I craned my neck, trying to see what it looked like. No luck.
Hellion took the bag of salt and scattered the contents along the mark of the inner circle. His shoulders swelled as he took a deep breath and closed the circle. He looked at me long and hard before shaking his head finitely as if in warning before moving to a goat I hadn’t noticed tethered well outside the circle. Speaking to the animal, he stroked its shoulder then rubbed its chin before grasping it and slicing through its neck in a single clean movement. With the same blade, he scored his palm deeply in the next heartbeat of time.
I involuntarily jerked. The sense of clinical observation I’d hidden behind was blown apart with the taking of life and shedding of blood, and this whole moment became grounded in reality. I wanted to take back my suggestion. I wanted to shout, “Stop!” My mouth felt as if it was filled with sand.
Hefting the twitching animal over his shoulder, Hellion stepped into the safe zone between circles, held the snout and directed the draining blood, uninterrupted, around the turned earth so that it defined the outer circle. Finished, he tossed the carcass, seemingly indifferent to the blood covering him. I couldn’t control the shudder that raced through me, head to toe, but I managed to remain silent. After all, this had been my idea. I’d kick my own ass thoroughly when the summoning was over.
Darius and the others stood silent, focused on Hellion’s movements and motions. The warlock—for he was no magus in this moment—turned to the vampire and inclined his head fractionally. With a soft voice, Darius began to chant. The candle bearers backed away from the hexagram. When they reached the outermost ring of the circle, they set their carved candles down and stepped back a pace, taking up the chant.
Deep, guttural and unidentifiable despite my developing skill with languages, the cadence sounded like it was related to Latin, but the words made my teeth hurt. Age colored the words in darkness, and I knew the invocation was older than time.
Coven members prayed outside the larger circle, their mouths moving quickly as they beseeched their gods for everything from protection to triumph. The sound created a low-level hum like a human white noise machine.
In the flickering firelight, blood danced red to black and back, an irreverent nod to the impact of light on color and violence done in the dark. Hellion stepped up to each man and murmured a few words before marking the party’s forehead in blood and swooping low to light his candle. He’d then hand it to him and move on. The chanting never faltered. When he finished with the men, Hellion returned to Darius’s side, went to one knee and inscribed the sigil on the black candle.
My hands fisted at my sides, nails digging bloody crescents into my palms. It felt suddenly as if the chant piped directly to my mind and drowned out everything else. It was so quiet beneath the chanting it was like someone had unplugged all other sound from the world but those six intense voices that I knew with certainty called to them Death.
My belly cramped as my adrenaline spiked. Willing myself still, I breathed in through my nose, out through my mouth.
Hellion rose slowly and made eye contact with the coven member at each of the five hexagram points. When he spoke, his voice echoed in my skull. “Circle of darkness I command you. Circle of darkness I confine you. Salted Earth I call to you, imprison that which is summoned to this place. Blood-bound protection I grant you, that none shall pass beyond. I call from the air a doorway to the Planes of Destitution. Deliver to me the Dominae, Agares, that he might be mine to command for the hours one, times two, times three. I offer you my blood as recompense.” Hellion sliced his forearm open, the shallow wound bleeding freely. He dropped blood on the wick of his candle. The flame sparked and rose several feet straight into the air. The other candles followed, counterclockwise.
Stars winked out. Flames outside the circle died and left only the practitioners’ candles to light the night.
Fear’s grasp bound my chest. Air. I couldn’t get enough air.
Invisible steel scraping and screeching against its equally invisible counterpart ripped through the air. The smell of brimstone, like sulfurous, rotten eggs, billowed out the invisible window in noxious waves. The ground shook. The outer circle rose up several inches at the same time the inner circle sank in equal measure. The earth swallowed the gemstones as sacrifices to her scarred surface.
Without warning, screams tore through the night air and everyone jumped. The tortured and the damned pled for salvation that they—and we—knew would never be found. Micah knelt at the edge of the circle and wept. It was the first I’d seen of him since we arrived, but I spared him only a fleeting glance. All around the circle people looked back and forth, shifting on their feet, unable to stay still as nerves gave way to fear.
Smoke joined the smell of brimstone, pumping through a dark smudge on the air. The sound of gagging made my stomach pitch, but I held. Hellion stood firm, his eyes focused on the growing rip in the atmospheric plane.
An arm punched through the fissure, followed by a leg bared to the hip. Agares folded himself through the opening a bit at a time until he stood within the circle, temporarily free of Hell. He looked like he had at our first meeting—very sexy, self-assured and in command. The biggest differences were that it was night, the time in which he was allegedly most powerful, and the Dominae wasn’t wearing any clothes. Not a stitch.
“Missed me did you, boy?” His eyes never left Hellion. With more than three dozen people watching, the Dominae began to rub his flaccid penis and lick his lips seductively. His dark hair was mussed, as if our call had woken him.
Under his attentions, his shaft grew long and thick, his hand working himself as he sought release. All the while, he stared at Hellion.
Hellion’s face paled. His dark blond hair ran wild after losing the thong that held it in place and his shoulders were so heavy with muscle that I thought he must have grown another six inches out, if not also up.
I wanted to go to him. Emotion clogged my throat and I couldn’t breathe or talk…or scream. And I definitely wanted to scream. All of the point men stood in solidarity, holding their position but never taking their eyes off of Hellion. They were clearly aware of Agares, but it wasn’t his command they followed. But their show of loyalty wasn’t enough—not for me.
I wanted to put myself in Agares’s line of site and protect Hellion from this vile creature. I wanted to kill him. I wanted to—
The idea hit me so hard I sucked in a deep breath and choked on the smell.
Agares spared me the briefest of glances before returning his gaze to my lover. “We’ve some unfinished business, you and I. Did you decide to take me up on my offer? Because I’d love nothing more than to follow through on my original promise, Hellion, Son of Markalon, and make you mine for eternity. One night with you wasn’t enough. I remember your sweet, virgin flesh, the taste of your arousal and, by the night, your cries.” A look of unadulterated longing passed over Agares’s face, tightening his eyes and pulling the corners of his mouth down. “I’ve never forgotten you, never stopped wanting you.”
Hellion’s shoulders curled forward.
Oh hell no. This wasn’t happening. I pulled my gun out of the waistband of my pants and, keeping it behind me, began to inch around the outer circle. A shot to the head wouldn’t kill him any more than it had killed his brethren in the alleyway, but it would shut him up. And God alone knew how much I wanted to shut him up. As I moved, the only member of the crowd who paid me any mind was Darius. I tried to focus my thoughts toward him.
I’m going around behind Agares. I want you to knock everyone down that you can on the off chance I miss. I moved my gun hand to the side.
Darius’s eyes widened slightly before he blinked once, long and slow. He was listening.
I can’t let this get out of hand. I have to stop it.
Darius blinked once more, and I picked up my pace. I probably should have waited to see if there was a second blink, but sometimes…sometimes you do what you have to do.
; Consequence be damned.
I crept along behind the coven members, my movements exaggerated and slow. They never noticed. Every eye focused on what was happening near the heart of the circle between Agares and Hellion.
Unfettered rage bit along my skin as Hellion struggled to keep control of the situation. Tremors wracked his body. My own rage responded in kind, and my finger twitched on the trigger guard of my gun. The urge to caress the trigger to action was so strong…
Agares caught my movement and, this time, turned toward me, a grin on his face and a significant happy in his lap. “I’ve been waiting for you, Niteclif.” He grinned lewdly, waving his hips at me so that I couldn’t help but glance at the engorged member that sprang from a hairless groin.
The coven members I’d used to shield my movement stepped aside to give the demon and I a more direct path of communication. I’d thank them for the courtesy later.
Looking him over from head to foot, I made sure to stop clearly on his arousal. I cocked my head to one side and tapped my chin with a finger. “Yeah? Still looks like you’ve got a hell of a long wait in front of you if you think to best Hellion as my lover.” Insult to injury—I snorted and rolled my eyes.
Muscles and tendons stood out in sharp relief on his neck and shoulders when he dropped his head back and roared to the heavens.
“Something tells me no one will hear your pleas.” I forced my hands to hang loose at my sides.
Chest heaving, Agares smiled. “Your heaven is nothing to me, woman. You, you are the ultimate prize in this particular game.” He licked his lips lasciviously and gestured again with his hips.
Cold stole over my skin at his words and my hand stole to my abdomen.
“You think to protect yourself from what’s to come, but you won’t.” He chuckled and I wished for a pair of pants, a sarong, even a potato sack for the man-creature. “You’ll belong to Asmodeus before this is all over.” His singsong voice taunted me.
A new terror I couldn’t understand rode me. I shuddered, head to toe. Asmodeus. Recalling my last conversation with Tyr, I knew that name. Dealing with the fear and knowledge would have to come later, though. Hellion needed me in the now.
The gun raised seemingly under its own power. “My heart belongs to Hellion. I belong to no one. And him?” I nodded to the warlock who stood rigid in the firelight. “He’ll never belong to you, you sick shit.”
With a roar, Agares lunged to his left, catching one of Hellion’s men unawares. He stumbled back instinctually, scrambling to get away from the Dominae who was morphing into Hell’s poster child as I looked on in horror. The man’s foot scraped the line of the circle and his candle winked out at the same time Hellion bellowed, “No!” A sonic boom concussed the air and the circle broke free.
Hellion made a slashing motion with his hand and slammed the fissured doorway closed, but not before two more Dominae peeled themselves free of Hell’s confines. They entered the melee with vengeful glee, ripping into soft human bodies as they tore toward me. Their hands sported thrice-jointed fingers tipped with obsidian nails filed to sharp points. Every movement was lethally graceful as they moved like dervishes through the first layer of shocked coven members.
Vampires rushed into the fight, providing the field-leveling manpower we so desperately needed. Darius launched himself at Agares as the Dominae and one of his brethren rounded on Micah. The vampire hooked Agares around the neck, squeezed and grunted as a rail of punches landed on his kidneys and the softest part of his belly. The blows seemed ineffective. Darius rallied with a series of sharp jabs to Agares’s face and neck, the Dominae gagging with the sharp blow to his larynx.
Micah fought with the other Dominae until Hellion, sword raised, charged into the fray.
“Down, Micah!” Hellion swung with all his formidable strength, beheading the unnamed demon where he stood. The creature fell to his knees, his head tumbling off his shoulders and his body beginning to decompose immediately. Putrid fluids oozed from every opening, the smell gag-inducing, as the body aged, turned to sludge, then seeped into the earth. Just like in the London alleyway, all that remained was a black smudge in the grass to prove the Dominae had fallen there.
Hellion turned back to the brawl. Rage made his features sharper, his cheekbones casting shadows up his face. His black eyes were bottomless pits. Something dark and alive burned within those depths, something that wasn’t quite human as it peeked out.
People scattered like hens in a henhouse when the fox drops by as the other Dominae continued to fight, always trying to make his way toward Micah who stood only a few feet in front of me. A vampire screamed in pain, causing Darius to glance his way. It was all the opening Agares needed.
He started away from Darius, but Hellion stepped into his path, putting himself between the advancing demon and Micah. My magus-cum-warlock and his nightmare sized each other up, circling round and round. I took a step to the right and raised the gun to eye level. In a two-fisted grip, I followed the action across the grass, waiting for my opening. Someone plowed into me from behind. I clutched the gun, almost squeezing off a round on accident as I went down. A heavy weight rode me to the ground. Just as I was about to curse the asshole who’d taken me to the dirt, a fist connected with my ribs and I grunted in pain.
I half rolled and took a glancing blow across a hip, tucked the gun in and fired blindly. The resounding boom rendered me partially deaf and the body on top of me permanently faceless. Blowback covered me in gore, and I fought to get out from under the body before I lost it. I didn’t make it. My stomach emptied into the grass as I continued to fight my way out from under the heavy Dominae who had begun to decompose.
“Help me!” I screeched.
Efien kicked the body off my lower legs and pulled me back, setting me on my feet. He pulled his shirt off and offered it to me in lieu of a towel. Grateful, I accepted the offering with a mental note to send him a Harrod’s gift card.
Darius slid to a halt in front of me at the same time Hellion threw his head back and yelled his rage at the night sky. It was then that I noticed Agares was gone.
Stars began to wink back into existence quickly, and I realized I’d never credited them with the amount of light they actually provided. I won’t make that mistake again, I thought, grateful for the extra illumination.
“All is well, cara?” Darius ran his hands over me, checking to be sure the blood wasn’t mine.
“Never better,” I said through the cloth of the shirt as I scrubbed at the bits of brain and bone on my face and neck. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.
Now that I was up, I could see the casualties were significant considering it had been three against an easy three-dozen people. The Dominae’s first run through the crowd had been effective, creating the chaos and confusion that had given them the upper hand. Hellion and Stearns were moving across the grounds, separating the wounded from the dead. I dropped my chin to my chest.
“Darius, how many…” I couldn’t bring myself to ask what I needed to know.
“Even one would have been one too many.” He laid his hands on my shoulders and their weight surprised me.
“Are you hurt?” I asked, incredulous.
The vampire smiled gently. “I am agelessly immortal, but not infallible, love.”
Scrubbing at my neck, I tilted my chin offered him my vein.
Instead, he picked up my wrist and looked at me, eyes pinched. “You are sure?”
“Positive. But don’t you need my neck—you cheeky sneak!”
He only shrugged. “I took what you offered. Now I’ve no time for sipping if I’m to be of any help to him at all.” My confusion must have shown because he paused, looking me in the eyes. “Someone must take the bodies home to London, love, and I’m the coven’s only pilot.”
I swallowed past the emotion lodged in my throat and nodded. I hadn’t thought beyond the immediate loss to the fact that there were families waiting for these people at
home. Who would tell them—
“He will, Maddy.” Dark purple stained Darius’s irises. “He’ll see every family that knew what their loved one was, and arrange accidents for all the others. Some willed that they just be buried at sea so that no one could use their bodies against justice.”
My breath clogged in my throat, emotion changing over to near hysterical laughter that lodged mercilessly below the surface. “I’ve lived through the living dead once. They died when their creator died.”
“So what then must happen to the living dead when they’re created by an immortal none is sure can be destroyed?”
I pulled my hand from his grasp and grabbed his arms. “Cremate me. Promise me that if anything happens to me, you’ll—”
“Do no such thing, because nothing will happen.” Hellion’s voice stripped the last of my control.
Turning, I met his gaze. “Promise me,” I wheezed.
He stared at me, unblinking, unwavering.
“I give you my word,” Efien said, sliding away from Hellion. I hadn’t even seen him approach.
I nodded once, hard. “Thank you.”
Hellion rounded on the vampire. “You’ll do no such thing.”
“He’s not yours to command,” Darius said softly, “but he does answer to me. Efien, why strike such an oath?”
“She owes and is owed as much because of what she is.” Efien’s voice was a satin-covered blade that promised no compromise.
“Meaning?” Hellion glanced between the three of us. “Speak quickly. My temper’s about played out.”
“I’m the Niteclif. That’s all he means.” My eyes challenged the others to argue. “Anything else would be ridiculous, folly even.”
Efien nodded once and moved away.
“Hellion, Darius needs blood and I was just about to offer him mine. What can I do to help you when he’s d—one.” The last hissed out between my teeth, the sharp sting of fang in flesh not tempered by magic or good will. Darius must have been hurt worse than I thought. The erotic pulling sensation made me clamp my legs together, my nostrils flaring with each draw he made.
Vengeance: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 3 Page 15