I used the flying stick to block the next strike while I drove my sword into the first witch. The screams of the witches mixed with the crackle of magical power. I moved like a ninja on crack.
Less than a minute later, it was all over, and I found myself surrounded by dead or dying witches. Those followers of Malcasta’s dark path who still clung to life would soon be meeting the Flayed Prince in person as their souls were sucked down into Hell. Demon Slayer dripped black blood.
The air rippled around the building’s roof, and I spotted more witches, dim shapes silhouetted by the pale orb of the moon. Part of me wanted to keep on fighting, but reason prevailed—meaning I talked Cyon out of it. We’d gotten very lucky during this first battle, catching the witches off guard with the sudden display of magic. Defeating the next phalanx of spell slingers, who were keeping a safe distance above me, would be a lot harder. And I made an easy target on the roof, completely exposed as I was. I needed a place where the terrain might work to my advantage.
I scanned the city streets below me and locked on an island of green about three blocks down—the park where I had first encountered signs of witchcraft was close. If I could make it to the park and hide among the trees and thick undergrowth, I could let the enemy come to me on my terms. I eyed the glowing branch in my hand, struck by a sudden idea.
Well, it wasn’t exactly my idea. Cyon was guiding me.
I am not going to do it, I protested, knowing already that this was an argument I would lose.
My newly acquired flying stick sizzled with mystical energy. It was waiting for me to draw on its magic.
“Hold on tight!” Cyon advised as I swung my leg over the flying stick and pushed off the roof. I’ve never been a fan of heights. Bungee jumping and skydiving are not my idea of a good time; fighting monsters satisfies my need for an adrenaline rush. The thought of placing my full body weight on a splinter of wood and diving off a fifteen-story building…well, it held zero appeal. But neither Cyon nor Malcasta’s incoming brood left me any choice in the matter.
I said a silent prayer and dove off the roof with the branch between my legs. My stomach rose into my throat as gravity took hold of me. The ground rushed up at break-neck speed, and I clung to the branch with all my strength.
Damn it, Cyon, why did I let you talk me into—
The protest died in my head, transforming into a guttural string of words that spilled, unbidden, from my lips. I was muttering in witch tongue again.
The branch hummed with power, and my mad descent stopped. I hovered for a beat and then shot forward, right past two incoming witches. The stunned spell-slingers gasped at me in surprise.
I had no idea what I was doing, but fortunately Cyon did. My jaw clenched with terror as I blasted into the urban maze turned deadly obstacle course. For a terrifying second, I feared we would crash into the building straight ahead, but the stick changed direction at the last moment and tore down the alley to my right.
I glanced backward. Behind me, the witches shook off their surprise and picked up the chase. A mad little voice inside my head wondered if I had accidentally wandered into a Harry Potter story. I clamped down on the gibbering terror and focused on more important matters.
How the hell do you know witchcraft, Cyon? I demanded. Demons didn’t cast fireballs by using the witch tongue, nor did they fly around at night on wooden sticks. How many secrets and surprises did my silent passenger have up his sleeve? Whatever the answer, the demon wasn’t being forthcoming.
My eyes watered as we shot through the snowy city. My heart skipped a beat as the park jumped into full view, and we descended toward a copse of trees. I wanted to avert my gaze, but I knew I needed to remain alert for this next part. The trees loomed ever larger as the icy terrain rushed up at me. Seconds later, I touched down on the ground. I had expected a hard landing, but it had been surprisingly smooth. Cyon knew what he was doing, at least.
I exhaled when my feet made contact with solid ground again. I jumped off the branch and cast the glowing green stick aside. That would be my first and my last ride on a flying branch, thank you very much. No more aerial acrobatics for this guy.
I took a deep breath of cold air. My heart sledge-hammered in my chest. Despite the searing wind and freezing temperature, sweat coated my face.
Who the hell are you, Cyon? I asked.
“There is no time for questions. We must hide.”
I’m not hiding from them, I thought.
I drew Demon Slayer, hoping to add weight to my words.
This is where we will make our stand, where we will fight them together. But I need you to be honest with me. Who are you Cyon? How does a demon like you know witchcraft?
The demon remained silent. I mentally pressed on.
Talk to me, Cyon. What kind of demon hates witches with a passion but knows how to cast spells and speaks the witch tongue fluently?
I waited for a beat, and the park exploded with brilliant light. I was about to receive the answers to my question.
At last, I was going to hear Cyon’s story.
13
I sensed movement behind me.
Driven by pure instinct, I lashed out at the darting shadow with my sword only to realize that I wasn’t wielding Demon Slayer any longer. The blade’s mystical light had dimmed. A quick glance revealed further differences. All the glyphs and runes along the side of the blade had vanished, the bone hilt replaced by steel. Even more disturbing, the arm wielding the sword wore chain mail.
Shock rippled through me as I looked down at my armor-clad body. I was inside the body of a knight, seeing the world from the perspective of a medieval warrior.
The sword in my gauntleted hand sank into the leather armor of a long-haired, bearded barbarian and found the flesh beneath. Blood sprayed the ground, and scarlet bubbled from the dying man’s lips as he collapsed in the mud.
Around me, other knights were battling a group of leather-clad bandits in a stark, rain-drenched landscape. Swords and maces and axes flashed. All the knights sported white capes with red crosses, their shields emblazoned with the sign of the Lord. These were Templar Knights, and that meant I was back in the fifteenth century.
I’m inside Cyon’s memory, I reminded myself. And that meant…
I gasped as the truth sank in.
Cyon used to be human. A knight serving the Holy Church. The instant this insight slashed through my mind, the battle froze as if someone had pressed the pause button. I felt myself stepping out of the knight’s body. I was back to good old Mike Raven, trench coat, beard and all. I stood at the center of the medieval battle field, the attacking warriors caught in a medieval tableau.
Without warning, Cyon turned his helmeted head toward me. He regarded me a beat and then snapped the visor back, revealing the handsome face of a man in his mid-thirties. The features were familiar. This man was a better-looking version of the creepy human incarnation of Cyon I’d freed from the binding circle back at Marek’s car junkyard. Unlike that emaciated, bald man, this fellow was a beefy, well-muscled specimen with a full head of hair.
“You’ve hidden the truth of your past from me all this time,” I said, unable to hide my amazement—and, if I’m being honest, my hurt feelings.
“You want to know who I am, monster hunter? Then shut up and listen!”
Cyon pointed his sword toward a dark fortress in the near distance. The castle’s oppressive towers and massive stone walls loomed before us. This nightmare structure made me think of Castle Grayskull on steroids.
“Before I adopted my demon name, I was John Mohun, Knight Templar Commander and feared witch hunter.”
I shook my head. “You’re fucking with me.”
Cyon continued, unmoved by my comment. “My men are here to put an end to the witch Bavmara. Tonight, she will fall under my blade.”
Before I could respond, the world warped and shimmered, and I found myself in the courtyard of the oppressive fortress. I trailed Cyon and his Templar Knights, t
heir mud-drenched capes billowing in the night wind as they strode toward the keep.
We had jumped forward in the timeline of Cyon’s memories, and judging by the bloodied men surrounding me, they had fought a fierce battle to breach the keep. Despite not being weighed down by heavy steel armor, I was the one who struggled to keep pace with these medieval fighting machines. These men were trained to endure the adversity of a brutal, harsh world that citizens of the modern era couldn’t imagine. NFL players were pushovers compared to these human tanks.
Cyon stopped dead in his tracks, and his men followed suit. Their numbers had shrunk since the last time I witnessed them in action. Storming the castle had come at a high price.
“The witch is near,” Cyon hissed.
As if to confirm Cyon’s words, the ground erupted. Chilling moans cut through the night as an army of reanimated corpses burst from the soil, mud clinging to rotten features and putrefied bodies.
A battle between the living and the dead ensued, and the dead quickly gained the upper hand. One knight after another succumbed to the undead horde, but Cyon kept on fighting. His broadsword hacked away at the creatures, their twitching forms piling up around him. He drove his sword down on the final zombie and exhaled sharply. Gasping for air, he crumpled, gripped by exhaustion. His legs buckled and he collapsed, his armor streaked with mud and blood, his face dripping sweat. Surrounded by the bodies of his men and the still-twitching zombies, he wept for his fallen comrades.
I inched closer and our points of views merged once again. I felt his pain, experienced his exhaustion. His thoughts became my thoughts.
The ground shifted and rippled. Terror crept up my throat as a series of rotten arms shot out of the muddy soil and latched on me from every angle. Before I could react, the zombie’s arms pulled me into the wet ground with inhuman strength. Despite the darkness, I could see the rotting faces of the dead who were whisking me into their cold realm. My gauntleted hand clawed at the surface world above, but I could find no purchase. Submerged, my body passed through the earth as if it was liquid. Dirt rushed into my screaming lungs as the corpses embraced me.
Death was upon me. I almost welcomed it. Time to join the rest of my men.
And then I felt a human hand grab me by the neck and pull me, coughing and spitting, all the way out of the stinking muck. I choked up the foul mud I had swallowed, the taste of copper mixing with it. Weakly, I twisted my head. The dead had ceased their assault, but why? Who had saved me?
A column of light rose in my field of vision, and I had to squint my eyes against its brilliance. The air shimmered, and my awed expression traced a pair of perfect female legs all the way up their owner.
A goddess loomed before me.
Who was she? Why had she come to my rescue. Her face, though regal and lovely, was cold as she stared down at me. Sudden understanding flooded my mind. This beauty who had saved me was also the horror I had come to slay. She was the witch Bavmara who ruled this castle. But why had she spared me from experiencing a nightmarish end?
In a world of blood and death, this witch was a vision to behold. Jet-black hair framed alabaster skin, emerald eyes, and an inviting pair of lips. The revealing cut of her robe offered tantalizing glimpses of her stunning figure.
Bavmara’s eyes blazed with defiant intelligence as she confidently pulled me up to her.
Just when things were about to get interesting, I shot out of the knight’s body and continued to follow unfolding events from afar. Cyon tried to bring up his sword, but he was spent, his wounds and exhaustion having depleted him.
Anticipating the attack, the witch snapped her long-nailed fingers. Her spell sent the crimson-stained sword flying. The blade landed in the snow, out of reach.
Unarmed, Cyon faced the spell-slinger. He glared at her defiantly, struggling to block out her otherworldly beauty. Few men would be able to resist this mesmerizing creature.
I stepped closer, drawn to the witch’s seductive presence, and noticed another disturbing detail—a bed of snakes danced in the woman’s hair as if she was Medusa herself, the serpents imbued with black magic life.
“You will soon succumb to your wounds,” she said, and the witch’s voice sent an electric shiver up my spine. “It doesn’t have to end this way. Turn your back on the church and join me, and we can rule this world together.”
“Never,” Cyon said, but his words lacked conviction, his once-commanding voice reduced to a glassy whisper.
His resistance made the witch double her efforts. Oozing sensuality, Bavmara leaned into him, her long nails brushing his blood-spattered jaw.
“Don’t touch me!” Cyon hissed.
He glared at the witch. “Kill me and get it over with!”
Without warning, one of the writhing snakes shot out of Bavmara’s hair and sank its fangs into Cyon’s cheek. He cried out and collapsed in the mud. When he looked up, all his cuts and wounds were healed, and his eyes shone with a newfound strength.
The witch smiled as she opened her robe, revealing a body to die for. In this case, literally.
Cyon reached out to her, his gaze shiny with lust. I wanted to reach out and smack some sense into him. Sure, she was a vision of luscious curves, but a battlefield full of dead knights and zombies wasn’t exactly my idea of a romantic setting.
Cyon didn’t seem to care. Piece by piece, he removed his armor.
For a beat, the witch and knight faced each other in the rainy downpour, both naked, both perfect specimens of their respective genders, both burning with desire. And then they crashed into each other. They rutted like animals, oblivious to the mud and blood and rain now hammering down on them.
I couldn’t look away, both fascinated and horrified.
The world spun, turning into a kaleidoscope of fractured images. I witnessed Cyon and Bavmara make love in every position and way possible, driven by hunger that couldn’t be sated. This was, frankly, a little too much information, but it helped explain Cyon’s current feelings about witches. The witch had drawn a good man into her diabolical web.
There was no escape for him in the visions I saw. I caught glimpses of the witch instructing Cyon in the ancient witch tongue and exposing him to the mysteries of the many grimoires locked away in her castle’s mazelike libraries. I understood now why Cyon had not used magic earlier. Unlike real witches and warlocks born with the dark gift, he needed the energy source—a grimoire—to fuel his spells. Varthek’s book had provided him with the power he needed to cast the fireball earlier.
I could not look away as Bavmara turned the former champion of light into a twisted shadow knight. Cyon might have been a monster, but he was still human.
That was about to change.
The mad carousel of images slowed down. Cyon was standing atop the castle’s tallest tower, the witch by his side. They were looking out over a raging battlefield while the cries of the dying split the night. Cyon and Bavmara had turned their kingdom into Hell on Earth.
With horror, I realized that Cyon’s Templar Knights were among the warriors. They had become an army of the risen dead, under the command of the witch. Skulls peeked from metal helmets, the tattered white capes with their red crosses fluttering in the wind like funeral shrouds. Symbols of God’s glory transformed into sigils of evil. Cyon acted as the zombie army’s general.
“For three years, we ruled the land in terror and made love to the sound of our enemies’ dying screams,” Cyon said, his familiar voice filling my head. “Bavmara took my heart, my soul, my honor. In exchange, she opened my eyes to mysteries beyond my imagination and offered me a power most mortal couldn’t even imagine in their worst nightmares.”
Cyon shifted his gaze from the burning fields to a fast-advancing army clad in shiny steel and white capes. The world had gathered its best warriors to confront the witch and her nightmare knight. Their terrifying reign of conquest was about to come to an end, and the past was about to catch up with Cyon in the most painful way imaginable.
; As a squad of knights stormed the castle walls, Cyon turned toward Bavmara, but the witch had vanished. Cyon’s face twisted with the pain of a betrayed lover. His deep-seated hatred and fear of spell-slingers made sense now.
“I fought valiantly against the army of light, but I was vastly outnumbered. What I believed to be true love had meant nothing when the witch abandoned me. I was taken prisoner, and the Templar Knight Commander decreed that I should burn.”
Suddenly, I was back inside Cyon’s head, feeling every cut and bruise on his body. The knights had removed my armor, and I was naked under a simple white robe coated with tar. I spat at my captors, earning me a vicious slap from a steel gauntlet. More knights dragged me toward the the waiting pyre and tied me to the stake. The flames of the surrounding torches painted their faces crimson and made them look like demons themselves.
“My time with the witch felt like a dark fever dream from which I couldn’t wake. As Bavmara’s influence faded, sanity returned. And with it came a deeper understanding of the horrible crimes I had committed under the witch’s influence. Death promised release from the pain and guilt. Or so I thought.
The Templar Knight Commander, Cyon’s successor, watched in satisfied silence as his men secured the rope against my struggling body. My desperate screams of protests drifted unanswered into the night. Deep down Cyon hoped the witch would sweep in and save him at the last moment.
Three knights lowered their burning torches on the pyre, and the kindling caught fire. As the flames grew, the smoke thickened around me. Breathing became painful as heat seared my throat and lungs. Would I suffocate before the flames reached me? Would I be granted that small mercy?
I received my answer a moment later as the fire swept me up in its scorching embrace, my thoughts giving way to an agony beyond words.
I burned. And burned.
And then I found myself in a searing ocean of flame, surrounded by other fiery human forms. I had arrived in Hell. The screams of the damned filled my head. I was one of them, a sinner condemned to suffer for all eternity.
Witch Wars (Shadow Detective Book 7) Page 10