Relic: Crown (A Kane Arkwright Supernatural Thriller)

by Ben Zackheim

  I leaned back in my wheelchair. “So why do you want to join us?”

  Thor wiped the beer dribble from his mouth with the back of his hand. “Because I want to kill my father.”

  My guts clenched tight. I glanced at Alix. He was the one who had told me of my connection to Odin. The dwarf winked at me and shook his head. I relaxed. Alix had keep it a secret from the thunder god.

  Thor clearly thought he’d get a different response from us. He glanced around the room, confused. “You people don’t know of Odin's unforgivable betrayal?”

  “It’s not like they report that shit in the New York Times,” Rebel said.

  The god frowned. “Hmph. I wasn’t in isolation for my health, humans. Odin killed my bride and stripped me of my hammer. I have vowed revenge. Odin will die at my hand.”

  I leaned forward and met his stare. “So kill him then. Why do you need us?” He bought himself some time by taking a big swig. He was cooking up a lie. “Tell me the truth, Thor.”

  He sighed. He could tell I'd read him right. “I need your relic in my hands, Kane.”

  “If he had a dime for every time he heard that, he’d be penniless,” Rebel said, because she’s Rebel and she never misses a chance to tell that same damn joke. Even in the End Times.

  “Which relic do you need?” I asked. "Don’t look at the dwarf, thunder god. Look at me.”

  Thor tapped me on the chest with one huge finger. “You are a true asshole, Kane Arkwright.”

  “Is that what you call people who won’t let you get away with shit?” He laughed again. I had to smile, too. He had one of those laughs that infects the room. But I didn’t let his eyes leave mine.

  “I need the crown, Kane Arkwright."

  Chapter 7

  I didn’t get a chance to dig deeper because the city of Paris shook.

  It started with a distant sound, low and terrible. Then the wood floor underneath our feet rolled like a wave. The sound of breaking glass raining down on the sidewalks was like listening to a billion small bells ring.

  Alix looked up at Thor. “Could that already be…?”

  “Silence, dwarf!” Thor yelled, cutting his friend short. But the nervous expression on the god’s face was the only clue I needed.

  I wagged my finger between the two of them. “What did you guys do?”

  Alix glanced at Thor, who shrugged. “We may have gotten into a bit o’ a tussle with a giant back in Jötunheimr,” the dwarf mumbled.

  Another loud noise cracked through the empty streets of Paris. A purple light flashed bright in the sky. Thor decided to speak up. “And we’ve been trying to lose a cockatrice for a good, what, two days now, Alix?” Alix nodded.

  “What’s a cockatrice?” Dino asked.

  “You led a giant and a cockatrice to Paris?” I yelled.

  “What’s a cockatrice?” Rebel and Dino asked together.

  Thor slammed his glass down on the bar, shattering it. “I didn’t think they would dare follow us! Giants haven’t breathed the air of Midgard for eons. Why would they follow me after a fun little…”

  Rebel frowned. “Fun little what?”

  “Wedgie,” Alix mumbled. Thor suppressed a laugh.

  “How do you give a cockatrice a wedgie?” I asked.

  “Very carefully,” Alix said. He tried not to laugh but Thor ruined his effort by cracking up.

  “What’s a cockatrice?” Dino asked again. “Does a cockatrice have a big c…”

  I cut him off. “It’s a dragon. Dino. Okay? A two-legged dragon. It’s mean as hell, too, if the stories are right.”

  “Oh-ho-ho-ho, those stories are very, very right, boyo,” Alix said before downing his whiskey in one gulp.

  “And even meaner after wedgies!” Thor and Alix laughed some more.

  The streets of Paris crunched under the feet of something huge.

  “That would be the giant!” Dino finished his drink in one gulp. “We can talk about Kane’s relics later, folks. Right now, we’ve got a fight on our hands.”

  I made to stand up, but my body reminded me to sit the fuck down. Rebel’s hand on my shoulder was meant to be calming, but it made my ears burn with anger. She knew I was frustrated. Her grip on my shoulder felt like just another thing keeping me down. I shook her hand off .

  “Push me outside, Rebel. Thor and Alix, you handle the giant. We’ll keep an eye out for the dragon.”

  Thor threw his head back. “HA! Always ready for a fight.”

  “Screw you,” I said as Rebel and I followed him to the sidewalk outside. Alix and Dino ran ahead, screaming things at each other to pump themselves up. “You brought us a big problem, Thor. Now we get to clean up your mess. Rebel, let’s get to Place de la Concorde. It’s two blocks that way. We can minimize the damage if we do this in an open area.”

  Thor turned to me. “Why minimize the damage, human? That’s what makes this fun! The city is abandoned!”

  “It won’t be abandoned when we win this war. I’d like to leave Paris in good shape if it’s all right with you.”

  Thor’s smirk faded. “Such hopeful animals you humans are.”

  I pulled a Glock from the wheelchair’s side pocket and fired. Thor cocked his head to the right and dodged the bullet. His smile died a miserable death as he pointed at me. “I vow to never betray you, and then you betray me? That is the last time you’ll shoot off your little…”

  He was interrupted by a dead monster slamming into his back. A dead monster that had been attacking him from behind before I put a round in its brain. The bullet was meant for the monster, not Thor. The thing looked like a flying lizard, about three feet tall with a six foot wing span.

  The god belted out a laugh. “You may join me in battle anytime, Arkwright! That was impressive!”

  I shot at him again, and again he dodged. Another lizard dropped to the street behind him. “Perhaps you could aim at the ones over there!” Thor yelled, regarding the skies above us for the first time.

  “But this is more fun,” I said as I shot past his shoulder to take down another one.

  Rebel bent over one of my victims. “These are cockatrices?”

  “No, cockatrices are two-legged.”

  “These are flecks,” Thor said. “They protect the dragon while he sleeps. But they’re also — what do you call them here? Fanatics?”

  “Fans?”

  “That’s the word.”

  Rebel turned me around. “All right, you two, that’s enough. We can crack open the Encyclopedia of Monster Crap later. You said the park’s this way, Kane?” She rolled me away from the god and leaned close to my ear. “He could be a powerful ally.”

  “Having Thor on our side won’t be a good thing, Rebel. He has no skin in this game. He’s just out for himself.”

  “Then why let him join us? You’re hiding something from me, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not hiding anything. You know Freya and Alix claim I’m Odin. If that’s true, then Thor might kill me when he finds out. I want to keep him close. I don’t want him realm-hopping until he hears my secret from someone else.”

  “Hm. Good thinking.”

  “Thank you, Rebel.”

  “You’re welcome, Kane.”

  “Did we just have a civil exchange? That was kind of fun.”

  “Don’t get used to it.”

  Our discussion was a little out of place in the pulsing purple landscape we were traveling through. A screech from high above made us look up just in time to see the shadow of a massive winged beast. It soared by too quickly for me to make it out clearly.

  Rebel clenched my shoulder. “What the hell was that?”

  “That was the cockatrice.”

  “That’s the thing you want to fight from a wheelchair?”

  “I have a plan. Don’t worry.”

  “Great. What’s the plan?”

  “Glocks.” My Vault Portal opened in front of us. “Give me a second.” I grabbed a box of ammo, dumped the bullets in my palm, and loa
ded both of my Glocks.

  “You’re going to take out a cockatrice and a giant with some pistols?”

  “These are explosive rounds.”

  “I think we’re about to put a permanent end to our polite conversations, Kane.”

  “That’s too bad. You’re fun to be around when you’re polite.”

  “You’re fun to be around when you’re in another room.”

  We reached the southwest corner of Place de la Concorde. The pulsing purple clouds above us were thick and low.

  “Where did it go?” Rebel asked.

  We watched for any movement in the clouds — fishermen in the sea, searching for a clue where to drop the net.

  A large mass broke through the clouds and then disappeared again, like a shark’s fin in the sky.

  Chapter 8

  I spotted the creature’s flesh push through the low clouds a second time, so I took the shot.

  Boom.

  A fiery orange plume erupted from the dark cloud.

  The scream from above meant all good things.

  Rebel slapped me on the shoulder. “Nice! That got his attention.”

  “Now we see if he runs, or fights back.”

  The gaping maw that emerged from the cloud solved that riddle.

  Rebel shoved my wheelchair out of the way. My shot missed. The creature’s chomping mouth, packed with teeth wet with saliva that could melt my face, slammed into the sidewalk next to me.

  The wings of the monster beat down on the concrete and sent chunks everywhere. The cockatrice pushed itself up until it dislodged its teeth from the curb. The fucker had several lizards riding on its shoulders. They hopped off of him and cheered him on like school kids watching a playground fight.

  The playground bully roared. I had a clear shot at its open throat.

  This time I shot the lamppost behind the lizard. I’d missed for a second time. It took me a second to realize why I’d missed — my wheelchair was lifting off of the ground.

  I was thrown through the air. I caught an almost-funny view of Rebel watching me fly away. Her mouth was open. She looked as surprised as I was. Alix stood next to her. His body was positioned as if he’d just tossed a wheelchair-bound man through the air like a baseball.

  Which is exactly what he’d done.

  The fucking dwarf had thrown me out of harm’s way. Well, he’d thrown me out of the cockatrice’s way. I still had to land. I didn’t look forward to that. My neck snapped back with the impact, but the rest of me felt like it had been captured by a giant pillow.

  Dino put me down on the street gently.

  “You and Alix decided to play ‘Catch the Kane’, Dino?”

  “Have to find some way to make you fun, buddy.” The troll grinned. “Bullets won’t take that thing down. Let us handle it.”

  He stepped over me and walked across the street. I reloaded and got ready to show him what I was still capable of. But I got distracted by the sight of the troll jumping onto a building. Dino may have been a dozen feet tall, but he could jump like a cat and climb like a spider. During the Mjölnir mission, he’d carried me on his back as he’d climbed the Chrysler building in New York. And he’d done it while being pursued by hundreds of undead.

  He climbed up that ten-story building in Paris within seconds. He didn’t even take a breath on the roof before he turned around, jumped and dropped onto the cockatrice’s head. The beast jerked left and right like a bull. Dino held on.

  Rebel reached out her hand. “Give me a gun, Kane!”

  “So you can shoot Dino by accident? I don’t think so, partner.”

  “Dammit, Kane!”

  “Stick with your strengths, Rebel!”

  She stuck her dagger nails in my face, pissed. I just smiled and said, “Exactly. Use those. You can’t do magic, but you can still fight. Leave the guns to me.”

  The cockatrice pushed off of the concrete and flew down the boulevard with Dino on its back. They headed toward Thor and Alix, who had drawn the giant into the middle of the wide street.

  Rebel backed away without taking her eyes off of me. “You stay hidden, partner. Don’t play hero from a wheelchair.” She ran toward the others. I probed the area for a spot to lay low.

  One of the flecks swooped down and slapped me across the top of the head. Damned lizards. I had to feel my skull to make sure it was still in one piece. I leaned sideways and pulled the wheelchair over me as protection. The makeshift shield got slammed by the fleck. It protected me, but it wouldn’t hold up to another blow.

  The dancing lights in my eyes cleared enough for me to peek out from under my wheelchair. There was no sign of my attacker. It was hiding. It was playing with me. I forced myself to my knees, Glocks ready.

  The fleck slammed into my back. I sailed through the air again and slid into the pavement with the grace of a drunk troll. My best guess was there was only one creature attacking me. That was good. The bad news was I only had a few seconds to find cover. The light show in my head ramped up again like an 80s Berlin disco.

  So yeah, I was messed up.

  I couldn’t see clearly, but the sound of those wings cutting through the air was as clear as a bell. I aimed at the noise and fired. The explosion and screech were comforting sounds. I’d extracted some pain from the thing. It hit the ground somewhere nearby. It wasn’t a kill shot. I could tell because the creature was still screaming. But was it hurt enough to back off?

  The blow to my solar plexus answered that question. As my vision came back, my air left me. I struggled to breathe. We’d fought our way to the edge of the square. The fleck got to its feet and searched for me. I had a clear shot, but I didn’t have a clear head.

  I fired anyway.

  The bullet tore through my enemy’s wing, sending an even more piercing shriek into the distinctly unromantic Paris night. The fleck tried to take flight, but its injured wing shredded under the pressure. It ran at me instead. I was starting to see stars again as my oxygen supply depleted. I shot the middle star.

  Boom.

  A long scratching sound filled the darkness. My lungs found their rhythm and I squeezed a breath in. The oxygen helped clear up the world around me.

  The fleck was in pieces. Its severed wing, topped off by razor-sharp claws, touched the toe of my boot.

  I leaned on the curb. An ear-pounding roar bounced off of the buildings. Down the wide boulevard, I saw something straight out of a horror movie. The cockatrice and the giant were standing back-to-back. My team surrounded them.

  Weakly.

  Rebel and crew appeared unsure, off their stride.

  I pushed myself onto my knees.

  I got one knee under me and used a pile of rubble to creep up to my feet. My legs were about as strong as my love life. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes and tried to relax.

  I leaned against a lamppost and took my first step in a week. It felt amazing. I took the second step and it felt even better. If I made it across the street I’d probably need a cigarette and a good night’s sleep.

  But I didn’t need to go far.

  I just needed to get a clear shot.

  Chapter 9

  It was risky.

  Thor, Dino, Alix and Rebel could probably do some serious damage to the dual monsters towering over them. But my instincts told me we’d lose someone before the fight ended.

  Neither monster knew I was there, so I had the element of surprise. But did I have a clear head? The world was still spinning. Could I get off enough rounds to take out a giant and a cockatrice? Would I even hit my targets?

  “Probably not,” a woman’s voice said from behind me. I lifted the Glock but she grabbed my wrist and twisted it until I dropped the gun.

  Tabitha.

  Otherwise known as the Queen of Vampires. Otherwise known as Isis. And apparently a mind-reader, too. I always suspected she could hear my thoughts. Now I knew it for a fact.

  She lifted the Glock, aimed it above my head and fired. The cockatrice shrieked and ascen
ded so fast its wings fanned the low clouds of Paris and sent mist rolling over the streets. She fired a second time, and the giant’s shoulder snapped back from the explosive charge. He hit the street with a crack that made me wince. He didn’t get up.

  I waited for the deafening echoes to fade. “Nice shots, Tabitha. You’re a natural.”

  “Don’t ever tempt fate, Kane,” she said with a small smile. It didn’t escape me that her other identity, Isis, was known to be the goddess of fate. She handed the Glock back to me.

  “What the hell are you doing here, Tabitha?”

  “Do you talk to all the girls that way?”

  Thor walked toward us. I was relieved to see he’d covered himself up by tearing off his shirt and wrapping it around his waist. He looked like a big kid who lost his favorite toy. He’d wanted to battle it out with the monsters but Tabitha had taken his fun away.

  She gave me a peck on the cheek. And by peck, I mean nibble. She leaned closer to me and sniffed softly. She licked her lips.

  “You need to work on your technique,” I said while wiping the blood off with my fingers. She took my hand in hers and licked it clean.

  Dino got within earshot. “If you guys need a room, you can take yer pick.” He gestured to the abandoned city around us with a melodramatic wave of his arm.

  “She was just leaving,” I said.

  Rebel rolled my beat up wheelchair between me and Tabitha. “What are you doing here? Didn’t you tell us back in Egypt that you were bowing out of this fight?” Tabitha frowned at Rebel, looking down on her with eyelids at half-mast. “Oh, sorry. Your majesty.” Rebel finished with the sassiest curtsy ever executed.

  Luckily, Tabitha ignored her. “I see you’re still fighting this war by the seat of your pants.”

  I shrugged. “That’s how we roll.” Dino helped me into the wobbly wheelchair.

  Tabitha stepped around Rebel and kneeled beside me. “I need to speak with you.”