The Hatter is Mad: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 2)

by J. A. Cipriano

  “That didn’t seem to work very well. Maybe you should try something else?” Caleb offered. His ‘tips’ were really starting to annoy me.

  “I’m sure this gun will work just fine on you if you don’t shut your mouth!” I growled and got to my feet, shoving the shotgun into my coat. I spread my hands wide and drew upon my power. It rushed into me like warm heat sliding along my body. I ran forward and slammed my palm into Bert’s face before he could regain his momentum.

  “White Sparrow!” I cried.

  My power surged out of me in a rush that left me a little weak in the knees. White fire erupted from the sky, splintering the ceiling and setting the bar ablaze as it smashed down around Bert like a tube of super-heated death. I stepped back and took a deep breath. My heart was racing. I hadn’t meant to throw quite that much power out. This was happening a little too often lately. My power was starting to get harder and harder to control. I noticed it with little things at first. Accidently breaking a door knob or a window when I shut it.

  This time though, I used an attack spell and nearly threw all my magic out in one blast. I shook my head and reloaded my shotgun. It helped me calm down. If I could be calm, I could control my power a little better. I glanced up to see Bert fall to the floor in a smoking heap. Well he didn’t die, and that was good… I guess.

  “Lucy, you got some ‘splainin’ to do,” I said as I turned and pointed my shotgun at Caleb. It was more of a casual pointing rather than a real threat, to be honest. Which, yes, I know, is horrible gun protocol. Fear flashed across Caleb’s eyes just for a moment, but I noticed it. Evidently, my little display of power wasn’t lost on him either. Swell.

  “Now, now,” he said, holding his hands out in front of him. “No need to get crazy.”

  “But this bitch ‘be crazy,’ remember?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him. “What was it you said again?”

  Caleb started to say something as Bert reverted to his human form, but I didn’t catch it. I wasn’t sure what Bert was but reverting to human form probably meant he was done being a jerk-face for a while. Very slowly, Bert got to his hands and knees and began to crawl away, which really wasn’t a bad idea given that the damn bar was on fire. This is why I need primo fire insurance. Recently, it was starting to seem like everywhere I went caught fire. Then again, fire killed most things. Coincidence?

  “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t finish this conversation with a bang,” I said as I sauntered over to Bert and put the shotgun under his chin. “I’m willing to bet my gun will have a more lasting effect when you’re not in uber-gross form.”

  “Because I’m about to give you mad good company for the price of leaving me the hell alone.” Bert coughed, and when bits of phlegm landed on my gun, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath so that I wouldn’t blow him into tiny pieces.

  Caleb walked over and snapped his fingers. The flames that had spread across the bar went out with a quiet hiss. Stupid Caleb and his stupid fire mastery. I was really going to have to learn that trick. My insurance would drop by half, I bet.

  “So,” Caleb said, kneeling down close to Bert. “Why don’t you make like a good lackey and let your boss know we’re here.”

  Chapter 12

  Ajax smiled, his lips curling disproportionally to the rest of his face as he settled into the black leather couch in his rather spacious office. He was wearing one of those black department store suits with a black tie and undershirt. I guess all black was his thing.

  He threw his head back and began cackling. It made me want to smack him. He reached up and pulled off his black emo-glasses before putting one hand on his knee, struggling to catch his breath. He wiped his eyes with the back of his other hand and tried to take a deep breath.

  I was less than amused. Leave it to Caleb to let me do all the heavy lifting and step in at the last minute to take credit for everything. Now we were at Ajax’s, and I wondered if Ajax could also turn all Johnny Blaze like the fat drunk from the bar. Part of me hoped I wouldn’t find out. It wasn’t that I was scared or anything but getting into short, painful squabbles wasn’t exactly the best way to make progress with the whole finding the Blue Prince thing we were supposed to be doing.

  “I. Can’t. Believe. You. Did. That. You actually set the bar on fire and shot Bert,” Ajax said, barely containing his laughter long enough to speak. “I’d heard you were spunky, but this takes the cake.”

  I closed my eyes and tried to take a deep breath. I wasn’t going to start another fight.

  “Yes, anyway, that pretty much leaves us with trying to find the Blue Prince in your town,” Caleb repeated for the third time in the conversation, sparing a glance at me that suggested he was aware of the length of my fuse and was doing his best to hurry this along.

  “The Blue Prince isn’t that hard to find. He’s all about depression and sadness. Just go find a coffee shop with someone reading sappy poetry and crying,” Ajax replied with smirk.

  I shook my head and sighed. “The Blue Prince kidnapped my friend Melanie. I think we all know that doesn’t mean happy fun time. So unless you have some way of helping us that doesn’t involve a wild goose chase through hipster coffee shops, I don’t see what use you are,” I growled, glaring at Ajax and to his credit, he didn’t squirm. He steepled his hands and looked past me at Caleb.

  “Caleb,” I said, turning toward him. “We need some progress making and now. We know the Blue Prince is crazy. That’s not news. What we need to know is where he is and why a giant, car-flinging orc tried to kill me. We do not need to be standing around with Johnny Blaze chatting about the morning paper.” I glanced at Ajax. “No offense, by the way.”

  “None taken.”

  “Lillim, we have to go about this rationally—” Caleb started, but I cut him off.

  “Rational to whom?” I screamed at him. “This makes no damn sense. No damn sense! We’re at the corner of Podunk and nowhere, trying to find the Blue Prince. And let’s say Ajax says ‘go here to find the Blue Prince’ and we go there and he is actually there. Then what? Then what, Caleb?”

  “Then you can beat him up for killing your hedgehog and kidnapping your friend?” Caleb ventured. He seemed unsure of what he was supposed to say.

  “Wha? I just… you just don’t even care…” I said. I took a step toward him and punched his chest. His eyes got wide as he looked down at the spot where I hit him. His mouth opened, but before he could say anything. I turned and stomped out of the room. Caleb followed me into the hallway, and I whirled on him, poking him in the chest with my finger.

  “I…” My words trailed off, sticking in my throat as I slumped down to my knees. I was suddenly very tired. “I just want to know why you left me. This whole antagonistic bullshit isn’t working for me.”

  Caleb took a step backward and glanced around the tiny hallway. A small sigh escaped Caleb as he knelt next to me and took my hand in his before speaking. “I guess we never really talked, huh?”

  “Talked? You just left. You said all those nice things to me and you left,” I said, looking away from him and at the off-white walls of the hallway.

  “You make it too hard for me, Lillim. When I’m around you, I do stupid things. I’ve never thought about other girls the way I do about you. I act reckless when I’m around you. It—”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I screamed and grabbed him by the shoulders. I wanted to shake him. Shake him until I felt better, shake my feelings away. I really don’t know what I wanted to be honest, but it wasn’t this. I didn’t want to even be around him. I never felt anything like this before and…

  “I fought a giant-snake demon, and it poisoned me. Every time I use my powers I get weaker thanks to that bastard. If I stayed with you, my feelings would get in the way—”

  “What do you mean your feelings would get in the way?” I interrupted as a million thoughts ran through my brain. “What do you mean?”

  He blushed and looked away, staring at the floor like it
was the most interesting thing in the world. “I care about you, Lillim.” He swallowed and looked up at me. The emotion in his eyes was enough to thaw my heart and almost make me forgive him. Almost.

  “People who care don’t leave in the middle of the night…” I said though the words had lost some of their harshness. That wasn’t fair. He needed to stop looking at me like he was. If he kept doing that, I was going to forget I was supposed to be mad at him…

  “I wanted to stay.” He reached out and traced my cheek with his knuckle. The heat of his touch was enough to make my knees go a little weak. “More than anything in the world, Lillim. I want to be with you.”

  “Stop. Please,” I whispered, my voice partially catching in my throat as I reached up to pull his hand away, but the moment my fingers wrapped around his, I could do little more than squeeze. This wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair for him to act sweet while saying he couldn’t be with me. It just wasn’t. He was supposed to be a jerk, not act like I was kicking his puppy. Not when he was at fault.

  “I’m sorry,” Caleb whispered, moving closer so our bodies were nearly pressed together. He reached down with his free hand and slowly moved my chin up so I was looking up into his eyes. They were so blue it felt like I was staring into the ocean. “You don’t realize how much.”

  “If you were sorry, you would be with me, Caleb. You wouldn’t make excuses about it,” I muttered, and the hurt in my voice surprised even me. It was in that moment I knew I’d still be with him if he asked. The thought chilled me because I wasn’t sure I was ready to admit it to myself, let alone him.

  “Do you know why I left?” he asked, leaning into me, but the only thing I could focus on were his lips as he spoke.

  “Because you didn’t like me? Because you were just following orders? Because—” he cut me off by pressing his mouth against mine. The movement was so sudden, I couldn’t even think as an electric shock rippled down my spine, turning me into jelly. His hands roamed over my back, pulling me into him as I stood there unable to even think.

  “I’d try to protect you,” he said, pulling away and brushing the hair out of my face with one hand. “Which is stupid because the last time I checked, you’re the most powerful Dioscuri on the planet. You know it. I know it. Diana knows it. Hell, even Warthor Ein is scared of you,” Caleb said before leaning down until we were eye to eye. “Even the monsters know that. Why else would the Death’s Edge come after you? You think Grollshanks wants to kill you? What a damned laugh. You’d already be dead if that was the case. What he wants, what Grollshanks really wants, is for you to kill him. He only fights people he thinks can kill him. That’s why he left after he beat you.”

  I stumbled away from him partially because of what had just happened and partially because of what he had just said. I mean, he’d just kissed me… and what did I do? I’d let him. I’d have let him do anything. I swallowed, taking a deep breath and trying to still my racing heart as he stared at me, patiently waiting for a response to what he’d said.

  “What does that have to do with anything?” I asked him cautiously. “There is hardly any supernatural activity in my sector. If you stayed there, no one would bother you. You’d be safe.” I left the “with me” part of my statement unsaid.

  “And why the hell do you think that is? You killed a dragon and defeated a master vampire. You think creatures like Ajax,” Caleb said as he grabbed me by the hand and dragged me back into the office. He was suddenly more upset than I’d seen him in a long time. He pointed at Ajax, one finger shaking. “You think they don’t take notice?”

  “It’s true. We take notice when powers like yours claim a territory. I pulled all my people out of your area,” Ajax said, but he wasn’t smiling anymore. “You are the boogieman. The Dioscuri have been saying that if we don’t behave, you’re coming for us. You are on a whole different kind of radar.”

  “The Dioscuri have been doing what?” I asked incredulously. There was no way that was true. Aside from the fact they were touting me like I was some kind of supernatural bad ass, it was a rude thing to do. Sure, the Dioscuri used Warthor Ein like a goddamn boogeyman, but I was a far cry from Warthor ‘I kill dragons for fun’ Ein.

  Caleb shook his head and rubbed his eyes with one hand. “It’s true, Lillim. They are talking about you like you’re vengeance personified.”

  I wanted to laugh, but for some reason, I suddenly felt angry. I’d never once been told I was good enough. Even if I was, there was no way my mother would condone people talking about me like that. She’d put them in their place, wouldn’t she? “Unlikely. That’s not like them. My mother is firmly in the camp of ‘Lillim can’t do anything right.’”

  “The only thing your mother wants to do is keep you safe, Lillim. You think we’re here by accident?” Even as Caleb said the words, horror filled me.

  “Safe from what? Something back home in Lot?” I asked, and with one deft movement I pulled out my shotgun and pointed it at his face. “Are you meaning to tell me we’re here as a distraction? For me?”

  Chapter 13

  Lot was a smoking ruin. Again. The great spires of the central library were on fire. They managed to survive a demon invasion, a civil war, and countless other atrocities, but now the spires were burning, filling the sky with so much smoke, it was nearly a thick black blanket in the air.

  Huge gaping holes were punched in the stone barracks surrounding the central hub of the city. Had someone been firing a cannon or something? Many of the thatched roofs were on fire as the wind carried the blaze toward the center of Lot.

  Lot was built like a fortress of successive rings, each meant to keep the outsiders away from the center of the city. It was where the civilians lived. If they were already able to burn the central library, the Dioscuri were in trouble. It meant the invaders had already breached the civilian quarters.

  All around us, Dioscuri were locked in combat with orcs, hundreds and hundreds of orcs. A giant blue and green portal swirling in the sky above us explained how they could. A magical barrier that prevented entry didn’t really work if you could open a gateway inside it. I couldn’t even tell how big the portal was because legions of the green-skinned, brown-tusked monstrosities were charging out of the portal’s gaping maw.

  “Orcs have been extinct for millennia,” I screamed at Caleb, trying to be heard over the din of combat.

  “We found out that wasn’t true a few weeks ago. Their dimension was only sealed away,” Caleb said, reaching back and pulling out his sword, Incinerator. “And before you ask, no, we didn’t open that portal.”

  “I can’t believe you knew this was coming for weeks and didn’t tell me. I could have—”

  “Done absolutely nothing to stop it,” Caleb interrupted. “That’s why your mother told me to distract you. She doesn’t want you here because you could get killed… like Dirge.”

  “What?” I asked, suddenly confused. “She thinks I’ll blow myself up?”

  “She thinks you might sacrifice yourself to save us all, yes,” Caleb responded. “That’s why I was told to take you after the Blue Prince.”

  “Well I’ve found him now,” I said.

  In the distance, I could see something that vaguely resembled a swirling blue-black tornado sweeping up everything.

  I sprinted into the melee. I still couldn’t believe what Caleb told me. Was it really possible my mother purposely tried to keep me out of this fight? Caleb said it was because my mother thought I might die. Still though, why wouldn’t she want me here to help defend the city… unless this was their last stand? Did my mother think we could lose? On our home turf?

  If that was true, and only Caleb and I were left alive, what would be the point? To repopulate? Bullocks to that. It didn’t matter at that moment, the Blue Prince was going down because at least for now, I knew right where he was.

  He was the only real threat anyway. Realistically, the only thing the orcs had on us was numbers. There was a metric ton of them and only a few of us. Sur
e, we’d get tired before they were all dead, but here on our home turf, Dioscuri could call on tremendous power because the runes set into the city’s streets were designed enhance the power of Dioscuri within its walls. Someone like Caleb or my mother would be like a Greek god of old stomping through armies of mortals. Apparently such things actually happened before. Still there were so many orcs that it seemed unreal.

  An orc as huge as he was disgusting smashed a giant axe down in front of me, splintering the cobblestone road and sending shards of debris flying in every direction. Without even thinking, I poked him in his piggish face and said, “Boom!” Magical energy exploded from my fingertips, slamming into his face and tearing his head from his shoulder in a spray of green blood. I was already past him before his body fell to the ground with a thud.

  I twisted, narrowly avoiding a two-handed sword as it cleaved through the air. I lashed out with the twin blades of Shirajirashii, disemboweling the huge, sword-wielding orc before diving sideways to avoid another brute’s war-hammer. It smashed into the ground, and without even really focusing, I pointed my wakazashi at the behemoth. A jet of red lightning leapt from the tip of my blade and slammed into the orc.

  It howled in pain, reeling back as I took two steps toward it and drove my knee into its crotch. Its eyes bugged out, and it sank slowly to its knees in time to meet my elbow with its face. The orc lifted upward off the ground and flew backward as I whipped around, sheathing my katana, and grabbed hold of the its fallen war-hammer.

  I whirled in an arc and released the massive weapon into the chest of another of the beasts. It stood there dumbfounded for a second as the heavy head of the war-hammer punched through its body and crashed into the creature behind it. The orc took one of those slow-motion moments to feel the hole in its chest before it was swept aside by one of its brethern riding what I could only describe as a winged tyrannosaurus rex. Orcs with dinosaurs… that seemed reasonable.