Chapter 2: Summons to Downstairs

Chapter 2: Summons to Downstairs

The impossible warmth receded as Kael took another involuntary step back, the familiar, soul-deep cold rushing back in to fill the void. The sensation of its return was more jarring than its momentary absence. For a split second, he had felt something other than his curse. Now, its chilling embrace was a punishment.

"Stay back," he repeated, his voice a low growl. He forced his will upon the shadows, and his scythe solidified in his hand once more, a stark promise of death.

Lena flinched, but not from the weapon. Her hand was still pressed to her chest, her brow furrowed in a mixture of pain and profound confusion. "What... what are you?" she breathed, the words carrying a weight of genuine curiosity rather than revulsion.

He had no answer for her, none that a mortal mind could grasp. He was an anomaly, a function, a forgotten tragedy. Before he could formulate a threat to force her away, the warlock, Silas, groaned again, trying to push himself up on trembling elbows. Duty, cold and absolute, cut through Kael’s disorientation.

He ignored the woman. He had a task to complete.

Raising the scythe, he stepped towards Silas. But as he did, Lena moved, placing herself between him and his target. It was a suicidally brave, utterly foolish act.

"No," she said, her voice firm, the paramedic in her overriding all sense of self-preservation. "Whatever's going on, he's hurt. I won't let you kill him."

Kael stopped. Killing a witness, a mundane one at that, was messy. Complications were to be avoided. There was a cleaner way. He let the scythe dissolve back into intangible shadow, freeing his hands.

"You will forget this," he commanded, focusing his will, preparing to reach into her mind and pluck the last few minutes from her memory. It was a simple cantrip, one he’d used hundreds of times on mortals who stumbled into the wrong alley at the wrong time. He lifted his hand, his grey eyes locking onto hers. "You saw nothing. A man had a heart attack. You did your best, but he was gone."

He pushed the magic forward. It was like trying to pour water into a hurricane. The moment his will touched her, it was met by a maelstrom of raw, untamed empathic energy. Her power, a defensive shield she wasn't even aware she possessed, simply absorbed his magic, neutralizing it completely. He felt his mental command dissipate into nothingness.

Lena blinked, staggering slightly. "What are you trying to do?" she asked, a new layer of fear in her voice as she felt the alien intrusion.

Kael stared, truly shocked for the second time in less than five minutes. It was impossible. No one resisted the Reaper's will. Not like this. Not by accident. He could force her, overwhelm her shield with brute power, but the thought of the psychic backlash—both to her and, unnervingly, to himself—gave him pause. What would it feel like to have that sun-bright empathy shatter against his power? The brief connection they’d shared made the idea strangely distasteful.

Before he could decide on a new course of action—one that was rapidly narrowing down to far more permanent and unpleasant solutions—the world dissolved.

The rain, the neon, the smell of wet pavement—it all vanished. The very ground beneath their feet gave way to an unseen force. Kael felt a violent, wrenching pull at his very essence, a sensation like being dragged through a keyhole. He was accustomed to it; it was the signature of a high-level summons.

Lena cried out, her hands flying to her head as the world twisted into a nauseating kaleidoscope of colour and shadow. She stumbled, and without thinking, Kael’s arm shot out, his hand clamping around her bicep to steady her.

A mistake.

Even through the thick fabric of her uniform, the contact was electric. His curse, the withering touch of death, met the defiant life in her. A jolt of icy agony shot up his arm, while a wave of dizzying, disorienting warmth flooded his senses from her. For an instant, their polar-opposite energies warred, a silent, violent explosion contained in a single point of contact. He immediately let go as if burned, the sleeve of her uniform where he’d touched it now tinged with a faint, grey frost.

The world snapped back into focus with jarring finality.

They were no longer in a Brixton alley. They stood on a floor of polished black obsidian that seemed to drink the light, in the center of a vast, cavernous hall. Towering arches soared into a darkness so complete that it felt like a starless sky. The air was heavy, ancient, and thick with the scent of old stone, ozone, and something else—the faint, metallic tang of blood and power. Strange figures lined the walls, silent sentinels in the gloom: hulking gargoyles with stony skin, slender Fae whose eyes glittered with dangerous mirth, and robed figures whose faces were lost in shadow.

This was the heart of Downstairs. The Obsidian Court.

Lena’s breath came in ragged gasps, her eyes wide with terror and awe as she tried to process the impossible transition. She stared at the frost on her sleeve, then at Kael, her mind clearly struggling to connect the dots.

At the far end of the hall, seated upon a throne carved from a single, massive piece of jagged rock, was the source of the summons. Lord Valerius was an ancient vampire, the master of the Court. He appeared as a man in his prime, with severe, aristocratic features, jet-black hair slicked back from his high forehead, and eyes that held the chilling patience of a predator that has outlived empires.

"Reaper," Valerius's voice echoed in the hall, a cultured, silken tone that carried absolute authority. "You were tasked with reaping a rogue warlock, not bringing home a stray."

Kael inclined his head, a gesture of respect born of necessity, not loyalty. "The mundane witnessed the event. She possesses a rare and potent empathic ability that interfered with my standard protocols."

Valerius's gaze shifted to Lena, and for the first time, she seemed to shrink. Under his scrutiny, she was no longer a brave paramedic, but a terrified human, utterly out of her depth.

"An Empath," the vampire mused, his lips curling into a faint, predatory smile. "How... fortuitous."

He snapped his fingers. The air in front of the throne shimmered, and a gruesome image appeared, suspended in the air like a ghostly photograph. It was a corpse, a goblin by the looks of it, its body twisted in a rictus of unimaginable horror. There were no visible wounds, no signs of a struggle. But its face... its face would haunt Lena’s nightmares.

"This is the third one in as many weeks," Valerius stated, his voice losing its silken edge and taking on the hardness of granite. "First a brownie, then a pixie, now a goblin merchant. Each found dead, with no physical cause. No magical residue. No soul-trace. They are simply... extinguished."

Kael studied the image. He felt nothing from it, which was in itself deeply unsettling. Every death, especially a violent one, left an echo, a whisper on the arcane winds. This was pure silence.

"There is, however, one consistency," Valerius continued, his piercing eyes settling on Lena once more. "My most sensitive seers cannot touch the crime scenes. The psychic scream left behind is too pure, too potent. An echo of pure, undiluted terror that shatters any mind that tries to perceive it."

Lena flinched as if he had mentioned her by name, her own gift resonating with the description. She could almost feel it, a distant, horrifying chord of agony at the very edge of her perception.

"Your seers cannot track it," Kael stated, understanding dawning in his cold eyes. "But you believe she can."

"An Empath of her raw power does not merely perceive emotion," Valerius corrected. "She feels it. She can immerse herself in that echo of terror, follow its resonance back to its source, and lead us to the killer." His gaze was cold, calculating. He was not asking. He was informing.

Lena found her voice, shaky but defiant. "I'm a paramedic. I help people. I don't... I don't know what any of this is. I want to go home."

Valerius smiled, a chilling expression devoid of any warmth. "Your home is now a part of this investigation, little Empath. The killer remains at large, and their methods are an existential threat to the peace I maintain between Upstairs and Downstairs. You are no longer merely a paramedic. You are a tool. Our only tool."

He rose from his throne, his presence dominating the vast hall.

"Kael," he commanded. "You will be her guide and her guard. Your immunity to emotional influence and your... proficiency in violent matters will keep her alive. She will be your key. You will be her shield."

The decree settled over the hall with the weight of a death sentence. Kael felt a surge of cold fury. His curse was his isolation, his solitude was his sanctuary. To be shackled to this woman, this walking, talking sunbeam who had already touched the core of his being, was a torment worse than any physical threat.

Lena stared at him, her eyes wide with fear and a flicker of something else—the same horrified compassion he’d seen in the alley. She was trapped here, in a nightmare world she didn’t understand, and her only protector was the cold, deathly creature she had tried to save a man from.

"Find this killer," Valerius ordered, his voice leaving no room for argument. "That is my decree."