Blood Moon (A Louisiana Demontale): Book 1 of the Crescent Crown Saga

by Schuyler Windham

  “Yes, John, it’s not promising. We received as much as seven inches of rain within a three-hour period Wednesday morning. This is causing devastating flooding across the city. As we can see from this radar image, Hurricane Morrissey is gaining traction and is shooting straight toward the Louisiana coastline at a breathtaking pace . . .”

  Leo counted his sit-ups on the floor of Saint-Germain’s living area. Ozul was napping on the sofa next to him. As he came up for the 117th time, Monette stepped in front of the TV, overshadowing him with her hands on her hips.

  “Why are you watching that?” she asked.

  “I’ve got to stay updated on the demon we have to fight tomorrow,” Leo panted. He tried to peer around Monette as he came up from another sit up, but she held still, blocking his view.

  “It’s not going to help us,” Monette rolled her eyes. “The strategy meeting this evening will actually be beneficial.”

  “Sure, but I just need to know how far away the demon is. Arachne said it’s under the ocean, where the eye of the storm is. So when it hits the shore, we need to be ready.”

  “Well, thanks General Obvious for tracking how long we have all day instead of actually preparing for the fight.” Monette shook her head. “For instance, I’m going to ransack our parents’ house because I know Dad has a baseball bat and hunting gear in his closet.”

  Leo snorted out a laugh as he did another sit-up. “You’re going to hit the demon with a baseball bat and . . . what, shoot it with a rifle?” As he said this, he thought back to the beast in the forest. Maybe the rifle wouldn’t be so unhelpful.

  Monette blushed and clenched her fists. “I’ll do whatever I can! I’m not going to let that thing sink our city!”

  “Okay.” Leo grinned and then grimaced. “Damn, I lost count!” He sat up, shaking his head in frustration.

  “I just need to borrow your car to get back home. Thankfully, Saint-Germain lives up here on a hill, but I need to leave now before the streets flood in our parents’ neighborhood.”

  Leo pulled his car keys out of his pocket and then hesitated, narrowing his eyes. “This is my baby. She is old and beat up, but she’s still my baby. So please. For God’s sake. Please . . . Don’t let my car float away. Got it?”

  Monette snatched the keys from his hand. “Got it.”

  “Monette.” Leo raised his eyebrows.

  “I know!” she sighed as she stalked out of the room.

  Leo continued his crunches for a few more reps when suddenly the TV went black.

  “. . . Hey!” Leo turned his head around to find Eshe with the remote in her hand.

  “Your presence is requested.”

  “. . . Okay?”

  “In the grand hall.” Eshe’s eyes were wide. “Do you know how to project?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Project . . . with a computer? The wires are oh-so-evil!” she said urgently.

  Leo laughed. “I can be your IT guy, I guess.”

  He followed Eshe down the hallway and joined Arachne and Saint-Germain as they congregated around a laptop.

  “Oh, good!” Arachne breathed. “I made a point of power on the computer, but I don’t know how to get the image down here up there. I know it can be done . . .”

  “A . . . PowerPoint?”

  “Yes?” Arachne shrugged.

  “Let me see it.” Leo cracked his knuckles like he was going into battle. He finally felt moderately useful as he hooked up the projector to the laptop. He stood back when he was done. “Okay. That should do it. Just push the spacebar to change the slide.”

  “Thanks!” Eshe bounced up and down. “You’re so smart!”

  “It’s just a projector hookup.” he blushed and rubbed the back of his head.

  “People will arrive in an hour. It was imperative we set this up with ample time to prepare for our guests,” Saint-Germain said. “Speaking of, Vrykos isn’t on the guest list.”

  “I don’t want to bother him unless we have to.” Arachne shook her head. “I want him to be proud of the decisions I make on my own now, not simply rely on him anymore as my mentor.”

  “He will be proud.” Leo smiled reassuringly at her, his fingers softly tracing her arm.

  Saint-Germain motioned toward his study. “Very well then, let's finish drafting the Royal Charter and our succession plan before the guests arrive.”

  Arachne stood at the front of the hall, pacing as guests entered. They meandered slowly and found their seats. Bael and Chio arrived early from their respective bedrooms in the mansion. Next, the Casquette Sisters Josephine, Magdaleine, and Odette waltzed into the grand hall. Madame Serafine and her daughter followed close behind. Leo didn’t recognize the couple dozen people who filtered in next, who he presumed to be vampires, except he spotted a familiar face with mussy brunette hair and almond eyes nervously finding a seat in the second row. Beatrice! He wondered why she was here. Just as everyone settled in, Marceline and Ulric slipped in and found seats near the back.

  Leo sat next to Eshe, holding a seat for Monette on the left. Leo began to worry as Arachne went to the laptop to start the presentation. But then, he heard Monette’s wet sneakers on the floor as she ducked down to take a seat next to him. She had a black duffle bag over her shoulder which made a horrific clanking noise when she shoved it under her chair.

  Arachne quirked an eyebrow in her direction then cleared her throat and went back to starting her presentation.

  “Now that everyone has arrived and is comfortable . . .” She turned on the projector. The opening slide was titled, The Sea Demon: Defensive Strategies.

  “To keep everyone up to date, the sea demon is on a collision course with New Orleans,” Arachne stated matter-of-factly. The audience members mumbled to each other in response.

  “The sea demon?”

  “I knew it. This city is sunk.”

  “How would we even stop it?”

  “Attention!” Arachne shouted. Just then, a rumble of thunder sounded from outside and rain began to batter the mansion. “Soul-stealers are already wandering the streets, attacking civilians in anticipation of this bloodbath. Other rogue creatures of the night are taking advantage of the chaos. As some of you know, the sea demon is a fearsome and ancient demon. You may have heard of its offspring: Cetus, Kraken, Tanninim . . .”

  She clicked the next slide, which had several sketch images of these old sea monsters. They had fierce fangs and dark swirling tentacles. “As you can see, the sea demon is not just an ancient, primordial demon. It is in fact, a sea dragon. Its name: Leviathan.”

  She clicked to the next slide with a depiction of a city sinking under the waves. “This makes the opponent one hundred times stronger than any other demon we’d normally face. Leviathan is merciless, of an elite class of the devil’s court. Many great civilizations have been felled by tsunamis and typhoons at its command. It sunk the city of Atlantis into the depths of the ocean.

  “We need to know exactly what we are up against, so I will read a description of Leviathan from the Book of Job in the Tanakh.” Arachne cleared her throat and then spoke. “None is so fierce that dare stir him up; behold, the hope of him is in vain; shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him? Who can open the doors of his face? Round about his teeth is terror. His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal. One is so near to another, that no air can come between them. They are joined one to another; they stick together, that they cannot be sundered.

  “His sneezings flash forth light, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. Out of his mouth go burning torches, and sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot and burning rushes. His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth. In his neck abideth strength, and dismay danceth before him. The flakes of his flesh are joined together; they are firm upon him; they cannot be moved. His heart is as firm as a stone; yea, firm as the nether millstone.

  “When he raiseth himself up, t
he mighty are afraid; by reason of despair they are beside themselves. If one lay at him with the sword, it will not hold; nor the spear, the dart, nor the pointed shaft. He esteemeth iron as straw, and brass as rotten wood. The arrow cannot make him flee; slingstones are turned with him into stubble. Clubs are accounted as stubble; he laugheth at the rattling of the javelin . . .”

  Leo leaned over and whispered to Monette, “See, the baseball bat is like stubble to it. Stubble. He laugheth—”

  “Shut up.” Monette rolled her eyes at him, her cheeks flushing.

  “. . . He spreadeth a threshing-sledge upon the mire. He maketh the deep to boil like a pot; he maketh the sea like a seething mixture. He maketh a path to shine after him; one would think the deep to be hoary. Upon earth there is not his like, who is made to be fearless. He looketh at all high things; he is king over all the proud beasts.”

  Arachne gazed out at the room, meeting the eyes of her ashen-faced comrades. She posed a question. “So now, what do we do?”

  The room met her with eerie silence. She took a deep breath.

  “Every monster can be killed. Leviathan is a chaos demon which is prophesied to be slain at the end of time . . . Only, we don’t need to kill Leviathan. We simply need to injure it enough to flee.”

  “Arachne,” Ulric quipped from the back. “We’ve all heard the description of this foul beast. How could we even injure it enough for it to give up?”

  “That,” Arachne wagged a finger, “is exactly the kind of enthusiasm we need.” She flipped to the next slide with a few solutions laid out in bullet points.

  “Water dragons might be weak to electricity,” Arachne supplied. “So Madame Serafine’s coven could conjure up lightning magic to electrocute it. The other obvious weaknesses are its eyes and any other unarmored parts of its body. We can develop our strategy around these two main points.”

  Chattering broke out again from their allies, some skeptical and some enthusiastic.

  “I have to show you something,” Monette murmured in Leo’s ear. “Meet me in the study in a few minutes.”

  Leo gaped at Monette as she swung the duffle bag over her shoulder. The contents clattered ominously inside. Leo took a deep breath and then turned to face the woman behind him.

  “Bea?” he questioned.

  “Evening, Leo.” She smiled at him, her cheeks slightly flushing.

  “I’m . . . glad to see you again.”

  “I’m here to defend my home,” she said with determination firing in her eyes. “I shouldn’t have stuck by Nathan for so long. He’s a coward.”

  “He is,” Leo agreed. “But this is also incredibly dangerous. Are you sure?”

  “I want to die fighting for my city,” Bea nodded fiercely. “Screw this demon. And . . .” She hesitated, frowning. Her eyebrows furled together. “I’m sorry about what happened . . . if I could go back and confront him, I would. Your friendship means a lot to me, and I let him control me, all because he . . . well, he created me. Saved me.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” Leo leaned over the back of his chair and placed a hand lightly on her shoulder, flashing her a reassuring grin. “The important thing right now is focusing on our strategy to save the city. We’re comrades now.” Even as he said these words, doubt crept in his stomach and laid there heavy in his gut. Who could he really trust at the end of the day? After all, Arachne’s oldest friend had betrayed her.

  Chapter 26

  Leo wandered into the study, his hands in the pockets of his bomber jacket. He curiously peered over at Monette as she finished unpacking the contents of her duffle bag onto the table in the middle of the room. He recognized their Dad’s baseball bat, hunting rifle, and spare ammunition, as well as his crossbow. Leo raised an eyebrow at the rest of the weapons: a spiked mace, sword, handgun with silver bullets, and wooden stakes.

  “What’s all this?” Leo raised his arms in exasperation.

  “Found it,” Monette huffed as she pulled out a short wand with a silver tassel on the end from the bag and set it on the table. “In our parents’ closets, of all places.”

  “Our parents?” Leo gawked.

  “We already know Mom isn’t being honest about us being witches.” She flashed a facetious grin at him. “Now it looks like Dad is hoarding Buffy the vampire slayer weapons in his closet.”

  “How’d you find all of this?”

  “I knew where he kept his hunting gear.” She shrugged. “In the back armoire. I was just digging around in there, making sure I grabbed all the ammunition. Then a secret compartment popped out, and I found all of this inside. I took the most formidable weapons I could fit in the bag.”

  “Jesus.” Leo gritted his teeth.

  “Yeah. So, then I went to Mom’s closet, out of morbid curiosity. I dug around in there for a while and found this,” she pointed to the silver wand and a dagger resting innocently on the table.

  “So, Dad is a vampire hunter . . .”

  “And Mom is a witch.”

  “You think she hid the Grimoire in the attic?”

  “Probably. I just feel . . . cheated,” Monette sighed. “Like our parents weren’t honest with us our entire lives about who they really are . . . who we really are.”

  “For sure.” Leo blinked, still trying to process the glittering weapons laid out before him. “We need to have that conversation after all of this is over . . . but for now, we need to focus.”

  “I’m taking the crossbow.” Monette raised her head proudly. “And the rifle.”

  “Which leaves me with this.” Leo pointed at the spiked mace. “Or the sword.”

  “We can each take some stakes,” she suggested. “Although it looks like most of the vampires are our allies or fleeing the city. Just in case?”

  Leo shrugged and then explained, “They’re going to spell our weapons so we can dissipate the soul-suckers. Demons and creatures of the night can do it on their own . . . but if we don’t have a spell, our weapons will just go through the soul-suckers like fog.”

  Then Leo tentatively reached for the sword, hidden in a worn brown leather sheath. A sunset-colored cabochon with glittering flecks of fiery orange, pink, and gold was embedded in the pommel and a gold tassel hung from the hilt. Leo pulled the sword from the sheath and held it tenderly in his hands.

  “Mona . . . This couldn’t be it?”

  “What?” she peered over at the sword. “Couldn’t be what?”

  “The sword . . . the sword we’ve been looking for!”

  “No . . .” Monette cocked her head to the side. “I don’t . . . know . . .”

  “Look, it has a sunstone on the pommel.” Leo held the sword facing down. The cabochon glowed intensely under the lamplight.

  “Why would our dad of all people have Lilith’s sword tucked away in his closet?” Monette clucked her tongue and shook her head. “That doesn’t make sense. It’s just a plain old sword, Leo.”

  He pursed his lips and carefully examined it. “But look at it . . .” he murmured.

  “Come on.” She rolled her eyes.

  “I’m serious! What if this is the sword?”

  “It’s not,” she gave him a look, “but whatever you want to believe.”

  Leo gripped the hilt of the sword, balancing it in his hand. It felt right.

  It felt powerful.

  The wind and rain beat against the Magnolia Mansion like a battle was already raging. Leo rested the sword near his nightstand and gave it another long, pensive look as Arachne strolled in.

  “Everything is ready,” she sighed, placing her fingers to her temple. “The eye of the storm . . . Leviathan . . . is expected mid-afternoon tomorrow.”

  Arachne pulled off her shirt and pants and threw them unceremoniously in the corner. She slipped one of Leo’s shirts over her body, several sizes too big.

  “Stealing my clothes?” He smiled slyly at her.

  She gave a one-armed shrug and flashed him a fanged smile. Then she crawled into bed next to him, sitting cross-
legged.

  “You sure you’re not worried about Keres? Going after her?”

  “Not right now. I know she wouldn’t have gone far. We’ll deal with her after Leviathan.”

  “How are you feeling?” he asked tentatively.

  Arachne frowned, staring off at the far corner silently for a few moments.

  “I’m afraid,” she finally murmured as she turned to face him. “I’m more afraid than I’ve ever been in my entire life.”

  He held her gaze and his lips trembled. “Me, too.”

  “What did we do?” she laughed weakly.

  “I don’t know.” They stared into each other's eyes for another short moment and then embraced. Leo rocked her in his arms for several minutes, stroking her feather-soft hair and just listening to the sound of her breathing and the pounding rain on the roof.

  “I wish I could make it all better,” Leo said.

  “You already do.” She nuzzled into his chest. “I know I’ve never felt more afraid in my entire life. But I’ve also never felt so . . . happy. Even though everything is going to shit. You are a ray of sunshine in this storm.”

  “No matter what, we fight together.” He kissed her forehead. Arachne peered up at him, tears welling up in her eyes. Then she nodded fervently as a few tears tumbled down her cheeks. Leo wiped them away with his thumb and kissed her tenderly.

  “You don’t need to worry about anything tonight,” he said as he rubbed her shoulder. “Relax. Let me show you how much I love you.”

  Arachne stared into his amber gold-flecked eyes for a few heartbeats, her pillowy lips parted as if words were dancing on her tongue. She leaned forward to press her lips to his and wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him passionately. Deeply. Hungry for his touch. He wrapped his arms around her and laid her on the bed beneath him. Then he lifted the shirt over her breasts and trailed kisses down her neck, breasts, stomach . . . all the way down to the inside of her thigh. A small groan escaped her lips as he slowly pulled her underwear down.

  Leo trailed his fingers from her hip to her thigh as he kissed her breast. The kiss turned to sucking, her breath hitching under his lips. Then he peppered her stomach and inside of her thighs with kisses, slow and deliberate. After a moment of hesitation, he swirled his tongue inside her, relishing her taste, her wetness, her warmth, on his mouth. But best of all was her moans of pleasure. Music to his ears. He claimed her with his mouth, she panting as he fucked her with his tongue.