My Black Beast (13 page)

Tiny trickles of the black-purple energy
collected in the stone and the scrimshawed patterns began to reveal
themselves as the magic moved along. The flow sped up and spiraled
in toward the center in a geometric dance. The light hit the
familiar scoop taken out of the middle of the rock and began to
pool into a buzzing sphere.

Lowell waited for the door to slide open as
all the others had done, but it didn’t happen. Instead the door
began to glow. Dim at first, the light picked up little by little
as it streamed from her leg until a wide rectangle formed on the
face of the stone. Minutes passed. The door was slowly beginning to
show what lay on the other side. Lowell turned his attention to
Marka. She was biting her lip and had her fists balled against the
pain. There was really nothing he could do. He wasn’t made of any
sort of magic and this wasn’t the sort of place you came to with
the intention of leaving something half finished. The best he could
do was not let his concern show. To support her by watching and
waiting until he could be of help.

The wall faded slowly, eventually becoming
just a pale grey tint with the slightest streaks of purple coursing
through. Another couple of minutes, and the wall was gone. Lowell
took a skeptical step toward it. He’d gotten to the point where
questioning things wasn’t really paying off, but this was still one
of those things that didn’t seem like it ought to be happening.
Marka, on the other hand, walked through the opening and into the
room beyond.

He followed, still a bit hesitant that the
door would reappear and that they’d be sealed in forever, but he
didn’t have much choice. The inside was dimly lit. Not dark,
exactly. Like a late evening sunset, only not the right color. He
could see everything in the room. At the center there was a small
mechanism, a series of onyx rings like he’d seen before. They
circled around another ball of magical energy. The rings floated
just above a small platform, revolving constantly at different
rates.

At three posts around the center pedestal,
there were tiny onyx prisms. Each of them was carved into the altar
which sat under it. There were no markings in this room at all,
only the glowing mechanism and the prisms. He could see a faint
sphere around the center pedestal. Maybe the prisms were making a
sort of laser alarm system kind of thing? It was hard to say and he
wasn’t exactly jumping at the opportunity to give it a
touch.

Marka flipped open the book they’d taken from
the library and found the page she wanted. She looked carefully
over the text and brought the book to Lowell. She handed him the
tome and pointed to a particular pattern that was in the bottom
corner of the page she’d selected. He traced his fingers along it
until he heard a tearing sound from near one of the prisms. Marka’s
teeth were latched onto her thumbnail and she was tearing it away
from the skin. Tears started to roll down her cheeks.

“
Jesus, Marka. What the
fuck?”

Lowell ran to her, but before he could grab
her and do whatever he thought would help, she yanked her head and
the nail tore away. She spit it onto the ground, breathing heavy
and clenching her teeth. Blood began to run down her hand. She
dropped to her knees, ignoring Lowell who was standing with his
mouth wide open.

She worked quickly, recreating the pattern
she’d shown him on the floor in her blood. As sections of it came
together, rivulets of purple flowed down from the altar into the
valleys between the deep red lines. She finished one and jumped up
to move to the other. Lowell followed, watching helplessly. The
protective sphere around the center was beginning to
flicker.

The second pattern was complete and the sphere
began to sputter and crackle. Not from the outside, but from
within. Whatever was held back by the prisms was trying to break
free. Marka paid the noise no mind and moved to the third altar. As
she got to work at the base, Lowell heard yelling from below. Just
as he moved to the door Degoed crested the stairs, walking toward
him with a dagger in his bony hand.

“
YOU!”

He pointed to Lowell and shouted. The next
words were in the old man’s own language, but there was blame in
his voice. Blame and hate and fear. The sound of a crack from
inside stopped the man dead where he stood as though he realized
where they were for the first time. His eyes narrowed and he
charged Lowell, the dagger over his head.

The dagger came down shallow as Lowell stepped
back, but the old man had committed everything to the blow. Pointy
shoulders jabbed at his chest and the pair went to the ground. He
could hear the dagger slide away toward the sphere. It slid into
the protective magic and hissed as the energy sent it shooting off
into a far wall.

Degoed struggled to push himself up. He looked
frantically around the room for his lost dagger. He wasn’t much of
a threat without the blade so Lowell wrestled with him as best he
could manage with his wounded arm. Any time he could buy Marka was
well spent. Old as he was, the Elder was wiry and put up more fight
than Lowell could handle with the damage he’d taken. Degoed freed
himself and began to clamber across the room on unsteady hands and
knees.

He had not covered half the distance to the
knife when a loud, sharp pop send a shock of energy through the
room. He froze, eyes turning in terror toward the center pedestal.
A sphere of white-hot magic lit the room like a tiny sun. The Elder
turned himself over and pressed his back against the wall. He began
to scream and curse in his own tongue. Old, horrified eyes locked
with Lowell's.

“
She makes our end. We will all
die.”

Lowell looked across to Marka. She was wearing
it, the ring. When had she put it on? The dense magical energy was
lashing wildly out from the slow growing sphere. A tail of it
caught Lowell on the arm, sending him sprawling in terrible pain.
It felt like acid was creeping slowly across his arm, burning
everything it touched.

Marka.

He gritted his teeth and forced his eyes open,
clouded with painful tears. He could see the blurred outline of the
girl against the hot white light. She reached out her
hand.

“
NO!”

The light consumed her as the orb jumped in
size.

“
NO! MARKA, NO!”

He got to his knees, the pain falling off
behind something worse. He stared into the burning torrent of
unbound energy, hoping for anything. There was only a violent wind
and a deafening hum. No. No, no, no. He balled his fists and forced
himself to stand. He took a strained step toward the light. He
pulled his leg forward to take another step when a pointed gust
caught him in the chest. He stumbled back and caught himself, if
just. Again he pushed himself toward the sphere that had taken
Marka and again it pushed him away. It was different from the
whipping air that filled the room. Almost gentle now. But it would
not let him move forward.

He swatted at the air, helplessly, trying to
force himself into the ball. The tiny wall of air refused to bend
or relent. Lowell fell to his knees. He shut his eyes, wanting
nothing more than to scream.

A warm, small hand touched his shoulder and
his eyes shot open. It was Marka. The pressure bearing down on
Lowell was immense as the ball sputtered in fits and bursts behind
her. He noticed it, then. He could see the ball through her. She
was fading like the door had. The feeling of warmth began to slowly
fade from his shoulder.

“
Marka, don’t. I can’t.”

He looked up at her, staring at her face,
pleading for anything. Marka smiled. It was beautiful and awkward
and not quite right, but it was true. She was happy.

The wind in the room died suddenly and the
magic smoothed and quieted.

She pointed to herself. “Go.” And then to him.
“Stay.”

She turned and moved back toward the sphere.
Marka turned around just in front of the brightly lit ball and
smiled again.

“
End.”

She stepped into the light and the ball began
to shrink and fade. It turned fast and bright. The entirety of the
black spire began to shake and shudder underneath him and all
Lowell could manage was choking sobs. The ball was a tiny dot when
the air began to rush toward it. Taking a breath became harder and
harder as the rushing air grew faster and more violent. Lowell
slumped and laid himself down on the cool floor, thinking how nice
it felt. He looked up to see what had become of Degoed. The hilt of
a knife stood out of his chest as hollow eyes stared off at
nothing.

All Lowell wanted was to sleep. The pain in
his arm was gone, he noticed and he couldn’t really breathe quite
right. He closed his eyes.

Chapter 15

A small prick in the back
of his hand
woke him up. There was the garbled sound of people talking but he
couldn’t so much make it out. There was an unsubtle pain over
basically every inch of his body. He could feel the pressure of
wraps on his arms and legs.

“…
used to be so cheerful before the
accident.” It was his mom. Oversharing, as was her custom. “His
sister—”

He tried to move and must’ve let out some kind
of sound.

“
Lowell?!”

God, she was shrill. His eyes cracked and
light flooded in for the first time in what felt like forever.
There was a blurry shadow looking down at him which was quickly
joined by another. His eyes adjusted and he blinked. A nurse and
his mother.

“
Lowell?! Are you okay? Oh god, my
baby.”

She leaned in to touch him and he let out an
involuntary sort of “ack” sound when she grabbed him. She shot away
at the sound, realizing he was injured.

“
The doctor! I’ll go get the
doctor.”

The nurse smiled down politely as she
continued taking his blood. He had a lot of questions. Mostly about
how common insane dreams were during a coma or whatever he’d been
in. Marka’s face flashed in his mind and a pain rose in his chest.
He reached up against the pain and grabbed for his locket. It
wasn’t there. He let out a ragged sigh.

“
End, huh?”

He huffed a sad laugh.

“
Sorry?”

The nurse looked concerned until he shook his
head and gave her a fake smile.

“
If you need anything, the button
is right here.”

She patted the bed next to him and left with
her cart of needles and vials. It was a sunny day, strange as that
was in Seattle. The blinds were down and he was glad for that.
There was a small click as the nurse closed the door
behind.

The hospital room was a private one and
weirdly spacious. It probably had room enough for two. Weird that
he’d get one. He didn’t have insurance that he knew about. He felt
a sudden urge to wiggle his toes, just in case he was paralyzed.
They worked. That was good.

The door latch clicked open again.

“
Your mom’s really going apeshit
out there.”

It was Emily’s voice. He looked over to see
her walk in carrying a wax plant. He wanted to laugh. They were
sort of a pain in the ass to take care of because they needed a lot
of light, but he’d insisted she start carrying them because he
liked their little star shaped flowers. She hadn’t wanted to but it
was basically the only thing he’d ever asked her for.

She walked over and put the plant down on the
table beside his bed. She’d always worn her hair long, but she’d
cut it short while he was gone.

“
You look good.”

She almost jumped when he said it.

“
Fuck sake, Lowell. Like I want to
hear that from a guy covered in bandages.”

He tried to laugh but ended up coughing. She
moved across the room, dropping an orange messenger bag into one
chair and sitting down in the other.

“
So what the hell happened?” She
crossed her legs.

“
What do you mean?” His throat was
dry and sore already.

“
Yeah, okay. Some ancient city
comes up in the middle of Puget Sound and floods basically
everything within a quarter mile of the water and you’re
oblivious.”

It wasn’t a freaky coma dream. He wasn’t sure
whether to be sad or happy.

“
There was a girl.”

“
Oh, romantic?”

“
No, she was young. And in
trouble.”

“
Yeah?”

“
I don’t know. I think I helped
her. What about all the people?”

“
In the city? They were fine. The
place was completely dry, however that works. The news has gone
pretty insane with the whole thing. Said there were some monsters
or something, even. Cops want to talk to you, too. Guess the
doctors said there was no way that was happening until they checked
you out after you woke up.”

Lowell laid his head back on the pillow and
stared at the ceiling.

“
You okay?” She walked over to the
bed and laid a hand on his. It was warm.

“
Nah.” He remembered Marka’s smile.
“I don’t know, maybe. I don’t know.”