Page 10

Chapter ten

T hey made their way through the forest of sparsely packed trees in a halo of firelight, passing sentinels along the path, all with their own torches to keep the darkness at bay.

Some souls Rune recognized, some he didn’t, but he offered a nod of respect and gratitude to each of them.

“We take turns watching for new souls,” Noah explained when Keegan asked about the watchmen.

“There’s more than just shadows out there, and it’s too dangerous in the riverbed, but we help as much as we can.”

That one sentence told Rune everything he needed to know.

More souls arrived often enough that a patrol had been formed.

The mirror world was hostile with threats he hadn’t even seen yet.

Most importantly, it told him that those who had found themselves trapped there hadn’t given up.

They were fighting back in the only ways they could.

“What were those things?” Keegan asked, his voice quiet and wispy.

“Soul eaters. They devour the dead. Good thing Rune here isn’t like us, or we’d be making this trip back alone.”

A hand patted Rune’s shoulder, the sensation barely detectable through his dense fur.

“Rune?”

Gods, he hated the fear in his mate’s voice.

“Just breathe. I’m still here . ”

They continued mostly in silence after that, Noah occasionally calling out directions, leading him across a starlit valley to another replica of the Village of Lost Souls.

Still sad. Still crumbling.

But this one alive with movement and conversation.

There was no soft glimmer of twilight, no cloud of hazy orange light.

Instead, the place glowed, illuminated from every angle in shades of yellow and amber.

Torches lined the dirt paths that wound through the settlement, and lanterns hung over every shop entrance.

Windows flared to life with the flicker of flames, and in the center of everything, a massive bonfire burned inside a circular pit carved into the ground.

The doors of the businesses stood open, souls coming and going as they went about their tasks.

Some tended the fire, some replaced torches, and others simply gathered in the safety of the light.

Rune growled his approval.

This wasn’t the encampment of scared, broken souls he had expected to find.

These were fighters, survivors, and they had chosen this place to make their stand in a world that didn’t play by the rules.

“Oh, my god,” Keegan breathed.

“How…how long have you been here?”

An apt question because while Keegan had only been in the Underworld for a few weeks, this level of cooperation hadn’t happened overnight.

“I don’t know,” Noah responded.

“A while. The village was already here and operational when I arrived, though. Then more souls started spilling in, and we adapted.”

“We?”

Noah snorted, the sound filled with disgust and derisiveness.

“Brie’s other victims.”

“Other victims?” Keegan parroted again, clearly struggling to make sense of the incomprehensible.

“It’ll be easier if I just show you.”

No one appeared startled or concerned about having a huge bear with glowing eyes in their midst. They stepped aside to allow him to pass, and a few sent curious glances in his direction, but otherwise, no one really reacted to his presence.

Beside the bonfire, Rune lowered himself to the ground with a quiet grunt.

His wounds had already stitched themselves together, but the ache from the battle still lingered.

“Down you go,” he instructed.

Once Keegan and Noah dismounted, he began the transformation back into a man, gritting his teeth as the magic washed through him, stretching muscles and realigning bones.

With the process complete, he knelt on the cold ground, filthy, sore, but still alive.

Before he could summon the energy to move, he found his lap full of a very concerned mate.

Keegan caressed his face, his neck, his shoulders, the touch investigatory rather than comforting as he inspected every inch of Rune’s body.

Finding him whole and mostly unscathed, his lips turned down at the corners, and he smacked his hand against Rune’s bare chest.

“You scared the hell out of me,” he snapped.

Rune couldn’t have pried the grin off his face if he tried.

“I love you, kaelaer. ”

Keegan sighed, the fight draining out of him as he wrapped his arms around Rune’s neck and collapsed into him.

“I love you, too, but don’t ever do something like that again.” His breath stuttered against the side of Rune’s neck.

“And don’t tell me to leave you. I won’t do that. I can’t.”

He couldn’t agree to that.

His mate’s safety and well-being would always be his priority, regardless of the consequences to himself.

So, instead of offering empty promises or pretty lies, he clutched Keegan closer, holding him, grounding him in the moment.

A young woman with soulful eyes and dark hair approached them, holding out a stack of clothing.

Rune took the tee and cotton pants, they nodded at each other, and she walked away—no words needed.

The white T-shirt stretched tight across his chest and strangled his biceps, and the trousers fit snug in the thighs, but at least he was covered, which seemed to appease Keegan.

Dressed and finally on his feet, he took his mate’s hand and followed Noah through the crowd to the diner at the end of the dusty lane.

It still felt strange to see someone else behind the counter other than Cian, but not as strange as witnessing it bustling with activity.

People filled the tables and booths, while others stood by the stone fireplace, their heads tossed back in laughter or bent together in conversation.

This was what the village in his world should have been, and when they returned to the Underworld—because they would return—he hoped they carried this sense of community home with them.

Noah led them to the back corner, to the same booth where Rune had sat across from Orrin so many times.

Only this time, there was no prince dressed in absurdly lavish robes to greet him.

Just a group of strangers, two sets of identical twins like Keegan and his brother, all with matching tattoos burned into their forearms.

“Ah, you must be Keegan.”

“We’ve heard a lot about you.”

The first set of siblings—older men with balding white hair and lined faces—slid out of the booth to offer their hands in greeting.

“I’m Joseph. This is my brother John.”

Keegan nodded, his expression a mask of confusion and concern.

“I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but given the circumstances…”

The men laughed before stepping aside to make way for the other twins—young girls, probably no more than teenagers, with big brown eyes and warm smiles.

“I’m Lucia.”

“And I’m Carmen.”

“Well, you seem to already know who I am.” Keegan glanced up at him, then back to the group.

“This is my mate, Rune.”

“Oh, damn, congrats,” Noah interjected.

“I mean, I kind of guessed, but I wasn’t sure.” Then he turned to the others and added, “Rune is alive.”

Rune didn’t know why that mattered, but he detected something in Noah’s tone, a weightiness to his words that instantly sparked suspicion.

Especially when the others reacted with flared eyes or quiet nods.

It was just that, though—suspicion.

So, until he knew more, he decided to keep his thoughts to himself.

With introductions out of the way, Rune helped Joseph grab a couple of barstools from the counter, and they all gathered around the table.

The older men opted for the stools, leaving Rune to crowd into one side of the booth with his mate and Noah across from the sisters.

“I’m sure you have questions,” John said to start the conversation.

Keegan leaned into Rune’s side with a self-deprecating chuckle.

“Only a few. Mostly, I just want to know why this happened to us.”

“Mostly greed, son. I know that’s probably not the answer you want to hear, but that’s the truth.”

Rune had little knowledge or understanding of the circumstances that had led to Keegan’s death, and as such, no input to add to the conversation.

Instead, he cuddled his mate, lending comfort and support while he absorbed the information being given.

“Brie was trafficking souls from the Underworld,” Noah explained.

“She would bind them to the mortal world and sell them on the magical black market to be used in different spells and rituals.”

“And she made a pretty penny doing it,” Joseph added.

Rune frowned. Clearly, this hadn’t been a one-off incident, either.

The female must have been doing it for years, right under his nose, and he hadn’t even realized it.

He thought back to all the times someone had disappeared from the village, and how it had always been explained away with the assumption that they had crossed the river.

Keegan shuddered beside him.

“And this place? This world?”

“It’s like a passageway between realms or dimensions.” Carmen waved her hand dismissively.

“Whatever you want to call them.”

“We don’t know all the details,” Joseph continued.

“I can tell you that Brie is human, though, and she stole the magic she used to tether us.”

“But why?” His mate’s voice was small, unsure, but ringing with indignation.

“What did she need us for?”

“The ritual she used to open the doorways between worlds requires anchors.” Leaning forward, John rested his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands together.

“Think of it like a lock and key.”

“Two parts of a whole,” Noah expounded.

“Identical twins.”

“But one from each world. One dead.” Joseph lifted his hand as he spoke, a wry smile on his lips.

“Heart attack.”

Lucia raised her hand next.

“Drowned.”

Then Noah.

“Car wreck.”

“And one living,” Joseph concluded.

John and Lucia raised their hands, their eyes on Keegan, who, after a moment of hesitation, lifted his as well.

“But the magic is like an infection. It drains the living twin until there’s nothing left.” Lucia sighed, her eyes glazed with memory.

Her sister’s mouth thinned with unveiled hatred.

“Then she traps us here to hide the evidence and moves on to the next victims.”

“Not all,” John argued.

“Some people she sold on the black market. I’d rather be here.”

Lucia shivered again.

“Good point.”

“The female was dragged through the portal,” Rune said, speaking for the first time.

He wouldn’t use her name, though.

He wouldn’t give her identity.

“What happened to her?”

“Oh, she’s still here.” Turning his head, Noah glanced through the window, to the space behind the diner where the light didn’t touch.

“She didn’t survive the blowback when you cut the puppet strings, but her soul came through the portal like the rest of us.” His eyes narrowed, and his nostrils flared.

“She hides in the blackness, in the places too dark for even the shadows to penetrate.”

Because while shadows couldn’t exist in the light, neither could they exist in the total absence of it.

“We catch glimpses of her sometimes,” Carmen added, her upper lip curling.

“She knows better than to get too close, but she watches.”

“Oh, god,” Keegan breathed.

“I just thought…” He trailed off and shook his head.

“I don’t know what I thought, but this is so much worse.”

It was a horrific tale that made Rune’s blood boil, but it didn’t answer the most pressing question.

How the hell did they get out of there?

From what he was hearing, the doorways could only be opened with a spell, but they had no talismans, no artifacts, no magic.

Moreover, the “lock and key” required to power the ritual no longer existed because every twin in the mirror world was already dead.

“So, there’s no way out?” he said, giving voice to his frustrations.

The strangers around the table glanced at each other, little knowing smiles curving their lips.

“We think there might be a way,” John said at last, his eyes focused on Keegan.

“Me?” Keegan yelped.

“What can I do?”

“I managed to undo the tether once,” Carmen said.

“It almost killed me.”

Rune arched an eyebrow.

“But it didn’t.”

“No. I survived.” She shook her head.

“And the tether reformed.”

Like the mirror ropes that had dragged his mate into this nightmare.

Shaking back the sleeve of his sweatshirt, Keegan held his arm up, tracing the scars of magic across his skin.

“But you said the ritual needs a living twin.” His finger stopped on his palm where the line had been disconnected.

“I didn’t survive.”

“I didn’t know you had died when I first came through, but I knew your stubborn ass would try to find a way to save me.” Noah snorted.

“Idiot.”

Keegan huffed and shoved his brother sideways.

“But I am dead, so what’s your point?”

“But your mate isn’t.”

“I don’t have a twin,” Rune said, shaking his head.

“But you’re bonded to Keegan, right? You’ve claimed him?”

He frowned, still not understanding what the guy was trying to tell him.

“Yes, but I don’t see why that matters.”

“We’ve been here a long time,” Joseph said, raising his voice when Noah opened his mouth to argue.

“Some of us longer than others. During that time, we’ve had a lot of discussions about possible ways to leave this place.”

“When Noah arrived and told us his story, we had hoped that Keegan might be able to open a doorway from the other side.” Dropping his head, John rubbed the back of his neck and sighed.

“We knew it was a long shot, but…”

“Hope is hard to extinguish,” Rune finished for him.

“I still don’t understand what that has to do with me.”

“We were held captive longer than anyone else,” the older male responded, motioning between him and his brother.

“I was already old, weak, and the magic drained me within a couple of days.” He looked up then, his eyes red-rimmed and shimmering.

“But I left behind a mate. A different kind of tether, but a tether to the living, all the same.”

Rune sat up straighter, his back stiff and his heart pounding.

“And the spell kept working.”

“It wasn’t as strong. We could only hold the doorways open for short periods of time, but yes,” John confirmed.

“Until Jayna died.”

“I’m sorry for what happened to you.” Keegan leaned forward, peering at the older twins around his brother.

“And I want to get out of here as much as any of you, but Rune and I bonded days ago.” He held his hand up, showing the severed thread on his palm.

“It’s still just a scar.”

“It’s a tether,” Carmen told him, her tone mildly exasperated.

“A handshake. It ties at both ends.” She glanced at her sister from the corner of her eye.

“Ours reformed when Lucia took my hand.”

“Okay.” Though he sounded skeptical, and maybe a little annoyed, Keegan turned and reached for Noah’s hand.

“No!” four voices shouted in unison.

“Not here,” Joseph said.

“We need to prepare the others. When the doorway opens, we won’t have much time to get everyone through it.”

Reaching under the table, Keegan took Rune’s hand and gripped it tightly as he addressed the group.

“Do you really think this will work?”

Rune appreciated that no one rushed to give him false assurance because the truth was, none of them knew for certain.

It was a theory, a solid one rooted in experience, but still a theory.

A Hail Mary. One last hope of the desperate.

“Rune? What do you think?”

“I don’t know, kaelaer. ” He wished he had more comforting words, but he wouldn’t lie.

“But what other choice do we have?”