Lord of the Night

Chapter 9: Anyalasa

At the transportation center, the Guardians on duty tapped their shoulders and tipped their heads in deference. Guilt pinched my gut and prickled the back of my neck.

I did not deserve the admiration in their gazes.

Though my rank surpassed their own, my loyalty clearly did not. I should have been focused on how to save the dwindling Guardians and humankind. Instead, my mind still scrolled through a reel of horrific images: Isalio strung up...screaming...begging...dead.

I found Fraschkit beside a row of terranean warpers. Rust dulled the warpers' once-shining silver metal, and the spidering support legs bowed out, succumbing to the weight. The tunnel had also deteriorated over time: sand coated the track, and the lights faded dimmer with each concentric circle lining the runway.

"Are you sure these warpers are still safe?" I asked Fraschkit.

"Safe as ever," Fraschkit promised. "Just a bit bumpier."

I scowled. "Because it was so smooth before?"

She snorted a laugh. "You'll be fine. I'll protect you." Then she jerked open the side door to the nearest warper and clambered inside.

With a sigh, I followed her.

Fraschkit's fingers danced across the dashboard, adjusting the knobs to program our trip. When she jabbed the start button, the whirring began, low at first but quickly gaining pitch and volume. I popped open the compartment between us, snatched two pairs of ear muffs, and passed one pair to Fraschkit. The ear muffs dulled the screeching whir and muted the clanking legs folding into the warper as we lifted off the ground.

For a bare second, we hovered. Then the warper lurched forward, speeding down the track. Through the front windshield, I watched the concentric circles whip by faster and faster as we approached the wall at the end of the tunnel.

Fraschkit whooped in delight. I gripped the bar below the dashboard, whiteknuckled.

The wall of dirt loomed before us, impossibly compact, and I instinctively braced for impact. But somehow, as it always did, the front of the disc sliced neatly through the wall of soil, carving a path like a builder ant. The windshield turned from rich brown to grainy tan as we rocketed upward.

In a cloud of sand and dust, we emerged.

The sand settled around us, leaving an endless stretch of desert. I darted a glance through the rearview mirror to see the sand already settled neatly behind us, leaving no trace of the eviscerated land below or the spot where we had just emerged. No human, Demon, or even Guardian could possibly locate our base without a warper.

The warper sputtered, choking on sand, and tipped from left to right. Then the whirring dropped to a gentle hum, and the warper cruised onward. We sailed across the desert just inches above the ground.

Fraschkit and I removed our ear muffs, and I exhaled a sigh of relief. The desert spanned endless before us, swaths of tan and mirages of silver sunlight stretching into the horizon.

Unfortunately, the calm allowed Isalio to reenter my mind. I remembered how my clothing draped his slim frame, and how he kneeled in front of me. I can make you feel things no Guardian ever has. And worst of all, I remembered my last words to him.

You won't die underground.

What an idiotic thing to say. Even if Rakimar and Borgal forbade Marqan from harming him while I visited my father, what was the long-term solution? How could I justify saving him? How could I prove his life held more merit than detriment?

How could I know it myself?

Fraschkit distracted me from my thoughts by socking me in the shoulder—a faux-friendly punch that was quite a bit harder than necessary, in my opinion.