by SJ Himes
“I had a feeling you would be. Though you are aware I will not be opening a new position if you go through with your challenge? You will have to fight, and defeat, either Etienne or Simeon for the honor of being an Elder.” Batiste replied, appearing bored, though Angel was fighting back the urge to hex Bridgerton where he stood and burn him to a crisp.
He wanted to be an Elder, and somehow Angel didn’t think the contest was to first blood. From the way Etienne shifted nervously, and how Simeon gave Bridgerton a single brow lift and hugged Angel to his side, it was obvious which vampire was not going to be challenged. Etienne glared at Bridgerton, who completely ignored him, finishing his drink.
“I would wish you luck, but I cannot. I would suggest you rethink your intentions since you cannot properly ascertain the dangers you’re taking on with such a task as an Elder challenge,” Simeon cautioned. “Neither Etienne or I are lacking in skills.”
Bridgerton chuckled, and sent a lazy glance over Etienne, the Elder hissing back.
Batiste interrupted the deeply intense moment by moving towards the table.
Everyone seemed to take their cue from that, people sitting across the room. Dishes clinked and silverware echoed across the space, and Angel found himself sitting between Batiste at the head of the table, Simeon on his right, with Bridgerton directly across from him, Etienne on Bridgerton’s other side. How Etienne could sit next to Bridgerton and not lose his shit Angel had no idea. Vampires in general had to be stone cold bastards to not show any emotion after casually discussing killing each other.
The rest of Bridgerton’s entourage was seated at the table, and Angel wished they hadn’t sat so soon, since he wanted to talk to some of these people, see if Simeon recognized their scents.
Angel looked as carefully as he could at the vamps and humans across the table, but none of the vamps stood out. He couldn’t hear them well enough to distinguish voices, not that he was sure he could recall Deimos’s voice from the stairwell as the vamp had been in full-blown bloodlust at the time, fangs warping his voice and mouth.
Dark brown eyes, so dark they were nearly black met his, and the human gave a jerk, his face going blank of all expression before he looked down at his plate and ate. The young man was younger than Isaac, probably twenty or so, and his neatly messy hair was dirty blond and thick. Angel kept watching, and the young man dared a glimpse up at him, saw him watching, and startled again, this time knocking his glass over. Water spilled on the table, and the young man awkwardly mopped it up with a linen napkin.
“I don’t know anyone,” Angel said aloud, looking away from the awkward young man, suspicion fussing at the back of his mind. He knew that boy. Somewhere, somehow, he knew that boy at the other end of the table. Angel jabbed at Simeon with his elbow, and Simeon gave him a raised brow, confused. “Introduce me to some more people,” Angel said, and nodded his chin at the boy, who was now staring back at Angel, face paling, eyes wide.
“Of course, a ghra, though I do not know everyone here. Some of our guests belong to Bridgerton,” Simeon said casually, and he directed his next comment across the table. “Mr. Bridgerton, would you do the honors of introducing us to your friends?”
“Certainly,” Bridgerton replied with a smile that told Angel he was anything but pleased. “My companions,” he said, pointing to two vampires on the other side of Etienne, who nodded as they were named, “Ellora Sumar,” a dark, nymph-like woman who looked like she was fifteen but acted far older, and “Douglas Eschard,” an older vamp who was reborn undead in his fifties, “both who have been members of my household for the last century, and my blood servant Rachel Evans.”
“Who’s the boy?” Angel asked, and Etienne bristled, but Batiste answered.
“That young man is Etienne’s newest toy. Daniel, I believe is his name?”
Time stopped, made a funny hiccup that stole the air from his lungs and sent his skin aflame in awareness. Angel slowly turned his head, the conversations around them falling into the background, his mind taken up in a refrain of horrified recognition.
Daniel. He did indeed know the boy at the table, and the young man knew him, too.
Macavoy.
Daniel Macavoy, son of Leicaster Macavoy, only ten years old when his whole family conspired and committed the mass murder of the Salvatore clan.
Simeon growled beside him, sensing his alarm, but Angel was too busy staring at Daniel. The young man at the end of the table stared back, so pale he was likely in danger of passing out.
And Angel saw in him the rude, abrasive young man at his door months ago, demanding to know how Angel killed a hundred vampires in a single night, alone and without help. Angel had sent him away, not even bothering to learn his name or why he so earnestly wanted to know how to kill vampires en masse. Daniel swallowed, and got up from the table, rattling the chair and table and mumbling apologies to the people seated next to him. Daniel wasted no time, taking off like a shot between the tables.
Angel pushed back from his chair, dodging Simeon’s hand and ignoring the voices calling after him, demanding answers. Angel followed Daniel, tracking the young man as he wove through the crowd.
“Daniel! Stop, dammit!” Angel called, pissed off. He just wanted to talk. He didn’t even know Daniel was still in Boston—and how the hell was he a blood servant? He was the son of two powerful sorcerers; Daniel’s blood was pure poison to any undead. “Daniel!”
“Stay away! He said you wouldn’t recognize me, I’m sorry! He made me do it!” Daniel cried over his shoulder, running between two tables for a side hall. Guards saw them coming, and people were yelling behind them. “Leave me alone!”
“Daniel Macavoy, get back here, dammit!” Angel yelled, sprinting hard. The guards at the door made to grab Daniel, but he backpedaled away and rammed right into Angel. Angel caught him about the waist and tried his best to hold the boy still, but Daniel was taller than him and weighed more. Daniel broke free and swung wildly at Angel. He ducked and held his hands up. “Daniel, stop, goddammit. Is it Deimos? Is Bridgerton Deimos?”
“What? No!” Daniel was panting, sweating, eyes darting around the room as both vamps and guards circled them, guests rudely kicked out of their seats. Simeon was approaching, Batiste, Bridgerton, and Etienne close on his heels, forcing their way through the crowd. “Stay away from me!”
A thump, a powerful tide of energy echoed between the space between Daniel and Angel. Angel knew what is was, and from the gasps in the room, he wasn’t the only practitioner in the room to feel Daniel tap into the veil. Blue energy crackled around Daniel’s shoulders, his aura flaring, becoming visible as he fed raw veil-power into his core.
“Daniel! I just want to talk to you! Stop it!”
He got his own shields up just in time. A ball of blue fire roared across the space between them, crackling as it fell in spurts of flame to the floor, his shields breaking it apart. “Get out of the way!”
Screams and shouts came from the guests as Daniel threw spell after spell at Angel, the boy clearly panicked and terrified. Eyes wild and hands shaking, Daniel screamed at him in bad Latin, his lack of training making him even more dangerous. A haphazard curse came screaming at him, and Angel caught it, his shields absorbing it before it could ricochet off their surface and hit someone in the crowd.
“Get out of here!” Angel screamed at the confused onlookers, getting Simeon’s attention and pointing at the people standing around watching. “He has no idea what he’s doing! Get them out of here or someone is going to die! Move it!”
Simeon nodded and began yelling orders, and Angel kept his hands up, pushing out with his shields, covering the fleeing crowds behind him as Daniel tossed spell after spell at him. The boy was barely holding onto the veil, power surging in badly maintained waves that swelled and fell in near chaos. Their impromptu duel was nothing but raw power and instinct. Fires broke out across the room, along the walls and on the ceiling, tables melting and glass breaking.
Daniel was cas
ting with everything he had, draining himself and leaving his control over the veil disintegrating. Angel kept his shields up and made them less reflective, stickier. Spells came at him, landing with sharp whines and hissing, the air thick with ozone and heat, and his focus fell to the boy in front of him. Daniel was sweating through his suit, and the boy fell to his knees as Angel pushed out, ready to pull a fucking risky as hell maneuver. All he had to do was get close enough, and he could turn his shields inside out and drop them over Daniel—trapping him inside, under Angel’s control, and the boy would likely knock himself out with his own spells. It was like flipping a teacup over on top of a spider, and he had to do it quick enough not to get bit.
He was only a handful of feet from Daniel when the boy stopped, a hand on the floor holding himself up, and he seemed to understand that everything he was trying to do wasn’t even getting through Angel’s shields—Angel had him outclassed. He hadn’t even needed to draw on the veil to protect himself from Daniel. The boy may be a sorcerer, but his training was woefully lacking, and Daniel was coming to realize that. The boy gave a frustrated scream, and Angel saw a ring of vampires approaching, encircling the boy, fangs barred and claws out.
Something was driving the boy, instigating his fear to such heights that his first reaction to being recognized by Angel was to attack, even in a room of innocents. Daniel was terrified—but the question was, who scared him the most? Angel, or Deimos?
“Daniel. Please listen to me. I am not your enemy; I will not harm you. Please, please stand down,” Angel pleaded, even as he twisted his wrists, prepping his shields for the flip. There was no way Daniel would recognize the motion, not with his training as bad as it was.
“You’re a Salvatore! You hate us all! You want me dead!” Daniel cried out, tears joining the sweat on his face. “He said you would kill me if you knew I was here!”
“Who said, Daniel? Who are you so frightened of?” Angel asked, crouching on his heels, hands still up, palms out, ready to flip his shields if he must. He could pour his will inside and break Daniel’s, as he would an out of control student lost in the veil, and knock the boy out. He made his voice softer, kinder. “Daniel, I am not your enemy. You were a little kid back then, and I have never blamed you for anything. Let me help you.”
The vampires were coming closer, Simeon, Batiste, and Etienne directly behind the exhausted sorcerer. Angel met their gazes, and gave an infinitesimal shake to his head, asking them to stop. They all did, Batiste holding up a hand to get the other vampires approaching to halt as well. Etienne was the last to stop, crouching about ten feet from Daniel, ready to pounce.
Angel met Daniel’s eyes, trying his best to convey his honesty. “Daniel, I will not hurt you, I promise.”
It made his chest hurt, actually hurt, to see the hope in Daniel’s dark eyes. The boy was ready to collapse, and Angel pressed just a bit more. “Daniel, who is Deimos? Is he the one who you’re afraid of?”
Daniel bit his lip, but nodded, and Angel cheered inwardly in victory. “I can keep you safe from him. Who is he, Daniel? Is he here right now?”
“Yes,” Daniel answered, falling forward, whispering. Angel could feel him trying to let go of the veil, the ambient power in the room spiking as Daniel fumbled his control.
“Easy, Daniel,” Angel cautioned. “Let me help you let go of the veil. You know I can do that for you, yeah? Then you can tell me who Deimos is, and this will all be over, okay?”
“Okay….” Daniel breathed, the boy ready to pass out. Angel dropped his shields completely, lunging forward as Daniel collapsed before catching himself, forcing himself back up on his knees. The vampires hissed in concert, creepy and disturbing. Etienne inched closer, and Angel glared at the Elder, wanting him to back off.
Angel was two feet from the boy when Etienne lunged, screeching. Angel was knocked away, falling on his ass as Etienne landed on top of Daniel, jaws wide as he bit the boy on the neck. Daniel screamed, blood running over his lips, the sound strangled. He clawed ineffectively at Etienne’s back, trying to get free as the vampire ravaged his neck.
“No!” Angel screamed and blasted Etienne in the back with a green ball of fire, making the vampire rip away, throwing Daniel to the floor. A small, dark gray jar bound in black twine fell from Daniel’s jacket and bounced a few feet away, clattering on the hardwood floor. Etienne roared in triumph when he saw it, and leapt, smashing the jar with his hand.
“Fuck!” Angel threw another ball of fire, but it was too late—Etienne blurred away, and the other vampires converged. Angel lifted Daniel in his arms, and with a burst of kinetic energy, pushed the vampires all away from him and Daniel. He kept an eye on the broken jar, the black smoke emanating from the fractured pieces, setting fire to floor in a set pattern as the spell released itself.
Daniel’s blood, running from his neck and out across the floor, met a trail of smoke, and the spell flared to life, a circle combusting around the remnants of the jar, and a void of black puddled and swirled in the center. Angel put a hand over Daniel’s neck, the boy unconscious already, trying to stem the flow of blood from his injury. Daniel had released the veil the second he lost consciousness, his mind open to Angel.
Angel reached for the veil this time and raised his shields around him and the boy dying in his arms. The spell unspinning itself in front of him was more dangerous than anything the boy had cast before—and now Angel knew who summoned the demon that attacked him.
“Angel!” Simeon called to him, trying to get to him through his shield, bashing at it with his hands, light flaring out and crashing from the points of contact. “My love, take the shield down!”
“Simeon, get back! Trust me, and get back!” Simeon cried out, unwilling, Batiste grabbing him and yanking him away.
A horrible roar of sound, and an intense and fiery burst of light crawled from the depths of the black void—a many-clawed hand snapped through the abyss, lodging on the wooden floor, and the demon on the other side of the void pulled itself through in response to the set summoning spell that had been trapped in the jar. Dark gray and green scales, splashed with random yellow spots adorned the beast, and it straddled the void, its tail slipping free just as the portal closed with a horrific snap.
It roared, raising to an impressive ten-foot height, its many tongues flailing over hundreds of teeth, the demon’s voice frighteningly familiar. “Angelus!”
“Angel!” Simeon screamed, the terror in his voice breaking Angel’s heart and threatening to destroy his focus. Batiste kept his hold on Simeon, who screamed in defiance and tried to break free.
He could handle this—he had to, or the boy would die, and the demon would kill Angel.
Angel sent his will down, into the boy, who was dying. Daniel Macavoy was hovering on the brink of death—and that was where Angel was strongest. He could not heal scratches or bruises or broken bones—but a mortal wound, a killing blow—that Angel had dominion over, and he used his affinity now. He could not bring someone back from death, at least not as they were in life, but as a revenant like August or a zombie or wraith—but a soul on the edge, between life and death and not fully departed, Angel could and would pull them back. The death magic answered him, and Angel sealed the torn arteries, fused the sundered flesh, poured veil-drawn energy into the failing body in his arms, and he called Daniel’s soul back from the brink. And while his spirit and Daniel’s communed, the transfer of power total and complete, Angel saw into the boy’s mind and heart, and knew the truth.
Angel lifted his head, and his hand came up, covered in Daniel’s blood, wet and sticky and full of power.
The demon scored the floor, its long tail smashing tables and chairs, tossing aside the foolish vampires attacking it like raptors would a t-rex in those sci-fi movies Isaac loved so much. Ichor dripped from its red mouth, and Angel saw the scars along its snout from their first encounter. Simeon yelled at the vampires, their bodies broken and slashed, but they backed away, waiting on Angel.
&nb
sp; Angel kept his hand up, and spread his fingers, sending out his will. As he healed Daniel, he stole from the boy the original name of the beast before him, summoned unwilling across dimensional voids to kill for his master. Angel gently lay Daniel down, the boy still wounded and drained, though he would live if Angel got him to a doctor.
Angel stood, and stepped over Daniel. He took one step, then another, focusing his will on the beast, and it backed away, lowering to all fours like a cat, its form changing and twisting, torn apart by the energies that held it here in Angel’s world, away from its home. The geas upon the beast was what drove it to violence and madness; Angel would end its suffering.
“Eroch, child of the void,” Angel intoned, stepping forward, measured steps and calm, even breaths focusing his will. “Eroch, hear me and obey.”
“Angelus!” It hissed, a thousand voices tumbling over themselves to form his name, and its eyes narrowed, flaring yellow. Spittle dripped from its fangs, and Angel could feel the beast push back against his command through the tenuous connection between them. “You must die, angel of death.”
Its voice was weakening, its will eroding, but not fast enough. If Angel couldn’t tame the demon, the geas would overwhelm the beast and send it after Angel, and anyone in its way.
“Eroch! Stolen child, enslaved soul of the void, hear me and obey!”
“Nooooo!” It screamed, neck twisting, lowering down on the floor, and Angel dropped his shields, needing no interference between the demon and himself. It was such a risk to take his heart thundered in fear, but he must win, he must make it answer to its name.
Simeon yelled at him, and Angel was thankful Batiste was the stronger of the two, keeping Simeon from harm.