Four Moons: The Complete Collection: (Books 1 - 4)

by Amos, Richard

  “Thank you.” After another wet sniff, she blinked back to green. “Now, we need to talk about payment.”

  I didn’t really have a set fee for my jobs, just went with the flow. “What are you willing to pay?”

  “Five-hundred pounds.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Are you sure? I feel like that’s not enough.”

  Pay more then. “That’s fine. If that’s what you can do.”

  What would I ever say if a client said they could only manage to chuck me a tenner? Actually, I knew what I’d tell them—wouldn’t be pretty.

  “Excellent.” From my jacket pocket, I pulled out a folded contract drawn up by me. I always made clients sign the dotted line. Formal and evidence for me to kick their arse if they tried to screw me over.

  G had stayed silent the whole time, the watcher. That was his job, after all.

  Trixie floated down and zipped across the paper in a weird act of speed-reading, then signed the bottom so quickly I’d barely had time to blink.

  There it was, in glittering black cursive—her signature. Deal done. Five hundred quid for me.

  I said my goodbyes just as the pixie turned blue again. “Sad about me killing him still?”

  “I’m such an idiot.”

  “Nah, just means you have a heart.”

  Guess that meant I had fuck all beating in my chest, then. A phantom pump keeping me upright.

  “So, I’ll come by your place later to collect payment when it’s done,” I added.

  “That would be great. I’ll be there then.” She was green again, back to munching her eggs.

  My dad would just have to wait. “Wicked. See you later.”

  As I stepped outside, a fight was breaking out between two guys. A war of words on the brink of fists and kicks.

  “The end is coming! All of us are doomed! You will see! You will see!”

  I mean, it was obvious these sorts of peeps would be out on the streets, crying about the moon. Couldn’t blame them, especially when it came to guys like this—a night vamp. Not like he could get some sleep right now. I’d go a bit nuts if I couldn’t at least get a few hours’ kip.

  Wait. His mouth. Blood all down his chin, his teeth basically crimson.

  The fuck?

  A body on the floor between them—another geezer, a proper chunk taken out of his neck.

  “You fucking killed him! You killed him!”

  The vampire looked down at the body. “He wouldn’t listen, just like you won’t listen. Why aren’t you hearing me?”

  “You’re crazy.” The guy, a human, pulled out a gun, pointing it at the vamp’s heart. Yep, a pull of the trigger would do it—the only way to kill a vamp was trauma to their dead heart. Not even a beheading worked. Had to be the heart with whatever you could find.

  A lot of vamps wore bulletproof plates. This one had been no different. The crack of the gun boomed down the street. Watchers and passersby, who actually didn’t give a fuck about nothing but their own business, screamed and yelled and dove into shop doors.

  The geezer with the gun was on the floor, as dead as the other guy, a bullet wound in his chest. His heart had taken the ricochet of the bullet meant for the vamp.

  The bloodsucker looked at me as sirens rang in the air. SCU approaching. “You will all see the end. This is it. The old world is dying. A new order will rise. Shadows everywhere. The tenshi have abandoned us. The mazoku will rise again, and all will die.”

  Vamps were normally pale, and a little deathly, but not really looking like death warmed up. Generally. But this guy was completely done in, his red eyes full of madness. I could see that. His head tilted, and he lunged at me, sluggish for a vamp, and tripped over the bodies.

  Someone screamed again as I went to move, but G was in front of me. With brutal strength and speed, he broke the vampire’s legs and dumped him on the ground, pressing a foot to his chest.

  “Try that again,” the beta seethed as the vamp shrieked, “and I’ll eat your heart out your chest.”

  Chills zipped through me.

  “The end!” the vamp howled, grabbing G’s jeans.

  The beta broke the creature’s arms. “Stay still.”

  Wow. Heavy shit.

  The SCU rocked up, two female agents in black body armor leaping out of the blue truck. They took over, securing the howling vamp as we got back in the car.

  “We will need statements,” one of the women called before G closed his door. She then appeared to realize her mistake at barking orders at the beta.

  “I’ll send something over,” he responded politely, no menace in his voice.

  “Apologies, sir, I forgot who I was talking to.”

  The SCU was under the control of the wolves, an extension of my dad’s army—just like his own wolf army and ten uber wolves.

  “It’s fine. Just make sure to lock him up. He’s a biter.” He closed the car door.

  “Wow,” I said. “What a nightmare.”

  Another SCU van rolled up, more agents spilling out for crowd control. The scene had gathered a lot of peeping pricks.

  Good, we were getting out of there.

  Chapter Four

  Pixie hollows were so weird. Like the concrete tower blocks they were always sandwiched between, they were tall and imposing but made of mud and moss, with lanterns hanging all over the structure. Always thought they looked mega-freaky.

  The hollow on Holloway Road (ha!) was sprayed with graffiti around the bottom edges, with twinkling yellow lights in several of the small circular windows cut into the mud. They were glassed over, some with curtains drawn. A few pixies were floating outside the main entrance. Some were green, some were pink. Pixies who were pink were either drunk or high.

  There was an emergency stairwell wrapping around the building for maintenance works to take place and serving as access for the fire brigade and SCU agents. The pixies had their own miniature ambulance service.

  We stepped out, approaching the main door. G carried the jam jars in a gym bag hanging on his left shoulder. The thing with pixie hollows was that though they were homes to these small creatures, they also had to accommodate human-sized peeps for deliveries and shit. I mean, pixies had to get their post.

  A pink fucker flew in my face, hiccupped. “Well, hello there,” she said, breathing beer breath on me.

  Bit early to be pickled. “Hi. Looking for Bruce. You know him?”

  She left me, buzzing around G in a wobbly flight. “Now, this is what I’m talking about. Want to find a witch to shrink you down for the day? Hic… Come up to my room. It’ll be worth it. I know a woman in Camden…hic.”

  “I’ll decline,” G replied.

  “You got something ‘gainst pixies?”

  “Maybe you should have a coffee or something.”

  I blocked out the conversation and approached the closest green ball. “Alright? Looking for a guy called Bruce. He lives in this hollow.”

  “What about him?” This guy had a ‘fuck off’ attitude in his gruff voice. I could relate.

  “Need to talk to him.”

  “About what?”

  “Private.”

  “Whatever. Can’t stand the cunt.”

  “Oh?”

  “Complete creep, stinks of cheese. No one round here talks to him. Lives on floor twelve, flat three.”

  “Cheers.”

  “Fiver.”

  “Huh?”

  “Entrance fee.”

  “I can just use the trade button.”

  “Yeah, you could. But then I might have to bite your fingers off.”

  Pixies were famous for that shit. In total, including the pissed pink one who was still bothering G for a shag, there were six of them. I was so not in the mood to fight the buzzers. More than anything, it was annoying, and there was only one pixie I gave a shit about.

  “Here.” I chucked him a fiver. The green ball grabbed it, and the paper was folded up until it vanished inside the jade light.

&
nbsp; Fucking pixies.

  “Pleasure doing business with you.”

  Don’t think so, dick. I nodded, turning to G. “Let’s go.”

  I spotted Ally and Drew’s car on the other side of the road. Hadn’t seen them back in Finsbury Park.

  “Please, don’t go…hic,” the pickled pixie said to G. “I want—”

  “Leave him alone, Sandra!” another female voice bellowed. One of the green balls flashed to red—anger. “You always do this. Stick to your own. Why you got to drag everyone down?”

  “I want more!” Sandra wailed. “I hate this fucking…hic…life!”

  “Oh, here we go!”

  Two of the other pixies changed from green to red. That was our cue to get out of the way.

  “Stupid cow! Get your head out of the clouds!”

  “I want him! I want—”

  Slap! “You stupid bitch!”

  Thankfully, the main door closed behind us, cutting the rest of the drama off. Man, pixies could really give a good slap. That’d been one hell of a crack.

  Inside the hollow was more of the mud and moss but prettier. Flowers of pink and yellow and purple grew from the ceilings and walls. The moss was a spongy carpet beneath my trainers, and it spread over everything.

  There were no lifts. Why did you need one when you could fly? Above my head was an open space where pixies flew up and down, walkways curling upwards for those of us who needed them.

  Bruce lived on the twelfth floor.

  Ah, greasy nutsacks!

  Oh, well. Bit of cardio was always good.

  “You wouldn’t believe what she had for her dinner.”

  “What?”

  Two pixies passed by, having the voices of two old women, and having a good old slagging off session.

  “Fish pie with chips.”

  “She never.”

  “She did. I told her, I said, well that’s two meals—two types of spuds, and that’s not right. You know, because the topping is mashed potato, init?”

  “She’s shocking. Did you hear about her daughter kissing that Spanish lad down the pub? Shameful.”

  Their convo had no substance to it. So what if the woman wanted chips with fish pie? What the fuck? Oh, never mind the real world going on around them, but fish pie and chips—scandalous. Plus, they were obviously being bigoted about the geezer being Spanish. Seriously? What a pair of dinosaurs. No, that was insulting to dinos.

  Me and G hit the twelfth floor pretty swiftly, being fit lads who wouldn’t be beaten by stairs.

  “Here.” G handed me a jam jar.

  “Thanks.”

  The beta carried on down the corridor, hitting the emergency stairs on the outside of the hollow. Had to block the pixie’s back window for the next bit.

  How the fuck would I have done this job without my buddy?

  Flat three. Tiny door, just like the windows, a tiny slot for tiny post. Not designed for larger bodies. If a fire broke out, a fire crew would come up either inside or out, and blast water into the flats. Same for SCU agents hunting a perp. They’d use the same method as me to get the pixie inside to come out and play.

  Tactic number one was ready to go.

  I knocked on the small wooden circle that was the front door. There was no peephole.

  “Who is it?” a male voice called.

  “Delivery.”

  Silence.

  “Hello? Sir? Delivery.”

  “Post it through.”

  “Too big, sir.”

  “Just leave it outside.”

  “I need a signature, sir.”

  “Please, go away.” Bruce sounded proper scared.

  “But, your delivery, sir.”

  “I don’t want it. Take it back to your depot.”

  “Can’t do that, sir. I need—”

  “Will you get the fuck away from my door!” he yelled.

  Ah, good and rattled. “No need for that language, sir.”

  “Please…” Was that the beginning of tears? “Please… Leave me alone.”

  Wanker had been cornered. “Open the door, Bruce.”

  “No.”

  Silence.

  “Bruce. Your package.” Good for me for seeing the role of delivery man through—defo sticking to my day job and not hitting Hollywood any day soon.

  “Go away! I’ll call the SCU.”

  “Go for it, bruv.”

  “I mean it!”

  “I believe you. I’ll wait.”

  “Go away!”

  Yeah, stupid motherfucker. ‘Cos, you know the SCU will fuck you up! Actually, that wasn’t true, was it? Still couldn’t get my head around them screwing Trixie over like that. They were normally pretty hot with this shit.

  “Please…”

  Boring. I didn’t have all day.

  Jumping back a few paces, I had the grenade ready. I took a run and hit the door in a flying kick that got it open on the first whack, the wooden thing slamming into the wall. Bruce yelped, buzzing around his small hallways, flashing from green to blue to red. With another quick motion, I lobbed the smoke bomb inside the flat. It went up in a burst of choking white, engulfing the frantic ball of light. It vanished, clearly heading for the window.

  “Help me! No! Shit!” The pixie’s glow reappeared.

  Good one, G!

  I readied the jam jar. The ball of light went from hover to frantic zip, whizzing right at me.

  Come on, buzzy bastard!

  Wham! Straight in the jar! Yes! I slammed the lid down and screwed it tight. No air hole. This was how he would die.

  “Gotcha.”

  The pixie, all blued up, screamed inside the glass prison, desperate, begging, all of it muffled.

  “Ah, shut your face, freak. Your stalking days are over.”

  Bruce stopped then. Even though I couldn’t see his tiny eyes, I felt like they were burning into me. “What?” he asked. I barely heard him, but there it was.

  “You’re scaring that poor woman to death. Stalking wanker. Sorry, but time to die.”

  The ball of blue fell to the bottom of the jar, running out of air. “It was her…”

  “Yeah, it was.”

  “I knew she’d do this to me.”

  “Before you did it to her.”

  “You—”

  His light was flickering. If I was in control of the situation, like now, I went for giving a quick death. But this was different. If I opened the jar, he could fly off. What if I slammed it down and crushed him? If he got away, that my reputation would take another hit. No more jobs, no more money for me to donate to Sanctuary—a homeless shelter project I mega believed in.

  Shit. I was watching him suffocate. He deserved it. He was making this woman’s life hell. He’d kill her in the end, and then what? Who deserved to die most? Him. Him!

  G jogged down the hall. “Good. You got him.”

  “Yeah—”

  “No!” a horrible shriek from below. Moments later, a blue ball of light appeared. “Please! Open the jar! Open the jar!”

  “Trixie?”

  “Open the jar!” she howled.

  Fine. She was the client, and she was still gonna be handing over the cash.

  I twisted the jar, and Bruce coughed, sucking in air. His fading light started to brighten.

  Trixie flew into the jar. “My darling!”

  What. The. Fuck.

  Bruce coughed some more. “Get…away…”

  “I couldn’t let him kill you. Not my baby! Not the love of my life!”

  “I’m not the…love of…your life…”

  “You are. You are! I know that now. I wanted you dead for not wanting me, but now I see—”

  “Wait a fucking minute,” I cut in. “What’s this bullshit?”

  Trixie blinked red, flew out of the jar, and got in my face. “I relive you of your services. Get out of here.”

  G growled. “He didn’t stalk you, did he?”

  “Never,” Bruce struggled. “I would never do that…to a
nyone. She’s been…she’s…I didn’t stalk her…she’s been stalking me…making my life unbearable…”

  “So, you’re the crazy fuck!” I snapped. “You played us!” I could’ve killed an innocent pixie.

  Trixie zipped at me, catching me on my right cheek with a nip. Man, that was one sharp bite! I retaliated with a swipe, cracking her with the back of my hand. She smacked into the wall, sliding down the moss with a groan before getting stuck on a flower, dangling for a few seconds, then hitting the ground.

  G helped Bruce out of the jar, tipping him onto the moss. “We’re deeply sorry for this mistake.”

  “I’ll…sue you…for this…”

  What could I say to that? Good luck? There’d be no evidence of me being here thanks to my ring—if it still worked. Taking the jar, I quickly dumped a groaning Trixie inside, punching an air hole into the top.

  This buzzer wasn’t gonna be suffocated. She could face the SCU. Or maybe I should tip her out and stomp on her. I was so done, happy to take the loss of money. “You never called them, did you? The SCU?”

  “Oh, my head,” Trixie moaned.

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  Footsteps. Heavy, shadowy whispers.

  Something was coming up the stairs.

  Hand claps—slow, mocking.

  Then the double-headed monster appeared. Mama Rita and Zach, mother and son sharing the same huge body, a mixture of male and female that had taken on a less messy shape than the first time I’d seen it, more muscular and defined. Half mother, half son.

  Both sets of eyes were a creepy obsidian, and both of them had the same shade of raven-black hair. Their faces were lined with black veins, the olive tones of their skin almost ashen now.

  I almost crapped my boxers. This thing was one big nasty that triggered the instinct to, well, shit yourself.

  “Still out on the hunt, Akira?” the head of Mama Rita asked. When she spoke, black condensation wisped out of her mouth—a sign there were mazoku inside her. I could hear them whisper beneath her voice.

  Her stupid, smirky sneer suddenly wobbled, and she took a step back. A hiss came out of her gob, along with my half-brother’s. Yep, that was the mazoku doing their weird recoil from me.

  Zach looked at me with pleading eyes, silently as he was deaf. If only my swords, which I had out and ready for action, could somehow cut him free from this abomination.