Path of the Horseman

by Amy Braun

  I sat in the same SUV with Kade, who was driving at the head of the road, doing at least one-twenty on the highway. The sand was cleared from this stretch of road, and most of the vehicles had been pushed off to the side. Most of them had massive dents in their sides, like someone had been shooting the world’s largest elephant gun at them. Kade’s hammer was resting on the armrest between the front seats, the handle leaning against the dashboard. The Vermilion in the passenger seat was doing everything he could not to touch it.

  That made me even angrier at Kade. Not only did he know that there were still humans around, he was using them as a personal army. Instinct told me he’d been cheating, using his powers to coerce them.

  You’re one to talk, Avery. You showed the humans exactly what you were. You gave Ciaran just what he wanted.

  But what the hell did he want it for?

  “So what’ve you two been doing since the world shit itself?” Kade asked. “I’ve been worried about my little brothers since we split up.”

  “Don’t patronize us, Kade,” I shot back. “You never gave a fuck before, and you’re not going to give one now.”

  “Ouch, that hurts, Pest. I’d watch that mouth of yours if you want to keep it.”

  I ignored Kade and looked through the windshield, seeing the tall towers of the Las Vegas hotels drawing nearer to us.

  “Avery was in Boulder City hunting Soulless and Plagued,” Simon confessed quietly. “I was at a resort in Henderson kinda doing the same thing.”

  “Kinda?” mocked Kade. “Meaning you were hiding and stuffing your face, right?”

  “Back off, Kade,” I warned.

  “Why? It’s true, isn’t it?”

  Simon shook his head at me before I could keep arguing. Kade sniggered.

  “Fighting Plagued. More like playing Whack-A-Mole. But whatever helps you pass the time, right, Pest?”

  “Stop calling me that.”

  “Don’t be such a whiny bitch. Of course, if you’re off collecting zombie heads and playing Mother Hen to that group of meat-sacks, I guess I can’t expect much else from you, right?”

  Vegas was only minutes away from us now. I was starting to see its ruin.

  “See, while you were pissing around and playing mouse, I was actually accomplishing something. I took Vegas for myself. Soulless and Plagued had clogged the place before I came back. I killed every dead fucker I saw, and made myself a nice little home. Funny thing about Vegas, though. Guess who it used to belong to?”

  I stared at the toppling “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada” sign that dangled half supported on its stand, the lightbulbs punched out and the white background smeared with dirt and dust.

  “Ciaran didn’t have Vegas.”

  Kade laughed. “You bet your ass he did. He used it as a base for his Soulless doormats, trying to snatch any humans they could find.” He turned in his seat and grinned at us. “I couldn’t resist crashing the party.”

  “Jesus, can you keep your eyes on the road?” Simon grumbled, though he looked out of the window instead of at Kade.

  “Aw, don’t be scared, Slime. Next time you get hurt, it won’t be from a car crash.”

  Simon shifted uncomfortably beside me. He only looked up when we finally entered the city.

  The last time I was in Las Vegas, it was on fire. Every single hotel billowed smoke from broken windows. Palm trees were tall torches in the night. Screams echoed around every corner. Terrified people shoved and pushed each other away, stepping on those who’d slipped in fresh pools of blood. It had been madness. The night we took Vegas had been one of the worst nights of my life, and I had promised myself never to return.

  This new Vegas looked completely different from the one I’d left to burn. As Kade drove the car through the cars pushed against the roadside, I caught a glimpse of the remains. The entire left half of Mandalay Bay was missing, like a giant bite had been taken from it. The Luxor’s sphinx was missing its eyes, the black pyramid behind it covered in holes from where the glass had been shattered. The golden lion of the MGM Grand was tarnished and burned. Blood lined the outside of the bridge connecting the MGM to the New York New York, whose roller coaster was missing giant chunks of track. The posh hotels of the shopping district had some of their letters missing, pulled down and left lazily on the sidewalk. The Eiffel Tower by the Paris looked untouched, but the hotel itself was virtually a crater of metal and concrete leaning against each other, as though a bomb had gone off in it sometime during the madness. Grime and silt floated in the pool ahead of the Bellagio. Caesar had been torn from his standing in front of Caesar’s Palace and lay in pieces on the road.

  If the hotels weren’t bad enough, the rest of the Strip would have finished tying the knot in my stomach. Charred and crumbling palm trees lay in heaps in the middle of the road. Cars were backed up and piled over each other on one side. Blood smears lined most of the concrete, though I couldn’t see any bodies. There must have been millions at the end of that awful night, but I didn’t want to think about what happened to them.

  The only moving things we saw were Plagued, but not nearly as many as I was expecting. That wasn’t to say there was a small amount of them– there were dozens. They dragged themselves along the cracked road, slapped their hands against the cracked shop windows, crawled with broken legs over the trash and debris covered sidewalks.

  Considering I expected Vegas to be literally overrun with Plagued and impossible to pass through, this was an almost welcome surprise.

  Kade turned the SUV and drove over the curb to the Venetian. I tried not to roll my eyes. Of course Kade would pick the hotel that screamed luxury and class. It would be all the more fun for him to destroy. He kept the vehicle moving over the bridge and the manmade canal, which had a thin line of vomit-colored water near the bottom. He pulled to a stop in front of an eight foot gate that appeared to have been constructed from sheet metal and the missing gondolas. It was the spawn of a trash heap and the Phocian Wall.

  On the opposite sides of the wall were more armed Vermilions. Kade stuck his hand out of the driver side window and waved to them. The Vermilion bowed at the waist, then hurried behind the gate. A couple seconds later, it was pulled open, splitting in half and allowing us to drive forward. Kade rolled the SUV through the gate and parked in the middle of the plaza, right in front of the Venetian’s pillars.

  The Vermilion in the passenger seat hopped out of the car and nearly jumped across the hood to open the door for Kade. He went for Simon’s door next. I skipped the stupid royalty treatment and opened my own damn door.

  When I stepped out, the hot desert sun beat down on me again. I glanced back and saw the humans getting out of the other SUV. They were so wrapped up in seeing the hotel, they didn’t notice how close the other Vermilions were getting.

  “Bring the humans inside,” Kade ordered. “Find some place to stow them.”

  The Vermilions circled our unlikely allies, forcing them to move. I started walking toward them, hoping I could explain what they’d seen, but Kade appeared and clamped a hand on my injured shoulder. He squeezed tightly, and I winced from the bruise he created.

  “Ah, ah, ah, Pest. You and Slime don’t get a nap yet.”

  I wheeled around, flinging Kade’s arm off me. “What are you going to do to them?”

  Kade lifted his hands, trying and failing to look innocent. His arms looked like they were made to crush tree trunks, and his grin belonged on the face of Hannibal Lecter after his favorite meal of human liver.

  “Nothing. We value human lives here.” He lowered his hands, but not his smile. “They’re more useful than we ever gave them credit for. Not very strong, but you can’t have everything.”

  I balled my fists and looked over my shoulder. The Vermilion crowd was moving into the hotel. I couldn’t see Maddy.

  “Well, saving your asses has made me a little tired. I’m taking some me time, then we can really talk.” Kadel turned to six of the twelve Vermilions by the gate
, who snapped to attention until they were stiff as boards.

  “Take my brothers on a tour. Go the long way around, through the canals so they can see how things work around here. Bring them up to the penthouse in an hour.” Kade looked at me and smirked. “And no matter what, don’t let them near their humans. If they decide to get cute, shoot them in the knees. If they’re still desperate to check on the well-being of their mortals, they can crawl up the stairs.”

  Kade saluted us and walked away to the hotel entrance. I seriously debated chasing him and giving him some muscle spasms, but Kade could still kill me even if I did make him dance like a puppet.

  “Fucking asshole,” I grumbled.

  “Don’t talk shit about our Emperor,” a muffled voice said. I turned around and looked at one of the Vermilions standing beside me. He was about my height and carried a tactical shotgun. His dark brown eyes narrowed to slits, and I didn’t have to push my imagination hard to see his upturned lip.

  “He saved our lives.”

  “Sure he did,” I muttered. “I’d love to hear how he turned you all into slaves.”

  “He didn’t,” defended the Vermilion. “We were fighting for our fucking lives, and we were losing. A group of us were trapped in the shops, and we couldn’t get out. Soulless broke through our walls like they weren’t even there, and the Plagued were crawling out from every corner. Then these demons broke through, some fucker with dreadlocks and a guy in a cowboy hat. They started taking anyone they could get their hands on and dragging them out of sight. When we tried to fight them, they threw goddamn fireballs at us. We knew we were going to die.”

  The Vermilion’s eyes were distant and wide, full of the fear he must have felt when his friends disappeared in the horde of monsters. Then his expression changed, the terror shifting into wonder.

  “Then Kade showed up, cutting through the fire like it was nothing to him. He started taking down anything in his way, smashing the Plagued and Soulless to bits. When the demons threw fire at him, he just sidestepped and threw it back. I’ll never forget the brightest of the flames. They were like a beacon, driving the demons back to Hell.”

  Guess I’m not the only one who fucked up and gave up the secret. But Kade did it on purpose, the asshole.

  The Vermilion was trapped inside his head for another couple seconds, needing to blink to remember where he was. He focused on me, and cleared his voice to get rid of the enthusiasm.

  “When he said he was going to be our leader, no one argued with him. Why would we? He saved us using powers no one had ever seen come from a human. He had his shit together. Kade is a god to us, and those who serve him are treated with respect and honor.”

  I raised my eyebrow. “All of them? I don’t think so. I know my brother, pal. He’s the opposite of a benevolent ruler.”

  The Vermilion scoffed and had the gall to roll his eyes at me. I almost punched him for it.

  “Obviously he needs to make examples sometimes. He reminds us to work harder, push ourselves more to survive. It’s a hard world and a hard ruler is needed.”

  That bullshit sounded exactly like it had come from Ruthless Ruling 101.

  I caught Simon looking at me awkwardly. Kade seemed to be in good spirits. The last time we had seen him, he’d been the opposite…

  War was the last one to return. He stood before us, heaving from the rush of battle. Blood drenched him, a fresh coat of it beginning to dry over the others. Clumps of hair and bone shards were glued to his war hammer with grey brain matter. Wild, terrifying black eyes searched ours.

  “Where are they?” War’s voice was a raspy growl. “Where are they?”

  Famine and I cast our eyes down. We feared confessing the truth to our brother. Only Death was able to hold his eyes.

  “There is no one else,” said Death.

  War watched his brother, shaking with rage and bloodlust. He could not suppress his desire to ruin and destroy. He lunged forward, using his free hand to circle Death’s neck. Our elder brother barely flinched, giving no indication of pain even as War squeezed is throat tighter.

  “You lie,” snarled War. Death did not reply. “You lie!”

  But he knew there was no deceit. Death would know if anyone still lived. War shoved his brother back, stumbling to keep his composure.

  “What happened?” he finally asked. I had never heard him so uncertain in my life.

  Death stared at War blankly.

  “We defiled the world. We eradicated life. We won.”

  That was the last thing my brother Death said before he turned and began walking away. Even when War dropped to his knees and howled like a furious, dying animal, he never looked back.

  Kade had always been wild and deadly, but that was what he was supposed to be. I never thought he could break until the moment Logan told him that all the humans were dead. I wanted to talk to my oldest brother more than ever. Did he know that there were still some humans alive? Or did he want to stop thinking about all the lives he was ending?

  But the odds of finding Logan were slim to none. He hated what he was. Kade didn’t. He embraced it, welcomed it, and was happy about it. When it was taken from him, he lost himself. I watched him walk away, wondering if he would die alone.

  Then he found us, and seemed more alive than ever before.

  I had the terrible feeling that this Kade was more dangerous than the old one.

  Chapter 12

  I’ll say this for my asshole older brother: He knows how to impress.

  It wasn’t just that the canal shops in the Venetian were in nearly perfect condition. Any traces of glass and blood were cleaned from the floor. Gas lamps and thick candles were lit along the corridors and bridges, making everything smell like a distant burning fire. The dim lighting darkened the fake blue sky and happy white clouds painted on the ceiling. The canal was empty of water and served as a tunnel leading through the shops.

  No, what truly amazed me were all of the living, breathing, people walking around the center.

  Their clothes were a jumbled mess of whatever they could find, but they moved briskly and with purpose, hardly speaking to anyone they passed. Clusters of Vermilions hung back near the walls and corners of the shops, watching the other humans like hawks and telling them to move when they slowed down.

  A few of them caught me staring and quickened their pace to get past me. Even Simon couldn’t stop gawking. These humans were alive, saved by Kade of all people, and they were functioning. They even looked relatively healthy. But there was no mistaking the tension in the air. Every set of eyes seemed to be rooted to the floor, and speed walking was the only pace any of these humans moved at.

  “How’d you make all this?” I asked no one in particular.

  “Emperor Kade provides us with seeds and soil from scavenging missions,” answered the Vermilion who worshipped my brother. “We grow fresh fruits and vegetables outside by the pool, and the diggers find water under the ground for us to filter.”

  “You sure Kade wants us knowing that?” Simon asked.

  “The Emperor has told us about his brothers. He said that if we ever met them, we could trust them.”

  The Vermilion looked at us.

  “And if they break that trust, he will kill them.”

  Good old Kade. Always covering his bases.

  The humans we passed didn’t seem alarmed to see us being escorted by the squad of six Vermilions. I had the uncomfortable feeling that this happened a lot– someone being arrested and taken for punishment. I didn’t see any gallows or gibbets, but that only served to heighten the suspense. Any kind of torture was open if you disobeyed Kade, but you wouldn’t know what it was until he dragged you kicking and screaming to the killing room.