by Eve Langlais
“He seems to be doing magic fine right now,” Charlie pointed out, rejoining the conversation.
“Which is a problem,” Bambi remarked. “He shouldn’t be able to do it at all.”
“But he is. Because he is obviously stronger than you believe. At least when drunk.” Charlie, still not helping.
Bambi glared at him. “I still don’t understand why you’re here.”
“Because he, unlike a certain sister-in-law of mine, offered to help me with my poor husband.”
“Poor?” Bambi waved a hand. “He’s fighting off a tremor worm and ogres like a pro.”
Isobel leaned around Bambi and glared at the ring. “I’m well aware he’s lobbing magic and ordering around the dead as if it’s easy. We will be talking about that.”
“I’d think you’d want to talk to him more about those women of loose morals he’s hanging with,” Charlie the shit disturber added.
“Chris wouldn’t cheat on me,” Isobel stated with firm conviction.
“Don’t be so sure of that,” whispered a voice. From behind Bambi—who never sensed a thing—stepped Famine, one of the four horsemen.
Unlike the last time she’d seen the male, he seemed well fed, his jowls not hanging slackly now, his suit fitting his corpulent body like a second skin.
Someone was obviously not lacking for sustenance.
“What are you doing here?” snapped Isobel. “I thought Chris told you never to bother him again.”
“Who says I’m bothering him? I am just a bystander, feeding on the greed of the crowd. The hope they will win. The dejection when they don’t. Absolutely delicious.”
The more Famine spoke, the more Bambi did her best not to fidget or worry about her makeup. She kept fit enough to fight off that pesky cellulite, but she could do nothing about her age. Getting old. Soon, she wouldn’t be able to keep up with today’s younger whores. Someone would shove her out of the limelight and take over her spot on the bed, legs spread.
Sob.
Slap. The crack of Isobel’s palm across Famine’s cheek caused him to yelp. The confidence he’d starved from her began seeping back.
“You stop that, right now,” Isobel demanded. “Leave Bambi alone.”
Mind clear again, Bambi gaped at the horseman who’d done his best to feed on her insecurities. He had a lot in common with his sister, Pestilence.
“Insolent, bitch. You should be on your knees groveling to me,” hissed Famine.
“The only man I worship is my husband.”
“Says the woman who’s here with her lover.” Famine looked past her to smirk at Charlie. “Maybe I should regurgitate a bit of my meal and feed your husband’s jealousy.”
Before Bambi could react and stop Famine from acting, he shoved her aside. A piercing whistle cut through all sound. Drew all eyes. Including Chris’s.
His gaze widened as he beheld his wife.
Narrowed when he saw who stood behind her.
Chris didn’t need Pestilence to poison his mind. Jealousy was a powerful beast all on its own, and when Charlie stupidly put his hand on Isobel’s arm while murmuring, “maybe we should leave,” Bambi’s brother snapped.
7
“Charlie, you idiot. Get away from me.” Isobel warned him a moment too late.
Then again, it was probably too late the moment she stepped into the warehouse with another man.
The good news? Chris would never hurt me.
But Charlie?
Yeah. The blue fireballs streaked fast and furious, hitting the shield. A force field that rang like a discordant bell as it tried to contain all that violent magic.
“Oh, fuck,” Bambi breathed. “Now you’ve done it.”
But Famine wasn’t there to listen, having slipped off into the crowd, feeding on their excitement.
Did the idiots not realize the danger?
Magic kept striking the shield, and Charlie still stupidly held her arm. He tugged her. “Come on, Isobel. I’ll get us out of here.”
Except leaving now with Charlie would only make things worse. The man inside the dome, the man with the glowing red eyes, would think she’d abandoned him for another.
Rather than move away, she moved toward the shield and placed her hands on it, the strangely spongy surface fogging and heating at her touch.
On the other side, her husband approached. His eyes lost their red glow and turned into black pools of darkness, his body vibrating with power. So much power.
Not all his.
Isobel knew the feeling of Chris’s magic. The darkness emanating from him right now?
Looked as if Mommy had found her baby.
The realization had Isobel stepping back from the shield. Yet Chris still approached. His hands lifted, glowing, the palms pressing against the invisible dome containing him and his miniature army of the dead.
The shield disintegrated, leaving nothing between the crowd and the man possessed by the dark deity inside.
The spectators hushed for a second then cheered. Idiots.
Did they not realize the danger?
Chris lifted his hand, a ball of blue fire sitting on the palm. Very pretty. Extremely deadly.
He stared at her. Through her.
The chill running through her veins a reminder that it wasn’t her husband driving the body.
Still, she tried to reason. “Chris, honey, maybe you should put that fireball away?”
The head cocked. The lips twisted into a sneer.
“No.” He lobbed it, and it singed past her, close enough that she wondered if he’d missed.
A glance over her shoulder, though, showed the real target. The magical fire chased Charlie, who weaved through the crowd. A gathering that bellowed, finally realizing the danger. Too late. Some stood in the way and died as the magical fire burned through them. Fresh souls for Hell.
Bambi had hit the floor the moment the shield dropped and now tugged a gaping Isobel down to join her.
“We have to stop him,” Bambi remarked, lying low and watching her brother, who ignored them both to stalk after Charlie.
“I am not hurting Chris.”
“Not Chris. Him.” Bambi pointed to Famine, who cackled off to the side as he fed more insecurities to Chris then gorged on the resulting rage.
“Kill a horseman. Got it.” Isobel’s hand went to her hip, where she kept her sword. Her handy-dandy magical sword, invisible until she drew it forth. A gift from her dead father.
“You distract Famine, and I’ll handle Chris,” Bambi suggested.
“Make sure you handle those sluts, too.” Because Isobel didn’t have time to kill a horseman of the apocalypse and the whores sniffing around her husband. Jealousy wasn’t a one-way street.
“On it.”
They bumped fists and went to their tasks, Bambi dodging screaming people—some on fire, running rampant—trying to reach her brother, and Isobel to chase after…what was a horseman exactly? Not quite a god, yet impossible thus far to kill.
But it didn’t hurt to keep trying. As soon as she came within reach, she slashed her sword and managed a thin slice in his sleeve.
Famine stopped chanting long enough to glare. “You dare to strike me, little girl? Don’t you know you can’t win? You’re nothing but a weaker, paler version of your sister. The runt of the family litter. Poor little Isobel with no magic.”
“You lie.” Isobel didn’t let him feed her insecurity. She didn’t let him eat her confidence. She held her head high because she knew the truth. She had magic. It was just different than everyone else’s.
She sliced again with her sword, and Famine danced back, avoiding the sharp tip. Maybe he could be harmed.
Harrying him, she pushed him into the ring, empty of Chris and his sister. The pair of them had disappeared.
But that didn’t stop Isobel from pursuing the horseman that would rob her of all hope, the being who would feast on her confidence. She wasn’t a buffet for his perverted magic. She kept jabbing and slicing.
From the stands, another voice called out, a feminine one.
“You were never your mother’s favorite.” Pestilence had arrived, her white hair and dress barely hinting of green. She’d not yet recovered from her previous encounter with Chris outside the crypt when they’d gone looking for Isobel’s father. Months ago now, and yet it appeared the poisoner of minds was still weakened. Or Isobel had gotten stronger because the doubts barely tickled. Perhaps Isobel wasn’t Mama’s favorite, but she was her papa’s little girl.
Lunge, parry, dice. A streak of oozing gray from Famine’s arm. It steamed in the air.
“You’re a meaningless cog in the grand scheme,” Pestilence hissed. “The Son of Perdition doesn’t need you at all.”
“No, he doesn’t, which is why we work well together.” They were partners.
“He could do so much better.”
“But he chose me.” Chris had chosen Isobel to be his wife.
“You’re fat.”
Isobel smiled as Famine found himself with his back against the wall. “I’m just right.” She lunged forward, and her sword slid between his ribs, right into where a human heart might be.
Except he wasn’t human. His body dissolved into a gray fog that steamed a final scream. “This isn’t over.”
It was for today.
She turned to face Pestilence and waggled her sword in the other horseman’s direction.
Her features pinched, the female sketched a portal, but before she used it, Pestilence uttered one last poisonous whisper, “You’ll never win.”
Funny, because I just did.
However, winning a small skirmish didn’t help Isobel find her husband. He’d disappeared with Bambi. Where?
She fired off a text to her sister-in-law—just three letters: WTF?. And got one in reply.
All is good. Sleeping it off. Will bring him by in the morning.
Bring him where? To their house, a plain old dwelling that lacked any kind of protective spells? It wouldn’t stop a horseman. Heck, it couldn’t even keep out mice.
But where else could she go?
Another text hit her phone, this time from her mother. I need you. Can you stay at the house for a few days?
How propitious. Her family home was the perfect place for them to regroup.
But Chris would never agree. He had too much pride.
Which was why she planned to use it against him.
8
Sunlight filled the garden, a bright puddle of brilliance illuminating the shadows, enhancing the vibrant greenery all around.
In the center of the lushness sat a table with two chairs, the ornate metal kind, painted white. Sitting at the table, an elegant woman with her blouse buttoned high on her neck, and her skirt long enough that even sitting he didn’t see her ankles. Gray hair was coiled at her nape.
He peered around. “Where am I?”
“The hanging gardens of Babylonia. I helped design them, you know. Not that anyone ever gave me credit.” The woman’s voice was monotone even if her words expressed disgruntlement.
“Who are you?” Chris took a step forward, prickled by curiosity.
“What a silly question, child. Who do you think I am?”
He could think of one person, but he’d never seen her face. Never actually met her. “It can’t be you.”
“Don’t speak to me of can’t. There is no such thing as can’t. Sit down.”
Chris stood still. At least, he meant to. His body, however, moved on its own, sliding him forward to the chair and bending him enough that his butt hit the wrought-iron seat.
Dark eyes perused him. “Well, who am I?”
“Mother?” The query emerged from him as he stared right back. Surely, this elegant woman wasn’t the monstrous thing that used dead body parts to form a mega creature. Not the entity that had possessed his foster mother and chased him through prison.
Her lips pursed. “Yes, I am your mother, the one who birthed your fourteen-pound body. Your head was the worst. Absolutely melon-sized. Still is, I see. You always were a bit large up there. Not sure if it made you any smarter.” She eyed him, and he gaped.
“Aren’t you supposed to be in prison?”
“Are you speaking of the prison my son never visited?”
“I didn’t know about you.”
“You do now, and yet still no attempt to see me.”
“You want me to visit?” His brow creased.
The woman poured from a teapot he only just noticed. “Of course, I would have liked a visit. A card would have even sufficed.”
He managed to retort, “Says the woman who never sent me shit.”
“I sent you plenty. Did that despicable Clarice never give my gifts to you?”
“I never got anything.” That he knew of.
His mother tsked. A real tsk. Rather fascinating. Growing up, his mom, Clarice, had never rebuked him. When he misbehaved, he was simply practicing for his Antichrist destiny.
“Where are we?” he asked. This entire place and conversation had a dreamlike quality to it.
“I told you, the hanging gardens of Babylonia.”
“But how? How did I get here?”
“Are you so behind in your education that you never learned even the simplest things?”
“I was raised by humans. What did you expect?” And only until his teens. Then, after his adopted mom had gotten arrested for murder, he did his best to avoid getting beaten too badly in his foster homes.
“Raised by humans, only a step above the beasts in this world. That is the fault of your father.”
“Dad is a dick.”
“Language.”
Rap. Despite there being none present, he could feel the slap of a ruler across his hand. And, yes, he knew what that felt like. Not because a teacher had ever done that to him, but more because, as a kid, it was the type of game boys played. The object being: don’t flinch, and most definitely never cry.
Had his mother seriously tried to punish him? “This is my dream. I’ll talk whatever damn way I please.”
Slap. Tap. More raps over his knuckles, harder this time. He clenched his teeth lest he suck in a breath.
“Oooh, do it harder. That tickles,” he lied.
“If this is your way of ingratiating yourself to me, it’s failing.”
“Your motherly instinct leaves much to be desired.”
“Perhaps I’d be more inspired if you weren’t such a disappointment.” Her lips turned down.
“If I’m such a failure, then why are you here?” Other than to prey on his obvious insecurities.
“You’re making a mistake.”
“Story of my life.”
“Bad enough you married that girl.” Said with utmost disapproval. “I need you to stay out of Hell politics.”
Since he had no idea what she spoke of, he could have easily given in to her request. However, Chris was ever the ornery sort. “Hell is my inheritance.”
“You will take nothing from the Devil,” she stated, holding out a plate of scones. “Even if he offers it.”
“You can’t tell me what to do.”
“Are you so sure about that? I can do more than you realize, son. Who do you think rides your body when you black out? Haven’t you thought to ask yourself what’s happening while I’m distracting you in here?” Her lips split into a wide smile. Give her a balloon, and she’d have been a perfect girlfriend for a certain psychotic clown.
“Give me back my body.” He looked at the half-drunk tea in his hand and cursed. “Have you been drugging me?”
“I don’t have to when you do such a fine job yourself.”
“Get out of my head.”
“I’m not in your head. We’re in—”
“—the hanging garden, or at least a dream version of it. Yeah. I get it. Which means I can get out of here by waking up.” He glanced around at the perfect blue sky, the expertly groomed foliage. Everything just right. All fucking fake.
“This isn’t real,” he
muttered, clenching his fists by his sides.
“Really, son, that’s the kind of thing a child says. You’re a demi-god. Use that power.”
“I can’t.”
“You’ve been made to think you can’t. Try again.”
He shoved away from the table, rising angrily to his feet. “You think I haven’t tried? I try to access my magic every single fucking day. But I can’t. It’s not there.”
“It’s there,” she said, her lip curling in disdain. “Obviously, you’re just too weak to figure it out.”
“Why do you care? Hunh? Why is it so important to you that I access my magic? I’ll tell you why,” he yelled before she could reply. “Because you’re planning something.”
“Of course I am planning, because not all of us are complacent sheep, content with our lot in life.”
“Who says I’m content?”
“Then fight for it. Fight for your heritage. You are descended from the Branch of the Terrible Ones. The Son of Perdition. Show. Me. Your. Strength.” The last words roared out of his mother, and with each syllable, the sunny sky darkened, clouds boiled, lightning flashed, and the thunder boomed, shaking the ground.
His mother stood in the tempest she’d called, untouched by it. Must be nice. He, on the other hand, felt every bite of the wind as it tore at his clothes and ripped at his hair. He felt the dark chill of the unnatural storm.
But the storm wasn’t the most dangerous thing. Riding a bolt of lightning came War, his mighty red steed no longer as gaunt as it had been, its eyes blazing with baleful fire. Atop the horse, War’s rusty-colored armor gleamed, and the lance he held was raised just high enough to impale the idiot gaping at him.
Chris threw himself to the side as the horseman of the apocalypse thundered past him. Hitting the dirt face-first, Chris should have felt fear. Instead…
“Motherfucker!” Because what else would those two have been doing the entire time they were locked in that prison dimension? Chris rose to his feet and huffed, hot breaths that steamed in the cold air.
His rigid body faced War, who’d pivoted his horse around and pranced in place, preparing for his next charge.
