I scrunched my face but gave him a stiff nod. Now was indeed not the time for banter or funny anecdotes.
Focusing on the mission at hand, I cast a reveal spell, and a waypoint pentagram immediately appeared slightly to our left, matching the location in the vision Lyall had shared. To my relief, it wasn’t locked. Since very few people voluntarily ventured into the Haunted Woods and survived to tell the tale, it wasn’t surprising that whoever set up this hideout didn’t bother to block access to this waypoint. A simple incantation revealed the word of power used to come here.
I raised my left palm face up before me and invoked a flame. This time, I didn’t attempt to scry but instead drew the letters of the message I wanted to send with my index finger. They appeared as blue flames over the red fire in my palm before vanishing.
“Oh wow! You can send messages that way now, without paper?!” Lyall exclaimed.
“Yes. I’ve never done it before,” I said, stunned, even as I spoke those words. “I just got a strong sense that I could do it. This ‘being whole’ business is truly growing on me.”
He snorted, but didn’t comment further, allowing me to provide the necessary information as to our location and objective to both Father Paulus and Prefect Ewan—the latter with far more reluctance. However, he was much closer, and able to provide faster evacuation support should the women still be alive.
“Ready?” I asked at last.
He started nodding, then hesitated, looking slightly troubled. “Should we wait for your allies?”
My jaw dropped upon hearing that request, which he made with obvious reluctance. Lyall was not one to want assistance when it came to causing chaos and mayhem. Had I not been here with him, he would have boldly gone inside and let the chips fall where they may. But his protective instincts were driving him to take greater precautions to ensure my safety.
I shook my head. “It will take them a while to arrive. If the women are indeed inside, every second wasted could be one too late for them. Furthermore, it is standard practice for inquisitors to send scouts in first and confirm the threat before calling in the troops. Under the circumstances, we’re slightly changing the rules, but mostly to make sure that they are aware of our last location should things go awry.”
Although I could still sense his weariness, who is also clearly pleased at the prospect of us going in alone. I cast out all thoughts of how members of the Order would likely react once they saw me. There was no question in my mind that I would be stripped of my rank and position within the Order. The Church could never have a clearly demonic being as part of their main enforcers.
Surprisingly, that thought didn’t devastate me as much as I believed it would. I was now something completely different. That wouldn’t stop me from doing what I had devoted my life to accomplishing. Maybe separation from the Church was exactly what I needed. With Lyall by my side, we could achieve anything together, no longer constrained by the shackles of the Curia.
But that, too, would be a reflection for another time.
“Ready when you are, my mate,” Lyall replied with a feral grin.
That did the funniest thing to me. A wave of bloodlust and a rush of pre-battle adrenaline swept through me. To my utter delight, the blind rage and gratuitous violence I had previously experienced when my darker side surged forward failed to rear its head.
I was in control.
In almost perfect sync, Lyall and I spoke the word of power that the cultist had spoken in the vision extracted from his memory. A grinding sound resonated as the dirt mound before us shifted, a gaping hole opening before us, revealing the entrance to an underground secret lair.
The air emanating from that place reeked of the same dark magic that had swirled around the Harbingers of Aeshua’s Sanctuary. Bracing, I followed Lyall as he took the lead going down the damp yet surprisingly wide steps leading into the bowels of the dungeon. No mage fire illuminated the staircase. However, light at the bottom emanating from the room below sufficed to allow us to see clearly where we were going. That said, since my transformation, my vision had become extremely acute, granting me a rather impressive night vision ability.
I cast a sound dampening spell on us before we entered. As we climbed our way down, I whispered a series of incantations to detect traps or other triggers that could harm us. But only silence and the total absence of any clear defense mechanisms greeted us. It screamed of arrogance and overconfidence. Granted, it would have been nearly impossible to find this place without knowing specifically where to go and how to open the entrance. And no one in their right mind would voluntarily traipse through the Haunted Woods for a chance of stumbling on some secret hideout. But I had been trained with the mindset of always accounting for the worst-case scenario. Had this been my place, you never would have been able to walk in without my permission and leave unscathed.
Being in the lead, Lyall got a glimpse of the room below a couple of seconds before I did. The string of curses he whispered echoed the ones that burned my tongue as soon as I laid eyes on the grim spectacle.
The place perfectly matched the vision extracted from the Elder cultist. However, there were three new additions to the clerics hanging over the pit: two pretty young women I remembered from the orgy in the Sanctuary, and in the central, lowest position, the Oracle.
“Nine Hells,” I whispered. “What in the world is he up to?”
From where we stood at the foot of the stairs, the Oracle appeared to have grown back most of her skin, which I had burnt right off her in the Sanctuary. Even her face—which had been horribly scarred as a result of the various experiments she had performed on herself—appeared to be healed. This type of magical scarring should have been impossible to reverse unless you made the kind of dark pact whose price always ended up being far greater than what you initially agreed to.
A quick look around the room didn’t reveal the presence of anyone else. However, the blood on the altar on our side of the pit, close to the entrance, appeared quite fresh compared to the other blood stains caked into the stone. It couldn’t be more than a day old. Who and what had been sacrificed here? For what purpose? Thankfully, the women all seemed unharmed. I could only hope that their minds had not been damaged during the magic coma they’d been cast into.
I gently squeezed Lyall’s forearm to tell him to let me take the lead. Although he appeared a little uncomfortable, he didn’t challenge my request. Wanting to limit the risks, I only took a couple of steps forward. I then proceeded to cast a series of reveal and detection spells in search of any traps, secret runes, and any words of magic that could give me a better idea of what we had walked into.
Feeling reassured that we weren’t in any imminent danger, I advanced further inside the dungeon while casting more reveal spells. Once the place was as secure as we could make it under the circumstances, I turned back to my mate.
“We have to take the women down,” I said pensively.
Lyall nodded. “Yes. But they are rigged.”
“Correct,” I said with a frown. “The minute we free one of them, Elliot will be alerted.”
I glanced at the pit. “That thing is also bad news. You know some nasty shit is going to come out of it.”
