Hell Bent Read online

  Hell Bent

  The Guild of Shadows

  -2-

  Marie Bilodeau

  © Copyright 2020 - All rights reserved.

  It is not legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this document in either electronic means or in printed format. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locations is purely coincidental.

  Cover art by Éric Belisle.

  Cover design by nia Loureiro.

  Editing by Jessica Torrance.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Marie Bilodeau is an Ottawa-based author and storyteller, with eight published books to her name. Her speculative fiction has won several awards and has been translated into French (Les Éditions Alire) and Chinese (SF World). Her short stories have also appeared in various anthologies. In a past life not-so-long ago, she was Deputy Publisher for The Ed Greenwood Group (TEGG). Marie is also a storyteller and has told stories across Canada in theatres, tea shops, at festivals and under disco balls. She’s won story slams with personal stories, has participated in epic tellings at the National Arts Centre, and has adapted classical material.

  Marie is co-host of the Archivos Podcast Network with Dave Robison, co-chair of Ottawa’s speculative fiction literary convention CAN-CON with Derek Künsken, and is a casual blogger at Black Gate Magazine.

  Find out more and see pretty book covers at www.mariebilodeau.com.

  Stay in Touch!

  Don’t miss out on a single update by signing up to my infrequent and super casual newsletter!

  Dedication

  To Derek Künsken,

  whose friendship programming is infectious.

  Acknowledgment

  I’m always humbled by all the support I receive. It takes a village to raise a book! Since I wrote a few books in this series in one quick succession, I’m forced (forced!) to repeat a lot of my thanks.

  First off, Tira became fleshed out thanks to the people surrounding the Dungeons and Dragon table, and how they interacted with her. She became who she is thanks to my #writersintaldorei crew – Brandon Crilly, Jay Odjick, Evan May, Derek Künsken, Tyler Goodier, Nicole Lavigne and Matt Moore.

  A bunch of the characters in this novel are based on the characters skillfully played by them, though the story, world and everything else is very much not at all it.

  We ended arc 1 of our campaign after almost two years. I wasn’t ready to let go of these characters, both the ones who lived, and the ones who perished along the journey. (You can read all about that at www.mariebilodeau.com/dd-taldorei/, should you be interested.)

  This is my chance to play with them again, and give Tira an entirely new direction to grow into.

  Aside from my game buddies, I also couldn’t have finished this book without Kerri Elizabeth Gerow, who has supported me for the length of my career and still seems to love me. Same for my sister-in-law, Jessica Torrance, who was instrumental in forging this book, both as its editor and head cheerleader.

  And of course, my maman Suzanne Desjardins, for her eternal support. My writing BFF Linda Poitevin, for continuously inspiring me to level up. And my brother, Jean-François Bilodeau, because he’s just so damn fun.

  And to you, dearest reader, for coming along this insane journey with me.

  Chapter One

  The dagger flew at a lazy angle, not even trying to hit its target. I sidestepped equally as lazily, not even bothering to take cover, and threw a dagger back toward the assailant.

  It went wide. Embarrassingly wide, even.

  We’d been training for more than three hours. I might not have been at my best, and this whole thing lacked a certain sense of immediacy.

  Turned out that I sucked at training.

  Someone gasped beside me and I turned to see Rachel go down, her pale skin almost luminous even in the darkness. Poor Rachel. She couldn’t see in the dark and had just taken a hit in the gut.

  Her assailant came in for a second blow, but I stepped in, grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

  Don’t hit a girl while she’s down, jackass.

  I yanked him back, wrenching his shoulder. He grunted, but didn’t go down, kicking my legs out from under me.

  Ouch.

  That was exactly what had happened last time, which proved doubly frustrating. This time, instead of kicking back, I pushed myself sideways to roll out of hitting range, pulled a dagger, and sent it flying in the general direction of the attacker.

  A satisfying thunk and grunt.

  I pushed myself up and looked in the direction my knife had flown. The attacker was still standing and came my way.

  Oh shit. I hadn’t hit the right target.

  Orienting after tumbling was damn hard! I leapt sideways, moved to meet my attacker, and tripped him. He managed to fall into a roll and took cover beside a half wall.

  “You hit me!” Rachel said, sounding pretty pissed. I winced. Well, now I knew what I’d hit. Still, a pissed Rachel wasn’t great for anyone involved.

  “Sorry,” I offered, trying to both apologize to Rachel while avoiding the arrow flying my way. The trainers’ shots were getting a bit less lazy, which proved worrisome. “I didn’t mean to,” I said in half a whisper. My breath burned my throat, and every limb ached.

  The other initiates were gone, already knocked out (sometimes quite literally). Rachel and I were still here but flagging like hell, and we knew it.

  “Tira,” she choked the word out.

  I knew that sound. Rachel was hurt, and tired, and probably pissed as hell.

  That was definitely not good.

  “Gangway!” I screamed, and threw myself behind a half wall, which had been a full wall a few sessions ago. It had almost withstood Rachel then.

  The darkness suddenly lit up with shades of pink, sparkles fluttering in the air. It would have been pretty, if I didn’t know what was coming next.

  The training alarm rang, the lights were thrown on, and someone screamed to take cover.

  I ignored it all and crouched with my head in my hands, the sparkles shooting lightning bolts one into the other, until the entire area caught in their brilliance erupted with blinding light. The half wall shattered beside me, throwing me to the ground, debris crumbling atop me.

  Stay down stay down stay down I repeated over and over like a mantra. The effect lasted at least an agonizing ten seconds. Getting up probably meant death.

  The light grew brighter. Fuck.

  I blocked my ears and opened my mouth. I’d seen one guy’s lung explode the first time this had gone off. After that, we’d received special training just to survive our own teammate.

  I closed my eyelids as tightly as I could. The light explo
ded and burned my eyes anyway. The entire room seemed to exhale as the air was sucked out. My lungs hurt, but I waited, knowing this would only take a second.

  The air blasted back in, retaking the vacuum created by the explosion. That’s what got you, if you weren’t paying attention. The second, bigger explosion.

  I rolled at least ten feet and came to a stop on my back.

  Someone coughed to the side.

  “Clear!” Someone managed to say.

  I opened my eyes and sat up, pushing pieces of drywall and metal off me. A few Guild operatives, aka our trainers, did the same, their dark clothes covered in dust. A few scrapes adorned me, but aside from that, I seemed unarmed.

  Not bad! I grinned and took stock to see how everyone else had fared.

  Rachel knelt in the middle of her devastation, a dagger sticking out of her shoulder (oops). She looked as ruined as the room around her.

  “Let’s call it a day,” Dame Zallir said, her voice cracking as always, a blend of jazz lounge singer and military commander. She stepped into the training room, looking pretty much like both, raven hair tumbling in messy waves down to her waist, dark skin covered by military fatigues. She didn’t wear the Guild of Shadows’ customary black outfit, nor could I spot the tell-tale infinity symbol anywhere on her.

  As far as I could tell, she was perfectly human. A perfectly scary, well-trained human.

  I walked over to Rachel and knelt beside her. She winced as she pulled out the dagger, blueish blood oozing lazily where the wound was already beginning to heal.

  “Sorry about hitting you,” I said. I wished that I’d grabbed a first aid kit so I could at least dampen the flow of blood a bit. Thankfully, it was doing just fine at slowing down without any gauze.

  I envied her that particular ability, though the rest of her powers made looking like a demon seem relaxing.

  “No worries,” she shrugged. “You pissed me off, though,” she looked embarrassed at her own outburst.

  “Understandably.” I helped her up. She handed me the dagger, and I flipped it into my belt. Unlike at Margrave Academy, where I’d spent my first few years as a Traded on this planet, we could keep our weapons here.

  At the Guild of Shadows. The place where I’d been shuffled off to, after a long and exhausting – not to mention damn weird and convoluted – trial. I had so many questions, but no answers were forthcoming. For three months, we’d been training. I hadn’t seen the outside of these walls except one time, and it had been made clear that I would be watched more closely.

  I sighed as Rachel and I limped out. We were exhausted, and still had no idea what we were doing here. Except for training. And staying alive. After a few failed exercises, it had been made amply clear that our survival was not assured.

  I passed by Dame Zallir, admiring the depth of her eyes, the assuredness in her relaxed stance, the way she seemed to know exactly who she was.

  And what she was.

  Human. She belonged here, unlike us Traded: random species from worlds far away, probably not marked on any star charts. A twist of fate following a weird portal incident that no one understood or could replicate.

  All I knew was that I looked like a demon, with purple skin, small horns, dark hair. It was a hell of a thing to look like when trapped on this world.

  “I’m going to get checked out by the medic,” Rachel said, and bid me goodbye. I turned to her, her pale blueish skin framed by short pink hair the only outward sign that she herself was a Traded. She looked perfectly human otherwise, unlike me. Well, the blue blood gave her away, too.

  “I’ll see you later,” I waved her off, heading down a secondary corridor toward our rooms. The Guild let us have our own rooms, to allow us space to reflect.

  Not that I took advantage of that, but I certainly enjoyed having my own space.

  “Tira,” Ian said, falling in step beside me. He was dressed in his dark Guild outfit, his long brown hair tied back and his beard slightly unkempt. Ian didn’t love hair, probably because he could shapeshift into animals and did so as often as he could.

  He didn’t have to do anything with his hair as an animal.

  “Ian,” I grinned at him. I hadn’t seen him in almost a month and had been worried about him. Ian was second-in-command of the Guild, a role he didn’t relish and one that Sonsil, the leader of the Guild, seemed to impose on him for reasons that weren’t completely clear to anyone.

  But he was the reason I was here, really. He’d been assigned to make sure I joined the Guild. Or made it here, since it wasn’t much of a choice. To make sure my past friendship with my best friend Clay didn’t get in my way.

  I had issues with Ian. But nobody was perfect, and he was as trapped as I was.

  “I’d like you in a briefing,” Ian said, his voice low. My eyebrows raised and I glanced his way, my heart beating faster as my grin widened. Was I about to actually get out of here for a bit? Briefings led to missions, right?

  My body practically vibrated with enthusiasm, a fact that didn’t escape Ian, who shook his head and sighed.

  “Don’t get your hopes up, Tira,” he growled. That only made me grin more. Grumpy Ian meant it would probably be dangerous.

  “What is it?” I asked, ignoring his comment. I’d barely disobeyed orders since getting here.

  “Meet me in the Mission Room in fifteen minutes,” he said, looking me up and down. “Maybe come with a bit less wall dust on you.”

  I looked down, my black uniform covered in drywall dust.

  I shrugged. “I look terrible in white anyway.”

  Ian nodded distractedly, mumbled that he’d see me soon, and headed down another corridor. I kept course, heading to my room to clean up and change quickly.

  I grinned as I got ready. I was more than ready for some fun and, from Ian’s dark mood, this would undoubtedly be fun.

  Chapter Two

  I’d never actually been in the Mission Room until now, and whatever I’d expected, it wasn’t this.

  It looked like a classroom. Several of us were invited to sit in the rows of about thirty tables and chairs. Only half the seats were taken, and precious few of those with faces I knew.

  It would be nice if the Guild believed in some sort of team-building exercise. We were expected to run into battle and have each other’s backs, to follow orders and work seamlessly together, and yet they didn’t seem to think it important for us to know one another.

  It’s not like there would ever be more of us. We were it. One bunch of babies traded twenty years ago. Cribs that had held human babies just moments before suddenly filled with monsters, from worlds they hadn’t even known existed.

  One time. One giant multi-planetary burp. The humans assumed, maybe out of parental despair, that their kids were on our planets (wherever the hell those were), and that those parents had taken care of their kids, just as they had us.

  Or so they like to say. Most of us were locked away in “schools,” taught to fight, to obey, to prepare to be shunted into guilds, organizations and leagues, to be kept in check for the rest of our days. While being useful to humanity.

  It was the price we paid for our survival here. They’d never made clear what would happen if we sidestepped, but I’d seen enough at the school alone to know that the price would be high.

  I never imagined it might be this boring, though.

  I looked from my desk to Ian, shifting in my seat to get more comfortable. Having a devil tail made sitting comfortably tough at times, especially in shitty old chairs.

  Ian had helped me find my way to the Guild. He’d saved my life a few times, and I’d saved his. But he’d been operating under the Guild of Shadows without my knowing, apparently not having gone to school, but recruited more quickly.

  He’d been vital in my split from Clay.

  Clay.

  I missed Clay. I didn’t blame Ian for our split. Clay had wanted different things than I did, and he was happy in his
fighter’s league. And Clay had kept a lot of secrets from me. Once those secrets had started to unravel, well, it was hard to hold it all together.

  In the end, I knew that I could only trust Clay so far. Just like I could probably trust Ian so far. Both were thick with secrets and lies, which scratched the shiny veneer of friendship. Of course, both could only trust me so far, too.

  I sighed, glanced around at the boring décor.

  I needed more friends. Maybe Rachel would be my new friend. She was explosively fun. I glanced around the room and spotted her there, and she gave me a suspicious smile.

  Could work out.

  “Good morning,” Sonsil said as he stepped in. Tall, dark-skinned, bald head, and piercing eyes, I still wasn’t sure if he was Traded or human.

  Sonsil stood in front of the class, pausing to look each of us in the eye, as though gauging us. Everyone stood straighter, except me. I leaned back in my seat. Sitting straight in a chair was great, but not the most useful ability. Sonsil paused on me a tad longer, and I swore a slight smile tugged at his lips.

  Before I could analyze it further, it had vanished, and he was all business again.

  He glanced to Ian and nodded, stepping aside to cede the front to him. Now I slid forward in my seat. I’d never really seen how Ian and Sonsil operated together, and I found it fascinating. Ian was supposedly second-in-command of the Guild, but he seemed to be more concerned with recruits and individual members than the overall Guild. It struck me as strange, but what did I know about operations? I’d been trapped in battle training all this time.

  I’d have to learn by watching, since no one bothered telling us anything.

  “The Rosetta Guild was attacked yesterday,” Ian said without preamble, his voice low but direct, clearly reaching the back of the class. A few initiates gasped. I had no clue what the Rosetta Guild was or did, but I didn’t like the idea of a guild being attacked.

  Ian continued before we could ask any questions, holding up his palm to stop any that might be blurted out.