In that moment, I knew that if she wanted to kill me, there was not a thing I could do to stop her.
“Elite! Put your hands on your head and get on the floor!” Jon screamed, his voice a little higher than it should have been, and a bout of giggles erupted from me. I couldn’t stop them, and I laughed until tears blurred my vision and ran from my eyes to drip into my ears.
What was wrong with me? Why was I so goddamned hysterical?
I did a mental check of my body, and while my ribs hurt, it wasn’t enough to send me over the edge like this. I turned my attention inwards, searching through my metaphysical defences, and it was there I found the leak.
Lily was channelling me; it was the reason I felt her magic as strongly as I did. She was still standing next to Steve’s body and instinctively I knew the only reason she was still standing after her little Voodoo conjuration was because of the way she was channelling me. That was why she’d drained me; it was the only way she could create a hole big enough in my defences to worm her way inside.
Closing my eyes, I tried to shut her down, but my heartbeat was beginning to slow, the voices and shouting around me becoming distorted as my body fought against the desire to shut down completely. She’d taken so much that I couldn’t even break the connection with her.
My heartbeat echoed in my head and it was joined by the echoing beat of everyone’s heart in the room. Just like it had before, the urge to drink down the energy of everyone else in the building washed over me.
I could swallow them whole, drink them down until there was nothing left. Then I’d be strong enough to face Lily.
Opening my eyes, I rolled over onto my stomach and cast a look around the room. The Elite had swarmed into the room, Jon leading the charge in his too-big bullet proof vest. He looked like a complete idiot, and yet from the expression on his face, he honestly believed he could take Lily down.
My gaze fell on Sonia, who had Steve’s head in her lap as she stroked his face. Had Lily’s magic failed?
Steve jerked, his leg convulsing, and Lily’s power spiked once more, drawing a ragged soundless scream from my lips as the connection flared within me. Digging my hands into the floor, I pushed myself onto my hands and knees as Steve’s spine bowed upwards, his grey, dead eyes rolling in his head as his hands found purchase in Sonia’s soft flesh.
The room immediately erupted into chaos, Lily’s laughter echoing through Sonia’s screams and the Elite’s shouts of confusion. I let what was left of my power flow outwards, drawing forth just enough energy from everyone in the room to replenish my depleted life. I could feel guilty later, when I wasn’t dead and everyone around me was still alive and hadn’t been eaten by a zombie.
I choked on the power rush and from the corner of my eye, I was just vaguely aware of Jon dropping to his knees as he clawed at the black helmet he wore. Drawing in a deep breath, I rolled my shoulders and flexed my arms. It wasn’t perfect, but until I could find a way to properly heal, this would have to do.
Sonia screamed again, the pleading in her voice snapping me back to the reality of the situation. I’d been right to think Lily would do something to screw everything up.
Climbing to my feet, I crossed to where Nic stood, his arms wrapped around Steve’s neck as he struggled to hold his head back. But the second I was close enough, I felt my stomach drop out through my ass as my eyes focussed in on what was really going on.
There was blood everywhere; Steve’s arms up as far as his bloated and mottled elbows were covered in the stuff and Sonia fought against his clawing grip.
Grabbing his arm, I dragged him backwards, lending my strength to Nic’s. Steve turned his head toward me and I fought the urge to gag as his eyes bulged. Lily hadn’t even bothered to give him a true connection, at least not in the way the usual Voodoo Priests did. Instead, she’d brought back this—whatever in Hell it was, because it sure wasn’t Steve—and she’d cut him loose from her power.
Something wrapped itself in my hair, jerking my head back sharply and forcing me to lose my grip on Steve. I turned in Lily’s grip and came face-to-face with her.
“You thought you could outsmart me? You thought by bringing your team here you could stop me?” she said.
Grabbing her hand, I broke the grip she had on me and twisted it up behind her back. “No, I didn’t. The last thing I wanted was for the Elite to come bursting in here during this,” I said, gritting my teeth as she fought against me.
I was better trained physically, and in a fight Lily wouldn’t stand a chance against me. But her magic was far more controlled than mine.
With her free hand, she twisted her fingers and my throat closed off, the air getting thinner as the oxygen in my lungs depleted. Throwing myself away from her, I clawed at my neck at the place where I could feel her invisible grip tightening on me.
“Just give me the blade and I’ll leave you be,” she said.
I shook my head, but that just caused the colours in the room to blur into each other.
Lily grabbed my head and pressed her forehead to mine. “Tell me where it is,” she said.
“No.” But it was already too late, I could feel her fingers sifting through my head as she searched for the place where I’d hidden the blade. Fighting her grip sent black sparks flying in my vision and the sound of Sonia screaming once more broke my concentration.
“She wasn’t pregnant,” Lily whispered before she released me.
Her words didn’t make sense and I pushed them aside as she tried to move away. Grabbing her ankle, I jerked her leg from underneath her, driving her into the ground. Lily’s frustrated cry gave me a momentary jolt of satisfaction.
Magic coiled within me. This time I knew her weakness, the connection she’d created between us would act as a conduit and no amount of attempting to deflect me would work this time.
“Amber!” The panic in Nic’s voice drew my attention and it was then I realised what I was listening to.
Sonia’s screams had cut off; her bubbling sobs filling my head with images I didn’t want to witness. There was only one thing that could make that sound.
Releasing Lily, I flung myself back across the room in Sonia’s direction. She wasn’t even trying to fight Steve off anymore, her hands scrabbling uselessly at the floor as her eyes stared, unseeing, up at the ceiling.
Nic had wrapped his body around Steve and from where I stood, I could see Steve’s dismembered arm lying next to them on the floor. Nic hacked at him with the small blade he had, but it wasn’t enough.
Dropping onto the floor next to Sonia, I dragged her out from underneath Steve. Her lower half was a complete bloodied ruin that brought stinging tears to my eyes. I’d done this to her. I’d caused all of this.
“Jesus Christ, Sonia,” I whispered, dragging my jacket off and pressing it against the blood that bubbled from her midsection.
Steve, by the looks of it, had tried to eat her; there was a clear bite mark on the inside of her arm, the flesh ragged and torn, but that was the least of her problems.
My magic still coiled within me as Sonia’s breaths became more and more laboured.
“Cut the head off, it’ll help,” I said to Nic as my heart hammered in my chest.
Sonia’s was slowing; I could hear it through the wet gurgling of her breaths and I knew she wasn’t going to last long. Even if an ambulance had been standing outside the door, I was pretty certain there was nothing on this Earth that could bring her back from the injuries she’d sustained.
Sonia grabbed my arm, her fingers digging into my flesh, and for one stupid moment I imagined all the zombie movies I’d watched down through the years were real.
Lily screamed, the sound echoing around the room, and I lifted my face in time to watch her send Jon and some of the other Elite guys crashing out into the hall. Sonia’s fingers spasmed and she coughed, blood spraying up onto her face as her eyes focussed in on my face.
The accusation in her eyes tore at me. I was to blame and she knew
it. She blinked and one tear trickled from the corner of her eyes. Turning her head, she stared at Nic as he struggled with Steve’s reanimated corpse.
“You can stop him, you can give him rest…” she said, her voice little more than a whisper and almost impossible to hear over the wheezing, wet gurgling of her breathing.
“Yes,” I said honestly.
“Do it,” she said, a shudder of pain racing through her body as she convulsed in my grip. “I don’t want to die knowing I left him in this torturous limbo….”
“He’s not really in there,” I said, glancing up as Nic grunted in pain. Steve fought with the relentless power of those who didn’t feel pain, of those who knew nothing but an all-consuming hunger, one that couldn’t be quenched.
“You didn’t look into his eyes. She brought his soul back, it’s in there, but he’s trapped….”
I stared down in horror at the truth in Sonia’s eyes. “How do you know?”
“She did it before you got here….” Another spasm of bloody coughing wracked Sonia’s body and I tightened my hold on her.
“That’s not possible, she would have needed a sacrifice, a life for a life….”
“She said she could use the baby, that it would be enough, and I agreed….”
“Sonia….” I trailed off my words trapped in the back of my throat as I realised what she was saying. She’d given up her unborn child’s life to bring back this monster.
“But I lost the baby when they told me Steve was dead … I miscarried and….” She cut off and tears clouded her eyes. “I thought it wouldn’t matter….”
I didn’t answer her; there was no answer for the things she’d done. Grief could drive a person to desperation and I knew that. And maybe the piece of her memories I’d taken had contributed to her decision. But it suddenly became clear as to why Steve had turned on her. She was the life—it was her soul in exchange for his….
“Oh, Christ,” I said, suddenly realising the extent of the mess we were in.
Steve would live, truly live, but only when Sonia was dead.
Horror washed through me, turning my blood to ice in my veins as I watched Nic struggle with the reanimated corpse.
Laying Sonia out on the floor, I scrambled towards Nic and caught his hand as he attempted to bring his blade down on Steve’s neck.
“You can’t!” I said, terror doing its best to claw its way out of my throat.
Grabbing Steve’s face between my hands I pulled his face towards mine and stared down into his eyes. It was there, lurking beneath the surface of his death-glazed eyes. His soul swam inside him, the smell of terror and horror suddenly overwhelming the stench of his rotting flesh.
“Rest,” I said, my voice echoing with power, a power that tasted different on my tongue.
He struggled in my grip for a moment longer, his soul suddenly surfacing as his eyes cleared and then, just as quickly as it had appeared, he went limp in my grip. His flesh felt slimy beneath my touch and I laid him gently back on the floor.
I cast a glance in Sonia’s direction, but her chest was no longer rising and falling with her laboured breathing and the terrible gurgling noises she’d been making had ceased. They were both gone.
“What the fuck is going on, Amber!” Jon’s voice cut through the static buzzing in my head and I turned to face him, but whatever he saw in my eyes had him stumbling backwards out through my apartment door.
“Amber, your eyes…” Nic said, fear in his voice, but he wasn’t afraid of me—I was certain of that. He was afraid for me.
“Crap,” I muttered and scrubbed my hands over my face. “Well, I guess if the cat is out of the bag, then there really is no point in hiding what I am,” I said with a sigh before I pushed up onto my feet. “But before the shit well and truly hits the fan and Jon tries to kill me, there’s someone I need to help.”
Jon peered around the door, his gun raised and pointed in my direction. “I know what you are!” he shouted; the fear in his voice told me just how dangerous he truly was.
“I don’t have time for this, Jon,” I said, raising my hands in surrender as the first gun shot rang out, the sound deafening in such close proximity. Pain burned in my arm as the bullet grazed it and I swore beneath my breath when I heard the sound of other gun-toting Elite preparing to fire through the walls.
Nic barrelled into me, taking us both to the floor, the force of his body hitting mine and knocking the air from my lungs as the roar of gunfire blew through the apartment. We rolled across the floor as the gunfire ceased as quickly as it had started.
“Go, I’ll keep them busy,” Victoria’s voice called to me from the doorway, and I didn’t need to be told twice.
I was on my feet before Nic was on his knees and I held my hand out to him but he shook his head.
“You need to go, Jason is coming here, we both know it, and someone has to head him off in the pass….”
He was right, Jason would be coming, and if I was still here … well, we both knew how it would end.
“Be careful,” I said with a smile before I turned away.
“You too,” Nic said.
I took off at a run, my legs a little unsteady beneath me as I crossed the apartment and raced down the hall to the window that led out onto the fire escape. There wasn’t a chance in Hell that Jon was going to catch me and accuse me of being a witch. That was one victory I wouldn’t ever give him.
Chapter 20
St Anne’s was quiet as I crossed the street and reached the locked gate. It seemed unusual to find the gates locked; I’d always imagined churches to be open at all times. After all, sin didn’t have a watch and absolution could be given at any time.
Grabbing the railings, I hooked my leg up across the middle bar and hoisted myself over the top, flipping my body over the sharp spikes carefully. My bullet-graze burned as my muscles strained against my arm and I dropped down onto the ground on the other side of the gate.
Keeping low, I crossed the parking lot as silently as I could. Demons, like vampires and shifters, had incredible hearing and getting caught out here just wasn’t a good idea.
Spotting one of the side doors that led into the church, I crept towards it and tried the heavy iron door handle. It popped open easily and I slipped soundlessly inside.
The church was silent but it wasn’t the kind that usually brought peace. Closing my eyes, I let the atmosphere wash over me, and I shuddered. I was so used to the churches back in Ireland being a place of peace and contemplation. Hell, I didn’t even remember it feeling so claustrophobic when I’d been here earlier; something had obviously happened to change things, but what that was….
Creeping up the aisle, I paused as I realised what it was that had changed so drastically.
The older priest that had welcomed me earlier lay across the altar, his eyes wide and unseeing as he stared at me. The altar cloth that was usually white had dark bloody patches decorating it now instead.
Staring up at the cross that hung overhead, I tried to imagine what He thought of all of this. Did God even have a plan? Or were we really just put on earth and cut loose from His care to get on with living ourselves? Survival of the fittest, but then, how was a human supposed to compete with something like a demon?
“So many conflicting thoughts, Amber,” Mia’s called to me, and I jumped.
She stepped out through a concealed doorway to the right of the altar, her expression neutral as she let her gaze drift over the dead priest. There had been a time when something like this would have bothered her. But not now….
“Mia, what happened here, what happened to Father Bailey?”
“I didn’t think you were the empathetic sort; you always gave the impression that nothing touched you. That deserting others, leaving them broken in your wake, was just something you did. And yet, here you are, actually upset over the death of a man you didn’t even know….”
“Mia, just tell me who did this.”
Throwing back her head, she laugh
ed, a long, raucous sound filled with joy and light. In all the time I’d known Mia, I’d never actually heard her laugh before. Everything was always far too painful, there was always too much going on inside her head, too many feelings belonging to everyone around her to process.
“This isn’t you,” I said, taking a small step forward.
The laughter stopped and Mia returned her gaze to mine. I watched as the colour in her eyes disappeared to be replaced with a darkness that caused my stomach to clench. This was definitely not quite what I had in mind. If Mia was possessed, then that made life a hell of a lot more complicated.
“That’s where you’re wrong, this is more me than I’ve ever been. No more suffering, no more pain. I don’t have to cower in the shadows because my gift is overwhelming me. I can finally live my life and I don’t have to give a damn what anyone else thinks or feels.”
“And that’s still not you. I wish you knew how to control your power but not like this, not at the expense of who you truly are….” I took a step towards her and Mia let her head drop to one side, her eyes assessing me the way a hawk watches a mouse scurrying through the grass seconds before it drops from the sky on wings of death.
“You do realise I know exactly how you feel about me and my gift, right?” she said, a cruel smile twisting her lips.
“Yeah, I do. The part you forget is that my feelings are centred around getting that crazy-ass demon out of you before it makes you do something you’ll regret,” I said, flexing my hands as my power surged within me.
“Oh, I dunno, I think we’re pretty much past the point of no return,” she answered with a small flick of her eyes in the direction of Father Bailey’s body.
It was enough of a distraction, my attention crossing to the dead priest for a second. It was all Mia needed as she launched herself across the space between us, time folding in on itself as she moved, and before I could react, she was on top of me.
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