by S. M. Reine
He would be turning forty in February, and he didn’t keep weight off as easily anymore. Yet he suddenly could have passed for ten years younger.
“This can’t be good,” he told the slimmer, more muscular version of himself in the mirror.
His concern was enough to trigger the bond. Elise’s consciousness nudged at his.
For an instant, he felt like he was sitting on a barstool in a dark casino cafe. It smelled like coffee and cigarette smoke. She sat at the bar with an empty shot glass and an omelet that hadn’t been touched.
Her thoughts drifted past.
What’s wrong?
The question irked him. He knew she had been doing something the night before—something that made her bring out the exorcism charms—but she had blocked his every attempt to check on her. And she had the nerve to ask if he was okay?
“Eat your omelet and mind your own damn business,” he said, turning from the mirror and tugging the shirt over his head. He saw a second shot glass set in front of her before their shared consciousness ended, and he couldn’t resist making a comment. “Tequila? With breakfast?”
Her annoyance was an electric pinch in his forehead. Mind your own damn business.
And then she was gone.
The doorbell rang before he could return to his office. He listened for the telltale footsteps that would tell him that Stephanie was answering the door, but the house was silent.
“Stephanie?” he called. She didn’t respond. When he stepped into the hall, he could hear the shower running. The doorbell rang a second time. “I’m coming! Just a moment!”
He ran a hand through his hair to attempt in an attempt to flatten it before opening the door.
The man on the other side didn’t belong in James’s neighborhood of manicured lawns, white picket fences, and golf courses. He wore a black polo shirt with a white “UKA” logo on the breast, black slacks, black boots, and a black patch over one eye. His hair was buzzed short. He was missing an earlobe and had a pistol in a shoulder rig.
He grinned a familiar grin.
“Jimmy!”
James realized his mouth was hanging open. “I’m sorry. Do I know you?”
“What, don’t recognize me after ten years and a thorough mauling?” He flipped up his eye patch. The socket was scarred closed. “Oh, come now. You wound me. And that should say a lot!”
That accent. That irritating friendliness. James dredged a name out of the dim depths of his memory.
“Malcolm?”
James dressed quickly and joined Malcolm in his SUV before Stephanie could see the company he had attracted to their neighborhood. The houses on their street were split between young families and retirees, neither of whom would take well to a visit from a man with an eye patch and an exposed sidearm.
“I should probably warn you,” Malcolm said as they got on the highway heading east, “I’m not working alone these days.”
James frowned at the equipment on the dashboard. There were two monitors: one with a map of the area and blinking blue dots, and the other with scrolling lines of text. “I see that.”
Malcolm flipped a master switch behind the wheel. The dashboard went dark. “I’m with the Union of Kopides and Aspides. Heard of us? We’re trying to unite all the demon hunters under a single banner, and we are all about the high-tech.”
“Yes. I’ve heard a lot about the Union.”
Elise and Anthony had a run-in with the Union at the end of the summer. She definitely hadn’t made any friends from it.
In the last real conversation Elise and James had shared face-to-face, she had warned him that the Union would probably show up soon, although she refused to tell him why. Given that she had used very colorful language in describing the Union, he knew it wouldn’t be for a good reason.
As if he could detect James’s train of thought, Malcolm said, “Hopefully you’re hearing positive things.”
“Not at all.”
He laughed. “The Union’s earned a bad reputation. Their preferred methods of recruitment are… shall we say, blunt? But now I’m a commander, and when I’m in charge, we do things the nice way.”
“They made you a commander?” James couldn’t keep the disbelief out of his voice. “Great show of character judgment.”
Malcolm’s good eye flashed, but not with mirth.
The Union had moved into an abandoned warehouse on I-80 between Sparks and Fernley. Malcolm had to flash two different forms of identification and swipe his thumbprint to get the SUV through the gate. The compound they entered was a sprawling affair with barbed-wire fences, spotlights mounted on towers, and men carrying guns.
James also had to sign a nondisclosure agreement on a sheet of UKA stationary before he could leave the vehicle. He barely skimmed it before dashing his name off at the bottom. It wasn’t worth worrying about the particulars; there was no way the Union’s contracts could be enforceable in a court of law that didn’t recognize their existence. He had no doubt that they had ways of keeping people obedient—but it wouldn’t be through litigation.
Malcolm parked the car and jumped out. James followed him. They were near the river, and the back fence was shaded with trees covered in dazzling golden leaves. The wind carried the bite of winter.
“Are you hungry?” Malcolm asked, striding toward the open garage.
“Not particularly.”
“Mind if I get some breakfast?”
He moved on without waiting for an answer.
They walked together through the garage, which housed an entire fleet of black SUVs. There were also two large RVs, each the size of a semi truck. And there was a tarp at the back of the room covering a vehicle that looked suspiciously like a tank.
“This is the fleet assigned to my team. We’re ready for anything—all-out war against the local demons, if need be,” Malcolm said casually, as if having a tank was no big deal. “We’ve got a helicopter coming this afternoon, too.”
“A helicopter?”
“You know, a flying metal thing.”
James tried not to grind his teeth together. “I’m just surprised that you have one.”
“Union HQ has placed the highest priority on our mission in Reno.”
“And that mission is…?”
He winked. “I’ll get to that once I’m not so hungry.”
They had constructed walls inside the cavernous interior of the warehouse stacked five floors deep. James and Malcolm emerged on a walkway above the highest level. Most of the Union’s building was underground, and he could look down on it from their vantage point.
James had expected Malcolm to be in charge of a single unit, but he spotted at least two dozen men walking the wings, which totaled at least four units. Not a small operation. “How long have you been here?”
“A couple of months.” He silently counted, ticking off his fingers. “Yeah, about eight weeks. Since the end of the summit. Come on, mess is this way.”
The path down to the mess conveniently routed through one surveillance room—complete with oversized monitors, computers, and beeping equipment that resembled NASA’s ground control—and an armory, where several rows of body armor and guns were hanging in lockers. Malcolm was showing off.
“How did you end up in charge of this?” James asked. “More importantly, how did you establish everything here without attracting notice?”
Malcolm grinned, stretching his scarred cheek below the eye patch. “Who says nobody noticed? We have a few government friends. The real trick was avoiding Elise’s notice, and she’s been too focused on chasing after demon-kings to see us.”
“You’ve been watching her.”
“We put some surveillance in the city. Ah, here we go.”
The mess hall was an open cafeteria on the topmost level of the warehouse. It was unoccupied at the moment, but a fully stocked snack bar with fresh produce and protein bars stood against one wall.
Malcolm snagged an apple and took a loud bite of it. “Sure you don’t
want anything?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
“Why don’t we have a talk back in my office?” He blew through the cafeteria, another armory—how many of those did they need?—and entered a long hallway filled with numbered doors. “This is where the men stay,” he explained, leading James down the hall. “It’s much nicer than military barracks. See?”
Malcolm rapped his knuckle on a door and pushed it open. On the other side stood a small studio apartment, complete with kitchenette and private bathroom. There was a poster of a woman in a skimpy yellow bikini on the wall, a flat screen television, and a comfortable bed.
A shirtless man paused in the middle of performing pushups without getting up. Sweat glistened on his shoulders and dripped down his back.
“Can I help you?” he asked, craning his head back to glare at Malcolm.
The commander bit off a large chunk of apple, chewed, and swallowed before answering. “Just giving the tour, Gary.”
Gary dropped the pushup position, got to his feet, and toweled off his impressively broad chest. Every inch of his torso was covered in a mat of wiry hair. He held out a hand. “Name’s Gary Zettel. Are you a new recruit?”
“I don’t think so,” James said, but he shook his hand anyway. The skin-on-skin contact rang bells in his skull. A kopis.
“This is James Faulkner,” Malcolm said, carefully enunciating the name.
It apparently meant something to Gary, because his brow lowered over his eyes. “Pleasure to meet you.”
“How do you like working with the Union?” James asked.
Gary snorted. “It’s better than the alternative. Can I resume training… sir?”
Malcolm held up his hands as he backed out of the room. “Of course, of course. Don’t let me bother you. Jimmy?”
The commander’s room was at the end of the barracks, and was laid out like a two bedroom apartment rather than a studio. A large window in the living room opened into the rest of the warehouse.
“You never told me how you ended up in charge of all this,” James said.
“It was a recent assignment. I enlisted a couple years ago, when I needed some medical care,” Malcolm said, flopping onto his leather couch and kicking his feet up on the arm. He waved at his eye patch. “They were going to take Ireland either way. Might as well side with the men who have money, eh?”
“I suppose.”
“They sent me to a training facility in Italy, where HQ is located. Nice place. I did that for a few months, and then they gave me an aspis.”
“They gave you an aspis?”
“Sure. Bloke named Bellamy. Nice guy. Not as good at magic as you are, but what can you do?” Malcolm finished his apple and chucked the core at the trashcan across the room. It missed. “I know what you’re thinking, but it’s a good match.”
James couldn’t resist. “You can’t assign aspides.”
“You can, and the Union does. All that superstition about a kopis and aspis having to be ‘best friends for life’ is a load of crock. All it takes is two people who can tolerate each other. I wouldn’t invite him over for Sunday dinner, but Bellamy’s a hell of a drinking partner.”
“Forgive me if I’m skeptical.”
“Think whatever you want. Bellamy and I have done well enough that the Union promoted us to a command position last year. And when the last bloke in charge of this unit fucked up the semi-centennial summit, they demoted him and gave this mission to me. So here we are now.” He swept his arms wide. “I have a bloody army . Hard to believe, isn’t it?”
James peered through the window. Men were running drills in the halls with dummy guns. “And what, exactly, is the purpose of this army?”
“I’m going to give it to you straight, Jimmy.”
“Dear God , stop calling me that.”
Malcolm’s grin said he knew exactly how irritating the nickname was. “The Union’s not doing well in the United States. Recruitment has gone much better elsewhere, but things keep getting in the way here. American demons are much more likely to have immigrated recently, much tougher. And they have those fiery, independent personalities. Liberty and justice. ‘All for one,’ you know. Or something to that effect.”
“Is this an attempt at recruitment, then?” James asked, gesturing between them. “Because if this is, then for the record, you’re not the person I would have sent to do it.”
“No, this is definitely not ‘an attempt at recruitment.’” He spoke very firmly. “Frankly, the Union doesn’t want anything to do with Elise—and that includes her aspis. Which is why we’re sitting down to have a nice chat in my warehouse. As much as we want to improve our numbers, we also want the same thing that you want, Jim.”
Jim. If Malcolm wanted a good punch to the face, he was heading in the right direction for it. “You have no clue what I want.”
“No? Let me take a guess.” He kicked his legs over the side of the couch and stood, pacing across the room. He ticked each point off on his fingers. “You want nothing to do with hunting. No more demons, certainly no more angels, and no more peril.” Malcolm glanced over his shoulder. “And you want Elise out of it, too.”
James kept his features composed.
In fact, that was what he wanted. He and Elise had once shared a dream of peaceful normalcy, and for five years, they had succeeded. Those five years of retirement had been bliss. They had worked hard. Built businesses from the ground up. Made friends, found significant others.
But when Death’s Hand had attacked in the spring, Elise had fallen into the business of demon hunting again. It was only supposed to be for that one job. Just one exorcism to save a child in his coven.
Things had spiraled out of control. James was back to retirement… mostly. But Elise had dived back in headfirst.
He realized that he had been lost in thought for several long seconds, and that Malcolm was watching him.
“The Union can’t give us that,” he finally said.
The kopis studied his fingernails. “We can’t, eh? Safety? Security? Freedom from the Reno territory and what lies below?”
“How do you propose doing that?”
“Leave,” Malcolm said simply. “The two of you can get out of here while you still have four eyeballs between you and live a happy, mundane life together.”
James laughed. “We can’t just leave .”
“There are other places safer than this one.” He leaned forward, and his smile was completely gone. “We’ve found a Haven.”
“A Haven? Impossible.”
“The Union has been to places you can’t begin to dream of, Jim,” Malcolm said. His gaze went distant. “Places beyond Earth. Places beyond hellfire, places beyond even magic .” He sighed. “Can you imagine a place with no gods or demons or witches? A place where people die, and they stay dead?”
“No,” James said. “I can’t.”
“Your imagination is terrible, Jimmy-boy.”
“You traveled with us for a few months. You know why that is.”
“Indeed I do,” Malcolm said. “But trust me—Havens exist, and we’ve found one of them.”
If it was true, it was a tempting offer. Very tempting. James raked a hand through his hair.
“Even if that were possible, Elise would never leave. Not with what’s in the Warrens.”
“But we have the manpower to protect the city. We have the technology—you’ve seen it yourself. We’ve refined our techniques. So long as you two are safely tucked away in the Haven—far from the all-seeing eye of your most terrible enemies—you can rest assured that nothing and no one will cross through those gates to find you.”
James wasn’t sure what to say. He searched for words, and found none. His fingertips felt numb.
Malcolm studied James’s face, and it might have been the only time in his life that he was sober and serious at the same time. “I brought you here so you could see what I have. I hope you realize how much we’ve invested in preparing to secure the area.”
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br /> “And what’s the price of our safety?”
“The Union wants the territory. That’s the cost. All you have to do is take Elise and get out of the way.”
It sounded too good to be true. And if there was anything James had learned in his years fighting demons, it was that anything that sounded too good to be true usually was.
The kopis didn’t wait for a response. He glanced through his window at the floor below and huffed.
“Hang on a minute.”
Malcolm headed out of the room and took the stairs to the warehouse floor three at a time. He limped when he moved quickly.
James knew his sudden exit wasn’t a coincidence. The commander had left him alone to think, surrounded by the grandeur of the Union’s finest technology. He was meant to watch as Malcolm directed a forklift carrying a crate to the storage area. He was meant to notice the camera mounted in the corner, and the computer built into the desk.
He was meant to see the glory of the Union and think about what it could offer him.
Leave with Elise?
God, what a thought.
He wasn’t prepared to address an idea that significant. Not on the spur of the moment. Instead, he wandered through Malcolm’s quarters and studied his belongings.
It was a true bachelor pad. He had a gun safe, but it was unlocked, and his rifles were propped against the walls like umbrellas. He opened the mini-fridge, expecting to find beer, and was not disappointed. Malcolm’s laundry was piled on the counter beside a flat-screen monitor that displayed the weather report, the temperature, and a scrolling ticker of Union news.
None of that was as surprising as the bookshelf next to Malcolm’s desk. The kopis wasn’t much of a reader. Frankly, James wasn’t sure the man was even literate. Yet his shelves were full.
The books were comprised of a matching set of small encyclopedias. He eased a volume off of the bookshelf. It was a slender book, barely thicker than his thumb, and the title on the cover said, “Prophecies of Flynn, Q1 2009.”