He swung the door open and peered out into the room beyond. It was more spacious than any he’d been in yet—a reception or receiving room by the amount of chairs and benches lying in pieces around the room. On the other side of it lay another set of oak double doors, this one half-splintered, half shattered entirely. And, between him and it, stood the creature.

  It stared at him with gibbous obsidian eyes that gleamed in the darkness. Its body resembled the shades he’d killed before. Jet black and imposing, yet somehow giving the impression of being formless, as though he were looking at a being made of mist.

  From its forehead sprouted a pair of mighty bone-coloured antlers, the tips of each razor sharp point glistening and dripping with crimson liquid.

  Unlike the top half, the bottom was almost too solid. The creature had the body of a deer or antelope; covered with brown fur and stood on four legs. Instead of hooves, however, the creature thudded back and forth on four very large, very human hands.

  You see how it still resembles a shade? The Drau is new-made. Possibly even less than a year old. We’re in with a chance. In fact… There was a pause then, and Casek could almost hear the gears turning in Tauph’s mind. This might be a golden opportunity.

  It did not give Tauph the chance to explain any further. The Drau let out another cry, the force of its voice sending chunks of furniture tumbling away from it. It leaped forward, its movements unnaturally fast, barely touching the ground as it raced at him.

  Casek threw himself to the left, lashing out with his blade arm. He felt the weapon make contact along the creature’s flank, cutting edge running across its entire flank as it tried to halt its momentum and turn back towards him.

  The skin, however, didn’t give way. The blow he’d landed should have opened a hole in this beast large enough for him to crawl inside, yet when he turned, there was no damage done at all.

  Not no damage at all. Remember, your weapon uses magic. So does the Drau’s defences. You might not have done physical damage, but you have weakened it. Keep it up!

  Casek ground his teeth as the creature forced him to scramble away from a second charge that came too quickly for him to ready an attack in time. “Why? Wouldn’t it be better to make a break for it?”

  If the Drau was any more powerful, then yes. But one this young is a golden opportunity that we can’t afford to pass up. I know this is hard, Casek, but you need to trust me.

  The statement couldn’t have been better timed. The Drau wheel round, and this time Casek could do nothing besides raise his blade to parry its lowered antlers as it charged directly into him.

  He grunted as the force of the impact sent him flying back, tumbling painfully over chunks of stone and decrepit furniture. It howled triumphantly over him, rearing back on its hind legs and chambering the front hands to stamp down on him, its creepy, elongated fingers curling into fists.

  Casek rolled as the fists crashed into the space where he had been, scrambling to his feet, and setting off away from the creature at a sprint.

  “What opportunity is worth being killed by this thing, Tauph?” he grunted, approaching the doors he had first passed through.

  The foci doesn’t just produce a weapon for you to use. That is only the beginning of their function. No, their true purpose is to help humans grow their magical capabilities in order to give them a fighting chance against the more powerful entities of the Shadow. That is their true genius.

  “How, though?”

  It allows you to bind Shadow entities to you. A twisted version of how I am bound to you, I suppose. You need to fight the creature first. Weaken it. Then you can enact the binding ritual using the foci.

  Casek blew through the doors back into the corridor, the Drau following not far behind. As unsettling as they were to look at, he was fortunate that the deer half of the creature did not have hooves. It was still unnaturally fast for how it looked, but he could keep ahead of it by nimbly avoiding the debris and rubble along the floor.

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  “What does that even mean?” he said, legs burning as he leaped over a stray chunk of ceiling.

  One thing at a time. Fight first.

  He swore loudly at that, but as he rounded the next corner, he turned on his heel. The creature followed clumsily after him, stumbling into the wall as it tried to turn itself at speed. Casek took full advantage. He surged forward, using the tightness of the corridors to get close to the Drau.

  The black blade in his hand blurred as he delivered a flurry of slashes aimed at the Drau’s exposed midriff. Tendril-like black arms reached down to block his attacks, and with each contact he could feel his power and the creature’s warring for dominance; how each blow landed stole a little power from the beast and rejuvenated his own, whilst each parried cost him some strength.

  It was a grim realisation that he could not do this forever. Just maintaining the weapon cost him, whilst it felt as though the Drau had a limitless well. No matter how often he struck out, no matter how clean a blow he landed, it felt as though he could detect to bottom to it.

  Finally, the creature wheeled itself around despite his assault, and used its other arm to lift a stray chunk of wood from the ground and swing it around at him. The blow knocked the air from his lungs as he staggered away from the beast, gasping for breath.

  This time, he could not block the charge of the creature, nor avoid it in the narrow corridor. Casek raised his sword up in time, but it did not halt the Drau. The blade shattered, and spear-like antlers skewered him like a stuck pig. For a split second, it carried him along atop its crown like some grotesque ornament, before shaking him off and dumping him on the ground with a boneless thud.

  He groaned, shifting his body in the heap it had landed in, surprised he could even move at all. Casek had expected the hot copper tang of blood in his mouth, of course, but the lack of damp warmth emanating from where the Drau had pierced him with its antlers took him by surprise.

  He patted around the area of the injury with an only slightly trembling hand and frowned when he felt nothing at all.

  Remember, these are creatures of the Other. The chunk of wood has injured your physical body when it struck, but the Drau’s antlers have wounded your body in the Other. Your magic.

  Casek glanced at his wrist, and sure enough, the singular glowing gem on the foci had reduced to the faintest of flickers, barely visible at all, even in the poor light of the building.

  A heavy pressure landed on his back, crushing him into the ground, and the Drau gurgled above him, the noise containing an ever so subtle note of satisfaction. Then something in the air changed. A sudden chill gripped him, pinning his body in place even without the pressure of the creature’s hand.

  Icy tendrils of power crept out from where the Drau had him pinned, crawling across his skin, coating it in a slick layer of what felt like oil. Casek squirmed as the sensation bloomed across his body, creeping down his back in one direction, and inching up his chest and throat, and towards his face.

  He gasped as the sensation reached his mouth and slunk inside, coating the insides of his mouth. This left him unable to scream as the sensation progressed to his eyes, surrounding and covering them even as he clenched them shut.

  Tauph was trying to say something, he knew, but even this was muffled by the sensation that seemed intent on consuming everything about him.

  The Drau moved its hand, easing the pressure on his back, and Casek tried desperately to move. To escape. To do anything but remain in this place and suffer any more of this. But he couldn’t. His limbs were frozen in place, his mouth and eyes locked open in a silent, horrified scream.

  Worst of all, he could still see as the sensation began to crackle and fizz with power, the oily coating covering him beginning to bubble and boil just on the surface of his skin. There was a snap, and from the bubbling on his cheek, just within eye-view, sprung a lilac crystal, pulsing with power.

  He felt another snap on his back, then another on his left thigh. Within seconds, the sensation exploded across the entirety of him; peculiar lilac crystals springing into life from the oily coating on his body and growing outwards, surrounding him.

  Soon, he was trapped in a crystal cage, like an ancient insect trapped in a prison of amber. Magic rippled through the crystals and him, and each pulse seemed to leave him feeling just a hint weaker.

  The Drau pranced around him for a while, braying and roaring and giggling, as Casek’s power slowly became its own. Then it padded off, deeper into the building, leaving him imprisoned.

  Casek did not know for how long he stayed there. He could no longer feel his own breathing, nor his own heartbeat. The chill grip of panic took him as he frantically tried to move and no part of his own body responded to his brain’s commands. It was as though he and his body were separated by the crystal, and he had been left here, trapped. Condemned to suffer, for only the Gods knew how long.

  Was this what he had woken for? To be imprisoned all over again, his power being drained by some forest demon? How long would it take before he died and could escape being fed on by this creature?

  If Casek could have slapped himself, he would have. There had to be a way out of this. A way he could escape this prison, and finally break out into the outside world—he’d just be damned if he could see it. All he had to do was keep his wits about him and not fall into despair. Keep thinking. Keep on trying things.

  A familiar giggling broke through the crystal shell, and Casek’s heart dropped once more. A half dozen shadows skittered into the room from the out the outside, scrambling over and around the crystal encasing him. They danced around it, whooping and howling with demonic laughter, and Casek felt several more pulls upon his magic begin, draining more and more from him.

  If Casek could have moved his mouth, he would have opened it to scream. Instead, all he could do was watch as the frenzied shades ate away, not at his body, but at his very soul.

  A note from Dylan King

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