by Vivian Shaw
Hendrix climaxed in a roll of drums and a whine of feedback. The blood stopped dripping random patterns on the floor. The lips of Ben’s wound resealed like a kiss and his arm was just an arm again, human, healed and held before his chest.
“Your antique can hurt me, but have you got all day?” Ben forced a smile, a humourless rictus. “That’s what you’ll need, because I’m charmed too, remember? And as for my head, I’m kind of attached to it.”
Flummoxed, Fulk opened his mouth to speak. Ben’s fist forced the words down his throat before he had the chance. The slayer’s face crumpled, and then he was flying backwards, over the bloody floor, past the bar with its broken bottles, out through the dirty square window that guarded Legends from the daylight.
Silvery spears flashed through the rain. Teeth and glass tinkled on asphalt. Tyres screeched. Horns honked. East 7th Street slowed to a crawl as a man dressed head to toe in black leather landed in the road.
Somewhere in the distance, sirens wailed. Ben retrieved the newspaper from the bar, thinking now was perhaps a good time to leave. As he stepped through the shattered window, he could tell that the cops were heading this way, the bartender making good on his threat. Who could blame him? Thanks to this lump sprawled in the road, the month’s takings would probably go on repairs.
Stuffing the Times into his jacket, the rain hissing off his cooling shoulders, Ben crunched over to where Fulk lay, a giant groaning on a bed of crystal. He bent down, rummaging in the dazed man’s pockets. Then he clutched the slayer’s beard and pulled his face towards his own.
“And by the way, it isn’t sleeping dogs, Fulk,” he told him. “It’s dragons.”
Then he took flight into the city.