Dusk Gate (Soul Bound Book 1) Read online

  The woman nodded even more fervently, to Xandra’s satisfaction. The keys were on the table, and Xandra picked them up, glancing at them before determining which key was set to which shackle. Using the wrong key would cause the shackles to sever the limb they were restraining, which was a hazard many would-be rescuers had learned to their dismay. Unlike them, she knew what the markings meant.

  Xandra stepped over the knight, annoyed that his outstretched hand was in just the wrong spot, and crouched down to unlock each of the half-elf’s legs. That allowed her to stand, which the woman did unsteadily, and Xandra stood, reaching up to unlock the others. The woman swayed and almost fell, even as her hands scrabbled at the back of her head, trying to undo the gag. Xandra sighed, tossing the keys aside as she spoke crossly.

  “Stop fumbling about and let me take care of it. You’re my only chance of getting out of here,” Xandra said bluntly. It only took her a second before she unhooked the latch and released the gag, pulling it out of the woman’s mouth. It looked like the gag had been in place for a day or two, Xandra noticed, and grimaced. She knew how unpleasant that was. “There.”

  “Thank you! They have to have a mana potion, then I can heal—” the woman began, her rather pleasant voice a touch raw, but Xandra let out another sigh as aggravation rushed through her.

  “Really? Are you all this incompetent?” Xandra demanded. “If I hadn’t come along… never mind that. Here, take what you need and heal him!”

  Xandra murmured the words to a spell as she extended her right hand, one of the few spells she’d been allowed to practice consistently, and mana surged through her body into the hand, which began to glow a bright blue. The half-elf hesitated for just an instant, looking at her hand, then took it… and mana surged into her like a flood. It only lasted for a moment before it cut off, but the woman gasped, staggering slightly despite the fact she’d taken barely any of Xandra’s mana.

  “H-how much mana do you have?” the woman demanded, and Xandra rolled her eyes, turning back to the table.

  “Heal your rescuer. I’m going to take what valuables I can while you’re occupied. If I escape, I’d rather not be a beggar,” Xandra replied, her voice practically dripping sarcasm.

  The woman didn’t reply, to Xandra’s satisfaction, instead speaking the words of a spell. Xandra swept most of the items on the table into her bag, leaving the ones that obviously didn’t belong to her Mistress. That done, she strode toward her Mistress’s quarters.

  She knew that her Mistress had a bag that could hold more than it’s appearance would suggest, and she suspected she could gather the most valuable items she owned in no more than two minutes. She’d had to clean them often enough, after all.

  Chapter 2

  Jasmine Alexis tried to ignore how it felt like her internal organs were twisting, along with the occasional, audible pops from her bones. The pain was surprisingly mild compared to earlier, even if it felt like her body was on fire, from how heat suffused her.

  She also resisted the urge to try to break the spell that the demoness had cast on her. Jasmine didn’t know what it did, but the woman hadn’t been trying to kill her, so it could wait. One of the things that had been drilled into her early on was that stopping spells that altered the body mid-way was incredibly risky. It could cause heart failure or permanent problems, so unless you knew a spell was going to be lethal, it was safer to let the spell run its course and have an expert reverse it afterward. It didn’t mean she liked letting it work, though.

  At least the demoness was dead, which made Jasmine a little happier… though the cost had horrified her. For several minutes she’d thought that her rescuers were all going to die in front of her eyes, and for nothing. Then the other woman had arrived, and everything had changed.

  Before Jasmine’s eyes the hole in Adrian’s chest closed, and she let out a breath of relief, asking, “Any sign of my holy symbol, Van?”

  “Nope. Or at least, if any of this was your holy symbol, I don’t think you want to touch it,” Vanreth said, shaking his head as he looked over the table. The paladin didn’t look like he was quite recovered from the blood he’d lost. “You’re sure the caustic b—I mean, the caustic elf didn’t take it?”

  “Yes, I’m sure. She only took the items which the demoness was wearing, and she wasn’t wearing my holy symbol, that’s for sure,” Jasmine said, grimacing. “I’ll just have to use more mana, I suppose. Queen of the Sky, please grant thy succor to this child of the heavens, and grant them life once more.”

  As she spoke, mana surged out of Jasmine in a torrent, surrounding her hands in a white glow that radiated through Adrian’s body. A moment later his back arched, and the man sputtered, spitting flecks of blood as his copper eyes frantically refocused. It took him a moment before he focused on her, and an instant later he flushed and looked away.

  “W-what happened?” Adrian asked, the mage sounding slightly strained. Jasmine pulled away, relieved that he was alive, but also trying to ignore her own nakedness. She’d put on clothing after Naomi wasn’t petrified… though that would take the last of the mana she’d just regained, even if she took it slow. Adrian sat up and worked his throat before spitting more blood onto the floor, looking slightly ill.

  Vanreth looked over, shaking his head as he spoke unhappily. “You had a hole the size of my fist through your chest, Naomi got petrified, and I was on my last legs when I killed the demon. That crazy… woman from earlier showed up, and let Lady Alexis go. Said something about leaving, which seems weird after earlier.”

  “I said that my Mistress only allowed me three hours of sleep a night. Then you killed her, and I am no longer forced to follow her orders,” the woman interjected in a somewhat caustic tone, descending the stairs rapidly and coming into sight once more. “That being the case, I wish to leave before I suffer the consequences of her demise.”

  The woman who stepped into the room was different than almost anyone Jasmine had met before, and there was something oddly mesmerizing about her. She was an elf, both tall and slim like most elves, but it was something else that unsettled Jasmine. The woman had tanned skin that almost looked like it had tiny, glittering flecks of gold embedded in it, particularly on her cheeks, and her eyes were a vivid, glowing violet that stood out in the dimly lit room like beacons. Her hair almost reached her buttocks and was pulled back in a hair tie, while being a purple so dark it was almost black, and she had a surprisingly full figure for an elf. One that would have matched Jasmine’s figure, before the demoness had changed her.

  That figure was shrouded by an attractive black dress that showed off a great deal of cleavage and the woman’s stomach, including a black sigil around the elf’s navel that looked familiar. That symbol also adorned the black messenger bag the woman was wearing in front of her, though now she was also carrying a black silk bag. Around her neck, reaching from the base of her skull down to her collar bone, was a rigid black collar, one which Jasmine had to assume almost immobilized the woman’s head, and while she wore a tarnished pendant, it almost seemed to lend her an even more imperious air than the attitude of the demoness.

  “Why would you be concerned about—” Vanreth began, only for the woman to cut him off.

  “We do not have time for this. Why is the priestess still petrified? I assume that if you can bring him back from the dead, you can fix that,” the elf said, gesturing at Adrian sharply as she walked across the room. Her tone sparked a hint of anger in Jasmine, though she held it back. The woman was helping them, even if she was rude.

  “I don’t have the mana to do it quickly,” Jasmine said, trying to be as blunt as the woman was. “It took most of my mana to bring Adrian back.”

  “For the love of—then say something!” the woman snapped, and she cast a spell so quickly Jasmine barely caught the gestures, and her hand began glowing bright blue again. “As I said, take what you need. We have to go.”

  “What’s the rush?” Adrian asked, but Jasmine didn’t hesitate, thou
gh she gritted her teeth before taking the woman’s hand.

  Jasmine had only encountered four or five magi who’d focused on the sphere of energy before. While the manipulation of mana was considered a useful sphere, it was generally considered a supplementary one at best, as it didn’t have many direct applications in itself. It was also the only sphere she knew of that allowed a mage to gift their mana to another mage, or to allow someone without the sphere to give them mana. This woman, whoever she was, put those that she’d met to shame.

  An ocean of mana surged into her, rippling and pure as flawless glass. It wasn’t accepting the mana that was the problem. It was keeping that ocean from flooding her mana core and destroying it entirely. This time Jasmine knew what she was getting into, though, and she quickly cut the flow off before it could begin hurting. She shuddered, feeling like all her senses were alive with latent energy. The woman simply frowned at her in response.

  “The instant that my Mistress died, everyone bound by her knew it. I doubt that any of them are going to be in a hurry to talk to the demons, but she was bound to His Majesty, the great Flayer of Souls,” the elf said, her tone flat as she folded her arms. “He’ll have noticed that she died, and as the alarm hasn’t been raised, he’s occupied. The moment he isn’t, he’s going to figure out what happened, and when that happens, we’ll all suffer. Those of you who just got here will likely die relatively quickly, but as I indirectly led to her death, I will suffer for an eternity. I would rather not be here to experience how he got his title.”

  Jasmine flinched at the explanation, moving over to Naomi as her blood practically curdled in her veins. While she’d known she’d been caught in a trap, she hadn’t realized which cult had captured her until now. Suddenly, escaping seemed even more urgent than it had before, and she murmured, “Queen of the Skies, please grant thy servant thy power, and return this child her mortal form.”

  “How do you know that?” Vanreth demanded. “You’re just a servant, aren’t you?”

  “I was a slave. I’ve survived here for longer than any other slave, long enough that I know exactly how long the average captive takes to break,” the elf said frostily, as the statue’s stony texture faded, slowly taking a living form again. “You have no idea what you walked into. If my Mistress hadn’t been naked, you’d have all died or been captured, and for nothing.”

  “W-what?” Naomi asked, looking around in confusion. “I was just…”

  “You got petrified, and we need to get moving,” Adrian said, glancing at Jasmine and flushing again. “Apparently, killing the demon is going to cause the alarm to be raised soon.”

  “I need clothing first,” Jasmine said, smiling nervously at Naomi, then rushed over to the table, where Vanreth had already held up her robes. Jasmine quickly pulled them over her head, and gasped when they caught briefly on her chest. The enlargement of her breasts was not something her robes had been designed for, and the robes didn’t hang comfortably even when she got them on properly. They probably wouldn’t fit at all if they hadn’t been loose to begin with. Putting on her sandals took another few moments, and she didn’t bother with the rest, simply shoving the jewelry and everything but her staff into her knapsack.

  “Done? Good. Now we have to go. I assume you came through the portal?” the elf asked, one foot tapping impatiently. Then she paused, reaching into the silk bag and pulling out a black cloak.

  “Yes, we did,” Vanreth said, looking at the woman cautiously. “Is that bad?”

  “No, not unless you did something else stupid. We shall see. I wanted to choose the best route. The stealthiest route that will get us there quickly. There’s no point in going down the main halls and raising the alarm for a handful of seconds,” the elf said, tossing the cloak to Jasmine with a sniff as she turned for the door. “Besides, there’s someone I need to rescue on the way. Most of the people who are here deserve to be here, but there are exceptions. Also, put on the cloak. White is a color that no one here wears.”

  “Who even are you?” Naomi demanded at last, as Jasmine hurried to follow the elf, fumbling with the cloak to get it settled over her shoulders. It was a question that had run through Jasmine’s head a time or three as well.

  “My name is Xandra. Beyond that, I don’t remember much… it’s been long enough that the details are hazy,” the elf replied, not even pausing in her steps. “Now keep up, I’m not slowing down unless we run into someone I have to kill. Hopefully not, I haven’t been allowed to practice combat spells in a very long time.”

  At least that explained why the woman had so much mana, Jasmine thought. Something about the woman’s name sounded faintly familiar as well, but she didn’t have time to dwell on the subject, not with how quickly the woman was moving.

  Chapter 3

  Pressing the correct part of the wall, Xandra didn’t even blink as a section of stonework recessed and slid to the side, revealing a well-lit passage behind it. Behind her the intruders gasped, which she found rather foolish, considering everything else they had to have seen here so far. Unless they’d been blind, she supposed, which was possible. Few people were as capable of self-delusion as worshippers of gods of light. She stepped into the passage without pausing, their footsteps echoing behind her.

  “What are these doing here?” the knight demanded, though at least he kept his voice down.

  “For the slaves, of course. Many demons have the urge to hurt slaves on seeing them, so these were built to keep us out of sight when doing drudge work. It shouldn’t be a surprise they don’t go into truly important parts of the palace, though,” Xandra said, continuing down the hall at a brisk pace, her eyes flicking back and forth. She heard the entrance slide shut, which was good. She wasn’t going to look back to see if they were following, not that she could with the collar on. She’d have to find a skilled artificer to remove it after they escaped.

  When, not if. If was a terrible word, and one Xandra refused to even consider.

  “Damn. These would have made getting around the palace much easier,” the mage said, prompting Xandra to roll her eyes.

  “Yes, which was why I didn’t tell you about them. I was under orders not to tell intruders about them, or show them the passages,” Xandra replied. “This is a different situation, and some demons still use them on occasion. If we encounter any, we’ll be forced to fight.”

  “What do you mean by under orders, anyway?” the woman they’d come to rescue asked at last, her voice wary. “It seems odd. As does how helpful you’re being.”

  That prompted a laugh from Xandra, though she kept it short as she turned a corner, not slowing down even slightly. She felt wound like a spring, like any moment the alarm was going to begin howling. She replied, even if the question was stupid.

  “You may recall my comment about most slaves deserving to be here. I’m no exception to that statement, as in fact I quite deserve what happened. I made a bargain with my Mistress… and eliminating the habit of calling her that is going to take some effort. In any case, I made a bargain and was overconfident. I didn’t check the contract nearly as carefully as I should have,” Xandra said scathingly. That memory was crystal clear. Her Mistress had taken delight in reminding her regularly. “Instead, I ended up here, magically enslaved to follow her every order. Those orders ended with her death, allowing me the first real degree of freedom I’ve had in a very long time. What I’m doing is trying to escape more agony. If I thought it would be safer or faster, I’d have killed myself instead, but my soul is damned to this place. I’d rather try to find a way to undo that mistake.”

  “…You sound like you weren’t very nice,” the young priestess said, her voice a little cowed. It also prompted a snort from Xandra.

  “I don’t remember,” Xandra said, smirking at the hall ahead of her as they kept moving.

  “Huh. What about this person you want to save? Is she the same as you?” the knight asked suspiciously.

  That was almost enough to make Xandra stop in the hall
way. She managed to choke down her laughter, shaking her head the tiny distance she could, incredulous amusement rushing through her.

  “Alora? Like me? Oh, if you get captured, tell the demons that. They might laugh hard enough to give you a chance to escape,” Xandra said, grinning broadly. “No, she cut her way through a few of their cults, then through a dozen or so demons before they managed to take her down. She is immune to magical domination, so they’ve been trying to break her. They haven’t succeeded yet, despite having had her for over a year. If we want to escape, we’ll likely need help, and she’s ideal for that. As long as they haven’t crippled her yet.”

  “Holy crap. We had enough trouble dealing with a few of them at once…” the mage muttered, to Xandra’s amusement. It improved her opinion of him, as at least he was willing to admit he had his limits. Many people couldn’t do that.

  “Where is she?” the knight asked at last. “This doesn’t seem like it’s that fast, compared to the other route.”

  “Shush. She’ll have a guard or two,” Xandra said, turning the corner, and she saw a slave carrying a laundry basket ahead of them. The man’s eyes widened as he saw the others, and he darted through a side door almost as quickly as he’d appeared.

  They fell silent, and a couple of turns later, Xandra turned a corner to see the door where Alora was imprisoned, with a demon next to it. A demon which she recognized.

  The demon was tall and handsome by demonic standards. He had blood-red skin, bulging muscles, and black horns almost as long as his forearms. He was wearing black armor and had a sword at his side. His name was Elgraxx, and after how many times he’d abused her, Xandra had a bit of a grudge where he was concerned. In fact, she was almost happy to see him for once.