Chains of Obsidian

Book 4: The Crystal Halls

by Thomas K. Carpenter

Genres: Dark Fantasy; New Adult & College

Synopsis

Kuma and Pandora are on the run in the Eternal City—the deadly realm of the city fae. With her grandfather in complete control of the Undercity, Pandora knows their chances of defeating him are slim, but she's not willing to give up while she still holds breath. She leads Kuma on a dangerous journey through a realm filled with enemies to find a former mentor who she'd failed years ago. Hylakane—the Steel Sun—is an outcast, the last remaining member of Ebony Court and the only one she thinks might be able to help them. If she can't convince him to take her back as a student and unlock the potential everyone thinks she has, then everything she ever believed in will fall to ruin.

 

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Release date: January 16, 2024

Publisher: Black Moon Books

Print pages: 375

Sample

Chapter One

 

Pain was familiar to Camina. To become a waku meant a continuous dance with the agonies of training. The best made pain their friend. During her few short months in the Drops, she'd witnessed Duro working out in a cavern, running up a vertical wall, thirty feet high, then leaping to a hanging bar where he did a hundred pull-ups before dropping to his feet, then starting all over. Camina got bored long before he'd finished. It'd been a lesson that greatness did not come cheap. The stones, while powerful, were not a shortcut to glory. They were only the beginning of a long and torturous path.

The pain Camina was experiencing now was not meant to better her, but to break her spirit. She knelt in a pool of her own blood and sweat. Minutes became hours. Hours had become days.

To her surprise, they'd let her keep the opal and amber stones attached to her belly button. Under normal circumstances, she'd use the opal to heal her wounds, but drained of energy from the constant beatings, she had little left in the tank, and what was there, she was saving in case she needed to find an early exit. It was theoretical, of course, how to take one's life using one's own opal, whispered late in the night when they'd gathered at the Academy discussing the limits of their powers. But it'd been a practical discussion given that a competent torturer with an opal could injure and heal someone for months, or years on end. Camina wondered if they'd let her keep her stones to test her will.

When a door opened somewhere nearby—she could barely see through puffed-up eyes—Camina's arms started to shake in anticipation. They were clamped in manacles and hanging above her head, and the involuntary movement made the ache in her shoulders worse.

A set of expensive leather shoes approached her spot at the center of the room, staying outside the puddle of bodily fluids. Camina spat, wishing she could mar the shoes in a pointless act of defiance.

"Release her arms."

The voice was like honey mixed with glass. Even though she wasn't the target, she felt the compulsion layered within the tones. She was being visited by a maetrie—a city elf.

The clicking of locks was followed by the release of her arms, which fell to her sides, the blood rushing back in, bringing on a new round of agony. Camina whimpered as she bent over on her knees, the shame of vulnerability long since past.

"They tell me you haven't been very cooperative."

Camina flinched. The voice felt like she was being grabbed roughly and forced to pay attention.

"I don't know anything beyond the plan, which you already know about since it's over."

"That's not what I'm asking."

Hearing him was both sweet and bitter, rich chocolate mixed with eye-watering capsaicin powder.

"Where is

is Pandora?"

"I don't know. I told the others the last time I saw her was when we first entered the complex. I hoped she was right behind us when we jumped into the waterfall. Your patrol picked me up at the end of the canyon and here I am."

A long pause. "Look at me."

Her head was as heavy as a boulder. Camina squinted through one partially open eye to see the leader of the Alliance clan, Dominion Thule. Some called the maetrie handsome, but he made her stomach crawl despite his superior features. He should have been attractive, but something about the sharpness of his cheeks and chin and the deadness in his eyes made him ghoulish. He wore an expensively tailored suit, probably custom made, but it did nothing to hide the fiend beneath the clothing.

"I told you—"

"Where is Pandora? You're holding something back."

"I don't know where your granddaughter is," said Camina, feeling the urge to answer every question to make the tension of his presence diminish.

A hiss sucked through his teeth. "So she told you."

"Unlike your kind, we find lying and secrets to be abhorrent."

"A weakness to be sure, one I'm happy to exploit," said Dominion. "Who was she with last you saw? Or heard?"

The answer bubbled up her throat even as she fought to keep it down.

"Kuma went back to find her instead of joining us in the waterfall. If you don't know where they are, they must have gone out another way, or followed us in the waterfall later. I swear that's all I know."

The compulsion popped like a bubble and she took a shuddering breath. She collapsed onto her knees, sobbing even though she didn't have a reason.

The voice of a second person that she hadn't realized had entered the room startled her, but she quickly realized who it was based on descriptions she'd been given. Titus Cabone.

"There was no sign of

either of them. They could have gone back over the cliff."

"Kavano would have seen them if they had."

"Not if they went before the fight."

Dominion hissed. "Or he's keeping this information from me."

"Would you like me to talk to him?"

Dominion laughed. It was short, like breaking glass. "And lose your head? No. As I said when this venture began, I don't want you interacting with him. He maliciously follows orders."

"Then why do you use him?"

"Because there is no finer warrior. He might be the greatest of the eleven."

"Nothing an enchanted bullet couldn't solve," said Titus.

"I recognize your time conquering other realms might have given you the misconception you are his equal, but you are not. Take no offense. It is only the truth. Which is why I want you to stay away from him."

Even without her amber, Camina could sense the bristling of the maetrie mercenary. She wondered if Dominion was purposely planting this seed in Titus' mind. She'd heard both mercenaries came at an extremely high price. Getting them to kill each other would be an easy way to cut costs.

"Go and search the Undercity again. Check all the usual haunts at the Terreno and the other settlements. Anyone or anywhere they might think to hide. I would like my granddaughter returned to me at the earliest juncture."

"Understood."

"Now where were we?" said Dominion as heavy footsteps went the other direction. He stepped into the pool of blood, placing a finger under her chin. Looking into his eyes from up close felt like staring at the sun. She worried she'd be blinded.

"So young and fierce. You'd be a wonderful addition to my cadre of waku."

Camina screwed up

her mouth. "Never."

"You must seriously misunderstand that word," said Dominion, chuckling. "I've made my career overcoming the word never. Call it fault that when I hear it, I find myself awake at all hours, my mind working away at it like a sculptor finding the truth in a piece of stone."

He let her chin drop, and Camina found herself desiring his touch again, which made her sick to her stomach. A moment later, one of her guards was placing a small glass to her lips and tipping her head back. If it was poison, she didn't care. Camina drank it down before she considered what it might have been. The liquid created warmth in her chest, a spark that grew to a bonfire until she felt what she could only describe as adoration for her captor. Camina warred internally with herself as she wanted to throw her arms around his ankles and kiss the soft leather of his shoes.

"What is that?" she gasped reflexively.

"Menya," said Dominion. "It will help make you an obedient and loyal waku who will do anything I ask. Even kill your friends if it should come to that."

Camina looked up, intending to be defiant, but found herself craving his attention.

"Never," she choked out, the word lacking the passion she'd intended. She felt shame and heat rise to her cheeks. Dominion chuckled and turned to the guard.

"Put her through the program. I want her working as soon as possible."

A collar was placed around her neck and she was led from the room and thrown into a shower. The guard stayed outside while she stripped and climbed into the steaming water, which simultaneously hurt and refreshed. The entire time she leaned against the cold tiles, all thoughts consumed by the picture of Dominion Thule leaning into her vision.

"I hate you," she whimpered, knowing that the combination of his maetrie compulsion and the elixir had put his hooks deep into her mind.

 

Chapter Two

 

Kuma fell out of the portal onto rough concrete. Vertigo rocked his mind, leaving him curled on his side, trying not to lose the contents of his stomach. He felt like he'd been catapulted off the side of the universe and was still waiting to land. Warm hands pulled him to standing.

"We can't stay here."

Pandora's voice brought him back to reality. He managed to squeeze his eyes open, expecting more spinning, but their surroundings had him gaping with surprise.

"Where are we?"

A single pillar of obsidian stood sentinel at the center of what his mind interpreted as a garden even though there was no actual resemblance. Statues as tall as buildings surrounded the portal, connected by faint webbing glistening in the not-light. The figures were noble and horrifying, visages of maetrie in various states of battle. The sky above the garden was gray and ominous. It felt like it was pressing down upon Kuma while further out the city skyline gave him touches of vertigo.

"Don’t stare," she said, grabbing his hand. "We have to move before someone sees us."

Kuma ran with Pandora, crouched and head on a swivel. They passed between the enormous statues. He felt like he'd been shrunk down to ant-size and was trying to escape a stone chessboard. They reached the edge of the garden and headed into a dilapidated street with oily puddles and broken concrete littering the area. She dragged him across to an alleyway as a new round of vertigo tried to tip him onto his side.

"What—"

Pandora clamped her hand over his mouth before he finished speaking. She found a boarded-up door and gently pulled the planks off until she'd made a hole big enough to squeeze through. Once inside, she put a finger over her lips.

He didn't so much hear the approach of the newcomers as feel it in his chest and in the balls of his feet. The rumbling made him think of a tank.

She crept to the front of the room. As far as Kuma could tell, they were standing in an abandoned living room. The furniture had turned to dust. She used the meat of her palm to wipe a tiny hole in the filthy window, revealing the street near the statue garden.

The creatures that entered his view defied expectations. They had the shape of horses, but could be nothing further from the truth, with crunchy glass bodies that ground together as they strolled. Riders in black armor with amber badging rode on the strange beasts, glowering at their surroundings. A tall maetrie with long black hair and an androgynous appearance dismounted and crouched to the shattered street at a spot that Kuma was certain that he'd passed by. The dusty window blocked his speech, which came through as vibrations. When he turned up his amber, he was met with the language of the maetrie, a speech so angled and sharp that it made Russian sound like a cushioned divan.

Kuma sensed the tension in Pandora as she peered through the gap, her teeth grinding like

a millstone. He placed a hand on her arm, receiving a glare for his imposition. The maetrie in black armor climbed back onto the glass horse-like creature and led the patrol away, heading in a direction that made following their progress impossible.

The urge to speak was strong, but Pandora shook him off when he opened his mouth. He couldn't sense anyone nearby with his amber, but he trusted her judgement in the Eternal City. They waited in the dusty room for an hour before she motioned.

"They've moved on from the area. It's safe to speak."

"Are you sure?"

She frowned. "Surety is a self-inflicted poison for fools." Pandora glanced at the window. "But I think we're good, as much as I can tell."

"Who were they and what were they riding on?"

Pandora's nostrils flared. "The creatures are called stelynka. Unlike the human realms' concrete, steel, and glass, all of these can be given life, or occur naturally on their own. To ride the stelynka is an act of willpower as a single touch will flay the flesh. There are races involving riding them bareback."

"Shadows below," he exclaimed. "That's horrific."

"More than you can imagine, but the stelynka are not our problem. The Marchesa was here too quickly. Had we been a moment slower, she would have found us."

"The Marchesa?"

"The Marchesa of Pain. Sharikilla. She runs his estate while he labors in Invictus."

"You don't like her."

Pandora stiffened. "Loathe is a better word. She was one who pushed my mother to treat me like a maetrie child. Those scars you saw on my back could be

contributed to her."

"Is the estate near?"

She bobbled her head. "Yes and no. The Eternal City isn't like our world, or most realms. Distance and direction don't work the same here."

"That makes zero sense, but I'll take your word for it." The ache in her gaze made him realize that coming back to a place that she'd once called home had brought back traumas from the past. Her forehead was etched with wrinkles and her jaw pulsed rhythmically. "What do we do now? Is there another way back to our realm?"

A flat gaze followed by a slow headshake gave him the answer. A cold emptiness filled his chest.

"We're stuck. Unless we could sneak back in once things have settled down. Maybe my uncle and Duro survived their fight with the maetrie assassin and we could go back at a later date when they're hitting the alliance."

"Kuma...they had no chance. There is no better warrior in all the realms. Even amongst the maetrie. There are only a few that could beat him, and even then, I'm not certain."

"Could we find one of those others and get them to help us get back?"

"Kuma, there's no point in going back right now. Face it." She hung her head. "I'm too tired to use the portal again. It took a lot out of me and we can't get back to the one in the garden without being caught."

"I know this place is filled with bad memories, but we can't give up. We have to try to get back. It'll take time, but we have to do it. For the sake of our friends and family. Anything could be happening back there. Don't you want to make sure Triana and Vasy are okay?"

"They're not," said Pandora with her eyes squeezed closed. "It was a mistake. A trap. We did his dirty work for him. He served up his clan leaders on a platter and now the rest of the alliance will look to him to protect them. I'm certain that he anticipated Daraja. I would bet my stones that he sent Titus to keep them from leaving. That's why we didn't see him in the complex. We were so stupid. So arrogant to believe we could beat him, and now he has complete control of the Undercity."

Despair had hollowed her out. She looked ready to collapse onto the floor. He wanted to say something comforting, but there was nothing he could think of. She was right. They'd been outmaneuvered. They

 were—

"Wait. Do you think Marchesa knew who she was looking for, or was that a patrol?"

Pandora wrinkled her mouth. "We probably triggered something when we left the portal garden. If they knew we were here, then they wouldn't have stopped looking. We'd have been captured already."

A tiny spot of light formed in his mind. "Then no one knows we're here. Not your grandfather. Not our friends and family."

Pandora looked ready to refute him, but she clamped her mouth closed and squinted.

"What's your point?"

"I don't know. I don't know enough about the Eternal City to know what's possible. Could we get help from someone who hates your grandfather? I can't imagine that he doesn't have enemies here."

"Enemies are cheap in the Eternal City. There are countless who would love to see my grandfather's head on a spike, but they'd rather use us as a bargaining chip than champion our cause. War is dangerous. It makes you vulnerable. No one is going to help us. That's not how maetrie society works. Going to one of his enemies would be the same as throwing ourselves at his feet and hoping for mercy. If we're unlucky enough to be caught, the only way we'll survive it is to make them believe it's not worth killing us or turning us over to him."

"Then we have to do it ourselves."

"You're delusional," said Pandora, grimacing. "I don't think you understand how bad our situation is."

"What choice do we have? I'm not saying that we're going to rush through the portal tomorrow, but isn't there something we can do? Are there other beings than the maetrie? Someone who might help us?" Her eyes lit up momentarily. "You've thought of something, or someone."

Pandora crossed her arms and paced away, shaking her head the entire time.

"I doubt he would want to see me. I already failed once. I don’t imagine he's the kind

of teacher that allows for second chances."

"Who?"

"Hylakane. The Steel Sun."

The name sparked a memory of when Pandora had told him about her training.

"He was from the Ebony court? But that's been wiped out now, right? That would make him inclined to help us."

"Not at all. Without a court, you're more vulnerable. He fled the populated areas or he would have been killed. Now he lives so far away as not to be bothered."

"Without a court? How did your grandfather survive then?"

"Being unaffiliated and never having been attached to a court has minor advantages. Call him a free agent. On the other hand, it's why he spent most of his time in our realm. Safer and more opportunities."

"Could we ask Hylakane to train us? At the very least, it would give us something to do, and if he agreed, we'd be better equipped to return home."

"I don't know..."

"Pan," he said, capturing her hand, forcing her to look into his eyes. "Look. I know this place is filled with painful memories, but for the sake of our friends and family, for the sake of ourselves, we have to try something. You've already said we can't stay here, but it not here, then where? Why not go to Hylakane, ask him to train us? If he doesn't, then we'll make a new decision, but we need purpose. We need a goal. Otherwise, we might as well march back through the portal and put ourselves at your grandfather's mercy."

"It's a long journey... but you're right." She hung her head momentarily before meeting his gaze. "I didn't realize how many painful memories would surface when I returned. This was not a happy place."

"So we'll go to Hylakane?"

"When I was sent to him before, it took weeks in the back of a carriage pulled by shadowbeasts. On foot will take us months and it'll be through dangerous areas without easy access to food or shelter. We might not even

make it to Hylakane."

"Better than sitting here."

"Kuma." She lifted their clasped hands. "If we're traveling through the Eternal City, we're going to have to be at peak efficiency. Every moment we'll need to expect to be attacked. We can trust nothing and no one. Everything in the Eternal City wants to kill us. This realm is the embodiment of survival of the fittest."

"I understand. Stay on my toes."

"More than that." She shook their clasped hands. "We can't have this. It's a distraction. It'll get us killed."

The warmth in his chest deflated. Despite the circumstances, part of him was looking forward to spending time with Pandora. He would be lying to himself if he said he hadn't hoped to rekindle their relationship.

"I'm not even sure you'd want me in the state I'm in." She looked away. "Returning hurts more than I expected."

"I will resist all urges to seduce you," he said with a cocked grin.

Pandora rolled her eyes as she released their hands. "Remember, death and disfigurement lurk around every corner."

Kuma touched the spot beneath his eye. "I'll keep the amber running constantly. Nothing can sneak up on us."

A heavy sigh released from her lips. "To Hylakane then. Even though I'm fairly certain he's going to reject me. Us. It'll be a long trip for nothing."

"It won't be for nothing. It'll be for hope."