“We’re not in the past,” Melisande said, as if suddenly certain.
“How can you be sure?” He noted the place where they’d first arrived, the middle of the street in front of a shop with the sign Cobbler swinging from twin chains.
“Because if we’d simply time-traveled, I would be able to mist again or communicate with my sisters in this time. And I can do neither.”
He turned his attention back to her, something he constantly fought, and resisted the urge to let go of her hand and stroke that long, gleaming braid. Goddess, he longed to touch more than just her hand, but he wasn’t willing to risk letting go of her just yet.
“You were injured,” he reminded her.
“I was. I’m not any more. The warding has me locked down just as it has ever since we first hit it.”
“If we’re not in the past, then none of this is real.” His gaze darted again, his senses taking in everything—the people walking the streets eyeing them with curiosity, the clank of rigging on the harbor nearby, the utter lack of birds, even seagulls.
“My thought exactly.”
The hint of impudence in her tone had him turning back in time to see a twinkle of mischief in her eyes as she lifted one blond brow. He stared at her, struck by the incongruence of Melisande with a twinkle in her eye. Goddess, he wanted to kiss her.
“But obviously some of it’s real,” she continued. “Like the water. The splash from that puddle soaked through my clothes.” Taking a step away from him, she tugged on his hand, apparently no more eager to let go of him than he was her. Which pleased him more than it probably should.
He was about to ask her where she was going when she released him to quite intentionally bump into one of the street sellers.
The woman turned with a frown, then, sizing them up, began to smile with a mouth missing half its teeth. “Fresh fish?”
“No, thank you,” he replied, then ushered Melisande past her.
Melisande whirled on him, that twinkle of mischief giving way to a gleam of laughter, and it was all he could do not to grin, or haul her into his arms. Goddess she was a beauty when she wasn’t glaring at him with kill-you-in-your-sleep eyes. Well, she was a beauty either way, but he rather preferred the laughter.
“She felt real enough.” The laughter in those sapphire eyes died abruptly on a gasp of horror. “I know what this is.” She stopped beside a broken wheel leaning against the brick and turned to face him, her color turning ashen. “It’s what used to be called a temporal cage.”
“Which is . . . ?” He didn’t like the sound of that, not at all.
“A temporal cage is essentially a Daemon mind game. In ancient times, when the Daemons still roamed the earth freely, they would create worlds with horrific creatures—things not seen in real life—then send their human captives into them to suffer, to die, while they watched . . . and fed.”
“This place doesn’t seem so bad.” He swallowed. Yet. “There has to be a way out.”
“I’m sure there is, but few ever escape the cages.” Pulling her hand from his, she crossed her arms. “We have to find the key.”
“What kind of key?”
“I don’t know. It could be anything—animal, mineral, or vegetable. Perhaps something that doesn’t look right, like a flower blooming out of season, or a rock with an odd glow.” She met his gaze, her own ripe with dread. “We have to find the key and destroy it before this world destroys us . . . as it was almost certainly designed to do.”
Chapter Ten
Fox didn’t like the way the inhabitants of this strange seaport were beginning to eye them. Not as potential customers but as a potential threat. He liked even less Melisande’s suspicion that they were in a Daemon temporal cage. Unfortunately, he believed her. Too many things over the past months pointed to the likelihood that Inir had acquired Daemon magic. It made perfect sense that he’d use the strongest of it to guard his stronghold.
“Let’s find that key and get out of here.” He glanced at Melisande and she nodded, but when he held out his hand to her, she ignored it and set out ahead of him as if she were determined to get them out of here. Or determined to keep him at a distance. Probably both.
Truth be told, he was as anxious to get out of here as she was. Kara needed them. They sure as hell couldn’t rescue her trapped in a place like this. He wondered if Lyon and the others would find themselves trapped in here, too. He wouldn’t mind the help in finding the way out. But, goddess. What if all of them wound up wandering this godforsaken place for the rest of their lives? Lives cut short by lack of radiance unless they were actually close enough to the stronghold . . . and Kara . . . even here.
Side by side, they wandered the seaside village, drawing more and more attention. An attention that was beginning to claw at his nerves. How many more eyes would he draw if he suddenly went feral? If only he could be certain they weren’t in any kind of real world of the past. Giving himself away as inhuman could bring down disaster upon the entire immortal world.
“I don’t like the way they’re looking at us,” Melisande said quietly.
“Me either. Just keep walking.” Unable to resist, he ran his hand down that silken braid.
She threw him an enigmatic look but said nothing, and he curled the braid around his hand, loving the feel of it wrapped around his fist. Releasing the long, golden length, he watched it fall down to the curve of her back, swaying to mimic her hips.
With effort, he tore his gaze away, concentrating on their surroundings, on finding the key.
The air was cool and damp against his cheeks, a far cry from the late May temps they’d left behind in the mountains.
But when he shivered, it was not with cold. His gut was delivering up another truth.
“This way,” he said, eyeing an intersection up ahead, knowing they needed to turn right.
Melisande glanced at him but said nothing, her gaze on the people who were beginning to throng the street, her hand on the hilt of her sword.
True humans couldn’t hurt them easily and would never overcome either of them one-on-one. But an angry mob could kill even an immortal. The last thing he wanted was to be forced to cut down humans, but he’d not allow either of them to be taken. He couldn’t, whether or not this place was real. And if that meant shifting into his animal, so be it.
All at once, the humans . . . dozens of them, now . . . pulled knives and swords out of their cloaks and sheaths, turning on them as if a puppet master had given the order to attack. And he probably had.
Melisande drew her sword.
Fox grabbed her free hand. “Run!”
He took off, pulling her with him. Now wasn’t the time to stand and fight, not unless they had no other choice. No, this was the time to get the hell out of Dodge and hope his gut would lead him to the key. Or to safety. As the cold drizzle fell on their heads and slicked the cobblestones beneath their boots, they dodged assailants, street carts, even a goat.
That intersection. They had to reach the intersection.
“Sooner or later, we’re going to have to stand and fight, Feral,” Melisande said beside him.
“Not if we’re lucky.”
“Let go of my hand. I can run faster.” She tugged her hand free and he let her go, knowing she was right.
At the intersection, he turned right, not even looking first. This was the way they needed to go. He knew it. The cobbled street tilted precariously downward toward the waterfront. A vast expanse of water lay beyond. What would happen, he wondered, if they were to steal a boat and sail away? Would they eventually come to the edge of this magical world and be forced to turn back? Or was the bay even part of the world to begin with?
Side by side, they started down the hilly street, a street blessedly devoid of people or assailants of any kind. Escaping that mob had been too easy.
Too easy.
No sooner had he acknowledged his disquiet than vines began to seep up from beneath the cobblestones, dozens of them, reaching for his ankles, his legs.
Fox pulled his knives and began hacking at them. Beside him, Melisande did the same, but the vines were too quick, too strong, and even as he hacked, they curled around his legs and feet, until he couldn’t move, then began to climb up his body.
“Fox!” The thread of panic in Melisande’s voice tore at him, but there was nothing he could do to help her when he couldn’t help himself. The magic was too fecking strong!
As he fought and hacked, the vines curled around his torso, his arms, his hands, his neck, yanking him back, pulling him down until he was flat on his back, sealed to the cobbles like Gulliver in Lilliput. With a furious roar, he went feral, but neither his claws nor fangs could find purchase to cut at the vines.
“Fox.”
He managed, barely, to turn his head, to look at Melisande who was tied to the street as he was, not four feet away. In her eyes, he saw a raw terror that made him crazed . . . and that helped pull him down because, goddess, she needed him this time. She was struggling against the hold of the vines, her eyes bright with tears that were beginning to leak down into her hair.
“Mel,” he said around the fangs still protruding from his mouth. He wanted to offer her comforting words and had none to give. They were caught, ripe for the slaughter.
“I can’t be captured. I can’t, Fox. I can’t.”
He didn’t want to tell her that capture was the least of their worries. Except, when he managed to glimpse back over his head, the mob was gone. They’d driven them into the trap and served their purpose. Why? So the Mage could come collect them?
“I can’t, Fox.”
She was panicking. His fangs receded. “Melisande . . . angel. Look at me. Can you turn your head and look at me?” When she managed, he caught her gaze and held on tight. “I’m here. I’m here, sweetheart. We’re going to get out of this. The mob’s gone. They’re not going to hurt us. We’re going to escape.”
“No. We’re not. Fox . . .”
What would make such a fierce warrior panic? But he knew. Being a captive like this was something she’d done before.
Goddess.
He had to get her out of here.
And he didn’t have a clue how to escape.
Panic welled, ripping at Melisande’s breath as she struggled against the vines that held her fast, just like the chains that had trapped her so long ago. Memories reared up . . . terror . . . betrayal . . . pain. She fought them back, fought . . . and lost.
“Mel, I have a plan,” Fox said quietly beside her. “Trust me.”
Trust him. A shifter. The thought was nearly laughable, and yet . . . she did. And a moment later, Fox disappeared in a spray of sparkling lights, shifting to a mammoth fox, then downsizing faster than she’d ever seen him. The vines tried to tighten around him, she could see them contracting, but Fox was faster. And suddenly he was bounding free, a tiny fox, racing away from the grabbing foliage.
Away. Leaving her behind.
Trust me, angel, he said, as if he’d heard her thoughts. These damned vines! Moments later, There! I’m free of them. I think. Don’t go anywhere, Mel. I’ll be back.
Don’t go anywhere? Hoarse laughter burst from her throat, then died a quick death as terror overcame her again. Sooner or later, someone would come. Perhaps Mage sentinels, perhaps just more people of this odd, magical world. They’d take her into captivity. And then what? Hurt her? Kill her?
Sweat soaked her back, a cold sweat that had her trembling even as she struggled against the iron hold of the vines.
Fox, if you leave me, I’ll kill you, Feral. Someday, I’ll escape, and yours will be the first life I take.
I’m not deserting you, sweetheart. I’m grabbing weapons against the vines. I’ll be back in a minute.
And suddenly her fear shifted. Fox, you can’t come back here! The vines will catch you all over again.
Melisande, tell me what you know of Daemon temporal cages. Are they always accessed from a labyrinth?
She thought about it. No, I don’t think so. I’ve never heard of the Daemons using a labyrinth, though there are old stories of ancient Mage creating magical gauntlets with them.
It makes sense that a Mage would use Daemon magic to create that which he knew. In other words, a labyrinth. Tell me about the gauntlets.
It occurred to her that he was intentionally turning her mind from her predicament, forcing her to think of something else. Easing her panic. And it was working.
She thought about the old stories, from the times before the Sacrifice five thousand years ago, a time when the Mage still had full access to their great store of magical power. And as she thought, her breathing began to even out, her trembling to quiet.
The gauntlets were a series of trials. Usually horrific trials. If the captive . . . almost always a shape-shifter . . . survived or escaped one, he was thrown into the next. Eventually, most died. The few who made it through the entire gauntlet alive were experimented on, then killed.
Fox made a noise in her head that sounded like a grunt. No reward for the strongest and most clever.
No, she agreed. Not when they’re your enemy.
She felt something slide against the side of her neck as if rising from the cobbles, then gasped as it turned razor-sharp, cutting her flesh. It rose, briefly, into her line of vision, a bright orange vine where the others had been green, sliding across her throat and down the other side, sharp, cutting, deeper and deeper.
Fox! I’m out of time. One of the vines means to take off my head.
Wulfe whined at the sound of the buzzing. It tickled his wolf’s ears, vibrating through his head and body like an electrical charge sprinting along his skin.
Do you feel that? he asked his companions.