Any of her cuts and bruises could’ve been the result of the crash. The strips of parchment pinned to her skin, though, they were something a little different.
There were six of them. Two on each forearm, and another two placed just below her collar bones. Words in an alphabet I couldn’t read were written in perfect calligraphy down the length of each piece of parchment. A small spot of blood stained each strip where the parchment was pinned to her flesh.
Hell. I didn’t know exactly what kind of ritual this was, but I could make a few guesses. The strips of parchment were almost certainly some kind of charm—not so different from the written charm I’d burned up for use in my little trick with Christina’s glasses. Charms could be protective, but I was going to take a wild guess that these ones were malevolent. And if they worked anything like a cunning man’s charms, they were probably aiming to change something about Christina.
I approached carefully. My fingers itched to pull the charms free of her skin, but until I had a better idea what they were doing, I didn’t want to remove them. There was a chance the shock would harm her.
“Christina,” I whispered, crouching down in front of her. “Christina, can you hear me?”
No response. I touched my truncheon to her chin, lifting her head. Her eyes were lidded, her face bruised and swollen. Her nose was broken, and with each breath I could hear the air rasping through her bloodied nostrils.
Amid the scar tissue on the side of her neck there were two fresh puncture wounds. She’d been bled less than an hour ago.
I gently lowered her head, then moved my truncheon to her jacket. With the tip of my truncheon I nudged the lapel, peering closely at the buttons. The third one down looked a little different than the others. It bore a glassy sheen and had no button holes.
A camera lens.
I flipped the lapel back, finding the thin wire that poked out through the fabric. It trailed down toward the pocket. No doubt that was where she kept the trigger that would allow her to snap pictures without anyone noticing.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and dialed Early.
“Early,” I whispered. “I found her.”
The old man let out a relieved sigh. “Alive?”
“Yeah. But she’s pretty beat up.” In the background I could hear a rumbling groan. “Is that Hider?”
“He’s become delirious. I don’t know how much longer I can keep him alive. Can you get Christina back on your own?”
“I don’t know. Someone’s been working some magical hoodoo on her. It might not be safe to move her. I need you to do what we talked about. I’m at the—”
The hinges of the shed door suddenly squealed. I spun around as one of the doors swung open.
“Ozzy?” Early said.
“Caretaker’s shed,” I hissed into the phone. “The hotel. Hurry.”
I hung up and switched off the light, then stuffed the phone into my pocket, next to Christina’s phone. Staying low, I moved away from Christina’s unconscious form and crouched behind the mower. My palm felt slippery as I gripped my truncheon. I licked my lips and tried not to breathe.
A silhouette appeared in the doorway, a dark shape against the moonlit night. It was tall, slim, dressed entirely in black. And from its head curled two thick horns.
The goat man.
4
For several seconds the goat man just stood there in the doorway of the shed, looking in. I couldn’t see his eyes. But I could feel them sweeping the darkness. Searching. I felt a prickling sensation at the back of my neck. I didn’t move.
The goat man took a step forward. His movements were unconcerned, unafraid. He passed through the doorway and pulled the door closed behind him. The darkness grew deeper. The goat man turned, and I heard the scrape of a deadbolt being pushed home.
“I can hear your heart beating.” The goat man’s deep voice filled the darkness. “It sounds like the heart of a scared little mouse. Are you scared?”
Like hell I was going to answer him.
But yes. I was scared.
Shoe leather whispered against concrete. As he took another step forward, I carefully shuffled away from the mower, moving back toward Christina. I licked my lips, preparing myself. I’d only have one chance.
“Who are you?” the goat man asked. “Did the girl’s mistress send you?” He waited a couple of seconds, as if expecting an answer. “Come out, little mouse. Don’t be afraid. I won’t kill you.”
“I know you won’t,” I said.
The goat man’s head snapped toward the sound of my voice. Faster than I could comprehend, he dropped into a crouch and darted toward me.
Glass shattered beneath his foot. My eyes were already closed. I knew what was coming.
Light filled the shed, as bright and brilliant as a midsummer’s day. Even with my eyes closed it poured through my eyelids, burning my retinas.
The goat man screamed. It was the scream of a man being eaten alive by fire ants. It was a scream of agony.
I opened my eyes into slits, squinting against the glare. The flash of the sunflare was already fading, the bottled sunlight escaping now that the vial had been crushed beneath the goat man’s foot. But there was still plenty to see by.
The goat man staggered about, screaming. He crashed blindly into the workshop table, knocking a toolbox to the ground and sending its contents spilling out across the floor. With a snarl, he spun around and stumbled a few more steps before slamming into the riding mower.
He wore a black dress shirt with an open top button and steel cuff links at the cuffs. Nice attire for a wedding, maybe. The goat skull probably wouldn’t fit in so well, though.
It must’ve been a pretty big goat before it died. Twin horns curled from the skull. For a moment I could almost believe that this really was some horrible monster with a goat skull for a head, like some vision of the devil. But as the goat man grabbed at the riding mower and tried to recover, I saw a shock of shiny black hair poking out from behind the skull. He was wearing the skull as a mask.
As the light rapidly faded, my eyes went to the goat man’s hands. They’d become blackened and blistered by the sunflare. Even as I watched, the skin burned and peeled away in small pockets, revealing tendons and scorched bone.
Before the goat man could recover, I had Christina’s phone in my hands. I opened the camera app and pointed the phone at the goat man.
“Say cheese.”
I snapped a photo of him. My shaking hand made it blurry, and the goat man’s wild thrashing wasn’t helping things. He shouted with rage as he heard the simulated shutter sound. Before I could take another picture, he’d launched himself at me.
I threw myself behind the riding mower as he pounced. Even dazed and in pain he leapt easily over the mower, swiping at me as he sailed overhead. His hands clawed at the air a half inch from my face, close enough for me to smell his cooking flesh.
He twisted in the air and hit the wall behind me feet-first, rattling the whole shed on its foundations. One burned hand grabbed at an exposed ceiling beam and he crouched there for a moment, defying gravity as he pressed himself against the wall.
Through the holes in the goat skull I caught a flash of golden eyes glaring at me. His legs curled to spring.
I dropped the phone and drew the vial I’d prepared earlier, flinging it at him in a single motion. As he launched himself off the wall, the vial smashed into his ugly goat head.
A glittering cloud of powdered silver and ironwood shavings exploded from the shattered vial, enveloping us both. He screeched.
But it didn’t stop him. The goat man crashed into me, arms extended. It felt like getting hit by two pile drivers at once. The air rushed out of my lungs. I felt ribs bend and crack. Pain ripped through my chest.
I slammed back against the side of the mower, the goat man on top of me. My truncheon slipped from my grip, clattering to the concrete beside me.
The goat man coughed and wheezed as the cloud of silver and wood surrounded h
im. His hands gripped at me, but I could see how much pain it was causing him. The silver dust collected in the open wounds on the backs of his hands, turning the flesh there even blacker.
“I will bleed you dry!” he roared.
His eyes flashed behind the goat skull. He jabbed one hand into my side, driving his fingers up toward my liver. Bile spilled into my mouth. I fought the urge to vomit. I stretched out my arm, reaching for my fallen truncheon.
The goat man threw his head forward and slammed the goat skull into my face. If he’d been stronger, the blow might’ve killed me. But the cloud of silver and ironwood was sapping his strength. As it was, I still saw stars. My lip broke open, spilling blood.
As blood dripped down my chin, the goat man inhaled sharply. His eyes widened behind the skull.
They widened even further when I stabbed the wooden point of my truncheon into his side.
The wooden stake ripped through clothing and penetrated flesh. His body went rigid.
I grinned at him, tasting my own blood on my teeth. “Doesn’t feel so good when they bite back, does it, vampire?”
He stopped pushing against my liver and grabbed at my hand that gripped the truncheon. His fist tightened, trying to crush my fingers and pull the stake out at the same time.
Despite what the movies would have you believe, wooden stakes don’t turn vampires to dust. You need a good helping of fire for that, and a little decapitation doesn’t go amiss either. But stakes have their uses. A well-placed stake to the heart will paralyze a vampire for several minutes. And a stake attack that misses the heart can still sap their strength and hurt them like hell.
But even with all the tricks I had up my sleeve, I knew I couldn’t defeat the goat man myself. The silver dust would interfere with his ability to work sorcery, and the stake in his side would slow him down. But I was only playing for time.
Ignoring the crushing pain in my fingers, I gritted my teeth and forced the stake another inch deeper into the goat man’s flank. A guttural groan passed his lips.
Wrenching my other hand free, I reached up and dug my fingers into the holes in the goat skull. With a grunt, I tore the skull off the goat man and let it drop to the concrete. The vampire behind the mask peeled back his lips, revealing sharpened teeth. He snarled at me.
“Francis Serrano, right?” I said. “Lockhart’s loremaster. Pleasure to meet you. I’m Ozzy. Hold still for a second, huh?”
I lifted Christina’s phone, aiming the camera point-blank at his face.
With a sudden burst of strength, the vampire roared and pulled the stake from his side. He tore it from my grasp, sending the truncheon spinning into a shelf of gardening tools.
I suddenly felt very vulnerable. Panicking, I threw a desperate punch at his face. My fist slammed into his jaw, scraping along his teeth.
I might as well have hit him with a pool noodle.
He picked me up by the throat and hurled me across the room. I smashed into a workbench and went down like a sack of meat. Groaning, I slumped down next to Christina Liu’s bound form. Somehow she’d slept through the whole damn fight. Wish I’d thought of that.
Serrano picked himself up, brushed himself down. The wound in his side wasn’t bleeding, but he didn’t look too happy about it either. Christina’s phone had fallen to the floor beside him, the light from the screen casting faint illumination on his face. He looked down at his burned hands, scowling, then lifted his head to glare at me.
He would’ve been a good looking guy under normal circumstances. He had the silver fox thing going on—thick, wavy dark hair slashed through with gray. Strong jaw, good cheekbones, just a hint of five o’clock shadow.
The sunflare had diminished his looks a little. Several patches of his face were burned and puckered. The skin around his eyes looked like a couple of fried eggs left too long on the heat.
“Tell me,” he said, standing over me. “What did you hope to achieve? You can’t beat me.”
I clutched at my bruised ribs, forcing myself not to cough. “No. Figured I’d leave the dirty work to your brothers and sisters.”
“By taking my picture?” He gave a thin, pained smile. “You and the girl have a lot in common.”
Crouching down, he picked up Christina’s phone. He swiped at the screen. His smile became relieved.
“It was kind of you to bring this to me.”
“You’re welcome,” I grunted. Every breath brought another wave of burning pain to my chest. “Guess you didn’t want to brave the river to get her bag off that tree, huh? What is it with you vamps and running water, anyway? I never understood that one.”
He ignored the question, instead focusing his attention on the phone. Guess he figured I wasn’t worth engaging with. I edged closer to Christina, hoping he was too distracted by the photos to notice me slipping my hand into her jacket pocket.
“All right,” I said. “Let me ask another question, then. I think I’ve got most of it figured out. Christina was playing spy at the party, at the behest of her mistress, Hana Kinfe. Maybe Kinfe suspected you were up to no good. Or maybe she was just snooping around for dirt she could use to increase her standing within the brood. I know what you bloodsuckers are like. It’s like Game of Thrones around here.”
Serrano lowered the phone and showed me his teeth again. That spiked my heart rate. I hurried up.
“Anyway, I bet no one was expecting Christina to capture anything as juicy as she did. Francis Serrano, consorting with another vampire’s swain. And not just any vampire, either. The broodmother herself, Sonja Lockhart. And Christina caught you red-handed.” I paused. “Red-mouthed, maybe I should say. It was a little hard to tell in the pictures, I admit. But I know what you were doing. You were feeding on Lockhart’s swain. I can only think of one reason you’d be doing that: because you’d already made her your swain. A little sorcery and some blood drinking and she’d become your willing servant. A spy inside Lockhart’s house. Able to feed you all sorts of secrets to ensure you maintained your position. Maybe even improve it.
“But that’s a dangerous game to play. And when you realized Christina had taken photos of you and your little spy, well, you couldn’t just let her take that information back to her mistress, could you? You’d be at Kinfe’s mercy. So you chased her down. Used some magic to make her crash her car, probably. Grabbed her, brought her back here.” I gestured to Christina, to the charms pinned to her flesh and the bite marks on her neck. “You’re going to turn her too, just like you did to Lockhart’s swain. Another spy for the network. Hell, maybe you have them all over the place, in the houses of all the important vampires in town. Seems like your style.”
Serrano regarded me. “I thought you said you had a question.”
“Yeah. I do. Why’d you curse the troll?”
“The troll?” He frowned and shrugged. “He was in the way.”
I sighed. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s what I figured.”
He stared at me a moment longer, looking a little puzzled by my question. Then he shrugged again, slipped Christina’s phone into his pocket, and strode toward me.
I pushed back against the wall and tried to stand, but Serrano lashed out with a lazy kick that sent me sprawling to the floor. I coughed and spat blood as pain danced across my ribs.
“I think I recognize you now.” Serrano crouched down in front of me. “You’re one of the local folk wizards, aren’t you?”
I groaned and looked up at him through blurry eyes. “Not wizards. Cunning men,” I corrected him. “I’m the pretty one.”
“Indeed,” he said dryly.
The vampire suddenly reached out, one hand clamping around my jaw and jerking me forward. In an instant, we were almost nose-to-nose. His nostrils flared and his pupils dilated.
“You have caused me both pain and inconvenience tonight,” he whispered. “Our little fight has awakened my appetite.”
His tongue slid between his teeth and lapped at the blood dripping from my lip into my beard. I tried to t
wist away, but his grip tightened on my jaw, nearly crushing the bone.
Shivering with ecstasy, Serrano pulled back a couple of inches, licking the red from his lips.
“I could kill you,” he said, “but that would only inconvenience me more. And it would not be satisfying. Instead, I’m going to drink from you. You’re going to become another of my swains. A mewling, pathetic creature whose only joy comes from having me drain you. I’m going to take everything you are, everything you would have been, and crush it into nothingness.”
I struggled to speak with my jaw clamped in his fist. “That’s against your law. Can’t take an unwilling swain.”
“I’ll take the risk.”
He pulled my head to the side and gripped my shoulder, exposing my neck. I cried out once more, straining to break free, but his strength was returning rapidly. Once he’d drunk his fill of me, all his burns and wounds would begin to heal. Within a couple of hours all the pains I’d inflicted on him would be gone.
And for all intents and purposes, so would I.
I trembled as I felt his cold breath on my neck. The points of his teeth scraped along my skin.
“Won’t save you, you know,” I said through gritted teeth. “It’s already too late.”
He laughed softly, his mouth still poised above my neck. “Is that so?”
“It is.”
“I have the girl. I have her phone, and all the photos she took. And now I have you.”
Now it was my turn to laugh. “Fucking vampires. You’re all so goddamn old. You never hear of the cloud?”
He paused and drew back a couple of inches. “What?”
“All Christina’s photos were automatically backed up to the cloud. And before I arrived, I made sure all those photos could be shared with some people who might find them very interesting. Kinfe. Lockhart.”
His lips peeled back. “Even if that’s true, it won’t matter. It was dark. The pictures are blurry. Lockhart won’t know for sure that I was feeding on her swain.”
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