Death Mask (Wraith's Rebellion Book 3)

by Aya DeAniege

  I climbed out of the car and looked around. Then I reached back in and grabbed the mace from the passenger side.

  Death walked around the car and eyed the mace like it was going to bite him.

  “No way am I setting this down and out of reach,” I said.

  “I wouldn’t expect you to, but it does beg the question of how you are holding that without it burning you.”

  “I’ll trade you the answer to that, for a couple of answers of my own.”

  “For what questions?”

  “The witches say that when you kill, it takes a part of the soul of the wielder to the afterworld with the dearly departed.”

  “A more accurate description would be that I can take them, and the person I’m riding fractures a little more with each trip across. But I’m not discussing the afterworld with you. That is something I am bound to keep to myself. No one knows for certain, and that keeps everyone on even ground.”

  “I more of want to know why Bau would give you up if you can travel across. Why did she make an elaborate spell to dip into the other side to bring her lover back? Why couldn’t the lover just ride back with you? You can’t be a one-way trip since you and the person you’re riding always comes back.”

  “I can take anyone and anything over. To come back, however, one must be the same as me. Male. I became male with each death she took on the field.”

  “How can I use the tool, if I’d end up trapped on the other side?”

  “The host doesn’t go with me. It’s the back and forth that rips their minds apart, my leaving and coming back. But that is why I cannot bring the lover back, and why she has created her elaborate spell.”

  I considered that fact, which begged another question.

  “How do you know you can bring anyone back?”

  “While bound to her, she forced me to bring a man back from the dead.”

  “Oh no, what happened to him?”

  Death looked away for a moment, then sighed and turned back to me.

  “She knew that he couldn’t live, but didn’t want to send him back, least her plan be ruined. It’s, I mean. It’s not like it’s a blind void or something. There are checks and balances. Taking something out is a bad, bad idea. Bringing him back in general was a bad idea.”

  “Oh no! She didn’t. Lu, really?”

  “He wasn’t near death when we found him. He was completely dead. Before you ask, he was that messed up to start with. Actually survived the process quite nicely.”

  The world did a giddy little spin.

  “Of course mama bear is angry, we just dashed her hopes of bringing back her lover and killed her baby boy. How much about the afterworld does she know?”

  “Only that it’s possible to retrieve a soul on purpose,” Death said. “Or at the very least, for me to retrieve a soul on purpose. That doesn’t suit her plan, however, as she only wants to bring back a woman.”

  “That’s bad.”

  “I know. Now you.”

  “I visited the Archives earlier, stole her heart, ate the Archivist, and then slammed it back into her chest.”

  A lie, of course. I hadn’t eaten the Archivist, Bau may have.

  “Ate the Archivist?” he asked.

  “The blood of the Archivist prevents the mace from hurting me, at least until the blood wears off. So I wouldn’t go about bleeding me anytime soon.”

  “Interesting notion. Shall we proceed?”

  “Do you agree to my terms?”

  “I do. Do you agree to mine?”

  I hesitated for a moment, but only a moment. “I do.”

  “Fantastic. If it gives you any solace, Peter was sorry for what he did to you.”

  “Apologies are to clear his conscience, not make my life better.”

  “True,” Death murmured, holding out his hand. “Shall we?”

  I took his hand in my free hand and exhaled slowly.

  Then I invited Death in.

  Just under an hour from when Helen left Lucrecia and a car passes by me?

  I turned and followed the car.

  The car was out of sight in moments. I couldn’t see who was driving or where exactly it was headed, but it was the first vehicle I had seen on my walk. The cell phone wouldn’t connect, I couldn’t feel her out with my powers or blood, or whatever else it was that Makers were supposed to use to find their Progeny. So, all I had to go on was my gut feeling, and it said to follow the car.

  I was walking, mind you, but given the direction, it was going, I made an assumption that I thought was pretty safe.

  Helen and Peter were headed towards the bay, but I didn’t know why.

  Unless Helen had explained the problem to Peter and he agreed to help. Siblings bonding over the murder of a vampire, I might think it adorable if their lives weren’t in danger. There was a nagging that I was missing something, but I wasn’t quite certain what.

  I reviewed the information that I knew and found myself still puzzled as I stepped onto the road leading to the bay. As my foot hit that asphalt to cross the road, the wave of terror overcame me.

  Like a neon flashing light, over the bay, seemed to explode. There was no visual, but that was the best way to describe it. It flashed on and off shouting, ‘here, here, here,’ several times.

  Then it just vanished.

  Balor had said that feeling a Progeny in trouble was a knowing, like that feeling of something moving behind you even though everything was silent. It was knowing when the sun would rise, or which way was north.

  It was not a neon flashing sign that you may or may not hallucinate.

  I found it difficult to separate reality from my senses as I continued forward. That neon light feeling was suddenly a flashing, literal light that said ‘here’ and then disappeared every other step.

  Helen was in trouble that much I knew.

  I swore as I stepped onto the road that led to the park, I saw a child running ahead of me, giggling into his hands. Above me, there was a great something as if a massive hole had opened up in the sky. My other senses, those not of the visual and physical world, were encountering things which I had no words for. Things were happening that hadn’t happened in the world before, but they had a distinctly acid trip feel to them.

  Maybe Lucrecia had drugged me after all.

  I looked up as the clouds seemed to swirl open. At the middle of it all, in the calm of the sudden storm, there was a rage filled flash.

  “Yeah, because that’s not going to draw the attention of the entire human race,” I snapped at no one in particular.

  There were things in the sky that could take pictures of the earth, of weather patterns. The cloud was also so far up in the sky, and so big, that it looked to overlap the city across the bay as well as much of my city. Our only saving grace was the fact that it was so late at night that there was less of a chance of it being seen by mortal eyes, but only less of one.

  As for the things up in the sky, well, I needed a phone to solve that problem.

  I had the tablet, not my cell phone. My phone had exploded inside Lucrecia’s pot, taking a good chunk of her floor with it. That meant that I couldn’t call for help because there was no way to get the call out. Before I had left, we had attempted to call Helen. Then Lucrecia had called Balor, and he was on his way over with Troy, then we had to do an interview.

  You know, if we survived.

  Grumbling to myself, I strolled towards the bay.

  I was concerned, but I wanted to keep an eye on the sky.

  We had been told that Bau couldn’t teleport, and maybe that wasn’t what she was doing up there. Maybe she was just rearranging the clouds to cause us trouble. Maybe she was trying to cause a storm that would black out the east coast of North America.

  I don’t know, might be fun.

  A country that was blacked out was a great deal easier to sneak out of than one that had active surveillance and was still looking for you and everyone you would be travelling with. The case might have been settled,
but we had still been told not to leave the country.

  As I entered the bay area, I saw something fall. It wasn’t the controlled fall that I had witnessed earlier with Bau. The body was tumbling, flailing even.

  That’s not one body.

  Something was fighting in the sky.

  Right, because that was completely normal.

  I stopped walking and squinted upward. My vision was twenty-twenty, maybe a little better than that, but even that vision only went so far. It was just that they were so far away and up in the sky.

  They were in a long descent, hair flying upwards as they struggled against one another. Some magic had to be involved in their fall because it wasn’t free-fall.

  Otherwise, they would have impacted the ground seconds after I had spotted them.

  As if to emphasize that point, something struck the asphalt in the center of the parking lot as if it had been shot from a bow far above the earth. It flashed, and the parking lot erupted into a crackling smoke.

  Magic.

  The parking lot began to crack along the little threads of lightning that worked their way through the smoke. Those cracks pulsed red and angry, as if in time with a heartbeat that wasn’t human. There was no sound with the cracking, it simply happened and appeared. We at least had that to be grateful for, the sorts of sounds that that kind of destruction caused would have brought humans down on us quite quickly.

  I looked up again and ran towards the object at the same time. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that the object was the mace, that Bau and Helen were up in the sky fighting. It was a little surprising given my knowledge of the world, but when magic was involved I was learning quickly that one simply had to go with it. If that was the mace and them up in the sky Helen and Bau, then I had to get my hands on the mace before they hit the asphalt.

  Helen didn’t know how to fight, she’d loose. Plain and simple.

  That meant that it would be up to me to use the mace to put an end to Bau before she got her legs back under her.

  Heart pounding in my chest, I dared to ponder what the magic in the parking lot might do, how far down the cracks might run. If I fell into one of them, I might have been swallowed up. Unless they were simply an illusion.

  Suddenly it was hard to breathe. Then it got hot, unbearably hot. Pain flooded my senses as I tripped over my own feet and slammed into the asphalt.

  “Ow,” I said.

  I’d like to emphasize that moment. To take those seconds that seemed to spread out into eternity to express the surprise in my voice, the startled pain that bloomed in my hands and knees. The fiery burning sensation and how every little tear could be felt.

  I had been smart and turned my head, I might have lost the tip of an ear, but my pretty face would still be whole for the interview.

  The pain burned along my skin and into my nerves. Where fire would hurt and then die off, this did not. It burned and burned and seemed to reach my very bones as it clawed its way into me. When a gust of wind came up, the burn renewed itself, like acid eating away at my flesh.

  Tears sprang to my eyes as I sat up. I didn’t think there could be a more appropriate response at that moment. Bringing my shaking hands upward, I expected to see nubs where my fingers had been. Perhaps the flesh flayed from my palms.

  No, nothing like that.

  I had road rash on my hands from stopping my fall.

  That’s all.

  “What in God’s good name is this?” I demanded of my hands as if chastising them might make the pain fade.

  Focus on something else.

  I had been beaten, raped, branded, cut into, and even murdered. Those things had been done by others as well as by my Maker, from which there was no hiding. None of it had felt so keenly as the pain did in those moments as I looked up once more.

  They were still above the city, coming to the height of the tallest buildings. The oxygen would be flowing by then, not quite as thin. Any advantage a vampire might have had would be gone.

  Except, considering the ones who were fighting, that oxygen could be a very good thing. Helen hadn’t perfected the idea of optional breathing yet. For some it took centuries to master, she had only had a week.

  What I didn’t understand is why she thought she’d get the upper hand over Bau in a fight.

  And then I watched them separate at a blow landed by one.

  At that distance, it was difficult to tell who was whom it was dark, they both had dark hair. While Helen was taller, both appeared to be the same height while tangled together. They were dressed in dark clothing and neither wearing a bra.

  Yes, when trying to identify the women, I did eventually turn to their boobs. If it had worked, I’d be thanked, not labelled a pervert.

  A movement caught my eye. I frowned and turned towards it.

  Peter was stumbling away from the epicenter. The crackling magic seemed to tug at his clothing, inviting him to come closer, just a little closer. He hadn’t been there moments before, or at the very least had been hiding. Possibly passed out on the asphalt somewhere.

  Come play with us.

  And then a giggle.

  I stiffened and looked down, around me. Little hands were rising out of the asphalt, reaching for my pant legs. Thousands of little voices begged me to play with them, giggled, and sung.

  I wanted to bolt.

  Hey, I’m a lot of things, a big brave man and such on.

  I don’t think any vampire would blame me if I had run from there screaming in a shrill manner.

  It was beyond anything that any of us had ever experienced outside of a bad acid trip. I had had a lot of those, so I suppose in a way, I was prepared. I had seen some strange things before, but I had been on drugs and had known that the drugs were in my system and everything would fade at some point. Even if I hadn’t consciously recognized that fact, somewhere at the back of my mind, I knew.

  This was not one of those times. This was one of those nightmares that I couldn’t wake from, that wouldn’t change unless I changed it.

  Which meant that I couldn’t run away. I couldn’t find the nearest vampire and ask them for help either, they wouldn’t know what in the hell to do.

  I walked forward, looking up as the two tangled again. I skittered around a mouth in the asphalt that opened and tried to lean towards me. Two feet or so across, probably a foot wide, with a set of impressive teeth. It grinned and laughed in a deep kind of way as I glared back at it.

  I almost missed the second one. That one I stomped on, for getting too close. From then on, I began kicking at anything that tried to reach for me. The closer to the center I came, the more obscene the manifestations of my mind.

  Or, perhaps, of the magic.

  There in the middle of it all was the mace, pulsing in time to the thundering in my chest. I approached it and looked up one last time. Then I looked back at Peter, fighting to get his foot out of the field of fingers.

  It could go two ways, I pull it out, and that’s the end. Or I pull it out and end up as a sacrifice for whatever in the hell was going on. Either way, I wouldn’t know until I did it. But looking around and considering the symbols I could see and what I knew of witches and Bau, and what had been said about me, the boy, for all those centuries, somehow I doubted I would be sacrifice.

  I was supposed to kill Bau, then be killed myself. That would make her the sacrifice. Maybe. I hoped, because there was no way I was leaving that stuck in the ground.

  I steeled myself and grabbed the mace. It burned into my hands, the agony tenfold what I expected from being burned.

  My body was screaming out that it was at its breaking point, trying to warn me off of going any further.

  But I knew better. A little burn had never stopped me before. I cried out as the mace began to move. Once it was moving, I refused to pause, I just kept pulling and pulling. The weapon seemed to stretch like taffy, insistent that it belonged in the ground.

  Suddenly it was free. I was so startled that I stumbled backwar
ds and it fell onto me, lighting a fire down my whole length where it lay. I struggled against its weight, pushing it off me as I fought for breath.

  The thump of feet right by my head was emphasized a moment later by the louder thump of a body hitting somewhere by my feet. The body had made a full impact, limp and travelling face up. It would have damaged bones and joints, probably rendering the second person unconscious at the very least.

  “Quintillus,” Bau purred out.

  She bent and plucked up the mace.

  “I must thank you for returning this to me. Perhaps in the new world, you may find a place. If you don’t die of your wounds.”

  I sat up, one arm against my chest in a mortal protective gesture.

  I had never pictured Bau as stupid, but there she was, about to monolog. I knew better than to give up the opportunity. In a fight, using the opponent’s stupidity against them was the easiest way to win. I only needed to gather my wits about me to ready my power.

  I wondered if I was ready for it yet, how long it took.

  Oh, I think we’re ready. Let’s light her up.

  I just needed my breath, my focus. Dragging in that breath, I turned to Bau.

  “What do you mean? An immortal can die of this?”

  Bau arched an eyebrow. “Boy, are you stupid?”

  I dragged in another breath, feeling it rattle through my chest. Feeling how my heart seemed to slow, dipping down almost, as fear clawed at me. The kind of fear that I hadn’t felt in fifteen hundred years.

  My body was in its death throws.

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “Your new God cannot save you. Only He might spare you. Maybe He will, but I doubt it. He is such a fickle god.”

  Death?

  Doubt it. Get it together man!

  “You’re calling the afterworld.”

  “Yes,” Bau said, kneeling as she ran her fingers through my hair. “Such a pretty boy. It would be a waste for you to die. Should I turn you again?”

  “Please.”

  What?

  Wraith roared in my ears, vibrating through my skull. His rage almost made me laugh. Despite how fluidly we had worked together over the last hour, that was the point that separated us. I would do whatever was necessary to survive, even if it meant asking her to turn me again. No harm could come of it.