Spellfire n-8

by Jessica Andersen

  He had thought he was going to die there, strung up against the fucking wall.

  Apparently not. Or at least not right now.

  Cobbling together some semblance of his former self, he did a once-over of his body and supplies, like he would’ve done back when he was a warrior. His shoulder and hip sockets howled and his skin felt strange on his body, as if gravity had changed now that he was standing on his own two feet. He was still wearing the jeans and boots he’d had on when Phee took him—or what was left of them. That was all, though. He didn’t have any weapons, backup, or way to contact the Nightkeepers. He wasn’t even sure he could copy whatever magic the demoness was using to get to Skywatch—although he could still feel the stir of dark magic in his blood, it, too, had deserted him, as if not even that half of his heritage wanted to claim him anymore.

  But he was alive, damn it, and he was free.

  And he had demons to kill.

  Grabbing the fallen whip, he staggered through the door and into an unfamiliar tunnel that was lit by a string of bare lightbulbs on a Home Depot–orange cord. The smell of the ocean was stronger here, and he could hear the rise-and-fall hiss of the surf. All around him, the softly ridged limestone and the cold slick of moisture told him the tunnel had been a subterranean river at some point, while the carvings—more screaming skulls along with the trefoil hellmark of the Xibalbans—said he was in what was left of an ancient dark-magic temple, somewhere in the former Mayan empire. On the shore of the mainland, maybe, or one of the sacred islands.

  Tightening his grip on the whip—the lash might work as a garrote, the bone handle as a bludgeon—he headed toward the sound of the ocean. It felt strange to be walking, stranger still to have the scenery move past him, but even as part of him registered the disconnect between now and a half hour ago, he scanned his surroundings, searching for his enemies. The tunnel curved up ahead; he slowed as he reached the bend and heard telltale scraping noises that fired his blood.

  Camazotz!

  Snarling, Rabbit surged forward, moving low and fast. He whipped around the corner and slammed into a ’zotz. The lone bat demon shrieked and backwinged in shock, causing it to rake its wings bloody on the stone around it.

  It wasn’t Phee’s favorite toy—this one was wearing a necklace of bones and teeth, signifying some sort of rank, and it was a big son of a bitch. Eyes flaring, it screeched beyond Rabbit’s hearing and lunged for him, claws outstretched. He tried to dodge, but the ’zotz slammed into him and they both went down. Red eyes gleamed from its pug-assed mug, and the stench swirled like sewage as they wrestled on the tunnel floor.

  Rabbit jammed an elbow under the thing’s chin and reversed the whip butt for a club blow that bounced off its cement-hard skull. The ’zotz gave a piggy, pissed-off squeal and raked his torso and upper thigh with its claws. The venom couldn’t knock him out—not anymore—but the scratches hurt like a bitch.

  Cursing, Rabbit grabbed the thing’s wrists and rammed a knee into its oversized genitals. The bat-demon keened in pain but wasn’t incapacitated. Instead, it twisted around, hissing, and snaked its ugly mug in to bite him.

  “Fuck you!” Fury surging alongside the knowledge that he needed to hurry, Rabbit jammed the whip butt into its gaping maw and shoved, putting his weight into it.

  The whip handle pierced the back of its throat and up toward its brain, something went crack up inside, and the ’zotz went limp.

  Rabbit lurched to his feet and took a couple of steps away, but then turned back, knowing the fucker was going to regen—

  A heavy weight slammed him into the wall and the battered ’zotz loomed over him, spraying his face with the oily black ichor that pumped from its throat wound. Fuck! Somehow, Rabbit tore free from its grip. The creature’s claws bit through skin and sinew, though, leaving him limping. He reeled around and shook out the whip, cracking it for good measure when the demon squared off opposite him with a blood-chilling snarl.

  “Son of a bitch,” Rabbit got out between ragged, painful breaths. So this was what it was like to fight without magic . . . it fucking sucked.

  He was still bigger and stronger than the average human, still thought, moved and healed faster, but that was it. He didn’t have the warrior’s explosive magic or protective shield, didn’t have his own pyro skills or telekinesis. Worse, the ’zotz could regenerate way faster than he healed, and it could be banished only by magic . . . or by him getting up close and personal, sawing off its dick and cursing it back to the hell that had spawned it.

  Rabbit was outmassed, outgunned, didn’t even have a knife, but he didn’t give a shit what the odds were. He didn’t know if this was one of the fuckers that’d whipped him to the bone, but that didn’t matter. Anything that kept him from going after Phee and saving Myrinne was the enemy right now.

  Roaring a vicious curse, he raised the whip and charged.

  The next minute or so was a slippery, bloody blur of Rabbit getting his shit torn loose while returning as many blows as he could with the whip butt, like some mad, beaten-down Indiana Jones. He blocked a blow with his forearm and lost his grip on the whip, grabbed for it and came up with the end of the camazotz’s tail instead.

  The demon screeched and tried to yank away, but Rabbit hung on. It was like holding a rattler—hot, scaly, dangerous and way stronger than it looked. The ’zotz roared and reared back, and its eyes went deadly cold, like it was saying, No more fucking around. You’re finished.

  But Rabbit wasn’t letting it go down like this. No way.

  Shouting as the oily fangs came at him, he blocked the incoming bite with that pissed-off rattler. The camazotz chomped down on its own tail. And screamed bloody fucking murder.

  Black ichor flew, pumping oily gouts that made Rabbit’s grip even slipperier. Instead of letting loose, though, he dug in. And, turning his fingers to claws of his own, he wrenched off the barbed end of the ’zotz’s tail.

  The bat demon’s screams went supersonic, no doubt calling in every reinforcement within earshot, but Rabbit didn’t care. Hissing between his teeth, he grabbed the ’zotz’s dick, set the barb’s edge to the base of the thing’s cock, and started sawing. And, as the bat demon sank its claws into the back of his neck, he grated, “Go back to hell where you belong, motherfucker.”

  It was JT’s quasi-spell, JT’s discovery that a nonmage could kill the bat demons with a sharp knife and a curse. For a second, Rabbit remembered the winikin’s face and his go-to-hell attitude loud and clear, and the memory pushed the animal instincts back down inside him, making him feel for a second like a mage, like part of a team. Sudden heat flared, turned the red-gold of Nightkeeper magic, and then—whump—the camazotz puffed to a cloud of oily smoke.

  And all of it—dick, tail barb, ichor, the whole mess—vanished, leaving behind only greasy smudges of char and ash.

  In the aftermath, the stone hallway rang with silence.

  Rabbit lay there for a second, sprawled and gasping, barely able to believe that he’d done it—he’d freaking done it! More, the silence said that the other camazotz weren’t close by, that maybe he had a chance to get out before they showed. He didn’t know how the hell he was going to get to Skywatch, but he knew one thing for damn sure: he needed to get his ass out of this fucking tunnel.

  Cursing, he dragged himself up. It wasn’t until a sharp pain in his palm worked its way through the other discomforts that he looked down and saw new blood flowing, red and thick, from a deep gash that ran along his lifeline, scoring through the tough layers of sacrificial scarring. More, the buzz he’d gotten from the ’zotz’s banishment hadn’t totally faded—it was still there, feeling more like Nightkeeper magic each second. It was weaker than his old fighting magic, more like his healing powers, deep-seated and cellular. And as he headed along the tunnel at a shambling run, it flared outward as if it were seeking a distant connection.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Skywatch

  One minute, Myrinne was sitting in the mansion’s main ro
om, listening in on a strategy session with seventy or so of her nearest and dearest—aka the Nightkeepers and their human consorts, the winikin, who had gone from being servants to possessing fighting magic of their own; and whatever the hell she was.

  But then in the next second, without warning, she was staring into her ex-lover’s eyes.

  Her. Heart. Stopped.

  On one level, she was aware that it wasn’t Rabbit suddenly standing up from a straight-backed chair on the other side of the room. But where, in the months since the resurrection spell had shocked the Nightkeepers by bringing Red-Boar back to life, she’d gotten used to seeing the resemblance between him and Rabbit, now it was more than that. It wasn’t just that the older man looked like his son or sometimes moved like him.

  No. In that moment, he became him.

  Rabbit’s eyes looked out from Red-Boar’s face, hollow and haunted, and his wide-shouldered, go-to-hell stance showed in place of his father’s slightly stooped frame. The sight of it—the painful reality of it—hit Myr in the gut and she lurched to her feet, barely aware that she and Red-Boar were suddenly the center of attention.

  Then he blinked, and Rabbit was gone.

  For an instant she thought she might have been wrong, that it had been a trick of the light. Then Red-Boar’s face lit and he spun to face the king. “I’ve got him.” He slammed a fist into the opposite palm. “I’ve fucking got him. I’ve got a blood-link!”

  And right then, with his features sharp and intense, his body vibrating with leashed energy and violence, the father looked very like the son. Enough to have Myr sinking back into her chair while the air rushed out of her lungs and a complicated sort of shock—part horror, part relief—raced through her.

  It was happening. Oh, shit. She wasn’t ready for this. Because as Dez asked if Red-Boar could lead the teleporters to the place and got a “Fuck, yeah,” her heart thudded sickly against her ribs with the knowledge of what was coming next.

  They were going to try to rescue Rabbit from the demoness who had corrupted him. And if the rescue succeeded, they were going to bring him back to Skywatch . . . because the gods had sent Red-Boar back from the dead, not just to find Rabbit, but to reunite him with the Nightkeepers.

  Apparently the Xibalbans weren’t the only ones who believed that Rabbit was the key to winning the end-time war—the gods did, too, and now the Nightkeepers. And where before their opinions toward him had ranged from “how could he?” to “good riddance,” now along with the wariness and mistrust there was scattered relief and a few “thank the gods,” because they were that desperate for something to believe in. They were pinning their hopes on Rabbit’s rescue and Red-Boar’s promise that he could be redeemed.

  The irony seemed lost on everybody but Myrinne.

  Then again, she was used to being the outlier.

  You can deal with this, she told herself, swallowing hard to keep the growing churn of nausea at bay. You knew it was going to happen one of these days. But now she realized that while her head might’ve known there was a good chance that they would find him and bring him back, her heart hadn’t believed it, not really.

  “You okay?” Anna asked from beside her.

  Myr just stared at her friend, feeling like she was drowning.

  The two of them had nearly two decades between them in age and were miles apart in looks, with Anna’s red highlights, cobalt eyes and ex-professor sensibility contrasting with Myr’s straight dark hair, brown eyes and Goth-goes-coed clothes. Their temperaments were as opposite as their looks, too, but they had bonded recently over their dubious distinction of being Red-Boar’s two least favorite people in the compound—Myr because she was only human and thus worth less than earwax in the old mage’s mind, and Anna because she couldn’t use the seer’s magic of her bloodline.

  It took a moment for Anna’s words to get through, another for Myr to nod. “I’m . . .” she began, but then trailed off, suddenly aware that although most of the others were already on the move, getting geared up for the rescue, there were more than a few sympathetic looks—and outright pity—being shot her way. Her spine stiffened. “Don’t worry about me. I can handle myself.”

  “I know you can. I just wish you didn’t have to.”

  “I’m not afraid of him.” Things were different now, and not just because the gods had sent Red-Boar back with an explanation of Rabbit’s brainwashing and a spell to ensure that he wouldn’t betray his king and teammates ever again.

  “That’s not the only thing you’re going to be up against, living here with your ex.” Anna’s smile went crooked. “Ask me how I know.”

  Maybe it was ridiculous to flinch at the word “ex,” but she’d never had one before. Besides, it sounded weird to call him that. There should be a distinction between a relationship that ended, say, because of infidelity or general assholeness, and one that flamed out in the midst of accusations and attempted murder. And that was when it hit her: after today—assuming the Nightkeepers pulled off the rescue—she would be dealing with Rabbit on a daily basis. Even fighting alongside him.

  A dull headache took root, pounding with the beat of her heart. “I’ll be fine.” I don’t want to talk about it. Not with you. Not with anyone.

  When Dez called for the teleporters to get into position, Anna hesitated. “I could stay.”

  “Don’t. Not on my account. I’ll just . . .” Myr made a vague gesture. “I don’t know. Go take some Tylenol or something. Maybe drink myself stupid.”

  Dez might not be the soul of sensitivity—the former gang-leader-turned-Nightkeeper king was more of the club-and-drag variety—but he didn’t ask if Myr wanted to go on the rescue mission. The answer would’ve been “no,” of course. In fact, she didn’t want to be there to see the warriors in their black combat gear, with their loaded weapons belts slung around their hips, didn’t want to wonder what they were going to find when they reached Rabbit, didn’t want to care.

  Moving on legs gone far wobblier than she wanted to admit, she headed out of the main room with no real destination in mind just so long as she didn’t have to watch the rescue team ’port away. To them, this was the gods’ will, the next step in the battle plan, and Rabbit was just another mage run afoul of dark influences. Lucius had spent more than a year possessed by a demon and working for the Xibalbans; Brandt had turned away from his wife and children because of a decades-old curse; and Dez had spent ten violent, lawless years under the influence of a dark-magic idol. Each of them had come back and redeemed himself, and the Nightkeepers were hoping Rabbit would do the same. They wouldn’t trust him easily—he had gotten plenty of second chances already—but they were willing to give him the slim benefit of a doubt.

  Myr, on the other hand, had no intention of giving him anything, ever again.

  Just leave, whispered her inner, smarter self. Just grab a Jeep and go.

  It wasn’t the first time she’d considered it—she even had a plan, and had stashed some cash and liberated one of the remote controls that the winikin used to deactivate the blood ward and open the main gates. Before, she’d always wound up staying, telling herself that the world needed saving and she could help. Now, though, she realized that she wasn’t nearly so tough as she’d wanted to think, because when it came down to saving the world or avoiding her ex, she was all about plan B.

  “So what are you waiting for?” she asked when she found herself in front of the door leading to the garage wing. “An invitation? Permission?”

  She wasn’t going to get either, she knew, and she shouldn’t have needed them. She was supposed to be a loner, an independent contractor who did what she wanted, when she wanted to. That was what she’d told herself back in New Orleans when freedom had finally beckoned. But almost immediately after the disappearance of the Witch—foster mother, fake tea shop psychic, and general evil bitch—she had fallen in with Rabbit, then fallen for him, hard. He had rescued her, brought her to Skywatch, and offered her everything she’d been raised to want: magi
c, power, a greater purpose. She had thrown herself into the Nightkeepers’ world, marveled at it, fought for a place in it, and earned the right to call herself a warrior, even if only a human one. And through it all, she and Rabbit had been a team within the team, a pair of misfits who fit perfectly together.

  Or so she had thought.

  When tears fogged her vision, she swiped them away with her sleeve. “Get over it. He’s gone.”

  The others could welcome him back if they wanted to, but as far as she was concerned, the demoness had taken Rabbit away from her long before he’d physically disappeared. In those last few weeks, he had been moody, suspicious and angry, entirely unlike the man she had loved. And that last morning. That horrible morning . . . No. She blocked the memories, not wanting to remember how his eyes had been cold, his voice a double-edged blade, his—

  “Fuck this.” She was moving before she was aware of having made the decision, pushing open the door into the garage and beelining for the wrecked Jeep Compass that sat in the corner, waiting for some body work and a new motor—or a decent burial. The cash and remote were right where she had hidden them, as were the keys to the oldest and most nondescript of the Jeeps, which didn’t have GPS tracking installed. Given that the teleporters couldn’t lock on to her with their magic—so long as she kept herself out of trouble, at any rate—she would be off the Nightkeepers’ grid.

  Heart drumming in her chest with a cadence that seemed to say hur-ry, hur-ry, hur-ry, she fired up the vehicle, hit the override for the garage doors, and aimed for the widening patch of sunlight and desert. She was doing twenty when she burst from the garage, thirty when she flew through the wrought iron gates that guarded the front entrance of the compound. And by the time she hit the first downhill dune leading from Skywatch, she had the pedal to the metal and the Jeep’s engine whining in protest. She didn’t know where she was going, didn’t care, just so long as she disappeared.