Page 153 of A Bond with the Dark

Dom stows his stake in the front of his pants, and Bash puts his in the back.

“Who’s gonna provoke who?” Bash asks in contravention, squaring his shoulders.

“Doesn’t take much for you to piss me off,” Dom glowers, spreading out his stance.

“Awe, come on, brother, I think we’ve come a long way today.” His voice is sharp with contempt.

“That does not make up for the last two-hundred years that you’ve been a complete dick. Why don’t you have another dream about my girlfriend?”

“With pleasure,” he answers with disdain, “as she will probably be dreaming of me, too!”

And this is enough to sear the anger in Dom to pounce on Bash. He flies up into the air and lands with a vicious blow to Bash’s head. Bash falls back and cracks his head on the stone floor, blood spewing forth out of his wound.

Dom’s eyes go white with the green rim, his teeth protract, and his skin turns pearly white.

Bash’s eyes turn white with a dark blue rim around them, his teeth protruding from the gums, and he hisses ferally at Dom. He lurches up and runs at Dom with that speed, knocking him to one of the stone pillars. The whole house rumbles, causing loose stones to fall from the ceiling.

Adaline looks up worriedly. Everett sends her a quelling glance.

Dom rounds on Bash and pushes him to the ground with a thundering boom, savagely punching him in the face time after time, punch after punch.

Blood runs thick from Bash’s nose and cut lip, he finally gets his teeth into Dom’s arm, ripping a chunk of flesh from it and spitting it out to the side.

I feel lightheaded at the gore and try to look away, but I know it’s essential to keep a steady eye on all that’s happening.

The wound heals as fast as it came on and suddenly Dom’s eyes go black, and he stops fighting Bash. His head goes still as though he’s listening to something. His head turns toward me, and I feel that terror again that I’m about to die. He rises from straddling Bash and walks toward me, Bash getting up and holding him by the arms.

Adaline and Hattie pour the blood over the artifact, chanting magickal words, and I chant with them, the hieroglyphics taking on a somber glow.

Another shock wave emits out of the artifact, and right as that happens, a hissing sound engulfs us, and the candles flicker in the breeze it causes.

As the hooded figures find their way down to the dungeon, Everett and Ollie are ready with their weapons and flash after them. Everett ferociously swings his mace to one’s head, making the most sickening crack as his skull caves in. Ollie takes his axe to another one, decapitating him with one swing.

The air changes again. The candles blow out, and a red glow secretes from the fireplace where this wraith of a warlock comes through, this time a man with diabolical red eyes.

His skin is as dark as the blackest night; his red and black dreadlocks hang around his fearsome and loathing face, framed by a dark goatee. He wears a black suit with red accents; the lapel and pocket square are that bright blood red. Atop his head is a black top hat rimmed with red, the skulls of small animals lining it, other bones in spikes reaching the top.

All along, we thought this warlock was a woman. But as it turns out, it is her male counterpart.

Adaline bends her gaze to me, and I summon my phoenix power. It becomes activated immediately when the warlock makes eye contact with me.

My skin cracks and fissures of gold emerge and glow. The fangs pierce through my gums, and the throbbing power within me propels me forward to the warlock.

Unable to tear my focus away from the man, the unequivocal fatality that rests within his aura staggers me.

Before I arrive at him to end him, his voice pours out of him, though his lips don’t move.

“You!” he admonishes, his voice echoing with such asperity in the dungeon that it almost stings. “You are the one that killed my sister!”

“That’s right,” I announce vehemently in a warrior rogue, trying to hide the terror within me. “I did. And now I will kill you.”

I make a move toward him. He holds up his hand; a long, spindly, dark, and terrifying hand.

“Before you kill me, Mederio, phoenix, know this,” he hisses petulantly. “I have Scarlet, and you will never know where she is or how to get her back if you kill me right now. The only way that I will reveal Scarlet’s location is if you give me the artifact.”

Looking behind me for reassurance, everyone is unmoving. Ollie and Everett are covered in blood, the gristly head of the grimspawn still dangling from Ollie’s hands. Bash is holding Dom back still, his eyes that black hue fixed on me. Adaline is poised with the artifact in hand, gazing from it to the warlock back to me.

“And if you think that by giving me the artifact and getting back Scarlet, you will be able to summon me again and kill me, it is there that you would be wrong as well. I have a hundred warlocks under the orders to mark your son should you be responsible for my demise.”

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