by M. D. Massey
“Would you believe that you weren’t my first choice for a replacement? I should be wearing your father’s skin right now! That is, if he hadn’t died before I could transfer my soul into his body. He put up quite a fight, and then decided to take his own life before I could complete the transfer. Such a waste.”
“Bastard!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, simultaneously drawing my Glock and snapping off three shots, two aimed at his chest and one at his head. All three rounds melted into slag as they reached the invisible barrier made by the Fear Doirich’s mage circle. They hung in the air for a second, maybe two, then were vaporized into nothingness.
“Wondering why Finn never told you? It’s because he doesn’t know, my boy. And oh, he’s suspected as much, and tried to hunt me down himself a few times. But while his magic has faded over the centuries, mine’s as strong as ever. He couldn’t find me unless I wanted him to. Perhaps that day will come soon, yes?”
I fumed where I stood, still pointing the pistol at the druid’s face. I was on the balls of my feet, and it took everything I had to keep from charging into the circle to take him on.
I felt a slight breeze on my cheek and heard a voice in my ear—the softest whisper, far too low for the Fear Doirich to hear.
Not yet, my love. Wait.
“Jesse?” I asked, forgetting everything else at the sound of her voice.
The Dark Druid rolled his eyes. “She speaks to you, eh? I’ve seen her following you everywhere over the last few weeks, moping along behind you while you ran all over town with that painted whore. Imagine, Colin—she was right there all the while, suffering while you humped that trash.”
The druid must’ve have seen something register in my eyes.
“You weren’t aware. I see. Well, this evening is turning out to be just full of surprises for you, isn’t it?”
He crossed his arms and tapped a finger on his lips. “You could be with her again, you know—once I inhabit your body.”
“Liar.” My response simmered out in a low whisper.
“I assure you that I speak the truth. Your soul will be trapped on this plane, just as hers is right now. You’d have centuries to spend together. Perhaps millennia. That’s what you want more than anything, isn’t it? It’s written on your face, Colin. Why not make this easy on us both?”
I narrowed my eyes and nodded slowly. “You want me? Fine, you can have me then.”
I whipped the gun up to my head and pulled the trigger.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I knew I couldn’t kill myself. I’d tried in the months after Jesse’s death; oh, how I’d tried. But each time I had, my curse would kick in. My “Hyde-side” turned out to be resistant to just about every physical insult imaginable. Gunshot wounds, thirty-story falls, drowning, drug overdoses—there was virtually nothing that could kill me, short of perhaps complete immolation at ground zero of a nuclear detonation. Which I’d considered, by the way. But I couldn’t come up with a means of stealing a nuclear warhead that didn’t involve killing a ton of people.
However, the Fear Doirich didn’t know that. I was certain that he knew about my ríastrad, the curse that caused me to morph into a twisted, deadly version of myself that was apparently one hundred percent Fomorian nightmare. He also knew I had Balor’s Eye lodged inside my skull. Oh, he wanted his hands on that bad boy, I could tell.
But he had no idea I’d survive a bullet to the skull. None at all. I banked on the fact that he’d be ready and waiting in the event I attempted self-harm.
I was right. In an instant, dark inky tendrils rose from between the flagstones beneath my feet, whipping about and wrapping around my arms like the limbs of some great dark octopus—or perhaps the deadly appendages of an eldritch nightmare. They felt fairly solid, but I was certain I could break the bonds with little effort. Just as Finn had said, I was mostly immune to the druid’s necromancy.
Yet, the druid’s magic proved sufficient to alter my aim, and the bullet missed completely. The Fear Doirich closed the gap in a heartbeat, moving with nearly the alacrity I’d seen in ancient vampires and fae.
“Ah, ah, ah—naughty of you to try that. Fortunately, I learned my lesson with your father. Unfortunate for you, I suppose. But you’ll be with your ghost girl soon, never fear.”
I allowed the tendrils of inky black to lift me up and draw me into the circle with the druid. He floated back to the center as his magic pulled me in, closer to where I wanted to be. His death magic held me a few inches off the ground, roughly three feet from where he stood.
Just a bit closer, I thought. C’mon, you decrepit son of a bitch, come closer and get me.
He spared me one more glance and tsked.
“This might hurt a bit,” he said.
He closed his eyes and began chanting. More shadowy necromantic magic rose from the floor beneath us, weaving itself in complex patterns around his body and arms. Then those tendrils shimmered as the magic concentrated in thin tight bands, crawling like little snakes to coalesce in a dark ropy mass around each of his hands, until they pulsed with an eerie glowing darkness.
That is, if you could call it a glow. It was more like the absence of light, as if the magic was erasing the warmth and energy from the space around it. Watching it was incredibly disconcerting, and the evil emanating from the old druid repulsed me to my core.
His eyes snapped open, revealing pupils large and black. He began floating toward me, extending his arms and that dark evil magic toward my chest.
“Now, I will have a new vessel, one that will last me thousands of years. And you will be with your beloved.” His eyes swam with the same inky blackness that surrounded his hands, until it obscured both the pupils and whites. “Everyone wins, Colin. Relax and it will all be over soon.”
I waited until I could smell the stench of his breath, to the point when his dark magic had nearly touched my chest. His breath smelled of clotted blood and flesh. Now I knew what had become of the missing organs from the bodies he’d sacrificed. Disgusting.
His hands touched me. I felt the cold, writhing pulse of his magic against my skin. Then, it just stopped, like it hit a wall of glass. The druid’s face registered confusion and disbelief.
“What? What is this?”
“Problems? I guess I forgot to mention—side effect of the Eye. I’m immune to your death magic bullshit.”
His face contorted in fury. “No! I’ve slain dozens of people to power this spell. This cannot be happening!”
“Oh, it be happening.” I strained against the shadowy bonds that held me and snapped my right hand into my Craneskin Bag, grabbing the phylactery and pulling it free.
I swung as hard as I could, punching him in the chest and smashing the phylactery in my fist with the impact, driving shards of the crystal deep into my hand as his spirit released. I extended my arm to the side, letting the remaining shards fall as I spoke the trigger words to the spell Finn had prepared.
“Póg mo thóin, bitch.”
The trigger words to the spell could’ve been anything, but Finn had wanted to send a message to the Fear Doirich. For my part, I was more than happy to deliver it for him. “Kiss my ass” in Gaelic seemed appropriate at the moment.
There was a whoomp and a burst of light as the runes on my body flared. Green druidic magic flowed out from my hands and into the Dark Druid’s chest. The light of Finn’s spell combined with my own magic was designed to do one thing, and one thing only: to bind the Fear Doirich’s spirit and soul to his current body, for good.
“No!” he screamed as he realized what Finn and I had done. He struggled against the bonds of my teacher’s spell as it entered his body. Tendrils of bright green magic displaced his own necromantic energies, snuffing them out as they wrapped around his arms and legs to hold him tight.
White and green light suffused the Fear Doirich’s form, until it shone from his mouth and chased the darkness from his eyes. The magic flared brightly, bright enough to nearly blind me and illu
minate the room. As it did, every necromantic rune and glyph, and every last trace of the necromantic circle, vanished in an instant. It was as though every trace of necromancy had been purged from the Dark Druid’s body, and from the room.
Because that’s exactly what Finn’s spell had done.
Then the magic released him and the Fear Doirich slumped to the floor, catching himself on his hands and knees. I fell as well, struggling to one knee, drained of energy by the spell.
The druid looked up at me, his eyes human once more but full of menace.
“What have you done to me, boy? What have you done?”
I stumbled to my feet and ran.
I slammed the door to the crypt behind me and tossed a simple cantrip at the door to jam the lock. It wouldn’t stop him, but it might slow him down for a few more seconds. I needed time to get in the open before he caught up to me. Plus, I needed to give Hemi, Guts, and the remaining trolls time to evacuate. Things were about to get ugly.
I scrambled up the steps to the chapel and slammed the lectern back in place. Hemi, Guts, and four troll warriors stood dazed amidst a sea of ghouls. Some of them were intact, others in various states of dismemberment. None moved. My people looked like shit.
Hemi turned to me and waved, looking slightly shell-shocked. “They just collapsed, all at once. We were about to be overrun, and they all fell like their strings had been cut. Is he dead?”
“We should be so lucky. Help me move something against this thing, now. Then you guys need to haul ass.”
The trolls, Hemi, and I managed to roll a dilapidated church organ near the lectern. We flipped it on its side, wedging the lectern in place. I knew it wouldn’t hold for long.
I grabbed Hemi by the arm. “Help Guts gather up his survivors, and then you guys get the hell out of here, just as far away as you can. Once the druid gets hold of me, it’s going to get messy fast.”
Hemi screwed his mouth up in consternation. “I can’t let you take this clown on by yourself. He’ll kill you, Colin.”
I shook my head. “Trust me, he can’t kill me. But once he starts in on me, I’ll be as much a danger to you guys as he is. Now go—get out of here before he recovers from Finn’s spell.”
Guts clapped me on the shoulder. “Honor to fight with druid of might.”
“The honor’s all mine, Guts.”
I watched as he and his trolls made their exit, moving like a bunch of green, lumpy extras from The Last of the Mohicans. Those guys were rubbery ninjas that healed like Deadpool. Just as ugly, too, but damned handy to have in a fight.
Hemi clapped me on the shoulder and followed after them.
“I’m buying the beer after this,” he shouted as he left the chapel.
If I make it out of this alive, I thought. And I give myself 50/50 odds, at best.
Finnegas had warned me I’d have only a minute or two to prepare once the spell had taken effect. What the Fear Doirich was experiencing right now was the feeling of mortality, along with all the aches and pains that age and decrepitude brought with it. Unlike Finnegas, who had slowed his aging process through magic, the Dark Druid had been jumping from body to body for two thousand years, discarding his hosts when each “vessel” was no longer of use.
He’d also used necromancy to sustain his physical hosts when they started to wear out, much in the way that necromancy preserved the dead. Strictly speaking, the body he was using was dead, but it had been kept in a state of suspension through magical means. That meant he’d never really experienced what it felt like to be old. Now that I’d removed the magical effects from his current body and locked him inside, it’d take him a few minutes to get his bearings.
But he was still hella dangerous. I needed to be ready for him when he recovered. Mundane weapons would be no good against him, because he’d be magically warded. And my magic was no match for his, that was for sure. I’d have to rely on treachery and the few magical weapons I had at my disposal. A loud crash from below told me he was on his way. I ran out the back door of the chapel, digging through my Craneskin bag.
My main fear was that he’d catch me in the open, trigger my curse, and then I’d get loose and rampage all over East Austin and the campus, which was just across the highway from here. I couldn’t let that happen, and thankfully I knew just the place to finish this once and for all. I headed there at full speed, casting small spells and cantrips left and right. They were traps that would mostly be minor annoyances to him—but they would lead him straight to me.
There was a huge explosion behind me, and I looked over my shoulder to see the organ flying through the air, headed my direction. I dove to the left between some headstones, and it crashed to the earth right where I’d been a split-second before. Organ shrapnel pelted me as the thing shattered on impact. I rolled to my feet and sprinted on.
The mausoleum where we’d found the druid’s super-ghoul was just as we’d left it. I wasted no time diving into the sarcophagus, tumbling down the hole at the bottom and into the tunnel underneath. I reached to flip on my headlamp and cursed when I discovered it was missing. Scrambling on all fours, feeling my way ahead in the dark, I followed the tunnel as quickly as possible to its terminus in the room where we’d left the ghoul.
Once I heard the groans of a struggling, limbless ghoul, I paused and pulled out my phone so I could use the glow from the screen to lay my trap. I pulled out my final surprise in the dim light, shoving it into the soft earthen ceiling of the tunnel above me. I set the fuse on my spell with a rune I hastily scratched in the dirt, and then I walked to the other side of the cavern, kicking the now helpless ghoul in the ribs for the hell of it along the way.
I turned off my phone, and waited.
I didn’t have to wait long. The tunnel soon lit up with a soft silver glow, the kind that came from ancient druid battle magic. Finn had demonstrated some of it for Jesse and me, once. It was mostly elemental magic—lightning, fire, and the like. But he’d refused to teach it to us, saying it was too dangerous for us to learn just yet.
Damn it if I didn’t wish I’d tried to steal those spells from him now. I didn’t have a lick of warded clothing on at the moment, nor armor or kevlar of any kind. Just my old Army trench, combat boots, jeans, and a now bloodied and filthy white dress shirt.
But what I did have I held at hand, ready for the druid to appear. As he strode into view, his eyes all aglow with silver light, lightning dancing off his fingertips, I hurled my magic spear with all my might. It flew true and straight, right at the druid’s heart.
He caught it just as it reached his tunic. I’d never seen a human move that quickly. The old druid turned the spear over in his hands, as if admiring the craftsmanship.
“Not bad work, I have to say. Not good enough to kill me, but not bad.”
He thrust the spear into the ground, halfway up the shaft, then snapped the rest of the handle off like a dried twig.
“Now, my turn,” he said, and smiled a devilish grin.
Lightning shot out from his right hand, catching me in the chest and blasting me into the dirt wall behind me. I hung there for a moment—not suspended by magic, but held by the suction of the impression my back had made in the dirt. It felt just like you might think—like I’d just been struck by one hundred million volts of electricity, and thrown back by a shockwave caused by instantly super-heating the air in front of me to 20,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
I was completely stunned and unable to breathe, like I’d had the wind knocked out of me by a giant, invisible hand. I slid off the wall and collapsed. Finally my body recovered and I began taking in short, gasping breaths.
It’s now or never, I thought. I muttered the words that would trigger my own spell, and the tunnel behind the druid exploded—not quite with the force of his lightning bolt, but with enough force to knock him flat.
And to collapse the tunnel.
I struggled to my knees, still wheezing. There was a huge black hole burned into my shirt, and the flesh underneath
was charred and smoking. I couldn’t feel a thing, but that was because I was in shock.
“You’re trapped down here with me now, bitch,” I mumbled.
He brushed himself off and floated to his feet. I’d just hit the guy with a spell that had basically been a magical demolition charge, and he floated off the ground. This was not good.
He sneered at me with contempt and floated closer. The light of his magic dappled the walls, floor, and ceiling of the small cavern like moonlight dancing on water.
“Stupid boy. Do you think me trapped? Think I can’t destroy you and escape this hole?” He landed in front of me, and squatted in order to get in my face. “I will have what I came for. Well, the other thing I came for. Obviously you’re damaged goods now, even if I could make the transfer. But once I have the Eye, I’m sure it won’t matter.”
He grabbed my jaw with his left hand, lifting my chin as he drew his right hand back, fingers extended into a claw. I watched as a ball of lighting grew to fill his hand.
“Prepare to be with your beloved.”
The druid slammed his hand into my head with tremendous force. I felt searing pain, then everything went black. In an instant all was dark and silent. It was as if I’d been transported to a place where nothing existed—a perfect void.
It was peaceful, yet frighteningly vast and empty.
I saw her approach from out of the nothingness, like she’d just walked into the room with me. Except there wasn’t a room, there was nothing—not heat, sound, light, or pressure. She was just there, all at once, and the warmth of her presence filled the space around me.
Jesse.
She smiled. I can’t stay for long, because your other self is coming.
No, Jess, don’t go. Stay with me.
She strode up and touched my cheek. I felt her caress in my core, at the seat of my being. I could only describe what I felt as pure love.