“Demons. Raiding the house. Trust me, if they catch you, they’ll strip that pendant off your neck and kill you. Or worse—and yes, there are worse things than being killed. Trust me.” Menolly frowned. “Chase, can you take her down to my bar and stash her in the safe room? You know where it is. I’ll give you the key. Nobody can get at her there.”
Camille frowned. “Take Maggie, too. We’re going to need Iris.” She turned to Chase. “We’re headed out to raid Stacia—we found the Bonecrusher.”
Chase blinked. “Of course I’ll take them. You think it will be safe for me to take her, though? I don’t have the firepower you do.”
“I can solve this,” Smoky said. “I’ll take you both through the Ionyc Sea. It will take moments, and it shouldn’t hurt your baby.”
Chase picked up Maggie, cuddling her to his shoulder as Smoky wrapped his arms around the detective and Amber. Before Amber could say a word, they vanished. A few moments later, Smoky reappeared.
“They’re safe. Chase will wait there for your call.”
“That takes care of that,” Camille said. “Let’s get a move on. Get everything ready that might be useful.”
According to the information from Kim’s mind, Stacia was staying on the Eastside again—she apparently preferred it to Seattle’s more crowded streets. Only this time instead of being near Marymoor Park, she had holed up in a house on the outskirts of Redmond, on three acres.
Roz picked up the magical stun gun from the table. “Is there a way we can recharge this without having to go down to the Energy Exchange? Camille? Can you do it?” He turned it over, stopping when he came to a panel on the bottom. As he flipped it open, we saw some sort of wiring, along with a mixture of various powders. “Holy crap—this isn’t an Earthside weapon. Not totally. Whoever made this had to be from OW.”
Camille took it, looking closely. “Correct. These compounds aren’t found Earthside. That means somebody’s come over here and set up shop selling a hybrid—the material this gun is made of definitely comes from over here. Who the hell would do that?”
“We don’t have time to find out now, but we’d better mark that down on our ever growing to-do list.” I regarded it quietly, then said, “Well, can you?”
“Can I what?” She gave me a quizzical look.
“Can you recharge it?” The stun gun was a powerful weapon and just might help us take down the Bonecrusher.
“I . . . I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe if I take it to Wilbur’s, he can help me. Morio, come with? I don’t trust his wandering hands.”
“Right behind you.”
As Camille headed out with Morio, I turned to see Iris, freshly dressed in a pair of jeans and boots that came up to her knees. She’d put on a long-sleeve shirt and heavy leather gloves.
She grinned. “Snakes have a harder time getting through denim and leather. I’m no fool.”
Smoky stepped to the side, discussing something in low tones with Shade. I eyed them suspiciously, but we didn’t have time for me to eavesdrop. We’d just finished gathering our gear when Camille and Morio returned.
“Freshly charged, though it might not be quite as powerful a jolt as the ones the Koyanni threw at us.” She handed the gun to Roz, who happily stowed it on his belt. “By the way, we’re still going to have to deal with them after this is done. But if we can take down Stacia, we can take down just about anything.”
I slid my arm around her waist. “If we can take down Stacia, then we’ll have another wedding reception for you guys—a family one only. And we’ll drink ourselves silly on Riellsring brandy and forget about Shadow Wing . . . even if for just a day.”
As we headed out the door to our cars, I steeled my shoulders. I was lean, mean, and had a new hairdo I was quickly growing fond of. And—my gaze flickered to Shade—a new boyfriend who already felt like one of the gang. We were off to defeat Stacia; good times like this didn’t come often enough.
The drive over to the Eastside didn’t take long; there wasn’t much traffic on the 520 floating bridge, and we sped along, late under the overcast sky, dodging raindrops and the occasional shower of hail pellets. We’d taken three cars—this time Shade and Iris were riding shotgun with me, while Roz and Vanzir caught a ride with Menolly, and Camille and her men took her Lexus. We were armed to the hilt, and I felt a stirring—always, now, before a battle, my blood began to rise and I felt anxious and eager.
We’re warriors now, I thought. Unwillingly thrust into a war we didn’t choose, but one that would risk the world if we let it happen. We were about to face our biggest foe yet, and I wasn’t sure how we’d come through. But we were growing stronger and more cunning. We’d learned a few tricks along the way, and we were more ruthless, more willing to cross lines that had stalled us at first. We had to be. The stakes were greater; our enemies were too willing to use our friends against us.
As we swung right onto Leary Way, heading toward the Redmond Town Center, I glanced over at Shade, who seemed entirely unperturbed about sitting in the Jeep. “Have you ever been in a car before?”
“Several times.” He flashed me a warm, easy smile. “Relax, I’ve been Earthside quite a bit. I am familiar with the customs. Perhaps more so than your brother-in-law, who’s been over here longer. I’m more willing to integrate myself when necessary.” He paused. “Lady Iris told me what you’re facing. I knew about the demons already, but she filled me in on the lamia.”
One less thing for me to do. “Iris said . . .” I glanced at her through the rearview mirror, and she nodded. “Iris said you’re half shadow dragon?”
He nodded. “Aye. Yes. Half black dragon—which is the same thing as a shadow dragon—and half-Stradolan.”
“What’s a Stradolan? I want to know what you can do. It might be important in the upcoming fight.”
Sucking in a deep breath, he let it out in a long, slow stream. “I can walk between worlds. I can move through the astral and the etheric without a problem, though I’m not very adept at shifting into the Ionyc Lands. I can enter the Nether-world and return. My powers are dilute because of my half-breed heritage, but I can, my lady, work with some forms of magic—shadow and illusion.”
“Like the coyote shifters?”
Shade laughed. “They work with illusion, yes, but not to the extent I can. However, as I said, my magical powers are limited. I’m one hell of a fighter, though.” Almost as an afterthought, he added, “Oh, yes. I can shift into dragon form, but only during the night in which there are shadows.”
I glanced over at him, my heart swelling. Something about him spoke to me. He was a half-breed, like me. His powers were slightly skewed. He could transform, but he wasn’t a full dragon nor full Stradolan. He was, for all intents and purposes, a misfit. Like me.
Turning right onto Eightieth, we followed the road as it wound through Redmond, then into the suburbs of the city, finally merging into 172nd. A few winding S curves, and we were nearing the address. Stacia still lived in the suburbs, but the house had a nice piece of land attached to it.
I pulled to a stop a house or two away and waited for the others. As I stared over at the lot where Stacia and her cronies were hiding out, I knew in my gut this was it. Tonight would be the end. For her . . . or for us. She’d killed Henry, she’d destroyed Camille’s shop, she’d subverted Kim and left Carter heartbroken, she’d taken control with Trytian’s army, and while they might be working together against Shadow Wing, she was out for our blood.
And we . . . were out for hers.
I glanced over at Shade. “Tonight, we fight. You aren’t a pacifist, I hope.”
He reached out and gently covered my hand. “I have slaughtered more enemies that you can imagine in my time. I am far, far older than you think. Whether he knows it or not, I’m older than your dragon friend Smoky. Stradolan . . . we spend much of our time walking out of time, so to speak. I fought in wars before the Great Divide.”
I met his gaze and saw the sands of time falling away, revealing an unend
ing flow of centuries. How long had he been alive? And then I realized he wasn’t anything verging on Fae. Or human. He was a half-breed, but he was the product of two great forces. How he even came to be perplexed me, but the warmth in his eyes was real, and so were the fingers that stroked my own. As I lost myself in the rich coffee of his eyes, Iris leaned forward and tapped me on the shoulder.
“We should go, Delilah.”
“Right.” I sucked in a deep breath, shaking myself out of the reverie. Whatever energy Shade was running, I wanted to be part of it. Whatever he was offering, I’d already accepted it.
As I climbed out of the Jeep, then helped Iris jump down, she whispered to me. “I like him. He’ll be there for you, Delilah. No matter what happens, this one will be there for you.”
I leaned down and pressed my lips against her cheek. “I know. I’m so comfortable around his energy that I want to curl up by the fire and never move.”
She flickered her gaze over to where he stood, observing the house, then back. “He bears your master’s energy. If he’s not an avatar of the Autumn Lord, he’s the next best thing. I wonder how they came to be so linked. And how he knew about me.”
“About that . . . what does Ar’jant d’tel mean?”
“Leave it for now. It’s part of my story. When we win—not if, but when—and the dust has settled on Stacia’s dead body, then I will tell you.”
As the others joined us, I gauged the house. It was surrounded by a high fence, but that was nothing new in the suburbs. We couldn’t get in from the back unless we managed to find our way through the thicket of trees that bordered her lot, and there were no roads back there. At least not close enough to give us an uninterrupted view of what was going on.
And last time, when we’d snuck in, we’d ended up almost getting blown to smithereens. We might as well just go in shooting, for all the good sneaking around had done us. I cleared my throat and mentioned my thoughts to the others.
“I say we attack on two fronts,” Menolly said. “I can sneak in. So can Shade. Smoky and Roz can’t because they don’t know what’s beyond the gates, doors. But let Shade and me get a head start, we’ll come in through the back to try to keep them from escaping.”
“I don’t like splitting up,” I said. “No. This time, let’s just go in blasting. Kill anybody or anything that moves and looks remotely demonic. But our prime target is Stacia. This isn’t her training camp, so I doubt if we’re going to find humans around to get in the way.”
Roz pulled out the stun gun. “Anybody want to use this? I have enough weapons to keep me happy for now.”
Trillian held out his hand. “My skills are fairly adept with a sword, but that will give me a better edge till the charge runs out.” He took the weapon, held it out to calculate the aim, and then nodded, hooking it on his belt. “I’m ready.”
“Watch out for snakes,” Camille said. “She’s bound to have the place like an oven in there, and where there’s a lamia and heat, there’s bound to be snakes.”
“I’ll prepare one of my freezing spells. Smoky should do the same.” Iris inhaled deeply, closing her eyes as the magic began to stir. I could see it, rising around her like a vortex. It was as if the past few months had ripped open her abilities, and the Talon-haltija could cast spells I hadn’t had any clue even existed. Smoky took one look at her and followed suit. The temperature around us fell a good thirty degrees.
“Our turn.” Morio looked at Camille, and they joined hands. “Dust to dust, death to death, spell to spell, breath to breath . . .”
Their voices rang softly through the air, chiming a note that sent a shiver of fear through me. They were growing more powerful, and their death magic scared the shit out of me. Until recently, I’d been worried. But now, I found something seductive about it.
Vanzir and Roz prepared their weapons—Vanzir had a nasty-looking sword, and Roz pulled out a handful of his magical bombs that I guessed were freezing from the icy white of their surface.
Shade looked at me and nodded. “I’m ready.”
I longed to turn into my panther self but resisted. Once inside, I’d assess whether I could do more damage on two feet or four. With a glance at the others, I straightened my shoulders. We were ready. The die was cast.
“Menolly—go.”
She blended into the shadows, running ahead to set off any traps that might be waiting. Except for Smoky—and perhaps Shade—she was the least vulnerable. As she covered the distance from gate to house, nothing actively moved, but Camille shook her head.
“They have wards, and she just activated them.”
I licked my lips. “They know we’re coming. Get your asses in there!”
As we plunged forward, Menolly kicked open the door and leapt to the side as a mass of Tregarts spilled out. The last time this had happened, Stacia had managed to escape while they distracted us. Not this time.
“Menolly, Shade—go left. Smoky, go right.”
As they circled the house, the rest of us steeled ourselves against the oncoming attackers. The first wave hit like a whirlwind, but Camille and Morio were ready at the front. A wave rippled forward from their linked hands. The first four Tregarts were caught in the wake of the rolling energy, and my stomach turned as eager earthen hands reached out of the ground to grab the demons’ legs and yank them, kicking and screaming, through the soil, deep into the earth, where they disappeared as if they’d never been.
I stared at the disrupted lawn. What the fuck kind of freakish spell was that? Did I even want to know?
It worked. Your sister is helping save your ass. My dagger whispered to me in the night, and I shook off my shock and dove in, looking for an opponent. It didn’t take long to find one, as the second wave lurched forward. Zombies and bone-walkers. The walking dead. Stacia’s specialty.
I narrowed my attention. One thing I’d learned from the battles over the past year: Never try to focus on everything that’s going on. Fight your own battle, then glance around and move on. Otherwise you chanced ending up on the wrong end of a sword. I straightened my shoulders and assessed the skeleton coming my way.
The walking pile of bones would fight until broken to shards. That much I knew. I also knew that they weren’t easily hurt by blades. Blunt objects were better, so I sheathed Lysanthra and, guarding my breath into a low, even rhythm, spun, my booted foot landing against the bone-walker’s skull.
The skeleton’s neck snapped back, and I kicked again, breaking the vertebrae. The head fell to the ground, but the bone-walker kept coming my way. Without the head, however, it was easier to jump out of its way and circle it. From the back, I pummeled it with a hail of kicks, breaking the tailbone in two.
The creature shattered, falling to the ground, and I pulled out Lysanthra and smashed the hilt through the skull, then severed the hands from the arm bones. One more smash to each hand ensured they wouldn’t scuttle around, grabbing our ankles.
I turned around, quickly surveying the battlefield. Camille and Morio were casting another spell. A circle of light surrounded them, whirling like a vortex, and they walked forward toward a group of five bone-walkers. The creatures disintegrated into dust as the edge of the light hit them.
Damn, I’d like to have me some of that magic, I thought.
Roz, Vanzir, and Trillian were pounding their way through a couple of zombies and a Tregart. Trillian was wisely holding back on the stun gun. Good. When we came up against Stacia, perhaps it would do some sort of damage.
Iris was focusing her wand on the house—she was standing on the porch, and as I watched, a layer of mist began to flow out of the Aqualine crystal, in through the doors, turning to frost everywhere it touched. A layer of ice, a layer of cold. Good girl. That would take care of any snakes we might encounter inside.
I realized there was an opening to get to the door now and took it, racing up the steps, sliding on the frost right through the doorway. Morio, Vanzir, and Iris followed me while the others hung back, fighting the las
t of the front guard.
We’d rushed into what had once been a parlor but now appeared to be some sort of barracks. Cots lined the walls. My guess—they were for the Tregarts. I slowed. Stacia should be in here and—if we were unlucky, Trytian, too. I wasn’t sure I wanted to take on the daemon. While he had tried to blow us up, my guess is that he would have left us alone if Stacia hadn’t entered the picture. And he was fighting against Shadow Wing.
As I turned the corner, I stopped short. There, ahead, was a tall, lovely woman. Striking. Stunning. Stacia.
Oh crap. Where the hell were Smoky, Menolly, and Shade? I tried to slide back around the corner before Stacia noticed me, just grateful she hadn’t shifted to her true form yet, but she turned as I was backing away. Her face—dark, brilliant eyes against an olive complexion—was beautiful, but the look in her eyes terrified me. There was no mortality there—no sign she’d ever felt compassion or mercy.
She smiled then. “I offered you and your sisters the chance to join my army.” Her voice was soft, too gentle for the look on her face. “Remember that when you die. I’m not like my predecessor. He enjoyed playing with his food. I just get the job done—that’s why I’m alive.”
As she began to transform, I turned to yell for Iris and Vanzir, but saw they had engaged four zombies that had appeared out of the corner. And I found myself facing a very large, very scuzzy looking Tregart. Crap.
His fist slammed into my gut, and I doubled over. As he leaned down to grab me by the scruff of my collar, I managed to thrust Lysanthra straight up and stab him in the face. He shrieked and staggered back, and I forced myself to my feet. Stacia was midway through transformation—apparently it took time to turn into a twenty-foot anaconda woman.
The demon was bleeding like a stuck pig. I pushed forward, stabbing him through a gap in the leather jacket, managing to hit him in the gut as he tried to maneuver his eyeball, which had been dislodged, back into the socket.
At that moment, the front door—which I could see from my position—slammed open, and Smoky, Menolly, and Shade burst through. High five! Backup had arrived. As the Tregart writhed on my knife, I gave it another good twist and slid my blade out of him. He dropped to his knees, and I brought the dagger down on his head, giving him one final gash that did the trick. He keeled over, and I raced into the living room, where Stacia was just finishing up her shift into her lamia form.
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