He kept talking, but I’d stopped listening. Of course, he had come here because of Dirge Meilan. In my last life, I had gone by the name of Dirge Meilan. Yeah, I’ve been reborn a few times, and so have most other people. Unfortunately for me though, Dirge only died three years ago, so most of the people who knew her were still around. The only thing more annoying than trying to explain how my age had been magically accelerated, was being compared to my former self. It was something I hated. It was the reason I’d run away from my home, and the reason I’d broken up with Joshua.
If this shark-toothed freak had come here expecting Dirge Meilan, there was no way in Hell I was going to help him. Call me petty. It would fit. I don’t really care.
“Get out!” My voice was hard and full of fury.
He stopped speaking mid-sentence and stared at me open-mouthed. Evidently he wasn’t used to being interrupted. Very slowly he regained his composure and settled his icy gaze upon me. Another chill went down my spine, and I tightened the grip on my shotgun.
“You Dioscuri get more arrogant by the day.” His words carried the edge of a raging inferno bubbling just beneath the surface. “Most people would be honored by the chance to help me take this realm back from Trius.”
Pause. Hold it right there. Obviously he knew who I was and knew I used to be part of the Dioscuri. That wasn’t exactly uncommon knowledge since the Dioscuri made it their mission to police all the supernatural creatures that caused problems in our world. They were the main reason that normal, everyday folks, hadn’t clued in to the supernatural community yet. So if supernatural hijinks were afoot, the Dioscuri would be the ones to step in and stop it. This was just the sort of thing I’d be trying to stop if I was still with them.
The worst wars in history were largely due to the power struggles of drakes. They were very territorial. So every once in a while a new drake comes to our world with the intent of destroying the current resident and taking over. That’s why Shark-tooth was here now. He wanted to take over for himself, and he wanted my help.
Why would he want my help? Well, aside from the fact that I shouldn’t be trusted with a tea cozy, let alone a plan to take over the world, I was basically a hired gun. The likelihood that I’d just join whoever offered me the biggest pot of gold would be demonstrably higher than someone who was all truth, justice, and the American way. Those weren’t exactly qualities I was known for.
“I’m not most people. I’m well aware of my mortality, and the idea of going after a drake weighs heavily against this ‘living’ I’ve become accustomed to.”
“You shouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition,” he muttered under his breath.
“Hello!” Mattoc’s voice boomed from the corner. The men turned toward him.
I squeezed the trigger on the shotgun as quickly as I could. While the drake dropped to the floor in time to avoid the gunfire, the five shotgun blasts tore into his men. Blood and gore painted my walls in effervescent sprays.
I grabbed my katana, Isis, from where it lay behind my desk and flung myself toward them. The leader was already running as I sliced my way through the wounded gunmen. I promised myself that they would be going to a better place because I knew it would make killing them slightly easier. Even still, nausea welled up inside me and tears gathered in the corners of my eyes.
Most people were reincarnated, so those that died usually came back again and again. That’s all life seemed like sometimes, an endless cycle of truth and karma. It didn’t make it any easier to kill them, though. I tried not to think about how the hired muscle might have an autistic son or an Alzheimer’s-stricken mother back home and instead tried to be thankful that they weren’t wearing full body armor.
Their blood was everywhere, sticky and wet. I took a deep breath and tried to calm down as it slowly turned into red steam. The metallic scent filled my lungs, and I coughed and fell to my knees as the steam drifted away. I watched, struggling to hold onto my lunch, as the bodies melted into nothingness. In a matter of seconds no sight or smell remained. They were nothing but a distant memory.
That’s the upside to killing people with a Dioscuri weapon, I suppose. There were never any bodies. They just broke up into harmless molecules and floated away. I guess they were designed that way to make killing easier. It is a lot easier to wade through a battle field, slaughtering hundreds of people, if there aren’t any bodies left afterward. The horrors of war are much easier to forget when there is no feast left for the crows.
My katana was glowing off-blue with several deep crimson ankhs etched down its length. Sparks of electricity seemed to dance along its surface. Without even thinking, I had charged it with energy. I stared at the weapon now that it was in my hand. Its hilt resembled a black serpent trying to swallow the sun. Its blade was so pure white that I almost had to shield my eyes. When it was sheathed it looked like anything else… but unleashed and charged up, well that was a different story. I had two of these weapons, a katana and a wakazashi. Of the two, Isis, my katana, was better suited for protection. Set, my wakazashi, was mostly all about destroying things. I didn’t take him out unless I really wanted to do some damage.
I shook my head and wiped the sweat from my face. I was going to have to track down that drake. Heart or no, blessing or no, if he was going after Trius that meant a battle was coming, and in this day and age there might not be much left afterward. Magic be damned, I didn’t even want to think about a drake trying to protect its turf with a whole mess of nuclear bombs.
Chapter 3
“I’m telling you, this is a bad idea,” Mattoc said. I don’t know how, but he had somehow changed into a white t-shirt and jeans. I wasn’t quite sure where his ghostly wardrobe came from. Then again, I was pretty sure he just looked like whatever image happened to pop into his mind. It made watching him look through clothing catalogues hilarious.
“And I’m telling you to shut up… again,” I replied.
“I’m not listening.” Was Mattoc sticking his tongue out at me? I decided not to investigate.
“Look, just because Warthor has sworn to protect Trius doesn’t mean you should go tell him that there’s another drake in town. On a scale from one to bad ideas, this is a terrible.”
Mattoc didn’t particularly like the idea of me tracking down my old master. The other Dioscuri called him The Invincible Joker, but to me he was just Warthor Ein, and I owed him my life. He was responsible for releasing millions of undead monsters into the world so I could be reborn.
On one hand, you had to respect him for daring to make demands of the gods. My old master had threatened to tear the doors off of Hell and pull me, along with every other creepy crawly, out of Hell, if they didn’t bring me back to life. On the other hand, you kind of wanted to kill him for actually doing it when they called his bluff.
Truth be told, I wasn’t sure I really wanted to tell Warthor about the new drake. Things could go all sorts of sideways when he got involved in situations. Still, I wasn’t going to admit that to Mattoc.
My hands trembled as I grabbed the mirror off the wall and scooped up a bottle of vegetable oil. I spread the oil on the mirror and held it so it caught the light just right. I concentrated, allowing magical energy to build. Soon the mirror’s face was a swirling mass of cloudy reds and blues. I mumbled Joshua’s true name under my breath. Nothing happened. I said it once more, a little louder, letting more of my energy flow into the words. It sparked as my breath touched the mirror and… nothing.
I pressed my palms against the mirror’s surface. The shimmering glass was like thick jelly against my skin. For a second, I could almost feel Joshua’s presence. “Why is it so…” I mumbled, pushing deeper into the glass. I hated it. It was cold and slick, like massaging a wet frog.
“Are you really going to go through the looking glass? That didn’t turn out very well for Alice, you know,” Mattoc asked from behind me.
He was right. Traveling through the mirror toward Joshua would be a big mistake. Whatever
was blocking me from communicating with Joshua would have to be strong to keep me from finding him. The likelihood that I’d wind up in a dungeon or stuck in a mountain was incredibly high. I pulled my hands from the mirror. They were colorless, as though my blood had fled from the flesh. I wiggled my fingers as the little needles that signaled returning circulation stabbed at them.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said with a sigh. Why was I even trying to find Joshua with a dragon, baby or not, on the loose? Sure, he’d sent me the swizzle and maybe, just maybe, he really was in trouble. I doubted it, though. Aside from the fact that he was half-demon, he was Joshua. Even among other demons he was feared.
I didn’t even need his help to find Warthor. Still, I knew I could trust Joshua to be the self-centered jerk that he was. Sure, I might not want to deal with him, but I was pretty sure he cared about saving his own skin enough that he would help me if it kept him alive. Even if that meant he had to lead me through the very bowels of Hell to do so. Besides, if anyone could find Warthor quickly— and I needed to find Warthor quickly— it would be him.
“There’s another way to find Joshua, you know.” Mattoc leaned back on his heels, a smile on his face. “There is only one place he can get a candy swizzle. You could do some real detective work. You know, trace his trail back to the source.”
Joshua could only get them from the Dioscuri. We both knew that, but that didn’t mean I had to ask them for help.
I settled one of my best glares on Mattoc. “Not gonna happen. I’d rather visit every single place in the universe before I call on the Dioscuri to help find Joshua.”
“They’re pretty good at finding people.” His voice sounded a little different, almost pleading.
I stopped listening to him and grabbed a cord of rope from my desk drawer. If I could enter the nether I could have used a spell to find Warthor directly. Unfortunately, without Joshua to lead me inside Earth’s magical realms, I knew of only one other entrance, and that was in the Dioscuri base camp. Although the Dioscuri would probably let me use it, I didn’t really want to be around them.
It wasn’t just that the Dioscuri were now led by my psycho, overbearing mother. It was more that people kept comparing me to Dirge Meilan. I was not her. I would never be her. I was Lillim Callina, and for some people, that was impossible to understand.
My past life as Dirge Meilan was always there in the background, like an invisible measuring stick that I was always being held against. Dirge would have done this. Dirge wouldn’t have done that.
“I’m not Dirge!” I screamed before I realized what I was saying. Mattoc shook his head and drifted away from me. He had been attached to Dirge for a long time and had grown to respect her. He didn’t like when I spoke ill of my former self.
Hell, I had nothing against her, personally. I only hated that I was being compared to her. That was another thing Mattoc and I argued about. He felt I should be honored by the comparison. I shook my head. Maybe he should try having every single person compare him to his past life. Then again, a self-centered jerk like him would probably get a kick out of that.
I walked to my table, a tiny rosewood thing covered in deep white scratches from before I’d rescued it from a local thrift shop, and dumped everything I’d gathered onto it in a heap. I mixed the various ingredients together until, finally, a dash of monkey screams and a minor explosion later, my magic rope began to move all on its own. It would lead me into the nether.
I hung on for all I was worth as it pulled me outside my apartment. The rope jerked me to the side, as I whipped around the corner and came face to face with a brick wall a few blocks away. That’s where the rope died in my hand.
“Just not my day,” I mumbled. I reached forward. The wall rippled as though I had touched the surface of a pond. I hadn’t known there was an entrance to the nether here, which meant it was new, which meant someone else put it here.
It spelled trap, but since I didn’t really have a better plan, I took a deep breath and jumped through the wall. I found myself exhaling a chilly breath of church air. At the very front of the chapel, in the center of several bronze statues of what I think were saints, stood a freakishly thin vampire with crystalline hair and a dreary maroon robe.
Chapter 4
“I’ve been expecting you, Lillim Callina, though you arrived a little before Joshua said you would. He didn’t think you’d come to find him quite this fast.”
Power radiated off the creature like a winter’s breeze, pelting my skin with little frozen pinpricks. I had to fight the urge to shiver and hug myself. Instead I steeled myself and settled my gaze on him. My stomach clenched, revulsion welling up inside me as I tried to focus on the vampire. I gulped and tried very hard not to lose my lunch. It wouldn’t have looked very tough if I threw up in front of him after all. It’s hard enough to look tough when you’re not vomiting up a lung.
Ever since my mom had tied me to a tree outside a vampire den during childhood, I’d never really liked vampires. Being around this one was not making me like them any better. Aside from the fact that the blood suckers brought back memories of snarling fangs and horrific claws ripping into my flesh, spilling my blood into the rain-soaked mud as I ran screaming and flailing, they’re really quite rude about the whole disemboweling and dismemberment thing. Given the chance, most vampires would gladly spill my entrails onto the ground and frolic in my hot, wet blood.
“You’ve been expecting me? For what? What are you doing here?” I called and was pretty sure it didn’t sound as impressive as I’d have liked.
“Lighting candles for the dead,” he replied as though it was perfectly natural for him to be in a church. Which it might have been… I wasn’t up to date on what all the cool bloodsuckers were doing. Maybe they hung out in churches now.
“But you kill people!” I exclaimed. Behind him, an immense painting of Jesus and His Apostles caught my eye. Jesus’ gaze seemed to bear down on me, and without realizing it, I took a step back.
“Then it is even more important for me to honor the dead.” The vampire turned toward me, his lips stretching into a crooked smile as he folded his hands over a silver crucifix. “If it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t be here today.”
I tried to keep the surprise off my face and I wasn’t sure how well it worked. I could deal with a vampire in a church… it wasn’t that odd, but a vampire holding onto a crucifix? That was a little strange. Now, I never claimed to quite understand faith magic. We’ve all seen movies where vampires and ghosts are incapacitated by crosses. However, there are just as many films where vampires and ghosts destroy those same crosses effortlessly.
This was one of those times where I should have just listened to my mother and studied. Then I wouldn’t be relying on Hollywood’s version of the facts. If I got out of this alive I was totally going to study. Well… I was going to think about studying. Baby steps.
I shook my head and narrowed my eyes. “But you’re a vampire!”
“Voln D’Lamprey.” He bowed his head.
The chill that ran down my back was so cold that I was sure someone had dropped an ice cube down the back of my shirt. I knew that name. Voln D’Lamprey was very well known because he was really good at tricking people into doing his bidding. It was rumored that he had been the driving force behind the Louisiana Purchase.
“Forgive me,” I mumbled and bowed my head. He gestured above my head and said something in what I thought to be Latin.
“Don’t worry, my lady,” he said as I raised my head. “If I were still human I might have reacted just as you did. I know you were expecting to find Joshua here, but, alas, it is only I who reside in this cathedral.”
He smiled, white teeth flashing in the dim light, and my head started to swim. I couldn’t look directly at him. The hard lines that made up his features had blurred into a whitish mass of light. I shook my head and swallowed before continuing.
“I don’t know how I wound up here.” I spread my arms to indicate the surro
unding room. “I was looking for Joshua and ended up here. But I haven’t quite figured out why.”
“Yes, Joshua told me you would help me with a task, a tiny trifle. In return for this small favor, I will relay to you Joshua’s exact whereabouts. How does that sound?”
I shook my head in an effort to break his gaze. I had to stop myself from taking a step back from him. I hadn’t really dealt with something as ancient as Voln before and it scared me. Even just being in his presence made me feel small, and I knew there were things even older than him… things like drakes. My god… I must be crazy. What kind of person would go after something so old, so ancient, that Voln might as well be a puppy in comparison?
I turned to leave, desperate to get out of his presence. Voln spoke again; his voice was low and musical. “You won’t be able to leave from here so easily. Even if you did get through the doors, you would just be trapped in the swirling winds of the nether.”
I hated when other people were right, especially when they came to a conclusion I had already decided to ignore. I turned back toward him, lowering my sunglasses so that my golden eyes showed.
“I don’t really have time for this. I’m trying to stop a dragon.”
“Why?”
“Why stop a dragon?” Because I didn’t want any number of bad things to happen? Because I wanted to be the important one instead of Dirge Meilan. Because, maybe, if I could stop this all by myself, people would stop comparing me to my former self.
“No,” he replied. “Why must you stop it? Do you not think that Warthor has long ago figured out how to deal with drakes? In the past, no Dragon Knight dared travel into the nether because all other drakes would seek to undo him. Yet Warthor has lived here for years, despite being Trius’ Dragon Knight.”
Everyone knew that the easiest way to get rid of a drake was to kill his Dragon Knight. Doing so would sever the drake’s tie to our world. Then, without a person anchoring him into our world, the drake would eventually have to retreat to the nether. That was how Warthor had defeated the last drake. He had simply killed the other dragon’s knight and claimed this world for Trius. Since that day, Warthor had a giant target painted on his chest, and he had done it on purpose.
Kill It With Magic: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 1) Page 2