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SIXTEEN

Omen

After spending much time mortal-side, it became obvious just how dreary and amorphous most areas of the shadow realm were. How could any setting have the same impact as even the mortal world’s more mundane sites in a world where our interactions were reduced to vague impressions and ephemeral sensations?

So, it said something that the deep, sprawling hollow of the place where the Highest dwelled still managed to strike me as imposing. The shades of darkness lay somehow thicker and blacker there than in any other part of the realm. The shadowy planes seemed to loom over you and simultaneously threaten to suck you down. If I’d been mortal side, the scent that drifted through the filmy air here would have made me think I’d stumbled onto a rotting old ocean-liner: a combination of salt and rust and wet loam that spoke of the immensity of the sea.

Had this area arisen this way naturally, or had the shadows collected more densely and pungently because of the ancient nature of the beings that dwelled here? Or maybe the Highest had constructed the atmosphere in some purposeful way. They did enjoy wallowing in their self-importance.

I waited at the edge of the depths, the innate scorching heat of my shadowkind form holding off what might have otherwise been a chill in the darkness. The scrap of a demon lackey who’d run off to inform the Highest of my arrival was taking so long I was considering eating him for dinner if he ever returned. The Highest drew in enough fawners that they weren’t likely to notice one minor being missing.

I was equally tempted to turn around and head back to the rift I’d leapt through—to return to the crisper air and the vivid colors and sounds that I had to admit I often preferred to this place even if I wasn’t terribly fond of most of the mortal beings that inhabited that world. But if Sorsha could swallow her pride and turn back to her Fund for as many answers as she could get, and even the damned imp was willing to spend hours scouring the streets for a shadowkind who might have information, how could I shy away from making at least this one attempt to support my greatest cause?

It was a matter of dignity.

The unimpressive demon didn’t return after all. Perhaps one of the Highest had decided he’d make a nice snack. Instead of a lackey coming to usher me in, the call arrived in an echoing swell of a voice that I felt wash through me more than heard.

“Hellhound, you may come.”

So kind of them to allow this meeting. As I traveled forward, I suppressed the snarky remarks my old self would have liked to make. I wasn’t sure I would have made them, even back when I’d had a hard-on for making trouble. Not after my first meeting with the Highest, anyway. I’d been smart enough even back then to prefer toying with beings who couldn’t turn around and bite me in two.

The attitude that came over me when I sensed the massive, ponderous presence of the Highest ahead of me was more than shrewd caution, though. There wasn’t much dignity in it at all.

I’d heard one of the humans I’d conned long ago speak about how he reverted into the postures of his childhood when he visited his parents, as if their expired authority over him could reduce him from his current status as an adult. While I’d never been a child in the same way as mortals, and the Highest had nothing to do with my existence, confronting their enormity made me contract inside myself instinctively, as if I wasn’t one of the oldest beings in the realms besides them. My hellish heat shrank back beneath my skin; my fingers curled their claws against my palms. I didn’t quite tuck my tail between my legs, but an embarrassingly large part of me wanted to.

I couldn’t help imagining the choice remarks Sorsha would have made about that. Which annoyed me even though she wasn’t around to actually make them, doubly so because of the other emotions that stirred at the memory of the glint that lit in her bright eyes with her teasing.

Our mortal ally had tangled herself up far too much in my thoughts.

“You return, hellhound,” one of the other Highest rumbled. They towered so close together I’d never been entirely sure how many of them there were. “Have you tired of your quest?”

I drew myself up with as much confidence as I could exude without crossing the line into insubordination. “Not at all. Actually, that’s what I came to talk to you about.”

There was a general rumbling between more than one of the beings—a chorus of disgruntledness. I thought it was a different one who spoke up next.

“When we permitted you to take your leave on this endeavour you requested to pursue, it was with the understanding that we had no interest in it ourselves.”

The “permitted” remark rankled, even if it was technically accurate. “I know,” I said. “But I thought you might be interested now that I’ve discovered more. The harm I thought was being done to our kind—it’s much more serious and widespread than I ever suspected.”

Another of the Highest let out a sound that could only be described as a grunt, which even the echoing quality of their voices couldn’t make portentous. “Are there rabble-rousers like yourself fanning the flames of ire again? We can send a host to bring them in line?—”

“No,” I cut in, instinctively bracing myself. For good reason, because an instant after my failure of manners, a jab of pain coursed across my throat like the jerk of a choke chain—if that choke chain had been buried within my flesh.

I barrelled onward. “I haven’t seen any of our kind inciting the conflict at all. The offense is all on the mortals’ side. There’s a large collective of humans spread out across the mortal realm, determined to destroy not just every being of our sort on their side but the entire shadow realm as well.”

“Hrmph. Not surprising after all the work you and your ilk did to stir up those hostilities in the past.”

My jaw clenched. I didn’t need them to remind me of my complicity in the problem. That was exactly why I couldn’t back down now and let the Company do their vicious work unimpeded. I’d helped set the stage for them, and I’d damn well yank it out from under them if I possibly could.

“What these mortals are attempting goes far beyond any damage the shadowkind ever caused them. They’re attempting an outright extermination. And from what we’ve uncovered, they’re close to achieving it. They’re even working on ways to extend their influence through the rifts. They want all of us dead.”

And that includes you , I thought but kept in. The Highest could read between the lines. The last thing they’d appreciate was a being beneath them suggesting they were in any way vulnerable.

One let out a bellowing sort of chuckle. “They could never penetrate our home. You may disdain the creatures, hellhound, but you give them too much respect at the same time. They are frail, waning beings who barely breathe before they’re gasping their last.”

It would seem like that to the Highest when they’d been around who knew how many millennia. As if a human lifetime wasn’t plenty long enough to wreak all kinds of havoc.

Some part of me abruptly wished that Sorsha were here, just to see what she’d say to these lumbering ancients. Better that she wasn’t, though, if it’d even been possible. I’d get to admire her brashness and the flare of that flaming hair for about two seconds before she was down one of these leviathans’ gullets.

I hadn’t really expected any other answer. But for the sake of being at least as intrepid as that one mortal, I gave it a final go. “I think they might come up with a way. But even if they don’t, they’re tormenting and killing all sorts of mortal-side shadowkind.”

The sublime presences of the Highest loomed even larger over me. “That is not our concern. We regulate the rest of you when we must, but we don’t trouble ourselves with mortals. If one of our kind has been intensifying the problem, then perhaps we would step in, as we did with you… and your associates. Otherwise those who choose to pass through the rifts must own that risk themselves.”

Naturally. They would police and even slaughter their own kind if other creatures complained about the turmoil we were stirring up, protecting the mortals from us as much as those creatures from the mortals, but ask them to shield us from a direct, organized onslaught of maliciousness from those same mortals…

What did these ancient goliaths know about any of this anyway? None of them had ever ventured mortal-side, as far as I knew. They laid down laws and punishments about a world they’d never even experienced.

I would simply be thankful that they’d provided a convenient opening for the other topic I’d wanted to raise with them, one I thought I might get a smidge farther with.

I picked my words carefully. “On the subject of our kind causing problems… I’ve heard a few beings mention one you were searching for not that long ago. A shadowkind you wanted reports of but warned others to stay away from because of the danger—the name might have been Jasper or Garnet… some sort of red stone?”

That question elicited a much more energetic rumbling. My throat prickled as several sets of senses focused intently on me. Their voices blurred together.

“What have you heard? Has someone located that being? What destruction has it already wrought?”

They were definitely worked up about this rebel shadowkind—and obviously their minions hadn’t located it yet.

“Nothing that I’m aware of,” I said quickly. “And no one I spoke to had any idea of that one’s current whereabouts. I simply wanted more information so that if I saw evidence that might point you in the right direction, I’d recognize it to pass it on.”

There was a moment of silence I couldn’t help feeling had a skeptical edge to it. Then one of the Highest responded. “It was in the region the mortals call ‘America’ when last we heard, but that was some span ago by mortal time. The name you must watch for is Ruby. And even you should not challenge this one. If you catch any sign, bring the matter to us at once.”

“As you request. I want nothing to do with anyone who’s raised so much of your ire. What has this one done, if I might ask, so I can be particularly wary?”

“That is none of your concern.” The attention on me shifted, with another pinch of pain around my neck. “ You haven’t been disturbing the mortals again during your quest, have you, hellhound?”

Darkness save my soul if they ever found out just how much mortal blood had already spilled at my hands—and claws and fangs—in the past few weeks. Not enough that it would have mattered to them if it wasn’t for my history, but with that hanging over me…

I forced a smile I wasn’t sure they’d notice and lied through my teeth. “Of course not, oh Highest ones. I’m keeping within my bounds. I’ll return to my quest, then—and do my best to ensure none of the shadowkind affected by these treacherous operations ever need to call on your help.”

“Very well. That is satisfactory.”

I had the impression of them turning their backs on me, and the tension that had coiled through my chest released. Breathing more steadily again, I loped out of their hollow as quickly as I could move without looking as if I were fleeing.

Despite all their power, that was the only thing the Highest really cared about in their old age: being left alone. Even telling their lackeys how to carry out their orders was an imposition to them. All the better for me that they’d let much of their surveillance of the mortal realm dwindle over the past century.

But it was clear we wouldn’t find more allies against the Company of Light among them. We’d just have to hope we could track down this “Ruby”—and that the enemy of my enemies would turn out to be a friend to us.