Scorched Shadows (The Hellequin Chronicles Book 7)

by Steve McHugh

  “Nice office, too. I assume you have your own bathroom.”

  Alexi pushed open the closest door, revealing a spacious bathroom. “Only the best.”

  “What’s the other door for?”

  “I keep some important things in there. It’s sort of my get-away-from-everything room.”

  “Sounds nice. I should really get me one of them.”

  “Viktor told me you were coming.”

  “Yes, I figured as much.” Mordred knocked back the rest of the vodka and placed the glass on a coaster on the glass coffee table in front of him. “Good stuff. So, yes, I knew he would; it’s why I didn’t bother chasing after him. People like Viktor think of their own skin before anything else.”

  Alexi smiled. “We all know people like that. They put their own needs above the needs of anyone else. Capitalism at its finest.”

  “You’re anticapitalist?”

  “Not at all, I love money. I love the things it can buy, including power. No, I just don’t like the desperation of those people who pretend to have my kind of wealth. It’s unseemly.”

  “So, I assume you’re going to try to kill me soon.”

  Alexi knocked back the rest of his vodka. “I was hoping you’d be persuaded to join our side.”

  “Your side? And what side is that?”

  The smile on Alexi’s face melted, revealing the true man behind it. “The side that’ll win.”

  If Alexi thought that a slight sneer was going to scare Mordred, he clearly had no idea of the kinds of things Mordred had seen in his life. “So, if I say no, you’ll kill me?”

  “Eventually. First Daria will peel your skin from your body. She does so enjoy her work. You’ll have to excuse her absence from this meeting—she’s on the lower levels enjoying her time with a young man who tried to help Elaine Garlot. He’s probably wishing she’d just kill him by this point. He’s presumably feeling pain the likes of which you’ve never imagined. You come into my club with confidence and a swagger, but if you cross me, I assure you, we will teach you to be afraid.”

  Mordred stared at Alexi for several seconds before bursting out laughing. “Holy shit, you’re an idiot.”

  Alexi’s expression darkened.

  “Seriously, you think telling me tales of some woman who likes to torture is going to make me afraid? Do you honestly know who I am? Do you have any idea of the shit I’ve done to people? Of the shit I’ve had done to me? I was kept alive and tortured every day for a century by people a lot badder and better at it than I’d hazard a guess your lovely friend is. Don’t get me wrong—I’m sure she’s very good at stabbing people with knives, but you think that’s torture? True torture is making it so that you’re broken every single day, until you begin to look forward to it, because your life without that pain and suffering is now meaningless. And then the day they leave you alone you scream at them to come for you, because all you’ve known for so long is the nightmare of having your mind destroyed in a way that never gets put back together.

  “Try spending a few decades with a species for whom the word ‘pain’ is synonymous with the word ‘life,’ and see how you think being stabbed with a knife compares. So, while I’m sure your stabby little friend is very scary, she’s not Baldr, she’s not Hera, and she’s not the dozens of people who took their turns on me for a hundred years. You think you know fear, Mr. Popov, well, let me assure you, you’ve never even glimpsed it. And if you threaten me again, I’ll show you fear. I’ll happily make the big bad wolf piss himself.”

  Mordred got up and walked over to the bottle of vodka, pouring himself a second glass and knocking it back. “Where’s Viktor?”

  A glass hit the wall beside Mordred, shattering. “How dare you speak to me in such a manner.”

  “I’ve killed kings and queens, Alexi. I’ve killed people with more guards than you have people in this club. I’ve gotten to people who prided themselves on being untouchable. You’re just a mutt with the delusion you’re someone important. And more importantly, you’ve trapped yourself in a room with me.”

  Alexi growled and began to transform into his werebeast wolf form, tearing off his suit as he did. Mordred drank some more vodka, removed the gun from the holster, and shot Alexi between the eyes. All in one fluid motion.

  “No one searched me, you fucking idiot,” Mordred said. “That’s what happens when you buy into your own legend. You think you’re immortal. I should know.”

  Mordred ejected the magazine and removed the bullet from the chamber of the Glock, placing them both in his jacket pocket, then took out a second magazine from another pocket and loaded it into the gun as Alexi groaned.

  “Normal bullets,” Mordred said. “Warning shot. Bet it hurts like hell, though.”

  “Gut you like a salmon,” Alexi said.

  “Actually I don’t think you will. I now have silver bullets—these won’t just hurt. I’m certain of that. I wanted to see if my theory about this room being soundproof was right. I figured you brought people up here for some alone time with you.” Mordred walked over to the second door and kicked it open, splintering the wooden frame. Inside there was a computer on a desk, a king-sized bed, and a large-screen TV on the wall. The room smelled of sex.

  “The runes to keep powers from working, where’s the master one?” Mordred asked. “There’s always a master one, and I’d really like it switched off.”

  “Not here,” Alexi said.

  Mordred removed a silver blade from the sheath on his hip and threw it at Alexi’s leg. The werewolf screamed in pain as the blade bit into his thigh. “That will kill you eventually,” Mordred said, walking over and pulling the knife free. Blood poured from the wound. “The silver is already in your blood. I can heal it with light magic. Can’t do that without removing the runes, though. So, I’ll ask again: Where is the master rune?”

  “You’ll die first,” Alexi said, and started to laugh as the door leading to the stairs outside exploded in a hail of bullets.

  Mordred threw himself through the open door and tapped his ear. “Diana, Polina, Remy—is anyone actually there? Because now would be a good time to storm the citadel.”

  “We’re on our way,” Diana said. “Just keep your head down. People are flooding out of the club, and until we can get through them, you’re on your own.”

  Mordred risked a glance back into the office as two bouncers, one armed with a shotgun and another with a semiautomatic submachine gun, entered the room. He ducked back into the bedroom before anyone could fire another shot.

  “If we have to come get you, we’re going to make this hard,” one of them said.

  Mordred removed the gun from his holster and stood up against the wall. “That’s funny, because I was going to say the same thing to you.” Mordred reached into his pocket and produced a stun grenade. He pulled the pin, tossed it into the room, and turned away from the small explosion, and several shots fired blindly as the two bouncers were momentarily disoriented.

  Mordred counted to three, stepped around the corner, and shot both men in the head. They dropped to the floor as Mordred walked over to Alexi and pointed the gun at his temple. “Where is the master rune? Now.”

  “Behind the gun cupboard. It’s etched on the wall.”

  Mordred pushed the remains of the cupboard aside, revealing the large rune that had been carved there. It hummed with power, occasionally shimmering black. “Blood magic was used to create this,” Mordred said. “You killed someone to make this.” He knew that if destroyed the rune might backlash power against anyone nearby, so he walked over to the doorway and emptied the rest of the magazine of silver bullets into the wall.

  With the rune destroyed, Mordred felt the magical power rush back into him. He walked toward Alexi and placed the Glock on the desk in front of him.

  “Daria is going to kill you for this.”

  Mordred placed a hand on Alexi’s arm, and his light magic went to work, healing the silver from the werewolf.

  “Why?” he a
sked when Mordred was done and had stepped away from his reach. “What’s to stop me from killing you?”

  Mordred watched Alexi get back to his feet. “Because when I’m done, I’m going to come back here and you’re going to tell me where Elaine Garlot is and what your involvement is in her disappearance. And if you’re dead, you can’t do that.”

  Alexi chuckled and took a step toward Mordred, flexing his fingers, ready to pounce.

  White glyphs lit up over Mordred’s arms and hands, and magical air smashed into Alexi, picking him up like he was nothing and throwing him against the far wall. Mordred flicked his hand, and tendrils of air slithered around Alexi. Another hand flick and the air dragged Alexi over to the windows in the room, pinning him against them.

  Mordred used his magic to push Alexi against the glass as it began to crack under the pressure.

  “She will kill you,” Alexi seethed.

  “She’ll try,” Mordred said, releasing the air magic from around Alexi, moving it around him in a shield. In an instant he used the blood of the two dead bouncers to power his blood magic and, mixing it with the air, smashed it into Alexi, sending him through the glass with ferocious force. Alexi bounced over the railing below and crashed into the empty dance floor as Diana and the rest of his friends entered the building. Alexi was breathing but was no longer going to be a problem. The LOA would deal with him. Now it was time for Mordred to hunt.

  CHAPTER 16

  Mordred

  Mordred spent a few minutes going through Alexi’s desk drawers but found nothing of any importance. He moved into the bedroom and almost stepped on the TV remote. He picked it up and threw it onto the bed, which caused the TV screen to come to life.

  He was half expecting to see something unpleasant paused on there, ready for Alexi’s return, but instead it was much worse. The picture was of a room with a concrete floor, and what appeared to be a drain close to the center. A short distance from it was a man in a chair with a blindfold on. The picture was in color, and Mordred could easily make out the wounds that covered the man’s naked body. He was shivering, and Mordred was certain that it was as much as a by-product of the cold as of the horror he’d clearly endured.

  “What did you find?” Nabu asked from the doorway.

  “Torture porn,” Mordred said, pointing to the TV.

  “Is that live?”

  “I assume so. There’s nothing indicating otherwise.” He picked up the remote and pressed the button to fast forward, but nothing happened. “Must be live.”

  “I’ve been hearing horror stories about what some of the people went through as captives here. A lot are never found again. Or at least not in their original state.”

  “Alexi isn’t that strong. There’s no way he’s in charge of all this.”

  “You think the woman . . . Daria is in charge?”

  Mordred nodded. “The whole pack alpha thing is something weres came up with as an easy way to say ‘leader.’ I get the feeling that Alexi was the leader because he had a good look, but he’s not even on the scale of people like Tommy. If this werewolf pack is so scary, it isn’t because of Alexi or those bouncers I kicked the shit out of. They were human. Where’s the rest of the pack?”

  “Waiting for us?”

  “Or out hunting. Either way, Alexi is a figurehead, not the alpha, or whatever name they’re using for it today.”

  “We have a werewolf pack of considerable power still active within this building.”

  “And they know we’re here.”

  “That’s not great news.”

  “Nothing about the last few days has been great news. Viktor is still here, too. I’d really like to find him before these werewolves cut their losses and remove his head for him.”

  “You think he knows where Elaine is?”

  Mordred shrugged as he walked toward the door. “No idea, I just want to punch him in the face.”

  He left Nabu in the bedroom as Polina, Morgan, and Remy all entered the office.

  “You really did a number on Alexi,” Polina said.

  “Did you know he wasn’t the man in charge?” Mordred asked.

  Polina licked her lips and looked irritated at the question, but her expression soon softened. “We suspected. No one we sent in was able to get word out about how the hierarchy in the pack works.”

  “You still think that Alexi created Daria?”

  “Yes,” Polina said without hesitation. “The power of a werewolf has no effect on the power of those they’ll change. They’re completely separate entities. There’s every possibility that he still bit Daria and she just became more powerful than he is.”

  “That wouldn’t be difficult.”

  “Nice bounce, by the way,” Remy said from the hole where several windows used to be. “You got some really good air on crashing him through a reinforced window.”

  “My power is a little bit more impressive than it was before I regained my faculties,” Mordred said. “We need to make sure this club is empty.”

  “The others are on it,” Morgan told him. “We thought we’d best come and see how you were doing.”

  “I’m fine. Annoyed that I wasted a perfectly excellent vodka by drinking it with that asshole. Who, by the way, I’d like to see stick around for a bit.”

  “Why?” Polina asked. “We can take him in for questioning.”

  “Or you can leave him here, and he can watch as we dismantle the rest of his pack. I’ve seen it work before. Trust me on this. He’s the type to fold when he has no option.” Mordred looked out over the nightclub. “Any idea where the entrance to this underground complex is?”

  “There’s a lift in a hallway behind the level you entered on,” Polina said. “Nice job not killing those two outside, by the way.”

  “I’m not an assassin,” Mordred said. “Had Alexi just given me what I’d asked for, he’d still be sitting on his nice chair, drinking excellent vodka and pretending he was important.”

  “You know your demeanor changes when we do stuff like this,” Remy said to Mordred. “You’re less . . . flighty.”

  “Anger focuses me. Gives me something to consider and work toward. And after seeing the footage in his bedroom, and after him trying to kill me, I’m plenty angry. Daria seems to consider herself some kind of torture genius. I intend to show her otherwise.”

  Nabu left the bedroom. “There’s a lot of older stuff in there, too. A USB stick was plugged into the TV. Alexi got his excitement from watching people get hurt—at least that’s my guess.”

  “Hopefully the amount of pain he’s in at the moment will have to suffice,” Mordred said. “I assume you placed a sorcerer’s band on him?”

  Polina looked offended. “I know how to do my job, Mordred.”

  “I know, I just like to check these things. I mean no offense by it.”

  Her expression didn’t change. “Yes, we put a sorcerer’s band on him. It’s not specifically designed for him, but it’ll do. He won’t be going anywhere, or hurting anyone else. Silver-laced cuffs, too, after he changed back into his human form. He won’t be changing out of it while he’s in them.”

  “Right, let’s get the rest of the pack sorted, then,” Mordred said. He left the room and jogged down the stairs, where he spotted several of Polina’s people carrying out a search of the premises.

  After making his way down to the bottom floor and through a set of double doors, he found himself in the corridor with the lift at one end. Diana stood in front of it, her arms crossed, while Fiona stood beside her. Fiona had acquired a rapier at some point, and it sat sheathed against her hip. Because she was a conjurer, her ability was based on creating traps and illusions. If she found herself in a fight, it was best done with weaponry.

  “What’s wrong?” Mordred asked.

  “There’s silver in the lift doors,” Diana explained. “We can’t open them. I try to pry them open and it burns my fingers.”

  “And we don’t know the code for the numerical pad, either,”
Fiona said.

  Mordred placed a hand against the lift doors and used his air magic to wedge it in between them. He slowly forced the doors apart, but the strain was too great and after only an inch the locking mechanism refused to budge and Mordred was forced to release it.

  “You got any other ideas?” Fiona asked, her voice full of anxiety.

  “One, yes,” Mordred said, and placed his hand over the number pad. A cone of razor-sharp ice left Mordred’s palm, smashing into the pad with incredible force, tearing it apart and causing several sparks. An alarm sounded all around him, and the lift doors remained closed.

  “Good job,” Diana said. “I could have just broken it myself.”

  The lights went off inside the club, bathing everyone in darkness for a short time before emergency lighting flickered on.

  Diana sniffed the air. “Wolves.”

  “Go fight,” Mordred said. “I’ll figure out how to get down to the levels below. There has to be more entrances if they can get up here.”

  Gunfire could be heard from the main club area, and two wolves burst into the hallway from the door at the far end. They eyed Mordred, Diana, and Fiona before howling and charging.

  Diana had changed into her werebear form before she took a step, charging into one of the werewolves, taking the massive beast off its feet and smashing it into the wall. Fiona removed a pistol from a holster and fired at the second wolf, who avoided the bullets with ease. She drew her rapier and moved to confront it, parrying the werewolf’s claw strikes and catching it with a vicious cut across one eye, which burned as the silver content in the sword went to work.

  A third werewolf appeared at the end of the hallway. His appearance caused Mordred to sigh, and he walked past Fiona and her opponent. The new werewolf growled and walked toward Mordred, who shot a two-foot-long blade of ice from his palm, which the werewolf smashed with a swipe of one huge paw.

  Mordred cracked his knuckles and threw two more blades, which the werewolf destroyed once again as he got closer and closer. Mordred smiled and waited until the werewolf was close enough before unleashing a torrent of water from his hands. It crashed into the werewolf, who couldn’t avoid it and was thrown back several feet.