by E. A. Copen
“I just need to know she’s safe.”
Her mouth turned down into a frown. “Why does it matter so much to you?”
My jaw worked, and I fought the gathering tightness in my throat. “Because it’s my fault,” I said quietly. The words slipped out of my mouth without going through my brain filter.
Kim reached out and ran her fingers over the edge of the bag. “I’m told that human females have a particularly strong nurturing urge toward infants. I couldn’t care less about that. I don’t understand why or how you can waste so many resources on a crying lump of meat. But guilt...” She lifted the baggie and stared at it, a dark memory gleaming behind her eyes. “I understand guilt.”
After a long moment of staring at it, she shuddered, wadded the baggie up and shoved it in her pocket. “I can make no promises,” she said. “But I will look into it. I can at least let you know the child’s condition. What does that hurt?”
I was about to thank her when my cell phone buzzed in my pocket. On autopilot, I pulled the phone out, accepted the call and pressed it to my ear. “Agent Black.”
The voice of my regional supervisor exploded through the earpiece and I jerked the phone away from my head. “What the hell is this?”
“You’re going to have to elaborate, Gerry,” I answered, turning away from Kim’s amused expression.
“A dead Stryx? And you want to be the primary on this case?” He gave a bitter laugh. “You’ve got to be shitting me, Judah. You don’t know the first thing about navigating vampire politics!”
I glanced back at Kim. “That’s becoming clearer as time goes on, actually.”
Gerry never stopped talking, though, and the next words out of his mouth were exactly the ones I had hoped I wouldn’t hear from him. “That’s it, Black. I’m sending someone down there to get things in order. And so help me God, Black, you’d better not screw this up, or it’s the end of the road for you.”
Chapter Ten
Gerry’s always threatening to force me to hand my badge back in. It was an empty threat since he didn’t have the power to remove me without going several levels up. Besides, if I left my post, he’d have a time filling the position. It wasn’t like agents were clamoring for the spot in Paint Rock, overseeing operations in Concho County. But if this case went sideways, and the Stryx decided to step in and take matters into their own hands, losing my badge would be the least of my worries.
My boss sounded like he was about to have a stroke as he went on and on about all the trouble and paperwork this was going to be for him. I imagined the little blue vein in his forehead popping out.
“Gerry,” I said at length. “I get it. You’re pissed. And I’m not an expert when it comes to vampires, but I know these people. I’ve developed a rapport with most of them. I can close this by myself. I don’t need a partner.”
“It’s not your ability to close the case I’m calling into question,” Gerry spat back. “Even though I know you’ve got plenty of other open cases that could use closing. It’s your smart ass mouth. You and I both know what your record looks like when it comes to politicians. Vampires are politicians. They love their mind games and power plays.”
“I know, Gerry. Just give me a chance!”
“You don’t know shit, Judah Black!” Gerry screamed into the phone. “With your record, you’re damn lucky I don’t hand this case up the line. The fact I’m letting you stay on at all is a personal favor. Nine a.m. tomorrow morning. Your office. Be there to meet your partner. And make no mistake, he’s taking the lead. You’ll fall in line or I swear, I’ll reverse my recommendation to the disciplinary committee.”
The phone suddenly squealed. I winced and pulled it away from my ear. As I did, I happened to see my call waiting kick on. Mara was calling. That was weird. Mara always texted. She never, ever called.
I didn’t have enough time to react. Something in the corner of the room caught my eye. The air shimmered like a mirage, the ripples growing larger. Half a heartbeat later, a wave of magick swept through the air, knocking the phone out of my hand and to the floor. As the ripples stopped, I tried to hide my surprise. In what I had thought was an empty corner of the room stood a lean stick of a man in a white button down, a suit vest and beige slacks. A few strands of long, wispy blond hair fell down over pointed ears as he swept a knobby looking stick in front of his face. He spun the stick once before bringing the pointed end of it down to strike the floor. A blue wall of buzzing magick sprang up halfway between me and Kim: a magick barrier.
For a moment, the wheels turned in my head as I tried to make sense of two things at once. First, there had been another person in the room, a practitioner I hadn’t even sensed. And he was good. No, better than good. Judging by the behemoth amount of power he’d called forth to make a barrier without even breaking a sweat, he was one of the most talented practitioners I’d ever met. But why had he called up a protective barrier in the first place? What threat could have been so imminent it forced him from his excellent hiding place to protect his mistress?
And why were the lights flickering?
“What is it?” Kim asked, standing, her face the definition of calm.
I glanced from Kim to the elf practitioner at her side, unsure, and then retrieved my phone. Great. The screen was cracked. “What is what?”
“Dunno,” answered the elf. “But it’s big. The perimeter wards just triggered.”
“What? Where?” I asked.
The two of them ignored me. Kim yelled for security. Brutus and company charged in, snorting like bulls and glaring at me. “Alert the perimeter,” she ordered. “I want a full sweep.”
Before her guards could move, the telltale daka-daka-daka of an automatic weapon in the distance cut through the air. Brutus growled for a report into his earpiece and then scowled when he got his reply. Even a few feet away from him, I could hear the screaming. It sounded like he was getting a report from a war zone.
“What the hell is happening?” I asked in my most authoritative tone, meeting eyes with Kim.
“We’re under attack,” Kim answered, taking a gun from one of her bodyguards.
“By what?”
As if in answer, there was more gunfire and another scream. A loud thwomf sound on the roof shook the small room and drew all eyes upward. Brutus screamed in a panicked voice, “It’s on the house! All units to the house! Protect the mistress!”
A horrible sound echoed through the room as something raked what sounded like claws over the clay roof tiles. I threw my hands over my ears, barely able to react because of the way the noise made my skin crawl.
“Go,” the elf screamed, presumably at Kim as both of them covered their ears.
“Too late for that, Creven,” Kim growled back at the elf.
The lights flickered one last time and then went out.
I stood in dark silence, waiting, holding my breath. My heart was thumping so loud in my chest I was sure it was attracting the attention of the vampire in the room. But if she did hear it, she said nothing. No one said anything, not for what felt like an eternity.
Then, somewhere close to me, Brutus whispered, “Mistress?”
The sound that followed was wet and heavy, reminiscent of the sound raw beef made when dropped from high up. Someone screamed. The room lit up as if lightning had torn through it, gunshots fired in blind panic serving as the source.
Something wooden and heavy lowered around my neck, pulling me back. I gagged and fought against it, but all I managed to do was throw myself off balance. Something cold swept under my feet, taking them from me. I fell. Someone grabbed me, jerking me back. Massive fingers, each the size of my arm, wrapped around my leg, the contact so cold I shouted out in pain. The two forces pulled on me as if I were a rope in a tug of war, humanlike hands and fingers pulling me one way while the frozen fingers pulled the other way.
Behind my head, Creven’s voice grunted. “You’ll not have her!”
Panic ran through me as one of his hands le
t go from under my arm. My body jerked the other way, and the cold coiled up my leg all the way to my knee. Even though I was wearing jeans, it felt like the thing, whatever it was, was right up against my skin, biting and tearing into my flesh with a thousand mouths of frozen teeth. Cold shot up my leg and settled in my chest. I don’t mean a little chill. I mean the kind of painful cold that consumes every thought. Frostbite cold. I kicked at whatever it was but couldn’t connect. The thing didn’t seem to have a body beyond the cloud of cold settling over me.
Light flooded the room again, this time brighter and tinged with blue. An animalistic roar pierced the air, and I was torn between covering my ears and my eyes as both intensified.
“Back,” shouted Creven. As he advanced a step, I could see the source of the light was the end of his staff. “Release her!”
Slowly, begrudgingly, the cold wrapped around my leg receded. My leg, which up until then had been numbed by the chill, suddenly came back to life, all pins and needles. I shielded my eyes against the light with an arm and caught a glimpse of a huge hand falling back into darkness. The elf pulled me back and pushed me against the wall next to Kim, who took up a defensive posture over me, snarling and baring her fangs. The barrier, which I hadn’t even realized had come down, went back up and the three of us stood behind it. Well, I just kind of sat there. My leg hurt too bad to stand.
The elf adjusted his staff. The blinding light wasn’t just emanating from the top of it. The light was running through it, lighting up a series of wards that beat with a pulse-like rhythm of power. When he shifted it upward, I was able to see the rest of the room.
Two of the three Brutus bodyguards were no more. Like Harry, their guts had been splattered all over the opposite wall. A few recognizable bits and pieces remained, an eyeball here, a quivering bit of intestine there... One whole leg was still intact. The third man lay in halves, the top half resting and alive on the far end of the table. The rest of him from the waist down occupied a chair. Pale terror sketched across his face. He tried to use his upper body strength to pull himself the rest of the way across the table and behind the safety of the barrier. Behind him stood a giant, grim-faced man of pale, gaunt features. He had a long gray beard and fists the size of my whole body. He managed to fit into the room only because he’d wrecked the other half. His icy blue eyes bored into us and a thick, gnarled lip turned up in a scowl.
The giant twitched one hand and a tree-trunk sized, spiked club swung into view. With one loud grunt, he brought it down on top of Brutus. With a sickening pop-thud-crack, it went through Brutus, collapsing the table. Then, the giant stepped forward and pointed his club at Creven.
“Step aside, elf,” it said in a booming voice. “My quarrel does not concern you.”
The elf lifted his pointed chin and tightened his grip on the staff. “Aye, but it don’t change the fact that I gave the lady me oath. No harm to her. Now, bugger off. You ain’t getting this one.”
“I am honor bound,” said the giant, narrowing his eyes. “The vampire is mine to slay. This is your last warning, elf. Step aside or suffer the same fate as these humans.” He gestured to the bodies.
“Hey, ugly...” I fought against the pain in my ankle, clawing my way up the wall. “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”
Dark laughter vibrated through the room. “You mock me, human. You assume I cannot breach your pathetic barrier and kill you.”
“Who are you?” I asked of the giant. “Are you what killed the vampire at Aisling?”
The giant smiled and stroked his beard. Icicles appeared wherever his hand passed over. “Why do you defend this one? You have nothing to gain. Step aside and let me kill it. What is one more dead vampire to you?”
“I wouldn’t draw its attention, love,” mumbled the elf. “Especially so soon after escaping it.”
I shifted my weight and braved a step forward. “Who summoned you?”
The giant growled and swung its club, embedding the spike in the wall. “I am sent to slay the evil you are protecting. If you intend to stand between me and my prey, then you will fall with it. But I am obligated to offer you escape once more. Human, elf, heed me. Stand aside. This is the last time I will offer you safe passage.”
The word obligated struck me. There was only one variety of creature I knew of that was required to make an offer three times before its actions were set in stone. And the giant’s talk of honor and slaying evil... This wasn’t a spirit. It was some kind of fae.
I tried to stand but toppled back down when I put weight on my leg. Creven heaved my arm up over his shoulder with a grunt. That was the only way I was getting anywhere. Whatever it was, I couldn’t let it go around killing people, honor bound or not. I had to stop it.
“I’m sorry but I can’t,” I said.
The giant turned his head aside. I swear, I heard his bones creak when he did. “You would lay your life down for this vampire?”
“No,” I answered. “I hate vampires. But I hate murderers even more.”
“Kiss my perfectly toned ass,” Kim said and pointed her revolver at the giant.
The gun barked as she filed a single round and struck him square in the forehead. The giant’s body jerked back slightly and he roared, pulling the spiked club from the wall. He swung it once, striking the barrier. A giant crack appeared in it, spreading from the impact point all the way to the floor.
“Time to go,” said the elf and lifted his staff to strike a plate in the wall.
Part of the wall slid aside, and he rushed us through into a metallic hallway beyond. A single door waited at the end and he urged us toward it.
“Where are we going? You know we can’t just leave that thing,” I huffed. “It’ll tear this whole place down!”
“D’ya know how to kill it?” asked the elf.
“Not off hand.”
“We don’t have to kill it. We just have to escape.”
We reached the door. He threw it open on a large living space with Persian carpets, crystal chandeliers and gold, silver and other precious metals all around. There was also a squad of private security in there, each of them wearing the fleur de lis. They had on the equivalent of magickal riot gear, dressed head to toe in body armor warded to the teeth. The blue wards glowed and pulsed as they moved into position behind us, covering the door.
We skidded across the carpets, headed for another door on the other side. I couldn’t help but pause in the doorway and turn around at the sound of the spiked club scraping down the hallway. When the giant came charging into the room, it did so through a hole blown in the wall with its hammer-like fist and swinging its massive club. Two of the security guards fell underfoot and got crushed like roaches, gut splatter going everywhere. The giant swung its fists and crushed another, grabbing up a third and ripping him brutally in half. The rest of the squad opened fire, but it was no use. The giant shrugged them off without them ever penetrating his skin.
“Come on!” the elf said and grabbed me by the shirt, dragging me through the door.
As we ran down yet another corridor, I shouted to Kim, “Your men are getting slaughtered. You should pull them back. Tell them to retreat!”
“And let that thing catch up to us?” she answered with an indignant laugh. “I think not. They’re serving their purpose.”
I looked at her, disgusted. “Those men had families, lives. You don’t feel an ounce of guilt over leaving them to die?”
She tossed her hair aside and shrugged one shoulder. “If you feel so strongly about it, go back and call the retreat yourself.”
We came to the end of the second hallway and spilled out into a garage full of cars. The elf darted for the closest car, a yellow Ferrari. Not one to linger in a situation out of her control, Kim slid into the driver’s seat, throwing open the passenger door for me. “Get in!”
Creven helped me into the front seat and then spun around at the sound of a crash. If the sounds coming through the door were any judge, the giant was wor
king its way toward us. The only thing standing between our escape and us getting crushed like Harry, Brutus and the others was one little elf with a stick.
“I’m not leaving him alone to face that thing,” I told Kim.
She rolled her eyes. “What are you going to do? Investigate it to death? You don’t have the proper tools for dealing with it.”
“And he does?”
“Creven can handle himself,” she said.
“Aye,” said Creven, drawing his staff across the floor of the garage in a circle. “That I can.” By the sound of his voice, the crazy bastard wasn’t even nervous. In fact, I half expected him to break out into laughter.
“You’re no good to us dead,” Kim said. “Now close the damn door so we can go.”
I took a deep breath. As much as I hated to admit it, they were right. Without preparation, I was a declawed kitten in a dog fight. But left to fight alone, Creven would get himself killed. I wasn’t going to run away from a fight, especially if lives were on the line. If we didn’t stop the giant here and now, it would go on a rampage after Kim. It wasn’t going to stop.
I grunted as I pushed myself out of the car and stood, putting as much weight as I could on the uninjured leg. There was an old broom lying against a cement pole a few feet away. With a lot of effort, I managed to pull myself over to it, flip it upside down and use it as a sort of cane to go and stand beside Creven. He eyed me curiously. “You ready?” I asked him.
“Aye. And you?”
I tapped my broom against the cement and sent a pulse of magick into my injured leg, giving it the added strength I needed to stand. It wouldn’t last long and it would still hurt but it would get me through the fight...I hoped.
“Come on, punk,” I screamed. “Come get some!”
Chapter Eleven
The giant charged head first through the doorway, shoulders so wide the walls cracked. Before it was even fully in the parking garage, it brought down a hammer fist with a shout. I jumped to the right while Creven dove left. The arm came down between where we had been standing and sent a spray of broken concrete into the air.