We circled the main dance floor, past several dark outlets sectioned off by curtains. Through the fabric I could hear moans, laughter, and the occasional grunt of pleasure, all punctuated with drafts of smoke that smelled like the back row of a concert. It was an air of hedonistic pleasure broken only by the thumping music of the club and the random shout of a girl who kept yelling about shitty lighting for selfies.
Lyanne and I entered the men's room, cautious but confident. A beady-eyed teenager washing his hands gave Lyanne a strange look but didn't say anything. My instincts didn’t pick up on any danger, so I ignored the kid and let him slide past us with only the barest of glances.
For the moment, we were alone.
“You think it will be a Succubus or Incubus who comes through that door first?” she asked.
I thought about it for a moment. “Succubus, probably. I'm like candy to them, they can't stay away.”
She pouted. “Are you saying I can't attract an Incubus just as well?”
“Dressed like that?”
Her eyes turned dark. “Fine. A wager then? If it’s a Succubus, you win. An Incubus, I win.”
“And the stakes?”
A dark smile to go with the eyes. “The winner gets to have a night with Eve first. If she’s game, of course, but I can’t imagine she’ll say no. I think she might even be able to teach me a thing or two,” Lyanne said thoughtfully.
“Really? Interesting. I accept your wager, and I have to say—the idea of someone knowing more about pleasing the human body than you makes me—well, how do I put this delicately?” I nodded toward my crotch and leered at her, earning a bark of laughter.
“Jesus, you’re adapting to this lifestyle rather well,” Lyanne said through her laughter.
“I blame you. And your mouth. And your vagina, as long as we’re spreading blame around. Hey, speaking of spreading—wait, showtime,” I said, looking toward the door.
The door opened, revealing a tall, pasty man in black hoodie. At first, I was disappointed, thinking that Lyanne had just won our bet, but at second glance I realized there was no way this guy could be an Incubus. Not only was my danger sense barely registering a tingle, but he was pale and lanky, with the vibe of a guy who thought the sun, activity, and women were all equally dangerous.
The pasty man gave us a gloomy look. He was a cutout of tortured emotional baggage, but with less body fat. “You made quite a scene out there. Well, you got my attention.”
I cast a sidelong glance at Lyanne. “He's not one of them, is he?”
She sighed. “No, he looks like a Griefer. Kind of like a vampire, but they feed on sadness.”
“Oh. How pointless,” I said.
The Griefer snarled. “Hey! I'm an immortal! And I don't just feed on sadness, but all negativity.”
I ignored him. “So, who won then?”
Lyanne also disregarded the intruder. “I don't know. A draw, maybe?”
“So who gets Eve?”
The sadness-vampire was fed up with our disregard for his status as a badass, so he rushed me, teeth bared and swinging yellow claws that appeared in a flash.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake—” I said,
I wasn’t sure how my Night Flail would work on creatures other than Succubi and Incubi, as it had been my impression that the weapon had been specifically designed for that cause.
Only way to tell was to test it.
The weapon lashed out, a straight shot directly at the Griefer's face. There was no searing or light effects when the flail connected, confirming my suspicions that the weapon was not designed for this kind of work. What there was, however, was a tremendous amount of force. When in doubt, a solid hit with hard metal can work wonders on an undead skull.
The vampire leaned his head forward to bear his fangs, and when the flail hit it snapped back with a sickening crack. His body was launched by the excess force and slammed into one of the stalls.
It was all rather anticlimactic, all things told. The body came to rest against the toilet and slowly began to turn to ash.
I brought the Night Flail back to my hand, then shrugged. “Well, that was easy. Guess now we wait to see who is next?”
Lyanne and I stood around in the men's room for another quarter of an hour until it became clear no one else was coming. My instincts were calm, not picking up on any creatures coming near the restroom.
“Doesn't look like anyone else is going to fall into the trap,” I said, disappointed.
Lyanne plucked with agitation at the dress she had been made to wear tonight. “They must have sensed the power of your weapon. Only the Griefer was inexperienced enough to not realize its danger. He was a rookie. An idiot.”
I cursed inwardly. “He was a fucking wet blanket, too. Good riddance.” I sighed, disgusted at my lack of control. “That was a mistake when I couldn't stop the Night Flail from coming out on its own.”
She pulled off one of her frilly bracelets and tossed it onto the floor. “Then we just need to get more aggressive.”
We returned to the main dance floor and noticed that the crowd had thinned, which made some sense if we’d tipped our hand to the immortals staling their prey. I cursed inwardly again at the dancing humans, all garden-variety club patrons with no idea that they’d been in the presence of undead killers. Seems I had accidentally snuffed the party.
My instincts did pick up on two Succubi making their way together toward the front doors. I pointed them out to Lyanne and the two of us trailed after them in a discreet tumble, eager to keep up.
Our targets stopped off to the side of the valet station. I pressed myself against the wall of the club's entryway and peered over to get a better look. One was a tall brunette, athletically built and dressed in tight black dress that was cut low enough that her breasts seemed ready to burst free with every breath, a view that was, in my humble opinion, not bad. The other was small Asian woman, with short black hair cut in a boyish manner that accentuated a fierce yet enticing face, all atop a petite body.
The smaller woman was rapidly tapping on her phone while the other woman paced in front of them, puffing furiously on a thin cigarette. They were clearly tense, and I was sure I was the source of their discomfort. The Asian woman brought the phone up to her ear and tapped her foot impatiently. After almost a minute of waiting she spoke. “Hello? Finally! Look we've got a problem. What? Yeah, I know this fucking number is supposed to be for emergencies only, but Tandi needs to hear— listen to me for a second! You know that stranger that has been stalking our haunts? Yeah, the one that dusted Ragan and made Eve disappear. He's here! At the Oil and Water! He just strolled in the front door and pulled out a weapon that reeks of . . . well, I can't describe it, but it feels like death. I don't know if he attacked anyone yet, most everyone cleared out right away.”
She was silent for a while as the person on the other side spoke. The brunette stopped pacing and froze looking at the phone.
The one with the phone got visibly angry. “What do you want us to do? Attack him!? It would be fucking suicide! Every one of us in that room hit him with a Charm the moment he stepped in and he just shrugged it off. You know how strong Eve was, and now she's just . . . gone! No dust, no anything! And I know you must have heard the same rumors as me about that powerful freelancer upstate who also just vanished. No, thank you. We need to get word to Tandi to send one of her Sisters of Pain—”
The smaller woman went silent and looked at her phone. “She hung up. Fuck me, if we want to get word to Tandi . . .”
That seemed as good a moment as any to make myself know. I stepped out from behind the wall, Night Flail dangling from its chain, and grinned at the startled looks that met me.
“Evening, ladies. Sorry to bother you, but I couldn't help but overhear you talking about a Tandi. You wouldn't happen to be talking about Tandi Goren, would you? I've been trying to find a way to send a message to her myself. I find her intensely interesting.”
The brunette hissed, her face twis
ted up in unalloyed rage. “You!”
“Yes, me,” I said lightly. “The one you were talking about on the phone. You know, the one who has been dismissing Tandi's servants. May I use that term? Dismissing? It sounds so much more civilized than—well, I’m sure you know what I mean. How does she feel about that, by the way? I'd been hoping to get her attention, but so far, not a dinner invitation. Maybe you two could help me out?” I added with an optimistic grin.
The Asian woman backed up a step, her eyes darting around like she was looking for an opportunity to run. The brunette, however, stood her ground, looking ready to rip my throat out. I got a good look into her eyes and saw only hostility and hatred there. There was no trace of humanity, which made my decisions that much easier.
Keeping my calm demeanor, I continued. “As I see it, we have two options. We can have a nice chat, you can tell me what I need to find this Tandi person, and I might be feeling generous enough to let you go. Or you resist, and—well, I'd say ask Ragan what happens, but he isn't in any position to answer.”
That was the breaking point for the brunette, and she rushed me. She was fast-- faster than any of the other Succubi I had fought. As I lashed out with the flail, she twisted her body in a serpentine fashion, and the strike soared past her with a whistle of air that split my senses. Her claws reached for my neck, and I barely managed to get the flail in place for a hard deflection, saving me from a wound that might have been fatal. She was pissed.
She snaked around me, a speedy blur twisting and contorting unnaturally as she came around my back, her teeth bared in a rictus of fury. I whipped the Night Flail over my head and the Succubus had to dive for the ground to avoid being beheaded. She slithered across the ground, her fangs protruding as she opened her jaw to bite my leg, but I ignored my instinct to jump back and kicked instead. My foot connected under the Succubus's jaw and sent her howling to the ground, spitting teeth and saliva in bloody strings.
I lost my balance and stumbled back to the wall of the club, before stabilizing myself with one hand as I continued to swing the flail with a hypnotic lethality. The Succubus was struggling to get back to her feet, clutching at her shattered jaw. I saw several of her fangs on the ground in front of her, glistening with a repulsive sheen. Before she could recover, I lashed out with the Night Flail again as she whirled to run, but the flail took her in the back.
The points of my weapon exploded through her chest in a cone of gore that was only overcome by the sound of sizzling flesh. Immediately, her body began to sublime, the ashes whispering away before I could catch my breath for the next round.
That was one Succubus down and no information gained. I needed a prisoner, not ashes, and in a blur I moved toward the direction the other Succubus had gone, her small footfalls already fading into the night.
Lyanne was already turning the corner to round the building. “Stop playing around, love. The other one’s getting away!”
Around the building, over a fence, and ducking past some dumpsters, I followed Lyanne, again appreciating how agile she was. The remaining Succubus rushed through a service entrance at the back of the club and slammed the door shut. Lyanne reached the door a second later, tried the handle and found it locked, then shouldered it open while barely breaking stride.
I passed through the service entrance after them, following Lyanne through a dark corridor and into what seemed like a metal refrigerator. When I finally caught up and saw what was in front of me, I froze.
Floating in the air before us was a spiral of radiating red energy. That was the best way I could describe it. It was like a pool of blood red water that someone had stirred with a massive spoon, pulsing with a faint but consistent glow, the edges contracting and expanding in a hypnotic pattern that was primal and seductive, all at once.
Lyanne stood with one hand on her hips, looking uncomfortably at the pool of energy. “A portal. No way to tell what is on the other side, but our friend must have jumped through.”
“So there could be any number of enemies waiting for us. Think Tandi is behind it?”
“There's only one way to find out. Oh, we are about to lose our chance!”
As I watched, the portal began to shrink as the energy faded, dull streaks gaining purchase in the swirling mass right before our eyes. Fearing losing my one lead, and acting on a minor hunch, I lashed out with the Night Flail. The flail crossed through the portal and went taut. The portal squealed in protest, the energy spinning more rapidly and producing a sound like a struggling engine, but higher pitched with a note of nearly human pain. The chain grew tighter around my arm as the portal tried to pull it from me. It was somewhat painful, but I seemed to have stopped the portal from closing, and the flail hadn’t let me down yet.
Lyanne gave a small clap. “My, Kurt, aren't you full of surprises?”
I grunted, trying to cover up the growing pain in my arm. “Yeah, I'm awesome. Hey, let's go through already.”
Perhaps sensing my discomfort and finding it amusing, Lyanne chose to saunter slowly through the portal. At least I got a good look at her ass, which she knew because she turned and a gave me a saucy wink. I followed behind, dropping the other end of the chain right as I passed through.
I stepped into a dark tunnel. The air was thick and humid, with the smell of mold and dust making it unpleasant to breath. The only light came from the glow of the portal. It illuminated the metal tracks and black stone walls. My time with the urban explorer's The Dark Places of New York allowed me to recognize this as a forgotten subway tunnel when I saw it.
My instincts were not picking up anything in the vicinity. Succubi could move fast, so it was possible that my target had just sprinted at full speed down the tunnel the moment she passed through the portal. Even still, it was strange to think that there was nothing around here. There had to be some reason the portal led to this specific tunnel.
The problem was I was currently restricted in my search area by the length of the Night Flail. The chain was the only thing keeping the portal from closing, leaving us stranded in the middle of a tunnel that led to--- well, someplace unknown and dangerous. I needed to take a gamble. Trusting my danger-sense to be reliable and that there were really no Succubi or Incubi around, I unwrapped the chain of the flail from my arm. For the first time since I had picked it up shortly after my mother's death, I let the weapon go.
To my relief, the Night Flail let me drop it, maintaining its position holding the portal open. The weapon flashed a kind of sentience at times, and there had been the distinct worry that it might not let me release it at all.
I felt naked without it; even defenseless, but Lyanne's presence was comforting. The former Succubus had lost the majority of her power, and yet she was utterly unshakeable. The worst agitation she ever showed was minor discomfort, and her confidence made me confident. We fed on each other just as she used to feed on men, but now, it was a mutually beneficial dynamic that made us both more powerful.
Lyanne sensed my trepidation and gave me a promising smile. “Come, let us look around quickly so we can leave this place. I’m eager to return home and remove this outfit. If you're good, I'll let you remove it for me.”
That was all the motivation I needed to stride bravely down the tunnel.
The t-shirt and jeans I was wearing didn't have room for all my gear, such as the high-powered flashlight, but I did have my phone with its flashlight application, which served us well enough as we followed the tracks. I ran the light up and down the walls until we came across a steel access door that was slightly ajar. After focusing for a moment to make absolutely sure I wasn't feeling even the slightest tingle of an unnatural creature beyond, I pushed the door open.
It seemed as though we’d been transported back to the 1920s. Incandescent lights in an old-fashioned lantern illuminated a room of gaudy opulence—silk and velvet upholstery in eye-catching colors, bright gold paint on the walls broken up only by expensive looking portraits, and spiraling jewel fixtures that served no pur
pose other than looking valuable. We might as well have just walked onto the set of The Great Gatsby.
In a connecting room were a row of mechanical typewriters beside a few sturdy metal file-cabinets. The cabinets got my hopes up when I noticed they were unlocked, but unfortunately one cabinet after another proved to be completely empty except for dust and one angry rat that squeaked with indignation before scurrying away.
It was the next room over that caught our attention. The décor stopped suddenly at the door, leaving the bare stone walls and hard floors. Along the walls were dark metal chains, and they weren’t rusted or damaged. They were solidly bolted to the wall and intended to stay in place.
It felt like a torture chamber, because that’s what it was.
The floors were stained with lurid red and black fluids, the pattern random. Scratches in the wall and ceiling formed symbols that were familiar to me, though it took me a minute to realize why: they were the symbols that appeared on a Succubus's chest when I struck them with the Night Flail.
There was no question that the torture was being done to Succubi, but the purpose was unclear. There was no need for them to torture the men they intended to use for food, as their victims would feed them regardless of their will. A Succubus overwhelmed men with her magical seduction, leaving a husk. There was no need to break the victims. They lunged into the arms of their killers, and they died willingly, awash in pleasure that blinded them to the danger.
I was going to ask Lyanne's opinion when I noticed the pale expression on her face. For the first time since I’d met her, the former Succubus was openly shaken.
“This is a place where they turn them,” she whispered. “This is where they make Succubi.”
No wonder she looked so haunted. This wasn’t just a torture chamber. It was an unholy place where life died and evil bloomed. “Were you turned here?”
She shook her head. “Not here. Somewhere similar, though. I recognize the symbols. The place I was brought was a bit more . . . elaborate, but the concept is the same.”
Succubus Hunter Page 11