by Danny Bell
I could hear the phone dropped in a panic on the other end. There was some shuffling in the background, some noises I couldn’t identify, before a more distinguished sounding man took the phone. “Miss Black, we had thought you left town and gave up, and then you had to go and quite literally darken our doorsteps.”
“I only give up on crafting projects and emotionally unavailable men, not beating the snakes out of unsuspecting, power-hungry idiots.”
“My apologies,” the man replied smoothly. “I had taken the nature of this call to be conciliatory, though if you wish to be aggressive, force is still an option.”
“Yeah, about that, maybe we can meet in the middle.” I tried not to sneer. “See, I wasn’t lying about having your treasure and, more to the point, I know how badly you need it back. So, maybe we can come to terms.”
“This could all be a—”
“I swear three times upon my magic that I’m in possession of Yata no Kagami. I swear it, I swear it, I swear it,” I cut him off firm without overplaying it. It worked like a charm, I shut him up entirely. “Yeah, you know how big a deal that is and how that sort of thing isn’t to be taken lightly, don’t you?”
“Very well, I believe you have what we are after.” The man recovered his composure by degrees. “So then, what is it that you want?”
“Clear skies, for starters.”
“Impossible, I’m afraid. The only way the rain will stop is with your death or with our victory.”
“Or your defeat,” I added.
“Indeed, though I wouldn’t be overly concerned with that possibility.”
“Yeah, I thought as much, weather control is a bit above your pay grade, isn’t it?” I taunted. “Y’all ain’t quite ready for godhood, are you? But you can give me something else here.”
“And that would be?”
“Leave my city,” I snarled. “Leave my city, and never come back.”
“In exchange for the sacred treasure, of course,” the man added.
“Of course,” I answered.
There was another brief moment of silence, the slight shifting on the other end that made me think maybe a hand had been placed over the phone briefly. “And what motivation do we have to not simply wait you out?”
“Because if I can’t win, I’ll be damned sure you can’t either,” I said as harshly as I could muster. “If we get off this phone without a deal, I’ll destroy it before it ever gets to my boss, because I won’t even risk it getting back to you in a roundabout sort of way. You have my word—hell, I’ll even swear to you three times that you’ll never see it again. How’s that for motivation?”
“Consider us motivated.” The man’s voice was laced with annoyance. “Shall we come to your place?”
“No, I think I’ll come to yours. Doubletree lobby in two hours. And if it’s not a person with a magic snake inside them, I don’t want to see anyone else there. That includes guests, staff, or your heavily armed thugs.”
“You’ll forgive me, but this sounds like a trick.” The man regained some of his confidence for a moment. “If we’re to have no backup, how are we to be assured that you, too, will act in good faith?”
“Because I swear upon my magic a second time that I’ll arrive alone if you will,” I replied confidently, adding the requisite swears after to emphasize my point. “Two hours. Doubletree lobby in downtown. Just the nine of us. Do we have a deal or not? There’s no second chances here.”
I held my breath waiting for that reply. This was it, my entire gambit relied upon them taking the bait right here and now. And after what felt like minutes, the man spoke.
“I believe we have a deal, Elana.” His voice suddenly sounded slightly reptilian, as if he was speaking in unison with the snake inside of him. “And we are very much looking forward to seeing you.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
As I approached the lobby doors of the Doubletree, a thought crossed my mind that if you couldn’t trust a snake, how stupid would someone have to be to trust eight of them? I didn’t know for sure that there were eight of them just yet, it was sort of the worst-case scenario. Still, I’d be legitimately surprised if they hadn’t made their number with the time I’d spent away. It only made sense.
The streets of downtown were unnaturally still, even with the downpour; it was still a bit eerie. Los Angeles always felt alive, even in the dead of night. Even when the shops were closed, and the liquor from the bars had seen its final pour, there’s always a sense of unseen movement. Right now? There was nothing but heavy rain on concrete and all the emptiness that implied.
Claire had dropped me off a block and a half away from the hotel as much for her safety as mine. I had promised to come alone after all, and I’d rather she’d be well on her way out of here before the negotiations inevitably broke down. That didn’t mean I could take my time, though; in addition to promising that I’d be there alone, I made another promise upon my magic, and that was that I’d be there within two hours.
Here’s the thing about swearing upon your magic: It’s not done very often because, for as much as magic could work for you, it could hit you even harder if weren’t careful with it. Swearing was bad enough; swearing three times was all but an ironclad guarantee that you’ll do what you say because no one wants to live with the consequences if they don’t. I just swore to two things, one of them being that I’d be on time, but it was the only way to get their attention. I couldn’t risk them waiting me out or picking us off one by one. As it was, even with my heavy boots, my feet were still getting chilled and waterlogged. I was ankle-deep in water, and the city couldn’t handle another day of this sort of rain without the National Guard getting involved.
I waited until I was out of the rain and in front of the lobby doors to cast my first spell. I felt it immediately. I would’ve cast it sooner, but I didn’t want to risk the interference the downpour caused if I didn’t have to after all. Just like that, I was ready to go. Besides just the necessity of staying on my feet, it was imperative that I walked in with confidence. I needed to buy time more than anything, and at the first sign of weakness, they’d make a move. The best way to describe what I felt was mega goosebumps. An engine had been turned over in my chest and it was practically begging me to step on the gas.
There were no valets here this time, no social climbers littering the lobby, not even a discreet bartender. All the same, I felt the need to make an entrance. I raised my staff with one hand and allowed a bit of wind to escape forth, slamming the doors just loud enough to produce a bang audible even over the storm, and stepped through with an exaggerated march, dramatically pulling back my hood, standing tall, and surveying the room. There were eight of them, as I’d suspected, and from the looks of it, they had gutted the bar. All but two of them had a bottle in their hands, and all of them looked as if they’d been dressed for the same event where we’d crossed paths last time.
“I told you she’d come,” one of them said. I wasn’t sure, but he looked like one of the guys from Star Trek.
“She swore on her magic,” Ginshi chimed in.
“Still hasn’t revealed her trick yet,” Sora the ice boy added.
“But there is most assuredly a trick.” This was from Logan’s father.
“She has a staff now, a lateral move, I’d say.” I recognized this one as well, it was Kaida’s father.
An unknown woman this time added, “Compared to that rod, a lateral move for sure.”
“Do you suppose she doesn’t know how to use this either?” Janet spoke up. If there was one there that had the potential to give me a chill, it was her.
“It’s a miracle she’s standing here at all, let alone dressed for battle.” The last voice belonged to the man on the phone and was still even a bit raspy.
I took a moment to appreciate the stark differences between us, most noticeably that, while they all sat in apparent comfort, I was dripping a massive puddle onto some lovely carpet. If it wasn’t all just for appearances, then they
were wildly overconfident Though, given that I’d nearly been killed every time I ran afoul of even just one of their members, maybe they were just regular confident. “Yeah, well, I’m the Comeback Kid,” I muttered to myself.
“Curious that she didn’t simply stay away.”
“Likely she was thrown to the wolves by her master.”
“She believes her luck will carry her over.”
“She’d rather die than live with the guilt of her actions.”
“She’s a fraud in any event.”
“Nonetheless a fraud who was foolishly chosen as a champion.”
“She owes us her death; the reason is irrelevant.”
“Perhaps, Elana, you can inform us yourself?”
I didn’t answer immediately, as unsettling as it was for them to all speak together so fluidly like that. I was trying to command a presence. “I would like to believe we are dealing in good faith here,” I began patiently. “Maybe it would be best if we were to go around the room and introduce ourselves, given that I’m only familiar with a handful of you?”
“Our individual names are no longer important.”
“Perhaps she hopes to use our true names against us?”
“Not very clever if that was her plan.”
“Maybe she doesn’t respect our true nature after all.”
“I don’t think she’s ever respected anything.”
“Maybe her magic; she does carry a staff after all, and she did hold true to her word in coming here.”
“That magic would not serve her should she choose to cross us.”
“Because we are Yamata no Orochi, and you may address us as such.”
I looked to the group then and flashed a knowing grin. “Ah, but you’re not, are you? At least, not yet. Not without this—” I reached into my bag with my free hand and produced a plate that I flashed for long enough to ensure that all eyes were on it. “Probably been quite a while since you were big and scary, wasn’t it? Tell me something; the descriptions of you, a bit exaggerated, right? Eight heads and tails, I can buy that, but trees growing out of your back? Trees are pretty big, that’d make you Godzilla sized and, no offense, but y’all don’t give off Godzilla vibes. And a belly always covered in blood? It was pizza grease, wasn’t it, you sloppy bastards?”
“You are disrespectful.”
“Arrogant.”
“A foolish child!”
“Insignificant before our strength.”
“No, she is afraid.”
“Yes, posturing.”
“Agreed, delaying the inevitable.”
“You would do well to give us what is ours before it is too late.”
Getting a sense that they were agitated, I began to amble sideways, casually enough that I hopefully didn’t give away the fact that I wanted the door at my back without letting any of them box me in. Two of them had sulked off to my left and right, ready to make a move. “This is a negotiation, isn’t it?” I asked, trying to keep an eye on them all. “Oh, I know I asked for you all to leave the city, but you had to know that was just to get you in the room, right? I really think I can ask for a bit more.”
The eight of them seemed eager to speak at once, so I raised a finger to cut them off and added, “Just one reply will suffice.”
The raspy-voiced man, who I was beginning to get the sense may have been their leader, was the one to speak up. “Get on with it and name your price.”
“Simple. On your way out of town you leave behind the people you possesed. They’re from my town, and that puts them under my protection. Get your host bodies somewhere else, these people belong to me.”
They looked at each other then, in bemusement, and horrible, inhuman laughter rose from them collectively as their forms began to shift to reveal something more reptilian. “These people made their deals.”
“Not exactly in good faith, though, was it? I know all about how you selected these people.” I was boldface lying at that point, but I might as well gamble. They didn’t know what I didn’t know.
“You’ve had dealings with the fae, how are we any different?” the man rasped. “Whether it was their greed or their grief that brought them to us, a deal is a deal, is it not?”
“I’m voiding the deal,” I challenged. “I was given responsibility for this city, and one of my big rules is no possession by mystical snakes.”
The man wagged an elongated finger at me. “Too bad we already know what you’re really bargaining for,” he said, pointing to Logan’s father. “This one, correct? You hope to set the negotiations high and try to work your way down to just one. Your problem is that you don’t know the position you’re in. You lost just by coming here. We have you, we have Yata no Kagami, and we have no need to give you anything. Not even your life.”
There was a twitch of movement out of the corner of my eye and, without hesitation, I released another of the spells granted to me in my staff. A swell rose up within me as an immense pressure built in my soul. It was the critical moment between the water being released and the crinkle in the hose being straightened on a hot summer day. It was what Bowie and Freddie were singing about. It was the Mentos the dubious grandmother dropped in the two-liter of Diet Coke with no hope of the cap being replaced in time. Sudden and raw.
Three invisible concussive bolts of raw magic released, striking the two assailants from either side of me, and I reserved the third for the leader. It was satisfying to be on the other end of this one, given that way back to the start of it all, this was the very first spell I’d ever been hit with. In the hospital with Lucia, when I was being chased by the Gardeners, it felt like a major league pitcher threw a fastball at my leg. For the longest time, I’d had no idea what that spell had been, and it bothered me.
Well, they only had the one bolt, and I had three, and I wasn’t playing with baseballs. Judging by the invisible impact craters on their faces? Mine were more like bowling balls fired from cannons.
No time to pat myself on the back too hard. There were crunching sounds from all three of them, but before any of them could hit the ground, I was out the door, and all of them would be right on top of me in seconds if I hadn’t. The first spell I had cast, I had thought of spiritual cold brew, and my professional estimate had been grossly underestimated. My whole body was burning in a subtle way that I’ll bet was enjoyed by athletes on the regular as my legs pumped and muscles flexed, creaking and groaning as any lingering stiffness shattered.
I’d never run so fast in my life, but to be fair, I think most humans had never moved as quickly as I was in that moment. Conservative guess, judging relative to my routine sprints when I trained with Chalsarda and the memory of slow-moving traffic in the passenger seat, I was moving a good twenty miles per hour; but more curious was how I felt confident in that number while I was running for my life. In fact, every thought I had seemed to be quicker, not just my body. Which was for the best because those snakes were not very far behind me.
I hadn’t bought enough time, I knew that, so I’d have to take the long way to where I was going. The trick here was that I couldn’t outrun them entirely if I wanted my plan to work. They had to keep an eye on me, but if they caught me early, I’d be absolutely done for. I’d had my coat buttoned up, which was already proving to be a restrictive mistake. It took less than a second to undo the buttons as I ran—goddamn, I was fast right now—but that one second allowed one of them to nearly catch up to me.
I skidded recklessly as I turned onto First Street and then again onto a little market street that ran through a plaza. My pursuer didn’t have my traction, it would seem, and it took them an extra moment to recover. I used the extra cover from an awning to shake out a blister shield; casting in the rain might not be entirely optional in this fight, but I had to take advantage of every second I was out of the storm.
Ahead of me, the unknown woman from earlier leapt down from a balcony above and whipped her arm at me, sending a stream of spikes in my direction. My reaction time was u
ncanny as I raised the shield and caught them all before whipping the Blister back at her. The rain seemed to split as those swirling energies cut through the air, exploding on the side of her head as it made impact before she could even regain her balance from the initial attack.
Behind me was Janet in full dinosaur-looking mode and one of the mystery dudes who came at me in the lobby, and ahead of me was their leader, whose head had become something more akin to a cobra, as well as Kaida and Logan’s fathers. I almost didn’t spot the extra one clinging to the wall of the building ahead of me.
I don’t care what you hear, seven out of eight is very, very bad. At least when it comes to snake sorcerers.
I hadn’t hoped to use this so soon, but I needed a distraction. I dipped my hand into my bag, retrieved the plate within and, to the look of immediate horror of everyone I could see, used my momentum to discus launch the precious little thing into the air. I couldn’t have asked for a better reaction as every single one of them made a mad dash to save it as I cut across the small street, nearly bashing my head on a No Stopping Anytime sign. Yeah, sign, give me a break. I’m trying.
Their leader roared incredulously as I zipped past them, smashing the plate on the ground. “It’s a fake!”
That roar should’ve been terrifying, but instead I found it immensely satisfying. After all, I swore two things on my magic, but only sort of implied the third. I wasn’t lying about having their treasure, but I never promised to bring it with me.
“It’s a distraction, dipshit!” I taunted in return. Sometimes I couldn’t help myself. With that, I cast my third new spell from my staff and watched in bemused amazement as an illusionary duplicate of myself continued to dash away from us all. It was like I was invisible all of a sudden, as everyone took off after my double and ignored me. I realized I could even see what it was seeing, but doing so was incredibly disorienting, and I forced myself not to.
Past Weller Court and back onto the main street, I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep this up. Ideally, I would’ve liked to buy half an hour of keep away, but at this rate, I didn’t know if I’d last another half a minute. Casting spells while running around was probably a bad idea. Doing all of that and in the rain was a worse one. I was moving, no question, but there were still physical limitations, and every single one of them was competing to catch up with me before the snakes did.