Page 41 of Insidious Monsters
He turned away. “You should go now. I’ll keep you updated on Barathos, but now that we have this, you’re safe.”
He stood with his back to me, shoulders tight beneath the gauzy fabric of his shirt.
Something wasn’t right.
Something was super off.
“Lothos, wha—” The shrill trill of my phone cut me off. Nandi flashed on caller ID. “One sec.” I answered the call. “Nandi?”
“August, it’s a trap. You have to—”
The call cut out.
I stared at my phone in shock for a heartbeat.
“August?” Telarion and Lothos both asked.
“Nandi’s in trouble. I have to get to her. Fast.”
“I’ll drive you,” Lothos said.
But Bentley Station was a forty-minute drive from here, and she needed me now. I locked gazes with Telarion. “You have to go ahead and help her. And eat any fuckers who try and hurt her.”
His lips curved in a wicked, ravenous smile. “I’ll see you there.”
* * *
NANDI
The spirit realm was devoid of heat and color. It was a listless gray expanse of in-between filled with drifting and sleeping souls. I preferred to spend as little time here as possible, and the ghosts of my mystic sisters and brothers were here to make sure that I didn’t have to linger.
I didn’t have to speak to communicate my need to them. They recognized the threat and wanted to counter, and so I gave them the energy they needed, opening myself to them and biting back a scream as they dug in their spectral claws and drew from me.
They took my heat, cycling through my memories, drawing energy from the emotions buried within. I let them have it, holding back on the urge to fight back and push them off, because I needed them, and they needed this.
They swept past me, barreling off the spirit plane and into the living realm, eager for vengeance on the monsters who’d ended their lives.
A phantom breeze lifted my hair, and pain ripped through my limbs as the spirit realm tried to eject me. I didn’t belong and the balance attempted to restore itself. I sank my fingers into the gray earth, anchoring myself because I needed to give them more time.
Screams of pain and bellows of triumph filled my head. Ghosts couldn’t hurt the living, not usually, not without help. Not without power being given freely and ironclad intent.
These murdered mystics had both. They had what they needed, and they took it all.
My chest ached with the invasion of souls. I fell forward, gasping for breath as my lungs shriveled. Another blast of air hit me, and phantom hands grabbed at me, desperate to expel me.
One more moment.
Just one more moment, please.
A vise clamped around my throat and a voice filled my head.
“You do not belong.”
This was new? But there was no denying the voice’s ancient authority, and I knew instinctively it wasn’t something I could fight, especially in this vulnerable position.
I know. I know, but I need a moment. Just one more moment.
“Find your place. It isn’t here.”
