“How do you plead?”
“Plead?” I cried. “Those are some pretty fucking vague charges, asshole.” Oh crap, did I say that aloud? Shit! So much for decorum.
“You tell ‘em, Bill,” Tom urged me on.
I heard a smacking sound behind me - probably Sally delivering some justice of her own upside his head, rightfully so.
“What I meant to say,” I began, trying to rein things back in, “is that I don’t understand the charges.”
“Allow me to elaborate,” Alex replied. “We have reason to believe the accounts given to us were falsified - that not only did you fail to slay the Icon yourself, but you actively sought to aid her.”
Oh, fuck. Had someone blabbed, or were they just fishing? I had to assume the latter because throwing myself on the non-existent mercy of the court wouldn’t do dick to help us. All that would do was get us dusted and start another Icon hunt, one I wouldn’t be able to stop this time.
“The Icon is dead. I killed her,” I said, keeping my voice steady.
“And her body?”
My mind momentarily wandered back to Sheila standing there in a towel. Yep, quite the body indeed. Okay, that was definitely not helping. “No idea. Maybe the NYPD got it? Maybe I ate it. Who knows? As I said, I was a bit crazed with the need for carnage after destroying the foul abomination. All I wanted was more of our enemies to slay.”
Nice one. I glanced to either side and saw some discussion amongst the crowd. Score a point for the Freewill.
I turned back to Alex, smiling. “That’s a not guilty, in case you were wondering.”
“Insolence to the First is also punishable by death,” another of the Draculas commented - a woman with brown skin and Asian features. Hawaiian or Filipino, I’d say. Of course, her lineage was fairly unimportant right then. It was more her statement that was worrisome. I didn’t know how much of an actual law it was, but there was no doubt those who sassed the Dracs tended to end up lining the insides of dustbins. An outcome like that could render any defense we put forth a bit moot.
Thankfully, Alex stepped in for the save - much to even my surprise. “I think we can dispense with protocol just this once. Let it be known that the First Coven believes in justice above our own gratification.”
Somehow that didn’t exactly make me feel better. The upside, though, was it definitely didn’t endear him to the other Draculas, based on their reactions. It did, however, seem to mollify the crowd - which I got the feeling was probably the point.
“Are you certain of your plea, Freewill?”
“Not guilty,” I repeated slowly, turning to get my message across as well. Alex wasn’t the only one capable of playing to an audience. “The Icon is dead by my hand and I certainly didn’t do anything to aid my ancient and hated enemy.”
“So be it.” Alex nodded to someone at the far end of the room.
The guards around us converged on our location. At first, I thought they were attacking, but they began herding us toward one end - closer to where the Dracs sat. I wasn’t sure what they were getting at, but then the massive blast door began to open again - once more moving silently as if whatever oversized hinges held it up were kept well oiled. Aside from seeing it happen, the only notion of its movement was the slight change in airflow as the titanic steel portal swung.
More guards lay beyond - a lot more than had escorted us inside. These were different, however. Gone were the trench coats and silver daggers, replaced by full combat armor, helmets, and riot shields.
I saw a dull glint of metal from near their center and realized the ones closest to the middle were holding blades of some kind - swords or maybe spears. They had a weird sheen to them that I couldn’t quite place, almost as if they were absorbing the light rather than reflecting it.
The gamer inside of me immediately wondered at their plus to hit, but before I could get a clearer look, I caught a glimpse of something else near the center that caused my cold dead heart to leap into my throat. It was a head of blonde hair, in itself not all that unique, but beneath it shone a set of eyes - silver in its purest form, making the stakes our guards held seem like dull aluminum sticks by comparison.
Holy motherfucking shit!
Sally moved to my side, standing on her tiptoes. “What’s going on?”
“Oh, just us being completely and utterly assfucked. The usual.” The flippant remark was just a defense mechanism. Deep down, I could feel myself freaking the fuck out as Sheila was marched in.
How the hell could they have captured her?
How were all of the vamps around her walking instead of turning to dust?
Of course, there was one question I should have asked myself above all, but didn’t because the answer was painfully obvious. I’d visited her a few months back, tried to convince her to fight by our side. I had thought us clever - that we’d taken adequate precautions. Seeing her now, though, it was painfully obvious my self-assessment of that situation couldn’t have been more wrong.
She was their prisoner and it was all my fault.
As the blast door swung shut again, gasps rose up from the crowd as some of the assembled creatures no doubt started putting two and two together.
I craned my neck to catch a better view, but the vamps surrounding her were big fuckers - most of them well over six feet. The closer they got, the harder it was to see if she was all right.
Go figure. I’d opened my mouth in front of some of the most powerful beings in the supernatural world and then proceeded to shove my foot straight down it - yet my own well-being was now secondary, as far as I was concerned.
If they’d hurt her...
The procession stopped and there was movement near the center. A flash of white light flared up and the dull blades immediately descended toward the cause.
Fuck that!
“Leave her alone!”
Although my own arms were still shackled, I couldn’t have cared less. I shoulder-blocked my way past the vamps guarding us, their attention diverted like everyone else in the room.
Someone screamed something and I registered movement on all sides, but I paid it no heed. Tensing my legs, I prepared to leap, planning to dive into the fray and start biting whoever was closest. I had little doubt this new group was made up of seasoned warriors. Colin hadn’t considered me a threat, but even he wouldn’t have been stupid enough to make the same mistake with her.
If I could sink my teeth into just a few of them, maybe we could fight our way out of this mess.
Or not.
As far as plans went, it was about as half-assed as they came. The multiple hands that grabbed hold of me before my feet could leave the ground attested to that.
I was hauled backward and my legs kicked out from under me as they threw me to the ground at my friends’ feet. As several sets of angry fanged faces converged upon us - their stakes raised as batons - Sally’s voice managed to stand out from the chaos around us.
“Good job, Bill. That ought to help our case.”
The Defense Rests
I wasn’t too worried about myself. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not crazy enough to ever look forward to a good old-fashioned pummeling. Even so, I have a few tricks up my sleeve, not the least of which was knowing that my healing would patch me up pretty quickly. Some of my friends weren’t so lucky, though, and one of them just happened to be heavy with child.
Fortunately, the angry vamps seemed mostly interested in me. After all, I’d just tried to bull-rush my way through their ranks. I was likewise the only one who’d lost their mind and attempted to come to the aid of the sworn enemy of the vampire race. There was also the part about me being their legendary savior turned epic disappointment. Don’t forget the war I began while up in Canada. Oh yeah, there was bringing about the downfall of Boston, embarrassing one of the Draculas, and unleashing a foe who now threatened the stability of our entire way of existence.
All things considered, if I were on th
e other side, I’d be kicking my ass too.
Pandemonium reigned for the next several minutes. I didn’t think my friends were being beaten to a pulp as I was, but several compulsions passed over the crowd as an attempt was made to restore order. Heh, there was one major flaw with compulsions, though. Add in enough strong emotions and a vampire could potentially break free or resist it for a time. Both rage and fear were two very strong survival instincts designed to override our rational minds. Love was a tremendous feeling too, but I had the feeling there weren’t too many folks in the room overcome with it at the moment. Go figure. If I had to guess, the Draculas purposefully forgot to invite any of the hippie covens to their little war council.
Oh well, none of that was particularly important at the moment. I was too busy enjoying the sensation of my arm snapping, a rib puncturing a lung, my nose breaking, and several other pesky contusions right before a size twelve boot came crashing down into my face, sending me into blissful darkness.
♦ ♦ ♦
“Come on...WAKE UP!!”
Compulsions don’t do dick when it comes to controlling me, but they sure as shit still feel like a claw hammer to the skull. At some point, my subconscious mind had started to emerge from the total nothingness that being knocked out produced, plunging me into another weird-ass dream in which Dr. Death and I were fighting over Sheila. Don’t get me wrong; it wasn’t some perverted threesome S&M thing. Well, okay, there might have been some nudity involved, but you can’t fault a guy for...
“You’re doing it wrong. Let me try.”
A hard smack across my face sent the imagery fleeing toward the far recesses of my mind, hopefully to stay locked up there.
“You call that a slap, pussy? This is how...”
“Okay, okay, I’m fucking awake,” I growled, not wanting to become a punching bag again. Christ, what the fuck was wrong with people?
I cracked my eyes open and squinted in the florescent light that streamed in from overhead. Two shapes stood over me, but I couldn’t quite make them out.
“Here, these will help,” Tom’s voice said. “I managed to grab them before they got smashed to hell.”
The familiar shape of a pair of glasses was pressed into my hands and I gladly slid them back on. The frames were a bit bent, but it was a shitload better than having cracked lenses.
Immediately, the room swam into focus, including the forms of my roommate and Sally - her presence explaining the compulsion.
“What happened?” I reached up and she grabbed my hand to haul me to my feet. At least we weren’t shackled anymore. The room spun for a moment as I stood, but my equilibrium quickly righted itself.
“You mean before or after the worst rescue attempt in recorded history?”
“After.” I was pleased to find my vampire healing had taken care of the worst of the damage. I still felt a little tender in places, but that would hopefully be short lived.
Unfortunately, the rumbling in my stomach quickly reminded me that the only blood I’d had in quite some time had been a mere flask’s worth when transported here. I tried to push that thought away as Sally spoke, but in the back of my head, I became acutely aware of Tom’s presence. Shit! I tried desperately to concentrate on her voice rather than the tempting treat standing just a few feet away.
“The whole place pretty much went batshit. The Draculas were forced to call a recess until everyone could calm the fuck down. Nobody was overly happy with that. Hell, I even heard a few of the guards actually mouthing off about it within earshot of Alex - dipshits. Methinks the industrial vacuums will be running overtime tonight.”
“Cry me a river.”
“Tell me about it. A few less assholes in the world. What a shame.”
Sally’s comment caused me to take a quick look around and notice the lack of anyone else in the room. Panic immediately set in. “Where...”
“We don’t know,” Tom said. “The guards dragged Ed and Christy off in another direction. They grabbed both of you, then tossed me in here too, like some sort of fucking afterthought.”
“Do you think they’re okay?”
“Relax,” Sally replied, sounding unconcerned. “I’m pretty sure you pissed off everyone in there the worst of us all. If we’re fine, they’re probably okay too. Besides, I got the feeling Alex was enjoying things a little too much to just go and start executing everyone before the festivities even got started.”
“But why separate us?”
“It makes sense with Christy. No matter how many wards they placed outside, if we got those manacles off of her - which we would - she could cause some trouble. She’s also a Magi. No matter what that old geezer said, I have little doubt they’re going to tread lightly with her. Politics are a motherfucker.” She turned to Tom. “That means she’ll be treated well so they can avoid any cross-cultural incidents...at least until they sentence us all to death.”
“That’s good,” he replied. “Don’t tell her I said this, but I’m kind of glad they stuck me in here with you guys. She looked pissed and...she gets a bit scary when she’s like that.”
“Pussy,” Sally commented with a snort of laughter.
“What about Ed and Sheila?” I asked, forcing myself to remain calm on that latter front.
“Don’t doubt that your girlfriend is in whatever passes for maximum security at this place.”
The slightest bit of scorn hung on her use of the G-word, but maybe that was just my imagination. I forced it aside for now. Of all the things to worry about in our current predicament, relationship statuses were easily at the bottom of the list. Even so, it did give me cause to wonder whether...no! Now was not the time. “And Ed?”
“He’s still an unknown, an X-factor. As far as they’re concerned, that makes him dangerous and, thus, he’ll get his own quarters where they can keep a close eye on him.”
“So basically what you’re saying,” Tom surmised, “is they’re keeping the threats under lock and key by themselves and tossing the rest of us in here together?”
I turned toward him, eyebrow raised. “Now that you mention it, that is sort of insulting.”
“You’re telling me,” Sally groused.
“Seriously. I’m the legendary Freewill.”
“Were the legendary Freewill. I’m pretty sure our buddy up in Boston is enjoying that title right now. Probably got it tattooed across that muscular chest of his.”
“You should have taken a picture while you had the chance.”
“Don’t think I didn’t consider it.”
I shook my head in frustration. “Regardless of him being Mr. Muscles, I have the same powers. Hell, I could bite you right now and power up.”
“And that’s going to do what exactly against the small army stationed here?”
She had a point there. Sally’s mind was as sharp as they came, but her blood was still only about half a century old. As far as the Draculas were concerned, she was practically still in training pants. James was the youngest of that bunch and he still had over ten times her number of years under his belt.
I considered all of this as I took in our surroundings. It was basically just an empty room about twenty feet square. There were no windows, no places to sit, not even a fucking toilet - which could become worrisome, depending on how long they expected us to stay here. A single door marked the only exit, and I could tell by the look of it that busting out was probably not going to be in our cards.
Just to be safe, though, I walked up to it and tapped with my knuckles - solid steel, by the sound of it.
“Already tried that,” Sally commented.
I backed up a step and noticed there was a very slight depression in the metal, fist shaped, if I had to guess.
“Anyone answer when you tried knocking?”
“Nope. Fortified and most likely soundproof, although I have little doubt they can hear us - probably see us too.”
I immediately got what she was hinting at.
The vampire nation was in some ways a walking, talking contradiction. They were steeped in tradition, relying on prophecy to guide them. At the same time, they could be surprisingly modern when necessary. Alex had once told me of how the Draculas used radioactive tracers to track their troop movements. Likewise, Calibra, the last prefect of the Northeast, had informed us of some of the technical capabilities of the Boston complex - including a transatlantic gigabit connection. Considering the facilities around us, this room was likely bugged to the point where one would need a lot more than a can of Raid to clean it out.
Thoughts of Boston brought with it memories of our last disastrous trip there. Calibra was now a prisoner to Vehron, assuming he’d kept her alive. Oddly enough, that outcome wasn’t considered the preferable option, considering how much she knew. Vehron had practically been a caveman when I’d accidentally freed him. Now, though, if he was anything less than a total muscle-headed buffoon, he’d probably spent the last few months forcing her to bring him up to speed.
It could have been far worse, though. James had been up there with us and had proven himself no match for the monster. Had he been captured, who knows the extent of the intelligence that could have been gained. He hadn’t been, however. We’d saved him and...
I stopped mid-thought and considered this, rubbing my jaw with my hand.
“What is it?” Sally asked.
“James.”
“I noticed,” she replied, her voice dropping all hint of her usual attitude.
“Remember what he said before Colin took him away...something about atoning?”
“Yeah. I don’t know what they did to him, but out there, he looked...broken.”
Silence descended as that sank in.
“No fucking way,” Tom said. “Dude’s too tough. We’ve all seen him. So he got his ass kicked once. Happens to the best of us.”
I eyed him skeptically. As if he would know anything about that.
“He’s still a member of the Draculas, right?” he asked. “It’s not like they voted him off the island.”
The Tome of Bill Series: Books 5-8 (Goddamned Freaky Monsters, Half A Prayer, The Wicked Dead, The Last Coven) Page 58
