Eve of Redemption Omnibus: Volumes 1-3

by Joe Jackson

  “Yes, of course, Lady Vanador,” the priest of Kaelariel agreed. He motioned to Marshal Saracht for some parchment and a quill, and the marshal nodded and made his way upstairs.

  Kari turned back to the body. She removed the rest of Turillia’s armor but found no other tattoos or distinctive markings. Just as interesting as the tattoos was the lack of scars, and Kari discretely checked the succubus for any telltale signs that she may have once carried a child. As a mother, Kari found she was interested in whether or not Turillia had children for more than just the practical reason. She didn’t find any such marks, but like with the scars, Kari supposed it was possible Turillia had been able to shed her scales to get rid of them. The way the succubus had fought, Kari doubted it was ever necessary, but that didn’t mean it was impossible. Kari wrapped Turillia’s body in the succubus’ cloak, and she was more than a little surprised when both Deirdre and Piotyr knelt and began uttering a quiet prayer over the corpse.

  Once they finished, Piotyr met Kari’s gaze as if he expected her to ask what he was doing. “No sense taking chances,” he answered preemptively. “This demon dabbled in necromancy; better to assume she might become undead herself if left unattended.”

  “Good thinking,” Kari said, though in the back of her mind, the thought of an undead demon was completely foreign. She rose to her feet, and waited for Marshal Saracht to return before she addressed her friends.

  “Kari, have you seen Sharyn? We didn’t see her when we came to the tower,” Sherman asked.

  Damnit, Kari thought. Getting tired of lying to people, but this isn’t the time for this.

  “Yes, we saw her. She had to go check on the movements of the werewolves, and then check in with her ranger contacts,” Kari answered. Deirdre stared at Kari while she spoke, but the priestess’ gaze held little judgment, and she didn’t say anything. “She might be back in a couple of days, but she gave me a message to give you in private.”

  “Oh, thank goodness,” the young paladin said, and his sister patted his shoulder. Markus regarded his student with a crooked smile, but didn’t say anything. “Later, then?”

  Kari nodded, thankful that Deirdre and Eli were content to let her explain things in her own time. Once the marshal came back downstairs and gave the quill and parchment to Piotyr, Kari spoke. “As you can all see, Turillia is dead. Emma’s gone, too; she escaped,” she said. Deirdre and Piotyr both reacted to her words, but it was fairly subtle and only Kari and Eli picked up on it. “Now all we have to do is drive this shadow demon out of Lord Black and let this city get back to normal. Everett, no matter what happens with Lord Black, there’s something else I need to talk to you about when we’re done.”

  The marshal nodded. The others seemed surprised that Kari called him by his first name, but no one asked about it. “Shall we go upstairs and speak with my lord, then?” Saracht asked.

  “Not just yet. Send a runner for Master Vlad and Master Devin, and once they’re here and Piotyr has finished copying this tattoo, we’ll be ready,” Kari answered.

  The marshal dispatched two of his men stationed outside to go fetch the priests. While they waited, Kari spent the time studying all of the people in the waiting room of Lord Black’s tower with her. Her conclusion that Marshal Saracht could’ve been the only person to betray her, intentionally or not, seemed to hold true. She was positive it couldn’t have been Markus, since he wasn’t even with them at Ambergaust’s church when she’d uttered the words Turillia quoted to taunt her. On the same token, she was sure neither of the Moreville twins would’ve told the succubus.

  She turned her gaze to Piotyr and his sister, and Kari was satisfied it wouldn’t have been either of them. The priests of Kaelariel were as reliable a couple of allies as Kari had ever met, for how short a time she had known them. Sharyn had suspected Eli, but Kari dismissed any such suspicion out of hand. Kari was upset with Eli for simply letting Emma go without asking first or giving an explanation, but Kari didn’t believe Eli would’ve done anything to help Turillia. The succubus had embarrassed him and stolen essence from him, and Kari was almost certain that his desire for revenge was authentic.

  That left two people: Master Vlad and Marshal Saracht. The very idea that a priest of Ambergaust would in any way aid a succubus was laughable. The fact that he had discovered and informed Kari of Turillia’s ultimate intentions further spoke to his credit. And on top of all that, Kari simply couldn’t believe that a priest – especially the head priest of an entire church – could be turned. If that was the case, Kari didn’t even want to imagine how much trouble her entire world could be in. If the demons could infiltrate the very priesthoods, what hope did the Order have of ever rooting them out?

  That left only the marshal. Kari was hesitant to suspect him of doing anything, but she understood that loyalty was the marshal’s defining trait. His loyalty to Lord Black may have led him to reveal more than Kari would have preferred, and thus any such betrayal had to have been accidental. Everything Marshal Saracht had done since being put at Kari’s disposal made it hard for her to believe he was in any way involved with the succubus. She was all but certain that the only way the marshal could have been the one to betray her is if he had done so accidentally or unwittingly. After all, he answered directly to Kaelin Black, and he’d been the last to know that Lord Black was possessed. It wasn’t all that difficult to imagine he had simply told his lord about what had happened, and didn’t realize that he was also speaking to the demon.

  In the end, Kari supposed it didn’t much matter; everything had worked out, if not exactly how she would’ve liked. Turillia was dead, there had been no casualties among Kari’s friends, Emma had left without killing anyone, and the shadow demon was alone and cornered. With the help of Master Vlad and Master Devin, Kari was sure Katarina and her two half-elite friends would be able to drive the demon out of Kaelin Black. It was possible they wouldn’t be able to banish it from Citaria, but Kari figured if the four priests and three paladins couldn’t do so, she would take Eli’s advice, and beseech Zalkar and Sakkrass for their help.

  “Lord Garant, what happened with your plan to come to the bell tower, was the storm too much?” Kari asked the paladin while they waited.

  “Aye. My apologies, Lady Vanador,” he answered. “The rain was much too strong for me to get airborne and be able to see anything or fly safely. So I came back here to keep tabs on Lord Black, figuring that would be the best way I could be of aid to you.”

  Kari nodded; she was satisfied he had done the right thing, even though it had left her in danger. Soon the waiting was over, and Master Vlad and Master Devin joined the gathering in the waiting chamber of Lord Black’s tower. With a nod, Kari sent Marshal Saracht into action, and he walked up the stairs to inform Lord Black that the deed was done. Kari had to hope that the marshal’s normally stoic, unreadable expression would keep the demon from suspecting they were about to spring a trap upon it. If the marshal could do his task for Kari properly, the demon would hopefully be content to sit and listen to the gathered friends speak of the battle.

  After only a few minutes, the marshal came down and beckoned for the gathered allies to follow him upstairs. Kari asked Eli to carry Turillia up with them. Once he agreed, Kari went up first behind Marshal Saracht, followed by Eli, and then the rest of the gathered allies. When they reached the Earl’s study, Black was seated in his chair with a cigar burning in the ashtray as usual, and he regarded the large gathering with interest. Just as on her previous visit, Kari noted the chill in the air that the fireplace did nothing to dispel, and she knew the demon still lingered.

  Eli carried Turillia’s body over near Lord Black, and Kari pulled back the top of the succubus’ cloak-shroud just enough to show her face. Black rose and approached, and he pulled the shroud down a bit more until he could see Turillia’s ruined neck. He made a short sound that fell between disgust and disappointment, and then he put the shroud back over the dead body before fixing his eyes on Kari. She wasn’t s
ure what he – or more pointedly, the demon – was thinking, but after a few silent moments, he gave an impressed nod and then took his seat again, from which he looked at the many faces before him.

  “I expect I owe every one of you a bit of gratitude for ridding my city of this menace?” he asked. It was hard for Kari to tell, but it seemed like the real Kaelin Black was in control. Kari couldn’t imagine the demon would’ve been too happy to see its partner in crime mauled, or that it would’ve managed to nod at her the way it had.

  “Well, I certainly do,” Kari answered after a moment. “If it weren’t for all of them, I’m not sure things would’ve turned out as well as they did. Between their aid in combat, research, and simply helping me get Turillia into a trap, everyone present helped me in some way.”

  “Excellent work, demonhunter,” Black said. “Did you discover anything more of her plans, or why she chose my city to enact them?”

  “Actually, I did,” Kari said. “Master Vlad was the one who figured out that she was trying to become a demon king, a goddess, or maybe both by stealing power from the shadow demon and then locking it, I guess you could say, within herself by drinking the blood of a powerful mallasti sorceress. She very nearly succeeded without us even figuring out what she was really up to, but she made one big and fatal mistake.”

  “She came to your world to do it?” Black asked with a chuckle.

  Kari wasn’t the only one to realize it this time: the demon had erred. Kari masked her realization better than the others, and thankfully, Black’s attention was on her. She cracked a toothy smile to bluff the demon, and said, “Well, yes, but that’s not what I meant. It was actually the fact that she raised corpses in the graveyard that did her in.”

  The demon in Black seemed surprised. “How so?”

  “Her necromancy attracted the attention of a local werewolf pack,” Kari explained. “And in the end, those werewolves saved me from her, and one of them was the one that actually killed Turillia. You see, I wanted to keep her alive to ask her questions and try to figure out what else was going on beyond her personal goals here. But one of the werewolves killed her, because it figured she was too dangerous to keep prisoner.”

  Kaelin Black laughed, though the others in the room didn’t share in his mirth. After glancing from face to face, he looked back to Kari and shrugged. “You have to admit, the irony is rather delicious in this case.”

  “Well, like I said, I wanted to get some information out of her first, but I did find out one thing thanks to her,” Kari said. She gestured for Eli to put the body down on the floor by the window, masking her intentions behind the façade of simply wanting to give him a rest. What she really wanted was for Eli’s hands to be free, on the off chance the demon tried to fight its way out of the situation when it realized it was caught. “Turillia let a secret slip when I confronted her, because she thought she was going to kill me anyway, so no one would ever find out.”

  “And what secret is that?”

  “That you and BlackWing are the same person,” Kari said evenly. She put her hands on her hips, close to the hilts of her scimitars without being an actual threat.

  Black’s eyes went wide before narrowing into a scowl. “What is this?” he demanded. “You rid my city of this succubus for me, and now you’re trying to make a play for my noble title? You’d best explain yourself, demonhunter, or the marshal will be putting you and your friends into the stocks.”

  Kari had thought the demon was in control, but the reaction to her declaration seemed to say otherwise. He doesn’t even know, she thought. She tried to think of how to explain things to Lord Black. If she could convince him that he was possessed and didn’t even realize it, he might allow them to perform an exorcism willingly. That still left the question of whether it was Lord Black or the demon itself that possessed the ability to split into two. If it was something Lord Black could do naturally, it wasn’t that big an issue, but Kari wondered if he even realized it. She imagined that may have been what drew the demon to him in the first place.

  Kari looked over toward the fireplace, drawing everyone else’s gazes toward it as well. “Feel that chill in the air that you can’t seem to get rid of, even with a good fire?” she asked, and Lord Black regarded her curiously. “That’s the mark of the demon; it’s how I knew it was in you, why you attacked me the other night, and how I know you and BlackWing are the same person.”

  “Why I attacked you…? You’re not making any sense, and you are wearing my patience dangerously thin,” Lord Black said, standing up. He was a massive, imposing man, and he towered over all of those gathered, stretched out to his full height. Kari could only imagine how much more imposing he looked with his wings spread. Surprisingly, it was Markus who approached and held up his hand to calm his fellow Earl, and Lord Garant’s gaze fell over Kari.

  “You told me you thought he was possessed, but what evidence have you that Lord Black is also BlackWing?” Markus asked Kari. “All evidence seems to contradict that theory.”

  Kari turned her gaze back to Lord Black. “You told me yourself when I first arrived in the city,” she said, and she could see he truly was confused. She guessed the demon had left him in control, but it was still present, its cold aura lingering in the air as a biting chill. “You told me that fifty-seven years ago you were attacked by a demon of some kind in DarkWind.”

  “And killed it,” the Earl countered.

  “But then you ran into a gnoll shaman who told you a shadow was closing in over you and your city, remember?” Kari asked. Lord Black considered her for a few seconds before he nodded, somewhat grudgingly. “I don’t think it was a gnoll shaman at all; I think it was Emma. I think she’s been watching you for a long time, because she knows what’s inside of you, and what it can do with your body.”

  “Conjecture? That’s what all of this is based on?” Lord Black asked incredulously. He turned to Lord Garant and pointed a clawed finger at Kari. “You’re going to try to depose me based on the conjecture of a woman who trips over words with more than two syllables?”

  “Hey!” Eli said, stepping forward, but Kari held him back with an outstretched arm.

  “No, we’re not going to depose you with conjecture,” Kari returned. “In fact, I don’t want to depose you at all. I just want to get this demon out of you, and find out if BlackWing is a part of you or the demon.”

  Black looked to Markus. “What is this? Was this your plan all along, Garant? To pin BlackWing’s actions on me and help remove me from power?”

  “Lord Black, I assure you that Lady Vanador’s accusations and conclusions have nothing to do with me,” Markus answered with a shrug. He folded his arms across his chest and waited for Kari to continue.

  “I’m not making this up. When I confronted Turillia, I saw something I almost couldn’t believe: she split into two separate, quite real beings,” Kari said, and there were muttered swears and sounds of disbelief from her companions. “That’s a power she stole from you – well, either you or the demon inside of you. I think this demon has been a part of you and your life since the day you thought you killed it in DarkWind. Emma tried to warn you about it, but I guess you ignored the antics of a stupid gnoll. And for the last fifty-seven years, the demon has been using a duplicate of you – BlackWing – to accomplish its evil ends.”

  “By the gods!” Lord Vlad exclaimed, coming forward. “Lord Black, you must allow us to exorcise the demon before it regains control or uses this power again!”

  “Everett?” Lord Black said, turning to his marshal, and his voice betrayed that he was both confused and quite scared that Kari might be right.

  “My lord, allow the priests to do their work,” Marshal Saracht said. “And be thankful this demonhunter figured it out before BlackWing did something irreparable.”

  “No one holds you to blame,” Kari assured the Earl. “This thing had us all fooled.”

  “Well, don’t wait for the damned demon to give you permission,” Kaelin Black sa
id, and he gestured the priests forward.

  Piotyr, Deirdre, Master Vlad, and Master Devin approached the Earl’s desk to begin their work. Black rolled his head dramatically, but before Kari could say a word, the Earl turned and grinned at her. He stumbled toward Kari suddenly, but she was on her guard and prepared for such a move. She caught the much larger male and spun him to the floor, and in the blink of an eye she had straddled him with a scimitar laid across his throat. Black came to his senses a moment later, and though he looked confused, Kari wasn’t about to fall for any such deception. At the very least, she would hold him in place while the priests drove the demon out.

  “Kari…,” Eli muttered.

  Kari looked up at the half-corlyps, then over her shoulder to see what he was staring at. Behind her, in the same place where Black had stood only moments before, was a duplicate of the Earl of Southwick. BlackWing didn’t just look like Kaelin Black; he wore the same outfit, the same necklace, and the same small weapons upon his person. Kari glanced back down at the massive half-demon under her, and she hesitated for a moment, unsure if she had the real Kaelin Black in her clutches. She withdrew her scimitar and started to stand, but Black tossed her aside once her weapon was away from his throat.

  What Kari assumed was Kaelin Black got to his feet quickly and rushed at BlackWing, and he punched the other hard across the face. The two exchanged blows for nearly half a minute, and once they’d switched places, grappled, and tumbled to the floor, neither Kari nor the others were sure which was which. “Block the exit!” Markus ordered his two students.

  Kaelin Black and BlackWing got back to their feet and continued to brawl. Kari was disappointed to see that the demon was smart enough to keep the telltale poison from dripping from BlackWing’s claws and fangs. They continued to trade blows, and as she watched, Kari got a good sense of just how strong Black truly was. Thanks to his size, he didn’t appear as muscular as Kari’s in-laws, but the crushing thuds of his punches – his and the duplicate’s, whichever was which – landing on meaty flesh left little doubt that he was a heavy hitter. Neither asked for help, so Kari wasn’t sure if she should intervene at all, but Marshal Saracht made the decision for her, stepping forward to try to apprehend both. Kari joined in, and Eli moved to do so as well. Soon enough, Kari noted that the priests were beginning a chant, likely to try to reveal the demon or drive it out.