Darkly Devoted (Book 1, 2, 3)

LOMD Chapter 19 - Love and War

Chapter 19

IN THE distance, Vivienne heard cries of anguish as the remaining survivors saw the boat floating away in the vast black lake, growing smaller and smaller in the distance. Vivienne decided not to be left standing there like an idiot when they made their way to her. The hostile teenagers would probably show no mercy to the girl who destroyed the last vestige of their hope. Vivienne turned and ran back in the direction of the atrium.

When Vivienne reached the atrium, she noticed that Julian was gone. There wasn't a body, so that must mean he was still alive. There was just a massive bloody puddle where he had been. She hoped he was wounded badly enough not to come back to finish the fight. Blake was lying against the far wall, in the darkness behind a pile of fallen rocks. Vivienne went to his side.

Vivienne noticed he was breathing, but he didn't respond when she quietly called his name. She pressed herself against the wall, trying to make herself as small as possible. She could only hope that when the other combatants would leave the two of them alone.

Vivienne pulled the map out of her bag and unfolded it. This map was now her only hope of getting out alive. She hoped it would serve her better than it had Zissa's mother. Her recent scuffle with Julian had left the map ripped in two. Vivienne tried to piece it back together in the pitch darkness. She took out a Segais stake and held it against the paper to light it.

There was a mark where the sinkhole leading to the surface was. Vivienne struggled to find the atrium on the map. Even if she found the sinkhole, what chance was there that would be a way out after all this time? She had no guarantee that whatever rope or contraption Zissa's mother had used to get down was still there. Vivienne checked the watch on Blake's wrist which was now splattered with his blood. It seemed to mock her with its calm ticking. It was four am. She had two hours until dawn.

Maybe it was the lack of light, but the tattered pieces of paper in her hands seemed to make less and less sense the more she studied them. The lines of the chambers and the paths leading to them were drawn multiple times as though the mapmaker wasn't exactly sure where they were. There was a section in the center of the map of blank paper where all the paths and tributaries of the lake stopped. Vivienne wondered why that was a site that was unexplored. Perhaps, there was something terrible lurking there if even the great demon hunters of the past didn't go there.

Vivienne put her light source away, ducked down as she heard voices entered the atrium.

"There must be another way out! Your mother found a way out when she became Grand Master before the boat was put here."

"My mother was chosen," Zissa yelled back. "She had the blood of the Segais. None of you are worthy."

"Your mother died here," a voice replied. Vivienne felt her blood run cold as she recognized that voice. Nicole. Vivienne fearfully glanced out from behind the rocks. She saw Zissa backing away from a horde of angry teenagers. Her creme-colored coat was stained in blood, some of it black – demon blood – and some of it red – human blood. A short figure stumbled out from amid the horde. Nicole had a gaping rapier wound in her neck. Her head had nearly been sliced cleanly off. Now, she was a walking undead.

"Please, Zissa. I just want to go home. I'm so cold," Nicole whispered.

"None of you will be going home," Zissa said, laughing madly. She wiped her bloody cheeks with the back of her arm. Her beige trench coat was now coated with dirt. Even so, she still held herself up, chest puffed out with all the self-righteousness of a high school Queen Bee. "There's a reason why only one is allowed out. You are all cowards, afraid to die for the cause."