The Light Within (Shadow and Light Duology #2)

32. Cinn

thirty-two

Cinn

C inn lay horizontally in the Displacement Bath, naked, breathing hard. Unlike the portable van-based tub he’d been displaced into last time, this time he arrived into Paris in a private pod, with a set of grey clothes hanging nearby.

He braced himself for vertigo as he slowly stood on shaky legs. The clothes—and trainers—fit him like a glove. Highly polished metal formed the four walls that surrounded him, reflecting Cinn’s pale, glaring image. The sight of the deep wound on his forehead from the car crash still startled him. He pressed a palm against the wall’s smooth surface, studying the deep frown lines etched into his forehead, the tight set to his jaw.

Cinn closed his tired eyes.

What if they didn’t find Julien? Or if they found his body in a lifeless heap on the ground?

The image his brain conjured was horrific, and a low groan slipped out of him.

A series of sharp knocks on the cubicle door. “Cinn?”

Cinn blinked. That wasn’t a voice he expected to hear, here in the Parisian Displacement Baths.

“Noir?” Cinn opened the narrow door to find the old man dressed in similar loose grey clothes. He looked so different out of his dark robes that Cinn snorted. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m the backup, lad.” Noir flashed him a wide grin, revealing a silver tooth Cinn hadn’t noticed before. “Don’t look at me like that. I might be triple your age, but I can hold my own in a fistfight. Don’t you worry.”

Cinn rearranged the doubt on his face to something that could pass for gratitude. “Thank you for being here.”

Noir squeezed his arm, gaze soft. “Of course. We wouldn’t let you deal with this all by yourself.” He added, “I’m in your corner, Cinn. Always.”

An unexpected rush of affection hit Cinn square in the chest. He nodded at Noir. Cinn didn’t trust Eleanor as far as he could throw her, but somehow this old codger always had a way of making Cinn feel safe. Feel heard.

A bath attendant complained at them in French, ushering them out of the tiled, chlorine-filled chamber. Elliot, Darcy, Malik, Madame Sinclair, and two strangers they’d been briefly introduced to back at Auri, were waiting by the exit. The circle made space to accommodate Cinn and Noir. A fresh wave of anxiety struck Cinn. What if he was expected to lead this motley band? He hadn’t the faintest clue where to start, aside from storming Lucien’s mansion.

As the circle quietened, all eyes turned to Eleanor, and Cinn’s fear lessened, somewhat.

“Listen up.” Eleanor commanded attention without raising her voice. Everyone shuffled closer. “I’ve received word that Julien Montaigne was seen entering his father’s house at approximately six thirty p.m. today. Around thirty minutes later, Lucien and Julien left the estate in the back of a black Mercedes-Benz. Their current whereabouts are unknown.”

One of the new people—Tanya?—made an obvious show of yawning. “Ma’am, it’s late. If we have no active leads, may I suggest we tackle this at dawn?”

“No!” Cinn’s cheeks burned under the heat of everyone’s startled gaze. “I mean, you can go, if you want. But I’m not sleeping until I find him.” Something in Cinn told him there wasn’t time for that .

A pair of sympathetic green eyes found his. “To be fair to Tamara, we can hardly march up and down every street of Paris,” Darcy said. “But I was wondering”—she glanced between Cinn and the others—“if our cat friend fancies being of use again.”

“I can’t summon her like a dog.”

Noir hummed under his breath. He was going to be pissed off that Cinn hadn’t divulged his shadowrealm companion to him. The rest of the circle appeared either bemused or confused at the mention of Béatrice. Why had Darcy brought this up in front of them? Cinn glared at her.

“Have you tried?”

What? Had Darcy gone mad? Cinn spluttered slightly. “Of course not!”

“Well, then!”

Cinn turned to Elliot for support, but he only shrugged.

Malik stood close to Elliot. “Worth a try, no?”

Attention remaining entirely on him, Cinn’s face continued to flush. “Fine,” he mumbled. “Can you dim the lights?”

Elliot tipped his head back, studying the strips of overhead lighting. A moment later, they flickered before dropping to a soft, ambient glow, casting long shadows across the room.

“I’ll just… go try over there.” Turning swiftly, Cinn beelined straight for a dark corner of the lobby, feeling the back of his neck prickle.

God, what he would do for his Walkman back right now. Or a quick cigarette. How was he supposed to focus on manifesting a demon cat when he was on the edge of an anxiety attack, images of Lucien cackling over Julien’s dead body plaguing his brain?

To make matters worse, he had six pairs of eyes glued to him, like he was a circus show.

Stop fucking staring at me .

This was stupid. Béatrice wasn’t going to magically appear for him. It didn’t work like that. Randomly roaming the streets of Paris would be a better use of time!

The quiet, concerned chatter of the group reached his ears and Cinn clenched his jaw. How long until they got bored and pissed off? The warding band around his wrist warmed with his rising temper.

And there she was. Two eyeless sockets staring at him from the darkest recesses of the shadow.

The cat shifted slightly, her silhouette wavering like smoke.

Thank fuck.

“Hi.” Relief cascaded through Cinn as he moved in front of her, shielding her from view.

The sound of footsteps behind him did not sound promising.

“Remarkable!” Noir gasped, reaching forward, hand outstretched.

When Béatrice hissed at Noir and jumped back, Cinn couldn’t suppress his nervous, unsteady laughter. “She kind of only likes me.” He shrugged. “I wouldn’t touch her if I were you. She bites.”

Behind Noir, the rest of the group shuffled about, trying to get a good look, while Darcy snapped at them to stay back.

Cinn dropped to the cool marble floor, lowered his voice to a whisper. “Okay, we’re all here. Where to now? Where is he?” Then, because he couldn’t shake the feeling that the sands of time were slipping away, grain by grain, he added, “Help me find him before it’s too late.”

Béatrice was still for a long moment. She let out a low growl that resonated deep within her and bolted towards the revolving glass door, paws skittering across the marble.

Cinn’s heart jumped into his throat as he watched the creature’s swift, determined dash. “Follow her!” he urged, already on his feet, moving towards the door.

Outside, the sign on the brick wall informed him he’d visited L’Oasis . Cinn sped past it, his borrowed trainers rubbing against his heel as he pounded them against the pavement—Béatrice was already at the end of the road.

“She’s a speedy one.” Running beside him, Malik sounded amused.

Cinn didn’t waste energy replying. His breaths were coming out in quick, frosty puffs as they raced through the damp, cobblestone streets of Paris. Their writhing ball of shadows darted ahead like a dark phantom, weaving through the narrow alleyways and cutting through the beams of street lights that somehow only made her darker. Elliot was right behind Cinn, while Darcy and Malik kept pace, exchanging glances filled with urgency.

When Cinn glanced back, he found Eleanor, Tamara and that other bloke trailing far behind them. Noir, moving with uncanny grace for a man his age, was almost a shadow himself, blending into the night as if he belonged there.

Béatrice led them past shuttered cafés and sleeping boutiques, across bridges that arched over the Seine like silver ribbons under the moonlight. Though, as they dashed past a few remaining tourists still braving the frigid night, the cat slipping through the crowd like smoke, Paris’s usual magic felt twisted, distorted. Like the city itself was bending around them, guiding them somewhere . The tug was palpable, a gravitational pull stronger than the fear of what lay ahead.

Just when it seemed the cat would vanish into the labyrinth of Paris forever, she stopped abruptly just outside a metro station.

“The catacombs?” Darcy said, on a gasp of air, clutching her chest. “Béatrice was never this fast before!”

Béatrice didn’t seem bothered by Darcy’s comment, quickly slipping through the bars of the ancient iron gate. The cat turned, her eyeless sockets locking onto Cinn, and with a flick of her tail, she disappeared into the darkness below, vanishing down the narrow stairway leading underground .

No! Cinn’s heart stuttered as he lost sight of her. He gripped two of the gate’s heavy bars, squinting at the entrance. Rough, aged limestone framed it, the words ‘ Arrête! C’est ici l’empire de la mort,’ carved deeply into the rock above, barely visible in the dim light.

“Move!” Elliot hip-checked Cinn out of the way, sending him stumbling into Darcy, who had her face pressed between two bars.

A deafening bang pierced the quiet air; Elliot smashed the lock. The chain fell limp, clattering against the metal.

Eleanor, who’d fallen behind, arrived and cleared her throat. Her grey hair, damp from the Baths, was now further dishevelled.

“You stay up here, ma’am.” Tamara tightened the straps of a grey rucksack.

Eleanor exhaled a heavy sigh, like she could easily collapse on the ground. It was definitely a good idea that she stayed behind—she’d slow them down.

“No,” Eleanor said, rubbing the base of her spine. “I think I need to come. If Lucien really is down there”—she pursed her lips—“I want to see him. Let’s go.”

Malik slipped through the gate first, heading straight for the narrow stone archway just beyond. Elliot caught his arm, pulling him behind him. Malik’s face scrunched in mild annoyance, and Cinn would have found it all funny if they weren’t on a life-and-death mission to save his idiot boyfriend.

Within seconds, a mixture of flashlights and lumenmote disks were thrown into hands, and then they were off.

When they first descended the spiral staircase into the greasy dark, Cinn feared there would be no Béatrice to guide them, that she’d leave them to fend for themselves in some cruel twist. However, she was waiting for them only a dozen steps down, tail flicking impatiently.

Down and down they went, the darkness closing in like a tightening veil, despite the soft light they carried. The cool air thickened with the scent of earth and history. And more than a few decayed bodies, Cinn supposed.

They reached the bottom, finding a narrow, dimly lit tunnel. The walls were lined with neatly stacked bones, skulls interspersed as morbid decorations. Of all the places in Paris they could have ended up, did it really have to be here? How and why was Julien in the fucking catacombs?!

They pressed on, each breath of damp air tasting faintly of limestone. The faint glow of their flashlights lit the slick, uneven floor, while the shadows of ancient remains stretched long and ghostly against the walls.

Cinn quickened his steps, the chill of the catacombs clinging to him like a breath from the grave. The tunnels stretched endlessly before him, and Julien seemed impossibly distant, hidden somewhere in their depths. A knot of dread twisted in Cinn’s gut, tightening with every step. How long was this going to take?

“This isn’t creepy or anything,” he muttered to Elliot, who was practically jogging to keep up. Elliot laughed hollowly, but it did nothing to relieve the tension building inside him.

Treading carefully, they followed Béatrice through the next tunnel, but every step grated on Cinn’s nerves. Their footsteps echoed against the low, arched ceilings, forcing him to duck every few paces, which only slowed them down further. The passage stretched on and on, narrowing with every turn, the neatly stacked bones giving way to rough, damp limestone that scraped against his arm when he moved too fast. The cold bit through his clothes, each breath turning to mist, and the distant hum of the city above was swallowed by an oppressive silence that pressed uncomfortably in his ears. Cinn’s eyes locked on Béatrice’s flickering form as she darted ahead with maddening ease, her graceful movements a sharp contrast to his growing frustration. She moved like she belonged here, while every twist and turn of the labyrinth only made him feel more lost—and more desperate to reach Julien.

They turned a corner, and a wider chamber opened around them, where the ceiling arched high above, disappearing into the shadows. The walls were carved with old, fading inscriptions and crude markings left by the hands of explorers from long ago.

Béatrice paused briefly, glancing back at them before slipping through a narrow crack in the wall—almost invisible in the gloom. A cool draft emanated from the passage on the other side.

“Here,” Cinn shouted behind him, pointing towards the narrow opening.

“She’s gone off map,” said Darcy.

Cinn twisted in the narrow space to find her poring over a map of the catacombs. “Where did you find that?”

She didn’t reply, only laid it flush against the wall, tracing the markings with her fingers. Noir joined her, humming to himself as he studied it.

“We’re not going to fit through that crack,” Malik murmured.

“Do not suggest we blow the tunnel up. I’m not getting buried alive today,” Eleanor said.

Anger coursed through Cinn at the note of finality in her voice. “Well, we have to do something,” he snapped at the woman. “We’ve come this far!”

“I’ll thank you for minding your tone!” Eleanor retorted. Behind her, her two lackeys glared at Cinn.

Cinn glared right back. “I’m going to look around the corner. There might be another way to get there.”

“There’s not,” Darcy said flatly, waving her stupid map in the air. “Come see for yourself.”

“I’m just going to check!”

With that, Cinn marched off. He was done being slowed down. They didn’t have spare minutes to fuck around with maps. He’d find another way, then quickly go back and get them .

Cinn’s frustration carried him deeper into the winding tunnel, the damp air pressing against his skin. He turned one corner, then another, the dim light from the main group fading behind him, swallowed by the shadowed twists of the catacombs. The walls closed in, the passageway narrowing, the labyrinth turning more chaotic with every step.

He should probably go back.

Cinn spun, staring at a tunnel that split in two. Was it the left-hand side? Cinn strode quickly through it, retracing his path, but each turn felt identical, a dizzying maze of stone and bone. Panic began to creep in. Cinn now had no idea which way he’d come from, and the voices of the others were only a distant echo swallowed by the endless dark.

You stupid idiot. Now they’ll have to waste precious time to come look for you.

The air stirred. A chill shot through him.

The shadows pulsed around him, gathering with a sudden, terrifying intensity. Without warning, a dark tendril shot out from the wall, wrapping around his arm like an icy vine.

In shock, he dropped his flashlight, which went rolling across the stone out of reach. He screamed; no sound came. The darkness tightened, tugging him off his feet and dragging him through the stone wall itself. The world around him dissolved into a swirling vortex of cold and black, a void that stretched in every direction. Each of his senses blurred—the feeling of the ground, of weight, of time, all slipping away like water through his fingers.

An eternity passed. Cinn tumbled through the darkness, unable to tell up from down, a sensation of falling and twisting through the unseen passages of the catacombs. Cold air rushed past him, stinging his skin, and faint whispers seemed to brush against his ears, though he couldn’t make out any words. Suddenly, he was thrust forward and spat out violently, landing hard on cold, damp ground .

Cinn lay still for a moment, gasping for breath, his heart pounding in his chest as a horrible realisation sunk in—he was in complete darkness. No light, no sense of direction, just the thick, oppressive blackness pressing in all around him.

“Holy shit.”

The blackness ate up his words.

Cinn sat up, resting his head against his legs. He allowed himself a low moan. That experience had been far worse than the Displacement Baths earlier. There, he’d felt weightless, fluid, whereas now he felt like he’d been a heavy stone that’d been repeatedly knocked against a wall.

He rubbed at his head, where a headache was forming. Then Cinn forced himself to his feet. The air here felt different—denser, older, filled with a deeper sense of dread. It was so dark, you could almost smell it.

Cinn pressed his hands against the rough, damp walls of the tunnel, the cold stone biting into his palms. The darkness was suffocating, swallowing everything in its path; he couldn’t even see his own fingers in front of his face. He let out a slow, shaky breath, forcing himself to focus on the sensation of the walls, the uneven texture of ancient limestone beneath his fingertips. With each step, his heartbeat pounded louder in his ears, a frantic drum beat that matched the panic rising in his chest. No shadow cat to guide him now—only his gut, a primal instinct urging him to keep moving, keep searching, to find Julien.

His mind raced with images of the labyrinth stretching endlessly, trapping him down here forever, forgotten in the shadows, his body never found. The thought gnawed at him, a tightness coiling in his stomach.

But he couldn’t stop, couldn’t let the fear paralyse him. Julien needed him. Nothing would stop Cinn from getting to him.

“Get it together,” he muttered, voice small in the consuming dark. Each step forward felt like a battle, the silence around him heavy .

A song burst to life in his head—“Dead,” one of the tracks on his beloved Pixies cassette. The one that he’d worn out to the point of ruin. Then Julien’s gifted replacement had burned alongside Maz, the precious treasure reduced to ash.

Cinn laughed to himself, the sound echoing wildly off the stone walls, a stark, jagged edge of hysteria in his voice. He pressed his fist to his mouth. Although he felt alone down here—truly, terrifyingly, utterly alone—he had no idea who was close by.

So, he mimed the song lyrics, imagining the frantic baseline thumping in his veins, the distorted guitar slicing through the air, drowning out the silence and the creeping fear. The song playing loudly within him felt gloriously comforting—his only possible defiance of the crippling terror threatening to consume him.

Armed with his music, he moved slowly onwards, feeling his way along the wall, praying his gut wouldn’t betray him, knowing that if he stopped now, he would never find Julien.

Then he heard it—the soft, almost imperceptible patter of paws somewhere ahead, followed by a low, rumbling purr that seemed to vibrate through the walls themselves.

Cinn froze, his heart pounding in his throat, just as something sleek and cold brushed against his ankles. He flinched, feeling the unmistakable shape of the cat slide between his legs, her shadowy form curling around him like smoke. “Béatrice,” he whispered, a shaky grin spreading across his face. She was there, waiting, guiding him again. Her presence was a lifeline, a tether to something other than his own fear. “I missed you, friend.”

He paused to stroke her, scratching between her ears. She purred, a grateful sound which quickly deepened into something more urgent.

“Take me to him, please,” Cinn urged. “As quick as you can! Go, go!”

Because, as he followed Béatrice through narrow tunnel after narrow tunnel, the feeling that they were running out of time only intensified. Every distant echo of his footsteps became a relentless reminder of the urgency, each sound a reminder that they were racing against an invisible, unforgiving clock.

“Hold on, Julien,” he said, to the skeletons of the catacombs. “I’m coming for you.”