Tank spoke up from Owen’s other side. “Healers aren’t slaves. They’re loyal. They’ve devoted their lives for centuries to healing injured cavali. Hell, they make more than I do. They’re free to leave the Capiti whenever they like.”
Owen nodded with a frown.
That’d be my argument too, but I’m not sure how it would hold up against pissed off vamps.
Esme was now spinning her hand to blur the symbol and activate the termino.
Behind Owen, someone whistled in admiration.
Owen turned and saw the Master Cavali walking to join them. Owen had spent the afternoon training with Loukas, who was always good for a few rounds of sparring to freshen Owen’s reflexes. The muscular black man had played football in college, and now in his forties Loukas was still in incredible shape.
He’s certainly capable of whopping my ass.
Loukas squeezed between Benja and Owen to stand and watch Esme. “The stories are true. I’ve never seen an alterni this good.”
Benja snickered. “This is nothing. You should see her with a bentaforx.”
“Uh, no,” Owen corrected with a snort. “Let’s hope we never see a bentaforx again.”
Benja flicked a braid off her shoulder but made a face of agreement.
Owen felt a gust of wind as the termino sparked and swirled, sucking the rift into it. Soon the smoking tear in reality disappeared in a final crackle of light, and the scene returned to normal. A silenced shot somewhere behind the dumpster suggested a cavali had found a stray spindlox, but otherwise the area looked clear. Loukas’s recruits regrouped where their Master Cavali stood with the king, and Owen noted with pride that few looked afraid.
Finished, Esme turned and walked back toward Owen. “Another one bites the…” She stopped a short distance away and swayed forward, then caught her balance. She put a hand to her head, her castorca catching the light.
Owen recognized what was happening, and he felt a chill.
Rift-gravity. She’s sensing another rift opening!
He turned. “Down!”
Dropping to a crouch, Owen pulled Loukas down just as a flock of chiroptorx swept over them. Owen lost sight of Tank and Benja as they jumped out of the way. He drew a gun and fired up at the flapping demons, and he saw a large rift hanging in the air right behind where they’d stood. Black smoke wafted from the rift and flaked onto the pavement. The chiroptorx continued to pour out of the rift, and Owen guessed at least a hundred clogged the air above.
Gunshots fired from farther off, and Owen stayed down to avoid getting hit. A cavali screamed, but Owen couldn’t see why. Loukas, who was right beside him, was impossible to see in the darkness, but he also fired up at the demons coming out of the rift. Owen crouched by the Master Cavali and aimed in the same direction, and together they fired into the rift. Cavali somewhere to Owen’s left and Loukas’s right joined their defense.
Shots pelted the beating wings and dark bodies of the chiroptorx. Several fell dead to the pavement. Those flying out of the rift tried to avoid the shots and crowded the outer rim of the rift, leaving the center open.
Owen looked up into the center of the rift and realized they were in serious trouble. “Move back! Move back!”
Loud bellows added to this warning, and a second later the first crustacox at the front of a herd leapt out of the rift. Owen and Loukas dove to the right. The crustacox’s short legs stumbled as it landed in this world, but it wasted no time and charged forward into the darkness created by the swirling chiroptorx above. Then another crustacox jumped free. Then three more. Then six more.
The only good news was that the chiroptorx flock was clear of the rift now, and the store’s security light illuminated the area again. Owen finally spotted Max, Dax, Benja, and Tank with a group of cavali against the side of the building. They were in good position to fire at the herd. Owen and Loukas stood on the other side, and Owen now saw spindlox jumping from the rift. These scuttled across the pavement and stupidly ran amongst the crustacox, getting trampled more often than they made it through.
Where’s Esme?
Owen fired at the hard exoskeletons of the ox-sized crustacox, but he had to run with Loukas to avoid shots from the cavali.
Shit. We’re likely to shoot ourselves with all this crossfire!
From the cavali’s position, Benja must’ve realized the same, and she holstered her weapon to instead extend her fingers and tap out an ice spell. A burst of ice shot from her hand and hit a few of the demons’ searching tentacles. The crustacox she hit bellowed and swung in her direction, but Tank took note and fired a volley into the charging demons. The frozen tentacles splintered and fell in chunks to the pavement, and the crustacox bellowed in rage. Demons that Benja missed swung toward the cavali, but Dax shouted orders and the cavali fired with a crossing pattern.
Owen glanced at the smoking, flaking rift but was satisfied to discover nothing more coming through for the time being.
We need Esme to close this thing!
“Esme?” he shouted over the herd. “Guys, is Esme over there?”
“No!” shouted Max. “Haven’t seen her since the flock separated us!”
Loukas ducked as a cavali shot ricocheted off a crustacox. “My lord!” He pointed.
Owen turned. He’d kept the flock of chiroptorx in his periphery, but now he saw that the demonic bats were ignoring the team. They weren’t fleeing either. Instead they flew like a living tornado, and their bodies were so densely packed he couldn’t see through to whatever held their attention at the center.
Hang on, alterni.
He reloaded and looked back at Loukas. “Follow me!”
A burst of smoke distracted Loukas as it wafted their way before flaking to the ground, but he recovered and nodded at Owen.
Approaching with as much stealth as possible, Owen kept alert and watched the blur of demonic movement. One chiroptorx swooped around to intercept them, but Loukas fired a perfect shot that dropped the pterodactyl-like monster to the pavement. The two men now stood within an arm’s reach of the flock, and Owen’s heart beat fast as he exchanged a look with Loukas.
Loukas held his gun ready. “What do we do? You think Esme’s in there?”
Owen looked up along the whirling flock of demons. He raised his gun. “Shoot up! If the flock’s circling Esme, we can thin them this way without shooting her!”
He fired, and Loukas matched him round for round. One or the other periodically clicked on empty, but they found a rhythm so that at least one of them kept firing at all times. They had to step back in a hurry whenever a killed demon fell, and soon a disgusting pile rose between them and the circling flock.
But there are fewer now.
Owen strained to see through the blur, and a sudden burst of flames illuminated the space between the flapping wings.
“Down!”
He and Loukas hit the dirt as an enormous ball of fire spread from the center of the flock and shot outward. The inferno swept up chiroptorx, and Owen looked up to see the demons burning as the fire rose into the sky. A second later the fire died, and chiroptorx ash fell to the pavement.
Esme was now visible where she’d stood in the epicenter, and she coughed and raised a castorca to cover her mouth as ash blew in the wind.
“Esme!”
Owen hopped to his feet, followed by Loukas, and together they hurried to the woman. Even in the dull light, Owen could see she was covered in soot. She fisted her hands and rested them on her hips as she caught her breath.
Her hands look okay. No magic burns. Thank the gods for however the paired castorcas channel her magic.
“You okay?”
“Yeah. I just need a second.” Esme, breathing hard, motioned to a section of her pant leg that was torn free, then lifted her purple eyes to Owen with a smile. “I knew this barrio scar would come in handy.”
Owen looked again and saw the exposed skin on her thigh. Sure enough, she’d pushed magic into the barrio symbol that had been a sca
r on her leg ever since their battle with the bentaforx. Now the scar was freshly burned.
She’ll need healers to look at that…assuming we get out of this.
“Oh no,” said Loukas beside him.
Owen saw what had caught the big man’s attention. Beyond Esme’s kill zone, two cavali were down, blood pooling on the pavement under their bodies. A handful of spindlox had found the corpses to scavenge, and the spidery demons scuttled over the fallen, clacking their pincers as they fought each other for position.
Loukas fired, and every shot exploded a spindlox body. Soon the demons lay around the dead cavali as scattered chunks of bone.
“I couldn’t get to them in time.” Esme motioned to the fallen men, then looked back to where the rest of the team fought the crustacox. “I’m good. Let’s go.”
“You have to close–”
“Oh, shit!” Esme’s eyes widened as she looked past Owen.
He started to turn. “What–”
Esme raised both castorcas and tapped her fingers to shoot an ice spell. At the same time, a wall of crustacox charged. Owen raised his weapon and fired, hitting a tentacle. Esme’s spell did more damage and froze one demon solid. Before Owen could react, she ran forward and punched straight into the frozen exoskeleton. It was obvious that she’d used a spell, for the strength of the punch shattered the crustacox on impact.
The other crustacox bellowed and reacted with a stampede, and Owen lost sight of Esme. As for his other friend, Owen watched in horror as a tentacle whipped to strike Loukas in the throat.
“Ah!” Loukas cried out in alarm. He fell to the pavement.
“No!”
Owen only made it a step before a crustacox ran right in front of him, and he bounced off the exoskeleton and stumbled before getting his footing again. He raised his gun and looked around in confusion as the crustacox stampeded back and forth between him and the rest of his team. Owen shot at every tentacle that came into view, but he noticed that none of the crustacox charged him. One crustacox ran by, dragging a corpse wearing cavali armor.
“Loukas!”
Owen fired at the tentacle wrapped around the man’s throat. It broke off, and the corpse slid to a stop on the pavement. Owen fired into the herd of demons and ran to the body. He expected to be trampled at any second, but the crustacox parted to run around him.
What the hell?
Suspecting the demons would turn on him at any second, Owen hurried to examine the body. He looked at the detached tentacle in disgust where it still squeezed the dead man’s throat. Blood covered the man’s face, and his eyes had been sucked…
Owen tried not to gag. But the cavali’s skin was white. This wasn’t Loukas.
His gun ready, Owen watched the chaos of stampeding crustacox. The rift’s smoke wafted over the herd like a sickening fog, and he couldn’t see far. Demonic bellows filled the air, and Owen heard an occasional screech from a spindlox. He heard gunfire too, on the far side of this blocking stampede.
What the hell are the crustacox doing? Why aren’t they attacking me?
Firing into the herd, Owen was met with no reaction. A bullet tore into a tentacle right where it met the demon’s mouth at the bottom edge of the huge exoskeleton, but the crustacox made no attempt to retaliate. Instead it kept stampeding back and forth, crossing paths with demons doing the same. It was as if they were running sprints to cut him off from his team.
“Come on!” He fired again and again.
To the right, Owen heard a bellow. He looked over as two crustacox lifted off the ground, rose high into the air, and slammed into each other, controlled by an unseen force. The next instant, their bodies were thrown away to crash into the pavement.
Esme and Loukas ran through the gap left by the demolished crustacox. A tentacle lashed out at Esme, but she raised a hand and ran a thumb against her fingers, snapping the tentacle in half. Loukas fired when a crustacox broke from the sprinting stampede to charge him, and Esme made a motion from his gun to the crustacox. This spell strengthened the bullets enough to penetrate the exoskeleton and kill the demon. The charging beast dropped and slid, coming to a stop a short distance from Loukas.
Owen hurried to join them. “What the hell is going on? They cut me off and–”
An earsplitting shriek cut him off. The three humans covered their ears, and Owen looked around to find the spindlox. The rift’s smoke still caused a foggy darkness, and the running crustacox were equally disorienting. Owen kept his gun ready and scanned the pavement between the crustacox.
“Owen!” screamed Esme.
He spun to face her, fearing she was in danger. Too late he saw a spindlox launch off the ground and fly right at him. He tried to raise his gun, but the cat-sized demon already had a bony leg on his arm. Owen was face to face with the spindlox’s bone-colored pincers, and he saw its glistening stinger swing toward his heart.
All this happened in a second, but to his shock the spindlox was yanked off him. He took a step back and sucked in a breath. His first guess was that Esme used a spell on the demon, but he looked over and saw her eyes wide with surprise. And she wasn’t looking at him.
Owen’s head snapped back around, and he saw now that a crustacox’s tentacle had grabbed the spindlox off him. The spider-demon let out another horrific shriek, but the tentacle squeezed and cracked the spindlox’s body. The crustacox then whipped the corpse toward the ground and smashed the legs right off. After that, the crustacox continued running around with its herd.
“What…” Loukas stared in confusion before facing Owen and snapping out of it. “We have to get back to the rift!”
Owen joined them to run through the herd. “What’s going on?”
Loukas shot at a spindlox leaping over crustacox backs. “We don’t know! Esme and I got to the others, and they’ve dropped a dozen crustacox. We fought with them when more spindlox jumped through, but then Esme realized you were missing, so we came back for you!”
They broke into open space, and Owen saw the rest of their cavali team firing from their same position against the grocery store. Like Loukas said, several crustacox bodies lay on the pavement. Several spindlox were down too, along with chiroptorx from the beginning of the battle.
The rift still swirled and smoked, looming open, promising more trouble.
Owen turned to Esme. “Why haven’t you closed it yet?”
She shook hair out of her face. “I was trying when the second batch of spindlox came through! They jumped right at me, and I had–”
“My lord,” interrupted Loukas. He put a hand on Owen’s shoulder, then pointed over at the cavali. “I’m gonna help our boys!”
Owen gave him a nod, and Loukas ran over, firing into the herd like a madman as he tried to reach his men.
Nobody’s a newbie after tonight, thought Owen.
He looked back at Esme. “You’ve gotta close that rift!”
Esme already had her hand up, and she pulled in her fingers to draw the termino. As per their usual tactics, Owen stood with his back to hers and covered her.
Cat balls, how many times have we done this – her closing a rift while I pick off the remaining demons? But this sure as hell wasn’t a normal attack. What were those crustacox doing with me?
Feeling unsettled, Owen adjusted his grip and made sure no malevolenci got too close. He glanced over at the rift and saw Esme swirling the sparking symbol into a blur. A second later, the last burst of lightning from the malevolenci world was sucked back inside as the rift sealed.
Relieved, Owen turned with Esme and advanced on the herd. Slowly, they squeezed the crustacox closer together like a bunch of sheep – very angry sheep who knew they were trapped. With the cavali on one side, Owen and Esme on the other, and Loukas cutting off their escape, the crustacox tried not to get jostled to the outside of the herd, where lucky gunshots pierced their weakened exoskeletons.
“Benja,” called Esme, “you got this from your side?”
“I’ll do what I can!�
�� yelled the jinn from somewhere among the cavali.
Owen knew what Esme had in mind and took a step away from her as she raised both hands and pointed her fingers upward. Her head tilted to look at the sky, then at the crustacox, and finally Esme winced before wiggling her fingers.
Lightning shot from the sky and struck the herd. A few crustacox bellowed and lurched to the side, but then Benja hit them with smaller bursts of lightning from her side. Bolt after bolt jolted the night, and Owen had to look away or go blind. He assumed the others were doing the same, and the nauseating smell of burning crustacox filled the air. Soon all was still, and Owen discovered the whole herd was down.
A few cavali left their group and hurried to dispatch the few spindlox scuttling away, but soon the area was secure.
Owen and Esme looked at each other, breathing hard, and headed to join the team.
Loukas kicked a charred exoskeleton. He raised an eyebrow at Esme. “Remind me never to piss you off.”
Max walked over and kicked a broken spindlox out of his way. He asked Owen, “You okay? Why were the crustacox cutting you off while they attacked us?”
Owen scowled as answer. He had a very unsettling feeling…
Esme scanned the cavali, who seemed shaken and exhausted. “How many did we lose from your group?”
Max frowned. “Seven, I think.”
Esme looked over to where she’d fought the chiroptorx. “Two died over there. So nine total.”
“Ten.” Owen remembered the man with his eyes sucked out.
Loukas wiped sweat and malevolenci blood from his face. “We’d better collect our fallen and get out of here.” He looked down at Esme. “Will your illuso hold until conjuri can clean up this mess?”
She nodded, watching with a sad expression as the cavali began carrying away their dead.
Dax had walked over to stand by his brother, whom he slapped on the back. “Come on, Max. Let’s help carry these guys to the trucks.”
Max nodded to Owen. “Glad you’re okay, my lord.”
“Thanks. We’ll all meet back at our truck in ten. Good work tonight.”
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