by Jenn Stark
During this little speech, Kreios had taken what seemed to be an almost involuntary step forward, his face alight with what could only be termed as unparalleled joy.
“Justice,” he breathed in his rich, indolent tones. “Justice.”
“You can’t—she can’t do that—” It was Eshe who spoke now, her eyes wide, though her voice held no real certainty. She swiveled in her seat toward Armaeus, then cowered back.
I glanced that way as well and saw what had startled her. Armaeus had grown taller, broader, his body now wrapped not in the impeccably tailored suit, but in a cloak of deepest midnight blue, so dark as to be black. That cloak rustled like shadows around him, his eyes fiercely intent above it, his skin burnished to a golden bronze as he met my gaze again.
“Strength to strength, the Council grows,” he said, the words falling from his mouth in a thousand different languages at once, all of which I understood. “Strength to strength, the Council stands.”
I didn’t feel anything but the sudden surge of magic that swept toward me, toward me and through me and past me. There wasn’t a bolt from the heavens, there wasn’t a shiny gold ring or new set of armor. I didn’t even get a wand. Still, I could perceive the change, could sense the tide turning in the Council as its construct bowed and strained.
But I wasn’t done yet. “You told me you would do anything I asked, if I so chose this path,” I said now, and Armaeus’s gaze shot to mine. The power pouring from him was so great, I braced myself as if against a flowing tide. But he didn’t speak, merely waited for me. “You gave me your bond that you would support me.”
Someone hissed, there was a clatter of commotion, but I had eyes only for Armaeus. I would not come into this Council weak, unallied. I would not fall into their predetermined box for me. I would not let the wave of inertia roll back over us, not when there was now so much magic in the world. So much possibility along with all the problems, the danger, the death. Gone were the days when the Council could sit idly by and let that magic founder on its own, only to be stamped out by those who could not understand it. Gone were the days of balance for balance’s sake alone.
It was time for that to change.
And I would start that change.
“I am Justice,” I said again, “but Justice means nothing on its own.”
The laughter that rolled forth at that moment started deep in the shadows of the archway. Hard. Feminine. Cold. The kind of laughter that would strike fear in the hearts of those about to be judged, if they had any true reason to be worried. The kind of laughter that would strike fear into any heart, honestly, whether they had reason to be worried or no.
To his credit, Armaeus didn’t even lift one of his winged brows. He held my gaze steadily across the room.
“You’re sure,” he spoke in all the varied languages, his words flowing across my mind.
Not at all, I replied without hesitation.
“Well, I’m sure,” Kreios chimed in, with such enthusiasm I nearly jumped. Armaeus didn’t move, but there might have been the slightest twitch to his mouth. “You said there was going to be war on the Council, but this…” The Devil sighed lustily. “I never imagined anything like this.”
A moment later, Gamon stepped out from the shadows of the portal, and everyone in the conference room went still and simply…stared.
I did too.
Gamon stood straight and tall, her hair and face uncovered, her weathered skin stretched over sharp cheekbones. Her eyes were piercing, her smile fierce. Her lean, muscled body was poured into tight, technical gear atop heavy-soled boots, and a well-worn weapons belt hung low on her hips.
For a long moment, nobody moved. Then Eshe’s exasperated voice sounded down the length of the conference table.
“You people are killing me with these clothes,” she groaned.
Armaeus said something to Gamon I couldn’t make out, and she turned to him, her gaze bold and defiant.
“What is going—” Viktor began, then stopped as my energy played across his throat.
“How would you serve, Gamon?” the Magician asked quietly.
Gamon didn’t hesitate, and she spoke in a harsh, throaty snarl. “You saved the earth from the gods, Magician, but not from the gods’ magic, and not from the scourge of demons that’s been set free. But that is nothing new for the Council. Good, bad, indifferent, the magic of this world formed the playground of those who wielded it, and they were the ones who made the rules. That’s not going to work anymore. Not with this much magic. And that one,” she turned to me, gesturing, “sees the good in everyone. Even when they don’t deserve it. I don’t. I never have.”
She looked back to Armaeus then. “That said, she also saved me. Poured her own energy into me, rebuilt me from nothing. Left a part of herself behind while she did it. That…changed me. So while I can see the evil, and there’s usually evil, I do know good when I see it now. When a reckoning must be made…I’ll make it.”
Her grin spread across her face. “I am Judgment of the Arcana Council. And whatever Justice brings to me, so will it be judged.”
She turned to Viktor. “Starting with you, das Schwein.”
“What!” Viktor’s outrage gurgled past the gag I had on him, and I dropped my energy away as Gamon reached out. “You! As Judgment! You have the blood of the innocent on your conscience, drenched so deep in it, the stain will never run clear. You are the dregs of humanity!”
“Then we should get along just fine,” Gamon purred. Slowly, deliberately, she closed her hand into a fist. A horn sounded, far in the distance…
And they were gone.
Several seconds passed. Then Simon shifted forward, leaning his elbows on the table.
“Ah…Viktor does have a point there,” he said. “Gamon sort of is the dregs of humanity.”
“As Viktor was, before he ascended to the Council,” I replied. “As each of us committed crimes before we stepped upon the Council’s path. Now, she cannot kill, she cannot exploit, she cannot cause harm—any harm—without Council sanction. Otherwise, she will be held accountable, like Viktor is being held accountable for the innocents he killed or had killed, those he kidnapped while he was on the Council. Like we all now will be held accountable. Both for what we do—and for what we don’t.”
Death shifted against the bank of windows, her cool voice slicing through the chamber. “We don’t have the luxury of doing nothing. Not anymore,” she said quietly. “The magic thrown to the earth by the gods, the demon horde set free… It’s too much. Too many know about the Connecteds. Too many will fear them. Too many will crave the power they represent. They will be targeted, taken. The darkness is already falling.”
“So we’ll meet that darkness,” I said. “I know the arcane underbelly better than almost anyone in the world. I know its people, I know its players. If someone—something—must be found, I’ll find it. And if there’s a call for justice to be served…I’ll answer it. I have no idea what that’s going to look like, but I don’t think I’ll lack for things to do.”
Silence met my words for a several heartbeats. Silence…and dawning understanding.
“Strength to strength, the Council grows,” Armaeus finally said, his words bolder now. Defiant. “Strength to strength, the Council stands—anew.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Night fell hard on the Strip that evening, the cool desert breeze whistling across the casinos and eddying down the sidewalks as Armaeus and I walked past endlessly flashing lights, our steps lost beneath the clatter of doors and feet, the squeal of tires and the hiss of exhaust.
“How long did you know?” I finally asked. I’d shoved both hands in my jeans pockets, not knowing what to do with them. It didn’t feel right to hold the Magician’s hand, not now that I was on the Council, yet I missed the simple connection of that touch already. Truth was, I had no clue what I was going to do as Justice. I knew only that something needed to change on the Council, and to make that happen, I had to become that cha
nge.
Beside me, Armaeus chuckled, the sound low, rich, and strangely free. “I sensed it in you when we met, but it was merely one outcome among many, one I could no more guide than I could shift the path of the night’s stars. I sensed the strengthening of the possibility when you and Gamon fought together on the ice, preserving the world but still as a tool, not as the directing hand. I did not know you would seek to bring her with you, however, until I stood at the portal your magic had opened and heard her set her foot upon the tread.”
He glanced at me, his black eyes glittering under the neon lights. “There are two Houses now without leaders.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. Gamon took over Cups to use it. She’ll find a replacement quickly enough. But Swords…that’s different. They need someone they can trust, someone proud and loyal and true. Ideally good with a knife too.”
This was the Magician, so he didn’t have to ask who I had in mind. “Has Danae agreed?”
I laughed ruefully. “Unknown. I sent Ma-Singh and three of his generals to her. It’s their choice too.” I smiled, a thread of wistfulness curling through me. “He took my resignation pretty hard.”
“He will be your staunchest ally in the Houses. He would be a good leader in his own right.”
“I know,” I sighed. “I tried that. He said he wasn’t interested. That his place was to serve, not lead, and that we all learn our places in the end. I don’t know if that was a veiled insult or a threat.”
“Or perhaps, simply a compliment.”
“Maybe.”
We passed the bright lights of Paris, and high above us, the Emperor’s enormous residence glowered, black against the midnight sky. “You, um, haven’t heard from Gamon again, have you?”
“I have,” he said, surprising me. “Are you aware one of her abilities is the infliction of terror?”
“I…” I frowned. “I didn’t know that.”
“She apparently can manipulate the mind of her victim to great effect. It was something of a specialty for her when she worked in the Mossad.” He paused. “The Mossad, Miss Wilde.”
“Right, I think I knew that…oh.”
I cast another swift glance up to Viktor’s monolith. Viktor, who had joined the council at a particularly tumultuous time in world history. “I hadn’t really thought that part through. I don’t think I knew exactly what Viktor had done, um, before he ascended to the Council.” I winced. “You guys were based in Munich then?”
“In Munich,” Armaeus agreed. “In the 1920s, the 1930s. You were quite right when you said Viktor’s ascension kept him from greater crimes against the Connected population…but the crimes he did commit never got their accounting, all these long years. And, as you’ll recall, Gamon even worked with Viktor over the years, never for a moment letting him know her past…or about those she once, a long time ago, loved. Never for a moment letting him think her interest in him was anything more than mercenary.” Another dark chuckle. “I think, perhaps, Gamon had more than your mother on her mind when she left with him today. But—he remains the Emperor. He will recover. Eventually.”
We passed out from under the large shadow of Viktor’s monolith and continued moving down the sidewalk and up and down the stairways, weaving through the crowd. We didn’t talk about the sudden influx of magic in the world and how it might manifest, we didn’t talk about the plague of demons. We didn’t talk about the rustlings and whispers about the Connecteds, from the Sentinel Group’s hidden halls to the highest offices of government. There would be time for all that.
Finally, we came around the corner of the Venetian, the gondolas floating on the artificial canal, the bright casino flowing into its sister property, the Palazzo, which had served as my own home away from home when I’d first started coming to the city to work as the Council’s artifact hunter. Now I stared above the Palazzo and—for just a moment—wondered how it would look with its own shadow domicile rising high above it.
“I think it would make me very pleased to see a home of your own creation, so near to me, no matter what design you chose,” Armaeus rumbled. “Happier than I ever imagined I could be.”
There was a rustle of fabric, then the Magician’s long, elegant hand reached out for mine. I pulled my own hand from my pocket and welcomed the warmth of his touch, imagining what I might possibly do with my very own patch of sky-high real estate. “So, what does the policy guide say about intra-Council relationships, anyway?” I asked.
Another laugh floated from Armaeus’s lips. “I doubt there’s an entry, but if it’s not to our liking, I happen to have an ear with both the head of the Council and its most powerful member. I think we’ll find an acceptable solution.”
I squeezed his hand. As we both stared up into the sky, the faintest rush of stars swept up, tracing the outline in the air.
“Dollface! You’re back! The adventure begins!” The voice boomed from the top of the steps of the Palazzo, and with several quick strides, Nikki bounded down to us, resplendent in her newly donned outfit of hiking boots with bunched-up socks, seventeen miles of leg, cargo-pocketed short shorts, and a safari shirt tied tight around her waist. No one gave her more than a passing glance, of course. Because, Vegas.
Then Nikki stopped and swiveled, her soft, broad-brimmed hat falling back slightly over her tumble of blonde locks as she looked to the sky, following our gaze. And as she saw what we were seeing, she whistled low and clear.
“Sweet Mother Mary on a trampoline.” She laughed with unabashed delight. “Our very own Hall of Justice!”
~~
Is this the end?
While Wilde Fire marks the end of the Immortal Vegas series, now Sara and the Council have their hands full with a world gone wild with rogue magic. So stay tuned for a new series, launching this fall…
The Wilde Justice series.
Meanwhile, if you’re looking for a new paranormal romance series to sink your teeth into, check out the Demon Enforcers series starter, Demon Unbound, launching in May, 2018 and featuring Warrick and the Syx. Read on for a sneak peak from Demon Unbound!
Demon Unbound
Opening to Chapter One
“Welcome to be-a-utiful Acapulco!” The game show announcer’s self-satisfied voice crackled in the hot, humid darkness, barely audible above the chattering rap music that blared out over the now-empty beach. Along this stretch of sand, however, no one sang, no one danced. The scent of blood hung heavy on the air, thick enough to taste.
“Shut that off,” Warrick snapped. “If I can hear it, they can.”
He stood evenly balanced on both feet, fists clenched, head cocked, as if he could smell the very night to find what he sought. Which he could. Every horde had its own particular stench, and Warrick had already come to know the Fuerza Negra’s too well.
“It’s not like they don’t already know we’re here.” Finn crouched beside Warrick, smirking as he pocketed his phone. Then he stood as well. With one thick-soled boot, he toed aside the spent rounds of ammo that littered the beach. “Looks like they’ve been busy, too. Normally we just have claw marks to go on.”
“Raum?”
The third of their team stepped forward, his face as bleak as winter, his eyes distant. Of all of them, Raum was the best at identifying the dead. He’d also always felt the weight of his sin the heaviest. But they’d each come to their present roles through their own disgrace; each with their own burdens to carry.
“Six killed,” Raum said, in a voice that had once made angels weep for its loss. “All males. All human.”
“Six.” Warrick scanned the barren coastline. “I thought you said this cartel left their kill behind as a message.”
“That’s their standard M-O, yup,” Finn agreed, reasonably enough. “Up to now, though, we haven’t been the ones getting the message. They may be trying to hide.”
“Or they’re making a stand,” Raum offered.
Warrick growled, the sound rolling dangerously over the quiet beach. “That’d be
a bad idea.”
Demons had lurked among God’s children since the dawn of creation, fallen angels who’d dropped a further rung in the divine pecking order by committing a sin against God or humanity. Though they lived in constant fear of being banished beyond the veil, they first had to be caught. As long as they kept to the shadows, they could survive—some even thrive, cheek to jowl with the sort of despicable humans who could give them a run for their money in a race to the bottom. Those demons spent their twisted existence on the fringes of society, victims of their own insatiable habits.
There was a catch, however. Demons couldn’t kill a child of God, couldn’t even harm them, and expect to avoid His divine wrath. That’s where Warrick and his team of enforcers came in.
Though they were themselves damned beyond the veil for their own sins, trapped in a bolt-hole created at the fall of Atlantis, the Syx had culled some measure of reprieve from their condemnation through their ability to rout out the worst of their kind. They’d spent millennia at the beck and call of humans who cried out for their aid. Now, that aid was in epically high demand, for two very good reasons:
One, it took a demon to banish a demon, and nobody was better at it than Warrick’s team.
And two, a shit-ton of the bastards had just been set free to roam the earth. Again.
Not since before the fall of Atlantis had the world teemed with so many of the damned. Warrick had felt their return like a physical blow, a howling in his bones. But so far, this new influx of demons hadn’t bubbled up to the top of the Syx’s shit list.
The Fuerza Negra had.
“Four women were with the male victims,” Stefan said, his voice floating through the darkness, rich and indolent. He didn’t mean to sound like a hustler on the make, but old habits died hard. And of all of them, Stefan was most attuned to the females of God’s chosen. He could beguile and be beguiled by them, in equal measure.
“Not dead,” Stefan continued. “Not hurt, at least not much. Scared, though. They know they will be hurt, probably killed, but they are brave.” He sighed. “Very brave. They have expected such a death all their lives.”