Fire Falls Into the Depths: Book Two of The Brimstone Archives Read online

  The wolf laughed and unleashed her beams from Leirgab as she shielded her eyes with the edge of her cloak. “You have become more confident in your powers. Cee will be very pleased.”

  Leirgab fell from the sky and tucked his body inward. Forming a ball, he padded his landing as he rolled across the ground that cracked beneath him.

  “Who are you, and what do you know about Cee?” asked Aiesha as she approached Leirgab, eyeing his body for any wounds.

  The wolf’s sharp teeth glistened. She walked down a set of stairs that appeared beneath each step. “I’m Raiven, and more importantly, I’ve been waiting for you. Thought I’d test out your powers to see if they lived up to Cee’s expectations. I suppose they’ll do.”

  Aiesha’s tail flicked. Leirgab stood up; his burly build stepped in front of Aiesha. “This wolf is up to no good. Why would she attack us? Clearly not something Cee would want.”

  Aiesha pushed Leirgab to the side. “I’m not backing down if she knows something about Cee. And if she wants my powers unleashed, I’ll gladly show her.” She approached the wolf, who now stood ground level. Her paws stiffened at her side, ready to form a fireball if needed. “Tell me where Cee is located.”

  The wolf laughed in Aiesha’s face. “Confident and demanding.” Her hood shadowed half her face. “I’ll show you to Cee.”

  She walked across the barren darkness with her small stream of light guiding her way.

  Aiesha motioned to Leirgab, who was already beside her. He still exposed a skeptical face with a crinkled snout. “What are the odds that we meet her shortly after crossing into the Cerebral Realm?”

  She nodded. “It is unusual, but she seems to know a good deal about my powers and Cee.” She and Leirgab continued to follow behind at a safe distance.

  Raiven turned around, looking backward while walking. “You know I can hear you, right?” Her teeth glinted with a wry smile. She somersaulted backward. “Houpor will be glad to see you as well.”

  Aiesha’s ears perked, and then she set off into a sprint toward Raiven. “What do you know about Houpor?”

  “He’s one of the elite members of the Corona Radiata. He trained you. Crossing the dimension sure did mess with your mind, didn’t it?” she said with a laugh. “We are not far from the edge of the Celestial Road. We’ll talk more once we get to the other side.”

  She jumped onward ahead of them. Aiesha and Leirgab quickly followed to keep up with her speed.

  The sound of French horns and trumpets resonated as if there were unseen walls. As they traveled further from the gates there were small, red fluid- and gas-filled orbs that meandered throughout the atmosphere.

  Leirgab reached out and touched a passing orb. It burst open, spraying bits of liquid into the air, which continued to float in space as if it were traveling down a stream. “Whoa, that was cool.” He reached out to touch another, but Raiven lassoed his arm with a stream of light.

  She growled. “Don’t mess with the objects that follow the Celestial Road. There could be dire consequences that set off a cataclysm in other parts of the Cerebral Realm.”

  Aiesha’s fireball shot toward the light stream, releasing Leirgab’s wrist as a popping firecracker with extended flares. She glared at Raiven. “Don’t mess with my friends.”

  In return, Raiven snarled with pointed teeth. “You’re lucky that Cee thinks you’re important. I didn’t sign up to babysit primitive rodents. Keep up so I can get on with another mission.”

  Aiesha’s body glowed white, ready to launch a series of fireballs, but Leirgab placed his paw on her shoulder. “It’s not worth it. We’ll find Cee and then ditch the wolf.” Raiven had already started heading further across the Celestial Road. The white aura slowly dissipated as Aiesha’s shoulders relaxed.

  They followed again, keeping a distance behind. Aiesha looked at Leirgab. “If she touches you again, she will be a hairless wolf.”

  Leirgab smiled. “I’m liking the new you. More confident and crazy powers.”

  She ran her paw through her deep, sea-blue hair, then reared back her arm as if ready to punch his shoulder. Instead, she relaxed, extending a claw toward his pointed nose, and sent a minuscule fluttering flame. The flame landed on the tip, causing his quills to shiver. “Okay, that’s just weird. It was like an electrical shock surged through my body. Maybe you stick to punching my arm.”

  Chapter 4

  The Cerebral Realm around them trembled, causing Leirgab’s body to sway. “What was that?”

  They glanced around, noticing the Celestial Road above them wavered like rolling hills. Light orbs flowed faster, some dropping off their patterned stream. The glass steps cracked, and a roar of rushing air swept past them.

  “Fool!” Raiven snared her teeth an inch away from Leirgab’s nose. “You poked around more than you should have.”

  Aiesha shoved Raiven back out of Leirgab’s face. “Nothing is worth sticking your nose in front of my friend’s face.”

  Raiven growled and sent a stream of light around Aiesha’s ankles, flipping her onto her backside.

  She quickly recovered and sent a steady flame toward Raiven, mimicking her own powers. Raiven leaped upward, glass steps formed below her paws. “I should leave you both to see the destruction you caused.”

  Another roaring wind soared past them, whipping their hair and robes to the side.

  Raiven streamed a light into the sky and ducked down as a cloud of gray mist appeared. Leirgab dive-rolled ahead of Aiesha as the misty form lowered to the ground in between Raiven and them. Raiven sent another stream of light lassoing around the misty, formless body. The light stream cut through the mist like air. Leirgab jumped up and watched the mist rush toward him. It flooded past his body like a shockwave, leaving his body unsteady. Aiesha shot a fireball from her paw as the mist approached her. Suddenly her body shuddered, and she felt nothing.

  She saw nothing. Pitch blackness. No sound other than her quickened breath at the realization that she was alone. She felt as if she was back in Cee Eoh’s cave. A moment of despair and loss overwhelmed her with sorrow. She reminded herself that she had a purpose. That Cee had needed her help with something bigger than what she left behind in their lands. Puunlo’s Paradise, once a home, was nothing but a lie, a dark veil clouding what she was destined to be. Her white aura faintly glowed, and a flame lit from her paw. The despair strengthened as she lifted her flame up to see a metamorph in front of her. Its gray body was fully formed but faceless.

  Aiesha stepped back and released a fireball toward the metamorph. It quickly dodged out of the way and rapidly appeared in front of her face, inches from her fur. It’s face took on Houpor’s. She heard his gruff voice inside her head. “Are you ready for another round of training?”

  She gasped as the metamorph raised a hatchet held in Houpor’s paw. His chest was dripping with blood as a gash spread near his chin, down and through his abdomen. The memory of Boca’s talon crashing down into Houpor’s chest was fresh in her mind. This time she felt her body heat with rage. A series of fireballs emitted in a spiraling wind tunnel around her.

  The metamorph’s body vaporized into a misty cloud. Maniacal laughter echoed in her head. “This will make you more powerful. Remember this feeling. It will fuel you.”

  She was furious at the comment. “You remember this,” she said as she bounded in the air with a spin and unleashed another series of fireballs, piercing the misty fog that surrounded her.

  A figure of Puunlo stepped down an invisible staircase toward her. “Ah, my tiny dancer is all grown up. You’s one of my greatest accomplishments.” His feet flitted in the air as his wings outstretched toward her.

  “No,” said Aiesha, flicking her tail. “You only fed us lies to keep you and your Paradise safe.”

  “But my sweet feline, I sacrificed so much to keep you safe. Did you really want to end up beside your brothers, only to die in the rebel fight?”

  “You were the one who gave the Jags the volcanic trident. You let them have the power that destroyed many lands and great rulers. You let Paradise fall. It was you that caused the Great Abyss and the death of my love.” Her body was now hovering above the ground as her hot white aura boiled from underneath every fiber of fur. “You killed Cee and Houpor!”

  “Yes, yes, show me what you would like to do to me to make things right.”

  A heated gust of wind radiated from her body, followed by a bursting white flame engulfing Puunlo and the cloud of mist, leaving her in pitch darkness. She felt her body collapse on the hard ground, losing her breath as the impact knocked air out of her chest. Her eyes fluttered, trying to stay open as she watched a mist form in front of her. Her eyes weakened to a close. Only a faint sound of laughing echoed in her mind before she fully lost consciousness.

  “Aiesha. Aiesha,” said Leirgab. “Wake up.”

  She felt his paws shaking her shoulders. She coughed and turned toward Leirgab. “I should have trusted Houpor sooner.” She launched a fireball toward Raiven, singeing the edge of her curly hair.

  Raiven yelped and twirled to the side, sending a light stream that wrapped around Leirgab’s body. She yanked with substantial force toward her, resulting in the lasso flinging him into the air.

  The sound of rushing water muffled all other noise. Everyone looked upstream at the cataclysmic rush of blood-red orbs bursting as they vibrated toward them. Aiesha leaped backward as Raiven continued pulling her lasso around Leirgab to the other side of the Celestial Road. Aiesha bounded back to the side they had initially passed over. Multiple glass steps cracked beneath her feet as the red flood approached. Her breathing quickened, and the acrid smell of metal filled her nose. She reached the opposite edge of the Celestial Road. Her last step wavered as the stair step cracked open, causing h
er to fall to all fours. She rolled out of the way in time to see Leirgab’s face in despair as he remained tightly lassoed by the light stream. Then the flood of red orbs blocked her view. She yelled in exasperation, “Leirgab!” There was no way he could hear her over the roar that passed between them.

  The flood continued with no end in sight. Aiesha stood up and ran along the side of the blood-red river, hoping for a way to cross the vicious path. She shot fireballs toward the road, but they dissolved into the rushing liquid.

  Aiesha’s eyes burned as the tears streamed down her face. She reached her paw into the red, flooded stream only to deter a small amount and watch it splatter to the surrounding ground. She reached into her pouch and pulled out the talisman, thrusting it into the moving stream. Nothing different from when she used her own paw. She was separated again, and not her powers, ancient talisman, or own paw could bring them together. Falling to her knees, she collapsed into her paws, lowering her head. She looked up into the vast darkness at her left and back to the flowing stream of liquid lights that roared beside to her. “Patience may be a virtue, but I’m not the dancing princess Puunlo wanted me to be.”

  She shoved the talisman back in her pouch when she caught a glimmering reflection next to her boots. She immediately looked above her to see a set of prism-enhanced stairs forming. This has to be a way across, she thought. She lifted herself up as the faint sound of trumpets blared from above.

  The last stair step formed within arm’s reach. She leaped upward and gripped the edge of the staircase, pulling her body onto the glass prism. The stairs only climbed a few feet before plateauing into a rolling hill runway that followed the Celestial Road.

  A blast of cold air rushed past her as she ran. She only ran faster, feeling her body heat. Before she realized it, her body was engulfed in blue flames that led a trail behind her. Ahead of her at the bottom of the hill, she saw Cee waiting for her with arms folded in a relaxed position. She ran faster. She came to a sliding stop, her flames extinguishing, as he remained present in front of her. This can’t be a mirage.

  Cee laughed and opened his arms to embrace Aiesha. She smiled and bounded forward into his arms. “I thought it would take forever to find you.” He was no longer aged or wrinkled like the last time she had seen his withered body, when she helped save him from the Jags. His youth had returned to him.

  Cee released his grasp. “Come with me. I want you to meet the others.”

  “The others?”

  He stepped down the side of the prism pathway as stairs formed beneath his feet. She followed him, her heart and breathing slowing from her sprint.

  After a short distance, they had walked through the vast darkness with only celestial starlight overhead to guide their path. In front of her stood three other cloaked figures. Their bodies and faces were hidden. Her stomach ached. She felt her shoulders and posture droop from an invisible weight as sadness overcame her. A dark mist formed around her, enveloping her boots, ankles, and legs. She was frozen. Paralyzed, unable to lift her paws. The dark mist now surrounded her full body, and it was difficult for her to breathe as pressure intensified on her chest. “Cee,” she said with a gasp of air. Her vision dimmed. The three figures approached her and pulled back their hoods. Faceless gray-scaled skin was exposed. “No!” she cried before the dark slumber overcame her.

  Aiesha’s eyes flickered open as she sat upright. I am not afraid of death.

  Her body was wrapped in a cloak, holding her captive on the ground. There was a murmur behind her. She rolled herself backward along the ground, paws overhead, positioning herself toward the voices. The cloaked figures of four beings cowered together in a circle. The indistinct conversation paused as one turned its head toward her.

  Aiesha felt her body grow warm, but the cloak encompassed her newfound powers. “Show me where Cee is.” The figures remained still.

  She rolled her body forward, tumbling toward the three figures. The sound of thumps followed her momentum.

  She stopped only after colliding with one figure. The others had moved to the side. That one figure did not falter in its steps. As she looked up at the hooded figure, its face was her grandmother’s. The eyes appeared softened around the edges, and her nose twitched as if avoiding a sneeze.

  “Grandma?” asked Aiesha.

  Her grandmother grinned, but the teeth were sharp and pointy, unlike her grandmother’s.

  “What is this? Why are you mimicking my grandmother?”

  The figure continued to hold its grin. Aiesha heard a voice inside her head. We have longed to meet you. Your source of powers can be of great use.

  Aiesha felt the darkness cloud around her again, like a mist rolling down a mountain. It forced her body to the ground. She struggled underneath the cloak that continued to restrict her powers.

  A shimmering light appeared from the blackness above her. She blinked her eyes to see if she was truly seeing the fluttering wings approaching her. A paw extended outward in midair.

  “Zuna?” The wind from the wings blew Aiesha’s sea-blue hair away from her face.

  “Come with me,” said Zuna as she slashed the binding cloak around Aiesha with the edge of a broken jewel.

  Aiesha bounded upward, reaching for Zuna’s paw. The surrounding mist dispersed with the sudden movement. Zuna grabbed Aiesha’s paw and lifted her up off the ground, breaking free from the cloud of darkness.

  As Aiesha’s body lifted away, she heard the screeches from the gray-bodied figures beneath her, their long, skinny arms reaching up toward her boots. She lifted her knees, pulling her legs barely out of reach from the mist that escaped their bony fingertips.

  She looked back up at Zuna in disbelief. “How are you alive? I thought you perished when I set off the explosion at the Tar of Tomorrow.”

  Zuna smiled back, looking down with her velvety red eyes. “I am going to take you to a safe spot I found. Then we’ll talk some more.” She lifted higher in the air.

  Aiesha held on with one paw, glancing across the newly viewed landscape of the Cerebral Realm. In the distance she could see the Celestial Road still flowing with the red liquid orbs that had burst into a rushing river. Overhead were more distant white orbs meandering through the dark sky.

  Zuna fluttered down closer to the ground near where a patch of large white crystals soared into the sky. “Here we can openly talk. It is a forest of selenite crystals.”

  “Like the small crystal sphere that Houpor held on to in the wooden box.”

  “Exactly.”

  Aiesha’s legs touched down on the ground, followed by Zuna’s.

  “It’s so magnificent,” said Aiesha, staring up at the furthest, most pointed crystal.

  Zuna placed her paw on Aiesha’s back, urging her forward through an opening between the jagged edges of the crystals.

  Aiesha stepped through the opening and felt a rush of calmness and tranquility throughout her body.

  Zuna’s voice quieted to a whisper next to Aiesha’s pointed ear. “This is where your uncertainties and fear can become something more. I will show you the way. The energy from the crystals will empower you in a way you have never known.”

  Aiesha glanced back toward Zuna. The velvet red eyes flickered, showing a brief glimpse of Houpor. A younger Houpor, one that she suspected Zuna had fallen in love with. A memory seeping out into the open under the brilliant crystals.

  There was an unforeseen light that radiated from the crystal forest. She inhaled, taking in a breath of fresh, crisp air. A sigh of relief escaped, knowing that she was no longer surrounded by the black cloud of mist and darkened figures.

  “Do you know what those beings were that were after you?” asked Zuna.

  “I am uncertain, but I suspect they were shapeshifters of some sort. They said they wanted my powers and had been waiting for me.”

  “Those are the metamorphs. They thrive on certain powers. It seems they prey on others to strengthen their own selves. They suck the life out of you.”