I sighed wearily. “Tell me about it.” I made my way back to the car, spotting Gunnar and Carl sitting on the hood, shaking their heads as if still dazed. They looked at me and lowered their heads in embarrassment. The SUV had not a scratch or dent on it. Jesus. Worth every penny.
I waved it off. “It was Death, guys. A freaking Horseman. And you were interrupting some very important personal business of his. Don’t be too hard on yourselves.”
Gunnar frowned curiously, then it dawned on him, and he began to laugh. “Ah. Othello is up there,” he said. “She’s been busy lately, running around all over the country. I can understand her… pent-up frustration,” he added, chuckling harder.
I frowned at that. Where had Othello been lately that even Gunnar knew about it and I didn’t? I knew bits and pieces of the New York fiasco, but that was about it. All I did was give Alucard a very thoughtful look – enjoying his sudden uneasiness – before I frowned at a new thought. Because I suddenly realized Talon wasn’t at or in the car any longer. Which meant he was probably about to do something he would regret if he had gone inside the bookstore, too, should he manage to interrupt Death and Othello a second time. “Alucard, I need to find Talon. Get those two in the car. They might need your help. Death clocked them good.”
“Gee, I hadn’t noticed,” he replied drily. Then he pointed at a nearby shadow in front of the broken window before walking off to help Carl and Gunnar off the hood of the truck. Talon was there, staring into the bookstore suspiciously, sniffing the air.
I walked up to him, preparing to catch him up. The sirens were getting louder, and I didn’t want us to be here when the police arrived.
Even though I very much wanted to see how Othello handled the police if anyone… prematurely interrupted her festivities.
Badump bump.
Talon chose that moment to begin yowling at the top of his feline lungs.
It was as shockingly loud and physically painful as a human suddenly yodeling right into your ear canal when you were late for work, and impatiently waiting in line for your coffee at Starbucks, eyes more red than white. You know, the sound those alley cats make only at three in the morning when they are right outside your window on a night that you’ve had trouble falling asleep.
Yeah. That sound. Except much louder.
I swatted at his shoulders violently, shushing him. “Stop! Are you trying to get us killed?”
Talon glanced over his shoulder at me. “They are mating up there. I know it.” He tapped his nose proudly.
I flung my hands up. “So?”
“I was paying tribute. It’s like…” he thought about it, cocking his head. Then he tried to snap his fingers like he’d seen Gunnar doing a few days ago, but his furry paws just made it a fluffy thump, “a high-five,” he said, frowning down at his paw pads.
I ran my hands through my hair in exasperation. “You can yowl at him later. In the truck, now. We’re leaving.”
And I forcefully shoved him back towards the truck. As he was climbing in, Talon spoke, turning to hold up his paw in my face. “I think you could do with a good high five, you know. You seem frustrated. Pent up. On the edge of violenc—”
I slammed the door a lot harder than necessary, hoping to catch his tail. Then I jogged to the driver’s seat, climbed inside, and got the hell out of the vicinity, idly wondering if simply considering murdering your pet lizard, cat, and puppy was a crime.
Alucard shot me a wink, and then began to whistle to himself. If he’d laughed, I might have added him to the list of to-be-slain pets.
Chapter 17
The car was silent for all but half a minute before Talon chimed in. “We should celebrate.”
Alucard snorted, turning around to study the short cat man. “Celebrate that Gunnar doesn’t have a broken spine? That Death is getting some. Or Carl— Hey! What are you doing back there, Carl?” Alucard snapped, leaning further into the back of the spacious SUV.
I angled the mirror to see, still needing to pay attention to the road since I was trying to avoid any nearby patrol cars who might recognize our SUV from the description of the pedestrians outside Plato’s Cave. Carl was tearing into my package. “It smells good,” he murmured to himself, tearing his claws into it.
“Hey! Go easy! What if it’s fragile?” I snapped angrily.
“It’s not,” he argued, finally tearing it free. He tossed the paper behind him and inspected… what looked like a handful of leather straps. “Mmmm. Thought I smelled jerky.”
I blinked, trying to get a closer look, but he was all the way back in the darkened third row. “What is it?”
Gunnar wrinkled his nose, backing off slightly. “It smells familiar.”
“Hey! Is it some kind of trap or something? Who was it even from?”
Since Carl blatantly ignored me, flicking his tongue up and down the leather wad of straps and buckles in his claws, Talon unbuckled his seatbelt and went for the packaging. He finally came up with the shipping label. “Darling and Dear in Kansas City,” he purred, sounding suddenly very interested.
“What did you order from them? Have you even met them yet?” Gunnar asked.
I frowned, shaking my head. “No. I haven’t met them, and I definitely didn’t order anything. Maybe Callie bought me something?” I said uncertainly.
Carl let the leather contraption unfold, like unrolling a small rug by holding the corners.
And we all stared in stunned silence to see what looked suspiciously like some sort of bondage gear outfit. Not a full bodysuit or anything, but something that looked designed to restrain someone. Like a Mad Max straightjacket that would leave more skin uncovered than covered.
“Ummm…” Gunnar began, shaking his head. “How much does something like that cost?”
“If you have to ask, you can’t afford it,” I muttered angrily. What the hell was going on here?
Alucard gasped in disbelief. “Callie bought that for you? Wow. Okay. I wouldn’t have pegged you as—”
“It said it was from Darling and Dear, not Callie. That was just a guess. Maybe they thought I would find it useful. Callie told me they were a strange couple. Pals with Dorian Gray,” I added, which should have explained it all. I still hadn’t met the bastard, but he’d approached us about televising our Fight Club at the Dueling Grounds. The legendary King Midas – cleverly disguised as farmer Midas Kingston – had seemed very interested in the prospect, since he loved making money, but Achilles and Asterion had not been as excited. The fewer who knew about our Fight Nights, the better.
As usual, Midas saw only the opportunity for gold – figuratively speaking. I had even signed over part of my investment portfolio to his care, because as far back as I knew, he had never made a bad investment. Probably because he would just walk into a company that failed and turn the building into solid gold – enough to make a small return, at least.
“Is Callie stopping by later?” Talon asked, casting a suspicious look my way. Alucard burst out laughing.
I snatched the address label from Talon’s paw, reading over it. “Look. It’s addressed to Grimm Tech, not me. If Callie was interested in a bondage experience, I doubt she would have sent it to my company. The company I’m hardly ever at. I’m dense, but I’m pretty sure I would have picked up on a bondage fetish if she had one.”
“You’re probably right,” Gunnar said in a neutral tone. “I mean, it’s not like a guy would ever send a discreet package to his business rather than his home. Especially when he knows a ton of his friends sleep at his house regularly and would definitely pilfer his mail. A man would have to be an idiot to use a discreet shipping address to hide his deviant hobbies,” Gunnar said, still with a straight face. I glared at him and he finally grunted with laughter. “I was in the FBI, man. This is textbook.”
“You two put the freak in Freaks,” Alucard grinned.
“It’s not—”
They interrupted me with an impromptu chorus of disjointed sing-song phrases mocking me fo
r my extracurricular hobbies.
I snapped my fingers loudly, a skill I had learned from my father as a child. It sounded like a bone snapping in half. It was a skill Talon had been unsuccessfully trying to master for a week or so.
Apparently, it was also some kind of signal for the bondage gear, because it suddenly came to life, hogtying Carl in an instant. Alucard gasped in disbelief, leaning away from the contraption. Gunnar was staring at Carl in shock, hands up to slice any straps that might lunge his way.
Talon leaned closer, sniffing the Elder cautiously. Carl blinked back at us, eyes wide.
“Do you have anything else to say, Carl?” I growled, pretending I had intended this.
The Elder paused. “Sorry, Master Temple. I’ve been a bad Elder. A bad, bad Elder.”
And even though he had meant it to be genuine… since he was wrapped up in bondage gear and acting submissive, the statement sent the car into fits of crying laughter. I snapped my fingers again, and a ball gag snapped into place.
Talon leaned closer and began batting at a dangling buckle of leather hanging from Carl’s jaw. Carl gagged, trying to snap his teeth at Talon, but the restraints prevented him.
I sighed, focusing back on the road. Thankfully, the rest of the car ride was uneventful. At least, my friends were too busy poking and prodding Carl to bother me. Every now and then, he struggled to break free, and knowing how powerful he was, how much he was feared by pretty much everyone I had ever met – even Gods – I’ll admit I was impressed at the gear’s craftsmanship.
I’d have to find a way to free Carl, now. Then I’d have to hide the damned thing before my friends decided to use it for a series of pranks on each other. Maybe it only responded to my snap. I’d dig through the packaging to see if there were instructions or anything, but at the moment, I didn’t want to let them see me doing so, because then they might find the secret way to command the device.
I really needed to meet Darling and Dear, to learn what kind of twisted psychopaths they were. Because if I was judging by their products, they were the freakiest pair of beings ever created.
But that would have to wait. Because I had a meeting with the Obsidian Son that I was late for. He’d been blowing up my phone ever since the event with Mordred, and I’d texted him back after Alvara’s to say we were on our way after a quick stop at the bookstore to pick up my mail.
After the fiasco with Othello, I didn’t have time to drop off my friends, so they were along for the ride to see what the king of dragons wanted from me. And I was fine with that.
Backup was smart. Since I didn’t know how to free Carl from the bondage gear yet, we would leave him in the SUV. I checked him in the mirror to find that he seemed completely at peace, and I sighed.
Why couldn’t I meet any normal Freaks?
Chapter 18
I stood in the manicured front lawn of Raego’s mansion, surrounded by dozens of obsidian statues of life-sized creatures, humans, and other dragons.
They were life-sized because, well, they had once been alive. These weren’t stone replicas. They were living beings who had offended Raego at some point, and he’d decided to turn them into obsidian statues.
His lawn ornaments were literally his fallen enemies. Talk about a super-villain vibe.
Raego was a very rare black dragon.
Dragons came in all shapes, sizes, and colors. Depending on the color and the type, they had access to different magical gifts. I’d killed a silver one who could manipulate your fears and shoot silver spikes like a suicide bombing porcupine.
I’d also met that yellow one who could use lust against you and spit oily, napalm flame.
Basically, they all had some kind of mental manipulation power, latching onto some human emotion and distorting it or enhancing it.
But black dragons were different. Although not as large as some of the others, they had the ability to basically shapeshift into anything. Not just dragon or human. Also, their magical ability was twofold – they could spit black fire that burned like dry napalm or emit a black fog of smoke that turned their victims into stone.
They could also dominate other dragons’ minds. At least, they had a lot more mental power than their brethren.
Which was why Raego was their king. Or, the Obsidian Son, the prophesied leader of all dragons, in hopes that he could lead them out of the dark ages and into the light. Make them more legitimate. Apparently, dragons had faced a pretty severe culling in history, with dragon slayers hunting them down mercilessly. They’d been forced to go into hiding, but enough time had passed now that they weren’t as afraid, and since they could hide their obvious telltale signs of horizontal pupils when in human form – thank the heavens for contacts – they could wander the world without anyone the wiser. Blending in.
I’d helped Raego earn his throne when I’d helped kill his father, Alaric Slate. The bastard had wanted to become the Obsidian Son himself, and had coerced one of my old friends, Peter, to help him achieve this task.
Which was why, right now, I was standing before a very familiar statue.
Peter.
In the chaos of fighting Alaric, Raego had seen an opportunity. He’d glanced at me for my permission, and damn it, I’d nodded. He’d immediately blasted Peter into a statue, turning the tide for our fight.
Peter had deserved it, and I didn’t necessarily feel bad, but a lot of time had passed since then, and seeing him now as a helpless human statue made me feel a bit… uncomfortable. My personal wounds and desires for vengeance at his betrayal had healed or scarred over.
Was he still alive in there? Raego had sliced his throat right before turning him to stone, spilling his blood to ignite the spell prematurely – the spell that allowed him to take over the mantle of Obsidian Son.
So, if he was alive, and we unfroze him, would he just bleed out thirty seconds later? Maybe it was more benevolent to let him remain—
“See anything you like?” A cool voice asked from directly behind me.
I flinched, spun, and prepared to incinerate the voice.
Only to realize it was Raego. “Good god, man. Creep around much?” I snapped.
“I don’t creep, I stalk,” he replied, cocking his head with a grin. Then he glanced past me at Peter’s statue.
I sighed, glancing up at Peter’s statue as well. “Is there an expiration date on your spell? Will he just unfreeze one day, back to terrorize us all somehow?” I asked, recalling Mordred’s knowledge of my history.
Raego scratched at his jaw, thinking. “I’m actually not sure…” He scanned the lawn, considering all the enemies decorating his property. “Maybe it is unwise to leave my enemies like this,” he said, frowning.
“Ya’ think?” I asked, drily. “You should probably destroy them all, just in case. You know how much carnage that would be, to have all these traitors wake up and rise against you? All conveniently located at your front door,” I said, staring at him meaningfully. Because the more I thought about it, the more realistic the fear grew. What if Mordred had stolen one of these statues, waking up one of our mutual enemies, and that was how he had learned so much about me… That the statue of Peter right in front of me was just an illusion, not the original.
Mordred could have an army of our old enemies waiting for us…
Raego finally turned to face me, looking annoyed. “If we have to start fearing my lawn ornaments, I’m hanging up my crown,” he growled, indicating the statue of Peter. “Don’t let fear cloud your judgment, Nate. Fear is a dirty syringe full of a poisonously addictive street drug, and revisiting old history is you slipping the needle into a vein and slamming down the plunger. Don’t give in. Mordred is fucking with you. There is no way Mordred could have done such a thing.” He rapped a knuckle against Peter’s statue arrogantly. “This bitch is mine.”
“It’s the anniversary, you know,” I told him, changing the topic. I would just come back some other time and destroy them all myself, whether he wanted it or not. It would help
me sleep better, at least.
He grunted, obviously well aware. It had been the night we murdered his asshole father, after all. The day he’d become the king. “No solar eclipse this time, though.”
“No, thank god. But tonight’s social event may have been worse than Alaric’s plan. Lot of Regulars in attendance, and Mordred played to their fears…” I muttered, thinking about that aspect of the talk, not just my own personal issues with Mordred.
Raego grunted. “Good thing we don’t need to waste our time with the affairs of mortals, then, eh?” Then he spat on the ground, a sizzling black stain that froze the grass into ebony spikes. “We need to talk about Mordred. He’s a problem.” Raego was walking back towards the house before I could comment. Likely to make sure Gunnar and my friends weren’t being eaten by his dragons.
I sighed, took one last glance at Peter, and then followed after him, but he must have run, because I no longer saw his silhouette.
I saw two familiar Asian dudes standing on either side of the open door leading into Raego’s darkened mansion. They hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights for us. The two late teens were wearing their usual Chinese suits, and they were exquisitely tailored. I’d heard a dozen names for the cut and style, but basically, the suits didn’t have lapels – almost like those Kung Fu jackets Bruce Lee used to wear.
They were brothers – and although not twins, they could have easily passed for one another at a casual glance. And, wait for it…
Their names were Fook and Yu. And their father, Chu, had been one of the dragons resisting my decision to become King of St. Louis – as well as being heavily involved in a plot to take down Raego as king of the dragons. Fook and Yu were not pleased with their father for that.
“Fook,” I said, dipping my head to the one on the left, first, “Yu,” I added, doing the same to the one on the right of the doors.
Horseman: A Nate Temple Supernatural Thriller Book 10 (The Temple Chronicles) Page 10