by John Conroe
After the mess of pizza boxes, trays, and chicken bones were stuffed back onto the hotel’s push cart that had carried the mass of food into the suite, we got down to serious planning.
First, Declan and Stacia would head out to provide a diversion. He was still wearing his ever-present hoodie and a plain blue ball cap. Stacia was still dressed in skintight lycra replacement clothes and stood out like a beautiful woman in revealing clothes. So he gave her his grey sweatshirt, which covered most of her body. Then he took the ball cap and runed it up with a pen.
As soon as he put the hat on her head, Stacia disappeared and a plain Jane, girl-next-door brunette was standing in her place. Brown eyes looked back at us from a face whose structure was only just barely recognizable as Stacia’s.
“Holy shit, kid! Can you do that in reverse? Make a plain girl beautiful?” Lydia asked. “‘Cause if you can, we’re quitting this demon busting crap and getting rich.”
“First of all, you’re already rich. And second, that’s really much, much harder to do. Essentially, the runes are blurring her features and suggesting others. Sharpening and creating the kind of facial structure she naturally has ends up looking fake, like bad CGI. With her figure covered and the hat blurring her, we should be pretty good unless…” he said, trailing off.
“Unless?” Stacia prompted.
“Any other witches are around. They’ll see right through it. In fact, the blurring runes could actually call attention to her,” he said. “We’ll go test it out in some of the stores downstairs. I want to get a couple more hats for you two,” he said with a nod at Tanya and me.
“Well, if you two do your jobs, people will be concentrating on the money, money, money,” Lydia said. “Unless, of course, you bust out of your clothes again, Blondie.”
“Hey, we’re giving out the stripper cards—not putting on a show,” Stacia said.
“If cards don’t work, a strip show certainly would,” Arkady said with a grin aimed at Stacia, but his eyes were on the kid. Declan’s face froze for a second as he processed the giant’s words, but Stacia grabbed his arm and towed him out the door of the suite.
“Living dangerously, big guy?” Lydia asked after the door shut.
“It’s good to joke with the kid,” Arkady said. “We’ve gotta loosen him up a bit or he’s gonna blow up like a bomb.”
“Unless he blows you up. And what are you going to do when he realizes your accent is only really thick when he’s around?” Tanya asked.
“He’s only got human hearing,” Arkady said smugly.
“Really? Omega, do you only have human hearing?” Tanya asked the television.
“I am assuming you are making a point about my sharing data with my father and are not actually interested in the answer. Security Chief Arkady’s premise that my father is under pressure is very valid. Although I will caution you that while he exerts much greater control over his responses than males his age are known for, he is extremely invested in his relationship with Miss Reynolds. He generally lets her deal with the kind of male attention that all you beautiful women receive, but he is not above using his abilities to deal out small warnings and retribution,” Omega said.
“Wait, did you just call us beautiful?” Lydia asked.
“You all exhibit the type of symmetrical features that are most commonly identified as beautiful, and I have observed the attention that both males and females accord you. I have also heard their comments, Lydia.”
“Omega, what kind of retribution does Declan dish out?” I asked, sharing a concerned glance with my vampire.
“It is rare, but it does occasionally occur when someone takes liberties like touching her or making a vulgar suggestion. She generally handles that and my father will leave it be. There have been occasions when she ignored the behavior and moved on. At those times, servers have tripped, drinks and food have been spilled on the individuals, people have fallen down, phones have been mysteriously ruined. There was one occasion at an NFL sporting event when an individual made a comment to his peer group concerning what he would do to Miss Reynolds and how much she would appreciate it whether she wanted his attentions or not. His friend laughed and told him no one could force a werewolf. The individual said something about silver chains and horse tranquilizers. Miss Reynolds heard it and it gave her pause. Father persisted in requests for what was bothering her, as he couldn’t hear it. She finally told him. That individual, who was still staring at Miss Reynolds, promptly fell over a railing, dropped ten feet, and broke his arm and collarbone,” Omega said.
“Good,” Tanya said. “Rapist wannabes need to suffer some serious pain. Rapists need to just die.” She’d had her own brush with rape—mental rape. Her assailant had been torn to tiny, bloody pieces by his victim.
“Rape or any connotation of rape is a huge emotional trigger for Declan,” Nika said. Her personal rules of privacy kept her from offering too many of her unique insights but we had all agreed that Declan was a special exception. “Any rape. But offering to rape his girlfriend? That’s a killing offense in his mind. In my opinion, he showed tremendous restraint.”
“Well, rape is a capital crime in any culture, and his own story certainly would enforce that,” I said.
“It’s more than that. He hates his father, who he has in fact met. To my knowledge, he hasn’t killed him, but I think that’s only because he’s conflicted by his half-sister, Zuzanna, who attends his school. But deep down, Declan feels he is damaged goods, tainted at birth by a monster who forced himself on his drugged mother,” Nika said.
“So mentioning horse tranqs and Stacia in the same sentence…” I said.
“If you put it that way… maybe he wanted the guy to fall and hit his head but it just didn’t happen?” Lydia asked.
“If my father had intended for the male to die, he would have died. Father’s control and abilities exceeds his aunt’s in many ways and according to private comments she has made to her partner, generally meets his mother’s, and Declan is still very, very young,” Omega said. “You should know that Father has instructed me to observe his behavior and if, in his words, he becomes a monster, I am to inform you all.”
“He said that? To tell us if his little choo-choo train goes off its tracks?” Lydia asked.
“Yes Lydia.”
“Perhaps when this particular adventure is all done, we should send him and Stacia on some kind of vacation or something,” I said.
“That idea shows foresight, complex emotional intelligence, and problem-solving skills—you’re scaring me,” Lydia said with fake astonishment.
I flipped her off.
“That’s better,” she said.
“They’re back,” Tanya said, redirecting my attention to the elevator doors opening outside the suite and the sounds of our werewolf and witch chatting.
Arkady opened the door as they approached and they came in with a swirl of expensive perfume preceding them.
“There was a big test bottle of Dolce and Gabbana Women’s Velvet in the store. Thought it might cover the werewolf scent a bit,” Stacia said.
“Creates more of a stripper scent,” Lydia said, making an offended face.
“Maybe a really successful stripper. That shit’s like three hundred a bottle. We got you guys some hats and sweatshirts,” Stacia said, deliberately moving closer to the tiny vampire, who cringed back from the odor cloud.
I watched Declan during that exchange, wondering that he didn’t seem to be paying any attention to their banter.
“More like ripper,” he said without looking up from the shopping bag, where he was pulling out bright-colored tourist trap clothes.
“What did you say, Sabrina-wannabe?” Lydia asked.
“She rips her clothes and then her attackers,” Declan said, handing Stacia a set of baseball hats. “So it’s Ripper scented.”
The girls stared at him. “What?” he asked.
“That’s not really much help D,” Stacia said. “Not the best mental pictu
re.”
“Yeah, whose side are you on anyway? Better not be mine,” Lydia said.
Declan looked at me and shrugged.
Lydia and Stacia basically got along, although not without some mild snark. Tanya and Stacia didn’t get along so much, at least at first. But ever since Declan had paired with the beautiful werewolf, my vampire had become less testy around Stacia.
“You all are just too well known to wander around without attracting attention. So I’m gonna doctor a bunch of hats and stuff to make you all a bit more average,” he said, opening his magic bag and pulling out pens, herbs in plastic bags, and a couple of little objects made from twigs and vines.
“I traded Erika for these,” he said, holding up the little circular twists of wood and vine.
“What did you trade her?” Stacia asked, her voice deceptively light.
“What do you think?” he asked, glancing at his werewolf.
“Kinky, perverted sex favors?” Lydia suggested.
“Please, I wouldn’t touch her with Arkady’s junk,” Declan said, head going back down as he focused on a pink women’s sweatshirt that look like it might just barely stretch over Tanya’s stomach.
“Leave my junk out of it,” Arkady said, settling into an armchair with a tablet computer.
“The medium of choice at Arcane is avatar modifications and spells. I pimped out her dirt warrior,” Declan said.
“And for that you got little twiggy twists?” Lydia asked Declan, her tone questioning his general intelligence.
“Yup. Yew and grapevine. The twins use a lot of vegetative material in their spell work. These little babies are like minature glamour projectors. You know those itty-bitty electric mosquito repellers that you put on your belt to drive the bugs away? No? Well these are basically the magic equivalent, although they repel peoples’ gazes instead of bugs. Kinda of like a demon does, but less,” he said, looking up and meeting my eyes.
Demons could hide themselves from most humans and ever since I had gotten stuck with a hypodermic full of demon blood, so could I… on occasion…if I was depressed enough and in a deep, dark mood.
“Okay then. Let’s get down to business,” Tanya said, studying the garish sweatshirt with satisfaction.
Chapter 19
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area lies a dozen or so miles to the west of downtown Vegas. The rocky canyon walls rise steeply from the flatness of the desert floor, their stones a surprisingly colorful blend of grays, browns, tans, and, as advertised, a goodly amount of rusty red in the daytime. At this time of night, however, it was all dark grays to my sensitive eyes.
The lady at the hotel’s concierge desk had barely looked at us when we asked about the hike to Fossil Canyon. It was the same response we got when we left the suite and got onto the elevator to the hotel lobby. I was equal parts delighted and slightly offended. Sure, sure, I hate the attention that has come our way since the events in Washington, but to be completely ignored to the point where people bumped into us was almost an affront. Almost. The other odd part was that Tanya wore a neon pink sweatshirt with the Mandalay name in garish gold while I was wearing a bright blue t-shirt with a picture of a shark on it, referencing the shark exhibit in the hotel. Nobody even looked twice. All because the kid had pinned a little twiggy circle of wood and vine to each shirt and then drawn six runes onto the fabric in a circle around the witch wood.
We parked across the road from the conservation area entrance, which was closed for the night.
Our side of the road had a large wooden sign overhead announcing horseback riding, and a dark blue older model Corvette parked with no one inside it.
The desert was mostly quiet in the dark, the sky overhead a blanket of stars glowing brightly in the complete absence of light pollution.
I suspect the landscape would have been utterly dark to normal eyes. Probably eerie. To our eyes, the stars provided plenty of light to see clearly, every bush and rock illuminated. I followed Tanya as she stalked into the desert, her vampire nature coming fully to the forefront. Watching her from behind, you’d never know she was so very pregnant, her motions graceful and silent.
We followed the trail that our distracted concierge had told us would take us to the fossil canyon. The path climbed gradually up out of the main canyon till we came to a shaded horse corral, empty for the night. Past that, we came to a Y-intersection with trails leading toward Cave Canyon and Fossil Canyon. We silently agreed to choose the cave route, our intuitions telling us it was the most likely site of Dragan’s explorations.
Minutes ticked by as we scrambled over dried-up river beds and stone waterfalls that only came to life when the infrequent rains poured down.
Tanya suddenly froze solid and I instantly matched her stillness. A very faint sound came from ahead. The click of pebbles on rock, the tink-tink-tink of metal on stone. She swiveled back to look at me, displaying a slight awkwardness for the first time as her stomach blocked her natural flexibility. A frown of annoyance flashed across her face before disappearing. Our link told me of her frustration with her current condition, overlaid with sudden excitement of finding her quarry. “Prey!” came to me through our bond, distinct and certain. It was clearly time to hunt.
We approached slowly, extra cautious about our foot and hand placement. Two more silent scrambles down low waterfall pour-overs and we were down in the next canyon. Our directions and map indicated it was a wash from Fossil Canyon, and on the far side of it, up high on the trail, was the source of the sounds we were hearing. Louder now, we could tell it was much more active than the original sounds had seemed to indicate.
Crossing the bottom of the wash, we began the climb again, but now we left the obvious trail, separating and each climbing the vertical surfaces to the right and left of the trail. An easy climb for any vampire, the rugged rocks giving us so many handholds that using vampire energy to climb was unnecessary.
The trail was now at the bottom of a steep V, winding below and between us, and it rose up a series of dry waterfalls before exiting the canyon. One of the dry waterfalls was jammed up with huge chunks of rock that had fallen from the canyon walls some time in the far past. A light glowed brightly from inside one giant jumble of boulder blocks, the sounds steady and louder at the light’s source.
Coordinated by our bond, we crept like lizards till we were above the bright light of the hissing Coleman lantern. Two massive blocks of stone had each sheared from the very walls we clung to, falling against each other so as to form a cave-like space between them. Light shone from the opening and shadows flickered back and forth as figures worked in a steady rhythm. Three individuals were visible, two that had once been female and the third more male in shape and size. Now they were just dead flesh, animated to carry buckets of rock and dirt, which they dumped in random piles.
One had clearly ended life as a stripper, her torn booty shorts and tube top a clear giveaway. The other female wore ragged, dirty hiking clothes and boots, her dead flesh likely that of a middle-aged woman. The male also wore hiking clothes and the animated body moved with more power in death than the potbellied figure had likely exhibited in life. They were all revenants, dead bodies animated by the will of a witch. We had both seen similar uses of magic at Declan’s home but had been kept out of the fight, having to stay behind a ward while in the middle of a complex spell led by his aunt. We had watched as the boy and his friend had destroyed the undead in a matter of minutes.
There were at least three more forms inside the cave, two steadily picking at rock, a third sitting silent and motionless.
The air smelled of decaying flesh and filth, with a hint of sulphur just underneath. I felt Tanya’s excitement ramp up. The silent watcher in the cave had to be Dragan.
“Holddd,” the unmoving figure said, his tone sibilant.
Two shadows froze and the sitting one moved; the sounds of metal prying at rock echoing up to us from below. Stone pinged and popped as something broke free.
“
Yessss, perfecttt,” he said, excited and satisfied.
Without need for visual signal or words, we both moved silently down the rock walls, closer to the cave.
The wind shifted, swirling around the little rock canyon, spinning dust up toward the stars overhead.
The figure in the cave froze. “Whattt? Vampirrrree?” the voice said. “And something else?”
A shuffle of stones and the outline of a young man filled the cave entrance, just for a moment, then a blur and he was out of the cave, standing behind the male revenant, looking around in every direction before finally lifting his head up.
“Why areee you here, vampire?” the young man hissed. He was built like an athletic college kid, muscles flexing under latte-colored skin, but his head was hidden by the bulk of the male revenant. I moved a one of my feet to my right, craning to get a better view. He caught the motion, spinning around to look up. He held a small rock collectors pick in one hand and a chunk of rock the size of a dinner plate in the other as he took a second to study me. Just a single second. His eyes. Just like the wonder kid had said, they were reptilian, cold, slitted snake eyes.