Serpent's Storm

by Amber Benson

I had no recourse but to follow him, so I flipped my own visor forward—and found that I couldn’t see a thing in front of me because the helmet was entirely too big for my head. Resigned, I flipped the visor back up in place and took a deep breath. The visor immediately fell forward, covering my face again and making my ears ring.

  “Dammit,” I muttered under my breath, my voice reverberating hollowly in my ears as it echoed inside the helmet.

  I reached up and shoved the visor into what I thought was a secure position, but the stupid thing just clanged back over my face again, obscuring my vision.

  “Dumb visor!” I said, grappling with the golden face guard and trying to force it into a raised position. Apparently the armor didn’t like being trifled with, because no matter what I did, I could not budge the faceplate. It remained locked in place, making me feel slightly claustrophobic while also giving me a new appreciation for what sardines go through.

  “Fine,” I said, deciding if I couldn’t beat ’em, I’d join’em. “You wanna stay shut? Then just move the stupid eyeholes down so I can see out of ’em.”

  Instantly, the helmet began to heat up, scalding the top of my head.

  “Ow!” I screeched, reaching for the burning metal, my first reaction to get the offending object as far away from my scalp as humanly possible.

  I hooked my hands around the smooth edge of the helmet and started yanking, but when I realized the helmet wasn’t trying to immolate me, I relaxed, letting it resize itself to fit my head. The eyeholes realigned over my eyes, and—my sight restored—I found Daniel waiting for me down by one of the gleaming, bone white pavilions. I clomped over to where he stood, grunting in exertion as I felt the armor getting heavier with every step, the short walk leaving me as winded as a jog on a treadmill would. It appeared that engaging the faceplate had triggered some kind of magical response, increasing the protection factor of the armor a hundredfold and making it much harder to maneuver in.

  Where Daniel stood, the surrounding pavilion was empty except for a long marble table overlooking the azure sea. I craned my neck, curious to see if any of the Board of Death had decided to put in an appearance, but Daniel and I were alone next to the pavilion—in fact, we seemed to be the last people in all of Atlantis, because there were only empty promenades and pavilions stretching as far as the eye could see.

  I inhaled the raw scent of salt and seaweed as the wind cantered across the perfectly crested waves, eddying around us and rattling our armor.

  “I’m gonna check that stuff out,” I said to Daniel, indicating the marble table. When he didn’t reply, I shrugged and clomped over without him.

  Laid out for our perusal was an arsenal of weaponry—totally old-school stuff: forged metal weapons right out of the Middle Ages, with no gun or flamethrower in sight. Since I was outfitted like a knight of the Round Table, I figured being forced to wield a sword was just par for the course. Along with a pair of swords, there was also a mace, a crossbow, a double-sided ax, and two bronze daggers.

  “Amazing,” I said, reaching for one of the long swords, its gilded hilt carefully crafted to resemble a mass of trailing grapevines.

  To my untrained eye, the blade looked like it was made out of polished steel, its stone-sharpened edges so precise that the blade glistened like quicksilver in the sunlight. Curious now, I wrapped my mailed hand around its bas-relief hilt and tried to lift it, but the stupid thing was so heavy I couldn’t move it. Frustrated, I threw everything I had into the endeavor, leaning back so my body weight would act like a fulcrum and lift the sword off the table into the air—but still, no dice. The sword might as well have been cemented to the tabletop because no amount of effort on my part could budge it.

  “Here, let me help,” Daniel said, sidling up beside me. Startled, I jumped, my armor rattling. I hadn’t even heard him walk over.

  “No, that’s all right,” I said, frustration mounting as I tried to yank the sword from its resting place to no avail. “I’ve got it.”

  Ignoring me, Daniel slid his armored hand around mine. Instantly, the sword was light as a feather, and together, we easily hefted it into the air.

  “Whoa,” I cried, the now much lighter sword swaying in our clasped hands as if it were a reed in a rainstorm.

  “I won’t let go.”

  As Daniel said this, his eyes—the only part of his visage I could see through his faceplate—grinned mischievously at me, and I was struck, not for the first time, by how magnetic his gaze was. The eponymous “they” say a man’s eyes are the windows to his soul; if that was the case, then Daniel’s soul was made of ice blue steel.

  “You have pretty eyes,” I blurted out before I could stop myself. This made Daniel grin sheepishly.

  “The better to see your beauty with, my dear,” he replied, making me blush.

  It’s funny how things happen sometimes. Daniel and I were supposed to be beating the shit out of each other with medieval weaponry so the victor could then reign supreme over Death. Instead, we were standing on the battlefield trapped in gold-plated tin cans, flirting with each other like a couple of teenagers in heat.

  “So, what happens if you let go of the sword?” I asked.

  Daniel shrugged. “It would probably flop onto the ground.”

  It was a totally benign statement, but my mind went right to “flaccid penis land,” and I giggled.

  “What?” Daniel demanded, but I merely shook my head.

  “You don’t even want to know.”

  Daniel rolled his eyes, exasperated.

  “You’re right. I don’t want to know,” he said finally. “You have a very juvenile mind.”

  You can say that again, I thought. I wondered what alternate, immature scenarios Daniel and I could be partaking in if we weren’t trapped in the middle of a pernicious battle between Good and Evil right then. The images that thought conjured made me blush again.

  There was just something about Daniel I couldn’t get out of my head. He may have driven me nuts as a live-in boy toy, but when our bodies were in close proximity to each other, well, all bets were off.

  “Enough canoodling!” a clipped voice boomed from behind us. We both whirled around to see who was yelling at us, and I gasped as I lost my grip on the sword’s hilt. Daniel grabbed the blade of the sword with his free hand, balancing the weapon delicately across both of his palms.

  “Sorry,” I mouthed, worried I’d almost skewered him, but I got a flirty wink in return for my apology, so clearly Daniel hadn’t taken offense.

  “If you two are through fooling around . . . ” the voice continued. I looked up to find a thin woman standing on the opposite side of the marble table from us, her brown hair piled on top of her head in a modified beehive.

  Sensing that she now had our undivided attention, the lower half of her face split apart in a protracted grin. There was something about the way her pearly white teeth glinted so fiercely in the sunlight that reminded me of a piranha’s dilacerating maw.

  “I will be proctoring this battle for the Board of Death, as its members are indisposed at the moment,” the woman purred, the rhinestones on the temples of her cat-eyed glasses twinkling merrily as she fingered the lapel of the vintage pink mohair suit jacket she was wearing. The tailored, high-necked jacket and skirt combo cinched in at the woman’s waist, creating the illusion of generous curves, but the woman’s shapeless calves and delicate ankles belied all the hard work the suit was doing.

  “I know you,” I said suspiciously. “You worked for Thalia when she was at Death, Inc.”

  I’d met the woman—Evangeline, Jarvis had called her—when I’d gone to the Hall of Death looking for my friend Senenmut’s Death Record. Even though she’d been completely pleasant when we’d bumped into her, Jarvis had been leery of letting her know our business, because she’d worked with my sister before all the crazy dad kidnapping stuff had gone down. Needless to say, the faun hadn’t thought her very trustworthy.

  And neither do I, I thought, agreeing wit
h Jarvis’s estimation of the woman.

  “Yes, we have met before,” Evangeline replied, shooting me a tight smile that was anything but friendly. “Under more pleasant circumstances, I’m afraid. By the by, how is your little faun friend doing these days?”

  She knew! The bitch knew Jarvis was dead and she was flaunting that knowledge in my face. It was pure evilness—and as much as I wanted to grab the mace off the table and slam it into her nasty grin, I wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of knowing she’d hurt me.

  “Oh, you know Jarvis. He’s hanging around somewhere.”

  Yeah, hanging around Purgatory waiting to get recycled into a new body, so I can never find him again.

  “Really?” She tittered. “How nice for him, then.”

  Evangeline didn’t press the issue; I guess she’d noticed my interest in the mace.

  “So how does this work?” Daniel asked, changing the subject. “We each choose a weapon and then we fight until someone concedes?”

  Evangeline picked up a tiny clipboard from the marble table—one that hadn’t been there the last time I looked—and consulted the top page as if it were a manual on car repair. She flipped the first page then the next and the next until she found what she wanted.

  “Yes, it seems that under the normal rules, one of you would concede and that would be that, but since those rules no longer apply,” she murmured, tossing the clipboard over shoulder, where it sailed past the marble balustrade and was swallowed by the welcoming sea, “I’m afraid you’re just going to have to fight to the death.”

  “That’s bullshit,” Daniel stammered. “You can’t change the rules like that.”

  Evangeline shrugged.

  “Rules are made to be broken.”

  “I won’t kill anyone,” Daniel growled. “Thalia promised me that Callie would go free. Killing her was never part of the deal.”

  Evangeline raised an eyebrow.

  “You gave your word, Daniel. You can’t back out now. Besides,” she purred, “I’m sure Calliope would love to know what you and her sister were up to in Purgatory this afternoon . . .”

  If the bitch thought she was gonna drive a wedge between Daniel and me, she was wrong. I knew exactly what my sister had promised him.

  “Shut your mouth, bitch,” I said, sick of hearing her smarmy voice. “Let’s just get this over with.”

  I made a grab for the other sword, trying to lift it from where it lay on the table, but like its sword brother, it appeared to be superglued to the marble.

  “Not again,” I said, ignoring Evangeline’s gleeful smirk as I worked to pry the weapon from the tabletop.

  “I think they’re magically drawn to a single combatant,” Daniel offered. “Look at the weapons and then take the one that calls to you.”

  “Ugh.” I groaned. “This is why I hate magic.”

  But I did as Daniel said, releasing my grip from the sword and stepping away from the table. I waited impatiently for one of the weapons to call out to me, and when my gaze finally settled on the mace, I plucked the heavy instrument of destruction from the tabletop and lifted it into the air, testing its weight. As far as weapons go, it was a pretty fine looking—and deadly—piece with a flanged morning star-shaped head and a long, thin handle of hammered iron that fit perfectly in my grip. I swung the mace over my head a few times to get a feel for the weapon, then I let it fall to my side.

  “You look good, Cal,” Daniel quipped as I hefted the mace back over my shoulder. I had to admit I did feel pretty badass just holding the lethal-looking weapon.

  “I don’t think this is gonna work out the way you thought,” I said suddenly, turning my gaze on Evangeline and swinging the mace menacingly in her direction.

  “I know what you’re thinking, Calliope Reaper-Jones,” Evangeline said, taking a wary step backward. “And it’s not going to happen.”

  “Really?” I said, using both hands to lift the mace over my head. “You don’t think so?”

  With all my strength, I slammed the morning star mace into the tabletop, the marble splintering as the weight of the weapon struck it full force. I heard a barely perceptible crack, and the table split into two neat pieces of veined white marble as it buckled under the strength of my swing. All of the other weapons tumbled to the ground at Evangeline’s feet, but since she wasn’t one of the challengers, they were useless to her.

  “Don’t touch me!” she shrieked, holding her hands up to protect her face, her back pressed against the marble balustrade that looked over the sea.

  I lifted the mace over my head, my arms straining underneath its weight, but before I could slam it into the bitch’s head, I felt Daniel’s arms around me, pulling me away from my prey.

  “That’s enough,” Daniel whispered in my ear, my armor-plated heels sending up sparks as he dragged me backward across the floor. I was too shocked by Daniel’s sneak attack to put up much of a fight, but I did manage to elbow him in what would’ve been his very vulnerable gut if he hadn’t been wearing protective armor.

  “Let me go!” I cried, flailing.

  “It won’t help anything, Cal,” he whispered in my ear. “They’ll just send someone else to take her place.”

  “So?” I replied, trying to wiggle out of his grasp.

  When that didn’t work, I slammed the heel of my armor-clad foot down, hard, on Daniel’s instep. I knew the blow would be glancing at best because of the armor, but that wasn’t my main thrust of attack, so I didn’t care. It was merely a diversion so I could keep Daniel off guard for the big-ticket maneuver.

  “What the—” he blurted out in surprise.

  I whirled around and slammed the butt end of my mace into his upper chest as hard as I could, knocking him off his feet and onto his ass. The beauty of Daniel wearing all the heavy body armor was that he had about as much mobility as a turtle when he lay spread-eagled on his back. Swinging his arms and legs wildly, he tried to right himself, but I was pretty sure it was gonna take more than the modified Macarena rehash he was doing to get himself back on his feet.

  I took my moment of freedom, racing back across the marble floor, my eyes locked on Evangeline. She was crouched like a cowed dog behind one end of the broken table, as if that would somehow protect her from my wrath.

  “Please don’t hurt me!” she cried, covering her beehive with her arms. “I’m not immortal!”

  I stopped in my tracks, morning star mace raised in my right hand as I let her words sink in. If what she said was true, then I didn’t even have to bloody my mace in order to end her pip-squeak existence. All I had to do was wish her dead and she would be . . . dead.

  There was something very appealing about that proposition.

  I crouched down in front of the broken slab of marble, glancing back to see if Daniel had been able to right himself yet—nope, he was still on the ground, floundering—then I leaned in close, the grille covering my lips inches from Evangeline’s ear.

  “I wish . . .” I began, my mouth curling in a mischievous smile as Evangeline’s whole body began to shudder, fear emanating from her pores like honeyed ambrosia.

  “I wish you would tell my sister that I’m gonna go to Heaven and have a little chat with God and then I’m gonna go down to Purgatory and kick her big, flabby ass from here into eternity.”

  I swiveled back on my armored heels as if I were going to leave, but then I went back in for more.

  “I don’t wish you death—no, that would be too easy,” I sneered, watching as the tension eased from her shoulders and she lifted her head to look up at me.

  “What I wish for you, bi-atch,” I continued, “is that every hair on your body should die and never, ever, ever, ever grow back.”

  Evangeline gasped, covering her mouth in horror.

  “You wouldn’t dare,” she said, reaching for her beehive.

  “Weren’t you listening?” I said, disdain dripping from my tongue. “I just dared, honey.”

  There was a terrible cry of anguish
as Evangeline slid her shaking hands into the crown of her beehive, only to have them reemerge with her hairdo wrapped around her fingers.

  seventeen

  They say the best way to cripple a lady is to take a potshot at her vanity—and this lady had a goddamned beehive on her head. There had to be a heck of a lot of vanity going on if she really thought anyone (outside of Amy Winehouse—and she was on fashion probation) could pull off that hairdo and still be relevant in the twenty-first century. As far as I was concerned, she deserved every ounce of pain and suffering she’d received at my hands—and would continue to receive from the Afterlife at large as she went about her hairless way.

  She was in my sister Thalia’s thrall, and because of that I considered her a party to the murder of my dad and Jarvis. Whether she did the actual killing or not, I hated her for her participation in these heinous crimes. Believe me, I would’ve done more than just depilate her if I could’ve, but Daniel had been right to stay my hand. Killing Evangeline would’ve done nothing but bring down a rain of crap from my sister, the Devil, and the Ender of Death. Much better to keep the proctor we knew: especially now that she was a cowering, sniveling mess.

  “Get up,” I said, ignoring Evangeline’s high-pitched screams of dismay as she ran her fingers across her hairless brow. It felt incredibly nice to be the responsible party for turning my sister’s henchman into a Baldy McBalderton.

  “I told you to get up!” I said as I shook the morning star in her face, threatening her with more than just magic-induced alopecia if she didn’t do what I wanted.

  “Callie?”

  I felt Daniel’s hand on my armored shoulder. I guess he’d managed to right himself after all.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’ve got everything under control,” I replied, turning my head to give him a quick wink, even though I didn’t really want to take my eyes off Evangeline.

  He returned the gesture—and I was glad to see he wasn’t mad at me for stomping on his toes and forcing him to do the upside-down turtle dance. I hadn’t wanted to hurt or humiliate him; I’d just wanted to give Evangeline a piece of my mind.