by M. D. Massey
2
All at once, the fire escape’s supports gave way with a metallic screech. I rolled to my side, pulling my pistol from my Bag as the catwalk collapsed. At first Eliandres was nowhere to be seen, but then I saw it—a human-sized distortion, leaping from the second-story fire escape landing as it fell.
Bracing my shooting arm on the minivan’s back bumper, I emptied the magazine at the blur that I suspected to be Eliandres. Seventeen rounds went downrange in rapid succession, and as the slide locked back I paused, fumbling to hit the mag release so I could reload. After several seconds of effort, I found myself failing miserably at that task. So, I shoved the gun back in my Bag, scanning the area for my enemies with rapidly blurring vision.
A low groan drew my attention to an area of pavement just a few feet in front of the collapsed fire escape. I still couldn’t see Eliandres, but a growing pool of bright red blood told me that at least one round had hit the mark. I ducked back behind the van, leaning heavily against the rear passenger-side tire.
“Looks like ya’ sprung a leak,” I yelled. “Not lookin’ good for ya’ Elly.”
All I heard in response were more groans, giving me hope that he was out of the fight. Unfortunately, I had no idea whether I could say the same for his partner, Lucindras, who might walk up and cap my ass at any moment. With little time to spare, I took a quick personal inventory to determine just how fucked I really was.
For starters, the manticore venom had spread throughout my body. The good news was that it had only paralyzed the area around the wound. So, while that leg was out of commission, I had control of my other limbs—more or less. But due to the inebriating effects of the poison, I wasn’t thinking very clearly and I was having trouble with fine motor control and speech.
That was the real bitch of it all. The method I’d learned to cast spells required three things: mental clarity to focus my magic, manual dexterity to perform the gestures that channeled whatever power I might gather, and a clearly spoken trigger word or phrase to release each spell.
In a nutshell, I was immobilized and too venom-drunk to reload my pistol or cast any spell worth mentioning. Sure, there were a few spells that didn’t require complex hand and finger positions, cantrips I could cast with a quick gesture and a simple trigger word. But none of them would be sufficient to take out a highly-trained fae assassin.
By this time, it was a given that Luther had heard the commotion and hopefully called for the cavalry. If he could reach Finnegas or Maureen, it was remotely possible they could convince the Druid Oak to send them here in an instant. But the Oak tended to only listen to me, and I was the only one who could directly communicate with it.
Since it was still dusk, I doubted I could count on the coven or Luther to pull my ass to safety. He’d probably kill Eliandres and Lucindras for attacking me outside his café, but that would do me little good after I was dead. Speaking of which, I still needed to get an antidote for the manticore poison if I was going to survive the night.
Wait—didn’t Eliandres say something about having an antidote on him?
It was worth a shot. Dragging my leg behind me, I began to crawl toward the rapidly-expanding puddle of blood some fifty feet away from my current hiding spot. As I crossed the parking lot, it briefly occurred to me what a wonder it was that no bystanders had shown up to investigate. I realized that the Wonder Twins must have cast a “look away, go away” spell on all routes of ingress and egress to the café’s back parking lot before they attacked.
“Hate… ya’… fuggers,” I mumbled as I pulled myself across a seemingly endless expanse of tarmac.
Finally, I reached the bloody patch of asphalt that marked where Eliandres had fallen. Fumbling around like a drunk man looking for a light switch in the dark, eventually my hand hit something that was vaguely human-shaped. Pulling myself atop him as ungently as possible, I rifled through his clothes, searching for any bottle or container that might contain the antidote. I was still searching when I heard the scrape of a boot on pavement behind me.
“Fug.”
“I really have to hand it to you, druid,” Lucindras said. “You have a talent for survival that defies all logic and reason.”
With an awkward, limb-flopping roll, I turned to face the other fae assassin, dropping an elbow on her partner as I did. He let out an “oof” and a moan that gave me the warm fuzzies. When Lucindras had shuffled closer, I squinted to get a good look at her.
“Ya’ didn’t even haf the decency ta’ die right,” I mumbled.
“I could say the same for you,” she replied as she limped around the rubble and debris that was once a three-story metal staircase.
It gave me no small amount of satisfaction that she looked like hell. Her leather catsuit was ripped, pierced, and charred, her left arm hung at an odd angle, and she had the broken shaft of one of her own arrows sticking out of her thigh. To top it all off, her right eye was swollen shut and she had a menagerie of cuts, scrapes, and burns on every exposed bit of skin.
“Look like shit,” I said with a drunken laugh.
“I will heal, as will Eliandres,” she replied through gritted teeth as she drew a long, thin dagger from behind her back. “You will not be so fortunate.”
“Meh. Died before,” I said, with little conviction. “S’not so bad.”
“Yes, but this time your alter-ego will not be sufficient to—how does that nursery rhyme go? ‘Put Humpty-Dumpty back together again?’”
“Har, har,” I said, pretending to look at her with unfocused eyes as I observed the darkening sky behind her. By now, the pink and orange streaks of dusk had faded to the bruised hues of early night. In a few minutes Luther would make his appearance. I just had to last until then.
Lucindras limped closer until she stood over me. “Any last words, druid? Not that I’d share them with anyone, mind you.”
“Gonna’ put zat knife in me, or jes’ keep babblin’?” I said, glaring up at her.
With only a slight wince to betray her injuries, she knelt beside me and rested the tip of the long, thin blade on my chest between the third and fourth rib. It would take only a little pressure to slide the knife into my heart, potentially piercing the ascending aorta as well. Bitch knew her work, that was for sure.
“Oh, how I have dreamt about this moment,” she said, leaning forward to get her weight over the hilt.
That was precisely what I’d been waiting for. Without fanfare or comment, I pushed the knife away with one hand, shoving my other hand in her face.
“Lasann,” I said, releasing my flash-bang cantrip right in her only functioning eye. She screamed with pain and surprise, but she also had the presence of mind to try to stab me anyway. I grabbed her wrist, pushing the knife away so it entered my shoulder instead of my chest.
“Gah! Yur’ one syphilitic cunt of a woman, ya’ know zat?” I growled through gritted teeth. Somehow, I managed to hang onto her wrist to keep her from stabbing me again. While we struggled, I reached for the cold-iron skinning knife in the sheath at the small of my back.
Despite being blinded in both eyes, Lucindras fought with abandon, grinding and twisting the blade to compound the wound. Thankfully the knife was buried in my delts and not in my shoulder joint, but the searing pain still made it damned difficult to draw my own blade. My fingers finally found the handle of my knife and I pulled it out, burying the blade to the hilt over and over again in her side.
Still the bitch continued to fight. “Fug’s sakes, die already!” I growled as I proceeded to perforate her chest and abdomen with abandon. Finally, her struggles subsided and she collapsed on top of me.
Pushing the assassin off, I pulled her stiletto out of my shoulder and stuck it in her eye for good measure. Then I turned over on my back, breathing heavily and deciding that the tall, slender female assassin made a suitable, if somewhat wet and sticky, place to close my eyes and rest.
Eliandres groaned beside us, so I pulled Lucindras’ dagger out of her eye and p
lunged it in her partner’s chest. “Shut up, you.” He answered with a short, rattling breath, followed by lots of nothing else. Satisfied that I’d get no further lip from either assassin, I allowed myself to slip into semi-consciousness.
It might have been moments or minutes later when Luther appeared next to me in burst of shadow and smoke, doing his master vampire Nightcrawler routine. He scanned the scene of destruction, pursing his lips and tsking like a parent who’d just caught his kid scribbling in crayon on the walls. Despite the fact that I was soon to expire, I had to laugh.
“Reminds me of the final battle in Endgame,” he said. “You know, where Tony—”
“Dude, spoiler alert,” I gasped.
“You mean you still haven’t seen that movie?” he asked.
“Been busy. Tryin’ not ta’ die an stuff.”
“You could’ve done this somewhere else, you know,” he replied casually, examining the damage to his car. “Perhaps away from my new Mazda?”
“Nope. One… car is a rollin’ stereotype. Two… pricks jumped me, pinned me down. Three… manticore venom.”
He nodded in response. “You’re dying, you know.”
“Yup. One of ‘em hazza antidote. Wouldn’t mind findin’ it, would’ja? Bit poisoned at the moment.”
Austin’s top vamp released a small, exasperated sigh, then he began rifling through their clothing in a blur. As he did, he produced several small vials in various shapes and sizes, opening and sniffing each one in turn. Luther’s nose crinkled in disgust at the first few, which he capped and pocketed rather than putting them back where he’d found them.
Finally, he presented a clear glass vial containing a light blue, milky, pearlescent liquid. He pulled the cap and took a whiff, frowning. “This may be it.”
“May?”
He shrugged. “Well, the others were definitely poisons, along with at least one incredibly virulent strain of bubonic plague—no idea what they intended to do with that. This vial doesn’t smell of toxins, but I can’t truly be certain if it’s the cure. The good news is that if it isn’t, it won’t make your situation any worse than it already is.”
“Joy,” I grumbled, motioning weakly. “Give it.”
“Even dying, he has the manners of a rabid ungulate.” Luther knelt next to me, popping the cap with his thumb as he gently lifted my head with his other hand. “Here, allow me.”
I opened my mouth without protest, keeping any and all comments about cold hands to myself. The liquid was cool and slimy as it went down, becoming an icy hot burn in my gut that moved slowly through my body and out to my limbs. As the strange warming sensation expanded, it intensified as I broke out in cold, greasy perspiration, shivering uncontrollably.
Based on the brackish color and acrid odor of my sweat, it appeared that the antidote was pushing the toxin out through my pores. Soon the hazy feeling began to fade and my injuries started to heal as well. I observed in mild shock as the gaping hole in my thigh closed and scabbed over.
Luther stood by, observing my recovery. “How do you feel?”
I cracked my neck and rolled my shoulders out, flexing my leg experimentally. “Honestly? I feel great—like I just had a double espresso after a week-long nap. What do you think was in that stuff?”
The old vampire’s upper lip twitched slightly. “Unicorn semen, a cure for magical poisons that also has minor healing properties. I didn’t want to tell you beforehand, because I knew you wouldn’t take it.”
“You serious?”
He nodded, crossing his arms and covering his mouth to hide a barely suppressed grin. “Deadly.”
“And unicorns are real?”
“Nearly extinct, but they are very real.”
“Huh.” I paused for a moment, considering the implications. “Listen to me very carefully, Luther—this never happened.”
Austin’s vampire coven leader made a zipping motion across his lips. “Oh, believe me—my lips are sealed. Yours, on the other hand…”
“Not funny. Also, I think I’m going to be sick.”
“You know I have to call Maeve about this,” Luther said with a dramatic sigh.
“As long as you leave out certain details, I don’t care who you call.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said with a barely noticeable yet eminently smug grin.
“And let’s keep it that way. Now, I suppose you want me to split before Maeve’s fixers arrive?”
“That would simplify things a great deal, considering that you just killed her pet assassins.”
I held my hands up in protest. “Hey, they tried to kill me first. All I did was return the favor.”
“Hmm. Yes, I can see that. Still, she is a fae queen—”
“—and given to bouts of extreme pissyness when her favorite hench-people are killed. Got it.” I paused and looked around at the carnage. “You gonna make her pay for the damages?”
“As if,” he sassed. “Her fixers will make it look like a freak tornado touched down behind the shop or something. Then the insurance companies should pay for everything.”
“Except my coffee,” I lamented.
He scowled. “Oh, quit pouting already. I’ll make you another before you go.”
I perked up. “You’re the best—you know that, right?”
Luther took his time sashaying back inside the café. “And don’t you forget it, sugar.” He returned a minute later, this time using vampire speed to deliver two steaming-hot cups of coffee.
I took the to-go cups from his hands, raising one to him with a nod. “Cheers,” I said, before taking a sip. “Ah, silky, sweet perfection.”
“That’s what he said,” the vampire quipped. “By the way, one of Maeve’s people just called to inquire about the commotion.”
“And, that’s my cue. I’ll see you later, Luther.”
“Sooner rather than later, actually. I have some coven business to deal with tonight, and when I do I’d like you to attend in your official capacity as justiciar.”
“I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m kind of busy right now. Can it wait?”
He gave a slight shake of his head. “This concerns you as well as the coven. Trust me, you’ll want to be there. I’ll have Sophia call you with the information.”
He disappeared in a cloud of smoke before I could respond, which meant my presence wasn’t just requested; it was expected. Realizing that I was a bloody mess, I decided I’d better clean up and finish getting ready to leave town. The Oak had portalled me to Luther’s earlier, so I returned to the junkyard in like manner.
As soon as I appeared next to the Oak’s massive trunk, Finnegas came barreling across the yard wearing his best “I’m a grouchy old fart so don’t fuck with me” expression. I held out his red-eye and he snagged it out of my hand without comment, sampling the dark, caffeinated goodness within. He closed his eyes to savor the moment, and the sour look on his face softened.
“Took you long enough,” he said, without commenting on my appearance.
“Yeah, well—I got sidetracked.”
He took another sip, arching an eyebrow at me over the paper cup. “Oh?”
“And I may have killed Maeve’s favorite assassins, just a teeny bit,” I said, pinching my finger and thumb together in front of my right eye.
Finnegas pursed his lips, then he nodded. “Best news I’ve heard all day, although I doubt Maeve will share the sentiment. But considering the way she’s reacting over this whole Celtic gods dust up, she can suck it. Get a chance to use the spells we’ve been working on?”
I sipped my mocha and nodded. “Ball lightning spell is still taking me too long to cast, but I managed to pop off Mogh’s Scythe on the fly.”
“Did you hit one of the twins with it?”
“A fire escape. Sliced clean through the supports though.” I waited for some comment of approval, but the old man was not forthcoming. “I almost died, you know. Eliandres poisoned his throwing knife with manticore venom.”<
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Finnegas perked up at that. “There’s only one antidote for that. How’d you survive?”
“I, uh, had the Grove whip something up.”
Finnegas stared at me, poker-faced. “Ah.”
I cleared my throat. “Anyway, I have some packing to do—”
“Not before we get more training in.”
“Oh, c’mon, Finnegas—I just dusted two fae assassins using magic. Obviously, my skills are coming along nicely.”
“Be that as it may, once word gets out that you killed an elite hunter-killer team all by your lonesome, whoever the Celtic gods send at you next will be no pushover.”
“Wait a minute—you think Eliandres and Lucindras were working for someone else?”
He took another sip of his coffee. “Oh, most assuredly. Despite their loyalty to their queen, they’d have had no problem taking a commission from another, equally powerful patron. So long as the contract didn’t require them to break trust with Maeve, of course.”
“Well, that’s disturbing. Now that I know I basically can’t trust any of the fae, I’m going to be really freaking paranoid until this beef with Aenghus blows over.”
Finnegas tilted his head toward the office. “You can trust Maureen.”
“Yeah, but she doesn’t count, not really. I mean, she’s been at odds with the rest of her kind for centuries, right?”
“Perhaps not so long as that—and don’t you dare let her hear you say something like, ‘she doesn’t count.’ The woman cares for you more than she’s willing to admit, and she’s rather sensitive about the topic of her schism with her own kind.”
“Half her kind. You know I don’t mean any harm by it, but I’ll be sure to choose my words carefully around her if the topic comes up.”
He tilted his cup at me. “You do that. Now, let’s retire to the Grove for one more training session before we wrap things up Earthside, shall we?”
“Alright, but I’m taking a nap after that.”
“You can nap all you want, once we’re far away from Austin and safely ensconced somewhere that Aenghus can’t find us.”