Brimstone Kiss: Phantom Queen Book 10 - A Temple Verse Series (The Phantom Queen Diaries)

by Shayne Silvers

  A quick calculation of the damage was all it took for me to be certain; a shattered clavicle, snapped neck, broken spine, cracked skull, dozens of broken ribs, punctured lungs...any one of those could have done the trick, and my best guess put the prognosis somewhere between “say your goodbyes” and “we gather here today.” And yet, Max looked anything but relieved; his skin swirled with that flickering light, his blazing brown eyes locked on the broken remains of his former employer as though Frankenstein’s corpse were some sort of abstract painting moments from revealing its secrets—a Picasso with hidden depths.

  “He can’t be—” I began.

  Max threw out an arm before I could finish my question, cutting me short. As if on cue, the twisted wreck that was the doctor twitched, his limbs spasming and realigning before my very eyes with various pops and snaps that made me wince and shudder. Not because I hadn’t seen or heard worse, but because Frankenstein had begun speaking throughout the experience, his voice cutting in and out until his head at last sat comfortably upon his neck.

  “That was...rude. There are very few things...I despise...but I must admit rude behavior...is chief among them. What an ungrateful creature you have become, Maximilliano. And after all I did for you and your sister. My lovely Camila.” Frankenstein’s voice grew wistful as he rolled his narrow shoulders. “I trust she at least would have had the decency to accept her fate with grace.”

  “You are el Diablo, himself,” Max spat. “I would never let you lay a hand on Camila. Nor will I allow you to touch any woman, ever again.”

  “You speak of the Devil, here?” Frankenstein fetched his eyeglasses from the floor, dangled them between his fingers, and waved his hand about as if showcasing the throne room’s quartz tables and diamond walls, its glass floor and obsidian ceiling. “There are no true devils, boy. There are only those who know they are in a dream, and those who do not. One group makes the rules, while the other abides by them. That is what it means to be a Master.”

  “You are not my master. Not anymore.”

  “Is that so?” Frankenstein asked, his perfect teeth appearing below his hairy upper lip in a sneer. The doctor snapped his fingers. Then, when nothing happened, he snapped them again...but to no avail. The doctor replaced his eyeglasses and squinted through their shattered lenses, his right eyebrow twitching. “Maximilliano, what have you done?”

  “I traded in your cold authority for something better. Something warmer.” Max pressed a hand to his finely sculpted chest and the fire within seemed to blaze hotter, strobing so brightly that I had to monetarily shield my eyes. “I have a new master, now.”

  I blinked away the spots in my vision to find the brujo looking at me, his expression gentle and far too close to adoration for my liking. Wait, was he talking about me? There was no way, I decided. I wasn’t his master. I was no one’s master. And yet, the instant I read the deep undercurrents of his thoughts, I knew both that he’d meant what he’d said and that, bizarrely, the notion of serving me—of belonging to me—gave him significant comfort.

  Which must have meant he’d been down here way too long.

  “You can deny it all you want,” Max told me, his expression chiding and a little pouty, “but you can feel it, too.”

  “Her?” Frankenstein tilted his head, his beady eyes widening at the sight of me clothed and ambulatory. Or at least that’s what I assumed had surprised him; there was frankly no way to tell what he meant by his use of the singular gender pronoun.

  “Her,” Max declared, as though that was a logical response.

  Maybe it was a guy thing, I thought. Some sort of caveman dialect that boys are taught as infants while their moms’ backs were turned. Either way, I wasn’t having any of it; if I was going to be the subject of the conversation, I had every right to participate.

  “Me,” I said, mimicking Max’s tone as I folded my arms across my chest.

  So there.

  “Look at you both!” Frankenstein shouted, throwing his hands up in the air. “You have no idea what you have done, do you? Either of you.”

  “What I know,” Max began, “is that Quinn called my soul back from beyond the veil when your pet torturer tried to kill me. Moreover, she has gifted me with power. True power, the sort that does not come with one-sided contracts and scrupulous fine print.”

  “You cannot be so foolish as to believe such power comes at no cost, my old friend.”

  “We were never friends. And I don’t care. I will do whatever she asks of me. I will become her servant during the day and her lover in the night. I will become her monster.”

  “Whoa!” I chimed in, alarmed by the brujo’s sudden declaration of fealty. “Easy there, Fuego del Toro!”

  “Oh, she would be so much more than that, Maximilliano,” Frankenstein replied, ignoring me, his tone thick with mirth. “So much more. But it does not matter. I see I have allowed my thirst for knowledge to outweigh my common sense. I am sorry that I will not be able to operate on either of you, but such abominations cannot be allowed to exist in nature.”

  “That’s rich,” I muttered, more than a little miffed at being dubbed an abomination by the madman who’d chopped up Chancery members to create a Faeling monster that still haunted my nightmares, not to mention the miserable shit who’d helped turn Ryan into a genocidal sociopath. “Shouldn’t ye be the one beggin’ nature for forgiveness, ye sick bastard?”

  Unfortunately, it seemed Frankenstein was through chatting; the doctor snapped his fingers yet again, except this time a heaving, grinding sound—like what you hear in Indiana Jones movies when one of those ancient doors creep open—accompanied the action. I spun to face the hallway, trying to determine the source of the noise, but there was no one in sight except Mabel, who lay passed out in a shallow pool of her own blood.

  Then the floor began to quake.

  “What’s goin’ on?” I demanded, wheeling on the doctor. “What have ye done?”

  “He’s called them,” Max replied, his head cocked to one side as though focused solely on listening, his mouth set in a grim line. “Their spirits. He’s told them to come for us, to tear us apart. Can you not hear them scream?”

  I felt myself take an inadvertent step backwards before I realized what I was doing, thrown by the severity of Max’s reaction. Had he said spirits? I froze, abruptly reminded of all those lost souls prostrating themselves on the Helspire’s battlements. That sound before...was it possible Frankenstein had let them in with the mere snap of his fingers? Could he have turned them into his slaves the way he had the undead sailors in the Titan Realm? One glance in the mad doctor’s direction revealed the bespectacled man watching us with renewed interest, inexplicably eager to see how we’d react to this newest stimuli.

  Of course, Max and I weren’t mice in a cage to be studied—to be poked and prodded and sacrificed—without consequence. Indeed, one look at the searing heat radiating off the two of us should have told Frankenstein everything he needed to know but had clearly ignored: Max and I weren’t the offering, we were the godsdamned fire.

  And we weren’t to be played with.

  “They’ll have to come down that hallway,” I insisted, glad to find Max smirking after my little reverie. I performed the necessary sign, tapped Nevermore, and watched with amusement as the brujo’s expression switched from appreciation to awe the instant my Valkyrie armor manifested itself, flowing from head to toe like a river until I stood with my helmet in hand. I donned the wicked-looking thing feeling as dangerous as I knew I looked. “I’ll slow ‘em down.”

  “And what would you have me do, mi diosa?”

  My goddess, his head translated for me.

  Oh boy.

  “Look, we’ll have to talk about all that ‘servant and lover’ bullshit, later,” I told the brujo, holding up a stern finger for emphasis. “But for now, go kill that son of a bitch like ye said ye would.”

  “I am not so sure he can die,” Max admitted, keeping his voice low so as not to be overhear
d. “Camila always insisted he was not strictly human, but I wasn’t certain until now what she meant. He is a homunculus.”

  “A what?”

  “It is like a…powerful espíritu housed in artificial flesh.”

  “Well then, we’re in luck…” I clapped the brujo’s naked arm with enthusiasm, the light beneath surging where my gauntleted hand touched. “Because I know someone who can burn that fucker’s house down.”

  36

  The spirits of Helheim arrived in a slack-faced, silent mob. Fortunately, the corridor leading to the throne room was narrower than the ones below, which meant only a handful would be able to reach me at any given time. I, meanwhile, waited for those industrious few in the middle of the hallway, curious to see whether they’d trample Mabel into a pulp or avoid her like the trash that she was. I put the odds at fifty-fifty but frankly could have cared less; she’d had her shot at redemption and had used it to drug, strip, and torture me.

  If the bitch died, she died.

  The horde surged into the bottleneck, each spirit leaping over the elf’s unconscious body as though she were a rock to be circumvented. I had to admit, I was a little relieved; part of me was really hoping she stuck around long enough to find out how it felt to have all her teeth knocked out...before I slit her throat and loaded the wound with molars like forcing candy into a PEZ dispenser.

  Fingers crossed.

  The first spirit to reach me was a husky fellow with a gimpy leg, his mouth opened in a soundless scream as he lunged for my shins. I danced back and slammed my knee into his face so hard he literally flew backwards, hitting the ceiling with all the force of a battering ram before crashing down upon a dozen of his fellow spirits. I blinked owlishly as Frankenstein’s de facto slaves scrambled to recover, surprised by the sheer strength behind my blow. Was this the added juice Nevermore afforded me, or a residual effect of the connection between me and Max, or both?

  I couldn’t be sure...but I sure as Hel wasn’t complaining.

  A woman came at me next, her hands clawing for the unprotected half of my face. Thinking quickly, I stepped inside her reach, took hold of her fur-lined cloak, and caved her face in with a vicious headbutt. Then, before any more spirits could launch themselves at me, I raised her body off the ground and used it as a shield to keep them at bay while I lashed out at outstretched limbs and delivered body blows with my free hand.

  And yet, despite the ease with which I was able to dispatch each of my assailants, I found myself being inexorably pushed back by their sheer weight and obstinacy; they literally clambered over each other in their haste to tear me to pieces. Worse still, if they backed me into the throne room, I knew there was no way I’d be able to keep them all in front of me; eventually, their blows would land—that, or they’d dogpile on top of me until their psychotic master could finish me off.

  Worried by the possibility, I took a moment to glance over my shoulder to see how Max was faring with his opponent, hoping he’d have Frankenstein subdued, or at least reeling...but found the opposite to be true. Instead, it was Max who was struggling to stay upright, his wrists bound by diamond-encrusted chains that seemed to have emerged from the walls themselves. Frankenstein, on the other hand, appeared more interested in Max’s futile efforts to stand than his own well-being; the mad scientist had leaned in to stare up at the much taller, broader man from mere inches away, probing the brujo’s chest with one spindly finger.

  “Max!” I yelled, unable to keep my emotions in check.

  One of the spirits must have sensed my momentary distraction because she ripped my impromptu shield from my grasp, flung her fellow spirit against a wall, and tackled me to the ground before I could mount a counterattack. I went down hard but was able to shrug off my assailant and rise to a knee before two more took their comrade’s place. Within seconds, several more latched onto me, winding their arms around my legs, their hands slipping between the gaps in my armor as if to pry them off and send me to the ground. But I refused to go down—not while Max was in trouble.

  “Max!” I screamed again, reaching out for him—not with my arms this time—but with my senses. When at last I found him, it was as if I could see through his eyes, could feel what he felt; I could smell Frankenstein’s aftershave. Indeed, the doctor was so tantalizingly close that I could see the pulse in his neck jumping. But Max had no way to hurt him; nothing he’d tried had worked and now his arms were bound by the doctor’s peculiar brand of magic, by the dominion he’d established over this place.

  “Then don’t use your arms, dammit!” I bellowed, thrashing against my would-be captors. I felt their blows raining down on my armored back, threatening to flatten me to the ground.

  “Do not bother interfering,” Frankenstein called, peering past the brujo to wave me off. “I will be over there to take care of you in due time. Until then, please wait your turn.”

  “Do it, Max!”

  The brujo—having heard and understood the subconscious message I’d sent him—lunged forward like a hound, taking advantage of the slightest give in his restraints to clamp his teeth around Frankenstein’s jugular. The doctor jerked at the contact, his expression flitting from startled to baffled and finally to annoyed in a mere matter of seconds. He began to speak, likely to chastise Max for his desperation, but no words came out. Instead, a vermillion light erupted from behind those perfect teeth. Next from his eyes, and then his ears, shining like the rays from the doctor’s skull as Max poured every ounce of power he had into the doctor’s flesh—enough to raze everything it touched. Indeed, the doctor’s skin began to smolder and smoke, to char and blacken. His jaw hung loose, his tongue turned to literal ash in his mouth, and still Max flooded him with that excruciating heat.

  The spirits at my back retreated like vampires as the light from the other room swelled, strobing to the beat of Max’s thundering heart. Relieved to find them gone, I climbed to my feet, forced to cover my own eyes to avoid going blind. And yet I could feel every pulse of power as though I were being hit by one wave after another, forced to ride them or risk being pulled under. Then, with a suddenness that stole my breath away, the power fled and the light died.

  And so, apparently, had Frankenstein.

  37

  I entered the throne room to find Max stomping the doctor’s charred remains to ash and kicking them across the floor for good measure. I supposed I couldn’t blame him; one resurrection was enough to make anyone aware of the distinction between “mostly dead” and “all dead.” Mercifully, Doctor Victor Frankenstein appeared to have no miracle in the works, which meant Max and I finally had a quiet moment to relax—to sit back, unwind, and congratulate ourselves on a doctor well done.

  Or, you know, to make out like teenagers.

  In hindsight, I supposed I could blame it on the adrenaline rush, or perhaps that mystical connection which bound us and had saved our collective asses, but—in the end—the why mattered a whole lot less than the how; the second Max turned to face me, I stripped off my helmet, grabbed the back of his thick neck, and drew him into the sort of kiss that got film ratings changed.

  Of course, you can’t get very far when one person is half naked and the other is armored from the neck down; I pulled away first, my heart hammering away even as I tried to get my bearings. But it was no use, all I could do was think about the kiss, about how good it had felt; his lips had seemed fuller than I remembered, his stubbled jawline more abrasive against my skin, but the underlying passion had never once wavered, not even as I peeled my mouth from his.

  “What is it?” Max asked, his voice somehow deeper than when I’d last heard it, more masculine. “Is something wrong, mi diosa?”

  I shook my head, uncertain of my own voice, not to mention what I might say; there was a lot wrong, and yet none of it was expressly his fault. Not really. After all, Max couldn’t help the fact that he was categorically my type—and by that I meant, tall, dark, and able to take a punch. Throw in the fact that I found the man so achingly h
andsome I would have gladly paid to watch him eat cereal and I’d have said we had a huge problem.

  Because nothing based so purely on attraction had ever led to anything good. Not for me. More often than not, in fact, it led to brutal fights, bitter breakups, and emotional blackmail. All of which I had spent years avoiding, until now.

  Perhaps sensing my indecision, Max reached out to brush his fingers along my cheek. And, despite my reservations, I let him. As if to acknowledge my allowance, the brujo bent down to plant a chaste kiss on one corner of my mouth, then the other, his soft lips grazing across mine in a movement that was far more sensual than it had any right to be.

  “Tease,” I mumbled against his mouth.

  This time it was Max’s turn to pull me in for a deeper kiss; his hands found either side of my face, cradling it as he raised me onto my tiptoes and explored my mouth with his tongue. Before I could even think to draw back a second time, however, the brujo pressed his body against mine, seemingly oblivious to the discomfort of grinding up against a walking tetanus booster advertisement. Still, I had to admit the sheer size of him, the way his arms enveloped me like a weighted blanket, felt right in a way I couldn’t explain. Committed to the kiss at last, I ran my fingers through his thick hair, slid my tongue along the swell of his bottom lip, and made a noise that was more growl than swoon.

  Only this time it was Max who pulled away.

  The brujo released my face with a startled gasp and stepped back clutching at his chest, his face a rictus of pain. I started to reach for him but then froze, too alarmed to do anything as the man fell to one knee, his breath coming in rasping spurts.

  “I...don’t...understand,” Max said, staring up at me with lost eyes that no longer burned with power. Indeed, the flickering glow which had emanated from him since we first touched seemed to have finally faded, leaving the brujo’s skin tanned but otherwise unremarkable