Havoc of Souls Read online

  “Silvani,” Xavier snarled as he bristled.

  The silvani turned away, his eyes seeking Charu once again, and his lips pursed as if he were thinking intently. Suddenly, he nodded to himself, turned and stepped back into the shadows. He was leaving. He stopped in his tracks only when a soft voice called out to him.

  From behind Meredith, Apane burst forward, pushing through the crowd, and threw herself before the silvani, her arms outstretched. His cool gaze flicked to her and he lifted a pale hand to stop her in his tracks. He shook his head, his arching antlers dipping through the air with the severe gesture. The lasa’s face crumpled and she hung her head as she withdrew, disappearing into the crowd.

  The silvani flicked an ear and turned his back to the room as he slipped away, the shadows reclaiming him. To Meredith’s surprise, a number of other beings drew back and followed suit. They grumbled and shook their massive heads. Even the cyclops frowned worriedly and departed, pushing their way through the mass of creatures eagerly pressing forward.

  A tail slithered across the floor toward her feet and Meredith kicked it away. Something snarled and her eyes snapped around trying to locate the source of the sound. Whatever it was sounded big. In the end, she looked back at Charu, hoping whatever it was wouldn’t be inclined to try again. Lacth hadn’t even noticed the tail; he still seethed, staring off in the distance, his fair human façade wearing thin, but not to the point where she could clearly see the monster that lurked within him.

  Something had happened there, but Meredith wasn’t sure what.

  For once, Charu wasn’t staring at her, nor was he struggling against his bonds. His ears were tilted forward and he was staring at the spot where the silvani departed. His eyes wandered to the Kessler brothers. Meredith frowned and blinked.

  Were they closer to the cage than they’d been earlier? They were leaning against the wall like before, but she was certain they were several feet closer to Charu. She met Charu’s eyes. He smiled at her and brought his finger to his lips.

  Meredith turned to face the lauchume when Lacth snarled impatiently, his hair fluttering around him on a current of power that pulsed out of him. Any sign of his previous good humor was absent. He strode over to where Meredith sat and yanked her to her feet, his amethyst eyes burning into her.

  “It is time, my dear bride.” His head lifted and he shouted to the crowd. “Let those leave who are too cowardly to take a step into the future! This bride is mine, and this night is ours!”

  Without further ceremony, he caged her within his arms and picked her up, moving with her into the center of the circle. He didn’t release her once she was set on her feet. She pushed against his arms and chest to no avail. She looked down and sucked in her breath as the script encircling them began to glow. Three hooded creatures sat around the perimeter, their resonant voices rising and joining in a chant as the light spread, illuminating each and every line within the circle.

  In desperation, Meredith turned her face away and screamed, but any sound she made was muffled as Lacth’s lips descended upon hers.

  Chapter 30

  Charu’s fury at the humans cowering in the corner of the room knew no bounds. His mate was surrounded by denizens of Aites, creatures never suited to the light of the mortal world. Things of nightmares. Yet these buffoons were frozen in fear at the sight before them while Meredith was forced to sit and endure watching the preparation of the spell that would bond her to the lauchume for eternity.

  What had they expected?

  The swarm of Aites didn’t bother with niceties. They practically crawled over each other when they could, creeping around the chalked circle with long fingers, tentacles, claws, and flexible searching tongues. Each creature was high on magically stimulated euphoria, but it wasn’t enough. They were even more eager to lose themselves in the taste of the power. A myriad of mouths had opened into gaping sighs of pleasure in their frenzy.

  He understood the fear of the humans. They were sharing space with such things that would turn and devour them whole if they weren’t restrained by the rule of the lauchume. Even knowing that the wulkwos king insured Meredith’s safety at that moment, Charu raged against his inability to protect her. The inaction of the humans pushed his fury to new levels. His mate was vulnerable, and the males seemed frozen in fear at the sight before him. They were no different than any of the other humans in attendance as witnesses who cowered far from the swarm.

  The swarm wasn’t one unified species. It was a shorthand description for the denizens of the outer courts of Aites, the places were only souls who became lost on the path to their ancestral abodes would ever find. They served the darkest functions of purification in the deepest places of Aites. It was uncommon to ever see them come together in such unrestrained masses, but here they were united in their desires. The lauchume promised them the very thing that they’d desire: to be set free of Aites and rule Earth.

  They were restraining their most natural urges to seek out pain and death, to feed from the energies of such horrors. Creatures that breathed in the exhalations and cries of misery. For every suffering, there was a being who coveted it and were provided their purpose to strip the souls of their taint by their brutal means before the souls could return again to the void of rebirth. But those who became lost in their kingdoms suffered worse than any. They were not guided by the prayers of their kin. They were left, forgotten, until the creatures tired of them and could no longer draw sustenance from their beings.

  That was in Aites. The things they could do in this world to the human populations would be compounded misery. Life often included suffering. If the swarm lingered on earth with the wulkwos, life itself would become suffering. The wulkwos in comparison were the mildest of creatures, often affectionate toward the souls of the dead whom they followed on the roads of Aites, and even they became monsters in the mortal world.

  He had to snare the lauchume whose power opened this world to the rest of the swarm. This was what he’d been afraid of—that eventually the swarm would discover the damage in the barrier and begin to seep out. He’d never imagined something so organized. He’d underestimated the lauchume. The male was known to be vain and lazy, but he’d never realized how cunning he was as well.

  Charu strained against his chains, feeding every bit of his wrath into them. They glowed so brightly that the heat began to burn into his flesh. They strained as if on the verge of snapping, but they did not break. He roared as the lauchume looked upon him with satisfaction. Charu bared his fangs and leaned forward, the chains groaning. They might not budge, but the effect was satisfying. The lauchume paled, pushed up to his feet, and turned away to speak lofty words for the dominion he had planned.

  Charu sneered, imagining the most painful and terrible ways he could rip the male from his human host, when a movement near the Kessler males caught his attention. The ivory form of the silvani prince immediately snared his complete focus.

  What was a silvani doing here? The silvani, as a rule, though they enjoyed feasting upon the fears of those they terrorize chasing through their deep forests, did not belong to Aites nor did they align themselves to any of the beings of that world. The silvani, like the lasa, satyrs, and all manner of nature spirits, existed between worlds; though, the forests of the silvani extended well into Aites and into the mortal worlds, causing confusion among both the living and the dead.

  They were capricious, and just as dangerous as any number of fae, but they didn’t take pleasure in the death of things despite their fearsome appearance. Silvani were generally rare to see outside their forests. The silvani lucumo, the king of their kind, was rarer still.

  He narrowed his eyes as he watched the spirit slide near the Kessler males. The movement was so slight that he almost missed it when the silvani brushed past them. The elder brother recoiled as if in fear, but in that instant the barest glint of something passed between their hands. It happened fast and, as far as Charu could tell, unnoticed. Eyes watched the lucumo, aware of h
is presence, chafing that he was present where he did not belong, but the humans were inconsequential and thus ignored. As was the bit of magic that was delivered into their hands.

  The lucumo looked toward the lauchume before his pale eyes met Charu’s gaze. The smile was unexpected, as was the multitude of sharp teeth. Few saw the teeth of a silvani unless they were being hunted by one. It was not pleasant to look upon, but it reassured him, nonetheless. He had no idea who’d sent him or why the lucumo would deign to tend to the task himself, but the message was clear. Charu made a gesture of thanks and the silvani acknowledged it with a nod before turning away.

  The fervor of the lasa who broke free to throw herself at the feet of the silvani did not move Charu anymore than it appeared to touch the heart of the lucumo. The taint on the little spirit was clear to anyone of the spirit world. He wished he had chance to spy her before so he could have warned his mate away from confiding in her. Lasa, like the silvani, dwelled so close to the mortal world that prolonged exposure to Aites could sicken them.

  He could see the shadows crawling through her even before he heard her shrill ecstasy at the idea of being reunited with the mother of the lasa, the goddess Turan. If she hadn’t betrayed his mate, he could have found it within himself to pity her. She wouldn’t be reunited among her kindred, no matter what the wulkwos promised her. That the silvani lucumo refused her supplication said all that needed to be said.

  Her interruption served at least one purpose: it distracted the swarm as the Kessler males inched along the wall, the elder brother’s hand curled tight around the silvani’s gift. They moved painfully slow, and Charu’s impatience threatened to unravel again. He tamped it down, and ignored his desire to gore something with his horns, preferably the brothers to get them moving faster. Holding back a low growl, he turned his attention away from them and focused on a far better sight.

  His eyes tracked over to his mate and found her watching him. Her lips parted and her brow knitted in confusion. She understood that something was at work. He smiled and touched his finger to his lips, willing her to play along. Just for now, until he was freed.

  The repercussion of the silvani’s visit came swiftly. Charu had expected the lauchume to carry on with ceremonial speeches and preparations designed to enthrall the crowd to his power rather than serve a purpose in the spell itself. Unsettled by the visitor, the wulkwos flew into a frenzy of activity. Charu froze as the male wasted not a moment, scooping up Meredith and hauling her into the center of the chalked circle.

  Yanking against his chains, Charu’s bellow ripped forth as the chains flared, drowning out even the brilliant red glow from his lantern. It was not enough to save him from the sight of the spell beginning to light up around Meredith and the lauchume, sending vibrations into the cosmos. He saw his mate’s mouth open to scream seconds before his enemy lowered his lips and swallowed her cries with his kiss.

  The entire cage rattled as he threw himself forward, pain ripping through him as his being attempted to manifest wings, desperate to free himself. A voice ripped through his anguish enough to draw his attention.

  “Fuck, man, chill. We were given this thing and told to bring it to you.”

  The elder brother stumbled back a step when he turned the full power of his fury onto him. Malevolence rippled off him as he narrowed his eyes at the human.

  “Free. Me.”

  “Yeah, no sweat, man. Take it.”

  The male tossed the small glowing sphere and Charu raised his hand and caught it. The moment the sphere hit his hand, the magic ghosted into him in a wash of hues. It flashed through him and he shuddered violently, his wings whipping out of him as the magic dissolved the bonds of the be-spelled chains. The chains cracked like glass and fell from his body like dust as the magic of the aiser flowed through him and burst out of him in an explosion that tore apart his cage.

  The brothers jumped back, shouting in surprise as he took to the air. He spared neither a glance as he sped across the short distance with rapid beats of his dark wings. They folded against his side just before he collided with the lauchume, guaranteeing maximum impact as he ripped his enemy away from Meredith. He struck with such speed that they went skidding across the floor together in a tangle of limbs.

  The wulkwos’s eyes widened and, in a bid for self-preservation, the lauchume finally abandoned his golden human personage and became the very thing his nature truly was. His body contorted beneath Charu. He twisted, lengthening as fur sprouted all over his body. A grisly muzzle pushed away from his face, filled with wicked fangs and two pairs of tusks, and he lunged at Charu. His spindly arms boasted massive claws and he swung them through the air. Charu’s own claws protracted and they collided in a relentless battle, claws raking and blows exchanged.

  Serpents coiled around him, hundreds of snakes striking out at any being who dared to come to close. Charu spat venom, and the lauchume screamed as it corroded through his vessel’s eyes. A cruel smile stretched over Charu’s lips as he rounded on the male.

  Opening his hand, he called for his hammer to manifest and felt the thin line of power gradually gain weight and bulk as it materialized. He hefted it high into the air and brought it down, determined to break through the mortal shell that, though transformed, protected the creature within. The hammer swung through the air and the crack of the impact rippled through the room, but then the swarm converged over them, their weight pulling Charu down to be savaged. The wings of harpies beat at him, talons and terrible claws ripped into him, monstrous fangs gored him as he was flayed by every attacker.

  Still, he fought on without slowing.

  He would vanquish each and every one of them. Darkness consumed him.

  A red light pulsed, and someone screamed. It was a scream of agony like the tortures of purification a thousand-fold all at once. A sound that pierced the very heart of him. He knew instinctively that his mate screamed as the lamp’s power ran through her.

  “Meredith!”

  Chapter 31

  The taste of Lacth invading her mouth made Meredith want to throw up. It was a nauseating taste of rot accompanied by fetid saliva. She attempted to break free from it, but he held her tightly, his mouth fastened on hers as if drawing her essence from her lips into him. She felt a trickle of the essence of his own being starting to invade her mouth, and her eyes widened as she realized exactly what was happening.

  She could feel a web beginning to knit between them. He was securing him to her.

  Then, the next moment, he wasn’t there. Her lips stung where he’d bit down slightly as he was ripped away. She’d heard a bellow of rage and had seen nothing more than black feathers and a malevolent red glow of eyes and then she was free.

  The spell momentarily severed, Meredith forced herself to focus as everything swam around her. She shook her head to clear it and drew in a gasp of shock as she saw Charu struggle with a creature that had more than one set of spidery limbs that terminated in giant clawed hands. Multiple barbed tails whipped around him as his grotesque muzzle bit into Charu’s shoulder.

  She didn’t stay and watch. She could see the dark mass of creatures drawing closer to the conflict and knew she couldn’t linger a moment longer. It was time for her to do as Tiurma instructed. She ran toward the lantern, nearly within reach of it when a hard hand gripped a handful of her hair, yanking her back. Whipping her head around with a hiss, she looked into Xavier’s angry face.

  His lips pulled back from teeth that gradually lengthened. Her heart pounded in her ears as he morphed into his true form. His head seemed to cave inward and lengthen into a sharp muzzle. Cilia frilled around his face like thousands of long, thin fibers. His maw gaped, displaying no less than four rows of jagged teeth. She twisted in his grip, desperate to get away, not even caring if she ripped hair from her head, but fisted her hair into a thick ponytail, holding her in place.

  His hand jerked away as another collided with him from the side. Meredith fell to the floor. A massive male with a lupin
e face and several tentacles dropping from the fur around the base of his skull whipped around on three massive serpentine tails that made up his lower body. Four powerful arms and a long tail ensnared Xavier, lifting him up off the floor. Glowing yellow eyes pierced her.

  “Go,” he rumbled.

  The voice had something so familiar to it despite the unusual inflections of spirits from other planes that she paused for a second, incredulous.

  “Palearas?”

  His impatient glower confirmed his identity.

  “Right, I’m going.”

  Meredith raced forward. She didn’t give herself a chance to overthink it. She knew it was going to hurt. The lamp flared as she enclosed both hands on its frame. Someone screamed. It was her. Her throat burned with an endless scream, but it was nothing to the searing pain that flooded her. She heard Charu’s anguished cry and wanted to tell him it was going to be okay, but she couldn’t summon words. She couldn’t do anything but suffer as the fire of the lantern burned through her.

  Light flooded her mind, piercing every corner, spilling out of her. She opened her eyes and all she saw was light. She opened her mouth and exhaled the light brimming over inside of her. Something moved in her mind as it burrowed deep within her, the sentience of that which had once been the lamp. In her mind’s eye, it took the form of a fiery being of a feminine form resembling Charu. The horns of the female arched proudly from her brow as her lithe form walked through her, her fingers trailing through the light and the essence of Meredith. Aethereal lips tilted in a pleased smile.

  The being of the lantern then spoke, whispering softly, its sweet lilt flooding through every part of Meredith’s mind like a sigh.