by Sara Snow
“What’s that?” I asked. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. In fact, those abandoned streets outside, with their creepy alleys and shattered streetlights, were starting to look pretty good.
“Once you get to know us, you’ll realize that you were always meant to be here. We’re your people, so to speak.”
Then she laughed, and the crone’s mask fell from her face. She was stunning, sexy Olympia again.
If I’d been startled by the sight of Olympia standing in the doorway of a condemned warehouse, I was even more shocked by what I saw next. The door opened onto a vast, circular room, which was lined with cushioned benches and low-slung chairs. Sconces in the walls held candles that shed warm light across the room. Small tables holding chess sets, books, and antique goblets separated the benches and chairs. The floor was padded, like a wrestling ring.
A framework of metal beams crisscrossed the room, extending to the ceiling where they merged into a series of horizontal ladders. Long, knotted ropes dangled from the ladders on the right side of the metal web, and heavy rings on chains hung from the left. In one corner stood a rack lined with dumbbells and kettlebells. Displays of weapons adorned one wall: swords and axes, maces and antique rifles, and blades of all kinds that I couldn’t even name.
“What do you think?” Olympia asked. There was pride in her voice.
“It’s like a CrossFit gym...on steroids,” I said.
Her eyes widened, and for a second I thought I’d offended her.
Good. The witch deserved a little jab at her ego.
Then, Olympia chuckled. “It’ll be good to have another woman around here for a change.”
“I agree. The place does reek of testosterone with so many of us males around.” A deep voice broke into our conversation. A man stepped forward as if he’d been hanging back in the shadows. He was tall and lean with shoulder-length black hair and a tanned, slightly weathered face. He smiled with his eyes instead of his mouth, filling me with a sense of warmth.
“I’m Kingston,” he said. “And you must be Georgia. Carter told me all about you.”
“Really?” My voice rose to a squeak and my cheeks flushed. “I only met Carter once, the night he...um, invited me here.”
I wasn’t sure if I should tell them what happened in my apartment the night Carter burst in and slaughtered the soul-eater. Had he told them how I’d made things move around the room, like the paring knife that had stabbed Carter in the arm? My childhood had taught me to never give too much away. You never knew when the slightest bit of extra information might betray you or someone else.
“He told me that you’re a special young woman. One who needs protection, at least until she can be trained to use her gifts.”
“I don’t need protection. I’ve been taking care of myself my whole life.”
“Yes, we can see that,” he said gently. “But your life has changed dramatically. Demons will be drawn to you.. You’ve had merely a tiny taste of the kind of trouble they could bring. You haven’t had to protect yourself from the others.” He replied.
“What others?” I asked, although I secretly knew what he was talking about. The soul-eater was just the beginning of the bizarre adventure that was becoming my life.
“There’s plenty of time to talk about the evil beings that lurk beneath the surface of our world. Let me introduce you to a few good beings. And while we’re at it, I’ll finish the grand tour that Olympia began.”
Kingston was probably the only man who could subdue Olympia. The sexy witch kept her mouth shut as we rode the shipping elevator, a relic from the days when this building actually was a warehouse, to the second floor. She wasn’t exactly meek around him, but the sass element was toned way down.
I couldn’t put my finger on the way Kingston made me feel. His eyes were infinitely dark, warm but sad, and I had trouble meeting his gaze. As the elevator rose slowly, he asked me questions about my job, my apartment, my hobbies. They were the kind of questions you asked to pass time on an elevator ride, but he seemed genuinely interested in the answers.
“Tell me about the tattoo on your wrist,” he asked. “Do you like music?”
“I write music,” I said proudly, wanting to impress him. “I have this old guitar, and I make up songs for myself. I’ve been singing and writing songs since I was a kid. It helped me get through a childhood that wasn’t exactly magical.”
“Sometimes, a tough childhood forges a strong woman. Will you play for us sometime?”
“Sure. Absolutely. I’d love to!” Giddy from his attention, I babbled on about the musicians who influenced me, particularly John Lennon, whose music had kept me sane at the lowest points of my childhood. So much for holding my cards close to my chest. As we left the elevator and entered the second floor, I told Kingston all about the things I loved and cherished most.
“I knew there was a reason Carter thought it was so important to bring you here. Let’s meet the rest of the Venandi.”
He gave me that smile again, not with his mouth but with his eyes, which were fixed entirely on me. And I knew what it was that drew me to him. Kingston was the kind of man that fathers were supposed to be. If he was a man, that is. I was beginning to realize that in this new world I had entered, you couldn’t take anyone’s humanity for granted.
If the first floor had been decked out like a CrossFit gym, the second floor looked more like a Four Seasons Hotel—not that I’d ever been to one of those establishments. As my feet sank into the deep, wine-red carpet, I wished I was barefoot so that I could wiggle my toes in the softness. The walls were a rich, creamy white trimmed with gold detail, and the hallways were lit softly by chandeliers. Now I understood why the windows were boarded up—so the outside world couldn’t see the luxury within.
“It’s comfy up here, isn’t it?” Olympia asked. “You’re going to love spending time with us.”
“Do you live here?”
“No, I don’t. I need my own space to work my spells and have one-night stands and shit like that.”
Now it was my turn to laugh. I couldn’t help liking Olympia, even if her beauty made me feel like a hot mess.
Kingston led us into a room that definitely reeked of testosterone, but in a good way. The walls were paneled with dark wood, like the inside of a hunting lodge. A wet bar stood in one corner of the room, and a pool table in the middle. Leaning over that table while gracefully holding a pool cue was a man who I would have considered hot if I’d been about ten years older. His head was shaved, and a long, pale scar ran along one cheek.
“Eli, this is Georgia. She’s come to visit us and learn about what we do.”
Eli looked up at me and gave a curt nod. I guessed that he was in his forties, but those four decades looked damn good on him. He wore jeans and a snug black t-shirt that displayed the carved muscles of his abdomen, chest, and arms. He was ripped, but in a way that showed he worked those muscles for a purpose, not just to look pretty. If anyone made use of the gym downstairs, it was this guy.
“Hope you’ve got a little time, then,” he said. “Kingston can be wordy.”
“And this is Jose, our local pool champion,” Kingston said, ignoring Eli’s barb. “He was about to beat Eli yet again.”
Kingston motioned to a slight, curly-haired boy perched on a stool behind the pool table. The boy’s faded blue Converse sneakers dangled a full foot above the floor. I wasn’t sure how Jose could beat anyone at pool when he wasn’t anywhere near a cue. Then, the boy gave me a shy smile and slid the eight ball into a corner pocket without laying a finger on it.
I froze. Jose and I shared a gift, only Jose was much better at controlling it than I was. If I wanted to move things, I had to be royally pissed off—this boy was as cool as a cucumber.
“I knew you were coming tonight,” Jose said. “You’re the beautiful girl with long black hair and purple eyes that I saw in my dream. I wrote about you in my notebook, and that made it real. That’s why you’re here.”
Jose’s
face was full of wonder, as if I was some kind of angelic vision instead of a snarky chick wearing a hoodie who had somehow wandered into this hidden palace.
“Nice to meet you, Jose. I hope we can be friends.”
“Okay, that’s enough masculinity.” Olympia clapped her hands together. “Time for us girls to go paint our nails and watch a chick flick.”
“Not yet,” Kingston said. “First, we need to get Georgia something to eat. She looks pale. I’ll prepare something delicious while you show her my library.”
Olympia groaned and rolled her eyes. “Fine. Maybe she’ll bore herself to sleep while she’s perusing those dusty old books. But food is a good idea. And a glass of wine wouldn’t hurt, either. How does that sound, Georgia?”
I gulped. It sounded unreal. For once, I had no smart-ass remark to protect myself from my feelings. In the past forty-eight hours, I had met a terrifying being who had tried to steal my soul and people who had shown me more kindness than I’d ever known.
But as I walked back to the elevator encircled by the arms of my new friends, one question haunted me: Where was Carter?
9
Carter
It had been a long, tense day. I prowled the city streets with my hands clenched in my pockets, trying not to think about how hungry I was. On my rounds, I stopped at a cathedral to check in with a cambion priest who was working as a double agent for the Venandi.
Father Michael had chosen to side with the good guys about fifteen years ago, when he made the ultimate sacrifice by joining the priesthood. I had to admire him for giving up all worldly pleasures, both human and demonic, to dedicate himself to protecting humankind. But he kept one foot in the realm of demons, stripping off his habit late at night to join their ranks and gather intel on their plans.
It was a dangerous, potentially deadly double-life that Father Michael led. One false step, one loose word, and the cambion priest would be nothing but mist and memories.
“It’s getting ugly out there,” Father told me when I stopped by to catch up on his latest adventures. “The skies are teeming with them now. There are incubi and succubi on every street corner. They’re forming armies, sowing chaos and havoc wherever they can find a foothold. And lately, they’re finding it easier than ever to lure cambion to their side. Then, they’re reinforcing their numbers by mating with humans at a rate we’ve never seen before.”
“Breeding like rabbits, huh?” I said with a wink.
Father Michael chuckled at my lewd humor. “Exactly what I was thinking. Be careful out there—more careful than you think you need to be. They’re dragging humans and half-humans off the streets these days. They’ll only get bolder as the days march on.”
I knew the priest wasn’t exaggerating. The demonic realm was growing. Groups of slayers like the Venandi were being rapidly outnumbered. As I paced the streets of Chicago—my “patrol,” I called it—I knew that I was under surveillance. Whenever a cloud crossed the sun, I heard the masses of dark wings overhead, watching and waiting.
I headed back to my car at about six p.m., ready to go back to the warehouse to meet up with Kingston and the team for their evening meal. It was always tough to sit there while we ate, thinking about the one substance I really craved. But I cared too much about the Venandi to let my feelings show.
As I drove, my vibrating phone woke me from my fantasies of blood.
“Carter. I need you. Pronto.”
I recognized Dominic’s voice, but I’d never heard him sound so panicked. Each syllable that he spoke was punctuated by a frantic breath.
“What’s up? Where are you?”
“That park where I always hunt. You know, the one with all the grass.”
“Well, that narrows it down. Most parks have grass, Dom.”
I was trying to inject a little humor into our conversation to calm him down, but my strategy didn’t work.
“Come on, Carter, don’t be a smart ass. I need to show you something—now. Before the cops show up.”
Dominic gave me a few wild, random directions. I knew the place he was talking about, a stretch of open space frequented by drug dealers, prostitutes, and lost souls seeking a refuge for their criminal encounters. Dominic liked to hunt in that park because the police always dragged their feet when they were summoned there.
“Where should I meet you?”
“I’m standing by the public bathrooms. This is ugly, Carter. Really ugly.”
I drove to the park, thinking that I’d probably find Dominic hovering over a half-dead victim, wondering how to finish him off.
Driving around the park, I searched for the typical cinder-block cube that housed the public toilet. I parked my car on the outskirts of the lot and walked the remaining distance.
What an enchanting place for a twilight rendezvous.
A human body wrapped in rags sat slumped against the concrete under a display of graffiti that read, “Abandon all hope ye who enter here.”
No credit to Dante, of course.
Clutching his phone to his ear, Dominic came running around the building.
“Thank god. Thank god, you’re here,” he gasped. The vampire’s face was chalk white, even paler than its usual shade of skimmed milk.
“What’s this about, Dominic?” I took him by the shoulders to hold his heaving body still. “What’s going on?”
“Follow me.”
I let him go and followed him through the park. At dusk, the expanses of grass were empty. Dominic’s dark jacket and slacks were spangled with the dull light of the setting sun.
Why do vampires always feel the need to wear black?
It was a dress code that I’d never followed, being half-human. It heightened the differences I already felt like I constantly needed to remind myself of.
Dominic led me to a grove of trees at the far end of the park, not far from a deep ravine that separated the open space from the highway. He halted before entering the shadows of the grove, gesturing wildly for me to go ahead.
“Here it is. Here. Just look!”
As I stepped into the shelter of the brooding trees, my nostrils picked up an all-too-familiar scent. An ancient smell, pungent and foul, with a hint of exotic spices.
Frankincense and myrrh masking the reek of sulfur. A demon had been here. A very old, very powerful bad-ass of a demon who still had ties to the primitive origins of its supernatural race.
The source of Dominic’s terror lay at the center of the circle of trees. And I understood why he had been so desperate for me to see it.
The body lay spread across the grass in a deliberate, gruesome display. I guessed it to be human from its general anatomy, but the thing was so badly mutilated that I couldn’t swear it belonged to any particular species. Its torso had been flayed and cracked open, with an iron rod standing upright in the space that had once been occupied by its sternum.
Whatever killed this victim had torn out its heart.
The body still had a head and most of a face. Its nose, mouth, and jaw had been half-devoured, but its forehead remained intact. That one unbroken expanse of skin was the only unaltered part of this unfortunate creature. Someone, most likely the killer, had etched a single word in Latin across the victim’s head:
PRODITOR
Still hiding at the edge of the grove, Dominic whimpered into his hands. “What does it mean, Carter?” he moaned.
“It means that you need to get a grip on yourself and let me investigate this.” I kept my tone civil, suppressing the urge to choke some sense into my wimpy vampire friend.
“But what do those letters mean?”
I had to think about that for a minute or two. My Latin was rusty, to say the least.
“Traitor,” I said finally. “This human, beast, demon, whatever it is, betrayed someone. And now, he or she has paid for it.”
“Why did I have to be the one to trip over this mess?” Dominic whined. Because, of course, it was all about him. The narcissism of pure vampires never ceases to amaze me
.
“How did you end up finding the body?” I asked.
Dominic took a deep breath. “I met this woman. A hooker, obviously, but pretty and so juicy.” He licked his lips. “I brought her back here because I knew it would be secluded.”
“Yeah. A real romantic getaway. So, what happened?”
“Could you cut the fucking sarcasm for five seconds? Listen, I brought a girl back here to feed off her. She saw the body first, screamed bloody murder, and ran. I saw what she was looking at, and I called you. I knew it wasn’t just another human killing. Look at that thing—it has to be one of those demons you’re always chasing.”
With the pointed tip of his Italian leather shoe, Dominic gestured distastefully at the gaping hole that used to be the victim’s ribcage. Tucked under those shattered bones was the long tip of a leathery wing.
But that wing was just the beginning. I bent down to look more closely at the victim’s chest. The perpetrator hadn’t applied much finesse to this killing. The chest had been ripped from throat to diaphragm. The cavity that had once held a beating heart was now a yawning black hole, pierced through by an iron stake.
“Do you have a Kleenex or a napkin I could borrow?” I asked Dominic.
“Are you kidding?”
“No. You’re a modern metrosexual vampire, aren’t you? You must have a monogrammed hankie in your pocket.”
“Well, it just so happens that I do have a handkerchief,” Dominic said, handing me an impeccably creased square of linen.
It gave me great pleasure to use that precious hankie to wipe the gore off the right side of the victim’s chest, which was relatively intact.
My hunch had been correct. The victim’s chest revealed a single, crude letter: P.