. But I wanted even less to keep picturing Simone Landry sniffing around Kane. Juliet was right, damn it—Simone was after my boyfriend. I needed to see him, talk to him. Until I could do that, anything was better than thinking about Simone. Even trying to read this damned book.

  The Book of Utter Darkness and I had a long and unpleasant history. Its pages contained both the history of the demon races and prophecies about how the centuries-long conflict between demons and humans would end. My race, the Cerddorion, was presented as the main obstacle that stood between demons and their goal of taking over the Ordinary, the humans’ world. Mab had stolen the book from the demons. During the years I was her apprentice, she’d forbidden me to even look at it. Ten years ago, when I was eighteen and near the end of my training—and thought I knew everything—I’d broken the rule and taken the book from its shelf in Mab’s library. The result: I’d accidentally conjured a Hellion. Difethwr, the Destroyer. The demon that killed my father.

  On that terrible night, the Destroyer had marked me, creating a bond between us. For years, the demon mark on my right forearm had subjected me to intense rages that I struggled to control. Two months ago, I’d killed the Destroyer. Although my arm still bore the mark—a bright-red scar two inches long that resembled a burn—the rages had died with the Destroyer. For the first time in more than ten years, I finally felt like myself.

  After my father died, I’d vowed never to touch the book again. But the book wasn’t done with me. When a demonic force started feeding on Deadtown’s zombies, reducing them to puddles of black goo, Mab summoned me to her home in Wales, saying it was time to continue my training. What I hadn’t counted on was that my training would involve studying this book—or trying to. The Book of Utter Darkness was written in an ancient, demonic language I didn’t understand. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the book tried to trick anyone who attempted to read it. It was almost like a living being—one that hated me and would do everything in its power to defeat me.

  At Mab’s insistence, I’d brought the book back from Wales. I would love to burn the thing, but Mab wouldn’t let me. “There’s much the book has not yet revealed, child,” she’d said. “You must keep going. ”

  So every once in a while, I forced myself to do what I was doing now. Taking another spoonful of cold, creamy chocolate for courage, I opened the book to a random page. It didn’t matter where I started. The book would share its contents with me only when it decided to do so. And anyway, the contents moved around inside its pages. A page showing an illustration today could be a solid block of text tomorrow, or vice versa.

  Just thinking about The Book of Utter Darkness made my head ache. Trying to read it was infinitely worse.

  I stared at the page, a jumble of unfamiliar characters, waiting to see if its meaning appeared in my head. The letters blurred. Nothing. The pages went double as my eyes crossed. I blinked and scooped out more ice cream.

  As I lifted the spoon to my mouth, a glob of ice cream fell and splatted on the page. Crap. I jumped up to grab a paper towel. Mab would be beyond annoyed if she knew I was dropping dairy products on her ancient, unique manuscript.

  I dabbed at the blob. A surge of power shot from the book and up my arm, buzzing through my demon mark and hitting my brain like a bolt of lightning. A white flash exploded behind my eyes, and scenes sped through my mind like a movie played on a super-fast projector.

  First, a man’s face in close-up: pale skin; a long, straight nose; and black lashes framing eyes so dark they seemed to dim the light. Pryce, my demi-demon “cousin” who wanted to lead demons from their realm to overrun the human plane. His mouth moved, but he made no sound—my ears were filled with a roaring like hurricane-strength winds. Pryce sneered at someone. The scene shifted and I saw that “someone” was me. We stood in a cemetery. I recognized the place—it was in Boston, on the night of last February’s Paranormal Appreciation Day concert. The night Pryce had tried to release the demonic essence that would make demons too strong for humans to withstand.

  Then Pryce’s eyes closed, and he collapsed on the ground. The vision switched to me, driving my flaming sword over and over into the body of a huge, writhing demon. God, I was bloody. I was killing Cysgod, Pryce’s shadow demon. Without his demon half, Pryce became nothing more than a living shell.

  Another scene, another face. This man looked like Pryce, but he was older, bearded, with a crazy gleam in his eye. He smiled, revealing rotted teeth, and a high-pitched giggle cut through the background roar. This was Myrddin, Pryce’s father. The Old Ones had released him from centuries-long imprisonment to make a deal—he’d help them gain eternal life, and they’d help him resuscitate Pryce. The vision showed Myrddin stooping over a freshly murdered human, capturing the departing life force in a jar. Suddenly, Myrddin was in some sort of lab, transferring the life force to the comatose Pryce.

  It had taken the life forces of five people to revive Pryce. The last had been Myrddin himself. I could see the moment now—me, bloody again, this time killing Myrddin’s shadow demon, as his mortal half gave his own life force to his son. Pryce sitting up, disoriented, then cocking his head as though listening to an inner voice. He ran away before I could stop him.

  The vision ended as abruptly as it began. I blinked, trying to figure out where I was. Kitchen. There was the table—I was looking up at it. I sprawled on the cold floor, clutching a chocolate-smeared paper towel. I got to my feet, stiff and sore all over, and looked at the open book. Not a speck of ice cream on it.

  I closed the cover. I tossed the paper towel in the trash. Then I put the lid back on the ice cream container and returned it to the freezer. Why is it that ice cream starts off looking like the solution to a problem and ends up feeling like nothing more than a big, queasy lump in your stomach?

  The book hadn’t shown me anything I didn’t already know. I’d killed Pryce’s shadow demon, rendering Pryce catatonic until Myrddin stole four people’s life forces—then added his own—to bring him back. Pryce was walking and talking, out there somewhere, but without his shadow demon. Why couldn’t the book show me something useful, like where he was now or what he was planning?

  I picked up the book and dropped it in the trash. I stood over it for a full minute, admiring the way it looked there—so natural, so right. Then, with a sigh, I took i
t out again. The book seemed to quiver with indignation as I lifted it from the trash can and stashed it at the back of a cupboard. Mab said it was important for me to keep working with the book, so I would. But otherwise, I didn’t have to look at it. As I shut the cupboard door, the kitchen light brightened.

  I’d report my experience to Mab the next time we spoke. (Well, maybe I’d leave out the part about spilling chocolate ice cream on the book. No harm done, no need to tell her, right?) But this was the third time in a week the book had rehashed recent events—although the most dramatic in its presentation. The previous two times, Mab had simply said, “Keep trying, child. ” I was sure she’d say it this time, too. In fact, she wouldn’t be happy that I’d hidden the book away. I sighed again as I retrieved the book from the cupboard and returned it to the table. Face down. I knew I’d have to go back to it, but I was done with the book for tonight.

  Now what? I cracked open the kitchen door. Voices came from the living room, a trill of Juliet’s laughter. Huh. Maybe she and Marvin were hitting it off. Not that I wanted to join their party. I got myself a glass of water and wandered back to the kitchen table. Still not ready to think about Simone. Instead, I flipped the pages of a two-day-old copy of News of the Dead, Deadtown’s cheesy tabloid. Even the monsters need a good gossip rag.

  Not thinking about Simone. Flip. How dare she put her hand on Kane’s leg? Flip. And on television, for all of Boston to see. Flip. It was like she was staking her claim to him. Flip. Not thinking about Simone. Flip. Was I remembering wrong, or had he caught her eye and smiled once? The page ripped in my hand.

  I stared at the torn piece, part of a full-page ad for designer coffins for any décor. I didn’t remember seeing it, didn’t remember seeing any of the previous pages. My eyes had skimmed over half the paper without taking in a word. I pushed News of the Dead aside.

  No use making myself crazy over Simone. Just because she wanted Kane didn’t mean he wanted her. We were all adults. I’d reserve judgment until I could talk to him. And then I’d yank a big handful of that gleaming chestnut hair right out of Simone’s scalp.