His order was greeted by a wordless roar of bloodlust, and the army began to march north, towards the domain of Malcanthet, Queen of the Succubi.
It didn't take long, even with such a massive group. Her 'scraper was only a block away, and the group didn't have to worry about the supply trains and so on that would have slowed larger armies. They surrounded the building with smooth efficiency, despite the fact that it took up the entire block. Orcus and the other warlords—and Akane and Derek—took the west side, the side with the entrance. It took about twenty minutes, but eventually everyone was in position.
“MALCANTHET!” Orcus roared, loud enough to rattle nearby windows. Derek nearly wet himself. This was the man he had walked up to and demanded accept him?
“MALCANTHET!” Orcus cried again. “We know you're in there!”
A window on the third floor opened. It was a very large portrait window, and the demon girl who poked her head out looked like she deserved to be in a model catalog. Perfect white skin, delicately curved horns, and eyes a rosy red. Even thirty feet away, she was dazzling. Her features were accentuated by a few abstract tribal tattoos.
“Orcus?” she called, stifling a fake yawn. “Is that you? What are you yelling about?”
“Don't play dumb!” he called back. “Release your prisoners, or we will come in and take them.”
“Oh?” A slow smile spread over her face. “You're here for dear old Mother, then?” She grinned, and her fangs glimmered in the dim light of the streetlamp. “I don't think she wants to leave any more.”
Derek swallowed. Was it already too late? Had the succubi already broken her?
“Bloody hell,” Obould cursed under his breath.
“She's lying,” Dispater said firmly. “Don't worry.”
Derek didn't share his confidence, but he didn't say anything. This just needed to be ended, period, and if the slaves could be saved then it was a bonus.
Orcus clearly agreed. “You have ten seconds!” he roared. “After that, we're coming in! TEN!”
Malcanthet narrowed her eyes and stepped away from the window.
“NINE!”
Metal bars slammed into place—not just over the one, but all the windows. In seconds, the place was a fortress.
“EIGHT!”
Around Derek, everyone started readying their weapons. The warbloods and hellions checked their ammo, the Draculas pulled out their knives, and the Nosferatu fell into fighting crouches. Akane unsheathed her sword, preparing to charge.
“SEVEN!”
Derek saw something scaling the building's south and north faces.
“SIX!”
Kemos. Spies and saboteurs. Of course. This was all a distraction. The real purpose was to give everyone else a chance to get into place.
“FIVE!”
Derek saw them place something on a few windows. Bombs, probably, but what good would they do that high? Most of the army couldn't climb like that.
“FOUR!”
A few more shapes appeared on the roof, readying rappelling lines.
“THREE!”
Some of the thinner window opened as arrow slits, and Nessian snipers prepared to fire.
“TWO!”
The entire army was coiled like a spring.
“ONE!”
Everything happened at once.
About a third of the windows exploded messily, setting fire to the rooms behind them. At the same time, a few select windows, farther from the others, exploded without fire, and the spy-demons began rappelling down to those.
The army leaped forward at the explosions as if shot from a gun, enveloping the building like a flood. Everyone with the claws to do so began scrambling up the walls, struggling for purchase on a 'scraper never designed to be climbed. Slaves and slavers popped out of windows to drop boiling liquids or just open fire on the crowd below, but the army's own snipers took care of them pretty well.
Derek and Akane were in the back now, with most of the warlords. Most of them had the glint of bloodlust in their eyes, but they were more valuable in the back, giving orders, than wading into the thick of battle.
“Assassins on the left,” Dispater reported in a bored tone. Even back here, the sound of gunfire was so loud Derek could barely hear him. The assassins he had spotted—Belians, by the look of it—had most likely been trying to take advantage of that to sneak up unnoticed.
“They're Belians,” Obould said. “If we wait, they'll probably trip over their own feet and kill themselves.”
There were only three of them, clad in dirty rags and clearly hopped up on chems. Their breathing was ragged and their gazes unfocused. They could barely even run in a straight line.
“Akane and I will handle them,” Derek said with more confidence than he felt. “Be right back.”
He wasn't sure if the warlords let them go because they thought they could handle themselves, or if they were just too surprised to stop them, but in the end it didn't matter. They were gone before anyone said a word.
They closed the distance. The lead Belian just grinned at Derek with broken teeth. “This is no place for children, little boy. We can smell your fear.”
He was afraid. Fighting adults was scary enough, but fighting someone built for intimidation and killing was something else entirely. Derek knew without a shadow of a doubt that any one of these men could kill both of them easily, without any mercy or hesitation.
Belians were monsters. That was the entire point, really. They abandoned any shred of morality to the sweet freedom of drugs and bloodshed. Sure, they had leaders—Belial, his wife Naome, and their daughter Fierna—but they didn't really lead so much as run at the head of the mob.
Derek mind froze, fear keeping him from thinking straight.
But his body kept moving.
It hadn't been that long ago that he had burned that into his muscles, forced them to fight even when the rest of him was screaming in terror. His body had only frozen up on him once in his life... but a bright young girl had her knee shattered by a baseball bat as a result.
Speaking of knees...
Derek was thirteen and his opponents at least twenty, so they were nearly twice his size, not even counting all their combat toys. They underestimated him greatly, but not enough to even the scales.
So to tip the battle in my favor, he went for their knees.
No matter how many muscle buffs and skin enhancements you got, no matter how many chems you pumped yourself full of, you couldn't change the fact that knees were designed to bend. That was just what they did. So if you wanted to bring someone to the ground, you didn't try to break the knee. You just tried to make it bend.
Derek kicked the lead Belian as hard as he could in the back of his knee, and he fell to the cold concrete in surprise. Before he knew what was happening, Akane lunged forward and skewered his heart with her blade, running him through with a single stroke.
It was hard to tell who looked more surprised, Akane or the Belian. It didn't matter—after a moment, he gurgled, blood bubbling from his mouth, and she hurriedly withdrew her sword.
The other two howled in rage and rushed them. Whether they realized a couple of kids wouldn't be able to take them in a fair fight or if they were just too angry to care, Derek didn't know.
He shoved Akane to the right while he dodged left, and the Belians missed grabbing us by inches. That also put him in the perfect position to strike at their knees again. He took one down, but Akane didn't stab him, so Derek grabbed him by the hair and slammed his head into the concrete again and again until he stopped moving.
That was the trick when dealing with chem-heads: Never stop moving. It confused them. He looked around the last one...
He was flat on the ground already, his ankles bleeding and multiple holes in his back. Derek watched as Akane stabbed him again... then again... then again, weeping the entire time.
He should have stopped her, but I couldn't move. What if she turned her sword on me? What if more Belians came out of
the shadows? What if the succubi had sleepers in their army? Now that the battle was over and his life wasn't directly in danger, his mind took control again. But he was too terrified to so much as twitch. What kind of man got paralyzed with fear? He looked back towards Orcus and the other warlords, hoping to get some encouragement...
And saw Asmodeus and his Nessians attacking.
The Nessians were vampires, operating out of Nessus, and slavers. They kidnapped children off the street and sold them to Malcanthet or the fey. They cared nothing for the suffering of others, only the weight of their wallets.
Asmodeus was the worst of them. He was over six feet, with a sharp face and blood red skin. He was dressed in a fine coat and wielding a pair of wickedly curved short swords, which seemed designed to cause as much suffering as possible before the kill.
The warlords were fighting back valiantly, but they had been caught by surprise, and were outnumbered. It looked like the Slave King had brought half his kith with him.
Derek saw him knock the strange-eyed vampire to the ground and step on his chest, swords ready. “We're vampires, old friend,” he said mockingly. “Everything must be paid in blood.”
It was the look on his face that shocked Derek. It wasn't a look of terror, or determination or professional detachment. It was a look of joy, and bloodlust. He was going to kill this man for no better reason than to satisfy his own selfish desires.
Life was a precious thing. Derek knew that better than most. It was fleeting, ephemeral, and always beautiful, even when it wasn't. You couldn't just crush it for no good reason.
It wasn't right.
“Hey, Ass-Man!”
Asmodeus Slave King, Noble of the Nessians and Master of Nessus, turned in his direction, a look of mild surprise on his face.
Derek threw his shoe at him.
It was all he had on hand, but it didn't matter. He was a warlord. It wouldn't have changed anything if Derek had thrown a live grenade instead.
The shoe bonked him on the head lightly, and he growled in anger, abandoning his target to stalk Derek instead.
Which was all the distraction the Nosferatu needed.
He barreled into the Nessian at full speed, without any battle cry to give him away. He still looked mostly human, except his hands were replaced with massive claws dripping with poison. Still eerily silent, he scratched at Asmodeus everywhere he could reach.
The Noble, however, was not silent. He screamed in pain and fury, striking the Nosferatu again and again with the hilts of his swords—the only part he could use at that angle. The brave vampire didn't let up, and took the blows without complaint. He just keep drawing blood, getting more and more poison into the slaver's system.
Eventually, Asmodeus managed to get his knee between himself and the Nosferatu, and flung his opponent away. He stood, ready to go on the offensive—
And dropped to the ground, screaming in agony, as the poison finally began to take effect.
The other Nessians abandoned their own battles and rushed over. They gripped their leader tight and carried him away, him screaming the entire time.
“Well done, Hal,” the strange-eyed vampire said as he rose and dusted himself off. “You too, Huntsman.”
Derek nodded his head as the vampire handed him back his shoe. He couldn't think of anything to say. Was he shaking?
The man picked up the swords Asmodeus had dropped, eyeing them warily. “Not really my style...” He glanced at the Nosferatu. “Doesn't your brother use swords?” He presented them to the silent vampire, hilts first. “Consider them a gift.”
He took them graciously, then backed away and nearly ran towards the battle.
The strange vampire chuckled. “Nosferatu are always interesting. I do hope he survives.” He frowned at Derek as he put his shoe back on—no, he frowned at something behind him. “Is your Akane okay?”
Derek turned to see her standing there, covered in blood spatters and clutching her sword. Her eyes were wide, and Derek wasn't entirely sure she was breathing.
She was staring at the Belian she had killed, the second one, the one she had stabbed repeatedly.
“Akane? You all right?”
Her gaze jerked to him. “No. No. No. No...”
“Okay.” He held up my hands to stop her. “Okay. You're not all right. I get it. What's wrong? Specifically?” He had a pretty good idea, of course. Killing was never easy. At least, not for sane people. It was actually a good sign that she was freaking out this much, but this was not a good time for it.
“I...” She swallowed and started again. “I killed somebody. Two of them. What does that make me? I'm no different than them.”
“Yes you are,” Derek said soothingly. “They were murderers. You were defending yourself and others.”
“What's the difference? Is there a difference?” She shook her head violently. “No, there isn't. It's like my mom always said. Killing is killing, and it's wrong.”
“Akane,” Derek said. He put his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to look at him instead of the corpse. “There is a difference. Trust me, this was necessary.”
She looked at him, nearly crying. “But, I don't know—”
“Trust me, Akane,” he said firmly. “That's an order.”
Something changed in her. Something... clicked into place. She stopped sniffling, and wiped away her tears. Her shoulders no longer trembled under his hands. She looked him in the eye, and adjusted the blue ribbon in her hair slightly.
“Yes, sir,” she said, and her voice only barely quavered. “I'm with you.”
Derek nodded and turned back to the others.
Most of the warlords weren't paying attention to the two of them. They were too busy licking their wounds and shouting into their phones, demanding to know how the Nessians got past the line. The strange purple-eyed vampire was chatting with Orcus, and gestured to Derek. The giant orc smiled in his direction and gave him an approving nod.
After a few minutes, most of the warlords dispersed. There was still a battle going on, and as the chaos increased, they needed to be able to actually shout at their men in person to get their orders across. Not to mention that splitting up and fading into the army would make things harder for any more assassins.
The only ones who remained behind were Orcus, Obould, Dispater, and a few of Dispater's elite warbloods. Mostly, everyone just stood around barking orders into radios and phones. There wasn't much for Derek and Akane to do.
About an hour after the Nessian attack, Obould closed his phone with a snap. “Front door is finally breached. But Shendilavri is a fortress, and the Malcatari know how to take advantage. We're having trouble just getting up the stairs.”
“We just need to rescue the prisoners, Ob,” Orcus said. “After that, we can turn this into a long-term siege.”
“They're not going to be easy to find,” Dispater said. He sounded halfway between worried and cautious. “Or to get out. Have your scouts found anything useful?”
“No,” Orcus said, grunting in annoyance. “They're having too much trouble moving around inside. The Draculas are having a little more luck, though not much.”
“Well, let me know,” Dispater said. “I want to get our men out of harm's way as quickly as possible.”
Malcanthet had a way of suborning people, of breaking their minds and forcing their allegiance. Derek didn't know the details. He didn't want to know the details. But she could create sleeper agents who acted perfectly normal until a predetermined situation occurred.
It was impossible to know what exactly set him off. Maybe it was something Dispater said, maybe there was a signal they all missed, or maybe it was just the right moment, like a time bomb going off.
But one of the Iron Duke's warblood bodyguards suddenly pointed his gun at his boss and pulled the trigger.
It was pure luck, really. Derek just happened to be looking at the bodyguards at the time, wondering if he should get a gun. Even though he realized what was going on the second
the vampire brought his weapon up, he barely moved in time.
Derek tackled Dispater as hard as he could, throwing him out of the line of fire as his bodyguard emptied an entire extended magazine at the spot he had occupied just a moment before.
It took the other two warbloods a couple seconds to get their own guns out, long enough for the traitor to start to reload. He didn't get a chance to fire again, though. His erstwhile compatriots tore him to pieces first.
Derek swallowed. “You all right, Honored Nightstalker?”
Dispater was clearly terrified—not that Derek could blame him, he wasn't feeling much better—but he wasn't looking at Derek, or even the corpse of his bodyguard. He was staring at something near the space he had been standing before Derek tackled him.
Orcus had been standing behind him.
The massive orc was on his back, laying in an ever-widening pool of blood and gore. He was already dead, that much was clear. What was left of his chest wasn't moving and the rest of his body was barely twitching with the last dregs of life. Even his eyes weren't so much as blinking.
Orcus was probably bulletproof, or at least heavily bullet-resistant, but Dispater had always made sure to arm his elites with the exact kind of rounds necessary for overcoming buffs like that. The bullets had torn through him like wet tissue paper.
Obould was crouching over the corpse, staring as if he couldn't believe his eyes. Very, very slowly, he reached out to touch his friend's face, and started weeping.
Derek left him alone. Let him have his time to grieve.
Derek turned back to Dispater. “Your orders?”
But he was shivering. “That's not... that's not...”
Derek frowned at his men. “Can you help him up?”
They nodded and moved forward, but the second they grabbed his arms, Dispater started screaming and flailing. The men nearly leaped backwards.
Right. So Dispater was down for the count. Derek had watched enough war movies to know that left then with only one option.
“Obould,” he said, turning back to the smaller orc. He didn't answer. “Obould.” He just kept staring at the corpse.
Silver and gold... they didn't have time for this. Orcus' phone was already buzzing with subordinates asking for orders.
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