07- Black Blood Brother

by Morgan Blayde

  Poor thing.

  I reached an opening elevator and stepped on.

  Someone behind me yelled. “You’re not supposed to use elevators in a burning building.”

  I turned and pushed the button for the lobby. “It’s fine. I know where the fire is.”

  The guy said, “Still…”

  I summoned my PX4 Storm and showed him the muzzle.

  “Never mind,” he said.

  As I made the gun vanish, several hotel patrons rushed onto the elevator. The doors closed. The car descended. The elevator was a lot quieter, but speakers in the ceiling did pelt us with Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire.

  I hummed along a moment, then made myself stop. Damn. The song’s stuck in my brain. I hate it when that happens.

  Holding Chrys over my shoulder, I attracted speculative stares, but no one asked me what I was doing. Of course, the answer was rather obvious. And it wasn’t like Chrys was screaming for help.

  I remembered the merc bodies from the bar. She’d dealt with them brutally, with great efficiency. And I still didn’t know exactly how. She could probably do that to me at the drop of a hat. It was something to keep in mind.

  Descending, the doors opened a few times. People approached. My hard glares—packed with murderous intent—kept anyone else from piling in. Eventually, we reached the lobby. Rushing out, I joined the flow of guests toward the front doors.

  Out in the parking lot, I headed for where I’d parked my midnight-blue Mustang. This one had pale blue electrical jags painted on the hood and sides; a little nod toward the fact that, in dragon form, I breathed lightning. I’d actually had storm fey assassins from fairy once try to kill me with lightning. It hadn’t worked out well for them.

  People had been trying to kill me all my life. This no doubt contributed to my usual sunny disposition and deep love for all mankind.

  I set Chrys down by the car.

  She stared into my face. “Are you quietly laughing at some private joke you’re not going to share with me?”

  “Yes. Is that a problem?”

  “No, not really. We all have our secrets. Where are we going?”

  “Not far. The hotel across the street.”

  “Because my womanly power has inflamed your passions and driven you to the edge of control, and you have to take me as soon as possible?”

  I opened the door for her. She slid in and buckled up. I went around and got in behind the wheel. “Yeah, and I want to check out the room used by the mercs.” I gave the magic-enhanced security system of the car a moment to scan my retinas and gave it a thumb print. Just cutting out an eyeball or chopping off a thumb wouldn’t get anyone use of my car. The device also registered lifeforce, having my half-dragon, half-Villager pattern on file.

  She asked, “How will you know which room to go to?”

  “It will be higher than your room, and will have a zip line anchored to something inside. Shouldn’t be too hard to find.”

  “There could be more of these mercs there.”

  “Doubtful. They wouldn’t hang around after everything went to hell on a hit.” I backed out of the space and sent the Mustang rolling toward the street. “Chances aren’t good they’ll have left any clues laying around, but I like to be thorough.”

  “Thorough, while in the grip of my womanly allure which has driven you nearly mad with desire.”

  “Face it woman, I’m hopelessly in lust with you.”

  “You do know that I’m more than perky tits and a pretty face, right?”

  “Yeah, your ass isn’t bad either.”

  “Oh, you silver-tongued devil! Be still my heart.”

  I navigated into the street, across the street, and parked in an underground area. Minutes later we were inside the lobby, at the desk. The female attendant in her white and navy pantsuit stared at Chrys’ fluffy white robe.

  I said, “We had to leave the hotel across the way. It caught on fire.”

  “What!” The woman’s eyes bugged out.

  I read her nametag and used her name to ground her and grab her attention. “Alyse, the important thing is that the misadventure interrupted my recreational activities. Someone will have hurriedly checked out in the last ten minutes from a room in one of the upper floors. The guy probably wore sunglasses and would have gone by the name Smith or Jones. We’ll take that room.”

  “You’re right, Mr. Smithfield and Mr. Jones,” she touched a key card on the counter. “But Housekeeping hasn’t been up there yet to—”

  “Doesn’t matter. I want that room.” I saw she was going to keep arguing. I pulled out a money clip with a wad of bills. Peeling them off, I held up a couple hundreds. “Make it happen.”

  The money vanished from my hand so fast, I had to count my fingers to make sure I still had them all. That out of the way, I scooped up the key card and registered using a fictitious name: Berry M. Deep. “Send up a couple bottles of champagne and some fresh linen. A ladder, too.”

  “A ladder?”

  “I’ll give it back when I’m done.” I held up another hundred.

  She took it and smiled. “Yes, sir. I’ll see to it at once.”

  I nodded and took Chrys’ arm, guiding her to the elevators. Once we were on and heading up, she looked at me. “Berry M. Deep?”

  I shrugged. “Hey, it’s what I do.”

  “What’s with the ladder?” she asked.

  “We might need it, depending on how the zip line is attached on this side. A wire-spool rifle was probably used to fire the line over the street. A bolt would have hit the brick above your window and mechanically anchored itself, or they could have used magic.”

  Now it was Chrys’ turn to stare at me. “I’m getting quite an unconventional education here.”

  I stared back. “They don’t teach Black Ops in grade school to you Villagers? Didn’t your people found the Slayers in this dimension?”

  “That has nothing to do with me. I’m a semi-evil mastermind, not a grunt. I was raised and groomed to follow in my father’s corporate footsteps.”

  “Speaking of which, exactly who is your father?”

  “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

  I didn’t laugh. I knew she wasn’t joking. The Village itself was a secret Villagers killed to protect.

  I said, “But you’d fuck me first, right. Sending me to hell happy, and all that?”

  “Of course! I’m not a complete monster.”

  The elevator opened on our floor. We got out and tracked down our room. She took the card and reached for the door knob. Before she could slide the card and turn the knob, I stopped her, grabbing a wrist.

  “I wouldn’t do that without checking for a trap first. If it were me, I’d have left after wiring the room to explode the next time the door opened.”

  She stared at my hand on her wrist, then the knob. Her face paled as her imagination kicked in. “Oh.”

  I moved her aside. “Better let me handle this.”

  I had a new trick I wanted to try out. I put both hands against the door and leaned against it. The Old Man had raised me to use shadow magic, one of his specialties. I could make swords and knives from shadow. I could create shadow hands to punch people out from a distance or poke them in the eye. This was trickier. I visualized a shadow body inside my physical one. Keeping half of it anchored inside, I let the top half fall forward as if I were diving into a vertical pool. My physical eyes were closed. I used the eyes of my shadow self to see the other side of the door.

  Yep, I was right. A potential boom! Opening the door would break a micro-thin wire. A pack of C-4 and a detonator were hanging from the other side of the knob. I pulled the electrical prongs out of the C-4, tossed it aside, and pulled my shadow torso back into my real body.

  Opening my eyes, I noticed Chrys staring yet again.

  I widened my eyes at her. “What? Don’t tell me you Villagers can’t do that.”

  “Of course we can. We are masters of shadow magic. I just didn�
�t know you were, too. Your file apparently needs upgrading.”

  “You’ve read a file on me?”

  “Trust me, it didn’t do you justice.”

  I opened the door and pushed her in. Following, I closed the door. Alone with her at last, I pulled her into my arms and kissed her until she sagged against me, all but melting.

  I carried her into the living room, and deposited her on the couch, opening the robe like it was a present from Santa. My cock’s voice exploded in my head. At last, my turn for happiness. Bury me deep, boy. Bury me deep!

  FOUR

  “Meeting the parents is always a bad

  idea. They either start thinking shotgun

  wedding or just plain shotgun.”

  —Caine Deathwalker

  From a window in the darkened office, I studied the never-resting city. Beyond the pane, casino lights flickered, luring the stupid and drunk to thicken the ranks of the stupider and drunker.

  My kind of place.

  Las Vegas—Sin City—was a major hub of the Southwest. Despite an on-going struggle between human and not-so-human elements for control, it had been human dominated since Sinatra adopted his trademark fedora. That tension had brought death to this random location—one I borrowed for my own use. There had been a brief, bloody battle here, leaving a dead vampire, a couple minions, and a human in leather that was heavily armed; a Slayer. Idly, I wondered how many Slayers had limped away from this hit.

  I turned back to the office, my dragon-sight making it bright as day. Bodies on the oversized, mahogany desk turned the wood much darker. The gray-tone walls had dark red splatter dripping down them. The smell of blood added a metallic tang to the air. That was how I’d located the place. What better place for a meeting with Villagers?

  Setting is everything when it comes to drama.

  Once here, Chrys had called her dad for me. I’d held the phone to her lovely face since she didn’t have the use of her hands, being all tied up in the big duffle bag I’d brought along. The bag sat on charcoal carpeting that was part of the sterile, industrial look in here. The black-leather-on-metal furniture had managed to avoid the blood spray. The smoke-gray glass coffee table near the duffle bag matched the smoke-gray mini-bar I’d raided.

  Thirst is a terrible thing.

  Finally, I heard the elevator down the hallway ding open. Three sets of footsteps came towards me. The walker in the lead spread his weight perfectly. The closer he got, the harder it was to hear his steps. The other two footfalls sounded light as well, but untrained compared to the first man. Dear old dad, I assumed.

  I put my glass down on the smoke-gray coffee table and reached down to the floor. I opened the huge duffel bag. Chrys glowered, her pupils large and black. A ball-gag muffled her protests. The chain wrapping her shoulder-to-ankle had tiny hexes engraved on each link. She’d let me bind her in the second hour of our love-play, not imagining I possessed anything that could actually hold a Villager.

  I love it when people underestimate me. I flicked the ball-gag and smiled at the girl. “They’re going to love you.”

  I turned to the wooden office door and let my eyes change. The right eye went dragon: yellow fire with a black vertical pupil. The left went black iris and crimson pupil, like my father’s. The door looked normal, but was reinforced with protection spells. The bookcases to each side held law books, human and other, corporate and international.

  I wondered if the approaching Villagers would be more surprised by Chrys in the bag, or by the piled bodies in this borrowed location. I wanted my visitors very off balance.

  The steps in the hall stopped in front of the door. The door opened slowly, spilling hallway light into the office. The man on the threshold smelled like magic and metals, with an undertone of cyanide. His navy-blue suit did little to hide large, dense muscle. He had short black hair, black eyes, and stood six feet. He could have just left the set of an action movie. The truth was far worse. This was a Villager, nothing even close to human.

  And I was banging his daughter.

  Part of me felt like screaming and running like hell.

  An older woman stood behind him. She wore an azure pantsuit that didn’t quite hide two guns under the vest. A teen boy stood at the man’s left. The three resembled Chrys.

  The man’s gray suit had spells woven in the cloth. I felt their oppression directed at me, a crushing surge of force that would have broken a mere human.

  I put my foot into the duffle, on the girl’s throat. She squealed in a muffled way.

  The teen boy lunged but was halted by the big man’s arm. The dad grinned without pleasantness. “Young man, release my daughter and we can discuss this like gentlemen.” His silken voice had magic too, the kind that compels.

  “You think I’ll trust a Villager that easily?”

  Magic rushed in from the hallway, burning my skin like acid. The smell of burnt orange filled my nose and lungs. Blue magic cones came out of walls, ringing me from every corner.

  I said, “Do you think you can kill a tough bastard like me before I dragon-stomp blondie here into the afterlife.”

  He waved a hand. Poison magic mist and floating cones retreated. He came into the room, and waved again. The couch dragged itself closer to him. He sat. Another wave of his hand and a bottle of bourbon floated out of the mini-bar, a glass in hot pursuit. He snagged the bottle and glass out of the air and poured a drink. The bottle he sent floating to the coffee table, offering me a drink.

  The woman and teen outside the room stayed there, tension in every muscle. Their eyes burned holes in me, figuratively speaking.

  “You have me at a disadvantage, young man. You know at least what I am.”

  I summoned a soft, gold glow around my right hand. Jags of electrical fire crawled over my fingers. “You know what this means, right?” A standing order existed among Villagers to watch out for me, and my magic. It was one of the pieces of intelligence the Selene, the Red Lady, had forwarded to me from her undercover position in the Village. It was too bad she’d infiltrated through a dozen hell-dimensions, not going directly through from Earth. The Earth route was my next major objective. There was a gate here in Las Vegas. These people knew where. I wanted to know, too.

  “The Offender. I’ve wanted to meet you for many years. Not this way, of course. What do you want?”

  “Information; who in the Village is working with the silver dragons hunting me?”

  Unspoken questions hung in the hallway. The two out there looked wide-eyed at the big guy. He looked just as shocked.

  “I don’t know. Anyone working with the draconians would be put to death unless under the royal banner, and our lords are above reproach. Well, not your father.”

  “The sperm-donor. He’s no father of mine. Okay, that answer is beyond you. Why don’t you tell me about the portal to the Village?” I slightly nudged the blonde in the duffle. She squealed encouragement to her dad.

  “You won’t survive entering the Village, so I’ll happily tell you how to get there. One of the canal bridges near Venice Beach has an out-of-place dark brick. It is a key. The portal there will take you in.”

  “Great. Don’t do anything rash. Slowly, I’m going to release the girl.”

  I removed my foot, bent down, and pulled away the fragile chains. Their magic was keyed to my touch. I wadded the links into a ball and pocketed them.

  Chrys removed the gag and struggled inside the duffel bag, slipping into the snug, silver-scale dress I’d stuffed in there for her. I hadn’t wanted to embarrass her too much. I had high hopes of fucking her again. Clothed, she dropped the bag and looked at me through veiling lashes, stretching her arms towards the ceiling.

  She smiled as if I hadn’t just put her through hell. “Caine, can we go eat now? I’ve really worked up an appetite.”

  The shimmering blue cones were back.

  The guns from the dead men floated up into the air. They drifted over to threaten me, as did a knee-high mist of navy blue billowing
in from the hall.

  “Our reservation’s not for another hour. I’d thought I was going to have to fight your dad. We’ll get a few drinks first. You just need to make your family stand down. Tell ‘em I’ll pick up the check.”

  Taking her dad was doable. Taking all three didn’t look good. And Chrys might jump in to help her family if they looked seriously endangered.

  She clapped her hands. “Okay, this is over, Daddy, unless you want to piss off the one person who understands your investment portfolio. Good luck surviving the Village elders who’ve invested with us when you can’t find their money.”

  The mist thinned away first, followed by the guns, and finally the floating arrows.

  Chrys said, “Good, let’s go. Dad, you and Mom lead the way.”

  I looked at her, “Just like that?”

  “Sure. I’m not losing you. I’ve examined Clan Lauphram holdings. Your official companies and your shell companies are a fascinatingly complex example legal subterfuge. Your short-sheeting the tax code is a thing of beauty. I want to know more.”

  When the hell did she get a look at our books? And how long has she been into me? Maybe I’ve had a stalker I didn’t know about.

  As her dad strolled off, I called after him. “I’ve fake-kidnapped the scariest person in your family, haven’t I?”

  He laughed. “Apparently. In another year or so, I expect she’ll kick me out of my own multinational corporation.”

  Chrys smiled sweetly at all of us. “Six months, tops.”

  I couldn’t believe myself. Yet again, I’ve dug my grave with my cock. Still doing stupid shit. How is it I always pick incredibly dangerous women to fuck? One day, that’s going to get me killed. Or worse, married.

  Chrys’ parents moved off. Her brother—a sixteen-year old, eyes hard like cobalt ice—stood there, arms crossed, waiting for me to pass.