The glow of the blood red gem on Amy's armor's breastplate was the only remnant of the transformation as Amy took step toward me. "Do you want me to carry you, or do you want Vaughn to float you upstairs?"

Samita cleared her throat. "Maybe you could carry me?"

"Why?" Vaughn asked. "Did I do something wrong? I tried not to flip you over or anything."

"No. It's just that you and the Rocket have been on the same team for years now, so I thought he'd probably be more comfortable than--" Her voice trailed off. "I'm sorry. I'm lying. It's because it's terrifying. I'm sure it's fine for you because you're controlling it, but I was falling in the dark. I couldn't see anything but wall, and the only thing stopping me from hitting the ground was air."

Still illuminated by Amy's gem, Vaughn nodded. "I get that. I've got to admit that I was a little nervous too. Sometimes there's not much wind to work with underground. Don't get me wrong. I could feel a lot of air flow here, but if we did hit someplace I couldn't control the air... Yeah, that wasn't going to be pretty."

Samita didn't say anything for a few long seconds. Then... "That doesn't make me feel better."

"No big deal. We've got all the air we need. Are you ready, Nick?" Vaughn raised an arm, and the dust on the floor began to whirl.

"Wait a second." Amy walked toward us, fishing for something in the pouches of her belt.

She pulled out a bottle. "Can you take off the helmet?"

"Sure." My suit's helmet disappeared, sinking into the suit.

Just like the last time I'd done it (when Haley started her climb), I plunged into darkness. Unlike the last time, Amy's gem glowed dimly, and I could see as she pulled a black chainmail glove off one hand, pulled a bottle out of one of the pouches, and opened it. Then she touched a finger inside the bottle, and touched my forehead.

I didn't bother to ask what was in the bottle. I could smell the blood.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

She said a few words in a language I didn't recognize, and a warmth spread through my body. At the same time, the room brightened--sort of. Everything had a red tinge, but I could still see mostly normally. More light collected around Amy.

That wasn't surprising. Whatever allowed us to see probably came from her somehow.

"Here's how this works," she said. "This is temporary. If you get too far away from me, or if I fall asleep, you won't be able to see anything."

"Are you likely to have a problem with staying awake?" I asked. She didn't look tired, but it was worth a question. I was trusting my life to it after all.

"While fighting?" Amy laughed. "No. That's what they created the Bloodmaidens for from the beginning."

"Amy," Samita said in a loud whisper. "We're not going to fight our own people unless we have to."

"I agree," Amy said, "but I'm certain we'll have to. Anyway, Nick's set. Are you ready?"

Samita took a breath, and glanced upward. "I'm ready."

Amy picked her up, and floated upward, stopping only to say, "Later," before flying away.

Vaughn said, "Not by much," and then we flew after her. The wind surrounded me, and I found myself moving upward.

It wasn't as bad as Samita described it. Sure, it was dark, but I could see the smooth rock walls and Amy flying above us. That wasn't much, but it was enough.

I supposed it might be worse if I wasn't used to flying, and was flying downward. That would feel more like falling.

It didn't take long to reach the top. The shaft ended in a room only slightly wider than the one at the bottom. The major difference being that the room at the top had a five foot high rock wall that effectively fenced off the hole from the room around it. There wasn't much room around it though--maybe two people could walk next to each other.

Vaughn took the two of us over the wall, landing on the sidewalk next to Amy and Samita.

As they turned toward us, I asked, "So what's next? I want to find Haley, but is there anything we have to watch out for here? And where is here anyway?"

Vaughn turned around. Following his gaze, I noticed the door--a very thick metal door. It was shut.

"We're under everything," Vaughn said. "After Amy and Samita got the spell done, we heard what happened and went looking for you. They did a locating spell, and that led us down here. The only reason we happened to find you was that you started playing Rush. I knew the song."

Amy added, "No one was down here when we came down. My guess is that they didn't catch Haley until she got further up."

"Okay." Not sure whether I should do it or not, I allowed my phone to connect to the network. It risked the possibility of revealing my existence and location to anyone who might be watching, but it represented my best chance to find out what Haley was doing.

Anyway, I had a hard time believing the fae were monitoring the compound's wi-fi.