Chapter 249 - Another Plan

"Plan C?" Cornellio rasped, raising his brows. "Since when did we have one?"

"It's a classic strategy in case your enemy knows your plans. Make a plan within a plan, a secret within a secret!" I said on my way to Cornellio's side. "Don't strain yourself too much now, your aura needs some cleaning."

While I pulled the remnants of Staghead's power out of Cornellio, Eve explained. "The seal Diana gave you was a fake we made. It's coupled with a beacon of sorts that will let us follow Staghead into Under Hills. Right now, he's weakened, and only an arm reach away. He wouldn't expect it, either. But we have to hurry before he realised he was tricked."

There was only so much I could do with Cornellio's aura. Whatever Staghead threw at him, it ate at him like acid, figuratively speaking.. I doubted that even a blood infusion would help him quickly. Cornellio needed more cold and death than life right now. Still, at least now he wasn't getting worse.

His complexion looked better now, too. He managed to sit up, but didn't risk trying to stand. "Then you have to find someone else to fight Staghead. I don't know what he did to me, but I feel worse than I even did since I became a vampire." Cornellio slowly closed his eyes, as if staving off pain. "Is this how hangovers feel like?"

"Good thing that you aren't the only fighter around, then, Cornellio. Diana, let's go find one. Jean-Jacques is the closest. That's convenient, because we will have less to explain." Eve gestured for me to follow and rushed out of the door.

I could tell that the other fey were retreating, too. By the time I and Eve reached the front porch, the fight outside was over. Only trampled ground and strewn around bodies told about its scope.

JJ almost ran into us at the door, stopping—on vampire speed, no less—at the last moment, fast enough to create a gust of wind that hit my face and blew away my hair. He looked ruffled, but mostly unharmed, despite the number of his opponents. Mostly unharmed.

"JJ, Cornellio's alright but down, we are cool too, time for plan C!" I blurted out. "Wait, is this an arrow?" I pointed stupidly at a broken piece of wood that protruded out of his shoulder.

"As it turned out, the fey didn't wear their bows as a fashion accessory. Don't worry, it's just an annoyance… an oversized splinter." JJ waved a hand that didn't hold a sword in a dismissal. "So we will visit the fey realm after all."

"Yes. I hope you are ready. The more we hurry, the less Staghead would expect us. I also checked where we will drop at. Wilderness. Everyone that teleported from here," Eve nodded at the battlefield next to us, "should be there, too, though, so it won't be easy."

"But you won't be on your own there, pal." The words came from Bob, who ran up to us from what must've been around a corner, but looked like seemingly nowhere. He looked worse for wear than JJ, but didn't show worse wounds than a long, bloodless gash that went over his side. "No reason for me to not join this time around."

Eve grunted in a vague disagreement. "I hate vampire logistics, but we are supposed to work together, not tear each other throats out. Don't forget, my calming spell doesn't go into another sub-dimension."

"But Jean doesn't need it, do you? And you can just do your neat little trick, turn invisible, and I won't even know you are there. Wasn't that how you crossed so many borders over the years, pal?" Bob asked, grinning.

JJ shook his head with reproach, but there was a sparkle of mirth in his eyes. "It's a wonder you still have something left of your nose with how curious you are, Bob. If that wasn't me standing here, but say, Terence, he would've torn it out for being nosey together with your head."

Bob snorted. "Terence? You picked a poor example. I'd like to see him try… Then I'd be able to tear off HIS head."

That prompted a bark of laughter from JJ that was interrupted when Eve clapped her hands to get everyone's attention. "Enough chit-chat! Everyone, take someone's hand so we didn't get thrown around on teleportation, and prepare for a fight!"

"Right…" Bob reached a hand free of weapon to Eve.

I took JJ's hand and Eve's, and like that, our chain was complete. The rest was just a matter of who will breach the space, and to my surprise, I found Eve looking at me. "Well, what are you waiting for, Diana? You had more practice in this."

Did I? Oh well.

"Alright. Get ready, guys," I said and reached towards the veil of space.

The way through it towards the other space was anything but obvious. But that was what the beacon seal was for. It was something that I could refer to as "reverse divination". It showed me the path, and in Ghost's examples with the magic box, after you saw it, everything became much simpler.

I just tore the space open and folded it with us on the other side. And just like that, in a blink of an eye, the scenery around changed.

The cloudy sky turned pure blue, but there was no sunlight falling from it. Instead, the light was just there, throwing strange shadows and creating a sense of wrongness deep in one's subconscious. Ankle-high grass grew under our feet, peppered with multicoloured flowers. Groves of trees were visible here and there.

And, just like Eve predicted, Staghead was there, too. Just a dozen meters away, surrounded by his fey henchmen. They were helping their wounded, while Staghead, smiling triumphantly, looked at the fake seal in his hands.

What a pleasure it was to see that smile turn into an expression of shock when he spotted us.