Inner Darkness (Book 2 of Dragonfire series)

Chapter 15

Stella's POV

I tossed and turned all night, dreaming of every possible way this could go wrong. Finally, my alarm went off at six am and I started getting ready. By seven, the five of us had already dressed, eaten breakfast, and we're ready to go. We loaded our gear on the hovercraft and took off.

The hour long flight was pretty quiet, but the look on Cullen's face said a lot. I could tell he was scared for Alena's sake. We finally slowed down and my heart nearly jumped out of my chest. Can you really blame me for feeling a little nervous? I must've shown it on my face because Cullen walked up to me and placed a hand in my shoulder.

"I'm really glad you came, Alena is lucky to have a friend who would do this for her." I nodded, unsure of what to say. Instead, I stood up and grabbed my gear along with the others. The pilot got on his radio and gave us instructions through the intercom.

"I'm going to open a shaft in the floor so make sure nobody is standing on it. I cannot land because the ground will suck the energy out of the ship. I have a rope that has notches in it so you can climb down. Use your walkie-talkies when you want me to come get you. Good luck." We thanked him and ascended down the rope one by one. I'll be honest, I was a bit surprised when my feet touched the ground and nothing happened. I expected to feel some sort of suction or indicator that my magic was being drained. I mentioned this to Lilah, but she said it would get worse the deeper into the caves we went. When all of us had finally climbed down, the pilot waved and returned to Kronborg.

I sighed and turned to Lilah, "Lead the way." The land around us was practically a bunch of rocks. To our right was a large group of boulders that almost looked like a maze.

"We need to walk through those boulders to find the entrance of the cave." The boys were the first to start climbing on the rocks. After a few minutes Derek yelled out.

"Hey guys I think I found it!" He stood in what almost looked like a room made of stone. Three large boulders formed walls and a fourth sat on top as a roof. Lilah walked in front of him and shined her flashlight in the opening.

"Yep, this is it." She led the way and the rest of us followed suite. We walked for about twenty-minutes or so before we saw a light at the end of the cave. When we reached it we saw small sconces filled with fire lining the way through the caves, presumably to the castle.

"Hey can we stop for a few minutes?" I wiped the sweat from my brow and leaned up against the side of the cave. "I don't know why I'm so tired, we really didn't walk that far."

"Maybe you're just out of shape, I feel fine," Alfio joked as he handed me a bottle of water.

"I feel the same way Stel, it's the walls. They are already starting to drain our energy." Lilah walked up to me and gave me a hand. "Let's get out of these caves so we can reserve as much of our energy as we can." I nodded and continued walking. After a few minutes we came to a split in the caves.

"Well, should we go left or right?" Alfio directed toward Lilah.

"How should I know? I don't have a map," she shot back. Cullen stepped up and examined both entrances.

"Why don't we split up?" My eyes widened and I shot him a look.

"Are you crazy? Haven't you ever seen a scary movie?? Separating is the worst thing we could do." Before he could answer a loud shrieking noise came from the right path. We all took a step back, unsure of what we just heard. I looked to Cullen with a knowing look.

"See, my point exactly!" Another shriek echoed through the cave, sounding closer than it had before. Whatever it was, it definitely wasn't human. A creature unlike anything I had ever seen slowly walked out of the cave.

It appeared to have a purplish-maroon color and stood on four legs. It didn't stand too high off the ground, but it had a long neck which formed into it's head. It didn't appear to have eyes, but I guessed that the small holes on either side of its head were ears. It opened its mouth to shriek again, and revealed many rows of razor sharp teeth. Suddenly it spit a thick, clear liquid across the cave walls. Everyone had jumped out of the way except for me. I looked down at my wet, sticky clothes and growled in disgust. Before I could start complaining, I felt a tingling sensation over the parts of my body covered in the liquid.

"Lilah what is this stuff....it's starting to tingle." Before she had a chance to answer, I started yelling in pain. The saliva felt as if it was on fire, burning my skin. "Get it off of me! It burns!" It started to solidify into some type of web material. The boys rushed over to pull it off, but it wouldn't budge. Cullen gave Lilah a panicked look.

"What the hell is this stuff? It's strong like rubber." I screamed again, annoyed and in pain.

"Someone just get this damn shit off before my skin starts to melt!" Finally, they combined their strength and threw the stuff on the floor. Derek held me as I collapsed into him.

Out of breath, I said as loud as I could muster, "Hint of advice, don't touch the spit." I looked over to the monster and saw it getting pelted with energy blasts. Lilah had already transformed and started attacking. With a final blow, the monster melted into a greasy stain on the floor. She transformed back into her regular clothes and dusted her hands off.

"Now that was disgusting." She walked over to check on me and make sure I was alright. I nodded weakly and took a sip of water.

"Now I know what you mean Lilah, all that struggling made my body feel like I just ran a few miles."

She gave me a reassuring smile and pointed to the cave going right. "Don't worry Stel we're almost there. The castle should be right through there.

"How do you know it's that way?" She turned around to see Alfio standing with his arms crossed.

"Well, the monster came from that way and I don't think it's coincidence. I think Damien sent it as a welcoming gift." We went through the cave going right, and soon enough, we reached what I had always envisioned hell to look like.

IM SORRY i feel like I haven't updated in a while but I am on break next week so I will be updating a lot! Enjoy :)