Prom Knight

by Ben Reeder

  PROM

  KNIGHT

  BEN REEDER

  Prom Knight

  Copyright © 2018 Ben Reeder

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons or entities is strictly coincidental.

  Cover art by Gerry Kissell

  Published through Wolfe & Stewart Press

  Visit my website: http://www.bensreeder.com

  Other books by Ben Reeder:

  The Demon’s Apprentice series:

  The Demon’s Apprentice

  Page of Swords

  Vision Quest

  Charm School

  In Absentia: An Anthology

  The Zompoc Survivor series:

  Zompoc Survivor: Exodus

  Zompoc Survivor: Inferno

  Zompoc Survivor: Odyssey

  Verge Walker series:

  The Long Walk

  For Sheena & Michael

  Who taught me what family means.

  Acknowledgements:

  This book is very special to me, and I’m very grateful to the folks who helped make it what it is.

  Randi, you keep me going, you are my light in the darkness, when all other lights have faded.

  George Canfield, thanks for helping me stay focused and pushing me outside my comfort zones.

  My beta readers, Valerie, Karlee, Gwyneth and Aquil. Thank you for showing me what this one looked like to other people.

  My Patreon supporters Zak Schreifels, Jacob Stein and Michael Baron. Thank you for believing in me.

  Greg Price, for making Steve Donovan come to life, Becca Reynolds, for letting me use paramiirs and for giving me all the little bits that make Ren so cool.

  Gerry Kissell, for coming through at exactly the right time. I’m glad you’re back in town, brother.

  And, as always, my mom, Mary Ann. No matter how old I get, I’ll always try to make you proud.

  My weekend gaming group, Wookiee, Tiffany, Mike, Lacee, Billy, Neil, Tristan, Greg, and Lily.

  Finally, my two oldest and bestest friends, Roanen and Angie. Roanen, we started chasing contrails together back in the day, and I’m glad you’re still along for the ride. Angie, you knew me when, and you helped launch this series to the places it’s gone and taken me with it. Thank you both.

  Author’s Note:

  I struggled with the opening to this one, given what happened this February. I wrote it some months ago, before the events in Florida. I sought the advice of others, wondering if I should rewrite it. The response was almost unanimous: keep it as is. And in the end, I decided to keep the opening, because it let me create something the real world was lacking: someone standing between kids and danger. And truth be told, that has always been what Chance is, an ideal, a metaphorical guardian for the innocent. Because in the end, he represents something to me that we always need more of: hope. I wish things like that never happened, but they still do. Barring that wish, then the opening scene is the next best thing: someone who can do something about something terrible, a guardian angel in a troubled world.

  Chapter 1

  ~ Strike from hiding, and never let the enemy see your true numbers. Uncertainty turns one man into an army in the mind of the enemy ~ Shadow Regiment saying

  Someone was going to die if we didn’t make it to school in time. Dr. Corwin sped through a stop sign and swerved around a slower moving car, dropping expletives like candy. Up ahead, I could see the rear of Truman High School, my old stomping grounds back when I belonged to Dulka. So far, no one was pouring out of its doors and there were no strobing red and blue lights from emergency vehicles. Our target, a white van, was pulling into the back parking lot.

  “That must be them,” I said, pointing. Dr. C nodded and coaxed a little more speed out of his Range Rover. With his brown hair trimmed into a respectable style and neatly trimmed Van Dyke beard, he looked more like the teacher he claimed to be than a wizard chasing bad guys.

  “The ride’s going to get a little rough. When we stop, I’ll take care of the driver. If any of them can actually do magick, he’s probably the most powerful one. That leaves whoever gets out of the van for you to handle.”

  “And they’re most likely just a bunch of scrubs or cowans with guns,” I grumbled. “How come you get to have all the fun?”

  “Because I’m the wizard,” he said, then he yanked the wheel to his right. The truck bounced over the curb and sent dirt flying as we hit the grass. We bounced across the landscape, then flew off the curb and back onto the asphalt of the parking lot. Most of the windows at Truman faced the front of the building, so we weren’t easily visible coming up on the back lot.

  The white van pulled to a stop and four people got out, all in black. Two looked like they were trying out for the Trenchcoat Mafia clique, while the other two looked like they’d watched one too many action movies, sporting bulky tactical vests and drop leg holsters. And big ass guns. Big ass black assault rifles, big ass shotguns and big ass pistols. We sped down the driveway, but the four gunmen made it through the doors, and the van was starting to pull away. Dr. C and I both let out some harsh language. We were heartbeats too late.

  “Hang on,” Dr. Corwin said, and hit the gas. Wards lit up across the dash and the windshield the instant before he plowed into the van, and I felt most of the kinetic energy of the impact flow past me and through me as things inside the truck started to move in slow motion. It was a variation on one of the spells I’d been learning, one that took the kinetic energy of an attack and dispersed it. This version focused our energy into the heavy bumper guard on the front of the Range Rover, turning the truck into a massive battering ram, protecting it and us from the damage of the impact at the same time.

  The other guy wasn’t so lucky. Dr. C hit him doing almost fifty. With the kinetic ram, it was like we were doing seventy-five. When everything started moving at normal speed again, the rear wheels on the van sat at an angle, and the back half of the vehicle was crumpled in like it had been hit by a semi. The Range Rover hadn’t even gotten a scratch on the paint. I had my seatbelt undone and was out the door as soon as we stopped moving.

  “Chance, wait!” Dr. C barked, unbuckling his seat belt as he spoke. I didn’t slow down. We couldn’t afford to wait for him to finish off one set of bad guys while the dudes with guns ran around in the school. I figured there was a whole school full of kids who would agree with me.

  “Ren, where are you?” I said aloud as I pulled a black domino mask down over my eyes.

  “Five and high, overtaking,” I heard over the earpiece of my Bluetooth. “Where do you want me?” I looked over my right shoulder to see the little green haired sprite zoom around the corner of the building, his antenna swept back over his head and his lavender eyes dull from the protective lens that came down from under his eyelids. He wore a small cylindrical backpack between his wings and a miniaturized version of a headset with a microphone. One of Mom’s aluminum knitting needles was slung beside the backpack, and duct-taped hacksaw blade rode in a duct-tape scabbard at his belt.

  “I’m taking the inside,” I said. “I saw four. I need you to make sure I find them before they get a shot off.”

  “I will,” he said.

  “Abscondum,” I whispered as I grabbed the door handle. The world went fuzzy around me for a moment, then popped back into focus. Light flowed around me as my repurposed chameleon charm that I’d worked into the mask went active, with th
e eye holes in the mask offering me a clear view of things even as it hid me from sight. Ren flew past me when I opened the door, fading from view as he flew away. A security camera mounted at the corner was pointed at the door. I pulled my hawthorn wand from its sheath at my belt and pointed it at the camera, envisioning the circuit that powered the entire system.

  “Disrumpo,” I whispered. A tiny white ball flew from the end of the wand to the camera, and a second later, the red light next to the lens went out. I figured I had about fifteen minutes before the spell that disrupted electricity to the circuit faded and the whole thing came back online. As spells went, it was a hundred times more subtle than my usual work, mostly because Dr. Corwin had helped me design it.

  One of the Tacti-cool dudes was standing guard at the first hallway junction, facing away from me. He looked left and right, but never over his shoulder. Ren fluttered past him, barely drawing a glance toward the sound of his passing. The heavy tac vest made a knockout ball a bad idea, so the paintball marker stayed in its holster. The trench coats would probably provide similar protection. I pulled a new toy from the pouch at my hip, a crystal bedecked copper contraption that wrapped around my hand and wrist like a gauntlet.

  “Induendum,” I whispered, activating its magic. The crystal gauntlet wrapped itself around my hand with a soft click as the ends adhered to each other. Once it was in place, the battle glove sent a tingling sensation up my arm as the crystals in it tapped into a nearby ley line and sent Elemental Air energy coursing through me. Tacti-cool turned my way but didn’t see me. I raised the battle glove and pointed it at him. The tingling sensation became more of a numbing buzz.

  “Enervo,” I said. Thin tendrils of white electrical energy shot from the crystal on the back of my hand and struck him. For a split second, he looked like he was going to scream, then he fell to the floor, his arms and legs twitching slightly as the spell jolted all the neurons and nerve pathways in his body with a micro-volt charge and made most of his voluntary muscles go limp at the same time. The beauty of the enervation hex was that it hurt like hell but did almost no lasting damage. The spell didn’t have to be painful, but I was an asshole like that.

  His eyes searched for the cause of his current agony, but he didn’t see me until I stopped beside him and pulled another charm from my pouch, a triple banded ring that Dr. C had given me, courtesy of the Sentinels. “Relligo,” I said, dropping it. The ring turned liquid and expanded into three heavy iron loops that snapped into place around his shoulders, chest and hips. When they closed into place, the guy let out a grunt from how tight they were. He wasn’t going anywhere unless I wanted him to.

  “One down,” I whispered. “Ren, where is the next one?” I scanned the halls as I waited for Ren’s answer. Something about all of this felt off.

  “Two of them are together. Third hall up, on your left. Hurry, they’re coming up on another intersection.”

  I took off at a dead run, and I could feel the chameleon spell flicker around me, taxed to its limits by my rapid movements. At the third hallway, my boots squeaked against the slick stone floor when I broke left, and I had to push myself off a locker to keep moving. I could see the two guys up ahead, one Tactic-Cool Redux, the other a Trenchcoat Mafioso. They looked over their shoulders at the sound of my footsteps, so I slowed down enough to let the spell keep up with me. They exchanged a look and a nod, then split up. I sped up.

  “Ambush!” Ren hissed a few steps before I hit the intersection. I dropped into a slide and brought the glove and my wand up, pointing in opposite directions. Tacti-Cool Two came into sight on my left, his gun up and his eyes wide as he looked across the hall for an opponent he could hear but not see and saw his fellow wannabe-murderer right in his line of fire. Amateurs. .

  “Enervo!” I said, then turned my head to my right. Trenchcoat Mafioso had raised a pump shotgun, but his expression was one of confusion. Like his friend, he realized too late that he couldn’t fire without endangering his fellow gunman. “Languido!” I said, and a thin white beam lanced out from the wand’s tip to strike him in the chest. Like the paralyzing hex, the knockout spell hurt like hell, since it shocked the nervous system into submission. Both guys dropped and twitched on the ground as I slid to a stop near the other side of the intersection. I scrambled to my feet and pulled out two more binders and uttered the activation word.

  “Ren?” I asked as I tossed the binders at their targets. There was still no gunfire, and as grateful as I was for that, it still didn’t track.

  “Library, hurry!” Ren said, his voice high with worry. “He’s got a girl cornered!”

  My boots were pounding against the stone floors before he started the second sentence. If he had a target in sight, I might already be too late. My breath came in short puffs with each step, desperation driving me to move faster than I ever had before. I pushed open the doors to the library in the hopes that the noise would distract the last of them.

  Ren flew past me. “C’mon!” he called out. His wings were clear, and he banked hard to make a left turn around a bookshelf, then I saw him bank right, almost clipping another shelf as he went. I followed him around the second shelf to see the last gunman, a Trenchcoat Goomba, leveling a shotgun at a girl who was cowering under a table.

  “Are you a good girl?” he taunted her, pointing to the gold cross she wore around her neck. “Do you believe in Jesus and all that?” She turned her eyes up at him, and I saw the fear turn into a sort of resignation. She nodded, and he laughed. “Where is your God now, huh?” But before she could answer, I laid a hand on his shoulder.

  “Ligato!” I whispered, and the neuron hex went off a little differently. Where the first version disrupted the muscles and made them go limp, this one locked every muscle in place. Between the magic and the touch, the chameleon charm flickered and gave out for a moment.

  “Wha!?” he managed before the spell kicked in completely. I leaned in close, now fully visible, if a bit blurry around the edges.

  “God’s kinda busy. He sent me to handle the little shit,” I hissed softly. Goomba’s eyes locked on me and he let out a squeaky little sound. When the binder ring snapped into place, the squeak turned into a high-pitched wail. The girl looked up at me, her blue eyes wide.

  “I do believe,” she whispered.

  My arm moved slowly, and I put my finger to my lips. “Mysterious ways. Don’t tell anyone.” She nodded, and I grabbed Goomba. “Caecus,” I whispered, and he shimmered out of view along with me. The grip that protruded from the middle of the back of the binders was smooth and warm under my hand, and when I twisted it, the paralyzed, whimpering Goomba became almost weightless. When I got to the two in the hallway, I activated the tether system so that all three floated along behind me while I headed back to where I left the first guy. He was already gone, and I hoped Dr. C already had him. From there it was a short walk to the back doors.

  Ren was hovering a few feet above my head when I came out into the April morning light. Dr. Corwin was waiting at the back of the Range Rover with the tailgate and rear hatch open.

  “Is the way safe?” Ren asked, intoning the ritual greeting of the Shadow Regiment.

  “The way is safe,” I answered. I pulled the mask off as I got to the back of the Range Rover.

  “Who protects the way?” Dr. C asked when I got close enough.

  “A bunch of badasses,” I said, breaking from the ritual exchange. The driver was lying next to another guy in the back of the Range Rover. The second guy was the sniper who had been lying in wait across the street from the front of the school. He had been the first catch of the day. The first guy I’d nailed was laying beside him. I stacked the last three guys like cordwood in the back of the truck, then we closed it up and went to the wrecked van.

  A dark-haired Dwarf had hooked it up to the back of a flatbed tow truck and was pulling it onto the tilted bed. At five and a half feet tall, he could pass for a short, stocky human with a broad face and a thick beard if you didn’t look
too closely or make certain assumptions.

  “Whyeer d’ye wan’ me ta take it?” the Dwarf asked, his accent thick. Dr. C handed him an index card and a handful of silver trade coins.

  “This address. Just leave it inside the main section. There should be plenty of room.”

  “Awright,” the Dwarf said with a broad smile. “Always a pleasure to be doin’ business with ye, Doc. ‘Tis good to have ye back.”

  “It’s temporary at best, Gam,” Dr. C said. The Dwarf shrugged as if dismissing the idea.

  “As ye say, Doc. As ye say.” He turned and climbed onto the bed of the truck, securing straps to the demolished vehicle. We headed back to the Range Rover and got in.

  “So, we drop these fellows off at the warehouse, then I need to get you to school,” Dr. C said.

  “I just nailed four psychos with guns, and you’re worried about me making it back to school before second period starts?” I asked.

  Dr. C looked across the front seat at me and laughed. “Chance, you’ve taken on demons, werewolves and rogue vampires.”

  “Don’t forget the warlocks in Boston,” I added. “There were a lot of those assholes.”

  “And warlocks. The point is, four normal guys with guns is a walk in the park for you. Hell, we should have caught this group before they rolled, and been done before first period even started. So, yes, you’re going to second period and all the rest today. And the rest of the week, if you want to go to junior Prom.”

  “You’re worse than my mother,” I muttered as he turned onto Lakeshore Avenue. Resigned to the inevitable boredom of another day at school, I reached down and unbuckled the gun belt from my hips and undid the holster from around my leg.

  “That’s why she doesn’t have to ride you about this kind of thing. In fact, I’m going to drop you off first. I can handle the bad guys.”

  “You’re not going to interrogate them before I get out of class, are you?”