by Linda Welch
My heart immediately throbs so hard, it should crack a few ribs. I hate the effect Alain has on me and hope he doesn’t realize how enticing I find him. I moisten dry lips with the tip of my tongue. “Soft? Not squishy?”
His deep chuckle makes me melt inside. “Velvet. I’ve missed you, Rain.” His breath brushes my cheek.
His lips are too close, too tempting. I lift my chin and avert my face.
With an exaggerated sigh, his arms fall and he moves back. I let my breath seep out when he turns his back.
“Come.” He gestures expansively at the sofa. “Sit with me. Coffee?”
“Sure.” I walk to the sofa and sit on the edge. “And do me a favor, Alain, make yourself decent.” His belt is unraveling, a fraction more and the robe will gape to reveal everything he owns.
“Oh.” His dark eyebrows shoot up and he looks down as though surprised. “Dear me.”
His eyes meet mine, his fingers flutter at his groin. “Are you sure you don’t want to… ?”
“Are you drunk?” I take pride in my steady voice, and that I can speak with a throat lined with sandpaper. I don’t know where to look, except not at Alain. It’s too much, too much innuendo, definitely too much Alain.
“On coffee?”
“Then stop acting like… .” I mean to say a dick, a poor choice of word under the circumstances. “… . like an ass.”
If he could sense my feelings, he would know I tingle inside, and in my imagination reach inside the silken material to grasp what is as smooth and silken, solid yet flexible.
Needless to say, the last part is guesswork. I have a fertile imagination.
Stop it, Rain!
I should go. “So, why did I have to come traipsing over?”
“For the pleasure of your company.” Alain takes a flat package from his desk. “And to give you this.”
Surging off the sofa, I snatch the package from his hand and tuck it in an inside pocket. “Thanks. That’s it? We’re good?”
“Unless you’d linger a while?” he suggests softly.
For one insane moment I’m tempted, but as so much about Alain tempts me, leaving is the sensible option. “You know what, I don’t have time for coffee, things to do, places to be.”
Walking out, I look over my shoulder and give him a sickly-sweet smile.
A deep rumble like a volcano primed to erupt follows me from the room. Alain is laughing at me.
City crews cling to ladders as they take down the soggy pennants. Eyeing the stores which line the narrow street, I wend between other pedestrians, heading for Midtown Baked Goods. They will sell out of my favorite goodies if I don’t get there soon. A newspaper vendor on the corner waves a paper as he yells the headline. A red-faced human woman with three tiny kids in tow barges through the crowd, making me skip aside. A messenger toting a backpack trots over the street. So many people are out today, the din of voices is deafening.
I am going to treat myself to something yummy.
Squeezing between two customers coming out, I enter Midtown and make a beeline for the case which displays hot pastries. The aroma in here is heavenly: meat, herbs, spices, grease, yeast and cooked pastry, cakes and buns. I slump over the empty glass case, disappointed, but a girl balancing a huge metal tray laden with goodies comes from the kitchen and shovels delicious creations on the glass shelves with a wooden paddle. My mouth waters, I may drool down my chin if she doesn’t hurry.
Six pies, two for now and four to take home. Carrying the paper bag to a table near the window, I sit down and dig in.
An unwavering gaze rests heavily on my spine. “Can’t a girl have some alone time?” I say through shreds of meat and pastry.
Castle lands heavily on the opposite chair. “We have a job.”
“Another, already?” I tear my eyes from the pie, wipe the corners of my mouth and look up.
“Already.” Castle works a pastry from the bag.
“Hey!”
He crams half in his mouth and mumbles through it. “These are good.”
I roll my eyes. “What’s the job?”
“A guy in Westho thinks sprites are in his walls.”
Sounds promising, an easy job, no pressure, and Westho is an upscale development. If he does have sprites, please let him have an infestation. Maybe if we clean out his house he’ll recommend us to neighbors when they find sprites in their homes. It could lead to more work. “Interesting. When are we heading over?”
“He wants us now.”
I brush more crumbs from my lips. “Fine.” I remember the money and take Castle’s share from my pocket. “A runner delivered our fee.”
“Before they got the report?” Castle stuffs the bills inside his coat but doesn’t count them in public.
“I took my share.”
“I’ll send the report off soon as I get home.”
“Oh, almost forgot, Alain paid us.” I work the small packet from another pocket.
Castle waves it away. “Split it up later.”
“Righty-ho.” I get up and snatch the bakery bag before Castle can pilfer another pie. He shoves back his chair, stands and walks before me through the busy bakery. Other customers watch him coming and clear a path to the door. He is big and has perfected the don’t mess with me look when he wants folk to get out of his way. If only they knew, Castle is a pussycat, except when he fights.
An alley takes us to a street running parallel to the pedestrian-only thoroughfare and his car parked near a garage.
The drive to Westho passes quickly. Neon flashes, lamps seem brighter, black and purple streaks the red sky. One hell of a storm is heading for Gettaholt. Streets transition from crowded stores and apartments to apartment complexes to row houses to individual dwellings crammed together. We skirt an industrial park, the buildings great hulks rising against the sky.
Packed into a small area, Westho is a neat little subdivision. Home exteriors are in good repair, the streets are clean. Low hedges or brick walls gird most two-or three-story houses and their tiny patches of lawn. You know a place is up and coming when it has its own supermarket.
The client, Ranger Tebbler, lives in a newer three-floor brick house. The blinds are down over the big windows but light splinters between the slats. Castle guides his old clunker to the curb and parks across the street.
He reaches back over the seat and grabs his sword. This appointment is for an assessment - we won’t know what equipment is needed till we identify which type of sprite bothers the client - and we don’t need weapons to rid the home of the little pests, but it pays to be prepared. I learned that over the years.
“You want something?” Castle indicates the weapons on the back seat.
“Nah. I think you’ve got plenty for both of us.” I carry blades, but I always do.
Castle wears a harness under his coat. He slips the sword in the sheath where it hangs at his side and can’t be seen when the long coat falls back into place. He doesn’t want to alarm the client, but Castle will feel naked on a job minus a significantly long blade.
We follow the short path to the door. Castle knocks and the door judders open. We exchange looks before going inside. Did Tebbler leave it unlocked for us?
Our eyes meet again in the dim hallway. The only light comes from deeper in the house. Something is not right.
“Mr. Tebbler?” Castle calls, but not too loud.
“Maybe he had enough, the little blighters drove him out,” I suggest in a quiet voice.
Castle jogs a shoulder. Leaving the front door ajar, we ease into the hall.
My feet whisper over polished stone tiles. The hall leads to a big room with yards of glass. Floor to ceiling windows, glass-topped tables and glass display shelves in the living space on our left, a glass-top bar with mirrors behind it directly ahead, a kitchen with stainless-steel appliances, stainless-steel counters and breakfast bar on our right. The ceiling soars two floors high and the overhead balcony has a glass and stainless-steel safety partition. A small l
amp burns near the window with enough light to define the room but not lift the shadows at the edges.
It is cold, but I don’t detect the movement of chilled, forced air conditioning.
I don’t hear the skitter of sprites, either.
The rain beating the windows and a ticking clock breaks the silence. My nerves jitter. My gaze is drawn to where the breakfast bar curves to a dark nook. We go over there cautiously.
A man slumps on a stool with his back to the wall. Blood mats his hair and plasters his face. Strangely, only a little red spatters his yellow T-shirt.
I squint. “Is that Tebbler?”
“Damned if I know. We spoke on the phone.” Mouth grim, Castle edges closer to the guy. I take my eyes off him to quickly glance at the room. No signs of a struggle. The place is immaculate.
Castle fixes his hand in the man’s hair and pulls his head up. The coating of blood somewhat distorts his features, but he’s still recognizable as a nice-looking man with a rugged face, blue eyes staring at nothing.
The gears in my head grind as I lean in for a closer look. The slit in his throat gapes, the edges turning white. He’s been dead a while but didn’t die here or the floor would be wet with blood. Blood sheets his face, yet no more than a few drops decorate his clothes. He was strung upside down, or held up, or bent backward over something before his throat was opened.
We are out of here. Sprites didn’t do this, their MO is mischief, not murder.
I tingle, the skin quivers on my bones. “Castle, this stinks.”
The temperature drops drastically, my breath plumes like shredded smoke. Ice feathers up my spine like frost on a windowpane. The clock stops. I can’t hear, my ears are numb and I can barely breathe as oxygen is sucked from the room. My pulse slows and thuds from toes to fingertips.
Oh fuck. Tebbler was a sacrifice.
Castle grabs my arm and mouths something.
Too late. The wall near the kitchen explodes and chunks of plaster and drywall shrapnel across the room. A wave of steamy heat smelling of sulfur spumes through and a hellion follows in its wake. One moment freezing, the next I feel as though fire peels my skin. I choke on the metallic tang of brimstone, put one palm to my nose and back away.
Exuding malevolence, it stands eight feet, clad in desiccated human skin patch-worked together, punctured by four-inch bone spikes which run down the shoulders, arms and backs of its hands.
An icy ball of fear expands in my belly. We can lose flesh and run but the hellion might follow. We can’t allow it on the street.
“Fuck,” Castle spits, and lunges forward. His blade carves through human and hellion flesh, opening a diagonal gash in the demon’s chest. It roars and claws at him. Instead of darting back, Castle follows through, revolving to bring his sword curving up to hack the beast’s neck. But it catches the blade and holds on, ignoring blood leaking from its fingers. It jerks Castle forward, its free hand clamps on his throat. Thick nails like yellow horn puncture his skin.
Fade out, idiot! But Castle holds onto flesh as he tries to wrest his blade from the hellion’s hand.
Pulling the obsidian dagger, dropping a smaller blade into my other hand, I dart behind the beast, take a flying leap to its back and plunge both blades in its neck. Dangling the length of its knotted spine, I hang on the knives and pull my knees up till they are braced on the hellion’s back. It roars again, jerks upright, releases Castle and his sword and twirls. I lose my grip on hafts slippery with hot, sizzling black blood and flip across the kitchen. My spine smacks into the breakfast bar; I bounce off and land on my face.
The pain is agonizing; something in my back is broken. I fade out as a heavy taloned foot aims for my head. Marble tile cracks. I pull flesh and come back good as new inches from a scaled ankle, and scurry behind the bar as Castle charges the demon from the rear.
Its back arcs and corded arms shoot up as the point of Castle’s sword punches from its chest. It turns and he turns with it, hopping on one foot, the other planted on its back. He wrenches his sword free and jumps back. It whirls, hand lashing out. The spikes on its hand open up Castle’s face from jaw to ear. He stumbles, hits a window and falls down, the blind concertinaing on top of him.
Rain sheets the window, the sky’s red light streams in.
The hellion tears to the window and stomps on the blind, but Castle is no longer there.
I swoop in, snatch the dagger from the floor and thrust the black glass into the hellion’s spine. It turns on me and the knife is jerked from my hand.
Black blood sizzles on tile, eating in, pitting the smooth surface. What does it take to bring this thing down?
I lose flesh and scramble behind the kitchen island. Castle is solid again over in the west corner, but the demon stands between him and his sword. I look around, desperate for something I can use.
Knives stick in a wooden block; clean, high-quality steel. Yelling something wordless, I snatch up a filleting knife, flip it and rise up behind the island.
Risking sliced fingers from the keen blade, I throw overhand. The steel punctures the demon’s right eye.
Screeching, it tugs the blade free. Mucus dribbles like discolored egg white from its eye socket.
Castle is behind the monster and he has his sword. With a roar, he chops at the demon’s nape.
Keening, the demon flails at its neck with both hands. It revolves and goes after Castle. Who disappears.
Threshing at air, the beast advances to where Castle had been as I realize … Gods dammit, I’m in a kitchen! I rip open cabinet doors till I find the pantry. Raking at the shelves, cans and packages hit the floor until I pull out a large white paper package and tear off the top.
“Yo! Big fellah!” I come from behind the counter with the bag in both hands.
It faces me unhurriedly, head hanging, hands relaxed at its sides. I sense amusement in its posture. Its voice is deep and guttural and grates inside my head like sliding shale. “Little one.”
“Little? Now you’ve really pissed me off.” I throw the bag; it bursts on the hellion’s chest and salt sprays everywhere.
The hellion roars again and shakes fists in the air as its body disintegrates, becomes fissured gray matter, then dust which sifts to smoke and disperses.
Hellions don’t die in the mortal realm, the atrocity has just gone back to where it came from.
I reach for the counter, miss, and smack on my butt. Panting, Castle falls to his knees and lets his head hang.
We inspect the wall before leaving. I don’t remember any sigils on it beforehand; if there were any, they were obliterated. Only a wall with a hole blown through it. No indication it was used as a portal to bring a hellion through.
The lines of Castle’s mouth tighten and a muscle jumps in his jaw. He rubs his forehead. “I’ll make an anonymous call when I get home.”
I nod agreement. Yes, let’s be long gone when the police turn up.
I wouldn’t want to be the officer in charge of this case. The damage in the house obviously resulted from one hell of a fight. The acid-pitted floor, ruined wall and lingering taint of sulfur in the living space will point to a demonic visitation. Then there is Tebbler. The man died in his bedroom surrounded by the paraphernalia of a dark summoning.
We don’t want our names linked to a sacrificial murder so make sure nothing which could identify us dropped out of our pockets. Fingerprints are no problem, we don’t have them. Hopefully, with how the rain is coming down, the neighbors are snug inside with their drapes pulled and saw nothing. We have to keep our fingers crossed nobody remembers Castle’s old car parked outside.
I’m queasy now. Whoever sent the hellion knew Castle and I wouldn’t run and risk it getting loose in the community. We were targets, meant to die.
My feet splosh through puddles. “It was a setup.”
“Feels like it.” With rain so heavy it blocks out the sky and the far side of the street, Castle’s attempt to shake water off his hair is futile. “Tebbler was k
illed soon after he called us.”
“Was he part of it?”
“Dunno. If he was, they double-crossed him big time. He might have made the call under duress, or they made him think he had sprites and put our names in his head. The summoning was complicated. They called the hellion and bound it until our arrival triggered the release.”
“Only a powerful sorcerer can do that.”
We reach the car and Castle tosses his sword through the doorless side.
“Have we pissed off any sorcerers lately?” I wrench open the front passenger door and scoot in. My skin is wet beneath sopping clothes, my feet squelch in my boots.
“Not that I know of.” Castle gets the motor running and pulls from the curb. He drives hunched over, trying to peer through the smears made by the ineffective wipers.
The drive is silent. Castle’s mind must be humming as much as mine, but neither of us comes up with a theory, a reason someone sicced a hellion on us.
*
Chapter Four
Alain Sauvageau pushes a lock of unruly sable-brown hair off his face as he writes an entry in the ledger. He lowers the lid on the cash box, locks it and leans back in the padded office chair. A computer would be nice, and a cell-phone. And a television bigger than a matchbox. HD television and a satellite dish.
Not that he’s complaining about life Downside, but he’ll leave in the blink of an eye should his Lord call him home. Less than a blink. But it won’t happen, redemption is a fantasy. He shrugs. His life is comfortable. He could have tried to end himself when he was cast out, or hidden. Like that poor sotted thing in the tower, he could have tried to atone by abusing his body. Instead, over the ages he adopted personas in many lands until he came Downside, where he learned the secret of true unity with a mortal form and made a life for himself.
He may well remain here forever. He has his small empire and his companions. The vampires are more than loyal employees, they are friends and their near-immortality means they won’t leave him for a very long time. This means a great deal because he has had enough of starting over.