by C. T. Phipps
Six of the trees continued to uproot themselves as they grew arms from their branches and became increasingly anthropomorphized.
“You have my word,” Alex said, putting his hand over his chest. “I will never make those kind of arrangements without you or Jane again.”
Kate Madison lifted up her hands and caused the six animated trees to catch fire around us. It caused Robyn to fall to her knees and scream as if the trees’ pain was her own, but she just focused through it and pointed at Jones’ host.
“Kill that son of a bitch!” Robyn shouted.
I’d never actually been in a mass battle before. It hadn’t been on my bucket list of things to do, either. However, no sooner had Robyn made the command than both sides made a move to attack. That went to show I really did need to establish myself as the leader. I would have gone directly after Jones and maybe prevented everything from going to complete hell.
“That’s all right, ignore the shaman,” I muttered, lifting up my staff and slamming it against the ground.
I unleashed every bit of stored magic inside the staff at once, calling forth the storm glyph that caused clouds to cover the area in seconds before pouring down rain. I, perhaps, overdid it because I’d been hoping to put out the flames of the trees with a drizzle and ended up more with monsoon season.
A cascade of water poured down upon us and blinded me even as everyone still charged at one another. Lighting cracked in the air along with thunder. Kate Madison’s fires, indeed, went out, and that meant we had a slightly better chance of survival, but I wondered what I could do to help in this battle.
Have faith in yourself, Jane. You are more dangerous than you know.
I tried to believe that. Of course, it would have been easier to believe if not for the fact I had to turn into a deer to duck out of the way of Jones pulling out a wand then firing glowing balls of hellish fire at me.
“You are not going to Avada Kedavra me, Hermione!” I shouted.
Alex engaged Visigoth in battle and it was hard to tell who was winning, since the two thousand-year-old vampire moved faster than the eye could see. Alex was friends with spirits of light and wind that allowed him to move every bit as fast. In the brief moments I saw them stop when one exchanged a blow. During the fight, Alex’s body glowed with sunlight he used to punch the ancient undead thing with the force of a mountain. They blinked in and out all around the clearing, like they were characters in an anime.
Lucien, meanwhile, turned into his twenty-foot-long dragon form and breathed fire that ignored the torrential downpour around us, only to have that fire wash over a similarly sized black dragon. The two grappled like kaiju, smashing into one another, biting, and slashing. It was a contest to be decided by pure strength and made me sad in a way, since there were so few dragons left in the world.
I tried not to scream as the two spider-women exploded into a mountain of spiders that grew into ones the size of cars, filling the area with things from Tolkien’s nightmares. Emma killed one another a single blow then another as Yolanda pulled out her shotgun to fight. That was when I forced down my fear, dodged between them, and charged at Jones before head-butting her across the field.
Should I feel bad about doing that to a little girl? I asked Raguel.
Yes.
Too bad! I proclaimed.
I didn’t get a chance to respond, though, because the Visigoth appeared right in front of me with Alex held above him in one hand. I should have known Alex had been throwing everything he had at the Ancient One. The millennia-old vampire looked triumphant, but there was a sadistic gleam in his old eyes that made me realize he wanted to watch as he killed someone I cared about.
Loved.
I turned back into a human woman, holding the Merlin Gun in front of me, and aimed at his head. “Put him down!”
The vampire laughed and spoke with an inhuman gurgle I could barely understand through his fangs. “A gun, you think you can threaten me with a gun. Wait, that’s the—”
I put every bit of magical energy I had into the Merlin Gun and fired a single bullet that slammed into the forehead of the vampire. The creature dropped Alex on the ground. Its head started to glow yellow then orange as the blessed bullet burned away its brain. Its head finally exploded as the rest of its body disintegrated into flaming ash. Ancient Ones could only be killed by another one of their kind—but the Merlin Gun was, apparently, an exception that proved the rule.
The first sacking of Rome is avenged. King Alaric has paid for his crime.
“Yeah, well the Romans were kind of asking for it,” I muttered.
Says the woman living in one of Rome’s spiritual descendants.
While the Merlin Gun was capable of focusing the power of any wizard to a tremendous level against what it perceived as evil, what was evil, it still needed one to provide the oomph. As much as Alex said I was stronger than any wizard, I couldn’t help but note that had taken almost everything I had. I collapsed to the ground even as I felt an immense amount of fear and confusion radiate out in a spiritual wave. The Visigoth had been the Seven’s leader, so his loss was an immense one. Sadly, none of them seemed to be the type to retreat either as they all believed they would be shown the same mercy they had shown others—which was to say none.
“Goodbye,” Jones’s voice spoke behind me.
“Crap,” I said, only capable of looking over my shoulder to see the little girl once more. Jones was no longer holding a wand, but instead the gun from my vision. He’d used up all of his magic, it seemed, getting rid of the storm around us as well as destroying all of Robyn’s living trees, as I saw nothing but burning stumps behind him where they’d been. Jones wasn’t aiming the gun at Alex, though, but me.
Jones contorted his little girl’s smile into one of deranged satisfaction, only to shake fiercely and collapse to the ground.
Behind him, Robyn was holding my Taser in hand. “Sorry, I hope you don’t mind, but I picked this up from your room.”
I glared at her then Alex, who was getting up. “See, I told you to Taser her.”
Alex didn’t respond, though, instead focused on the battle still going on between the dragons. Karl Chang had gained the upper hand on Lucien and was clutching his back between his arms, squeezing him to death.
Alex knelt down, lifted his palm up, then propelled himself forward with telekinesis before smashing the dragon across the battlefield into Samson the golem. The dragon’s body broke in half then turned back into its human form.
I stared at him. “Okay, you are teaching me how to do that.”
Larry hurled his magic hammer at Samson with more force than was humanly possible, causing the stone golem to shatter into a thousand pieces. The stone statue spoke something in Hebrew I didn’t understand.
He said thank you, Raguel translated.
With that, the battle was over, as Deana, Emma, and Gerald had killed most of the spiders. Kate Madison, unlike her fellows, had been smart enough to flee into the woods. Stephen Caldwell, the biker, had knelt down in surrender with his hands over his head. We’d won with no casualties! Yay! Then I saw Yolanda on the ground, twitching. She’d been bitten by one of the spiders and they probably would have been lethal at a normal size.
“Shit!” I said, running toward her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Alex and I both rushed to Yolanda’s side while Lucien shifted back to his human form. Yolanda was writhing in pain and I knew, in an instant, the demon inhabiting the spider twins had made their poison so it dealt death slowly.
“Damn it,” I said, coming to her side.
“Is there anything you can do?” Larry said, grabbing her hand and holding it tight.
“Alex?” I turned to him.
Alex placed his hand on her stomach and closed his eyes. “I can keep her alive and dull the pain, but her time on Earth will end the moment I stop. The poison is all in her blood.”
Yolanda stopped thrashing about but still looked to be in pain. Her breath
ing was labored and I could see sweat coming from her forehead, as difficult as it was to see with her clothes soaked like everyone else’s, including my own.
Larry looked over to Gerald. “Surely you can do something.”
“No,” Yolanda hissed. “I am not going to become a monster.”
“I could not change her with her blood poisoned as it is,” Gerald said, standing in the back. “I’m sorry.”
Larry growled at Gerald, clearly seeing it as a betrayal, despite the fact they barely knew each other. He was also ignoring Yolanda’s wishes.
“Let me help,” Jones’s voice spoke from the back as Lucien stood over the girl with a gun pointed to the back of her head. It wasn’t the most pleasant thing to see but I reminded myself “she” was a century-old psychopath wearing his daughter’s corpse.
“Right,” I said, turning back to her. “Fat chance.”
“I know the magic to transfer the disease to another,” Jones said, chuckling. “Death can be pay for life. You know this. Alex knows this.”
“I’ll do it,” Larry spoke up, quickly. “I’ll give my life for you.”
“F…that, Larry,” Yolanda said, in between pained breaths. “You are not dying for me. You need to live.”
I pitied and envied the hunters at the time. They’d managed to create a bond unified by countless missions together. It was a bond that was always going to end in death, though, because there were only so many times you could wrestle with Death before you lost. I didn’t want it to end for her like this, though. Strange as it may seem, I had started to respect the hunter and had forgiven her for the fact that she was an angry bigot. Maybe the fact she was on “my” team was all it amounted to, but that was enough.
“That’s not your choice,” Larry said, holding her hand with both of his now. “I would do anything for you.”
“Oh, spare me,” Jones said, laughing. “People die, that’s what they do, and the only ones who matter are the immortal.”
“Alex can do it,” Lucien said coldly.
“What?” Jones said, looking back.
“Lucien,” Alex whispered. “Don’t ask me—”
“Do you want to save your friend or not?” Lucien said. “I’ve seen you do it before.”
“Please, Alex,” Larry looked over to him.
“All right,” Alex said, lowering his gaze.
I looked over at Jones. “Awesome. Goodnight, Jones.”
“You wouldn’t dare kill a child,” Jones laughed.
“You’re right,” I said, standing up and then leaping in the air before kicking in Jones’s direction. “SPINNING DEER KICK!”
Despite making a Street Fighter II joke, I was entirely serious about the spell I was working. I’d recovered enough to do one more. It was the only one I knew other than how to read objects. It was also an ability I’d used only once before to defeat the Big Bad Wolf. It was the power of exorcism.
The blow struck out against Jones and knocked his ghost clean from the young girl’s body. I saw Jones’s translucent form hover in the air for a second before disappearing. The look of snide contempt on his face was unmistakable even as he faded away. Judith collapsed like a doll which had its strings cut, plopping face-first into the muddy ground before her. Lucien bent down to check her pulse.
“Is there any chance he’s permanently dead?” I asked Alex.
“No,” Alex said, still holding his hand on Yolanda’s side while giving everyone orders to make circles, marks, and glyphs around her. “However, he will be trapped in the Spirit World for a while.”
“How long was a while?” I asked, looking around. “Because he didn’t stay dead for more than a few hours last time.”
“We should draw protective circles around his daughter and son,” Alex said. “At least that will force him to seek out the others. He can take any of his followers, though. It’s just harder.”
“She’s alive,” Lucien said, standing up. “I think she’s got her soul still, too.”
“There’s an unusual sentence,” I muttered, looking over to the fallen soaked form of David Jones. “Is he alive? I mean, he got hit by lighting.”
David lifted his hand up and waved it a bit.
“Well, that answers that question,” I said, wondering if I was willing to sacrifice his life to save Yolanda’s.
That would be murder, Raguel said.
Oh, that would be murder, I thought, rolling my eyes.
Yes.
Okay, fair enough.
“Can you help her?” Lucien asked.
“Yes,” Alex said, taking a deep breath. “I’m going to need Robyn’s hand, though.”
“Like hell!” Robyn said, pulling away.
“I promise you no harm will come to you,” Alex sad, his voice serene. “I want to try and take power from the whole forest, though, rather than trying to kill someone for it to work. It is the gift of life you’ve been blessed with, Robyn Taylor, and something you can give to the rest of the world.”
“I’ve heard a lot of holy men talk stuff like that,” Robyn said, staring at me. “Usually before they ask to fuck me.”
“I have someone else for that,” Alex said.
“You better be talking about me,” I said.
“Yes, Jane, I mean you,” Alex said.
“Just checking.”
“Monogamy is overrated,” Lucien muttered, looking over his shoulder as he made protective circles around the fallen Jones family members. “Honestly, more people should work in groups. Frankly, one should never knock threesomes before—”
“Please stop talking,” Alex said.
“Right,” Lucien muttered. “By the way, I wasn’t referring—”
“Silent as a monk who has taken a vow of silence,” Alex said, holding out his other hand for Robyn.
Robyn, reluctantly, put her hand in Alex’s. “This isn’t going to hurt, is it?”
“It will, yes,” Alex said. “I am asking you to endure it for the life of a stranger.”
“All right,” Robyn said.
“Ugh,” Yolanda said, choking. There was a defiant look on her face and I saw she was struggling to maintain it despite everything. “Just heal me or let me die, because this in-between thing is really sucking.”
What happened next could only be described as a combination of a miracle and an abomination. The screams of both Robyn and Yolanda filled the air while I saw Alex’s eyes produce tears of blood. The air filled with magic and there was a rush of the wind before Yolanda jolted up then vomited what seemed like a stomach full of black fluid. The fluid caught fire on the ground before going out almost instantly.
Robyn pulled her arm away from Alex’s. “Holy crap, could you warn me next time you’re going to do something like that?”
“I did warn you,” Alex said, sighing. “It worked, though.”
“What would have happened if you hadn’t?” Larry said, going to check on Yolanda.
“Yolanda would have died and then one of those spider women would have hatched from Yolanda’s body to wear her skin,” Alex said, frowning. “We got all of the spiders, didn’t we? They’re hosts for the demon otherwise.”
There was the sound of rifle fire nearby.
“Yeah,” Lucien said. “Alice is going to get them all.”
“You trusted the crazy mercenary lady with a gun?” I asked. “The one who tried to kill you?”
Lucien nodded. “She promised we were fine.”
I stared at him, waiting for some sign of sarcasm. “Okay.”
Deana looked at me. “It seems my new master is not the only one who has an exaggerated sense of a promise’s value.”
“A man is only as good as his word,” Lucien said, looking at Alex. “Though some promises clearly mean more than others.”
“So you didn’t have to kill anyone?” I said, turning around to look at our prisoner. Steve Caldwell was lying facedown on the ground, his body burnt to a crisp from the inside out. It was like someone had set his blood o
n fire. “Oh.”
Alex sighed. “I was hoping not to, but it didn’t work out.”
He was a murderer many times over.
“I know,” Alex said, surprising me. I hadn’t realized he could still hear Raguel when he spoke. “That doesn’t make it any easier.”
“Well it should,” I said, looking around.
Larry looked over at the burnt corpse then at Yolanda. “I don’t care what he did. I’m glad he did it.”
Alex stood up and looked around. “We are reaching the last leg of our journey. All we have to do is find the entrance to the Grove.”
Robyn waved her hand like it had been burned then pointed behind Lucien. “There it is?”
I looked where she was pointed and squinted. I could just make out a shimmering circular gate that seemed like an optical illusion in the sunlight streaming through the trees. A rainbow from my impromptu storm was nearby, making the clearing look peaceful and serene despite the numerous dead bodies scattered about.
“Huh,” I said, taking a deep breath. “That was easier than I thought.”
“You call this easy?” Larry asked.
Yolanda slapped him across the shoulder. “So what do we do now?”
Alex looked over to it. “Robyn can bring people through the gate, but I don’t think the rest of us will be able to go. The curse here is very powerful and only she can break it.”
“How do I do that?” Robyn asked.
Alex shrugged. “Take someone through the gate and confront the Dryad. Ask her to do it.”
“Before or after I set her on fire?” Robyn asked.
“Before, preferably,” Alex said.
Robyn nodded, seemingly missing the joke (if a joke there were). “Jane, I’d like you to accompany me. Can I take anyone else?”
“If you can hold their hand, yes,” Alex said.
“Then you, Handsome Agent Man,” Robyn said, pointing to you. “Sorry, Gerald, but I need a wizard here.”
“I understand,” Gerald said, looking down.
Robyn paused before responding. “I’m glad you came, though, Gerald. It was hard when you disappeared. You were one of the few people who were ever nice to me.”