‘I can’t.’
‘You can.’
Everything inside me became conflicted. I’d walked on eggshells the moment we’d entered the mall, and now I felt like I’d crushed every one, leaving a mess behind. The look on the soldier’s face. The fear. The sickening pain he’d felt. Then nothing. Gone. Snuffed out like a candle.
A sudden rush of warm energy filled me from the mate connection. Coiling around, a bright light spilled inside and forced me away from the cold place of retreat that threatened to shut me down. I held onto it, finding the strength of my energy to push me forth. And even though fear of what we faced still haunted, I could face it.
My eyes flickered open, glad when the fury came.
“Hold on to that,” Kaleb said, breathless. “Hone it. We’re doing this to take out Dreven before he wreaks this havoc on the world. On unwitting citizens. On kids. On those who can’t fight back.”
“Don’t you ever lose it?” I had to ask, wanting to know how he did it. How he stayed so calm during all this.
“Yes. I do. Whenever you throw yourself in harm’s way. You’re fitted with a reaction switch that just flips the second someone is in danger with no thought or care for your own wellbeing.”
“You want me to apologize for who I am?”
“No. But I’ve told you before. You’ve got to think of us sometimes. Of me. How the hell do you think I’d react if something bad happened to you?”
“The mate magic,” I whispered.
“No, Terra.” He stepped closer and rested his hand on my waist. “The first time you reached death’s door, when I found your body, hanging from those chains after the rogues had bitten into you. I almost lost it then. Envisioning a future without you in it killed me before we mated. You leaving would break my heart with or without the mate magic, so stop it, or I’ll kick your ass back out with the zombies.”
A smiled tugged at my lips. “Wouldn’t that defeat the objective?”
His thumb found its way beneath my shirt and stroked my skin. “Hopefully, with your fear of zombies, the threat will be enough.”
“Where’s Officer Finn?” Someone asked in panic. “He’s not here! Where is he?”
I looked away, not wanting to see the terror in their expressions.
“We need to set up some light, and assess the area!” Kaleb boomed to the clambering hysteria rising in the store. “Everyone with a flashlight raise it now.” Thirty or so lights raised high. “Put them somewhere strategic,” he ordered, “Let’s get some light in the room. Point some light through the glass door to assess the entry point.”
Some hesitated, until Lopez bellowed, “Do it!”
Hearing it from one of their own jolted them to action. Soon, enough light flooded the room.
Zax used water bottles to spread the light. With others he zoomed the flashlights and aimed them at the ceiling. With his clever techniques, not only did light flood across the store, but toward the outside too.
“I’ll set up a triage,” Mayra said in panic when she caught the look on my face. Off she scurried to the corner, gathering medical supplies. Libby assisted her, snarling at any of the officers who demanded Mayra see to their buddies first.
Kaleb wanted me to jump to the front of the line. But I refused. My injuries weren’t deep. But still he slunk off and found a medical kit and some of Mayra’s salve to apply to my wounds.
When he’d finished, I rested my hand against his cheek. “Thanks, Kaleb. For everything.”
He wrapped his arms around me. “From now on, we trust in us. All of us. Let Mayra tend the wounded. We’ll help where we can, then we pull together as a team to decide next steps.”
“What is it with you and bossing me around?”
“It’s an added side benefit of me getting to kiss you better when I piss you off.”
“Asshole.”
“That’s my girl.”
“No wonder you’ve never had a serious girlfriend before.”
“What? I’m sex on legs, baby. Any woman would be lucky to have me.” His eyes twinkled in the flashlights’ shine.
“Nope. I think you’re my penance for all the wrongs I did in a past life.”
He grinned. “Do you know how many women are weeping into their sheets right now because I’ve claimed you?”
“Erm, let me guess. A big fat zero.”
“Every damn one, baby. I’m that good.”
Taking a breath, I held onto him, and directed us toward Mayra, happy to fall into the distraction he provided. “Come on then, Mr. Perfect. Let’s go put that perfection to work.”
26
The Bodyguard Six took over settling the officers. A few needed a pep talk, but I’d let Grady sort that later. To them, he was a soldier. He was one who could relate to the grief from their losses.
Once we’d regained order, the seven of us, the IET, huddled in the storeroom to discuss next steps.
“We need to find Dreven,” I said, starting the conversation. “But we’ve cleared most of the mall. Only the final section to go. Can we leave these guys behind while we go forward?”
“We don’t know what we face the closer we get,” Grady replied. “And that’s what they’re here for—to fight.”
“I doubt they signed up to fight zombies.”
“No. They did so to serve and protect this country. Domestic or otherwise. And by being here, they’re protecting it.”
“He’s right,” Mayra said, rubbing her arms to ward off the cold settling in. “Dreven had the nerve to raise an army—to take over a world of supernaturals with the power to take him down. Being over here with the humans. What if he’s trying the same thing?”
“If that’s the case, what’s the point of all the drama with the mall?” Bernard asked.
I thought on it, trying to get into Dreven’s head. What would I do if I was a powerful mage who could raise and control the dead—shells or otherwise—and had escaped over to Earth?
“The wards,” I blurted.
“The magical wards?” Zax asked.
“Yes. The wards. They’re the only thing keeping the escaped prisoners in Seattle at the moment. Now, as far as I’m aware, they might not be strong enough to keep a mage in check, but they haven’t tripped. They would have alerted you on the laptop, Zax.” I stared at him. “He might have already done so!”
“Nope,” Zax replied, lifting his wrist. He pushed back his sleeve to show a watch comms from Portiside. “This works over here. It syncs with the technology in the laptop back home. Trust me, if he’s tripped the wards we’d know about it.”
I sighed in relief. “Okay. If he wants a world takeover, the wards are his priority. So why all this drama? Why play us?”
“Distraction maybe?” Libby suggested.
“But why?”
“To find a way around the wards without alerting anyone?” Mayra replied. “After all that’s happened, it’s no wonder the prisoners are coming out of the shadows to make their move. They’re getting spooked.”
“That makes sense,” I said. “We’ve taken out six already. And two who made it through the portal in a short time frame. Lauz, the soul-borrowing demon, told me they’d had to disband because of Daha the djinn too eager for his vengeance. They’d planned to stay in the shadows while over here until the Consilium ordered us back home or until they’d picked us off one by one. But that hasn’t happened. We took out Daha, and we took out Lauz. News may also have reached them that we’ve killed Torroro depending on how far and wide the corruption in the Consilium goes. Dreven has the power and the knowhow to break through the wards. He’ll either want escape or world domination. Either way, the wards make sense.”
“It takes a lot of power to manipulate all of this,” Bernard told me, his pale face highlighted by the flashlight Libby held. “Why draw so much attention to himself while doing so?”
I had no clue. “To keep us busy? Lure us into a trap, maybe? Test our skills? Piss us off? But none of that matters. The priority
is to take the mall. So let’s clear the rest. Maybe we can enter the multiplex on our own while the rest of the troops hold ground on the outskirts. At least then we can use our assets to the fullest without an audience.”
“How far now is the multiplex?” Kaleb asked Grady who’d committed the mall blueprints to memory.
“We’re about ten stores down from the food court. The multiplex is another few stores down from that. But the court is our biggest problem. It’s more open. There are also escalators from the lower floor. It’s a great location for their last line of defense.”
“The only other way into the multiplex is from outside,” I said in frustration. “That’s not an option either, so we keep going. Let’s go in as a unit to the food court and assess the threat level. How are the injured?”
“Patched up,” Mayra replied. “I used my salve on the bandages without them knowing. It should ward off any infection. Nothing life threatening.”
“Good.” But my voice broke as the image of the fallen soldiers, and the humans eaten, took residence in my mind. Grief hit. Especially for the young soldier who had his head torn off in front of me. “We’ve lost two. Let’s not lose any more.”
Mayra rubbed my arm in comfort. “I’m sorry you had to see that,” she whispered.
The revulsion and sorrow reared. “He was so close to me.” I squeezed my eyes tight, seeing the scared face on the decapitated head, frozen forever in fear. “They tore off his head and threw it like a bowling ball. And now he’s gone. His life ended in less than a second because Dreven wants what?” I sniffed, trying to hold back the tears. Trust me to act the weakest of us all.
“It’s not a weakness,” Bernard said as if reading my mind. My eyes fluttered open and he held my gaze. “Crying for them. Feeling for them. It’s not a weakness.”
I gnawed my lip. “I almost had him.”
“But you weren’t meant to,” Zax reassured me. “Remember Dolly and all her lectures on life and death? We all sign up for a bigger purpose, no matter our beliefs. This isn’t the end for him. Or for any of us. If you can’t believe in anything else, believe in that.”
I had to believe it. Otherwise I’d lose my mind.
Bernard focused on me. “After all this, if you want me to charm the thoughts of his death from your memories I’ll do it.”
Studying my friend, I thought about the many hundreds of years he’d lived. How many horrors had he seen in the world he’d once operated? Yet he’d handled it. He’d survived his past. And bore the scars.
“No one can charm vampires.”
He frowned. “So?”
“If you have to carry the burdens, then so do I.”
“You’re an Empath,” he smiled warmly. “All this will be harder for you.”
“No it won’t. We’ll bear it. All of us. Only in different ways. And I get to ugly cry and go all red-nosed and sniffle to let out my pain because apparently, that’s my thing.”
He laughed at that, and Kaleb took my hand and kissed it. “I love your red nose and snot trails.”
I quickly wiped my nose and found nothing there. “You’re a dick.”
He winked. “Don’t you know it.”
Everyone chuckled, and it lightened the mood. I looked across at Grady. “How are you dealing with the zombie gig?”
“Zombies are no problem,” he sighed. “My brain can take that better than Kaleb turning into a wolf.”
“I’m so damn sexy. Everyone feels that way,” Kaleb replied.
“Wait until you see a dragon flying over head,” said Mayra.
Grady smiled. “I don’t know. Seeing a dragon would be awesome. Especially after meeting someone as cool as Zax.”
“Thanks, man.”
“Anytime. It’s the vampires I’m worried about.” He glanced at Bernard. “Sorry. One too many fanged horror movies as a kid.”
Bernard showed his fangs. “And you’d be right to fear them. My kind aren’t all as awesome as me.”
I rolled my eyes. “And as you can see, Grady, most supernaturals come with a good dash of ego.”
Libby stuck out her breasts. “Only because we can back it up, sweetheart. We can’t help it if you humans feel inferior to all this.”
I looked at her curves. Thought of Bernard’s fashion sense. And Kaleb’s muscles. To Grady, I said, “They’ve got us there.”
He chuckled. “You’ll get no argument from me.”
I leaned my head back against the wall in the small space. “Know that I love you guys. I have faith in this. I have faith in us. We will do our damned best to get everyone, including ourselves, out of this alive. We will take Dreven down.”
“I’ll buy the champagne if we do,” Bernard quipped.
“Wow. Our champagne snob honors us. I’m in.”
“If we get out of this with our sanity intact, it will be worth every cent.”
27
Grady gave the soldiers a pep talk. It helped some. After that, we stayed as one group, but he nominated leaders of the smaller groups again in case we got separated or needed to disband. We aimed for the multiplex; the final section to assess and see if Dreven was anywhere in the mall’s layout. After that, we’d check the basement and offices on Grady’s instruction.
The rest had done everyone some good. We’d all needed it. By carving out a slice of normal it gave us the chance to reset. The adrenalin pumped in unison, and with weapons aimed and ready to use, we followed Grady’s lead toward the food court.
“What’s that?” Someone said, aiming their weapon to the east. Grady put his hand up, urging everyone to a stop. We’d had a few false starts, people on edge, every one of our senses on high alert. But this time I heard something.
The lights flickered around us, and we blinked against the brightness. No electricity ran through the place, which meant only one thing.
Magic.
We waited. But whatever lurked didn’t come from the east. The lights turned off abruptly, throwing us back into darkness. A cackle filled the air.
“Look.” Mayra pointed before her and whispered. “I sense magic.”
Green streams of light appeared ahead at the center of the food court. They wavered and flickered, forming an image.
Blurred and pixelated, a face filled the upper part of the mall from ceiling to floor.
Dreven.
“Ah! My dear fellows!” The image said, a twisted smile on his face. The distorted view gave me enough for an identification and nothing more. It flickered again as the magic struggled to project his face before us. “I’m surprised you’ve made it this far!”
The words, “What the hell is that?”, “What the fuck now?” and, “This is bad.” All came from behind me. I didn’t move, my eyes only for Dreven, keeping my weapon aimed and my senses on alert for a sudden attack. What is he up to?
“My plan, so beautifully exited, needs some refinement,” he continued. Is that a smile on his face? “But first. I want Terra and the rest of the IET to drop their weapons. No one else. Only them.”
“No chance,” I growled.
“That’s not playing nice, Agent Vane,” he replied. So he’d heard me. “I can’t wait for you and me to have a little chat.” His voice echoed all around us as the magical projection wavered. “But until then, I’m sure I can persuade you to drop those weapons of yours. Can I not?”
His face disappeared and the lights from the mall, from the surrounding stores, all crackled to life. I blinked my eyes against the sudden brightness. But what I saw before me had my mouth falling agape.
A scream—a human scream—pierced the air.
Illuminated before us, several beastly zombies, once tall muscled men, appeared. They had their hands wrapped around the necks of terrified humans: the owners of the screams.
“They have hostages?”
A girl wept. About twenty years of age. Dirty clothes hung from her frame. She sobbed, begging for someone to help. Next to her, the zombie held onto another woman. An older woman. One w
ho rambled nonsense, her eyes focusing on the ceiling. A row of three others held captive, three men of varying ages, either raged, begged, or sobbed, waiting for their savior or destruction.
The zombie in the middle caught my eye. Ragged hair fell to his shoulders. He stood over six foot with large muscles that flexed while he held on to the girl. But he hadn’t rotted yet. He looked fresh.
The Bodybuilder Zombie laughed. But when he opened his mouth to speak, it was Dreven’s voice that erupted. “We don’t want these pretty humans to suffer now, do we, Terra?” He squeezed the neck of his hostage who wailed in pain, her air supply cut off when he pressed harder. “IET must drop their weapons or they die!”
“IET?” a soldier whispered. I ignored him.
Where had Dreven got hold of the humans? How long had he held them in captivity? Had they got past the second shield outside, passed the remaining solders? Had he swiped them from the streets or kidnapped the innocent humans before the zombies? The questions all reeled in my head.
The zombie squeezed harder, and the hostage wheezed. “Fine!” I put up my hands. “We’ll remove our weapons.”
I lifted my gun from around me and dropped it to the ground, sharing a worried glance with Kaleb. But he did the same. So did the others.
“And your swords,” the puppet-zombie-Dreven said. I reluctantly withdrew them from my harness and dropped them to the floor.
“We’ve done what you’ve asked. Now let them go.”
He laughed. “I never said we’d let them go. Just that I wouldn’t kill them. Yet.” He yanked the hair of the younger girl and tugged her head back. She whimpered when he licked her cheek. I scoured the area, trying to discover a way get to them before the zombies snapped their necks.
“We can fall back,” Bernard whispered from beside me. “We can move through the parts at the rear of the stores. Come up behind them.”
I shook my head once. Enough to tell him it was a bad idea. Dreven had eyes on us all. One wrong move and the hostages would be dead in seconds. I had to keep the mage talking.
“What do you want, Dreven?”
Death Be Rising (The Terra Vane Series Book 7) Page 17