'Twas the Darkest Night

by Sophie Avett

  After all, it wasn’t her fault he didn’t want her anymore.

  The clock face on her Mickey Mouse watch chimed and she threw the business card over her shoulder. The wizard could rot for all she cared. It’s not like she’d ever loved him anyways. Besides, she was late. And nothing pissed a vampire off more than tardiness.

  Who had time to deal with an angry Astrid? The Devil himself.

  Grabbing her snow-white cloak from the peg next to the ale barrels, she shoved a lollipop in her mouth and plucked up her purse and the weathered stuffed elephant. “Come on, Perri-wink,” she called. “We’ll pick up some cake on the way.”

  The sweet-pink will o’ wisp dropped the carton with a crash, and together they left the half-finished Star Sanctum and wove down the lonely corridor to the mixed floor. Operating out of a warehouse near the docks, Club Brimstone was the shape of an ancient star. Magic had been welded into the seams and black stone walls to create a well-stocked fun-house for all of New Gotham’s naughty little monsters to enjoy.

  Well, it would be if the Pixie and the Dragon ever managed to stop their bickering and finish remodeling in time for the grand re-opening. Four themed rooms. One for every faction. And none of them were ready for opening. As it was, the only rooms available for entertainment were the Dungeon and the mixed dance floor.

  Cathedral doors peeled opened and Gillian was swamped in the thrum of dub-step with vibrating electronic vibes and a sizzling base. Gillian descended the rich wood planks and was swallowed by a rolling mass of vampires, witches, the occasional fey, and sparse pockets of humans.

  Mark Garrix’s Animal lit the crowd into a frenzy and the candy witch waved to the rave wizard. An orange bunny mask for a head, he offered both hands in the air and the crowd responded like flowers popping up from the grave.

  “Put your panties to the sky, ladies!”

  Puffs of fur, leather, and velvet star-dusted cloaks brushed against her as Gillian shook her hips along with the song, weaving through the clusters of gyrating bodies toward the back of the mixed floor.

  Posted near the silver beaded entryway that would lead into the Dungeon, Club Brimstone’s famous leather palace, Astrid Dweyer waited like Cerberus, a tempestuous steward for the hellish delight going on behind the curtain. She was too cool for the grave, slouching against the wall like a spider in waiting, her glittering net was reams of black cotton and leather. A black cobweb laced bodice clung to her willowy curves, and the halter straps tied at the nape of her neck. Witchy raw hem stained with a blood red spatter of roses. It was a vampire’s cocktail dress, nowhere near the uniform most other Club Brimstone employees wore.

  Not that the Dweyer sisters cared. And no one gave less fucks than Astrid.

  No one.

  Petrified flies with iridescent wings and glistening dew droplets embroidered the silken tresses pressed into tiny curls on top of her head like a beehive. She was slender, tapered perfection. Wind didn’t whip through her hair—it caressed. Fog didn’t run from around the corner to slap her on the face—it knew better. Somehow, someway, even the forces of nature seemed to bend around her sister. Surprising to some given she was the youngest at only nineteen years old.

  Green rays from a wandering strobe light caught the purple tea-shades perched on the bridge of her sharp nose. The violet tinted lenses glittered as she lowered the glasses, assessing the fast approaching werewolf. Thin, wiry and eyes black as night. The scent of enchanted oak, amber, and aloe. He was gorgeous. Like goddamn.

  What a pity.

  Hadn’t he heard? Astrid was a suicide prize.

  “So hot.” Gillian plucked a pair of lacey dotted sugar-white gloves and whacked the vampire waiting patiently next to her on the chest. “I feel bad for him…”

  The vampire’s eyes were sapphires. Face hidden behind the elegant folds of a soot black leather duster, the only sign of life the glimmer of a bloodstained ivory fang. Like with most vampires in New Gotham, when he wasn’t stalking Club Brimstone, he probably spent his time making it rain from his perch in the city’s stratosphere of the rich and the ruthless. Well, he wasn’t doing anything now. He might as well make himself useful.

  “I mean, really, you’d think she’d cut a guy some slack.” Gillian whacked the vampire again until he took the hint and held her gloves. “Not his fault she’s beautiful,” Rummaging around in her clutch, she plucked out a sea-shell compact mirror and a tube of black cherry lip gloss. “Pity, pity, pity.”

  “Hey.” The werewolf swaggered up to her sister, clad in black jeans, a leather jacket baring the faded inked scorpion symbol of his tribe, and nothing else. Not even shoes. He was nothing but toned skin and whip-chord muscle. And he knew it. “You’ve been watching me…”

  Astrid didn’t respond—at all. She didn’t even bat one of her thick, full eyelashes. If the werewolf took the hint, he ignored it. Dropping his hand on the wall next to her head, he brought their bodies a fraction too close and murmured, “I don’t care that you’re a half-breed. It doesn’t matter to me. And if it matters to anyone else, I’ll handle it.”

  Gillian popped open her compact case and elbowed the vampire. “Smooth, real smooth.”

  “Are you blind?” Astrid finally graced him with something other than a vacant stare—and blinked. “I ain’t interested.”

  His nostrils flared. “Well, that’s not true, is it? You’ve been watching me all night.”

  “I get paid to watch.”

  “I like an audience.”

  “Not interested.” The azure flecks in Astrid’s eyes refracted the light like shards of twilight. “I’m not gonna say it again, honeybunches.”

  Ooooh. Honeybunches.

  This was bad.

  “Are you sure? I fuck like the Devil.” The werewolf hooked his thumbs in his belt loops and tugged. “A good girl would get on her knees and pray.”

  “Oh?” Astrid’s mouth waxed on a bland smirk and she threaded her fingers through the short black hair at the nape of his neck, and pressed her dangerous, rose red lipstick to his ear. “My pussy is like Jesus. So...bow down,” she kneed him in the groin, “and worship.”

  Snot and saliva flew from his nose and mouth as he doubled over and coughed. Like butter, he melted against her and she let him fall to his knees without a glimmer of mercy. On the contrary, she was suffocating him. Her hold around the back of his neck was punishing, sharp nails pulling thick lovely red droplets of blood to the surface of his sun-tanned skin. Mouth and nose smooshed against her thigh, and in too much pain to fight back, he grappled at the hem of her skirts with weak, spasming fingers.

  “Don’t kill him. We’re in public.” Gillian smooched her lips together. “Besides, no need to be antisocial, Astrid.”

  “I’m not antisocial, I’m selectively social.” Holding the gasping and shuddering werewolf against her thigh, she lifted her chin and slanted the vampire lingering at Gillian’s side a curt greeting. “Need something, sugar?”

  The vampire answered her with a slow head-shake and extended Gillian her kid-gloves.

  She dropped her makeup back into her purse and worked her fingers into the tight black holes. “Many thanks, sir vampire.”

  The vampire caught her chin in his warm leather gloves and squeezed, and then swept through the beaded threshold into The Dungeon without a word.

  She almost dropped everything and ran after him.

  Gillian covered her cheeks. “Oh my Pop-tarts…”

  Smoky black annoyance curled in the air and the hairs on the back of her arms lifted. Sir vampire momentarily forgotten, Gillian’s eyes flitted back and forth as she chanced a cautious look over her shoulder. “What?”

  Astrid was peering at her over the brim of her tea-shades, the corners of her mouth tilted in a vague smile. “I’m like this close”—she pinched her fingers—“to losin’ my shit with you, Gill.”

  The candy witch waved her off and wandered to the black and red splattered mirror wall-panels. “So, you don’t like my taste
in men, relax. Not like I actually went home with him.”

  “You woulda been sorry if you had.” Astrid tossed the corpse kneeling at her feet in the corner. “They call that animal the Devil’s Hand for good reason. Makes all the girlies cry”—she lifted a disdainful eyebrow—“you’re right, he’s just your type.”

  Whatever. Wasn’t like Astrid was the one who couldn’t walk into the grocery store without running into ten guys she’d fucked. No, that awe-inspiring honor belonged to Gillian. And sometimes, Brenda, depending on what store.

  “A man can change.” She licked her thumb and smoothed it over a manicured eyebrow. Her sister snorted unattractively and Gillian fluffed the oil black ringlets framing her moon-shaped face. “I’m serious, you never know. Besides, Momma says it never hurts to dream a little sinister dream.”

  “Sure, hon…” Astrid glided across the wood planks in six-inch bolero red wedges with gold decorative thorn print and the grace of something with eight legs instead of two. “Keep walking around with that shit floatin’ around your head, you’ll get real far.” She snatched a couple of drinks from a passing tray. The first, she downed on the spot and sent back with a passing skeleton. The second, she took for the road. “Hurry up, Gill. We still gotta find Brenda.”

  “I’m coming, I’m coming…”

  Gillian dusted imaginary specks off her Lolita threads. Sure, sure, Club Brimstone had uniforms, but Gillian Dweyer wouldn’t be caught dead in anything she hadn’t designed herself. The very insinuation was ludicrous. Worthy of death upon utterance. Why?

  Because she was too friggin’ cute, that’s why.

  Black cotton trimmed with white anglaise broderie lace and ribbon. The bodice was fitted to her curves, and several black, mesh petticoats gave the skirt a belle-like volume. White, heart-shaped buttons laced the pleated front and the ruffled apron added just the right sweetheart touch. Matched with a pair of polyester black leggings printed with skeleton bones on the front and back, she was a Grimm Reaper’s French maid in tiers of black cotton candy foamed by vanilla frosting.

  Honestly, who could doubt brilliance like that?

  Astrid draped her mini-velvet black duster over her shoulders. “Gill.”

  “All right, all right.” Hooded in snow-white velvet, Gillian stole a Shirley Temple from a nearby table. “Where is she?”

  “Where she normally is…” Astrid rolled her eyes heavenwards like the burden was almost too much. “The Pit.”

  Cigarette butts, cardboard fast food cups, and all manner of assorted trash littered the alley stretching behind Club Brimstone. Sickly sweet remnants of spectral dust, blood, and bile. The stench of matted fur and the vacant life-less stares of those who had fallen, the Pit was a rumble pen. Even the brave and the stupid little boys and girls didn’t brace foot on this hallowed ground. Not unless they were ready for life in the twisted fast lane.

  And, of course, it was Brenda Dweyer’s favorite place. If she wasn’t home with her sisters, out fucking someone to death, or running naked through a haunted forest, she was misbehaving and causing mayhem in Club Brimstone’s backyard.

  Why? Because middle children are difficult, that’s why.

  The back exit to Club Brimstone clanged shut like heavy doors to a tomb. Serpentine fog slithered between their ankles like a fat Asian dragon as their heels clacked across the sparkling, damp pavement. Figures shrouded in smoke and fog rolled by. Some fat, some tall. Some winged, others horned. Whispers—faint insidious whispers echoed everywhere at once like a specter’s crazed lullaby. Rumors were they came from the sheets of rusted black brick wallpapering the narrow corridor. What was left of those who’d fallen in this level of Hell.

  Werewolves battling for supremacy roiled to the coven’s left. Half-shifted, they howled and snapped gleaming white incisors. Posted against the wall, pockets of other shifters in packs of threes and fours, observed in a line of glittering jackets, combat boots and bad attitudes. Ever vigilant. Either be one of them and earn your claws or be food. They weren’t picky.

  A piercing bestial whine. Blood splattered across the brick, and Astrid kicked the rolling head out of her way. “I ain’t in the mood for this shit.”

  Gillian waved at the shirtless shedu carting the carcass to the dumpster. “It’s early.”

  On their right, a pair of blonde witches in matching slinky blackdresses found themselves back to back, caught between a lion-shifter with eyes the color of the Serengeti sunset and a blue-haired, chocolate-skinned vampire. Blood leaked from the corners of their mouths as each witch clung to her champion, kissing and touching with abandon.

  Gillian dodged a pair of lacey pearl panties and caught the other on the tip of her finger. “Fuck...a...mouse,” she deadpanned. “Where. Is. Brenda?”

  In the middle of a drug deal. As per usual.

  Sometimes Gillian swore her sister’s only saving grace was her style. The soft sheer black floral lace clung to Brenda’s tight, toned muscles. Fluffy black fur for a neckline, it was the kind of garment that should’ve been worn as a long, sleeve-less blouse, with a bra and a pair of leggings. Not Brenda. Brenda wore it with a shiny cropped leather jacket, patent leather knee-high hooker boots and nothing else.

  That’s right. Absolutely nothing else.

  “Lovely.” Astrid folded her arms. “Real class act.”

  Plastered against graffiti brick with arms draped around a half-naked fox and a strapping young bear, she was in the middle of a tight sandwich of paranormal goodness. The fox placed a tiny white bunny-shaped tablet on the tip of his tongue as the bear curled long sensual fingers into her mane of black curls and gently wrenched her head back. “Give me a sec,” she whispered. “I’m going to Wonderland…”

  The corner of her lush black lip gloss curved and she sighed into the fox’s mouth, giving him the access he needed to slip her the pill in a long, deep kiss. Metallic droplets wept from the side of her mouth, and the bear caught the rivulets that splattered on her collarbone with a long, dexterous tongue. Swallowing one of Alice’s White Rabbits, she closed her eyes and scraped her teeth across her bottom lip. “I’ll be right there…”

  Astrid and Gillian exchanged a long look.

  Selling drugs was one matter.

  True, it wasn’t Gillian’s first choice of career for her sister, but whatever—it was a living. And really, until the apocalypse came and people needed to start hunting one another down for meat, it wasn’t like Brenda was fit for anything else. She’d been fired from any job she’d managed to hold for more than a week. Theft, assault, the occasional murder—it was always something.

  Abusing the merchandise was an entirely different can of carcass worms.

  It was playing with fire and Brenda wasn’t scared of burning. She wasn’t afraid of anything. There probably wasn’t a bone of fear left in her body—she’d spent the last twenty-three years exorcising pain and weakness with the kind of work-out regiment that made Gillian quite proud of her rule not to sweat for anything that didn’t end in orgasm.

  “You know…” Annoyance flared off Astrid in waves and framed her tampered figure in ribbed arcs like bat wings. “Shouldn’t we do something, Gill?”

  “Yes.” Gillian conjured soapy liquid from the pink carbonated liquor with a zap of magic. “Bubbles.”

  “Right, bubbles.” Astrid took a nice big sip of scotch. “Why didn’t I think of that? No, really. I’m astounded. I kneel before Zodd and your powers of deduction.”

  Gillian conjured a flower bubble-wand from the pink umbrella. “You know, you’re turning into a real crabby candy-ass in your old age.”

  “I’ll kill you,” Astrid muttered into her glass. “I’ll kill everyone.”

  By the time Brenda pried herself from between the two shifters, hundreds of shining bubbles were hanging in the fog like blissful pendants. The she-wolf stumbled into their circle, dragging a sleeve across her mouth. “Hey, guys, am I lat—Gill, what the fuck are you doing? Stop blowing bubbles.”

  �
�Yeah.” Astrid pinched the bridge of her nose. “You’re late. We’re all fucking late...”

  “We need to talk, Brenda.” The interruption was an eruption of molten tar. Deep, running, and earthy. The scent of charred clay wafted as the trinity was dwarfed in the shadow of a golem. “Now.”

  Huge black buttons for eyes and running mud as a body. Its legs were as thick as tree stumps, hands two meaty globs of soil. It wasn’t an actual living thing. Just a lazy Jewish wizard’s shell. Its puppeteer was probably tucked away in some tower, miles and miles away.

  In Brenda’s case, not even distance could save him. She lifted her nose to the wind like a snout, fierce Norse blue eyes narrowing on the intruder. “What do you want, Maximus?”

  Mud bubbled from the golem’s chin as its mouth split into a cheesy gob. “What do you mean what do I want? I want you to pay what you owe me. As a matter of fact”—he snatched up Gillian like a ragdoll and she squeaked with surprise as soil closed around her waist like quicksand. She was only miffed for a moment, and promptly resumed her bubble blowing—“I plan on making sure I get what’s owed to me this time.”

  “Take it up with Alice.” Brenda holstered her hands on her killer hips. “And put my sister down. Now.”

  Astrid rubbed the throbbing vein in her forehead. “Seriously, we’re hella late.”

  “Give it a rest, runt. That bitch can wait.”

  “Crabby candy asses everywhere.” Gillian propped an elbow on the flat of the golem’s pointer finger and huffed a fat lazy bubble. “Everywhere.”

  “Oh, shut up, Gill.” Brenda barked and raked wine-red nails through her oil mane of curls. “Run your mouth after you finish doing the dishes, which you never did last night.”

  “I’ve got your sister!” The golem lifted the tiny Lolita witch caught in his mud-caked hand like a magic gauntlet. “I’ve got your sister!” When Astrid and Brenda proceeded to stare at him like he’d lost his mind, his enthusiasm wilted. “What? Don’t you care?”

  “Do you know what you need?” Gillian blew a bubble and it popped on his forehead. “A bow.”