But the field broke first.
Suddenly, I was hitting the ground outside along with what felt like half an ocean’s worth of water, leaving me gasping and heaving and coughing until I thought my lungs would come up. Which is why it took me a moment to notice several things: the field was back in place, and half a dozen mermen were on the other side, staring at me with their huge, colorless eyes. Hilde and Saffy were standing in front of me, trying to give me a chance to recover while holding back what looked like a mass stampede of people. And the book—
Was going insane.
I finally gasped in some air and scrambled back a few paces, getting my feet under me in the process. And getting away from where the tome was writhing and jumping and spilling a searchlight’s worth of radiance everywhere. It was strobing the faces of the panicked people flowing around us, who were running away from—
What the hell were they running away from?
I couldn’t see with all that light in my eyes, and with taller people and things flowing around me. And it was so loud in here, with people screaming and the loudspeaker blaring and my ears still half full of water, that I also couldn’t hear what Saffy was yelling at me. Until my ears popped and her voice got through.
“—of here! Did you hear me?” she screamed, grabbing and shaking me.
“No,” I said, and threw up some more water.
But then the light shifted and the crowd parted for a second, and I was able to see past her shoulder. More specifically, I was able to see a bunch of light fey pouring through one of the portals down the hall, a big one. Along with what looked like—
“What the hell is that?” I yelled.
“Time to go!” Saffy said, a wand in either fist.
But there was no time to go. No time to process the few dozen impossible things that had just happened and were still happening, because one of said things was about to run us down. The silver-haired light fey soldiers streaming out of the portal were attacking people with the weird spears they liked to use, which could deliver anything from cattle-prod-like encouragement to fry-you-where-you-stand bolts, but that wasn’t the main problem.
No, the main problem was the elephant-like thing that a bunch of them were riding, and that had just torn its way through the portal. It was enormous, at least five times the size of the earthly animal, and suddenly made the huge space seem a lot smaller and more claustrophobic. And when it bellowed, the very air seemed to shake.
Or maybe that was all the screams that suddenly joined in, like a chorus following the lead singer, because the thing was about to charge. Make that was charging, right down the rock-cut corridor, giving people very few places to go. Especially us, because the only “shop” within reach was full of mermen, who were still floating there, enjoying the show.
Only they weren’t looking at the crazed, mutant elephant, I realized. They were looking at—
“You have got to be kidding me!” I screamed, as something finished shredding the book and boiled out into the air. And, unlike in evil Santa’s shop, I got a good look at it.
“That’s not a ghost!” Hilde yelled.
No shit, I thought, staring upward.
At the giant column of black smoke that had already filled the spa
ce above us, looking like an oil fire, except oil fires don’t have glowing red eyes. Ones that turned on me menacingly a second later, as what I guess was a head stopped churning around the ceiling and dropped down in a sinuous, almost snakelike gesture. Right in my face.
I just stood there, trying to think where my power could send it, assuming I had any right now, which I wasn’t sure of, because I couldn’t feel it. I couldn’t feel anything but stark raving terror. Which wasn’t helped by the latest screeching bellow the damned charging elephant I’d somehow managed to forget about let out.
I screamed, because that’s what you do when you’re trapped between a powerful, pissed-off demon and ten tons of charging fury, wondering which will kill you first.
It looked like it was going to be the elephant, which was almost on top of us now, roaring and blowing and slinging people out of the way, left and right, with its huge tusks—
And then trying to stop on a dime when it was suddenly confronted with an even bigger, even madder, even more destructive force that, for some reason, was now grabbing the feys’ huge ride and—
“Oh God!” I yelled, right before Saffy tackled me and flung us both back against the merpeople’s ward, causing several of them to rear back in alarm.
But this time, we didn’t go through. This time, we stayed put, Hilde and Saffy warding like mad, putting a shield in front of us and several other people who had ducked inside that I’d have defied anything to get through.
Including the elephant thing’s guts, which were spraying all over the place, like bloody rain. Some people were still screaming, and others were just standing there, covered in blood and watching in shock as not-a-ghost sliced and diced the ride and then started on the fey. And then the whole long concourse of traumatized shoppers gasped when the mighty group of fey warriors turned tail and ran like all the demons of hell were after them.
Or, you know, one really big one.
Only he wasn’t giving chase. He was coming back over to me. And bending down to get those freaky eyes on my level. And looking at me expectantly.
“Sh-Sh-Sh-Shadowland?” I finally managed to say, naming the nearest hell region, and the easiest one to shift him to.