Ghosts were insubstantial, often unable to influence the physical world at all. But the supernatural was something else entirely. Graves sometimes had trouble touching a human being, or anything of the human world, but monsters and magick… he could combat them. Unfortunately, this meant that he was vulnerable to their touch as well.
Graves tried to block the pain, a trick he had mastered in life and never expected to need in death. He was tugged toward the floor. More tendrils converged upon him, sensing the air for his whereabouts, using his gradually materializing foot for reference. He didn't have much time. For a moment, he ceased his struggles. The string of magick that gripped his ankle loosened, just slightly. With every ounce of his will, he tore himself away from its grasp, and darted down through the floor to the level below.
The foyer swarmed with invading Corca Duibhne, and they began to panic as Morrigan shrieked from the floor above them. Graves flowed through the amassed Night People, who stumbled about the townhouse lobby, banging into one another in alarm. Then he was through the battered front door and out into the freedom of the night.
The neighborhood was deathly quiet except for the wails of a dog howling in the distance. The animal was afraid, and Graves did not blame him in the least. Things had grown worse since his departure to the spirit realms. A thick, rolling fog, the color of dried blood, covered the ground and blotted out any light from the sky.
The ghost rose above Louisburg Square, the pain pulsing through his leg just starting to fade. He hovered above the rooftops and gazed in awe at the city below him. The unnatural mist seemed to hold it captive, and shapes that even at this distance he could tell were not human, shambled upon the streets. He dove down toward them for a closer look and recoiled at the sight. Corpses in various stages of decomposition were making their way through the streets, all moving in the same direction, as if being drawn to something.
Graves could sense the turmoil of the souls trapped within the moldering remains, and then he understood the final words of the psychic Yvette Darnall. Something had dragged the spirits back to their putrefying bodies, intent on using them for some insidious purpose that he had yet to fathom.
Graves rose again into the air, watching the dead march down Beacon Street through the blood-red fog. Conan Doyle was gone. He knew he had to find his other allies, but first he needed to learn more about what was drawing the dead back from the afterworld. At the very least, he thought, as he watched them all streaming in the same direction, I want to find out where they're headed.
'Blast!' Conan Doyle bellowed above the shrieking winds that had abruptly torn through the quiet of the forest. He planted his feet firmly upon the moss-covered ground, fighting the sucking void that attempted to pull him in. He had been trying to re-open the doorway from Faerie to his home, but it was no longer there. In its place was a swirling vortex, a churning vacuum that tugged at him, a magickal trap that would consume him and anything else within the reaches of its voracious hunger.
Fighting the pull of the maelstrom, he threw himself backward, landing hard on the forest floor.
'Arthur!' Ceridwen screamed, her voice barely audible over the mournful wail of the vortex.
Struggling against the pull of the current, Conan Doyle turned onto his stomach and sunk his fingers into the soft earth, trying to drag himself away from that sucking hole in the fabric of Faerie. He saw Ceridwen now, anchored to a nearby tree with one hand. In the other, she still held her elemental staff. The flame within the sphere of ice that capped that length of wood glowed like a miniature sun, aroused by the presence of dangerous magicks.
The strength of the maelstrom increased, and for every inch of progress he made toward Ceridwen, he felt himself pulled back by three. The two sentries that had escorted him earlier cowered nearby, holding onto one another for dear life. One had managed to grab hold of an ancient vine beneath a cover of loose dirt and leaves, and was using it to secure them against the inexorable pull.
It had happened so quickly. They had decided to return to his townhouse in the world of Blight, and had used the magick of the ancients to open the door. He had not even considered the possibility that a threat might be present, not even taken basic precautions. Arrogant fool! Bloody amateur, he fumed, even as the screaming void dragged him closer. Walked right into that one like some novice.
The sentries cried out in fear and Conan Doyle lifted his gaze to see them sail above his head, still clinging to one another, broken vine trailing behind them like the tail of a kite, as they were consumed by the hungry whirlpool. Spells and incantations flooded Conan Doyle's mind, but he could not concentrate long enough to cast one. Then, as if some powerful beast had grabbed hold of him, he was violently torn from his purchase upon the ground, and he knew that his time was up.
He thought he heard the voice of Sanguedolce mocking him for his arrogance, but realized that it wasn't the voice of the arch mage that he heard at all, but that of his former lover.
'Is being sucked into the abyss part of your plan, good sir?' Ceridwen called to him over the din that filled the wood.
A tether of magickal force engulfed his body, suspending him in the air before the hungry void. His body crackled with an icy blue corona of supernatural energy.
'If it be so, I question the soundness of your judgment,' the Fey sorceress yelled, as she emerged from her place of safety behind the great tree, her staff extended. She had changed clothes for traveling to the human world and now wore a hooded blue-green cloak and hand-woven trousers the color of sand. In the swirl of the vortex, her cloak fluttered and the effect created in her attire the illusion of the ocean crashing on the shore. The sphere of power at the staff's end glowed once more, ice and flame combined by Faerie magic into a cold blue fire, providing him his lifeline. She fought the pull of the trap, struggling to keep her footing.
The maelstrom increased its pull upon the forest, and he listened to the creaking moans of the trees as their tenacity was tested. Ceridwen fell to her knees, sliding across the forest floor, but still she held her elemental staff high, maintaining her concentration and preventing him from being drawn into the spiraling hole.
Conan Doyle cleared his head and found the invocation that would suit his needs. He spun around to face the insatiable gyre and uttered a string of powerful words. The mage extended his arms and felt the might of the ancients flow through him. The countering magick streamed from the tips of his fingers, and his spell began to knit closed the rip that had been torn in time and space.
The portal to chaos fought him, screaming and howling, but his magick was stronger. Sensing imminent victory, he roared the last of the incantation. The swirling maelstrom imploded with a thunderous clap of sound that knocked him and Ceridwen through the air, back across the ravaged clearing.
An eerie stillness came over the forest and Conan Doyle slowly rose, checking for breaks and injuries. He glanced up to find Ceridwen standing where the vortex had been, passing her staff through the air, verifying that the rift had indeed been closed completely.
'I'm fine,' he said.
She turned and narrowed her gaze, looking at him coldly. 'Plead your pardon?' she asked, confused.
'I said I'm fine.' Conan Doyle brushed dirt and debris from his clothing. 'Just in case you were concerned with my well-being.' He knew he was being curt, but at the moment, her total disregard for his welfare was maddening.
'I see,' she said, expressionless. Emotionless. She turned her attentions back to the spot where the maelstrom had been. 'All trace of the entryway to your home, to your world, is gone. The last of the known gateways between Faerie and the world of Blight is no more.'
Conan Doyle felt a tremor of something akin to fear in his heart. If Morrigan had been inside his home, the situation in his world had become most dire indeed.
'We shall have to build a new one,' he said. The process was time-consuming, but there was simply no choice. 'We'll return to the kingdom immediately and — '
'No,' Ceridwen interrupted. 'There is no time for that.'
Conan Doyle glared at her. 'What else do you suggest? If that was the last entryway, then we have to conjure another.'
Ceridwen turned her back to him and began to walk away. 'It was the last of the known entrances,' she said, striding deeper into the dark wood.
'But I know of another.'
