Crap. This was not going so well. The understatement of the year.
“Destroy the ward, Sammy!” cried Faris as he wrestled with the man for the gun, his face red and twisted with strenuous effort.
No. Ya think?
I recoiled at the loud chatter of gunfire and ducked next to the couch. Bits of cushion rained around me, making it look like snow. Peering over the edge, I could make out two more of the armed men—one behind the kitchen island and the other flat against the wall near the entrance.
I couldn’t see the others. Perhaps they were dead.
Movement behind Faris caught my eye.
Logan threw himself forward, hit the ground, and rolled to a crouched position next to a leather chair near me. Show off. He made it look so easy.
He lifted his gun and shot toward the man in the hallway. The sound cracked like thunder. The man jerked back in a bow of agony with blood splattering from his neck. He fell to his knees with a hand on this throat in an attempt to stop the bleeding. The man raised his gun and shot at Logan. His shot went wild, but he never stopped. His hand shook, the pain visible in his tight posture, but he kept pulling the trigger as fast as he could.
I heard several sharp clicking sounds. Either the gun had jammed or he was out of bullets. Which ended up working for Logan’s favor. The man wavered and then fell flat on his face and didn’t move.
“Lucas!” came the other man’s voice. “Get up!”
Seeing a clearing, Logan made to move toward me—
He jerked back behind the chair as bullets hit the floor, splintering the floorboards where his boot had been. The man vaulted to the kitchen and skidded to a stop next to his fallen friend.
“Lucas!” Pointing his gun at Logan and still shooting, he pressed his other hand against his friend’s neck. He lowered his gun for a second. Though I couldn’t see his face, I felt his anger as he let go, his movements stiff with aggression and the promise of pain.
Then he pointed his gun at Logan and started shooting again. Fear clenched my heart as bullets flew in Logan’s direction, hitting the chair and shredding it like it was made of foam. This wouldn’t last. Logan was trapped. If he moved an inch, he was dead. But if he didn’t get away from the chair soon, he would die.
Crap.
“Any time, now,” shouted Faris with sweat breaking on his brow for the very first time. I had no idea the demon could even sweat.
Since no one was shooting at me at the moment, I took it as a sign to get my witch butt moving.
With my heart thrashing madly, I shoved the couch out of my way and moved to face the ward.
As fast as I could, I wiped my hand across the bloody ward, smearing it and destroying the blood-drawn diamond to sever the magical connection.
The effect was instantaneous.
A sudden sensation of cold, rippling energy washed through me, hammering through my mind like a thousand beating drums. I jerked at the pulling crest of power. It crashed into me, and I cried out as the power from the ward suddenly took all the space inside my core.
I staggered, releasing the energy spindled inside me and forcing it out. Bracing myself, I set my will and let the energy go, leaving me shaking from spent adrenaline.
Brushing the hair out of my eyes, I stared at the mess that had once been a neatly drawn ward. My pulse thrashed in my throat. I was tired, exhausted, sweaty, and shaking—but I’d done it.
The ward was broken.
A wicked smile pulled at my lips. My turn, you sons of bitches.
Gritting my teeth, I vaulted over the couch, spotted the armed man who was shooting at Logan and shouted, “Glacis!”
A rush of invisible power surged through me and blasted out through my hand, hitting the man square in the chest.
He froze, and the gun slipped from his hand, landing with a loud thud on the hard floor. He went down on his side, stiff like the trunk of a falling tree.
I folded my fingers in the shape of a gun and blew the top of my index finger. “Gotcha.”
I turned in time to see a malevolent smile spread across Faris’s face as he yanked the gun from the man’s grip like he’d taken a toy from a small child. “You snooze, you lose.” And then with a blur, he snapped the man’s neck. The man went limp and collapsed to the floor in a tangle of limbs.
When I looked back at Faris, a cigar had appeared in his hand. He bit off the end and spat it to one side. A flame danced on his other hand, and he puffed on the cigar a few times while he lit it. He blew out a ring of smoke and smiled when he caught me staring. “What?” he shrugged and took another puff. “It’s weird. I felt this immensely satisfying release when I broke his neck. It called for a cigar. You know what I mean?”
“No.” I did not want to think about the twisted satisfaction demons got from killing humans, even if this guy had it coming. I crossed the living area to the frozen assassin lying on the kitchen floor.
Logan was next to me in a flash. “What do we do with him?”
“We need him alive,” I panted, slightly relieved at seeing the angel-born without any holes in his pretty skin. I moved to stand over the man and reached down to pull off his black SWAT mask.
I stared at a young guy, maybe eighteen or nineteen years old, with a plain face and large brown eyes.
Crap. He was just a kid.
CHAPTER 11
I didn’t like torturing young men who looked like they had just graduated high school, but he had tried to kill me and my friends. He’d wanted to do it. In my book, that qualified for an ass-whooping.
I spread my lips into a wide smile. “You and I are going to have a chat.”
“You think he’ll talk?” asked Logan as he slipped his gun into his belt holster around his waist that I’d never even noticed. It made me wonder if he had another gun hidden in an ankle holster.
My eyes moved back to the shooter. No half-breed or angel-born energies came from him. Nope. This little boy was all human. It didn’t take an expert to read the fear in the young man’s eyes.
“He’ll talk.”
Anger pinched his eyes. This was going to be fun.
“Ask him about the book,” came the mid-demon’s voice. I turned my head. With his legs crossed at the knee, Faris sat on what was left of one of the sofas. His cigar was perched in his left hand with a drink in the other. Apparently, he had found the liquor cabinet. He was clearly pleased as a cascade of black energy washed over him and his attire shifted to reveal newly ironed and clean clothes.
“Nah. I thought I’d ask him where he got this cute outfit.” God, that mid-demon was infuriating. Dead bodies were strewn everywhere. We’d almost died, and here he was, sitting at his leisure and enjoying the view with a drink. That’s what you got when you made a mid-demon your familiar.
Logan reached down, picked up the man’s gun, and pointed it at him. “Do it.”
I pulled at the power on my sigil rings and chanted, “Confractus glacis.”
A slip of energy washed through me and spilled over the young man. His eyes widened and then he sprang into a crouch, ready to sprint. Then he froze, only to find the barrel of his gun against his forehead.
“Move,” threatened Logan, a bemused expression on his face, “and you’ll be decorating this kitchen with your brain.”
Was it wrong to think he was sexy at this very moment?
“That might actually improve it,” called Faris from the living room, shoots of smoke spilling out of his mouth.
I pointed a finger at Faris. “You. Zip it.” Then I turned on the human. “You. Sit,” I ordered, seeing as he wasn’t moving. “This won’t take long. I promise. Five minutes tops.” And then you are going straight to jail, you murderous piece of human waste.
“Screw you,” spat the young man, though he sat back down on the floor, his eyes wide and filled with a mixture of pure hatred and fear.
“Nice.” I exhaled. “Now. Let’s start with the obvious question. Did you kill Lars?”
The young man g
ave me a smug smile. “You mean, did we gut that old witch? Ya. We killed him,” he added proudly, surprising me and making me feel a little ill. For a moment I thought he was lying, but then he kept talking.
He pulled his face into a pleased, satisfied expression. “We did the world a favor. One less witch in the world is a better one. Magic is the devil’s work. Corrupts the soul.” He made a disgusted sound in his throat and spat on the floor, as though just saying the word magic brought a foulness into his mouth. “Everyone knows… witches are the devil’s children. Just like all you monsters,” he added, staring at Faris who was way too occupied with his drink to care.
“Monsters?” I snickered. “Like I haven’t heard that one before. And here I thought the new generation was supposed to be smarter.” I put my hands on my hips, wondering how long I had until the cops showed up and we had to split. “You’re a walking contradiction. You say you hate witches. Hate magic. But then, one of you had to perform magic to make that ward on the wall,” I said as I pointed to the red smear. “You also needed some serious magical skills to beat Lars. And then you went and decided to sacrifice him to a demon. What’s that, if not magic?”
The young man spat on the floor again, like he was protecting himself from whatever curse it was, just to speak of magic. “You don’t know anything.”
“You’re right. I don’t.” I cocked my head. “Enlighten me.”
With his jaw clenched, he narrowed his eyes in anger. “I’m done talking.”
I pursed my lips. “Hmm. I’m not done yet.” I tapped into my sigil rings, drawing forth just enough magic to have tiny ribbons of fire dance around my fingers. I held up my hand for him to see as yellow and orange flames reflected in his large eyes.
“You can kill me with your witch fire,” said the young man, his tone thick with defiance, “but I’ll be resurrected.” He raised his chin and said, “Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.”
Ok-a-a-a-ay. This was all kinds of crazy.
I looked at Logan. A shrug lifted his shoulders. “I’m a warrior. I’m not versed in scripture.”
“That’s from the bible,” said Faris, smoke billowing from his lips. “John chapter eleven, verse twenty-five.”
I raised my brows. “You know the Bible?”
Faris creased his face in bewilderment. “Of course, I know the Bible. Every demon knows the Bible.”
Right. Stupid me. “What does it mean, exactly?”
The mid-demon took a sip of his drink in a casual gesture. “It means he believes his faith will resurrect him. If you… let’s say… cut off his head, he will be resurrected. Well, that’s what he believes will happen to him.”
I wiggled my fingers, letting the fire coil around them like rings. “Will it work?” I asked, wondering if this was celestial magic.
Faris leaned back into the sofa. “No idea. You need to ask God.”
I frowned at the demon before turning back and looking down at the young man. “Your faith and your beliefs are your own. I really don’t care what you believe. But when your beliefs start affecting innocent lives… that’s where I have a problem.”
“Die, bitch,” hissed the young man.
Logan smacked him across the face with his gun and sent him sprawling on the floor.
“Watch your mouth, boy,” said Logan. “I’m not as patient as Samantha.”
The stranger rocked back and faced us. He grinned, and sheets of blood covered his teeth.
I leaned closer, making a show of my magic. “You’re human. But you can see magic and the supernatural elements around you. I gather you and your dead friends can all see the supernatural. Right? I’ll take your silence as a yes.” Humans that could sense and see the supernatural were rare, but it happened. “So, you’re a freak of nature, just like us.”
He bared his teeth in a snarl. “I’m nothing like you, you devil bitch. I’m not the devil’s spawn. You are.”
“You offered Lars as a sacrifice to the demon Naberius. Why?” I questioned, seeing as he seemed to be willing to cough out some information without the need for me to burn him.
The young man stared at me.
“What book did you take from the Gray Council vault?” I tried again.
This time, the young man blinked and said, “A very old one.”
Smartass. “What does the book have to do with Naberius? Does the book belong to him?”
He spat blood from his mouth onto the floor. “No.”
“What does a group of human thugs have to do with a demon like Naberius? What did he promise you? Eternal life? Power? Money? Women?”
“My money’s on women,” came Faris’s voice from the sofa. “What’s money, when you can have the most beautiful women in the world?”
The young man chuckled. Blood trickled down the side of his mouth. He wasn’t taking me seriously. Now I was getting angry. I placed my hand on his shoulder, and my fire magic burned through his clothes, licking his skin.
He howled in agony as he fell forward on his hands and knees. The air stank of burnt hair and charred fat. It rose to my nose, reviving my memories of my flesh burning. Fire and pain were old buddies. I pushed them back. This was too important to let my feelings get in the way.
I pressed harder. “Tell me about the book! What’s so important about it? Why do you want it?”
The young man cried out in pain, his arms and legs shuddering, but I wouldn’t let go.
I felt Logan tense next to me. If he was going to stop me, there’d be a problem. If he couldn’t handle it, he should leave. I needed answers.
“Who do you work for?” I cried, my magic biting into his flesh. “Why did you try to kill us? Answer me!”
The young man collapsed to the floor on his side, sobbing in pain.
“If you tell me about the book, the pain will stop. I promise.” All true. I did not want to keep going. Please, just tell me what I want to know.
A strangled cry erupted from him. “You’re all going to die. All of you. Magic is going to die.”
“What? What do you mean?” I waited a moment longer. “Fine.” I let go of my magic, and the fire along my fingers vanished. “You won’t talk to me now. Let’s see how long that’ll last when the Gray Council shows up. This is nothing compared to what they’re going to do to you. You should have talked to me,” I said, wondering if I should have asked him for his name. “I could have saved you a few fingers and toes. It’s going to get really ugly for you, kid.”
The young man rolled back on his knees. “I ain’t going to some devil’s prison.” He started to shake in fear… or maybe hatred. I didn’t know. “I’m not. Never. You can’t infect me. My soul is pure. The devil shall not take it.”
“Dude, you need to stop smoking that crack,” came Faris’s voice. “Trust me, we don’t want your soul.”
Before I knew what was happening, the young man clamped down hard with his jaw. White foam spilled from his mouth as he keeled over. His body thrashed and convulsed like he was having a seizure.
Oh. Hell. No.
“Damnit. Hold him!” With my hands, I pried open his mouth, my fingers slipping over a mix of foam and saliva as I searched for the cyanide pill. I slipped my fingers around his teeth, under his tongue. Nothing. The idiot had swallowed it.
“Step back,” I ordered. “I’m going to induce vomiting.”
“Now, that’s entertainment,” cheered Faris.
I took a breath and tapped into my sigil rings—
But then the young man stopped moving. A single breath escaped from his lips, and then the light faded from his eyes.
He was dead.
CHAPTER 12
I leaned against the wall with my arms crossed over my chest as I watched the Gray Council’s cleanup crew take pictures, categorize the crime scene, and bag the bodies of the dead humans. The cleanup crew was a mix of male and female half-breeds. But unlike the gray uniformed GHOSTS, they wo
re light blue hazmat-looking suits equipped with medical briefcases.
The New York City cops never showed up. Either Lars had put up some serious soundproof wards on the exterior of his home, or his apartment was designed with top-of-the-line soundproof walls.
I called the Gray Council immediately after the young man had killed himself. I’d never actually called the Council before, and after describing the events to the secretary, she’d put me on hold for about two minutes. Then she came back on the line to tell me a cleanup crew was on the way and to wait for the Gray Council member named Irva.
The Council’s cleanup crew had showed up about fifteen minutes after my phone call. Initially, I’d been impressed. But after more than an hour of prodding and taking samples, Lars was still suspended in the air by those chains. That left me with a sour feeling in my gut. The right thing to do would have been to take him down. Why were they leaving him hanging like that?
“Are you planning on waiting here all night?” Faris leaned on the wall next to me. “It’s Saturday night. We should be dancing and drinking and having sex. Not sharing air with these half-breed CSI.”
I glanced at the time on my phone and slipped it back into my bag. “It’s past three in the morning. Most clubs are closed at this hour.”
“Most, but not all.” Faris let out a loud sigh. “What’s Boy Scout doing in there, by the way? We’ve already seen the dead witch. What’s more to see?”
“Apparently, lots.” I looked over to Lars’s bedroom past the bullet-embedded frame. I couldn’t see anything but walls and the shredded doorframe. Logan had gone in with Irva the moment she’d arrived on the scene, and that was a half-hour ago.
The sound of hushed conversation coming from the room fueled my anger, making me dizzy with the added tension and nerves.
Worse, I felt like an idiot waiting. I hated waiting. The longer I stood out here, the darker my mood. What fed my temper was that I had no idea what they were talking about. I had called the Gray Council. This was my case. And yet Irva had barely glanced my way while ordering Logan to follow her into Lars’s room.
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