And a flicker of unease danced right down my chest and flicked me in the nuts.
She was insane.
Her father flashed her an enabling smile, a practiced gesture. “There, there, Honey. Let me talk to this man here and explain. He doesn’t understand magic like you do,” he pleaded.
She folded her arms impatiently. “I want my toys back. She took them away. They’re mine!”
I turned to Boris, frowning. “She was… abducted by a gang of shifters. They… broke her. They had her for hours. All night. They picked her up from the street outside our home, where she had been playing with her toys. I had been inside, working. Her mother outside with her. Normal day. I heard the screeching of tires, and a scream that I will never forget.” He took a deep breath, eyes distant.
“I’m not going to fall for your sob story, old man.”
But he didn’t seem to care, lost in the memory. “I ran outside to find my wife dying in the street, her throat exposed. She had used her last strength to scream my name. I saw a van racing down the street, and suddenly realized that my girl was… gone.” A tear streamed down his face.
“Stop it, Daddy! That was just a nightmare,” the girl warned. “I don’t have a mommy. Just a guardian angel.”
“I know, Honey. I’m just telling the man about your nightmare. How strong you are. How you managed to wake up from the bad dream.”
My mind was racing. What the fuck was going on? Tory was staring at the two of them in shock. Mallory groaned from his position near the wall, and I saw that my friends still lay in a circle around Tory, like the spokes of a wheel. Eyes open, staring up at nothing, but breathing. Where was the Huntress? Gunnar? Ichabod? The tent was empty for all but us, as far as I could tell.
Boris lowered his voice, trying to keep the child from reliving the nightmare, apparently. “The trio of shifters beat her to a pulp. Raped her. Tried to force a change. Three different strands of lycanthropy. When they couldn’t force a change, and grew tired of their sport, they hit up a convenience store before seeking another victim. Just so happened that a witch was nearby. She heard the men bragging about their conquest, and went to the nearby warehouse where they had kept my daughter.” His voice was a dull rasping sound, like grave dirt on a coffin. “The witch tried to save her, but there wasn’t much left. The witch tried to console her pain, telling her stories that the men had only been a nightmare. Not real. They were actually naughty toys, but the witch had taken care of them.” His breath caught.
“No, no, no, no…” the girl began to sob, stomping her feet and shaking her head. “Naughty toys. Never again… I will fix you. Make you better. Let you fight each other when you want to be naughty…”
And I shivered. Holy crap…
Boris met my eyes and nodded. “In her pain, my daughter managed to ask the witch one question. A single word. And I don’t even know how she managed that, dying, mind broken after crying and calling out my name for hours as they raped, tortured, and abused her in a dirty warehouse…”
“What did she ask?” I whispered, ignoring the soft whimpers coming from Tory.
“How?” The man was staring down at the ground. “My daughter asked the witch how she had taken care of them.” He took a deep breath and met my eyes. “The witch then tried to heal her with her powers. Show her how to control the beasts. And… it worked. Thanks to the trio of conflicting lycanthropy genes in her blood, and the witch’s spell, something… new was born from the tragedy. My daughter. A Beast Master. The witch later found me, and told me what she had done. And… I couldn’t bring myself to tell my daughter the truth. I spent months caring for her, trying to help her heal, and soon realized that I didn’t have time to make money.” He glanced at his daughter sadly. “We happened upon a werewolf in a park. A bum. Begging for change. My daughter grew terrified, and before I knew it, the beast was under her thrall. A mugger happened upon us as we frantically tried to fix what she had accidentally done. But my daughter had other plans. She commanded the werewolf to save our lives. And he did. Dying in the process, but he did save us.”
He looked up at me, eyes a million miles away. “And that’s when I realized how much I hated shifters. I felt not an ounce of pity for the dead werewolf. And I realized I had found a new way to make money. Collect some beasts… some toys, for my daughter. I could let her false memory come to life, and gain my vengeance upon the monsters who had ruined my family.”
I stared at him in horror. “That…” I cleared my throat, struggling to find a response as I risked a glance at the girl. “That doesn’t make it right. You can’t condemn a whole race for the actions of a few.”
The man shrugged, turning cold, hard eyes on me. “I don’t give a damn about right. I wanted blood. And I got it. And my daughter got her toys back.” He shot me a challenging look. “So, now you know our story.” Then he glanced back at my spectacles thoughtfully. “Again, how is it that she obeys you? How do those glasses work?”
Realizing I couldn’t stop him, I took a risk, letting him think I was granting him my trust in exchange for his honest story, but I saw Mallory climb to his feet, hand twitching, ready to kill the man if he did anything dangerous. “Here. You can see for yourself. Granted, you agree to let us go.” The man nodded. I took them off, and strode up to him. I handed them over, and then folded my arms.
He stared at them a good long moment. “I would do anything for my daughter…” and I began to grow very uneasy, even though I had anticipated this. “You really shouldn’t have given me these. I never intended to let you leave.” Then he stabbed me in the stomach.
I fell to my knees with a grunt and my friends shouted in alarm. Well, Tory didn’t. Boris watched me for a moment, satisfied. I felt an oily warmth wash over me, only to be replaced by a queasy feeling in my stomach, then a flash of cold. I kept my face hard, not revealing anything.
Boris flicked a finger, and his daughter snapped her fingers. My friends halted as we heard a shout from deeper within the quarry, and then the metal clang of dozens of locks disengaging.
Then a miasma of feral roars, and the padding of many large feet filled the air.
A moment later, a horde of monsters tore through the pallet gate leading to the pit.
Coming straight for us.
Chapter 57
My friends tensed, and I did my best to look beaten, dying. I saw Boris slowly raise the spectacles to his face, frowning as he turned to his daughter, staring at her as he tried to figure out how to make them work. My smile began to stretch as I saw Van frowning at me, then at Boris.
Boris suddenly flinched, instinctively casting a ball of fire at thin air as he dove to the ground.
Well, thin air to everyone but me. I could see Carl clearly. And about a dozen of his friends. It had been difficult not acknowledging them as they followed me through the circus. The fire fizzled to nothing before them, I know not how. And they grinned through inky black fangs, chortling in a nightmarish laughter at the puny wizard at their feet. And his stupid spectacles.
Because I had used my powers to replace the lenses with enchanted glass from Chateau Falco.
I climbed to my feet. “Hold it, Carl.”
Boris was panting. Then he noticed me standing, brushing off my stomach and his eyes grew as big as saucers. “How?” he stammered. My friends – except Tory, who was glaring at the horde of monsters, waiting – looked equally incredulous, which surprised me. I would have thought she had told them.
“Tums.” I grinned. Then I turned to Tory. The Beasts were closer than I had thought. “Now!” I roared at her. The green fog erupted around her again, and the murderous beasts almost upon us skidded to a halt, groaning and whimpering in confusion.
Boris swung to face me, eyes wild. Seeing he couldn’t harm the albino lizards before him – and that no one else seemed concerned or even aware of them – he attacked me. A frantic ball of fire struck me in the chest, igniting my shirt, and burning like the dickens. I fell on my ass, the flame eati
ng away at me like acid. Then I felt it.
The sensation of warm oil again flowed over my wound, dousing the flames on my chest, and then I felt my skin tugging, itching, healing as the wound closed back up. Then a cold tingle flashed once, and the heat evaporated. I glanced through the burned hole in my shirt, and even though I had hoped for it, was amazed to find totally healed flesh beneath.
Boris gasped as he saw me climb to my feet again, but his eyes darted in every direction as the Elders surrounded him. He began to scream. “Say hi to Carl,” I snarled. “And his friends.”
And I watched as Carl stalked up and stabbed Boris right in the forehead with his milky white knife. White fire erupted from his skull, shooting straight into Carl’s open mouth. The other Elders rocked back on their heels, eyes rolling up into their skulls for a few moments as they moaned – as if having sampled a particularly flavorful wine – thin tendrils of the white fire shooting straight for their mouths, also. Then they tore him to shreds like a school of piranhas.
I looked up to stare at Alucard, remembering how he had told me never to use a forehead strike in a fight. Of course, he couldn’t see the Elders. He just saw the aftermath, and must have thought I had done it. He didn’t even look at me, so horrified by the sight of Boris’ death.
The Beast Master let out a piercing scream, unable to stop the madness of seeing her father torn to shreds by invisible monsters, suddenly reliving the nightmares her father had saved her from years ago.
I actually felt… sorry for her as I walked over to Tory, checking her wound. With Boris dead, now all we had to do was deal with the psychotic daughter. I hadn’t had to use my last shred of Maker power yet, but judging by the horde of monsters before us, I knew that might change any second.
I shouted loud enough to be heard over the Beast Master’s screams, keeping with the white lie I had told everyone. That I needed them to break the curse. I still didn’t know how I was going to do the next part, both Shiva’s plan and my promise to my Beast, but I needed to keep up appearances, or else everyone was going to start asking questions about how I was suddenly able to use my power even though I was cursed. “Gunnar, you better get that chimera to Rufus right fucking now! The whole cage is going to kill everyone here in nanoseconds. Tory can’t keep using her power, or—”
“Nate!” Tory screamed. I flinched, spun to face her, and my heart stopped.
A massive claw of pure ice, like icicles given life, clutched her head like it was a basketball.
And another claw of glowing coals gripped her thigh, burning through her pants.
From beneath the quarry floor, which now resembled quicksand for a good several feet around Tory, stopping right next to the tip of my boots.
And I realized that the thumping I had heard earlier was indeed a monster beneath us.
The clawed hands began to drag her… away. Not across the ring, but back into the very rock itself, pulling her through the floor.
Even though I had no idea what the hell – exactly – was happening, I reacted.
As did Alucard.
We dove for her.
As our fingers made contact with her, we were sucked deep into the quarry.
Before the sound of the real world faded away entirely, I heard a chorus of beasts let loose cries of freedom.
And bloodlust.
And outrage.
And a little girl suddenly began to laugh.
My friends were all going to die.
And what was about to happen to Alucard, Tory, and I…
Well, that would be a worse fate.
Chapter 58
We entered the Land of the Fae much as everyone comes into the world: kicking, screaming, and covered in blood. Because we crashed through a stained-glass window, and fell a good thirty feet straight into a pool of water that must have been a balmy 32.1 degrees Fahrenheit. Just a hair over freezing.
I gasped, frantically thrashing to get out of the water as my chest tried to instantly shut down in shock. If you haven’t ever jumped into water this cold, I’d advise you against it.
It is literally worse than being hit by a bolt of lightning.
I can tell you this from experience.
Medically speaking, your body instantly freaks the fuck out.
And the pain. You have no idea. It’s as if every millimeter of your body was suddenly slapped with the flat of a ruler that had been covered in acid. It stings, its arctic chill actually burning.
Burning with pure shock at such cold temperatures striking you everywhere. Simultaneously. It’s blinding. Shocking. Your breath is instantly expelled, and you only have seconds – if you’re lucky – to continue even a marginal control of your anything.
Your body instantly diverts all brain power to keeping your core warm enough to keep that ticker of yours ticking. Which means that you quickly lose control of your motor functions, preventing you from saving yourself.
Catch-22, right?
Yup.
Luckily, the water wasn’t deep, and my head exploded from the water at about the same time as my friends’ heads. Gasps of pain, shock, and terror echoed in the icy cavern around us.
We jerked left and right, standing only in chest-deep water, and we all began clamoring to get out on jerky, aching limbs, momentarily forgetting the dangers of what had brought us here in the first place. Like I said, that level of cold murders your mental capabilities as well as your physical ones.
We crashed to the frosted rock embankment outside the pool, panting as clouds of vapor filled the space. The air felt like razors in my throat. I reached out to touch my friends, and the sensation of tactile feedback stung like I had reached into a beehive, an explosion of pins and needles at the pressure against my skin. But I verified that all of us were alive before I crashed onto my back. It wasn’t long before the familiar inner warmth began to spill through me, moments later replaced by a flash of cold. Like magical Icy Hot.
But my friends didn’t have a magic belt, so were not as lucky.
And the party had only just begun.
A heat wave like the Sahara suddenly struck us like a charging bull, and we all hissed in pain as we suddenly felt parboiled, our skin already overly-sensitive from the arctic bath.
My heart shuddered, skipping a beat, then double-timed to make up for it.
My beast whimpered deep inside of me, unable to help, loudly cursing his poor choice to ally with me. I ignored the whiny bastard.
You would think that heat would have felt good after our ice bath.
You would be grossly incorrect.
It hurt more than anything I had ever experienced, and I had just received a new top score on pain thanks to the ice bath. I gasped, unable to breathe properly, clothes steaming as I seriously contemplated jumping back into the pool.
You know when you’re cold and you try to step into a lukewarm bath? And it makes you cry out in agony as your skin explodes with pins and needles?
Well, that’s lukewarm water. After being slightly cold.
This was an exponentially higher form of torture than that.
After a second or two that felt like an eternity, my steaming clothes literally began to burn me. I frantically began tugging at them with numb fingers, afraid I was about to get third-degree burns from the steam trapped against my skin.
The belt began working overtime, struggling to find out exactly how to heal such rapid, conflicting injuries. Which made me want to throw up.
Just as we regained strength enough to renew our screams, the heat vanished, throwing us back into the cold… but this time, just the natural cold of our new home.
Soft clapping filled the silence, reverberating off the walls like a steady drumbeat. The sound hurt both the frozen interior of my eardrums, and the tender, burned flesh of my earlobes before Ganesh’s belt had time to begin doing its thing.
We stood in darkness. Alucard stared wild-eyed, tugging Tory to her feet, and placing himself in front of her as he silently asked me what the fuck
was going on with only his eyes.
Good friends could do that, and I found myself silently relieved to have been right about his loyalty. He hadn’t chosen the Beast Master out of desire to kill. But a desire to save his adopted daughter. The best kind of father material. But we didn’t have time to get sentimental.
I let out another shiver, shoulders and ligaments still twitching spasmodically as I assessed our surroundings.
We were in a dark cave. The darkness was broken up by glowing hues of icy blues, purples, and greens in several places. The stalactites and stalagmites – I never knew which was which – glowed and pulsed, throbbed and breathed as if we were inside the gut of some giant ice-beast. I glanced up, and up, and up… to see a shattered stained-glass window in the ceiling of the cave. Dozens of feet or more above our heads. I hadn’t imagined it.
And I realized that we were officially fucked, because there was no other way out.
“Fubar…” Alucard murmured, following my gaze.
We were in the Land of the Fae.
And I had one decent boost of power left. My Beast began murmuring dark ideas to me. I listened, but was distracted by the kaleidoscope of colors in the cave, and didn’t quite follow how any of his ideas might get us out of here. I very discreetly accessorized my wrists.
And that incessant clapping kept right on clapping.
I slowly turned until my gaze rested on a throne. A figure sat upon it.
The Winter Queen had decided not to draw from her B team any longer, and had apparently decided a more… direct approach was required.
Her skin glowed a pale, pale blue. Like the faintest-hued sapphire catching sunlight. She smiled at us, fangs glistening in the moonlight that pierced the broken stained-glass window above, and the tips of her pointed ears were covered in hoarfrost. Frost also coated her eyelashes, and icicles hung from the bottom of her earlobes.
She wore furs of purple, green, white, and blue. Which, of course, wasn’t possible.
Beast Master: A Novel in The Nate Temple Supernatural Thriller Series (The Temple Chronicles Book 5) Page 31