I understood the fate the vault had in store for us. It would drown us in a pool of blood.
As these thoughts tumbled through my adrenalized mind, Sanchez’s voice finally broke through the static.
“What's happening in there? You guys alright?
Nothing could have been further from the truth.
“Hang on, I hear footsteps. Shit, I think we missed somebody.” I could hear Sanchez snapping back the safety of his pistol. An instant later, the gun went off. One shot after another. The man was emptying his whole magazine into the new arrival. The gunfire died away to be replaced with Sanchez’s screams. He sounded more like an animal than a human being, the screams filling me with terror. Despite the blood pool rising around me, I was almost relieved to be inside the vault instead of out.
We weren’t alone in the bank any longer. Maybe we never had been. Who knows what entities protected this place in addition to the human guards Dimitri’s crew had taken out?
If they were even human to begin with, a voice added in my mind.
I was gripped with a terrible idea. Even if through some miracle we managed to break out of the vault, something far more terrifying would be waiting for us outside. Judging by everyone’s pale, scared expressions, we had all come to the same conclusion. Sanchez was by himself and inexperienced when it came to facing demonic creatures. I, on the hand, had spent my days duking it out with monsters. Over the years I’d dispatched things that would have made most people’s hair turn white. I had my own premature grays to prove it. Whatever was out there, I could handle it.
At least that’s what I had to believe.
Mind made up, I waded through the waist-high blood and fought my way to the door. Normal means wouldn’t be able to breach the sealed exit. Fortunately, I had a few tricks up my sleeve. Literally.
I held up the Seal of Solomon as I advanced toward the door, my hand coated with blood. I was reminded of the blood rain that had swept the Cursed City during Marek’s infernal ritual. That day felt distant in my mind, as if it had all happened years earlier. So much had changed in so short a time. Skulick was a broken man, and Archer was struggling to regain her humanity. They needed me. If I didn’t make it out of this vault of horrors, I’d never be able to put things right with the people I loved.
I reached the exit and took a deep breath. Magic had sealed the door, so perhaps magic would open the vault. I hoped the mystical power contained within the ring would succeed where the others had failed.
I saw the rising panic in the explosives expert’s eyes as I shouldered Max aside. At this point, he probably was ready to use whatever charges he had left and try to blow the door open. I doubted it would work without killing us in the process.
“What are you going to do?” he said, his voice cracking.
Watch and learn, I thought. I started pounding the metal with my fist, making sure the Seal of Solomon made contact with the mystically charged vault door before my knuckles. It rained sparks almost as if I was using a welding torch. Neither Skulick or I could wield any real magic, but some of our relics and talismans were infused with ancient power. I was gambling that the bank’s black magic might not react well to the white magic stored inside my ring.
Lucky for all of us, I turned out to be right. The vault door started to tremble and vibrate, and a greenish light crackled across its surface. A popping sound filled the vault as cracks started to form in the steel.
The blood finally reached my shoulders, and my movements became sluggish as I fought against the liquid. A few of the others were shorter than me, and they’d already been lost in the blood. Haru and Shoji were gone. Norton was trying to climb the wall of safety deposit boxes, heedlessly scrambling over the mercenaries in his panic. Vittoria’s eyes met mine an instant before she went under, and something passed between us, an unspoken communication without all the bullshit posturing and game playing from before.
For a moment my nose stayed above the surface, desperately gasping for air. Then my world turned crimson.
The syrupy, thick substance engulfed me. I felt like an insect caught in gooey amber. Blood filled my nostrils, coated my eyes. Blind and deaf, I had no idea what was happening to me. Driven by desperation, I kept hitting the vault’s locking mechanism with my magical ring. Again and again…I would keep on doing this until I ran out of air…
Suddenly I felt myself moving as a force swept me forward. The vault door must be open, I thought as I was flushed out of the vault. Suppressing a scream, I was flung into the adjacent antechamber in a fountain of red. All of us now lay on the red carpeted floor of the antechamber, coated with blood, coughing and gasping.
After a disoriented beat of catching my bearings, I stumbled back to my feet. The floor was slippery, and I fought back my revulsion the best I could. I found Vittoria among the red-coated team members and offered her a hand. She gratefully accepted it.
Another figure rose back to his feet. Dimitri oozed rage and aggression, a man of blood and fire, demonic in his own way.
I scanned the antechamber. The other bank robbers were still on the ground, shell-shocked and disoriented from the literal bloodbath.
I continued my inspection of the antechamber and found the man who had been separated from us when the vault door closed. Sanchez lay on his back, lifeless eyes transfixed to the ceiling. His skin had been stripped off his body, revealing bloody musculature and bone.
Norton made his way over to us and pointed a shaking finger at the corpse. “Who could've done this?”
Not who. What.
Dimitri scraped a hand over his head. “We must've missed one of the guards.”
I rolled my eyes. “Does this look like something a guard would do?”
“I-if it wasn't a guard...” Norton stammered.
Shoji interrupted them and pointed up at the now-moving security cameras. Apparently both the infernal and mortal security systems were back online.
“What the fuck did the old man get us into?” Shoji said, his voice humming with dread.
I exchanged a long look with Vittoria.
“Just a suggestion, but perhaps we should get our asses moving,” I said.
“I’m calling in the chopper,” Vittoria said.
I nodded, distracted. I wasn’t worried about our ride just yet. I was more concerned about getting out of this place in one piece. The blood in the vault and the attack on Sanchez were just the opening salvo. The bank’s occult defense systems were getting warmed up.
I turned to Vittoria. “I want my gun back. Now.” I expected her to hesitate, but she quickly handed me Hellseeker. It gave off a faint glow, as it always did when evil was present. It felt good to be armed, but one magical pistol wouldn’t be able to stop a horde of murderous demons.
I glanced back into the blood-coated vault, and my heart hitched into my throat. The door was halfway open but the figure lurking just beyond was intimately familiar to me.
Cyon winked at me, a mocking grin on his gaunt face.
13
I couldn’t believe it. How could Cyon be here of all places? It was impossible. My mind had to be playing tricks on me.
As if in a trance, I made my way back toward the vault. I didn’t care that I might be walking into a trap. Didn’t care about the looks I was getting from the other members of the group. All that mattered was confronting the demon so I could make sense of what was happening.
My shoes squished as I stepped onto the blood-covered floor. I tried not to look at the flayed corpse as I passed, but it didn’t matter. That image was etched on my mind’s eye forever.
By the time I arrived in the vault chamber, the demon had once again vanished.
This game was getting old. Had I imagined the whole thing? I flashed back to my strange vision of the demon back at the museum when I faced Khafet. He’d seemed so real.
My eyes scanned the blood-covered floor. The only footprints in the sticky red substance were my own. Nothing suggested that the demon had ever been h
ere. My attention turned to the wall of safety boxes where Cyon had stood a moment ago. The hilt of a sword sheathed in a leather scabbard now poked from an open safety box.
I warily removed the weapon. Glyphs and mystical symbols adorned its surface. What sort of sword would be kept under lock and key inside the devil’s bank?
My scar hummed and I realized the blade inside was infused with powerful magic. White magic, judging by the sense of deep calm washing over me. I didn’t detect any deception or malevolence coming from the blade, only a fierce sense of justice and goodness. Crazily enough, it made sense—at least in the world I lived in. The forces of darkness would want to safeguard a sword that could slay their kind. What didn’t make sense was why Cyon would guide me to it.
If he’d been here at all. My blood-stained fingers closed around the sword’s hilt, and I drew it from the leather scabbard. Energy pulsed and flowed from my wrist into my arm, the drawn steel humming with an undeniable power. I was reminded of the magical energy found within Hellseeker but the power contained within the steel felt even stronger. A series of glyphs, whose exact meaning I couldn’t decipher, lit up across the surface of the blade.
Had the sword used the image of Cyon to get my attention? Perhaps the magic contained within the weapon had identified me as a demon hunter. Maybe it hoped I would liberate it from this prison. The evil magical relics inside our vault back at the Cursed City wanted to be set free so they could wreak havoc upon the world of man. This weapon of light wanted to return to the world as well so it could strike down evil. And it had chosen me to wield it.
Footsteps rang out behind me. I slid the sword back into its scabbard and turned toward Vittoria as she stepped up to the vault door. Unlike me, she wasn’t foolish enough to enter the chamber.
“What is it?” she asked. “Raven?”
I shook my head, beyond an explanation. I slung the scabbard over my back, its strap biting into my shoulder. I wasn’t used to carrying a thirty-pound blade but despite the discomfort, there was no question about leaving it behind. I knew I needed to bring this sword along, knew it was of grave importance.
I wordlessly stepped out of the vault. The team studied me with wary expressions, their curiosity mixed with suspicion. I could tell they regarded me with a newfound level of respect. After all, I’d saved their lives. They were beginning to realize that I might be their best shot at leaving this cursed bank in one piece.
“Let’s get out of here!” I declared, my voice vibrating with a strength which surprised even me. It was almost as if I was drawing power from the sword. Instead of being worried by this development, I only experienced an all-encompassing sense of relief. I’d found a new ally that literally had my back. Suddenly I didn’t feel like some helpless pawn in Vincent Taske’s game any longer.
I was in charge now.
Vittoria watched me for a moment, her eyes widening as they swept over the hilt peeking above my shoulder. “Is that a sword?” she asked, clearly hoping I might elaborate about the mysterious weapon. Realizing no explanation was forthcoming, she spoke into her headset. “Chopper one, can you read me? There's been a new development.”
The radio hissed. “Who is this?”
Impatience flitted over Vittoria’s face as she answered. “Who the hell do you think it is? It’s me, Vittoria.”
A beat of silence and then the pilot said, “That's impossible...”
“What are you talking about?” Vittoria asked.
“You can't still be in the bank,” the nervous, trembling voice on the headset continued. The pilot’s initial confusion was giving way to something that sounded a lot like terror.
“What are you talking about?”
“You and the others are here with me in the chopper.”
“What?”
“I'm looking right at you!”
“Is this a joke?” Vittoria’s voice was trembling now too.
“Oh, fu—”
The pilot never finished his last words. His voice exploded into a series of bone-chilling screams. They were rapidly drowned by bestial, inhuman roars. I heard the clash of a violent struggle, the unnerving sound of rending flesh. And then the headset mercifully went dead. Vittoria exchanged disturbed glances with everyone else.
“Oh, Jesus. What just happened?” Max said. “Did we just lose our ride out of here?”
It sure sounded that way, I thought. I remained strangely calm and centered.
Armed with the sword, I felt like I could take on the whole underworld. Let the demons attack! I was ready.
Stop it, I urged myself. False bravado will get you killed. A magical weapon might offer a fighting chance, but this was the devil’s bank. Stealth and speed were what I required now to survive.
“We need to get out of here. Now!” I said. Not even Dimitri protested.
The team rapidly snatched all their equipment, and we started making our way down the corridor. The plan was to get back to the office where we’d first entered the bank, climb the rope, and use the snowmobiles to head back up the mountain’s tunnel system. With the chopper most likely compromised, we would be stranded on the mountain. But right now, our most pressing concern was getting out of this accursed place. Once outside, we could re-strategize and consider our options.
We had barely reached the antechamber’s exit when the whir of a security camera caught my attention. A freaked-out Haru charged past me and blasted the camera with a handgun. It rained sparks and plastic fragments. Most of us had flinched at the sudden sound, but now we turned to glare at her. The thief smiled at us sheepishly.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’m a little on edge.”
I knew how she felt. This accursed place was watching us. Waiting for the best opportunity to strike. I had a feeling we wouldn’t have to wait too long for the bank to make its next move.
14
One by one, we left the hidden vault area, slinking through pools of darkness in the winding passage. Our destination was the bank’s main customer floor, which would lead us to the account processing office.
Every detail in the customer area seemed to jump out at my hyper-alert mind. Wood-paneled counters in the cashier area. Glossy marble and granite flooring. Majestic stone columns. Dim fluorescent lights that flickered spookily above and dappled the marble floor, casting a web of malevolent shadows. The copper bas-relief double doors of the exit seemed miles away.
As we passed the corpses of fallen guards, Dimitri eyed their bodies suspiciously.
“They're dead, Shoji pointed out. “Unless you want to kill them again.”
“Fuck off,” the Russian spat.
I started to lag behind the others, the pain in my scar building. I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone—or more likely something—was watching us. We weren’t alone.
“What is it now?” Norton wanted to know, picking up on my somber expression.
Before I could answer, the room changed around me. The colors in the paintings grew darker, more foreboding. The sculptures appeared more grotesque, animalistic, bereft of all beauty.
I swallowed hard.
As I backed away from the transmuting landscape, I stole a glance at McManus. The Irish gangster flanked me, sweating like a pig on its way to the slaughter house. Judging from his bugged-out expression, he was picking up on the same subtle changes to our surroundings.
And then it happened.
Without warning, a choked scream exploded from McManus’ throat. An expression of agony disfigured his face as he clawed his back. Seconds later, his shirt lit on fire.
As the charred fabric dropped to the floor, I realized that the cross tattoo on McManus’ back was ablaze. The holy symbol had provoked the demonic bank’s black magic counter measures. Apparently, Vittoria’s instincts had been right on the money.
McManus, screaming at the top of his lungs, collapsed and desperately rolled around the floor. Despite his mad efforts, the fire was spreading. I was reminded of a case of spontaneous combustion Skulick a
nd I had investigated in New Orleans.
Knowing time was running out for McManus, I tore off my coat and rushed to his aid. But before I could reach him, the ravenous flames engulfed the man’s form.
I backed away, raising my padded coat to shield myself from the hungry blaze and billowing smoke. McManus’ suffering was mercifully brief as his flaming body pitched forward and stopped moving. The stench of burning flesh wafted through the air and nausea crept up my throat.
The bank had claimed its latest victim.
More would follow.
Sudden movement behind me made me whirl. My eyes widened with horror. The bullet-riddled body of one of the dead guards had jerked back to life. It was crawling across the floor, dragging its legs.
Its lifeless gaze locked on me. Blood poured from the eyes, nose, and ears, and a grin distorted the dead man’s features. A pair of horns burst from his head, the low-level demon manifesting his true form.
Understanding slashed through my mind. It had all been a trap, a diabolical game. The guards and the bank personnel I’d felt so sorry for had never been human in the first place but had been using a glamor of some sort.
As this horrible realization sank in, the other dead guards around us staggered back to their feet, now transformed into an army of the dead animated by demons.
We all stood frozen in tableau, our brains barely able to process what we were seeing. Too much was happening too quickly.
I was the first one to break free from our collective paralysis. Hellseeker out and ready, I reflexively squeezed the trigger, pumping two bullets into the first zombie-demon. The creature’s head snapped back, and it crumpled to the floor in an unmoving heap. My quick reaction galvanized everyone else into action.
Following my lead, Dimitri and Max swept the bank floor with lead, a mad hail of bullets lashing the guards. The onslaught slowed the zombies’ advance but barely stemmed the tide. The dead guards kept picking themselves up, scarred tissue regenerating. The team’s bullets would not stop the horde for long.
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