“My sweet little Missy?” Vincent cooed. He stepped over to the mad woman and pinched her cheek. “No, I guess I don’t need her, but then you don’t really need a pet. She amuses me and has such a brilliant talent for killing.” The unicorn gave me a little shrug as if embarrassed by his sentimental weakness. “And if I should ever need a little Death Magic to raise another army of zombies, Missy would be so happy kill some poor souls for me.”
“I’m happy to kill for Vinnie,” she purred.
“I’m sure you are,” I muttered, inwardly wishing that they’d just kill each other, but that wasn’t going to happen. Not for this happy couple. “What—”
Shots rang out, echoing through the massive warehouse and cutting off my question. I dropped to the ground, seeking some kind of cover when there was none near me. Lying flat on the dirty concrete, I chanced a look around to find Serah coming in from a side entrance with Gideon hot on her heels. The cavalry had arrived at last.
“Watch out! He’s a unicorn!” I shouted as I pushed off the ground and scurried over to Trixie. I never saw the warlock react to my words, but then Gideon was a master at hiding his emotions. He just kept his eyes his adversary, while Serah kept the other bitch busy.
Just a couple feet away from Trixie, a massive force slammed into my chest, knocking me away from her. My shoulder hit the concrete first and my right arm went numb for a second from the impact. Gritting my teeth, I pushed back to my feet, flexing my fingers against the pain as I quickly checked to make sure that my arm hadn’t been knocked out of its socket. My shoulder hurt like hell and my skull felt like it had been cracked, but my brains weren’t leaking out so I’d push on.
A quick assessment of the magic in the air revealed that Gideon was attempting to put a binding spell on Vincent to keep the fucker from killing one of us with magic. I was willing to be a whole lot less subtle. I already owed magic two years for killing; what did it matter if I tacked on a third? It took frighteningly little time to mentally call up a spell that would rip Vincent’s heart from his chest.
The reluctance I’d felt just a short time ago at Chang’s about killing the last unicorn? Gone. Evaporated in an instant when I saw Trixie held captive. Vincent was insane and he was killing innocent people to raise the dead. He’d threatened Trixie. Threatened my child. He was going to die.
With a rush of twisted magical energy, I threw it at the unicorn, ready to send him screaming into the next life, but it never reached him.
Vincent’s high-pitched laugh rose above the gunshots and the screaming. With a light wave of his hand, he pushed away the spell I’d created as if it were a butterfly fluttering about his head. “Did you really think you could get to me so easily?” he chuckled. “Your magic is useless.”
It looked like he was right, but there had to be a way. The Towers had destroyed nearly every dragon and unicorn on the planet. I didn’t have a freaking clue how they managed to do it, but I was willing to bet that they’d done it with magic, since they didn’t do a damn thing without it.
My gaze darted briefly to Serah as she fired at Missy. The killer was bleeding from several gunshot wounds but they weren’t slowing her down. Serah popped out a spent magazine as she ran, leaving it to clatter against the concrete floor and reaching for a fresh one from her coat pocket. The TAPSS investigator turned and fired again.
As Gideon aimed a new and lethal spell at Vincent, I magically jerked some rusted rebar free from a partially crumbling pillar. The steel rod whistled through the air as it cut across the warehouse, chasing behind Missy until it finally caught her. With a twist of my wrist, the rebar wrapped around the woman, pinning her arms against her sides and trapping her legs together so that she dropped to her knees with an enraged scream.
“Keep your gun on her!” I shouted at Serah while I turned my attention back to Vincent. The unicorn needed to go down, if only for a few moments. Anything so I could get Trixie out of danger.
Taking my lead from Gideon, I tried to match a second binding spell to the one he was attempting, hoping that power from both of us might work.
But still, Vincent waved it off with a yawn. “Here. Allow me to give you a lesson.”
I didn’t have time to even flinch at those words. The magical energy crushed me to the ground. It wasn’t the same as when he’d used Death Magic, but rather it tasted sweet like spun sugar and caramel apples. Yet, it was tainted and twisted, leaving you sure that the caramel also contained poison. Pain clamped down on my muscles and my scream was echoed by Gideon’s. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the warlock hit the ground a second before me.
I blinked and found myself staring at Trixie. Her mouth was open, but I couldn’t hear her shouting over the roar in my ears. Or maybe that was my own screaming. The blood in my veins was on fire, pouring through my body so that it ignited each organ. The elf strained against the ropes that held her arms behind her. She was getting free, but I was afraid that she’d come to me if she did. I didn’t want her to save me. I wanted her out of here. I wanted her safe.
The pain suddenly eased. My gaze darted to Vincent to find that blood had blossomed on his shoulder. With Missy somewhat secure, Serah got one shot off at the unicorn, but now she had his attention. The TAPSS investigator dropped her gun to her side and took a wary step back toward her captive. Missy snarled as she struggled to get free. Blood soaked her long-sleeved cotton shirt from her gunshot wounds, but she didn’t seem to notice. The rebar was keeping her trapped and all she wanted to do was to tear into Serah. But she didn’t need to. Vincent was about to do that.
“Vincent!” I shouted, my voice hoarse from screaming.
“Later,” the unicorn muttered, making a little shoving motion in my direction so that I stumbled back to the ground as the wave of magic hit me.
Gideon caught on that we needed to be more direct in our approach. He punched Vincent with a nasty spell that was meant to boil the creature’s flesh off his bones. A small shriek cut through the air as Vincent wasn’t able to immediately unwind the spell. Large red blisters broke out across his hands and face before popping, making it look like his skin was starting to ooze away.
With a snarl, Vincent made a single slashing motion at Gideon and the warlock went down with a gasp. He landed on his side facing me and I could see that the front of his shirt had been shredded and was becoming dark red with his blood. Gideon didn’t move for several seconds despite the fact that Vincent was closing in on him.
“Vincent!” I screamed, trying to draw the unicorn away from my companion, but he paused only long enough to toss a spell behind his shoulder. I cringed, waiting for it to hit, but it never did. Trixie screamed, her body twisting against her bonds as she attempted to get away.
Swearing vehemently, I quickly unraveled the spell attacking the elf as I pushed to my feet. Her screams stopped a second later and she nodded her thanks to me. With Vincent’s attention trained on Gideon, Serah rushed over to start cutting through Trixie’s ropes.
For a breath, the world slowed down and everything became startlingly clear. Gideon and I couldn’t beat Vincent. The Towers might have crushed the unicorns and driven them to extinction, but it couldn’t be done with one warlock and another who’d never finished his apprenticeship. Vincent had centuries of experience and access to power that I couldn’t tap on my best day. At my peak, I couldn’t use the same powers that Vincent had punched through me . I needed an edge, something to level the playing field, or we were all dead.
Pulling my wand out of my left sleeve, I pushed the tip into the palm of my left hand as I looked over at Serah. “Stay there with Trixie and don’t move until I tell you,” I said in a calm voice.
“Gage,” Trixie rasped, fear filling her wide green eyes.
I wanted to apologize to her. To reassure her that everything would be okay. But as I hovered on the precipice in that second, I knew the road I stood on would
take me farther away from the woman I loved. There would be no going back. There was only this road or death. I gave her a small smile. I was choosing life for her and my child.
Using my wand like a knife, I cut the demon’s symbol into my palm. As I finished the last line, I whispered the words of the spell I used to unlock the doorway. And the whole world changed in the blink of an eye.
I roared as a torrent of energy flooded into my frame, lifting me up until my toes barely scraped the ground. My arms were flung out to my sides as the energy filled every fiber of my being. Pain was erased and I felt alive!
No, it was better than that. I felt powerful. It wasn’t the same power that I tapped into every time I cast a spell. It wasn’t the energy cast by every living creature on the planet. This was darker magic, drawing from the well of energy in the Underworld. This was the power of the demons. True death magic.
As I slowly settled back down onto my feet, a darkness fully cloaked me, wrapping its way around my soul. I could feel a low chuckle echo up through my body before thumping against my brain. Zyrus. The demon was no longer outside, terrorizing anyone who came close. No, the demon was now inside of me and reveling in its newfound freedom. It could now feel things in ways it never could before when set loose upon this world. Dark, malicious emotions twined with mine, blending and merging so that it was difficult to determine where I ended and the demon began. The next laugh I heard rumbled up my own throat.
Vincent froze a couple feet from Gideon and stared at me. There was a mix of horror and hatred in his lean face, twisting his features so that his inner insanity and ugliness were visible to the naked eye. A grin stretched my mouth wide and the demon’s twisted joy washed through me and became my own. Together, we had the power to take down the unicorn, and Vincent knew it.
His eyes darted back to Gideon as the warlock moved slowly, trying to push into a sitting position. The unicorn lunged at him. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to attack him or simply trying to use him as a shield, but we weren’t going to allow it. Dropping my wand on the ground, I reached out both hands and threw out a chunk of the energy boiling within me, throwing Vincent toward the wall farthest from Gideon. A pain-filled cry rose from the unicorn as he crashed against it and fell to his knees.
I walked deeper into the warehouse, sparing a quick glance at Gideon, who was now watching me in stunned horror. The air crackled and snapped with magical energy. Overhead lights popped out but were quickly replaced by glowing red orbs hovering in the air. Zyrus stirred within me as I neared the injured warlock, sensing an easy target.
He caused you trouble, my master.
“He’s not our target,” I snarled, forcing the demon to focus on the unicorn that was rising to his feet.
He will harm us. We will have to kill him later.
“Later.” I clamped down on my control of the demon and closed the distance between myself and Vincent, which helped Zyrus to forget about Gideon. The demon he’d glimpsed something from the future regarding Gideon, but I couldn’t worry about that now. I had enough trouble in my present to deal with. The future could wait.
The unicorn was ready for me, instantly pummeling me with some threads of Death Magic he’d found a way to save. It either wasn’t as strong as what he’d used on Gideon and me, or the presence of Zyrus was making a significant difference, because the spell caused only a slight cramping before dissipating completely.
“Now it’s my turn,” I murmured, unleashing a series of spells that rolled off my fingertips like fat drops of rain. There was no need for remembering complicated words or symbols. With Zyrus I was tapped into the raw energy of the Underworld and I could twist it into doing my every whim. The power had become just an extension of who I was, like another hand or leg. Or maybe it was just a bit of my soul. It didn’t matter. I didn’t need to think about it and I didn’t want to.
Vincent’s maniacal laughter was replaced by his screams, which helped to ease some of the anger that had lit a fire in my brain. The horrible tension in my shoulders and the throbbing in my head slipped away with Vincent’s pain and blood.
“Gage!” Gideon shouted in my ear. His hand clamped down on my shoulder and he jerked me around so that I was half turned away from Vincent. I blinked, feeling slightly dazed. I’d lost track of time, as if my body had stepped outside the stream of seconds as they ticked by. I shook my head to clear it and Zyrus roared inside me at the interruption. I was confused. Why had the warlock stopped me? Why was he touching me? Why was he alive . . .
“Gage, you’ve got to stop this. There’s no reason to torture him,” Gideon argued. He was partially bent over as he stood and his face was deathly pale from blood loss. I could sense the pain that wracked his body, and it pleased Zyrus. “Just end it now,” he whispered through broken lips.
“No reason?” The words tumbled from me, but they echoed through my brain as well. Who had said them? Was that me? Zyrus? “That son of a bitch has killed dozens to raise the dead. He tried to kill us. He was planning to kill my girlfriend and our child. Wouldn’t you let him suffer if it was your family being threatened?”
“No. I don’t believe in torture,” Gideon said firmly. He straightened a little, meeting my gaze. Something he saw there made him flinch and his frown deepened, but I didn’t care.
“Lies,” I snarled. Knocking his hand off my shoulder, I gave him a hard shove so that he was thrown to the ground several feet away from me. “You’re a warlock. A member of the Towers. You all torture. You thrive on fear. I was there. I know. You’re like them.”
“That’s not true, Gage. Think. Take a deep breath and think. I’ve protected you. I have just as much to lose as you. I would do anything to protect Ellen and my daughter.”
An image of Ellen smiling up at me at the Christmas party, the warm sympathy filling her brown eyes, danced through my brain. She wouldn’t like me hurting her husband. She wouldn’t like me fighting with the man who had protected me from the Towers. It was like a punch to the gut. For a moment, I could feel my mind ripping free of Zyrus.
A loud, harsh gasp filled the silence of the warehouse and I stumbled back a step. It was like coming up for air after being submerged for far too long. I mentally clawed for some handhold, anything to keep from letting Zyrus take over again, but I knew it was a fight I couldn’t win for long.
“Watch out!” Serah screamed.
I twisted around to Vincent in time to see him pulling together a new spell. In that instant, I lost my fight against Zyrus and the demon surged back into the driver’s seat of my body and mind. Chunks of broken glass, wood, and steel jumped from the warehouse floor and flew through the air. Pure, raw energy grabbed Vincent and pressed him, spread-eagled, against the wall, so that the flying flotsam could spear him through the arms and legs.
Vincent laughed, a low, choking sound. “It’s fitting. A warlock destroys the last unicorn this world will ever see. And to do it, he had to be possessed by a demon. How will history remember this event? Who will be painted as the monster?”
A slow grin spread across my faces and I stepped close to him. “No one will remember.” I reached out my right hand toward the rows of pristine unicorns and their bodies ignited one after another. Vincent’s screams were more deafening than when I’d tortured him. He struggled, fighting to pull free of his bonds both physical and magical, but it was for nothing. I stared at him, drinking in the pain deeply etched into his pale face as he watched the black smoke billowing through a broken out skylight. The last remains of his people were reduced to ash.
His screams became heavy sobs as he hung his head. The last hope of the unicorns was gone in a cloud of greasy black smoke.
“No one will remember you,” I said softly, my voice almost a caress. “No one will remember your fight to save your people. No one will even know you ever existed.”
Vincent raised his eyes to my face and I knew I’d never
forget the hatred that blazed there. I was glad.
Lightning quick, I pulled a large shard of glass from where it was pinning his wrist and plunged it straight through his heart. The unicorn gasped and stiffened in pain, and the mad light disappeared from his eyes.
As I turned away, I became aware of Missy’s hysterical screaming. Pulling the shard of glass from Vincent’s chest, I walked toward her, leaving a trail of unicorn blood behind me as it dripped from the glass. Standing before her, Zyrus stirred, overjoyed to see her bouncing between mindless rage and abject despair at the death of her companion. Her eyes were wide, and spittle and blood dripped from her lips. She tried to rise and attack me, but she couldn’t get to her feet while still wrapped in the steel rebar.
“How could you! He was beautiful! He was perfect!” she screamed at me until her voice started to become hoarse.
In the distance, I thought I could hear Trixie shouting for me. Or maybe it was Gideon. But I couldn’t focus on it. Missy was a Christmas gift just waiting to be unwrapped. Clenching the glass shard in my hand, I grabbed a chunk of her hair and wrenched her head back, holding it at an awkward angle. She could no longer move, but it didn’t stop her enraged screaming. That was good.
With the glass in my hand, I slashed across her stomach, letting blood pour forth from the massive wound. Her angry curses instantly turned to pain-filled screams that echoed off the walls of the warehouse. With a chuckle, I plunged the glass into her heart. The screams stopped with a gasp. I released her hair, letting her fall to the ground in a heap as life drained quickly out of her body.
Backpedaling from Missy, I clung to the relief and joy that Zyrus felt because there was something sick churning in my stomach. I could hear Trixie weeping softly and it was like little daggers driving straight into my heart. Unfortunately, Zyrus heard the sound as well. The temporary pleasure it got from slaughtering the last unicorn was shoved aside by a hunger for yet another kill. A pregnant elf.
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