by Jen Pretty
I swallowed my nervous energy and stepped further inside. Singh slid in beside me, his thick mane tickled the back of my hand, and I stroked his fur, trying to comfort myself. The tension in the room was beyond painful. My limbs jerked and twitched with every step.
A near silent rumble from Singh made my heart skip a beat. I moved toward the back room where the pool tables sat. It was dark, but my eyes caught a slight movement in the shadows. As I passed a table, I set Bennet's knife down, my eyes never leaving the darkness and I called my own blade to my hand. I had found the demon.
At the edge of the arched doorway to the pool table room, I paused. The darkness seemed too complete in my peripheral vision, and I turned my head in time to see a blaze of magic fire spark to life, blinding me momentarily before it shot straight for me. I jumped back a step just in time, and the fire crashed into the wall and sputtered out.
I stepped forward again and, as another ball of fire took shape, I launched my blade and heard the wet thud of the hilt hitting flesh as the blade slid home. A female voice screamed, and the body dropped before I called my blade back to me. I assumed it was Cindy. The darkness robbing me of confirmation.
“Face me, Bennet. Only a cowardly warlock hides behind filthy magic and a young witch. Are you not powerful enough to fight your own battles?” my voice spoke without me. Durga taking liberties with my body was normal, but with the tension in the room, her words were like a spark in a puddle of gasoline.
Bennet's scream of rage echoed through the bar, shattering the glass behind me and the unlit bulbs above the pool tables. Sparks flew with the glass, blinding me for a moment, giving the warlock an opportunity to leap upon me, his hands circling my throat. He rode me to the floor, my back cracking as it hit the hard tile. A roar beside me was the only warning as the lion grabbed hold of the warlock, his teeth around the man’s arm and threw him across the room.
Bennet rose a moment later and flung his magic at Singh, who collapsed in a heap.
“NO!” I screamed as my knife appeared in my hand again and the warlock’s eyes turned in my direction.
I faced off against Bennet, his magic against mine. His magic was red hot. He threw a ball of fire at me. I dodged, avoiding the flame. Frankie appeared behind his father. Frankie raised his hand, and I saw magic start to form. It wasn’t his usual magic though. It was dark red like his fathers, and I saw he was about to tarnish himself to save the city and his coven.
In the same second Bennet turned and pressed his hand to Frankie’s chest, as if he had known his son was there all along. I released my blade in a last effort to end the dark warlock’s miserable existence before it was too late. My knife spun end over end and hit its mark. Bennet collapsed with the handle of my knife in the side of his skull. But it was a moment too late. Frankie was blasted backwards by Bennet’s magic and slammed into the far wall of the room with such force, he broke through the drywall, causing a cloud of white dust to drift after him as he crumpled to the ground.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I froze in place.
Bennet was dead, but what about Frankie? Or Singh? Where was Arnie? I couldn’t decide what to do first. The silence stretched out, broken only by my labored breathing, until I heard a soft growl behind me. The sound snapped me back to motion, and I turned. Singh lay on his side, outside of the pool table room. The light from the glass front door, illuminated the blood covering him. I assumed his own, as he hadn’t done more than throw the warlock off me. I scrambled to his side and put my hand on his chest. It rose and fell in a steady rhythm. His paw moved, touching my leg with the rough pads of his foot. A warm flush began at the place where his paw touched me. It spread throughout my body, running down my arm, until the warmth flowed out my fingertips. Singh’s chest grew warm beneath my hand. Durga rose to the surface and used my mouth to coo at the lion, like he was a tiny kitten. She didn’t speak English, but the tone was universal.
Singh sat up and turned his bright yellow eyes to mine. He shifted back to human form, his gaze never faltering.
“Thank you, mother Durga,” he whispered, bowing his head.
A rustle made me turn my head in time to watch as Cindy disappeared with a still unmoving Frankie. I jumped up, but it was too late.
“Shit, I hate that witch,” I muttered.
Singh stood up, his clothes clung to him, wet with blood.
“We have to find Arnie and then kill that stupid witch.”
“I hear some voices,” Singh said, picking his way through the debris towards the bar. He flipped up a section of the counter that made a doorway and stepped behind the bar. He unlatched a solid oak door on the far side to find a few humans locked inside. As soon as the door opened, they shoved past us and each other until they disappeared into the night. Inside the storage room, Arnie slumped against the far wall.
I bolted across the small room and fell to my knees in front of the old warlock. He wasn’t moving. I pressed my hand to his cold wrinkled cheek. He was dead.
“Durga, please?” I begged. She had healed Singh. Could she not save the old warlock?
Her sadness coursed through me, but she didn’t warm my hand. There was nothing the great Goddess could do about death. Death was final.
I slid his eyelids closed and straightened his rumpled shirt. He still gripped his dishrag that he used to wipe down the bar. A single tear tipped over the edge of my eyelid and trailed down my face towards the old warlock. I stood before it could fall and replaced the grief with rage.
I already had my revenge on Bennet, but Cindy still lived, and she would feel my wrath. A fire grew in my chest, each breath I took stoked the flame.
I pushed all the emotion away for a moment and located Frankie. He was in the warehouse. My anger flowed freely as Durga mixed hers with mine. I turned to Singh. He stood in the doorway of the storage room watching us.
“He’s mine; the witch will die today,” Durga said with my mouth.
Singh nodded. “Yes, Goddess Durga.”
Durga pushed me out of the small room and then out of the bar. She forced my legs into a run. She wasn’t toying with Frankie when she had hinted that she desired him. Her rage was that of a lover scorned. I could not have stopped her rampage, had I wanted to.
Singh ran beside me as a human. But the growl that underlaid each of his breaths betrayed his animalistic side.
We rounded the corner and into the alley. The solid steel door of the warehouse stood between Frankie and me. Durga rose up and kicked the door in like the frame was made of paper. It fell with a loud hollow bang, and we strode into the place of magic.
Today the ceiling displayed hundreds of dragons swirling and roiling like the sea. Their time faded wings were flapping and bodies churned. The warriors with pikes and swords clashed in great bloody battle on the walls. The scene so alive, their battle screams and death moans almost reached my ears. The candles were lit again, and the sconces glowed bright enough to illuminate the entire space.
In the middle of the vast space stood Cindy holding her stomach. Blood trailed down her leg and puddled at her feet. A limp and broken Frankie lay on the floor beside her. He was still alive; his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm.
“This isn’t what I wanted,” she said, her eyes focused on the ground. “I’m sorry, Durga. I just wanted him to love me.”
“You do not destroy that which you love!” Durga hollered back.
In a flash of light, the three members of the council arrived. Durga turned her rage on them.
“You have made a fine mess!” she scorned.
“Our apologies again, Durga. We had no previous knowledge of this child. She had always been loyal,” the ancient witch said from her place beside the two warlocks.
Cindy dropped to her knees. “Please, I beg of you. This was not the plan. Bennet promised only you would die and then I would be with Frankie. I never meant for any of this to happen.” She crumpled, her head in her hands as sobs wracked her hunched back in violent shutters.
&nbs
p; “You thought you could kill me?” Durga laughed. The sound of it scared me, and I shrunk back to let her do what she wanted. Her power welled like a dam at capacity. The weight of it would have dropped me to the floor, but she held us upright as my arms came out to my sides.
My arms divided and multiplied. My head nearly bowed beneath the weight of a crown. I was no longer standing on my feet but sitting on Singh who was a massive lion again. His spicy smell infused my nostrils and the sound of bells echoed through the open room.
Cindy was a stain on humanity. Her shocked look lasted only a moment as Durga’s golden trident flew from my hand and impaled her in the throat. The force of it knocked her over backwards. The room fell to silence.
The dragons on the ceiling blew fire and danced. Their rhythm slowing until they ceased. The wall sconces snuffed out leaving the room half lit. Durga, her revenge complete, folded herself back into the corner she occupied within me.
I slid off Singh who then lay down on the floor and rested his chin on his crossed feet.
Walking towards Frankie, I watched as his chest continued to rise and fall. The rhythm steady and assuring.
I knelt beside him and took his hand. He was still covered in drywall dust, but when I touched his face, his eyes fluttered open, and my heart skipped a beat. His gaze skipped past me to the walls and ceiling, then focused on my face. He traced my features with his eyes for a moment and then smiled, his ridiculous cocky half grin. It was so absurd and so perfect, I leaned down and kissed his dusty lips.
When I leaned back up to look at him, he cleared his throat. “Did we get him, Lark?”
“Yes, we got him, Frankie.” He smiled and scanned the room again, His eyes fell on Cindy’s body, her throat a mess of blood from the trident that had vanished when Durga left.
“I should have known,” he said.
“You couldn’t have,” I replied.
“I can read minds, Lark.”
The female council member cleared her throat. “Thank you for taking care of this problem. W will go now,” she said.
I turned back and narrowed my eyes at them. It was their fault that this got so out of hand in the first place. They disappeared in a flash of light, leaving Frankie, a snoring Singh and me alone in the giant warehouse.
I wanted to lay down beside Frankie, but a dead witch lay in a pool of blood beside us.
Frankie pushed off the ground with a groan, probably at my unspoken thoughts and I rose to assist him. I pulled his arm over my shoulder and helped him to the door to the apartments. As we walked out of the warehouse, Singh hot on our heels, the candles that lined the walls flickered out. The strange space was definitely a place of magic.
We climbed the stairs slowly, and I helped Frankie onto the couch. As he groaned and slumped down, I reached into my pocket to pull out my cell phone. I still hadn’t heard from Vincent.
My phone was once again smashed. The screen was a spider web of cracks, and the case was bent. At my current rate, Vincent would start making me buy my own phones.
“I doubt that, Lark.” I smiled at Frankie’s mind reading. “My phone is on my nightstand,” he said.
I walked through his room. It smelled like him. His phone was where he said it was, I picked it up and dialed Vincent. The phone kept ringing, so I hung up and called Cedric.
“Yes,” Cedric’s voice came through the line.
“Hey, where are you guys?” I asked.
“God, Lark. We are looking for you.”
“Sorry, had a bit of a run in and broke my phone,” I replied before turning and walking back out to the living room.
Frankie was now on the floor beside the couch, and Singh was flaked out on the couch, his toes twitching in sleep.
I laughed at the ridiculous lion. He was such a cat.
“Where are you? We can come pick you up,” Cedric said through the phone.
“Actually, can you send a cleanup crew to Arnie’s? It’s a mess. Bennet killed Arnie. He’s in the storeroom. I’m at Frankie’s place. I can't get ahold of Vincent, though.” I sat down at the kitchen island and started pulling my boots off.
“Uh, Lark. We should come and get you.”
“Why?”
“Something happened,” he said.
“What? What happened?”
“It’s your studio, Lark,” he said, sounding very serious.
“What the fuck happened at my studio?”
“We’re on our way. Be there in ten.” He hung up. I set the phone down and pulled my shoes back on, tying the laces.
“What is it?” Frankie asked from the living room. He was still sitting on the floor.
“I don’t know, something happened at the studio.” I stood up and walked back into the living room. “Will you be ok here for a bit? You don’t have any dizziness or feel like you might pass out?” I asked.
“I’m fine Lark. I need some rest. Can you help me to my bed before you go? This oaf kicked me off the couch.”
“He’s done that to me too. Overgrown house cat.” I giggled, helping Frankie to his feet again and down the hall to his bed. I tucked him in, said goodbye and shut his door so he didn’t end up with a cat in his bed.
I walked down the stairs and out the garage door just as the team pulled into the alley in the big van. I slid the back door open and popped inside.
“Where is Vlad?” I asked. Only Drew, Cedric and Darya were inside.
No one spoke.
“What happened at the studio?” I asked, trying to
to get a response from someone.
“Vlad is just holding down the fort. It’s better if we just get there, ok?” Cedric said as he peeled out of the alley and turned the radio up to stop my questions.
I didn’t understand but tried not to think about it as the van cruised through the city and out to the suburbs. I closed my eyes for a moment but opened them again as we slowed down. Police officer ahead directed traffic. Farther down the street, smoke billowed up into the sky.
“What happened?” I recognized where we were and realized that the smoke was coming from my studio.
Without waiting for the van to stop completely, I slid open the door and jumped out. I ran past the officer who I recognized as a vampire. He didn’t try to stop me, just kept waving traffic through a detour.
My legs burned, and my heart raced with adrenaline. Durga urged me to go faster. I stopped in front of the burned-out shell. Broken glass covered the parking lot like sparkling diamonds. It didn’t just burn. It was blown up. The walls stood at angles, and the roof was caved in. Smoke billowed from the rubble. Firemen poured water onto the smoking ruins, preventing it from bursting back into flames. Police officers held back the small crowd and an ambulance was standing by, but there was nothing left of my perfect sanctuary. I collapsed to the ground beside the fire truck with its lights flashing. Vernon was here in my city again. This was exactly his style.
I closed my eyes and cleared my mind. I sent out my senses and sifted through all the vampires in the city and the state and then the whole south-west. He was gone. I pulled my senses back in. How could he have gotten so far away so fast? He had to have been here.
Then I realized Vincent hadn’t lit up anywhere in my search. I quickly looked for him again. By now a few vampires were standing nearby, watching me, but I ignored them. I couldn’t find Vincent. He was gone too. Apparently, a lot had happened while I was busy cleaning up the magical mess.
“I’m sorry for your loss, Lark,” said a vampire I recognized from the house.
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “You mean the studio?”
“No, I meant… Uhm, you know. R-Randy.” He stuttered. “He was kind of yours, was he not?”
I covered my mouth and glanced back to the wreckage. It was late at night, nearly morning, really. But Randy had been staying all hours to make up schedules and design advertising campaigns.
“Oh, no,” I whispered.
A fireman came back to the truck and ask
ed me some questions. The vampire who had told me about Randy answered them and explained I was in shock over the loss of my friend and business. I was in shock. Durga tried to push anger at me, but I held on to the sadness.
Randy was the first vampire I trusted. He was brilliant in his way and a light in the darkness.
“Lark,” Trevor whispered as he crashed down beside me, his sharp knees hitting hard on the pavement. “Are you ok, Lark?” He slung his arms around me, and the sobs started. Trevor was the broken boy, but only his thin arms held me together as I let the pain flood over me. It was too much. Randy didn’t deserve this. He was as innocent as Trevor. He had never hurt anyone, and Vernon came in here and blew him up in a safe place. This was a place of peace and internal reflection. And now it was a pile of rubble.
“Maybe he got out,” I sobbed. He was durable, surely the bomb didn’t kill him.
“They already found him. His neck was severed by a piece of glass,” Trevor whispered.
I stood up and stumbled to the grass where I promptly vomited. I continued to dry heave, my eyes filled with tears and, sobs shook my body.
I closed my eyes when my body settled, and Durga appeared in the darkness. She had a look of sadness on her face too. Then her face changed to one of anger. She bared her teeth, and her eight arms waved violently like streamers in a hurricane. She was sitting on Singh in my vision, and he roared, though there was no sound.
Vengeance would be ours.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Cedric showed up in the van and gathered me in his arms. He carried me away from my old studio and the last place I had seen my first vampire friend.
I didn’t have anything left in me. I sat numb in the back seat of the van, as he drove us back to Vincent’s mansion.
“Where is he?” I asked as we stopped at the house. “I know he isn’t here.”
Cedric looked away from me. “He left a note.” Then he turned and walked towards the mansion. I followed him up the stairs, into the house and down the hall to Vincent’s office.