by John Conroe
I also had a message that I almost deleted; one of those offers for increased service plan coverage or some such. At first it appeared to be from Verizon, but looking closer I found some suspicious phrases.
For only $10.31 each year, you get downloadable photos of all your favorite celebrities from Brittany to Jessica Alba to Call now to Trac 71 for this special offer.
The price caught my attention because it was mine and Tanya’s birthday, and the flat out obvious initials for Tanya did the rest. Checking my supply of Tracfones I found one numbered seventy-one.
The call went through quick but it wasn’t Tanya that answered.
“Hello?”
I was pretty sure the voice belonged to Anna, a young vamp who I knew only slightly.
“Anna, it’s Chris. I got a message to call. Or at least I think I got a message,” I said.
“Yeah, er …Tanya isn’t here. She’s at the meeting. That’s what she wanted to talk to you about.”
“What meeting?” I asked.
“The meeting with the weres! Aren’t you there, you are supposed to be there!”
“Slow down, I don’t know about any meeting. I’ve been up North. What are you talking about?”
“The weres called a meeting at the Tunnel. You’re supposed to be there too. Tanya and Lydia wanted to know what it was about. But they’re gone, along with Senka and Galina.”
“Hold on a second,” I said, holding my hand over the phone. “Brett, is there some meeting with the Coven that your father called? At some tunnel or something?”
“Not that I know of…” he began to answer, but Kelly interrupted, having been checking her own messages.
“Brett, there’s a message from Afina on my voice mail asking about a meeting with the Coven. Apparently they called it?”
“No, the Coven says your parents called it!” I corrected.
All three of us reached the same conclusion simultaneously.
“It’s a trap!” I said, just as Brett swore and Kelly’s eyes widened.
“Anna, call Tanya and stop her. The weres didn’t call that meeting!” I said into my phone.
“I can’t! They don’t get cell reception underground!”
“Then tell Arkady or whatever security guys are around to get to them fast! Stop them from that meeting!”
“Arkady is with them, but I will send Trenton and some others!”
“Anna, listen, this is important! Send EVERYONE that you can find! Got it?”
I hung up from her and turned to the others. Brett was visibly frustrated, having to fly the plane and unable to get on his own phone. Kelly looked alarmed and David was even quieter than normal.
“Who would do this?” I asked.
The plane was quiet for a moment, then Brett spoke.
“Lots would do it…if they had the knowledge and the connections. Only a handful actually could hope to pull it off. My father will bring at least a standard security team with him. Some armed in two legged form, some in four legged form. I’m not sure about the Coven, that’s your area, but I strongly suspect that there will some really formidable individuals there,” he said. “I doubt any of the normals would be so daring. The fey could try something, but it doesn’t seem their style. I don’t know any other were group big enough to attempt it.”
A cold knot formed in my stomach. “I think I do! Loki’s Spawn have the numbers if they shifted enough people up here.”
“Your mother was suspicious that the Spawn knew about Stacia’s party, and had five members handy to show up. She’s been wondering about a leak,” Kelly said.
“In the Pack? Are you crazy?” Brett demanded, outraged.
“What’s this tunnel that was mentioned?” I asked.
“Atlantic Avenue,” David said quietly.
“Atlantic Avenue is a street!” I said, confused.
“Under Atlantic Avenue is an abandoned train tunnel. It’s been bricked over for years, but it was built in the mid-1800’s by the Long Island Railroad company to get the train out of the city’s traffic. Some guy ‘rediscovered’ it in the seventies and now they give tours to normals, but the supernatural community has used it for meetings and such for decades,” David explained.
“Wait…did you say ‘fey’ a moment ago?” I asked Brett.
“Yeah, fey..you know, elves, fairies, goblins and that sort,” he said puzzled.
“Really! They’re real?”
They all nodded without answering.
“Okay, back to this tunnel. How fast can we get there?”
“We need to land at JFK. We’ll get a Pack security team to pick us up,” Brett said.
It wasn’t fast enough. My chest was getting tighter with every breath and the beast was rattling his cage at the thought of Tanya in a trap. Unbidden an image popped into my head, while ahead of us the City loomed. A wall of roiling black clouds rushed to meet us like a sky-high tsunami of rain.
“I have an idea,” I said, although actually it was Okwari’s suggestion.
Chapter 32
“That’s insane!” Kelly said, after I had detailed the plan.
“Your Alphas and my mate don’t have any time to wait for us to land. And they don’t even know there is a problem yet!”
“You’ll be killed!” David said with certainty.
“I’ll be fine. You’ll have as much danger landing in this storm. By the time you get there it’ll be over one way or the other!” I replied.
The little plane bucked as a sudden gust shoved us sideways, Brett grimly fighting it back on course. I reached up and touched the Tear on its necklace, mentally trying to evoke the stores of resolve and determination locked within it.
“Alright! We’ll try it,” Brett said suddenly. “But don’t blame me if you get killed!”
Maybe the Tear had worked or possibly, his math had work out the same as mine. There just wasn’t time for anything else.
“I’ll have to do some fast talking with JFK flight control, the storm gives me some excuse. I’ll get as low as I can, but the winds over the city are strange on a normal day. This storm makes them deadly!”
He got busy with the radio, while I reviewed the plan. Not a lot to go over, really. It was simple – Brett would fly directly over Atlantic Avenue, getting as low as possible, and I would jump out. Nothing to it! A quick drop of somewhere around 500 feet and then I would need to get through about four or five feet of brick, asphalt and dirt. Of course, I would have considerable help. Ursine help. Okwari had sent me images of me falling slowly through the sky, supported by my own ‘wind’ as he eased me to the ground. I could Lighten myself with vampire techniques and I had easily survived drops of over fifty feet, but still, leaping out of a fully functional aircraft without a parachute seemed insane. My knotted heart said otherwise. Tanya was in real trouble, despite having Senka, Tzao and the others with her. Enough weres, fighting in close quarters could overwhelm almost anything.
I opened my mind as much as I could, straining to feel my connection to Tanya. If only my ability to sense her was as strong as hers to find me.
I felt a tug, just a slight pull, but Brett chose that moment to speak.
“Chris, we’re just about over Atlantic Ave. You’re gonna need to move quick!”
“Listen, just land this thing safely. I’ll take care of your parents and my crew!”
“By yourself?” Kelly asked.
“Kelly, what you don’t know about me is that I’m never by myself!” I responded, yanking the door open and leaping into the wet blackness.
* * *
Immediately, I was flipped end over end, bullets of rain smacking my exposed eyes. I was falling fast, and at first panic threatened to overwhelm me. A weighty tug on the chain around my neck righted me into a facedown sky-diver’s fall, the Tear also lending me determination, even as it straightened my descent. I focused on Lightening my weight and as my speed slowed, a cushion of air formed under me. Okwari simultaneously sent an image of us falling
directly toward a massive multi-lane street. The pull I felt from Tanya matched his image of where we were headed, although the connection was now flavored with her rage. She was fighting!
* * *
Normal night vision was useless in the torrential storm, but my version of thermal vision offered small details from below. There were few cars on the wide road below, the storm working to keep people off the streets. A couple of tractor-trailers passed each other, headed in opposite directions. Ground was rushing up fast and suddenly, my supportive wind disappeared from under me, my fall accelerating. I put my arms out in front of me, hands together in a classic dive pose, but with mono edges formed over both hands. Aiming straight at the pavement below I returned to normal weight, letting gravity speed the last fifty feet or so.
* * *
My plan was to use my mono-edged hands and momentum to slam through the asphalt, dirt and bricks. My plan sucked!
I sank elbow deep into the street, slammed to a halt, flipping over onto my back, smacking my head, shoulders and spine hard enough to black out for a second or two. Pain and disorientation disappeared as panic took over and I leaped to my feet. I had made a mini-crater about a foot deep, but before I could do more than glance at it, the sound of screeching tires and a blaring horn interrupted me. Looking up right into the blinding headlights of an onrushing SUV, I could see the driver’s panicked expression as he tried to stop.
It was a big vehicle, part of my mind automatically deciding it was an Escalade, from the Caddy emblem on the front. Twenty feet from impact, it hit something else, something really big. The front grille, bumper and hood caved inward toward the engine and the back wheels came up off the ground, as it slammed to a halt. I switched to Sight, noting the giant green, purple and red form of Okwari, his head pointed at me, not even bothering to pay attention to the machine that had totaled itself against him.
Below me I sensed Tanya’s rage changing to exhaustion. The berserker inside smashed free of his cage, just as car doors slammed and a voice heavy with Brooklyn accent said: “Are you fucking crazy! Whaat’s the fucking matter wit you!”
My head tilted up, the berserker and I looking at three brawny-Italian looking guys, whose expressions of anger flashed over to fear.
“Run!” I said in a voice not my own, just as Okwari rumbled a warning from his invisible position right in front of them.
The three changed directions fast, turning and running back into traffic, where the other oncoming cars were slowing at the sight of the wrecked Escalade.
My attention turned back to the barrier of stone and dirt below me, but I was pushed out of position by three thousand pounds of furry power.
Okwari stood up to his full height, hunched his massive shoulders forward and brought both trashcan-lid sized paws down on the ground like a polar bear breaking the ice dome of a seal’s den.
I’d like to tell you that I loosened it for him, but anyone who saw the road buckle down into a sudden depression would know the truth. A five foot wide hole had opened into a pit of darkness, a gust of damp, moldy air rushing up, smelling of vampire and wet were, fear and blood. Lots of blood.
No sooner had Okwari pulled back then I dove past him into the hell hole below his feet.
Chapter 33
I can’t tell you a lot of detail of my fall into that pit, but some things managed to get seared into my memory. My fighter-self was in charge, dropping twenty feet to the dirt floor of the old tunnel, my body already oriented in the direction where I sensed Tanya.
We had come through right on top of the combined Coven and Pack group, twenty-seven all together, according to my fight brain. The tunnel extended on either side of them, filled wall to wall with Loki Spawn weres. Wolves, bears and cats mixed with Spawn in human form and beast-man form, all fighting to get at the vastly outnumbered vampires and Pack members. Two hundred, thirteen was the number that popped unbidden into my head. The fighting had paused for a microsecond as my bear punched through the ceiling, but was now back in full frenzy.
I had already oriented on Tanya, who was out on the edge of her group, fighting fifteen weres by herself as Lydia pulled a wounded Senka back to the slightly more protected center of the group.
A were bear bit down on my mate’s left arm and just before his massive teeth crunched shut, my mind detected the gleam of silver – painted onto his teeth.
From here it gets sketchy. All I can tell you is that the sight of those brutal teeth closing on my Tanya’s slim arm broke my sanity and I went nuts.
The first six Spawn in front of me exploded into shreds as I shot through them, my entire body wreathed with mono edges, my arms spinning in arcs too fast for even the weres to see. I went through another ten enemy, like a mower through grass. Arms, legs, torsos, heads, gun barrels, parts of machete blades all parted like air as I spun forward.
But as fast as I was going, I still wasn’t to Tanya as I saw a giant wolfman pull back his silver-clawed arm to swipe at Tanya’s exposed head. A purple-black bolt of aura from my right hand completely removed his head before he could swing. The bear still had her arm in his jaws and I pulled with my left hand. Most of his brain and part of his spine ripped clear of his body, shooting across the thirty feet to my hand. I threw the remains into the face a rushing wolf, then crushed its skull with a front kick.
Behind me I heard Lydia yell. My internal heads-up display showed two giant cougars, each the size of a tiger, feinting at the young guardian, who was doing her best to protect Tanya’s grandmother. Without conscious thought, a bolt shot from my hand and speared both cats, one through the chest, the other through the hips.
Tanya was struggling with five, no, six new weres. I wasn’t going to make it, not before they killed her. Not before she was torn apart by silver tipped claws and teeth. Not before I lost her for good.
Any anger or rage I had ever felt before, at the loss of my family, at Hellbourne, at Reyes, at poor George Lassiter, at the forces of my own government, all paled before the geyser of purple-black fury that exploded from deep inside me. The Tear on my chest went white hot, I screamed in rage and the world exploded into violet light.
* * *
The sound of dripping water is the first thing I can clearly recall. That and the awful smell of burnt hair. Then the warmth and weight of a slim body held in my lap. My vision returned just as I realized cool lips were fastened to my right wrist and a steady pull was suctioning blood from my arm.
She was draped across my lap, her right hand, bloody and grimed, holding my wrist to her mouth. Both eyes were closed and I had an immediate flashback to my first meeting with her.
This time, just as then, her eyes snapped open, startling me with their glowing blue irises.
I was sitting cross-legged on the ground, my head bowed over her broken form.
An enormous presence was looming over us both, but I knew instantly that it was the protective bulk of my friend.
“Chris?” a voice spoke softly, yet with an urgent tone.
I lifted my head and saw Lydia facing me from twenty feet away, Galina, Nika, Arkady, Senka and Tzao arrayed behind her. Further back, Brock and Afinia watched with me with wary eyes.
Nika moved up next to Lydia, her gaze locked on me.
“Chris?” Lydia said again, more urgently.
She was looking at me like someone might watch a rabid dog, with fear and wariness.
Why would Lydia be afraid of me?
I opened my mouth to speak, but the sentence in my head failed somewhere between my brain and my mouth.
“Mine!” I stated in challenge.
Lydia’s expression changed to shock and she involuntarily stepped back half a pace at my utterance.
Nika’s expression didn’t change. “He’s puzzled by your fear. He’s also having trouble talking. He meant to say ‘She is mine and I am hers’ but all that came out was ‘Mine!’ ” the slim mind-reader reported, never taking her eyes from me.
I’ve always thought Nika was j
ust a major pain in my ass, but I had to admit, she was handy to have around when my brain and mouth came unwired.
Lydia stepped forward, slowly, her face firming with resolve.
“Chris, we need to get to Tanya to help her!” she said.
I cleared my throat and mumbled my way around a response.
“S-so come on, all-lready!”
Why were they waiting? Where were the Spawn? What the hell had happened?
Lydia and Nika surged forward at my words, and after a wave from Lydia, the rest moved up as well.
Okwari woofed once, nudged me with his snout and then spun out of the tunnel in a swirl of wind. The remaining vampires and Pack weres looked around wildly, as they felt rather than saw his departure.
Lydia began to examine Tanya, but Nika kept her attention on me. I glanced around the tunnel. Not a single Loki’s Spawn were remained in sight. The tunnel arched up over my head, reaching about seventeen or eighteen feet, its walls and ceiling made of brick. The floor was dirt, which was turning into mud in the center, right under the compact car-sized opening that Okwari had punched through the curved ceiling. Above, on the street, I could hear sirens and see flashes of light from cars and approaching emergency vehicles. Water dripped and ran in through the opening in mini-torrents.
“Lydia, we are leaving NOW!” Senka said firmly from fifteen feet away. Most of the other vampires had kept their distance from me and now were headed toward an opening in the brick wall that I was pretty sure the normal world was unaware of.
Tanya released her grip in my arm as Lydia slipped a needle into her arm, the other end connected to a bag of O positive blood. Then the tiny vampire scooped up Tanya like she was weightless and looked at me.
I climbed unsteadily to my feet, suddenly dizzy. Lydia looked concerned.