The four of them pass a lot of the time duelling, sharpening their reflexes, testing their skills. Magic is all about trial and error. Even after thousands of years, Beranabus is still discovering new aspects of himself, depending on what’s thrown at him.
I’d like to join them, but I’ve been given a task and Beranabus doesn’t take it kindly when one of his assistants disobeys a direct order. So I keep to myself, studying the lights and focusing on Juni Swan and her master.
It’s difficult because of the whispers. The murmurs come regularly while I’m concentrating, not as strongly as at the hospital, but distracting none the less. I can’t stop thinking about the spell they’ve woven. Is it the work of the Shadow? Unlikely—if the creature could exert such influence, it would turn us against one another.
The Kah-Gash? A weapon that can destroy universes and distort the laws of time would have no difficulty bending a few humans to its will. But the Kah-Gash would surely have wanted me, Grubbs and Bec together, to unite so it could be reassembled.
If not the Shadow or the Kah-Gash, who can be controlling the lights? Are they self-conscious, some new life form? Or maybe I’m imagining them. I’ve doubted my sanity in the past. Maybe this time I’ve cracked for real.
Finally, after a week of self-torment and doubt, I sense Juni opening a window and leaving Lord Loss’s world.
“She’s moving,” I tell the others, disrupting their latest duel.
They crowd around me. “Where did she go?” Beranabus asks.
“Earth,” I say after a brief pause to confirm her location.
“And Lord Loss?”
“He stayed in his own realm.”
“Can you tell where she is exactly?” Dervish asks.
“No. I should be able to, but I can’t place it.” That worries me more than I reveal.
“Is she close to Grubbs?” Dervish presses.
I do a quick scan and shake my head.
“Well?” Sharmila asks Beranabus.
“Kernel and I will investigate,” he says. “The rest of you stay here.”
“Nuts to that,” Dervish huffs.
“Don’t forget about your heart,” Beranabus says. “Or Sharmila’s legs. You’re a pair of wrecks on that world. Let us check the situation and report back. We won’t engage her if we can avoid it.”
“What about me?” Bec asks. “I can survive there.”
“Aye, but I’m asking you to wait. Please. Until we know more about what we’re walking into.”
I’d like to know more about it too before I cross. But I’ve lived with Beranabus long enough to know he doesn’t hold much faith in the philosophy of look-before-you-leap. Except for his edgy pursuit of the Shadow, I’ve never seen him act cautiously. He believes it’s best to jump in the fire and deal with the flames when they’re licking the soles of your feet.
Keeping silent about my fears, I slot patches of light together and open a white window. With my back to the others, I offer up a quick prayer, the kind I used to reel off when I was a fresh apprentice, before I grew hardened to the terrors of the Demonata. Then, sensing Beranabus behind me, I step forward into the unknown.
→We find ourselves on the deck of a massive ship, close to a swimming pool. Deckchairs are strewn about the place. Bodies everywhere, ripped to pieces, stomachs carved open, heads and limbs torn loose. Puddles of blood merge and spread slowly, seeping into the cracks between the planks. The water of the swimming pool is a deep, dead red.
Beranabus ignores the corpses. He’s seen worse in his time. I have too. But it still hits me hard whenever I walk into a nightmarish scene like this. It only takes me a few seconds to recover, but Beranabus doesn’t even need that. He’s instantly alert, looking for threats, sizing up the situation. I see him relax slightly and, once I overcome my initial shock, I realise why. The area is charged with magic. We’re on Earth, but it feels like the Demonata’s universe. We can operate at full capacity here.
“We’re encased,” Beranabus says. “The ship’s been sealed off by a bubble of magic. They must have a lodestone.”
Lodestones are rocks which were filled with magic by beings known as the Old Creatures. They ruled our world in the distant past, holding the demons at bay. They fled many generations ago, but left the charged stones behind. Many have drained of power over the centuries, and Beranabus destroyed most of the others, to stop the Demonata’s power-hungry mages from making use of them. But some remain, secreted away, either unknown to him, inaccessible or indestructible. Demons or evil mages sometimes find them and use them to open limited tunnels between universes, allowing the Demonata to spend more time here and wreak maximum havoc.
“Where’s Juni?” Beranabus asks.
“Lower down. I thought it would be wiser not to face her until we’d assessed the risk. I don’t know if anyone’s with her, but there’s an open window. It’s not very sturdy. Only weak demons could cross through it.”
Beranabus thinks about that, then says, “I’m going back for the others.” He steps through the window, leaving me with the dead.
The silence is disturbing. I play out crazy scenarios inside my head, imagining the corpses coming back to life and attacking. I’ve never seen a zombie film. I heard about Night of the Living Dead when I was a child, but my parents wouldn’t let me watch it.
I don’t have any hair – I’ve always been bald – but if I did, it would be standing on end. I’ve got a bad case of what my mother used to call the heebie-jeebies. I want to duck through the window after Beranabus. This ship is bad news. We’ll wind up dead if we stay, bleeding sacks of flesh and bone.
Before I can bolt, Beranabus returns and the others cross after him. My nerves settle and I laugh away my fears. Zombies—ridiculous! I’ve seen enough of the universe to know we need never fear the dead, only the living.
The Disciples are nervous. Bec scans the lower decks and says there’s only one demon on board with Juni. I tell the others about the open window.
“We should go back,” Sharmila says. “Juni has set this up to ensnare us.”
“Why would she be expecting us?” Dervish asks.
“Lord Loss may have reasoned that we would target Juni. Perhaps everything – the attacks on Dervish, Juni revealing herself on the roof of the hospital – was designed to lure Beranabus here. The demon master might be poised to cross and finish us off personally.”
“Not through that window,” I tell Sharmila, certain no demon master could make use of the opening close to Juni.
“Then through another,” she says. “We have never been able to explain why Lord Loss can cross when other masters cannot, or how he goes about it.”
Beranabus sighs. “You could be right, but we might never get a better shot at Juni. If she’s not expecting us, it’s the perfect time to strike. If she is and this is a trap, at least we can anticipate the worst. The magic in the air means she’ll be dangerous, but it serves us as much as her. If Lord Loss doesn’t turn up, we can match her. If he does cross, we’ll make a swift getaway.”
“Are you sure of that?” Sharmila frowns. “If we have to open a new window…”
“We won’t,” Beranabus says. “Kernel will stay here and guard our escape route. You’ll know if any other windows open, won’t you?”
“Yes,”