It took the Shadow a moment before she could answer. She threw back her head and laughed, the sound high and pure on the desert air. And then, as quickly as it had come, the laughter died. “Why, do you not think I’m up to it?”
Billy shook his head. “No, no, nothing like that. But there might be a lot of them, and besides, everyone needs a helping hand sometimes.”
Scathach straightened and quickly reached down for the nunchaku on the floor by her feet. The chain connecting the two short lengths of wood rattled as she picked it up.
“Something wrong?” Billy glanced in the rearview mirror. They were the only car on the long, straight Interstate 15.
“We’ve got company,” Scathach said quietly. She pointed off to her side of the road with the blunt end of the nunchaku.
For a moment, the immortal saw nothing, and then a dozen red and golden circles briefly flared before vanishing. “Coyotes?” he asked.
Scathach shook her head. “Too big. Wolves.”
“There are no wolves in this part of California.”
“Exactly.”
He peered out into the night. “Where are they?”
“They’re here.”
The road curved slightly and the Thunderbird’s headlights picked out four huge gray wolves sitting up ahead at the edge of the highway. As the lights washed over their snouts, their eyes glowed golden.
“I’m guessing these are not natural,” Billy said quietly.
“What do you think?” Scathach asked. She leaned back so that Billy could look across her. The wolves were loping silently alongside the car, keeping pace with it.
Billy checked the speedometer. “We’re doing seventy-five miles an hour. What kind of unnatural are they?”
“Cucubuths. Shape-changers. Abominations. They’re the spawn of a vampire and one of the Were clans. Can you see their auras?”
Billy squinted into the night. Wisps of smoke curled off the running wolves. “Dirty gray?”
“In their human form, they will have tails, but their auras will always reveal them.”
“Will they attack?”
“No. They’re merely monitoring our progress.”
“So we’re expected.”
“I am expected,” she clarified.
“You said your friend was being held captive by vampyres.”
“I did.”
“So who told them you were coming?” Billy asked. “And coming down this road?”
The Shadow shook her head. The same thoughts had been running through her head.
“Sounds to me like you’re riding into a trap,” Billy murmured.
“It wouldn’t be the first time.” Scathach showed her vampire teeth. “And I’m still here.”
9.
The apartment took up the entire top floor of one of the newest towers in Las Vegas. The walls were entirely glass, offering a 360-degree vista of the city and the surrounding desert landscape. And while every room in the hotel and casino below had been decorated to the most particular specifications, the penthouse was unfinished. Snaking loops of wire curled from the metal ceiling joists, the supporting columns were bare metal and the concrete floor was still covered in thick sheets of plastic. Workmen’s tools were piled in one corner of the huge room, cans of paint and ladders in another.
The golden-haired young man in the impeccably tailored black suit was reflected in the dirty floor-to-ceiling windows. Opening a sliding door, he stepped out onto a broad curved balcony. Far below him, spread out in a glittering sweep of color, lay Las Vegas. He loved this view. There were taller buildings in Vegas, more spectacular hotels and casinos, but none of them had this view. The apartment had been chosen and designed to allow him to look out over the city he secretly ruled, but he’d stopped construction midway to completion. Before it could be finished, there was something he needed to do. Someone he needed to kill.
Bitter memories soured his expression, making his beautiful face ugly and cruel. Maybe when the night was over, he would be able to call in the builders to complete work on the apartment. Stepping back inside, he looked around. He knew exactly how this room would be: pure white. White Italian marble would be laid on the floor, and tiny spotlights in the ceiling would outline the constellation Cygnus. In some Eastern and African cultures, white was the color of mourning. He would keep this room as a shrine to the memory of the woman he had once loved … before she betrayed him.
Suddenly, the dry, gritty air was touched with an indefinable musky scent and he felt a vibration. He adjusted his tie the instant before a shape stepped out of the shadows behind him.
“She’s coming.” The creature spoke in the ancient language of the Celts.
The young man turned and spread his arms wide. “Morrigan, Great Queen,” he said in the same tongue. “It is good to see you.”
Pale-skinned and dark-haired, the woman had a narrow, angular face, with prominent cheekbones and a pointed chin. Her eyes were hidden behind small black circular glasses. The Morrigan was dressed from head to foot in figure-hugging black leather. An ornate corset was studded with silver bolts and bars, giving it the appearance of a medieval breastplate, and her leather gloves had rectangular silver studs sewn onto the backs of the fingers. The gloves had no fingertips, which allowed the Elder’s long black nails to show. She wore a heavy leather belt decorated with thirteen round shields, and draped over her shoulders was a shimmering cloak made entirely of ravens’ feathers. The ancient Irish had called her the Crow Goddess. She was worshipped and feared throughout the Celtic lands as the Goddess of Death and Destruction.
The man caught her right hand and bowed over it, pressing his lips to her cold flesh. “Thank you for coming.”
The Morrigan stood at the window and looked down over the city. Even in the early hours of the morning, it was a kaleidoscope of lights. “Are you sure you want to go through with this?”
The young man blinked in surprise. “I never thought I’d hear you say that.”
“I’ve known The Shadow a lot longer than you. I have followed her down through the millennia in this world and the other Shadowrealms. She is fearless and deadly.”
He turned to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Morrigan. Pulling a white handkerchief from his pocket, he ran it over the glass. The white cloth came away smeared with black, and he tossed it aside. “Ah, but we have a huge advantage.” The Morrigan glanced sidelong at him, razor-thin eyebrows raised in a silent question. “We have the element of surprise,” he continued. “Scathach believes she is coming here to rescue me.” He laughed and his breath created a moist circle on the glass. “And in that moment of surprise lies her doom. I will have my revenge.”
“Revenge is always a dangerous game,” the Morrigan said quietly. She slid open a door and stepped out onto the balcony. A waft of sour, dry heat accompanied by a dull, buzzing rumble of traffic washed in from the city below. Then, climbing onto the rail, the Crow Goddess launched herself into the night, soaring high over the never-sleeping city.
Uninterested in the Morrigan’s flight, the young man turned away from the window, slid a flat black phone from his shirt pocket and hit a speed dial number. The phone was answered on the first ring. “She’s coming,” he announced. “Remember, the red-haired female is mine and mine alone. Any companions are yours.” His smooth, handsome face turned bestial. “If she is harmed by anyone other than me, my vengeance will be terrible.”
10.
The lights of Vegas bloomed on the horizon, a glowing stain against the waning night.
“Decision time,” Billy said. “Where are we going?”
“We?” Scathach asked.
“We. I’ve decided I’m going to hang around for a while. Just in case you need a hand.”
“It is a very sweet offer,” Scathach said, sounding genuinely moved. “But if you stay with me, you will end up dead. Everyone does. It’s one of the reasons I don’t have a companion.”
“I’m not that easy to kill,” Billy said. “Trust m
e, a lot of people have tried and failed. I’m still here and they’re not.”
“It’s your decision. I can’t be responsible for you,” Scathach said, her voice turning cold.
“I wouldn’t want you to be,” Billy said. “I’ve been responsible for myself for my entire life. This is my decision.”
“As you wish.” The Shadow turned away and looked back outside at the cucubuths still keeping pace with the car.
“ ‘As you wish’?” Billy said. “That’s it? No arguments?”
“Would you listen to me if I argued?”
“No.”
“Would you obey me if I told you to leave me alone and head back to San Francisco?”
“No.”
“Exactly, so what’s the point in arguing?”
“There is none.” Billy grinned. “I’m sticking right here. I have a feeling that hanging around with you might be fun.”
Something like a smile curled Scathach’s lips. “Fun. I don’t believe anyone has ever said that to me before. You know something,” she added, reaching for the nunchaku on the floor, “these cucubuths are really starting to irritate me!”
Without warning she leapt from the moving car.
Billy stood on the brakes, locking the tires. The heavy car fishtailed down the road, rubber screaming and smoking. By the time he came to a stop, Scathach had landed in the middle of the startled creatures. Instinctively, one lashed out at her, dagger-sharp curled talons hissing through the air toward her face. The Shadow moved her head a fraction and the claws missed her; then the heavy end of the nunchaku shot out to hit the creature between the eyes above its long wolf’s snout. It fell without a sound. A second threw himself at her, transforming from a wolf into a man in midair. The nunchaku struck him down, and as he fell, Scathach caught him and flung him into another creature. They tumbled into the dirt together, yelping and barking like dogs. The Shadow’s nunchaku whirled around her in a buzzing blur and then connected with both creatures’ skulls. They crashed back into the dry undergrowth and lay still.
“You should not have done that,” another of the monsters lisped, its tongue struggling to make sounds in a mouth never designed for human speech.
Scathach whirled. She was facing three huge cucubuths. They were caught halfway between their human and wolf forms: a wolf’s head on a human body, animal claws on the end of muscular human arms. The biggest creature dangled a length of chain, while its two companions carried clubs.
“You cannot take all of us,” the creature said.
Scathach laughed, her face rippling through a change that revealed the beast beneath the flesh. “Oh yes, I can.”
Suddenly, the three creatures were lit up by approaching red lights. The Thunderbird appeared, engine howling as it backed toward them at high speed. Brakes screamed and the car rocked, sliding sideways, slamming into the three cucubuths. Two were catapulted off into the night, while the biggest was shoved straight toward the Shadow. Her nunchaku whirred and the creature stopped as if it had run into a wall. It folded to the ground at Scathach’s feet.
Billy launched himself out of the car and darted around to examine the passenger side. The door was buckled and there was a deep indentation on the front wing. He pulled a handkerchief out of his back pocket and rubbed furiously at the longest of the scrapes.
“I don’t think it’s going to rub out,” Scathach said gently. “That was a very brave thing you did. Great driving, too.”
“Get in the car,” Billy snapped. “We’re going to Vegas. I’ve stripped inches of rubber off the tires, and do you know what a new door for one of these costs? Someone is going to pay for that.”
11.
Elvis—fat, white-suited Elvis—was standing on the sidewalk across the road from the Las Vegas Wedding Chapel of the Bells. Marilyn Monroe, wearing a badly fitting white dress, was leaning against him. Both looked as if they had been out all night. Marilyn was wearing a Just Married sign around her neck.
“That’s the third Elvis we’ve seen so far,” Billy said, grinning. “And always the jumpsuit-and-rhinestones Elvis.
“Say, you don’t know if he was ever made immortal, do you?”
Scathach shook her head. “I have no idea. No, that’s not true. I do know—because I sang with him once,” she said absently, “and I would have known if he was immortal. So no, he wasn’t.”
Billy was so startled, he almost ran a red light at Sahara Avenue. “You sang with Elvis?” He turned in the seat to look at the red-haired girl. She had rested her elbow on the window and her chin was in her palm, long fingers touching the side of her face. She would never be called beautiful, Billy knew, and yet, in the kaleidoscopic wash of lights from the Las Vegas strip, she was striking.
“I was a backup singer. It was a long time ago.”
Billy shook his head. “I had plans to see him in Indianapolis in ’77, but something came up and I couldn’t go. I’ve got all his albums on vinyl, though.”
“I’m more of a Dean Martin fan myself.”
“Don’t tell me you sang with him, too,” Billy said breathlessly.
“Twice,” Scathach said. “Once in this very town, back in 1964.”
They were almost opposite the Sahara Hotel when Scathach abruptly straightened. She’d spotted a figure sitting on the bench inside a bus shelter. “Pull in here,” she said very quietly.
The figure stood and Billy squinted. “It’s someone wearing a superhero cloak.” He watched the warrior slide a long, narrow dagger out of its sheath and hold it flat against her arm. “I’m guessing it’s not a superhero cloak.” And then he saw who was standing by the side of the road. “Try not to do any more damage to the car,” he muttered as he pulled into the Buses Only zone and stopped.
The Morrigan stepped out of the shadows of the bus shelter and examined the indentations in the car door. “Those cucubuths are tougher than they look,” she said. As she spoke she opened her mouth in a smile, revealing sharp teeth.
“You were watching us,” Scathach said.
The Morrigan pointed a black-nailed finger upward. “I was around. It’s a shame about the damage. It should never have happened,” she added. “But it’s your own fault: you should never have engaged the cucubuths. They were ordered to leave you alone.” She leaned forward to look squarely into Billy’s face. “Good evening, Billy.”
“Evening, ma’am. Or should that be good morning?”
“I see you’ve met,” Scathach said.
Billy nodded. “The Morrigan is an old friend of Quetzalcoatl—my master. She’s come a-calling once or twice.” Although he kept his face expressionless, he was unable to disguise the distaste in his voice.
“It is not too late for you to turn back, Billy. Siding with this”—the Morrigan paused, looking for the correct word—“this creature would be a mistake.”
“That’s what she said.” Billy grinned. “And I didn’t listen to her, either.”
“And while the cucubuths are under instructions to leave the Shadow alone, the same protection does not extend to her companions.”
Billy laughed. “I ain’t afraid of no dogs.”
“You should be,” Scathach and the Morrigan said simultaneously.
“Since when did you two become my mother?”
The Morrigan glanced up and down the street, then folded her arms and leaned casually against the side of the car. She looked down at Scathach. “I seem to remember that you were told you would die in an exotic location.” She deliberately spoke in English for Billy’s benefit.
“I’m not sure Las Vegas counts as exotic,” Scathach answered. “It only thinks it’s exotic.”
“You will die here, Shadow. Before the sun rises.”
The red-haired girl shrugged. “So, I take it you know why I’ve come?”
“I do.”
“Is it true, then? Is he here?”
The Morrigan blinked her black eyes and then she nodded. “He’s here.”
“A prisoner of the vampyre
s?”
“The blood drinkers are everywhere.”
“And you—why are you here, Morrigan?”
“Oh, Scathach,” the Crow Goddess said, reverting to the Irish language. “I was there at the very beginning, all those centuries ago. It is only fitting that I should be here at the end. I will give you a proper burial and sing the old songs over your corpse.”
“I’d really prefer that you did not.”
Scathach and the Morrigan eyed each other silently, and finally Billy cleared his throat. “Ladies,” he asked, “are we going to sit here and chat all night?”
The Morrigan tossed a scrap of paper at Billy, who deftly caught it in his right hand.
“It’s the address of an as-yet-unopened hotel and casino,” the Morrigan snapped. “Drive around the back and into the garage.” She smiled at Scathach, and a dark hunger flickered behind her eyes. “You will find what you are looking for on the top floor,” she said in English, and then continued in the ancient language of Danu Talis. “I will come for your corpse after your defeat.” She looked at Billy. “Take her there now … and if you value your immortal life, turn around and drive away.”
“See you on the top floor,” Billy said cheerfully.
The Crow Goddess glared at the immortal. “You won’t even get past the lobby.” She stepped back into the shadow of the bus shelter, and her form warped and changed. Billy pulled away from the curb as the huge birdlike figure took to the sky in a slow ascending spiral.
They drove down Las Vegas Boulevard toward the garish lights of the enormous hotels and casinos. After a few moments Billy broke the silence.
“So what’s the plan?” he asked.
“I don’t plan. Anyone in my way can either step aside or I will step over them.”
“You’re my type of girl,” the immortal said admiringly.
Scathach laughed. “Oh, Billy. I’m a ten-thousand-year-old vampire. I am most definitely not your type of girl.”
Billy’s cheeks suddenly reddened. “I was talking about planning. I—I’m not that big on planning myself,” he stammered. “I wasn’t suggesting anything else.…”
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