“That’s a warm up for what I’ll do to you in future.” Darius spat on Vard’s face then got down from the bed, tossing the finger into a glass of water on Vard’s nightstand and wiping the blood from his hand down his pants.
He passed me the sun steel blade and I leaned down and added a few more slashes to Darius’s artwork on Vard’s chest as Darius watched with a dark laugh, knowing this was never going to heal. He’d bear those scars until the day one of us came to kill him.
I wiped the blade off on Vard’s bedsheets before placing the sword back in its scabbard and turning my back on him.
But I frowned as I realised Geraldine wasn’t there.
“Where the hell did she go?” Darius whispered and the two of us ran out of the room, checking the corridor but finding that empty too.
A scuttling noise drew my attention to the ceiling and I swore as I found Geraldine bound in a web of darkness, her body glued in place and tendrils of shadow gagging her as she tried to shout a warning to us.
A rush of movement behind me made me whip around and some dark creature collided with me.
I hit the ground with a growl, shoving it back, its jet black body slick with some gloopy substance. It was half man, half monster and I threw it off of me in horror as I realised its face was a weird combination of Darius and Xavier’s, sending it tumbling down the stairs to my left as it shrieked and shadows swirled around it.
“What the fuck is that?” I shuddered as Darius tugged me to my feet.
The thing flipped over backwards on the stairs, its arms and legs lengthening as it scuttled up towards us, its head spinning on its neck and a huge black tongue lashing out of its mouth left and right.
“Ah!” Darius dove at it as it leapt from the stairwell, slashing his axe and severing its arm, making the creepy creature stagger away from him and lunge towards me instead.
I raised my Phoenix sword, tearing forwards in a burst of speed to meet it and ramming the blade straight up underneath its jaw, slicing through shadow and bone.
The creature shrieked as it leapt away from me, springing over my head as black blood sprayed across the tiles and it grabbed hold of the wall, scuttling up it like some kind of fucked up spider and hurtling towards Geraldine as she thrashed against the shadows which held her in place.
Darius threw a handful of flames between it and her and the creature screamed, lurching backwards and losing its grip on the ceiling.
It fell towards me with a howl and I shot aside before I could end up crushed beneath it, swinging my sword at it as more black gloop and blood sprayed up mine and Darius’s legs.
Darius swung his axe at the thing but it rolled aside, the blade ringing out loudly against the tiles as it leapt to its feet.
It screamed as it came for me, the grotesquely familiar features of its face making me recoil as it reminded me of my best friend and I shot towards it once more, driving my blade home in its chest with a grunt of effort.
It fell to the ground at my feet, making a horrible rattling, grunting noise as it died.
“Phew.” I stepped back, grimacing at the black goop which coated us and Darius swung his axe, beheading the thing to make sure it was definitely dead. The vile creature bled a puddle of black blood around our feet and we exchanged a look of shock.
“Ahhh, my ladies, I love you!” Geraldine cried as she fell from the ceiling as the shadows released her and I whipped out a finger, catching her easily on a gust of air and setting her down beside me.
“Oh, gracious, I have been saved by a dashing yet unfortunately shamed Fae,” she gasped then her gaze fell to where the monstrous creature had died and she stomped her feet in the blood like a kid playing in a puddle. “I have to say, I thought that beastly vagabond would pose more of a challenge, but what luck, it appears to have been an easy kill after it caught me unawares.”
“Yeah, I really thought that was gonna pose more of a challenge,” Darius said thoughtfully. “But then bam, thwack, splatter, dead.”
“Definitely seems like it should have been harder,” I agreed, relieved that it hadn’t been. “What the fuck was it though, and why did it look like you?” I grimaced and Darius shuddered.
“Don’t know, don’t care, frankly, brother. Let’s get the fuck out of here,” he said, leading the way down the stairs and we pulled tapestries aside until we found a way down into the tunnels.
“Into the night we go!” Geraldine cried as we ran along in the dark. “With a shadow eye in our pocket, and another slap delivered to the false king. Oh-ho!”