The Light Within (Shadow and Light Duology #2)

33. Julien

thirty-three

Julien

J ulien wasn’t dead.

Yet.

At least, he presumed he wasn’t dead. The afterlife could easily consist of being locked in a catacomb cell, but somehow, he doubted it.

A heavy fog clouded Julien’s thoughts, making it difficult to piece together the events that had led him here. His head throbbed with a dull ache, each beat of his heart sending a wave of nausea through him as the lingering effects of Jonathan’s special compound refused to fade.

The prison he lay in was a narrow, suffocating space carved out of the ancient stone, its rough, damp walls pressing in on all sides. The air was thick with the smell of mildew and earth, almost tangible in its heaviness. Nothing was visible to him, not even a single speck of dirt—the darkness was absolute, swallowing everything in its path. A constant reminder he was miles under the ground.

Composed of sharp, jagged objects, the disturbingly uneven floor moved under him as he shuffled. Bones . He was lying on a bed of bones.

The only sound was that infuriating drip of water. Distant, rhythmic. But at least it gave him something to focus on. It was easier to drum his bound hands against his back in time with the drip, rather than think about other things.

Like the fact he’d allowed his father to trick him so easily.

Like the fact he was going to be buried amongst the bones of strangers, forgotten and alone .

Like the fact he’d never get to say goodbye to Cinn. To Elliot, to Darcy.

What was worse was that they would likely come looking for him, eventually. After a week or two, he supposed.

Though… would it really be that long?

Julien had made it crystal clear to Elliot that he needed to stay put with Cinn. He’d promised Elliot he’d be twenty-four hours. What would happen when that time ran out?

Would they come straight to Paris? To his father’s house? Would his father bump them off too? Finally, get his hands on Cinn, for whatever nefarious purpose he wanted him?

Although… was Julien being na?ve? Would it even take twenty-four hours? If Julien had woken up to find Cinn gone, he wouldn’t have followed the instructions of some silly note left on the dresser. He would curse him every name under the sun, then leave immediately to go find him by any means possible. Give him several slaps before kissing him silly.

You thought you were so clever, didn’t you? Well, you’re a fucking idiot.

Julien threw his head back against the hard rock, the sharp bite into his scalp not nearly an adequate enough punishment for what he’d sentenced those he loved to.

You’re a useless piece of shit.

They’d all be better off without him, anyway.

It worsened Julien’s nausea to think about, but with him gone, Cinn would meet someone who didn’t make him want to tear his hair out on a daily basis. Elliot would finally make more friends, now that Julien was no longer holding him back. The faint frown lines on Darcy’s forehead would smooth out. She’d have constant hot water in her shower.

Hot tears trickled down Julien’s face, igniting fresh waves of anger. No matter what happened, his father would not see him cry. Julien blinked them back, rapidly. His mind reeled, searching for some glimmer of happiness to cling to .

An image fell into his brain—cool sunlight streaming into Maz, as Julien drove on a winding country road towards Paris. Julien accidentally singing that silly Wu-Tang Clan song. The look on Cinn’s face when he realised—

A loud bang, followed by the sound of stone being dragged across stone. The memory of Cinn’s delighted smile dissipated into smoke, leaving only the blackness behind.

Julien didn’t have the energy to devise a cunning escape attempt, so he just lay there and waited for whatever was to come.

His body was rolled over, once, twice. Yanked roughly to the side. A flicker of dim light illuminated the space, revealing the shape of a tunnel, its walls lined with crumbling stone and dark, tangled roots snaking down from above.

Julien didn’t bother to suppress his low moan of pain, his headache reaching sledgehammer levels. The person manhandling him wasn’t his father, or Jonathan, but some unknown man with a thuggish face. He barely glanced at Julien as he dragged him to his feet. Another man joined them, another muscled brute.

“You can walk, or we can carry you, princess,” he said. “Your choice.”

Julien took one unsteady step forward, followed by another.

The man grunted in approval, pushing on Julien’s shoulder.

Two twists and turns of the catacombs later, the three of them spilled into the chamber with the massive stone slab, where Jonathan had knocked him out. That fucker. After all the late nights Julien had pulled for him, all the designs and projects he’d seen to completion.

Julien paused, expecting his father to slip out of a shadow, smiling victoriously.

“Down there,” a man grunted.

Squinting in the low light, Julien could make out a narrow set of steps descending from the far side of the stone slab, almost invisible against the rough-hewn surface. The slab wasn’t just a table—it was a hidden doorway, its edges barely perceptible, leading to the dark mouth of another chamber below.

A few hard shoves had Julien flying towards the next staircase, then stumbling down the uneven stone steps.

When he reached the bottom, his eyes dashed around the space, dimly lit with several lumenmote disks propped against the catacomb walls. His gaze sought son connard de père .

The chamber was empty, however. Empty of people, at least.

Because there, dead in the middle, was something that could only be it . That goddamned machine. Machina Tenebris.

He would have loved to laugh at it, to say that it didn’t look like much, after all this build-up. But that would have been a lie.

It dominated the chamber like some monstrous metal heart. Roughly the size of a compact car, its intricate structure contained an array of polished brass gears, darkened iron plates, and strange crystalline tubes snaking around its surface. At its centre was a core—a sphere encased in a lattice of black metal, pulsating with an unsettling blue light that seemed to draw the shadows inward. Tendrils of red flowed from the sphere, reminiscent of the shadowrealm’s red vines. They coursed up through a series of glass conduits that stretched towards the ceiling, casting sharp, erratic patterns on the walls.

Julien couldn’t look away. This was motetech, certainly, but motetech unlike he’d ever seen.

The air around the Machina Tenebris crackled with a faint hum. Its subtle vibration passed into the ground, thrumming beneath his feet.

“It almost seems… alive,” Julien murmured to himself. Like it was a living, breathing entity.

“Doesn’t it?”

The reply in French made him jump. His two security guards still clasped his shoulders, but Julien didn’t need to turn. His father’s voice was unmistakable, carrying that smooth, self-assured lilt that always seemed to mock him, even in rare moments of sincerity.

Instead, Julien’s gaze remained fixed on the machine. A part of it caught his attention. An odd-shaped contraption protruded from the side of the machine—a cluster of metal appendages, each tipped with sharp, needle-like ports, bristling like the legs of some mechanical insect. This part of the machine looked different, as if crudely attached by a child.

A cool sickness spread throughout Julien as he stared at it. He didn’t know what he was looking at, not exactly. But it wasn’t good.

His father’s voice broke Julien’s horror-struck stare. “Bring him closer,” he ordered in English, with a casualness that suggested he was asking for a cup of tea. He walked past Julien to stand near the machine.

Julien’s heart hammered as he resisted, trying to plant his feet, throwing his weight back. “Fuck off,” he hissed, straining against the men’s grip.

But the men didn’t relent, dragging him inexorably forward, the cold prongs of the stone floor scraping against his feet as the machine loomed ever closer.

“This has all worked out rather conveniently, wouldn’t you agree?” his father said, his tone light, almost amused. “You see, acquiring Cinnamon Saunders was proving to be quite the tiresome endeavour.”

At Cinn’s name, a white-hot fury surged through Julien, threatening to boil over. Don’t give him the satisfaction . His hands clenched involuntarily, nails biting into his palms as he struggled to tamp down the anger rising with the bile in his throat.

“When word reached me about the little… mishap with my men in that hotel room, I must admit, I found myself rather intrigued.”

Putain . Julien should have tried harder to ensure that the third man on the balcony didn’t live to tell the tale .

“It wasn’t until that priest started spilling his secrets”—his father grimaced with disdain—“or should I say, your secrets, that things took a most intriguing turn.”

Julien’s heart sank faster than a treasure dropped in the Seine.

The secret he’d closely guarded since his childhood was no more.

“Father Gérard just… told you everything?” Julien blurted out. He couldn’t imagine it.

“Not at first.” He fiddled with a part of the machine Julien couldn’t see. “I had to be rather persuasive. People can be quite cooperative when their loved ones are at stake, don’t you think?”

Julien clenched his jaw so hard, his teeth ached with the effort. “Is that a threat?”

A loud laugh echoed off the catacomb walls. “In fact, your loved ones will be quite safe now, thanks to your efforts. As I explained to the priest, this resolves everything.”

Part of Julien didn’t want to encourage him to continue, but a larger part demanded answers. “What?” he spat. “Enough with the games, just tell me.”

“We knew—Jonathan and I—that we couldn’t continue like this forever.” Tapping the metal surface of Machina Tenebris, his father sighed, looking at the machine mournfully. “We knew we had to find a solution.”

“So… you knew that this… thing ”—Julien jerked his head at the machine—“was behind the recent calamities… the umbraphages, even, and you didn’t pull the plug on it?”

“Not immediately. It only became undeniable in the last eighteen months or so, when our increased output directly correlated to the increase in such events.”

Julien’s gaze drifted upwards to where the machine fed into the catacomb ceiling. Where did it go, exactly? To HorizonTech’s motecell production site? It was on the other side of Paris, but the catacombs did stretch that far…

“Once we grasped what we were dealing with, we set about finding a solution.”

There was that word again, making Julien’s blood run cold.

“The very night Viktor Sturmhart caught wind of the possible existence of a shadowslipper, he contacted Jonathan. And so began the second phase of our project.” He lifted up the cluster of metal appendages, marvelling at them. “To find a suitable, sustainable source of power. We originally thought only a shadowslipper would do.”

“Would do…” Julien repeated, staring at the contraption.

His brain had been tirelessly working in the background to make connections that he now fought to suppress, unsuccessfully.

The bundle of thick wires his father held were arranged in a cruel arch. Julien traced their path, horror growing by the second. Three port-like attachments, with needles sharp enough to pierce skin. Skin and bone.

“No,” Julien whispered, a full-body shudder passing through him.

“It will be quite painless, once we’re past the initial installation. You’ll become comatose.”

As if on cue, Jonathan Steele materialised from the shadows of an adjoining tunnel, his face set in a grim line. Without looking at Julien, he walked behind the machine, to focus intently on something unseen.

“This outcome benefits all. With your body to power the Machina Tenebris”— Julien almost choked —“ the planet’s equilibrium will settle. The calamities will reduce to natural levels. The umbraphages will be no more.” A sneer curled on his father’s face before he pinched his lips in distaste. “This way, your precious friend Cinnamon remains unharmed.”

If Julien had his hands free right now, he’d use them to strangle the crazy old man. He’d slam his father’s skull into the stone again and again until it shattered. Press his fingers against his windpipe until it collapsed. Push his eyes against their sockets until they popped.

“Ready when you are,” Jonathan quietly said. Then he moved around the machine to face Julien. “He’s telling the truth, Julien. This really will fix everything.”

Julien didn’t stop his jaw from dropping. “ Fix everything? Fix everything, with the caveat, I live out the rest of my days sealed in the catacombs, as a vegetable plugged into a machine?!”

“What’s one life compared to all those currently suffering?” his father asked, quite seriously.

Breathe.

Julien forced himself to inhale the stale air, his breath unsteady.

“I’m your son!” he eventually got out. “Your last surviving family member.”

“Since when have you cared about that?” His father sneered at him, as if he were a piece of dirt. “Your entire life you’ve barely treated me with respect, let alone anything close to love.”

“Because you were a fucking abusive prick who mistreated every one of us!”

The words hung heavy in the cold air. For a long moment, the only sound was the soft hum of the machine. The oppressive silence of the catacombs swallowed Julien’s voice, leaving nothing but the weight of his words echoing against the stone walls.

Anger glistened in his father’s eyes, and he opened his mouth, where daggers undoubtedly waited to be thrown.

Julien was twelve years old all over again, hiding under the dining table, watching his father lift his mother off the floor by her neck.

“I know you killed them!” Julien screamed, before his father could offer any sort of pathetic defence. If this was the end, he wanted some shred of resolution. To hear his father say the words .

“Killed them? I fear you’re mistaken. It was your actions that brought the church walls crumbling down on your mother.”

The guilt that Julien had lived with for the last ten years surged like a tidal wave, shattering the dam Cinn had laboriously built, with his steadfast words of reassurance. It crashed over him anew with a force that left him breathless.

“As for my beloved daughter, well, she aligned herself with the wrong people and paid the price for her dangerous choices.”

Beloved . He made a mockery of the word with his tone.

“You murdered her with this!” Julien nodded down to the locket around his neck. The side where the metal touched his skin warped from amplifying excessive motepower. “Her locket! Of all things! She burned to death! Her flesh melted!”

“Bring him here.”

The two silent men pushed Julien forwards, and Jonathan raised the trio of needles, readying their position. Another shove, and Julien was mere inches from his father, the man he’d detested throughout his entire living memory. The man who’d killed his biological family, and tried to harm the one he’d built for himself.

Seizing his chance, Julien threw his head forward with all the force he could muster. His forehead collided with his father’s face with a sickening crunch. The old man staggered back, his nose bursting with a violent stream of blood. He stumbled into the side of the machine, swearing under his breath as he clutched his face. The two men, momentarily thrown off balance, struggled to regain their composure while Julien’s breath came in harsh, ragged gasps, his heart pounding with a fierce surge of rage.

“You’re going to rot in Hell, you selfish monster!” Julien snarled.

His father wasn’t religious. It still felt good to shout.

“ Mère never loved you, and neither did we!”

The vile man paused, looking up at Julien for a moment, clutching his nose. Blood pooled down his wrist as his brow furrowed, like he was lost in some distant, fleeting memory. “No. No, I don’t suppose she did.”

“I don’t know how you tricked Mère into marrying you!”

“Oh,” he replied calmly, wiping his face with the black of his sleeve. “I had my ways.”

At this, Julien screamed.

His screams tore through the catacombs, raw and primal, echoing off the damp walls. His body convulsed with frantic energy as he thrashed against his wrist restraints, flailing his limbs wildly. He kicked out, striking one man in the shin, sending him stumbling. Desperation fuelled his strength as he wriggled and twisted.

Julien wasn’t deluded.

He understood the dark reality of his situation: there was no way he could possibly escape.

But he wouldn’t die like a meek lamb, trotting merrily off to slaughter.

The men struggled to pin him down, their hands clamping onto Julien’s arms and legs with grim determination. Julien’s breaths came in ragged, gasping bursts as he struggled to suck in oxygen in between wailing further abuse at his father.

Distantly, a small part of him recognized that Jonathan stood closer to the machine now, and the ominous whirring of the Machina Tenebris had grown in volume.

Jonathan reached for the myriad of connectors, held them steady.

Julien’s vocal cords felt as if they were being torn apart, clawing painfully at his throat. But with his limbs restrained, and the two muscle-heads carrying him towards the looming needles, his screams were all he had left.

So, he screamed. Raw, desperate.

He screamed for young Julien, who could only watch as his mother unravelled before him, a tragic victim of her cruel husband .

He screamed for the teenaged Julien, burdened with the crushing weight of guilt. Crippling guilt. Guilt that would taint the best part of a decade of his life.

He screamed for his darling sister, whom he had vowed to protect and failed. He hoped she’d forgive him.

Finally, he screamed for himself, and all the possible lives he wouldn’t get to live now. All the love he wouldn’t get to share.

The point of a cold, sharp needle was pressed into his skull.