Surrender to Darkness Page 15

  “Nothing is more important than getting you and the Veil to safety,” he said firmly. His hands felt along the rock face for the recessed door latch.

  Kiyoko bent and picked up the item, shaking it loose from broken glass. The outer edge was a wooden rectangle, carved with an intricate design that stopped her heart. She didn’t need to see the rendering to recognize the many bumps and sharp points. She’d run her fingers over this wood too many times not to know what it was. The lovely maple-leaf picture frame that held her parents’ wedding photo.

  Umiko would never have left it here.

  Not willingly.

  “Wait! Don’t—”

  The tunnel door slid open with the smooth rumble of well-oiled gears.

  11

  The house was a total loss.

  As the berserker rage slowly retreated from his veins and his sense of self returned, Murdoch sighed over the damage. Walls gone, floors smashed, and ceilings collapsed. What hadn’t been already destroyed would soon be consumed by the flames licking up numerous posts and beams. Kiyoko would be devastated.

  On the positive side, the demons were dead.

  Between his raving berserker, several very useful Romany spells, and the skill of the young onmyōji warriors, they’d managed to take down all twenty of the wretched hellspawn. It hadn’t hurt that the demons had been oddly distracted. Swatting at the air about their heads, pitching random fireballs into the night, roaring with rage for no obvious reason. Whatever the cause, he and the others had benefited. They had suffered only one casualty—a young man who fell to a barrage of fireballs before Murdoch arrived.

  He frowned.

  One casualty, assuming Kiyoko had gotten out before the demons reached the house. He hadn’t found any sign of her in the wreckage, so it was a fair assumption.

  Just not a sure bet.

  Call him a Nervous Nellie, but Death’s warning was still ringing in his ears. If you don’t turn around, you might lose the Veil. If Kiyoko had made an easy escape before all this started, why would there be any risk to the Veil?

  There wouldn’t.

  Murdoch pointed his sword at the young onmyōji who had rallied the others to fight at his side. The warrior had taken a fireball to the left shoulder during the battle, yet he stood tall and straight. “You. How would the others have escaped the house? Is there a planned escape route?”

  The blank stare he got in return had him biting his tongue. The lad clearly didn’t speak English.

  “Kiyoko? Sora-san? Umiko?” He spun around, pointing at various places around the demolished house. “Where did they go?”

  The young man’s eyes lit up, and a rush of syllables poured from his lips. He leapt over a burning post and headed for the back of the house. Kicking aside pieces of broken pottery and splintered ceiling panels, he cleared the floor in what used to be the kitchen. He pushed a carved wooden square near the wall and the floor panel popped up on one side. The young man lifted the panel and pointed to the metal door beneath.

  Murdoch slid the metal door to one side and peered into the dark cavity. A tunnel.

  He rubbed his chest.

  Two obvious options, then. Drop into the tunnel and follow, or determine where the exit was and head overland. With his enhanced Gatherer speed and ability to see in the dark, the direct route through the tunnel was the obvious choice. Claustrophobia shouldn’t enter into his decision at all. The air in the tunnel wouldn’t actually disappear the moment he stepped inside, nor would the walls actually close in on him. The fear was all in his head.

  He jumped into the tunnel.

  Being a coward wouldn’t save the lass. He glanced up at the young onmyōji and with no hope of being understood said, “Go around. Meet me at the other side.”

  Then he took a deep breath, bent forward so the roof wouldn’t touch his head, and jogged into the gloom.

  Kiyoko’s warning came a moment too late. The tunnel door slid open to reveal a huge red oni demon pitching fireballs. Reacting swifter than she thought possible, Sora threw himself against the rock wall and miraculously dodged the first hellish orb. Kiyoko yanked Ryuji behind her, stepped back, and muttered the incantation required to raise a shield around them both.

  A ripple of fear ran through her. There were four additional hulking outlines posed against the bright sky, and they were challenging opponents. The heavily muscled, seven-foot-tall beasts oozed a deadly poison from their thick red hides and wielded massive clubs capable of crushing rock—clubs they were currently using to expand the opening of the tunnel with ground-trembling force.

  “What are those things?” asked Ryuji, his voice hoarse in her ear.

  Kiyoko didn’t answer. Pulling him down, she avoided the swift slice of Yoshio’s blade as he leapt past them to enter the fight. Without a weapon, all she had to offer was magic. But she could do better than a simple blind spell now. Her ki had gained more strength during the trek through the tunnel.

  Still, she had to choose wisely.

  There was little hope that Umiko had survived an ambush, but if she had, and if she lay wounded outside the mouth of the tunnel, a spell like rock shower would finish her. Recalling her shikigami was also out of the question, because they might still be aiding Murdoch and the others. No, a two-pronged attack made the most sense: a culling spell to siphon off the battle fervor of their opponents and feed it to the team at the house, and a dragon conjure.

  The winged snake dragon would be best.

  From experience, she knew that if she blended her mystic abilities with Sora’s, the resulting dragon would be almost undefeatable. But the sensei was engaged in a desperate fight for his life against one of the oni and disturbing him—even briefly—would be a mistake.

  She would have to conjure this dragon on her own.

  The ground shook, the walls trembled, and a hail of rock and dust pelted his upper body. Murdoch flattened himself against one wall and sucked in a sharp breath, his heart ricocheting in his chest. That sure as bloody hell wasn’t in his head. The walls were closing in on him.

  His mouth dried.

  What a horrific finish that would be—lying trapped under a ton of rock, pressed tightly on all sides, unable to breathe for the rest of his immortal term with Death. Two hundred and fifty-six years of his worst nightmare come true.

  Ah, Christ. He needed to see light.

  And he needed to see it now.

  Hands chilled with a cold sweat, he put everything he had into a dash for the end of the tunnel.

  Kiyoko smiled through her exhaustion.

  The dragon was a sight to behold.

  A sixty-foot wingspan kept it aloft, a long, powerful tail whipped from side to side, and shimmering blue-green scales covered its huge body from head to tail tip. It not only breathed great gusts of fire at the oni demons on the ledge but it swallowed every fireball they tossed at it with a gleam of satisfaction in its black eyes.

  Three of the five demons turned to face it, leaving two oni to combat Yoshio and Sora. Improved odds, to be sure, but Sora was injured. Although summoning the dragon had drained Kiyoko’s ki to the point where her limbs felt numb, withdrawing from the battle was not an option. Not until it was won. Drawing deep on her remaining power, she strengthened the shields around the two men and tossed small irritation spells at the demons.

  The dragon’s tail swept one of the oni off the ledge. But the acidic poison leeching from the oni’s skin drew a pained roar from the mighty beast, and it sank several feet beneath the ledge before regaining its altitude. Its tail was now safely tucked away.

  Kiyoko bit her lip.

  It would have been far better if the dragon had lashed out in fury, knocking the others off the cliff as well. They had five minutes—ten if they were really lucky—before the poison clawed its way through the dragon’s body to its heart. Given the desperate edge to Sora’s and Yoshio’s battles, that wasn’t promising.

  Kiyoko tossed an ease-pain spell at the dragon.

  Her own r
ibs were beginning to throb, but the spell was better spent elsewhere. A truth proven moments later when the dragon used the forceful beat of its wings to blow another of the oni off the ledge. She shared a triumphant smile with Ryuji, who was plastered against the wall, pale-faced.

  But her satisfaction didn’t last long.

  The third demon howled in rage and threw its powerful club at the winged beast’s snout. In a regrettably accurate shot, the dragon took a blow to the head, briefly dazing it. It managed only one more blast of fire before the poison reached its heart and it collapsed, plummeting out of view and down the cliff to the rocky terrain below. The now clubless oni was badly burned, but alive.

  The odds were still three to two in favor of the demons.

  Worse, both Sora and Yoshio displayed obvious signs of tiring—shorter leaps to escape the pounding of the clubs, near misses with fireballs, white lips, and ragged breathing. If Kiyoko didn’t act, and act quickly, they would all be dead and the Veil would be lost.

  But what could she do?

  Fresh air. Blessed, sweet-tasting air from the outside world.

  Murdoch closed his eyes as the cool wash of damp fall air hit the back of his throat. Then he frowned. Not so sweet tasting as it ought to be, though. This air was marked with the sharply bitter scent of brimstone.

  His berserker hummed beneath his skin.

  Brimstone could mean only one thing. He rounded the last corner of the tunnel to the bright light of day and a small but fiercely fought battle. His fingers tightened around the leather-wrapped hilt of his sword. More demons.

  His gaze quickly found Kiyoko and Watanabe a few feet back from the fighting. Watanabe hugged the stone wall, trying to stay as small as possible, but Kiyoko stood pale and proud, her hands spread wide, using whatever strength she had to wield magic. Sora and Yoshio were valiantly holding back the demons—three great red brutes, two of them armed with stone-pulverizing clubs.

  His blood hummed and his muscles thickened.

  Let me loose, his berserker howled.

  Murdoch beat his inner beast back with gritted teeth. He couldn’t let go. Not here. Even though the demons had widened the mouth, the space available for battle was severely limited. If he let his berserker free, he wouldn’t be able to guarantee Sora’s or Yoshio’s survival.

  Suddenly the air around him whooshed, and he felt the feathery touch of numerous wings graze his cheeks. Bats? If so, even his extraordinary Soul Gatherer vision couldn’t spot them. Ghost bats, perhaps.

  Under the repeated pounding of a demon club, Yoshio’s shield finally crumpled. The club arced toward him yet again, and he dove left. But the uneven floor proved his undoing—before he could launch himself into the air, he lost his footing and stumbled. Fanciful thoughts of invisible bats fell victim to harsh reality, and Murdoch surged through the tunnel to the young warrior’s defense.

  “Poison skin,” Kiyoko gasped at him as he passed.

  Trying not to notice how utterly spent she appeared, Murdoch shored up the front of his shield with a Romany ward. Combined with his berserker’s natural repel charm, it should be enough to keep him safe. He loosed the bonds on the ancient beast inside him just enough to take advantage of its strength, then entered the battle with a blistering swing of Bloodseeker.

  The mighty sword skimmed the top of Yoshio’s shield and sliced through the bubble of protection around the demon, driving unswervingly into the bulging biceps of its arm. The creature roared with rage, displaying an impressive set of saliva-dripping fangs, and redirected its hell-forged weapon at Murdoch. But the arm no longer functioned properly. After a wobbly, ineffectual attempt, it dropped the club to its side. Yoshio moved in for the kill.

  The third demon lowered its head and charged into the tunnel like a bull. Murdoch ducked around Yoshio, braced his legs for impact, and met the charge full on. His feet slid back a good ten feet before they both ground to a halt.

  Then the battle began in earnest.

  The demon’s strength was impressive. No match for a fully loosed berserker, but a significant challenge for Murdoch in his half-roused state. The pith demons he’d faced outside the house had more in common with pesky gnats than they did with this fellow. The creature slammed him into the rock wall with an easy sweep of its arm, cracking his skull. Damned thing was faster than it looked.

  Still, a demon was a demon.

  And as such, it belonged in hell.

  Murdoch ignored the lump forming on the back of his head, and ducked to avoid a follow-up swing. Best to stay away from those claws. They might well be able to pierce his shield if the demon got a good hold.

  “Land true, land hard, land quick,” he murmured to Bloodseeker, which now hummed eagerly with the additional potency of a demon blood enhancement spell. Then he gave his berserker an inch more leash and attacked in a flurry of precise thrusts and slices. He became a killing machine. His attack fell into the easy rhythm of a battle-seasoned warrior, his blade struck fast and hard, and victory was his within minutes.

  Not entirely due to his talent.

  Again, he benefited from decidedly odd behavior on the part of the demon. Wild swings that seemed not to be aimed at him at all. Loss of focus. Strange snarls at the air around its head. Almost as if those invisible bats were pecking at it.

  His sword pierced the creature’s thick hide with uninhibited enthusiasm.

  As the demon shuddered at the end of his blade and slipped to the ground, Murdoch took a deep breath to calm his berserker. He pulled his sword free of the carcass and spun around. To his immense relief, Yoshio had already defeated his wounded demon and had gone to the aid of Sora. Both men smiled triumphantly as the third and last demon crashed to the rock floor, a patchwork of cuts decorating its skin.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Murdoch saw Kiyoko slump to the floor.

  Watanabe reached her first, dropping to his knees at her side and cradling her head in his lap. He brushed her hair back and stared at her wan face with obvious concern. “We need the doctor.”

  Murdoch had trouble breathing.

  Kiyoko was injured.

  The sight of Watanabe’s arms wrapped around her tore several of the mental restraints he had on his berserker, which was already dangerously close to the surface. Christ. The man’s hand was caressing her cheek. Murdoch jammed his eyes shut, struggling to maintain control and avoid ripping Watanabe’s head off.

  “Did the doctor survive?” Sora asked.

  “Aye,” answered Murdoch. The one-word response was all he could manage.

  “Then let us get Kiyoko-san to the compound as quickly as possible. I assume we can return through the tunnel, Mr. Murdoch?”

  “Aye.”

  “Will you lead the way?”

  Murdoch opened his eyes. Watanabe now stood with Kiyoko in his arms, apparently prepared to carry her all the way. He carefully averted his gaze. Puny little Watanabe would be forced to hand her off to Yoshio at some point, guaranteed. He’d love to be there to witness the man’s failure, but … One trip through that blasted tunnel was quite enough.

  “No, I’ll go overland and meet you at the other end.”

  Sora skewed him a knowing glance. “It’s quite a climb up the cliff face.”

  “I’ve no problem with heights.” Which was true. A childhood spent scrambling through the Highlands, leaping from crag to crag in pursuit of hare and deer, had given him an excellent tolerance for high places. It was only the caves he’d had trouble with.

  “We’ll see you at the compound, then.”

  The little party headed back through the tunnel, led by Yoshio.

  As they disappeared from view, Murdoch tried not to worry. She was strong. Her breaths were shallow, but even. And she had Sora with her. She’d be fine.

  Ah, hell, maybe he’d better run.

  Kiyoko woke up in the infirmary, lying on a very firm, very thin cot. The stark overhead lighting gave her location away. That and the pungent smell of antiseptic.

 
; She tried to sit up.

  “Don’t even think about it, lass,” came a dry voice from the corner of the small room. “You’re to stay there until the doctor gives you permission to move.”

  Kiyoko fell back against the pillow and tilted her head so she could see Murdoch. There were no chairs in the room, and he leaned against the wall looking uncomfortable but resolute.

  “How bad is it?” she asked, bracing for devastating news.

  “The house is gone, and you lost a young warrior.”

  “One?”

  He nodded. “Just one.”

  Kiyoko felt a huge weight lift from her chest. Until she recalled her discovery in the tunnel. “Plus Umiko-san.”

  “Sorry,” Murdoch said with a snort. “You weren’t that lucky.”

  “What? Are you saying Umiko-san is alive?”

  “Aye, the dragon lady survived,” he confirmed.

  “How?”

  “I found her on the ledge outside the tunnel, clinging to a chunk of rock with more strength than I thought her capable of,” he said. “She wouldn’t let go until I pried her bloody fingers loose. Considering she had a broken arm and a dislocated jaw, it was an impressive feat.”

  “Umiko-san is alive.” She couldn’t hold back a smile.

  He responded with one of his lopsided grins, and her heart beat a little faster. “And still giving me hell.”

  “For what?”

  “Pretty much everything,” he said. “Your injuries, the demon attack, the loss of the house.”

  Kiyoko bit her lip to keep from laughing. It sounded so much like Umiko. She could almost picture the little woman shaking her fist at Murdoch. “She has a point. You did break my ribs.”

  He pulled away from the wall, his eyes dark with regret. “About that …”

  “Oh, stop it. I deserved everything I got. I wanted the berserker to surface, and it did.” She sighed. “Besides, it wasn’t as if you meant to hurt me.”

  He was silent for a long moment, staring at the floor.

  “The kiss was worth it,” she said softly.

  His gaze met hers. Dark and steamy. “It was a good kiss,” he acknowledged.