Dark Cotillion (First in the Brenna Strachan Series)

by Hadena James

  “He wouldn’t be out without keepers. I’ll gather who I can and bring them.”

  “The more people here, the more will be injured. I understand Cerebus is immortal.”

  “He is, but not everything with him will be.” Belphegor hung up on me.

  “Demons are coming,” I said as my phone rang again. This time it read “Leviathan.”

  “Yes, the Demons are definitely coming.”

  I flipped it open, “I just talked to Belphegor.”

  “What about the others?” Levi asked.

  “I haven’t heard from Beezel, Abaddon, Mammon, Asmodeus, Berith, or Astroth,” I paused. “Wait, my phone is beeping. I’m sure it is one of them.” I checked the caller ID. “Abaddon.”

  “I have Uncle Abad on the other line. What should I say?”

  “Tell him to hurry, I’m on my way.” He hung up and I answered the other beep.

  “Uncle Levi says to hurry up. Levi and Begor are both on their way.” I didn’t bother with a hello.

  “Three uncles?” Abaddon sounded irritated.

  “I have a beep, I’m sure the line is pretty busy. The house phone keeps ringing as well.”

  “Aside from Cerebus, do we know what we are dealing with?”

  “Nope, but Fenrir is shifting and Anubis is sort of Vamping out, as best he can. Ba’al is stretching his wings and Gabriel seems to be glowing more than normal, even when he is really irritated normal.”

  “So, they believe…” his voice was lost behind the beep. I pulled the phone from my ear. “Lucifer” was on the caller ID.

  “Fuck, someone called dad.” I sighed into the phone.

  “Tell Luc we can handle it.” Abaddon hung up and I answered the other line.

  “Hi, papa,” I tried to sound cheerful.

  “I hear Cerebus is headed towards you.”

  “How’d you hear that in Europe?” I asked.

  “Beezel called to tell me that he is on his way over. I’ve called Magnus and a few of the others. You should have help very soon.”

  “Lucifer,” I rarely use my father’s first name, but every once in a while, “you are not flying back.” I made it a statement, not a question.

  “No, I realize that I would be more of a hindrance than a help.” He sounded stiff and bristly. He was just as pissed as everyone else was scared. I could understand that. “Is Cerebus with or without keepers?”

  “Don’t know. We can’t actually see, feel, or hear anything. We just know that it is five in the afternoon, the sun is still shining, but the world is going dark. The Overlords associated it with Cerebus and everyone seems to be on high alert.”

  “Do not fuck with the Hell-Hound, Brenna Strachan.” My father’s voice was very stern and it seemed to be with concentrated effort that he was speaking, and not just shouting a stream of obscenities. “Leave it to the Overlords and the Elders.”

  “I’m crunchy, I’ve been told.” There was another beep. I sighed even heavier. “I have another call.”

  “I imagine you are going to have lots of calls,” my father disconnected. I was pretty sure he was about to do something really stupid. I answered the other call and was surprised to find it wasn’t a Demon on the other end.

  “Where the fuck have you all been?” Pendragon snapped at me. “I have been calling for the last two hours.”

  “Really? The phone calls only started about five minutes ago.” I told him.

  “Damn,” he made a complicated noise that I was sure wasn’t entirely Human. “Time slip. The island is fucking empty, Brenna.”

  “What do you mean, ‘empty’?” I asked skeptically.

  “I mean that there isn’t a single living creature on it except me and the Chimeras, and they aren’t real happy about being here.”

  “Not a single creature but you and the Chimeras?” I asked, not sure I understood.

  “What the fuck?” Anubis yanked the phone from me. “What do you mean empty?”

  There was some very fast chatter on the other end of the line. I could hear the notes, but not make out the words.

  “How?” Anubis shouted. Everyone turned to look at him. A car screeched to a halt in my driveway. One thing that can be said for pissed off Demons is that they know how to make an entrance. Leviathan didn’t knock, he just came in. The door didn’t exactly explode off its hinges, but the knob left a very nice hole in the sheet rock before ricocheting back.

  “Impossible!” Anubis yelled and stamped his foot. “How can the prison be empty, Uther?”

  More chattering. The darkness seemed to be growing. Several mouths were hanging open. From the chatter, I caught the words Minotaur and Djinn come from the phone. Anubis answered by slamming the phone into the ground. It shattered into about three bazillion pieces. I was betting the insurance wasn’t going to pay for it. Even the floor seemed to break a little from the throw.

  “Uther is bringing the Chimeras to our aid, but we are royally fucked.” Anubis turned to Gabriel. “Anyone with the ability to Call should use it. We are about to be slammed by everything. They even managed to empty the prison. We have supernatural creatures and evil fucking Elders headed our way.”

  “How?” Ba’al asked. Levi looked like he might explode.

  “A Witch, a Minotaur, and a Djinn,” Anubis answered. “The Witch bespelled Pendragon, the Minotaur and Djinn ensnared his mind and managed to override his power. He isn’t sure how. He will have Vishnu examine it if we survive.”

  “I’ll call someone,” Ba’al dug out his phone. Since I had nothing better to do, I answered the land line.

  “Hello?” I said picking it up.

  “There is chaos and panic in the streets.” The voice belonged to Mammon. “I’m downtown. Cerebus is eating Humans. Minotaurs are running around doing what they do. I’m pretty sure I just saw Jack the Ripper run past my car, but that would be impossible. More so though, I just saw Agamemnon and Jesus Christ trying to control a Dragon on a leash. Since both of them are in Prison on the Island, I’m wondering if it’s a trick of my mind.”

  “Nope, the prison is empty. Long story, but it gives us some clues as to what is going on. How long before you get to my father’s house?”

  “Pretty long, they are trying to empty the Zoo. They have a Nymph calling animals as she walks down the streets. Wait,” there was a long pause. “Nymph gone, just got eaten by a crocodile. However, there does appear to be a rather large salt water crocodile meandering down the streets and he seems to be accompanied by a Wyvern and a Dryad.”

  “Okay, Uncle, exactly how many different species are you seeing and how many are of the mythical kind?”

  “Oh, about the only thing I don’t see is a Chimera. However, I am disturbed that Jack the Ripper, Agamemnon, and Jesus, are all walking free among the living.”

  “Are they all headed this way?”

  “Oh yeah,” Mammon took a deep breath. “You are in deep shit, Brenna. If there’s a safe place for you to take refuge, it might not be a bad idea to go there.”

  “Do we need to worry about the non-mythical creatures?” I asked.

  “Who are you talking to?” Anubis growled.

  “Mammon and he’s downtown. I think this is going to be very, very, bad.”

  “Oh, okay,” Anubis went back to talking on his own cell phone.

  “Nah, not really. The non-mythicals can’t be controlled like the mythical. They will cause mayhem and havoc, but not the devastation that the others are causing. There went a troll.”

  “How much help am I going to need?”

  “Do you know the number for the Secretary of Defense?” Mammon asked.

  “No,” I told him.

  “Then you might be screwed, kiddo. I’m on my way.” He hung up on me. The phone had been in the cradle less than three seconds when it rang again.

  “I know, I know, bad shit is headed in my direction.”

  “Uh, Miss Strachan?” The voice on the end of the line seemed vaguely familiar.

  �
��Yes,” I responded.

  “Ma’am this is Deputy Howard with the Jackson County Sheriff’s department. I just had a…” he paused. “A something, I don’t know what it was, come into my station and destroy most of it. It seems to be headed your way.”

  “What did it look like?”

  “A giant, real giant, multi-headed dog. And we are getting reports from several counties in Missouri and Kansas that non-Human but hominoid creatures are attacking people.”

  “Yes, my Uncle Mammon just called to tell me that he had seen a Nymph get eaten by a crocodile in Old KC. He was somewhere near the zoo.”

  “Well, we were wondering if this was connected to you.”

  “Unfortunately, yes, I believe it is.” I let a tear fall from my eyes. “We are trying to control the situation, but we aren’t sure how.”

  “I’ll call in all officers available and see what I can do to get the National Guard on the way.”

  “Thank you,” I hung up as I started to cry. I fell into a heap on the ground near the phone.

  “What?” Levi rushed over to me.

  “People are dying and it’s my fault.” I told him through tears.

  “Not really,” Levi touched my hair. “You can’t be responsible for the evil of others.”

  “I feel responsible.”

  “You should feel terrified. We need to get you somewhere safe.”

  “No, what we need is a miracle.” I told him.

  “How many?”

  “Several?” I looked into his eyes.

  “Several miracles, coming right up.” He stood up, offered me a hand. “Call them to you.”

  “Call what to me?”

  “The things that are attacking people. Call them to you. Send out a burst of magic and remind them of their target. If they refocus and come here, that will minimize collateral damage. So, send them magic, bring them here.”

  “I don’t know how.”

  “But I do, if you can share some serious power with me,” Magnus had come in quietly enough that I hadn’t noticed. “Come on, lass.”

  Magnus drew a circle on the floor. He filled it with symbols and words in a language I didn’t understand. He pulled me into the circle.

  “This will concentrate the magic and send it out to all the Elders and all the mythical beings. It might even be felt by Humans and other animals. If we can send them all a ‘telepathic telegraph’ letting them know your exact position, we can keep the rest of the city safe. Right now, they are searching for you. The magic of the house is keeping you hidden.”

  I hesitated.

  “They are searching everywhere they feel Demon magic, Brenna, which is why they are attacking structures,” Levi told me.

  I moved into the circle. My mind cleared and opened. I felt Magnus’s hand take mine. I closed my eyes, took a couple of deep breaths and then reopened them. The world looked different. Magic ebbed and flowed around beings, around objects. I could see it all. In the distance, I could see streaks of color. I began to gather the magic. First my own. The pink shimmering threads solidified and drew closer to me. I felt them as they begin to fill me up. I pushed it into Magnus.

  “More,” his voice was farther away than it should have been. I pulled more magic. The remnants of spells cast and magic done in the house. A rainbow mixture that included magic from my mother, father, and siblings. It came willingly, eager almost. I shoved that into Magnus.

  Magnus touched the rim of the circle. I felt the magic begin to exit us both. It rushed into the ground and the air. It turned the invisible, visible. The currents could be seen stretching out from us.

  “More,” Magnus echoed the word.

  I drew in more of the wild, loose magic. This time, I saw the auras of the Overlords. Their magic moving towards me. I pulled it. I called it. I felt it slam into my chest and take my breath away for a second before shoving it into Magnus. He pushed harder, empting himself. More currents of magic raced out among the world.

  “Still not enough,” Magnus told me.

  “Well, I’m not sure how much more I can pull,” I snapped at him. I closed my eyes and searched for more magic. I found it. It was in the ground. It was in the Elders that were filling up my driveway, house, and it was free flowing in the distance. I pulled from all of it. Nearly begged it to come to me. For several moments, nothing happened. I waited and called it again. It began to move. I took it in, felt it twisting inside of me. Felt my head begin to swim with it. I felt faint. I threw up. Magic came with it.

  The first strange bit of it finally reached me. It was perfectly black. Blacker than darkness and blacker than a void. I wasn’t even sure black was the right word for it. I had never seen magic so dark. It entered me. I threw up again and felt something inside of me try to break. I pulled in more. My body began to fight it. I ignored it and pulled more. I pushed it into Magnus and Magnus shoved it into the circle.

  There was a howl. Several howls answered it. The ground began to shake. Something was running. Something with magic so dark that black didn’t seem dark enough to describe it. It wasn’t evil, just heavy.

  “Holy fuck,” Gabriel’s voice came to me from somewhere distant. I felt my feet running on hardened ground, but they weren’t my feet. They were giant paws.

  “There it is,” Anubis answered. I looked out the window to see the giant Cerebus. Nothing was visible.

  “She’s my opposite,” Pendragon’s voice answered.

  “She is,” Gregorian answered. I felt a long, wet tongue move up my body. I felt it and felt magic fill me. I could hear the thoughts of those around me. I pushed the magic out of myself. Something else howled and it wasn’t even remotely like anything I had ever heard in my life.

  “She is magic,” Gregorian said as he curled his long tail around me.

  “She isn’t really doing this,” Levi said but it sounded like a question.

  “Yeah, I think she is. I think this is her power. I think she can use the power of those around her,” Magnus answered.

  “Wow,” Levi sounded more than just awe-struck. The dark magic came at me faster, filled me up again. I forced it out.

  “Stop!” I shouted and felt my knees give. “It must stop.”

  “How do we stop it?” Someone asked.

  “We can’t,” Levi sounded sad, “she has to stop it.”

  “No,” Gregorian answered.

  He picked me up and cradled me in his long arms. Razor claws carefully touched my flesh. I felt myself throw up. I wasn’t throwing up anything on my stomach. I was throwing up pure magic. I could see the colors dance as they hit the floor.

  “Help me,” I felt something else slip away from me. It was intangible, but there. Something in my mind was struggling against me.

  “Demon, use the magic as you should.” Gregorian told me.

  “I don’t…” My chest felt tight. My mind felt fuzzy. It was beginning to break. I could feel my sanity slipping away. “Understand.”

  “Demon magic,” Gregorian whispered in my head.

  The words were confusing to me. Demon. Magic. Neither seemed to make sense. I closed my eyes. More magic was spilling from me. More was racing towards me.

  “Demon magic,” Gregorian whispered again.

  “Heal,” I thought the word. As soon as I thought it, I felt the magic change. It no longer seeped from my being, it poured out. As it left, my mind seemed to fix itself. The world was right again. Well, except for the giant dark cloud of magic that was firmly headed in our direction.

  “Demon magic,” Gregorian took a deep breath. “They come for you. Are you capable?”

  “No,” I told the Chimera, “I am not. But I will not give in without a fight.”

  “Good, Demon.” Gregorian turned his head skyward and let out a sound that was chilling. There were several replies. “We will help.”

  “Brenna, we should prepare,” Levi’s voice came to me.

  “How do we prepare?” I asked, crawling from Gregorian’s grasp.

 
; “I do not think…” Magnus and Anubis both started talking.

  “Agreed, but what choice do we have?” Leviathan looked at them. “We will need her.”

  “As long as I don’t have to do anything magical,” I responded.

  “No promises,” Levi took hold of my hand.

  “What do we have to do?” I asked.

  “Bren, there isn’t much time now. I feel Cerebus coming closer as we speak,” Leviathan told me.

  “Funny, I can see his magic. He is closer than you think,” I told them all.

  “Useful, but…” Anubis shook his head at me. “You realize that you are actually in mortal danger, correct?”

  “Yes,” I frowned, “but I don’t know what to do and no one is telling me what to do.”

  “Do what you do!” Beezel bellowed as he came up to me. He grabbed my arm roughly. “Mammon is within a mile of here. Cerebus is right behind him with an entire army. I know you don’t have much control and you aren’t sure what to do exactly, but trust your instincts Brenna Strachan. For the first time in your life, trust your fucking instincts and stop relying on everyone else to tell you.”

  “Am I missing something?” Abaddon asked, taking hold of Beezel.

  “I am trying to remind our niece exactly who she is and what she is capable of,” Beezel sneered.

  “Easier ways to do that.” Abaddon let go of Beezel by jerking him away from me.

  “What is th…” He turned on me as I spoke. His eyes were completely red and glowing like fire.

  “This is not going to be pleasant.” He took my face in his hands, squeezing my cheeks, applying pressure directly to my cheek bones. My skin burned under his touch. A painful, flaming burn that seemed to sear my very soul and it called to me. Something deep inside. Something dark, horrible, and mysterious. It called to something that I had never felt before. It raised my mouth skyward and screamed.

  Power brimmed inside of me like never before. Not outside power like I was used to calling, but my own power. It was strong.

  “Who are you?” Abaddon asked.

  “Brenna Strachan, Lieutenant of Demonnation, Daughter of Lucifer, Daughter of Elise Strachan, of the Great House of Strachan. I am Witch, I am Demon, and I am.” Each word seemed to come from somewhere else. The words were coming out of my mouth, but not from my mind.