Emergence (The Infernal Guard Book 1)

by SGD Singh

  “I will kick your ass, Mehta. That's not even a little funny.” Lexi tried to stand, but Asha pulled her back.

  “The point is,” Asha insisted, over the seductive sounds of the Wraith, “it's not me! Okay, sure, there's a slight resemblance. If I had a bunch of work done, got Photoshopped, and aged five years… but your wild, mystery drink-addled imaginations are filling in the rest.”

  Aquila touched Asha's leg, bringing her attention back to the Sphere. Himat was shaking his head, backing toward the river, as the Wraith moved closer to him.

  “He's gonna—oh!” Aquila laughed as Himat tripped, falling back into the water as the Wraith reached to embrace him, and everyone but Asha cheered.

  Himat jumped up, scrambling away. The Wraith lunged at him, wrapping its arms around him, kissing him, pulling his clothes up, away from his stomach. Himat closed his eyes for a second, then opened them wide. He was frantically trying to pry himself away from the Wraith, and they both fell into the water again just as the room returned to reality, revealing Himat laying on the floor, panting.

  The room fell silent as he struggled to stand, looking sick, and returned his weapon to the wall. Without meeting anyone's eyes, he returned to his seat.

  Uma stepped forward. “Good effort, Pradhan,” she said.

  Laughter broke out again.

  “Hey! Enough of that. He remembered the flare, and he didn't use cutting weapons on the Wraith. Many more experienced warriors have not remembered as much.”

  Afzal said something to Freya and Hua Tseng, and Tanvir handed them something steaming to drink.

  “All right,” Uma called. “Tomorrow we continue. Drink up and get some rest.” She joined Barindra and Chakori across the room.

  Everyone filed down to get their drinks and Asha watched Himat with a feeling of loss as he drank quickly, not meeting anyone's eyes, and disappeared through the door. When she tasted her drink, Asha's heart sank with the realization of how distressed a person had to be to chug it the way Himat had and not gag.

  Chapter 27

  “Focus, Asha,” said Janu.

  Asha sat in the Zen garden with Lexi and Nidhan, her willing volunteers for another attempt at bringing others along with her to ghost Ranya. Janu thought people who were already close to Asha would be better able to “blend their psyches” with hers, but after several only semi-successful attempts at ghosting classmates, Asha's frustration was mounting. Janu was experimenting with whether different teas could add to their chances of success. So far, the only discernible result was that Asha was really beginning to hate tea.

  Now it was time to visit Ranya.

  Sitting cross-legged on the grass, Asha leaned against a moss-covered stone and took a deep breath.

  Kairav nodded, smiling encouragement. “You can do it…”

  Looking doubtfully from Lexi to Nidhan, she took their hands and closed her eyes.

  There was a feeling of falling, and then Asha blinked up at a mansion. It looked like the Itmad-ud-Daulah Tomb, only with modern lighting and more windows. Surrounded by manicured gardens and a vine-covered stone wall, it stood imperially at the top of marble stairs.

  Asha turned to look for Lexi or Nidhan but found herself, unsurprisingly, alone.

  Movement caught her eye, and Asha saw a bored-looking civilian pacing in front of an iron gate in the stone wall, a machine gun slung over one shoulder. Four more heavily-armed men stood at the top of the stairs, leaning against carved pillars in front of a massive door.

  With a sigh, Asha crossed the garden and climbed the stairs, dreading what she would find inside.

  The sentries seemed to look right through her as she passed among them and she paused, trying to overhear their conversation. Perhaps they would drop some hint of where they were.

  But they spoke in a language Asha didn't recognize, much less understand. She felt a pang of unreasonable irritation at India and its more than thirty languages—actual separate languages! Each spoken by millions, not to mention the hundreds more dialects that each claimed a few thousand speakers.

  Getting past the closed door was going to be a problem. Asha looked for an open window along the seemingly endless palace veranda, but she was interrupted when a cell phone rang somewhere across the garden. She saw one of the men by the door motion to the bored guard at the front gate. He pulled it open, and two men in suits entered, supporting a semiconscious boy between them. They laughed and shouted in the same unrecognizable language.

  Realizing they were going to enter the building, Asha waited near the door and slipped in as soon as the guards opened the massive slabs of inlaid stone and wood. The men in suits dragged the boy in behind her.

  Inside, Asha found herself in a large, empty hall. Gaudy pillars reflected on the bare, shining granite floor the size of a football field, and Asha looked around, disoriented.

  “Please… Bhaisaab… .” the boy pleaded in Punjabi, and it dawned on Asha that he was their captive.

  “My mother is sick… she needs me… my sisters—”

  “Shut up,” the larger of the two growled in English, wrenching the boy's slender arm.

  Asha noticed he was missing one tattered flip-flop, his foot covered in dirt and blood. The pitiful image triggered her temper and anger coursed through her—her power to pull life begging to be released.

  The men turned left, dragging the boy toward a stairwell leading down, and Asha followed, her mind searching desperately for a way to help him. Could she use her Talent in her ghost form?

  Soft firelight flickered at the base of the stairs, and they entered a luxurious bedroom.

  Asha's stomach gave a nauseating lurch.

  Ranya reclined against silk pillows on an obscenely large, round bed, next to a stone fireplace the size of a small garage. Despite this, she looked bored. She glanced up as they entered, and Asha's heart leapt in triumph as Ranya looked right through her.

  She could ghost Ranya while wearing her necklace! Spy on her undetected!

  Could she kill her?

  The look of wicked delight that filled Ranya's features when her eyes settled on the boy brought the nausea back, and Asha realized she didn't particularly want to see what happened next. Her determination to save the boy battled her repulsion.

  Clapping like a little girl, Ranya sat up, smiling like a girl at a candy shop. “Oh, you got him for me!”

  The shorter of the two men bowed. “You admired him earlier in the market, Goddess. We are but your humble servants.”

  Goddess? Oh, hell.

  Giggling, Ranya held out a hand and the two men rushed to kiss it. “Yes.” She smiled with indulgent amusement. “You can have what's left of him when I'm finished.”

  The men grinned at each other as they bowed, their eyes filled with dangerous exhilaration, and Asha kicked herself for not trying to kill them earlier.

  Ranya was looking at the boy as if he were a decadent cake, and Asha saw him tremble. He backed up into the men, who shoved him forward.

  In the soft light of the fire, Asha saw that he was extraordinarily beautiful.

  And he looked no more than fourteen.

  His exquisite eyes filled with fear as Ranya slowly rose from the bed, emerald silk billowing out around her. She crossed the room, and with an elegant gesture of her curved claws, she waved the men out.

  Bowing low, the two men left the room, the sound of their footsteps fading on the stairs.

  Asha felt her blood turn to ice in her veins as Ranya ran a clawed hand along the boy's trembling face, and through the tears that ran down his smooth cheeks. Tilting her face to his neck, she inhaled deeply, whispering.

  Now or never, Asha. This isn't a dream.

  Asha concentrated on draining Ranya's life force.

  Ranya's head snapped around, dark eyes demonic in the light of the flames.

  “Who's there?” she hissed, whirling away from the boy. “Show yourself!”

  She clutched at her chest, falling to her knees.

&nbs
p; And started laughing.

  “Did you really think that cheap trick would work on me?”

  Asha focused her mind, redoubling her efforts.

  Ranya paled, staggering, then raised her arms, muttering under her breath. The fire flared and she shrieked, her eyes bulging in her flushed face. “Get out!”

  The boy began to move to the stairway, but Ranya held out a hand, her shining nails like razors, and he froze. “Not. You.”

  She looked truly insane as she smiled around the room. “Asha? Is that you?”

  Asha stood still, not daring to breathe.

  “If you want to kill me, you'll have to actually face me.” She studied her nail guards. “I'll be waiting when you decide to stop slinking around like the miserable coward you are… and you can bring your little friends, too.”

  Asha tried again, but her ghost form only had a fraction of her power.

  Still, Ranya's eyes flared in indignation, and she spun, searching frantically.

  Then Ranya stopped, her smile twisting her beauty to something of nightmares. “When you sleep, Infernal Guard bitch whore, dream of this moment.”

  Ranya crossed the room in a blur of silk and with a sickening crack, she broke the boy's neck. His beautiful eyes widened and he blinked once, before crumpling, lifeless, to the floor.

  With a scream of rage, Asha fled, Ranya's hysterical laughter following her up the stairs. She didn't care anymore how loud her steps were.

  The four security guards stood at the door, laughing as they passed around a reeking bottle.

  Asha raced toward them across the pillared room, a ghost of vengeance, and as if they felt her fury, the men froze. The bottle shattered against the floor. Asha raised her hands and they fell one by one to the stone, gasping, suffocating. Three of them made it to the outside stairs before tumbling, shrunken and lifeless, to the grass below.

  Crossing the garden, Asha stared down at the last remaining man as he fumbled with shaking hands at the gate's lock, a look of wild panic contorting his features as he peed himself.

  “Please…” he whined, searching the air, eyes bulging with fear.

  It was the thing to say. The boy's last words echoed in her mind as Asha allowed the civilian to open the gate before she raised her hand.

  And took his life.

  This, she thought with a pang of remorse as the strength of their vile existence coursed through her. This is what we do. Asha shook her head. She had ended lives. Yet how many more like that boy had they killed? Tortured to death while they laughed.

  Stepping through the gate, Asha looked around for any clue of where she was. The driveway ended at a wide, tree-lined boulevard, with walled-in mansions between fields of wheat and flowers.

  She waited. Finally, an approaching car showed Punjab plates.

  Following the road for a mile, Asha came to a small shopping center. Restaurants, boutiques, a beauty parlor, a general store.

  All with Patiala phone numbers painted on their signs.

  Asha closed her eyes and was back in the Zen garden.

  Asha opened her eyes and noticed Lexi pale, glancing at Nidhan in alarm.

  “She's here,” Asha said, tearing her hands free. “If we move now, I can find her.”

  Kairav grasped Asha's shaking hand and put a large glass of something dark orange in it. “Drink this.”

  Papaya, pomegranate, garlic, and ginger. Asha grimaced, accepting a glass of water from Kairav when she was done. “We have to move now! Don't you get it? Ranya is here! At least within the district somewhere…”

  Janu pressed some numbers on his phone. “Jodha are on their way… tell us what happened, Asha.”

  Chapter 28

  At dawn, they found the mansion. Aquila followed Asha, in their bird forms, through the thickening fog and touched down outside the gate. Shifting, he stayed close to her as they approached Chakori and Kelakha, and the four of them gathered around Barindra in the deserted street, awaiting orders.

  Barindra typed something into his phone and turned to Chakori. “They're not far. We wait.”

  Uma, Garud, and Fanishwar arrived minutes later, their motorcycles coasting silently through the fog. Aquila heard Asha catch her breath as they appeared like phantom warriors. He could feel her exhaustion, her nerves ragged from taking a human life for the first time, her mind filled with remorse. Aquila made himself remain still, fighting the ridiculous urge to wrap his arms around her and comfort her. Leaders of The Infernal Guard do not need to be coddled. Even gloriously compassionate leaders who don't know they're leaders yet.

  “Okay,” said Barindra, his gravelly voice low. He matched words with hand motions for Asha's sake, surprising Aquila. The commander must have noticed her exhaustion, too. “Kelakha and Aquila around the back, Fanishwar, the front. Chakori, you're on aerial signals, and the rest of us stay with Sandhu. Let's move.”

  Aquila felt Asha's twinge of revulsion as Fanishwar shifted into his cobra form and slid under the gate. He couldn't continue to let Asha's presence distract him in the field if he wanted to survive long enough to be with her. Pull yourself together, for fuck's sake. She's more than capable of taking care of herself, and you damn well know it.

  Kelakha motioned to him impatiently. Wake up, yaar. Crouching, an instant later they were nearly identical sparrow hawks gliding around the wall.

  The garden and land around the property appeared deserted in the still morning, and a haunting screech echoed through the mist. Chakori was giving the all-clear.

  “Clear,” Barindra said as the hawks landed and shifted back inside the gate. Kelakha hurried to unlock it, and Barindra strode inside. “Let's go.”

  Garud and Uma fell into step next to Asha.

  “Someone locked it from the inside,” said Garud, holding a large knife in one hand.

  Uma motioned to Kelakha and Aquila. Stay near her. They moved into step behind Asha, crossing the garden. Fanishwar stood at the massive door with Chakori at the top of the steps, weapons drawn.

  Barindra nodded once, and Chakori opened the door. They entered the gloom of the stone and pillar hall, spreading out. Asha pointed to the stairs, and Uma held up an arm. Wait here. She and Barindra disappeared down the stairs as Chakori, Garud, and Fanishwar fanned out across the hall.

  Standing between himself and Kelakha, Asha looked around at the pillars reflected in stone, and sniffed.

  Death.

  Aquila nodded, frowning at her thought, just as Barindra and Uma returned.

  Barindra signaled to them. Level three civilian casualty, and pulled out his phone, while walking to the door.

  Aquila tried not to react, but Asha must have felt his disgust.

  What?

  He reached to stop her, but Asha was already running, moving down the stairs. He bolted after her, Kelakha cursing once before following. The stairs opened into a bedroom, and Asha skidded to a halt, stumbling back. Aquila lunged to hold her upright, even while fighting the nausea clawing at his own throat.

  A boy lay on the bed. Its embroidered quilts were soaked with his blood, and only his face was left intact. The rest of him had been gutted so completely, it was as if he'd been turned inside out.

  Aquila felt Asha's hysteria threatening to boil over, and he held her tighter. But beyond her horror he felt his own rage. Leaving the corpse's face was Ranya's twisted joke, a reminder to Asha of the beauty that caught her notice. Of what got him killed.

  Asha turned, squeezing her eyes shut, and Aquila caught her as she sank to her knees with a sob. He crouched with her. “He was already dead, right? He was already dead when she did this. Aquila, he wasn't… He couldn't have been…”

  Aquila held her closer, beyond caring that Kelakha was looking at him with disapproval.

  You saw him die, Asha. He didn't suffer beyond that.

  Aquila felt Uma's hand clamp down on his shoulder. “The police will be here soon.” Her voice was full of ice.

  Five piercing screeches at split-second interva
ls filled the air. Vampires.

  Aquila pulled Asha to her feet and up the stairs before she could react, Kelakha and Uma ahead of them.

  Are you gonna tell the rookie what the hell that means?

  Vampires. Asleep in another room.

  Uma made a hand motion at Aquila. Get her out of here.

  “No,” Asha said, easily interpreting the signal and stepping away from him.

  Uma gave Asha a look that could peel paint off a car, but Asha held her gaze. Aquila tried not to smile. The fierce determination in her glowing eyes easily matched up against even the most experienced Guard member. Uma let out a piercing whistle, which brought Chakori gliding toward them from the other side of the hall, an eagle owl weaving between the gaudy pillars. Transforming, she gripped Asha's arm, marching her outside before she could protest.

  Aquila listened to every word, ignoring Uma's stern gaze.

  “You have a lot to learn about following orders, Sandhu,” he heard Chakori snap. “You think we have time to worry about you and take care of five Vampires? You will go back to Headquarters. Now.”

  “Let me help,” Asha answered. “I can—”

  “No, you can't. You're done here. The cops are on their way, and unless you want them added to last night's body count, you'll let us finish this before they get here.”

  Two high-pitched screeches filled the air. Now.

  Chakori growled, “Just stay out of the way.”

  Racing back inside, Chakori shifted, flying into the darkness beyond the pillars.

  Asha did the same, and Aquila followed.

  Another stairwell. Another, much larger, room. This one just as luxurious as the one where Ranya killed the boy and twice as creepy.

  There were five beds occupied by terrifyingly beautiful women. They lay dormant, still as death in their pale beauty.

  Strewn around the filthy floor were the remains of the security guards.

  So they were… unconscious?

  Aquila wasn't sure how much more Asha's nerves could take, but he'd never lied to her and wasn't going to start today.

  Maybe. It's possible. But Vampires will also eat fresh kills. Sorry, Asha.