Hardboiled: Not Your Average Detective Story (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 5)

by J. A. Cipriano

  “I think that’s your lying voice,” Thes said, shaking his head at me. “When you lie, your scent changes and your voice goes just a twinge higher. You should work on that.”

  “On my lying voice?” I smirked. “You want me to be a better liar?”

  “When you’re trying to assure me we aren’t trapped in some deep dark doom cave? Yes, I do,” he said, looking back out over the Phlegethon.

  “Okay, well, I’ll put that on my ‘to do’ list,” I replied for lack of anything better to say. Note to self, don’t lie to werewolves.

  “I don’t think we can jump it,” he said, still not looking at me.

  “What about, and hear me out, an ice bridge?” A smirk slid across my face as I said the words. It was so crazy it just might work.

  “An ice bridge? Sounds great, where do we get one?” Thes asked, and his voice was a lot less dismissive of the idea than I’d expected.

  “Well… this one time when a vampire lit my apartment on fire, I was able to channel the elemental energy from the blaze into giant storm clouds. Maybe I could do something like that?” I replied, holding my hand out toward the Phlegethon. “I don’t know if you can feel it, but the power coming off that river is intense. It would waste a lot of energy to do it, but I think that maybe I could form it into ice.”

  “That seems kind of dangerous. What if it melts before we get across?” Thes looked at me dubiously. “This is even worse than your ‘jumping it’ plan.”

  “I never suggested jumping it, but if you have a better idea, I’m all ears.” When he didn’t respond, I shut my eyes and reached out with my senses toward the raging Phlegethon. It rolled over me like boiling lava, searing my insides and making my lips dry and crack in the space of a second.

  I concentrated, envisioning the massive ice bridge that I had crossed on the way to Warthor’s demesne in the nether a long time ago. I knew the mechanics of how to build stuff like that, even if I wasn’t good at it. You grabbed energy and thrust it into the construct until it became real. Usually, the problem came from not having enough energy to make your construct real, and the less experience you had, well the more energy you needed to compensate. But come on. This was the Phlegethon. It was teaming with energy, and if it went out? Well, I could cross that way too.

  I inhaled, sucking in power and air at the same time, and when I exhaled I let the power of the Phlegethon flow into and through me. It rushed out like a roiling blaze, slipping into the construct in my mind with a whoosh, before settling and filling out. Sweat began to pour down my face as I dropped to my knees in the spongy earth as more and more energy rushed into me.

  It was like poking a hole in the side of a balloon. More and more power rushed out as the pressure behind the hole increased, making it bigger and bigger… the only problem? I was the hole. I felt the flames filling me up, boiling me from the inside and turning my blood to molten lead. The construct was barely formed, little more than a skeleton in my mind when I dropped forward onto my hands and knees. Ice rushed out over the ground, splitting and cracking in the intense heat.

  Instead of melting the bridge as it should have, the heat gave the bridge shape. It slapped into the bridge and solidified in my mind. When I opened my eyes, the bridge stretched outward from the cliff face below us, building slowly as my fingernails turned blue.

  “See,” I huffed in a breath that came out in a spray of icy fog. “I told you I could do it.”

  Thes glanced at me, eyes wide with amazement. “I didn’t even think that was possible,” he murmured and squatted down next to me on his haunches.

  “It’s nothing,” I replied, voice straining as small icicles began to form in my hair and a shiver wracked my body. The bridge was still barely halfway across. Unfortunately, I was starting to run out of steam. At this rate, I wasn’t sure I was going to make it.

  “Is that so?” he asked, putting one hand on my shoulder. A surge of energy flowed into me that filled my peripheral vision with images of the moon, filled my nose with the scent of pine trees and forest, filled my mouth with the triumphant taste of blood from a fresh kill.

  Frost crept over Thes’ hand, snaking up his arm like a thin white serpent, and power surged outward along the surface of the bridge in a sea of silvery flame. It leapt off of the edge and solidified in midair like a frozen staircase. A chill rippled over my body. It was all I could do to keep from crying out as ice surged out and out and out.

  The ice hit the ground on the other side of the Phlegethon as I collapsed to the ground. My face smacked into the spongy earth, but I’ll be honest, I barely felt it. The edge of my vision began to go hazy and far away as Thes picked me up, throwing me over his shoulder.

  “You did great, Lillim,” he said, taking a step toward the bridge. “Let me take it from here.”

  I wanted to argue. To tell him to put me down because I was fine, but somehow, my mouth wouldn’t quite work. Darkness swam over me, obscuring my vision more and more until everything faded into inky blackness.

  Chapter 12

  The smell of meat roasting over a fire filled my nose, chasing away the last remnants of a dream I couldn’t quite remember. Maybe it was because I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten, or because I’d just made a goddamn ice bridge out of fire, but for whatever reason, it was the best smelling thing in the world.

  “You’re awake?” Thes asked as I opened one eye and looked around. He had his back to me, so how had he known?

  “Yeah, where are we?” I groaned, pushing myself into a sitting position. He was bent over the edge of the Phlegethon, holding a giant horse’s leg by the ankle. The haunch sputtered and popped as he turned toward me, sweat running down his face.

  “Across the river. We made it, thanks to you. Unfortunately, Connor is still out cold. Whatever that guy did to him…” he trailed off as he sauntered toward me, the steaming leg held out in front of him. “I don’t know what to do for him. It makes me feel bad.”

  “Um… where did you get that?” I asked, glancing around for a corpse, but the only thing I saw was a giant bloody smear a few yards to my left.

  “Centaur,” he replied, holding it out toward me. “Want some? It’s not as bad as it seems like it’d be.”

  “You’re eating a centaur? Those are sentient beings,” the words rushed out of me as nausea swelled up in my throat. It was like… like eating a person.

  “I’m a werewolf,” Thes said with a shrug and bit into the haunch, tearing away a chunk of meat with his teeth. Juices dripped down his face as he chewed. “I eat what I kill.”

  “That’s not an excuse,” I said, growing very angry at my suddenly rumbling tummy and watering mouth. I’d used a lot of energy up making that bridge… so much so that I was still weak and woozy. “I’m not eating that!” I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him.

  Without saying anything, Thes tore off a hunk of meat and held it out to me in a way that reminded me of a cat bringing you a dead bird. “You used a lot of power. You’ll need your strength to cross that,” he said, gesturing behind me with the meat.

  I glanced over my shoulder to see a thin river of smoking white tar bubbling a couple feet behind me. “That must be the river Styx,” I said because what else could it be? The river Styx was said to run parallel to the Phlegethon in Tartarus. Besides, Apep had said it would be here.

  “Uh, yeah.” Thes smirked at me and gestured with the meat again. “Eat this, or I’ll shove it down your throat. I had to rip off a centaur’s leg, and it wasn’t exactly pleasant, let me tell you.”

  “I’m not eating that, and you can’t make me,” I replied, at which point Thes jammed the meat in my face. I tried to cry out, which was a mistake because he shoved it into my mouth and clamped his hand over the top.

  “Don’t make me pinch your nose,” he said when I refused to chew. I’m ashamed to say it, but I chewed and swallowed like a good little girl. I didn’t even put up much of a fight. The worst part? He was right. It wasn’t bad.
In fact, it was pretty much the best tasting meat I’d ever eaten. That made me feel even worse.

  “Was that so bad?” he asked when I finished. “You don’t have to answer. I know you’ll lie and say that it was horrible, when it wasn’t.”

  I nodded curtly at him before climbing to my feet and taking one swaying step toward Connor. He was lying slumped on the spongey pink ground beside the river’s edge. It seemed like a precarious position, but the distance between the two rivers was only about five meters or so. No matter where he was, he’d be close to the edge.

  I bent down next to him as Thes ripped off another chunk of meat and popped it into his mouth. “It’s not as good raw,” he said as I put my hand on Connor’s forehead. He felt cold, too cold for it to be good. It sort of reminded me of how people felt before they turned into vampires, except I could still feel his pulse beating. Besides, we hadn’t fought any vampires. Turning only took a few minutes. If he’d been turned, he’d have woken up a long time ago.

  “I have no idea what to do about him either,” I replied as Thes flopped down next to me and offered me his meaty haunch.

  “Eat more,” he said, ignoring me.

  I gave him a look that meant ‘we’re on a different subject now,’ and he smirked at me.

  “I’m fairly certain that you’d have healed him hours ago if you could have,” Thes said, poking me in the cheek with the leg of centaur, which I’ll be honest, seemed a little obscene. “I think all we can do is make him comfortable until it wears off, or we find someone who can fix it.” He smiled, baring his teeth into a grin that was just this side of sinister. “Now eat more so we can get the hell out of here.”

  I shoved the haunch away from my face and stared at it for a long time. Then I reached out and ripped off a chunk of warm flesh and sighed. “I think you just killed a small part of me,” I said before shoving it into my mouth. It sort of tasted like really well marbled steak mixed with expensive mushrooms.

  “Is it the part that never thought you’d eat a sentient being who was trying to murder you in your sleep?” Thes asked as centaur juice dripped down his chin and spattered on his bare leg. “Cause that part of you was pretty lame.”

  I stopped mid-chew and stared at him for a long while. “We were attacked? How long was I out?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, glancing at his wrist pedometer. “Time stopped working when we got down here, but if I had to guess? Long enough for us to be attacked by a centaur, me to rip off its leg and throw it in the river, cook and eat it?”

  “So like twenty minutes?” I asked, taking another bite.

  “Try six hours, easy.” He shook his head. “I tried keeping count, but I kept getting distracted around the four minute mark.”

  “Well, I was tired.”

  “You should be tired, Lillim.” Thes’ voice dropped a couple octaves as he said it. He looked away, staring out at the Phlegethon as fire leapt across its surface. “You just transformed the mythical fire river of Tartarus into ice and made it into a bridge. I didn’t even know that could be done.”

  “Neither did I,” I replied, getting to my feet. I wasn’t quite sure why, but I suddenly felt a lot better. Maybe centaur meat had magical properties? Or maybe I was just starving after using so much magic.

  “Somehow,” Thes said, standing and swinging the haunch over his shoulder like a prehistoric caveman, “that doesn’t surprise me. Let me guess, you get chastised a lot for doing things half-cocked.”

  I blushed and looked away as he bent down and threw Connor over his other shoulder. It was partially because he was right, and I disliked he was right so much. I mean, he was a teenage boy. Wasn’t he supposed to be wrong by definition? The other problem was that standing there in nearly nothing, all bulging muscles and tanned skin he looked a little too… primal.

  Standing there, he didn’t seem like someone I’d want to date or anything. No, he was the type of guy I’d want to pull on top of me for a one night stand… if I was into that sort of thing. It made me feel a little bad for him because as far as I was concerned, even without being furry, he wasn’t boyfriend material… and if I’d had that thought… well… others probably had as well.

  “You look like you’re having some deep thoughts,” Thes said as he stepped up next to me. “I can tell because you’re chewing on your lip.”

  “No one likes you,” I blurted and took a step past him and glared at the bubbling river Styx because I wasn’t flirting with him, dammit. “Isn’t there supposed to be a boatman that takes you across this to Hades?”

  “I have no idea,” Thes replied, evidently deciding to ignore my comment. “And everyone loves me.” Or not…

  I grumbled at him as we started walking upriver. I’m not sure why we chose that direction, but I briefly remembered something about the source of the river coming from the underworld which was actually above us. It was as far over us as heaven was above earth. That would be one hell of a climb, and I wasn’t looking forward to it.

  “Is the river Styx the one Achilles used to become invulnerable?” Thes asked, after we’d been walking for what felt like hours and was probably actually hours judging from the way my feet hurt.

  Those little blue shoes Connor had gotten me were definitely not made for walking, and I’d long since taken them off and slung them over my shoulder. So yeah, I was hiking across the spongy, glistening pink surface of Tartarus barefoot, and it sort of reminded me of walking through a marsh only without the mud between my toes.

  “Yeah, I think so,” I replied and Thes’ eyes got huge as he stared at the bubbling river next to us.

  “Don’t even think about it,” I replied, resisting the urge to punch him in the arm as horrible thoughts swam through his eyes.

  “I could be Superman,” he murmured, voice not quite right.

  “You do know that would give you a weak spot that if injured will kill you, right? You’re a werewolf. You heal pretty much anything. That’s a horrible tradeoff.”

  “So you say.”

  I was about to respond to him when the scenery around us changed. The pink fleshy walls and floor vanished, leaving us standing in a cavern of white marble. Little flecks of pink glittered within the stone like dancing starlight as we moved.

  “Well that was weird,” Thes said, glancing around, his nostrils flaring. “Even the scents changed.”

  “Maybe we should go back?” I offered even though I knew we wouldn’t be going back.

  “Welcome to my humble home.” The words thrummed outward over me from everywhere, bristling across my flesh and driving me to my knees. I fell, clutching my ears, blood seeping through my fingers. I looked around for the source of the words as they faded away, like wisps in the wind that still echoed in my mind.

  There was a loud thunk next to me as Connor slipped off Thes’ shoulders and hit the marble with a wet sound that couldn’t be good. Thes writhed, eyes crazy as he whirled around, his haunch braced in front of him like a club.

  “Apologies. I have not spoken to mortals in a very long time,” the voice said, but this time it was less… harsh. The clink, clink sound of chains smacking against marble filled my ears as a huge creature emerged from the shadows to my left.

  I spun toward it, my hands out in front of me, ready to attack when a soft reptilian hiss in the back of my mind told me, “No.”

  “No?” I thought, and the bangles around my hands pulsed once as if winking at me.

  “Who are you?” Thes asked, voice confused and angry. His meaty club was raised up like a baseball bat, but even from here, I could see his hands were trembling.

  “I am Kronos,” the creature said as it stepped into the light. He was huge in the way that an elephant was huge, and his skin had that same grey color. Huge ears stuck out from the side of his head, so that it looked like if he caught a strong breeze he might take flight. He reached up and stroked a bedraggled grey beard with one hand, yellowed nails cracked and split. “I used to be a god.”

&nbs
p; “Kronos… as in the father of Zeus?” I asked like a dumbass because what other chained up old Titan would be in Tartarus claiming to be Kronos. Then again, there were supposedly a boatload of Titans down here, and it wasn’t like they were above impersonation and trickery.

  “Yes, that is I,” he replied, settling down onto the floor in front of us. Huge legs crossed in front of him as he leaned backward on his palms. His limbs were encircled by huge black chains, the links so big around that they reminded me of the ones used to haul in ocean liners. “I am pleased that I have not been forgotten. That is the nature of time after all, to sweep everything away until all is lost and nothing of the past remains.”

  Thes glanced at me, a questioning look on his face, and I shrugged. Thes sighed and wiped his face with his hand. “Okay, so… sorry about trying to brain you with my centaur leg,” he said, and I had to resist the urge to laugh hysterically at him as a sheepish grin spread across his face.

  Kronos waved one huge hand at us, eyes sparkling like silver flecked emeralds. “It’s okay, but you shouldn’t eat meat,” he said. “So what brings you to Tartarus? I know it is lovely this time of year, but even though I put out brochures, no one ever comes to visit.”

  I smirked at him as a grin spread across his huge black lips to reveal a set of baleen. You know, the kind of teeth that those giant whales have.

  “You’re a vegetarian?” Thes asked. “I thought all gods like feasted on the blood of their enemies and sacrifices and what not.”

  “Perhaps they do now, but when I was in charge no man sought hunger and no beast was killed to sate him. Animals spoke with human voices and frolicked through the land as equals.”

  “So you were a bunch of hippies,” Thes said before clamping a hand over his mouth.

  Laughter boomed from the Titan, spreading out over me like caramel and satin, rich and sultry with hints of more to come. I shivered. That was a scary sound… scary because I could see myself getting addicted to it. In fact, if he asked me to give up meat in that voice, I might just do it.