Darkness Eternal

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Synopsis

Kata is a witch who has been held captive and tortured for centuries by her evil sister, Marika, who was turned into a vampire. On the orders of his clan chieftain, Uriel is sent to rescue Kata from her prison. Just as he's about to free her, they're both transported through a portal into the underworld, where they try to avoid Marika, until Kata's demon friend magically places them in an illusion bubble to keep them safe. There they explore their attraction to one another. But when Marika finds them and they realize she's been transformed into something even more indestructible than a vampire, they must fight for their very survival against the odds.

Review

"Darkness Eternal" is a novella in Alexandra Ivy's Guardians of Eternity series that falls between Devoured by Darkness and Bound by Darkness in the series chronology. Uriel is a vampire whose clan chieftain, Victor, has taken under his protection a young woman who guards a child that could be the key for the Dark Lord's minions to resurrect him. The woman's mother is being held prisoner in a magical cell beneath Stonehenge. Victor tasks Uriel with rescuing her. Kata is a human witch with psychic powers who has been kept alive by magical means for centuries. She's been held captive and tortured by her insane sister, Marika, who was turned into a vampire, so she doesn't tend to trust their species at all. Over the years, she's been visited by a mysterious little demon named Yannah, who happens to be with her when Uriel breaks down the door to her cell. Then the two of them suddenly find themselves transported to the underworld. Yannah places Uriel and Kata in an illusion bubble apparently to help keep them safe from Marika. There they start getting to know one another a little and give in to the strong attraction that they've both felt from the moment they met. But when Marika, who appears to have been turned into something even more immortal than a vampire, finally discovers them, interrupting their solitude, they must run for their lives. Just as it looks like they might not survive, help comes from an unexpected ally.

I'm normally not one for reading book series out of order, but the first Guardians of Eternity book, When Darkness Comes, left me less than impressed. Therefore, since I'd started the series mainly intending to catch up before finishing this anthology, I decided to just jump ahead. "Darkness Eternal" begins with a bit of an info dump of characters' names and situations that were unfamiliar to me, leaving me feeling a bit lost. Maybe I would have understood better if I'd read the earlier books, but I have on occasion jumped ahead in series and didn't have any issues, so this tells me that this novella doesn't stand all that well on its own.

Once I got into the meat of the story, it was a bit better, but in all honesty, not much happens plotwise. Uriel and Kata simply move from one situation into another with little explanation of how they ended up there. We don't learn how Uriel got into the prison where Kata was being held. Then no sooner has he broken in, than they fall through a portal of some sort into the underworld. Did Yannah have something to do with it? Maybe? It was Yannah who put them in the illusion bubble, but then there's no reason given for how Marika found them there, or why she's now supercharged or something, or why the unexpected ally came to their aid. While Uriel and Kata are in the bubble, they almost immediately have sex, then share one or two more personal tidbits about themselves, before getting it on some more. I didn't really feel much of a connection between them, yet Uriel is ready to mate Kata practically at the drop of a hat and starts turning on the possessiveness. There were just a few too many occurrences in this story that readers are simply expected to take at face value that had little to no reasoning for them even happening in the first place. Therefore, I didn't find it to be particularly engaging or believable. Aside from Uriel being a tad too much of an arrogant alpha for my taste, I liked him and Kata for as well as I got to know them. The love scenes and action parts are pretty well written, too, so because of these things I gave it three stars. However, after two reads in a row that failed to capture my full attention and that had a lot of unexplained events, I unfortunately don't see myself continuing with this series or reading more from this author. "Darkness Eternal" can be found in the anthology Supernatural.

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Alexandra Ivy