Page 10 of Daemon Master

The silence stretched until he cleared his throat. “I’m not sure how to explain Heartrender’s strange behavior, but I suspect Shadowlash is bonded. If I’m right, its master must be after what I found in Crastley’s lab. We need to warn the Watcher Division and organize a search.”

Arbiter Janice’s fingers drummed against her desk. “Have you told anyone else about this?”

He shook his head.

“Good. We don’t need word of this getting out and sparking a panic. It’s for the best you came straight to me.”

Relief flooded him as he nodded. Recounting his harrowing day had been both cathartic and draining, making his earlier brushes with death seem more real. He’d survived by the thinnest of margins, and he doubted he was out of the woods yet. At least, he had the Arbiter on his side.

Arbiter Janice rose, her chair scraping against the floorboards. She skirted around her desk and paused with one hand on the door. “Of all the people for this to happen to, I’m so sorry it had to be you.” Her calm façade slipped as she swallowed hard. “Wait here. I’ll be back as soon as I can so we can put this whole sordid mess behind us.” With one last glance at Heartrender, she stepped outside, shutting the door behind her.

Adrian leaned back in his chair, touched by the Arbiter’s concern. It felt good to knowsomeonecared what happened to him, and even better to have that person take charge. All he had to do now was wait for her return. Then, he could head home for a nice, long nap.

Heartrender shifted by his feet, raising its head to lick at its translucent front paws. Adrian had never seen a daemon mimic normal animal behavior like that before. Then again, most daemons he encountered either possessed the vacant stare of the bonded or the crazed stupor of the bondsick. Was it some distant ancestral instinct rising to the surface?

Given what he’d discovered of Crastley’s reading habits, he suspected the old man would’ve known. Adrian’s thoughts turned to the journal he still had tucked in his satchel. He’d mentioned Crastley’s notes to the Arbiter, but she’d apparently forgotten in her haste.

If he was going to be stuck waiting, he might as well take a look. He extracted the beaten notebook and flipped it open, blinking in confusion at what he found. Words filled the page, but none that made any sense. He found the same garbled gibberish on the next page, and the next.

His heart sank. If Crastley had encoded his notes, it might take ages to decipher them. Perhaps the Arbiter or someone else at Serenity Corp had access to a daemon that could help.

So much for straightforward answers.

Skipping to the journal’s end, he drew in a sharp breath. He hadn’t expected to find anything different, but the words there, while written in a looping scrawl, were in the common tongue.

“Allow me to preface this account,” Adrian read aloud, “with the first of many confessions. I dedicated my life to discovering answers within the Seeker Division. After countless experiments and decades of study, I know more about the nature of daemons than perhaps any other human alive. So, believe me when I say that everything Serenity Corp has told us is a lie.”

He paused, remembering the scribbled notes left behind in Crastley’s books. Even if this was nothing more than a madman’s ramblings, curiosity compelled him to keep reading. The handwriting grew increasingly illegible, as though Crastley had rushed to get the words down.

“Serenity Corp wants us to believe they are our saviors—that their bondstones are a necessary pillar of our society. Yet, it is their own greed and folly that have driven us to the brink of annihilation. I was once naïve to their betrayal. Even after I suspected the truth, I continued to aid in their deception. But no longer!”

Spirits above, what was Crastley talking about? Serenity Corp wasn’t perfect—Adrian’s own interactions with the Watcher Division proved that. But their discoveries had won the Daemon Wars and led to the formation of the League. Without the combined expertise of the Watcher, Keeper, and Seeker Divisions, civilization would have long since succumbed to the feral daemons in the Untamed Wilds beyond the Bulwark. Hoping to find some answers, he read on.

“I destroyed what I could of Project Paragon and fled far enough with Specimen ADN-563 that I thought—I hoped—they would never find us. Perhaps I should have destroyed her as well, but I couldn’t bring myself to betray her trust—not after the lasting bond we had forged.”

Heartrender had perked up as he read, fixing its eyes unwaveringly on him as he struggled to process Crastley’s words. Was Heartrender thisADN-563—an escaped Serenity Corp experiment? His mind churned as he finished the note.

“I have written a full account of what I know within these pages. Only those who walk the rightful path of a daemon master will find the secrets they seek. If you wish to know the truth, then your journey begins with the symbol below. Hold it in your mind, shape it with your aether, and meld it with a willing daemon to experience the true bond as it was intended. Then, you—”

The words cut off there with a sudden jerk of ink on the page. Beneath it, more carefully drawn than the rest of the note, sat a circle of unfamiliar runes like those he’d seen scrawled on that scrap of paper back in the lab. As it had then, his aether roiled as if eager to form the shape.

Adrian reined in his reserve. Now wasnotthe time to experiment with unfamiliar magic, especially when the note made so little sense. The very notion of a daemonwillingto be enslaved was ludicrous.

Heartrender picked that moment to dart over to the door.

“What is it?” he asked, slamming the journal shut with a disgruntled huff. “What do you sense?”

The daemon glanced at him and let out a little yip before turning back to the door. Spirits above, how had he already come to trust the strange stray this much? His first thought had been that the daemon was trying to help, not that it might attempt to escape.

When Heartrender scratched at the wood, he sighed. “All right, give me a second.”

His aethersense registered nothing interesting outside, but perhaps Heartrender discerned something he couldn’t. He considered summoning Trailseeker—the daemon should be restored enough to manifest—but held off. After its valiant fight against Shadowlash, Trailseeker had earned the right to rest.

Instead, he moved to open the door, frowning when the knob wouldn’t turn. Why would the Arbiter lock him in? Was she that concerned about Heartrender getting loose?

Heartrender mewled anxiously. As if understanding this route was blocked, it dashed to the window behind the Arbiter’s desk. The daemon couldn’t quite reach the glass even standing on its hind legs, so it batted at the wall underneath.

All three of its eyes widened imploringly when it glanced back at him. His unease deepened. He might not be able to communicate with the daemon directly, but its silent plea seemed perfectly clear:Danger! Run!