I can also hear the soft murmuring sound of my love whispering comforts to her.
My best friend is standing next to them beaming at me, and I know that his happiness for us is real and genuine.
This lifts a weight from me I never really understood that I was carrying. I can only hope that it lifts a weight from him as well.
The doctor snaps his fingers a couple of times before he figures out that the nurse isn’t coming back and that he will have to round up his own damn drink.
Which he manages by reaching into yet another pocket for yet another small bottle of booze.
The battle, for the moment at least, is over.
In the aftermath, part of me wants a cold beer.
And the other part, the part that I will have to somehow learn to deal with now, is demanding mead and wenches.
His tone is mercilessly sly and I instinctively know that I will have to guard against his influences. He is Loki, or at least a fragment of him and he will be a force to be reckoned with. I don’t like mead so the bastard better get used to beer.
Marcus solves the dilemenia for now by walking over to the good doctor’s fridge and grabbing both of us a cold beer.
Always have liked that guy.
I drink my cold beer, I shake both my best friend’s hand and the doctors hand, before kneeling down by my love who is cradling our daughter in her arms.
Our daughter, fuck me gently with a chainsaw, we have a daughter.
Then I kiss Genevieve and whisper my love and forgiveness into her ear, as I stroke the bald as a cueball head of our squalling newborn child.
Trust me on this friends,be you human, Warlock, Dabbler or fucking Demigod.
It doesn’t get better than that.
Chapter Seventeen
Odin and I stand just outside of one of the countless entrances to the underground tunnels that are controlled by the Goblins.
With my newfound awareness, I am aware of the disturbing hum of the what the Goblins call their Great Machine powering up.
The sound has a wrongness to it that I am powerless to describe, think fingernails on a chalkboard, times infinity and beyond.
Then just to make it suck even more, add in some Kayne West.
Odin lays a hand on my shoulder and it serves to focus me on why we are here right now.
“You know what must be done.” He says simply and then he steps away and leaves me to it.
I stand alone for a moment and contemplate what I am about to do, I can feel the formidable wards standing between me and the machine that the Goblins have slaved away for centuries to build.
No bragging, but I also know that I can brush them aside with a shrug of my will.
I wish that we could take the time to talk to the reclusive Goblins and explain why we can’t allow them to do what their culture more or less demands that they do.
Whatever the hell that is.
But since we can’t do that, I am here to use force to pull the plug and stop whatever it is that they are doing, before they bring flights of rabid Angels down upon our heads.
The hum of their machine is seductive, it pleads its case in its own way to be allowed to finish the task with what it has been built for. Out of respect, I listen for a few moments before I do what I came here to do.
I bow my head and I broadcast an apology for what I am about to do, even as I gather the power I need to do it.
Odin smiles encouragingly and stands slightly away from me, guarding my back as I savor the sweet rush of power that I gather into a simple shape.
His smile broadens as I fling that shape towards The Great Machine of the Goblins.
I keep adding terrible sounds to my list of terrible sounds, the sounds that will haunt me to my dying day.
The awful wail of Goblin voices, following the magical monkey wrench I threw into the workings of their Great Machine, just pushed itself to the top of that damn list.
My life is so weird now, that I am unsure what God I should ask for forgiveness.
Mission accomplished, well at least for now anyway, This will slow down whatever it is that they are trying to do but it will not end it. I have bought us some time but that doesn’t mean that I have to feel good about it.
Oddly Odin’s approving smack on my back, doesn’t make me feel any better.
Loki enjoyed the show anyway.
Yeah, we aren’t going to be besties.
I look up into the sky with my newly enhanced vision and as I watch all of the flights of Angels peel off and go to wherever they keep themselves.
For now we will call that a win.
Chapter Eighteen
I have a daughter.
Fuck me gently with a chainsaw.
Her name is Pyper.
I had no input into that particular choice, by the way.
Her mother informed me that it was traditional amongst her kind that the mother got to choose the name of the child.
This could, of course be total bullshit, but in the interest of domestic harmony, I have made the choice to go with it.
Call it being supportive.
Call it diplomacy.
Call it utter cowardice .
Don’t really care what you call it, because I love this little person, no matter what her name is, in a way that I never even dreamed was possible.
We brought her cuteness to the Librarian and he did a few tests, that he was obnoxious enough to refuse to share the results of .
It took some of the sting out it that he couldn’t hide the smile on his face, as he talked to us about it.
Always have liked that guy.
Dominique has returned to his pack, he still hates me, but that hatred is tempered at least a little now, by a little gratitude for what we did for him. He asked for no explanation when we returned home with a baby and we offered him none. Before he left, he leaned forward and sniffed at me.
He then looked at me with something almost like respect, before leaving without a word.
The Packmaster isn’t a friend, he isn’t an ally, but maybe at least now, he isn’t a mortal enemy and sometimes that is just as good as it gets.
The Council, still led by Helina Regret, hasn’t approached me yet, but that day is coming. They will want to understand what happened to me and what I am now.
Good luck with that, because I sure as hell don’t understand it myself.
They will be summoning me to appear before them soon, if I was still just a Dabbler they would have done so by now.
But I am not just a Dabbler anymore so they are proceeding cautiously for the moment.
Sooner or later their need to know what I am and what I can now do will outweigh the need for caution.
They will need to determine if I am an new powerful asset that can be exploited to serve their plans, or if I am a new powerful menace to those plans that they will need to deal with.
It is hot tonight so we have taken the stairs to the doorway that we aren’t supposed to have keys to and we are all hanging out on the roof. Classic rock is playing softly on a battered boom box.
My best friend is rocking the cradle with one foot absently, while he pours over stacks of ancient scrolls and assorted magical tomes trying hard to understand what has happened to his best friend. My daughter coos softly at him while he does so.
Figures.
Even newborn girls love him .
Meanwhile I am dancing with my lady love, I whisper some words into the night and suddenly we are floating a few feet above the roof top, spinning in slow lazy circles.
Together we dance.
The Puppet whispered seven words to me before she died.
Each word costing her moments of her dwindling life.
Want to know what the hell they were?
Of course you do.
Well then, here the fuck they are boys and girls.
These are they words that I will share as I take my lady love into my arms and rise to float above this city we are bound to and call home. The
city we just recently had a hand in protecting. The city we will probably be called upon to protect again in the future.
These then are the seven words that I whisper into my love’s ear.
Seven words.
Life Is Short Always Remember To Dance.
Remember them well and whisper them to others, whenever you can.
The End.
I started writing this book over a year ago, I opened it with an active shooter event long before such an event tragically came to pass in Las Vegas. Friends urged me to rewrite the beginning of this book and I seriously considered doing so for awhile. I came to the decision not to, because to change it would alter the course of the plot too much. Please know that I am no way glorifying the violence that has tragically changed the way we perceive Las Vegas, our hearts go out to all affected by the events that took place on that sad and horrible day.
This book has caught our own personal lives in a state of flux, by the time you read this, we will have relocated our household some one hundred and thirty miles away to Ocean Shores, Washington. We have rolled the dice and decided to semi retire here, because from our first visit we fell in love with the place. It would be really helpful if everyone bought lots and lots of our books to help out with the whole semi retiring bit, lol.
So stay tuned friends, more books and more changes coming your way soon. We appreciate each and every one of you readers, you are why we do this thing that we do. Whatever changes in our personal lives, you remain the reason we do what we do. If you see us at a show please do not hesitate to come talk to us, we love our fans!
The usual thank yous, go out to the usual suspects you all know who you are by now. Rita Ohara, you kick serious ass and you are the only person I have ever co written a story with. Micheal Ohara, your taste in beer is questionable, but you rock as a human being.
As always a big thank you to my talented and tireless editor, who also happens to be my lovely wife. You are tasked with the thankless job on making my writing shine, as you wade through the manuscript red pen in hand..
We hope you enjoyed book two of the Dabbler series, give us your input at [email protected]. It is an understatement to say that we love hearing from fans.
Turn the page for a hint at what is to come for this series…
GODS OF SIN CITY
I took my daughter to her first day of daycare today, she is two years old now in human years, My powers are dialed down and I make calm chitchat with the young blonde female at the front desk.
Pyper holds my hand as we fill out the required paperwork, she is on her best behavior.
Which makes me really fucking nervous.
I can feel her voice in my mind asking me endless questions, as her solemn green eyes take in her surroundings.
The woman behind the desk smiles at us blandly, as she goes about the business of signing us up. Her normalcy makes me wonder how good of an idea this is, but I have been outvoted.
Marcus and Genevieve think that it is a good idea to expose her to the normalcy of the human world.
I remain unconvinced.
Things have been quiet since we slapped down the Devil himself and defeated his attempt at claiming our child.
Too quiet.
We keep waiting for the other foot to drop, so to speak.
On more than one front.
The Goblins never acknowledeged what we did to stop their progress on what they call their Great Machine. They simply started building it again. The Angels have retreated to their realm and steadfastly ignore us now.
I am ok with that.
Lucifer hasn’t taken a new form yet to come back to Vegas to vex us.
I am more than ok with that.
Pyper is a blonde little bundle of joyful energy and hasn’t displayed anything like magical ability or powers yet, aside from a weak telepathic connection between her and I, but we know that it is coming.
And if we know that, so do other players in this game.
Those players will have to get past me.
And while that may not be impossible, it is for some complicated reasons a bit harder than it used to be.
To those who want to test that level of difficulty.
The ghost of Loki and I agree on one thing.
Bring it bitches.
The End
Sin City Angels: The Dabbler Novels Book Two Page 7