I wasn’t about to be double crossed by my ex-partner. I would just have to see what the scroll—Lucy’s true objective—was for myself.
Following at a close distance and waiting until Lucy had to duck under a branch, my pickpocket’s hands undid the duffel bag’s zipper, slipped inside and came out with a wrapped up, laminated ancient scroll. Parts of it were missing from old age, and I didn’t have time to look at it now. It was too dark. I slipped it inside my jacket.
“Theo, that was wrong!” Simon said.
Garfunkel crossed his arms. “Pretty slick. Good technique.”
“Thanks,” I whispered as I checked over my shoulder. Something was watching us as we moved through the woods. The Jersey Devil …
After some time, Lucy said, “My Fitbit says I’ve walked ten miles today, Theo.”
“You go, girl,” Clio said.
“I believe it,” I said as I glanced over my shoulder at a tree with a distinctive carving on its trunk. “Don’t you think we should have reached the car by now?”
“I uh, we’re almost there.”
“You sure? That tree back there looks familiar.”
Lucy scoffed. “We’re not walking in circles, if that’s what you mean.”
We continued through the woods.
“Don’t you feel that?” I said, gripping absently at my jeans. “Someone’s watching us.”
“Who? The Jersey Devil?” Lucy asked sarcastically. “It’s probably an owl.”
“Maybe it is just an owl, but we definitely should have reached the car by now. Clio, can’t you use your magic to find the way?”
Clio flipped some of her blonde bangs out of her eyes. “And burn some time?”
“Theo, how dare you make such a suggestion.” Garfunkel said.
“Yeah,” Simon joined in.
I sighed. “Well, regardless of if Lucy admits to it or not, we’re lost.”
“Are not,” Lucy said.
A twig snapped from somewhere off to the side and a male voice said, “Are too.”
I spun as several hooded figures slid out from behind the tree trunks and shadows, the sky blue bandanas tied to their bare arms fluttering silently like flags.
The leader of the Brotherhood of Zeus stepped out into a patch of moonlight.
“Miss Apollonia,” Blue Rag said, moonlight glinting in his eyes. “We are still on the same side. Agree?”
Spider Face materialized next to the Zeus gang leader. He grunted and a handful of hooded assassin-thugs surrounded Lucy and me.
“Yes, we are,” I said cautiously, my eyes shooting first to my tattoo, then to Clio. “But now is not a good—”
“Nice jab scattering the tracking sigil’s signal,” said Blue Rag. “Smart.”
“Then how did you …” My voice grew hard and I turned to Lucy. “Was it you?”
Indignance flashed in Lucy’s eyes.
The Brotherhood of Zeus leader shrugged. “Eh. In a way.” He snapped a finger and four hooded minions closed in on Lucy like shadows, restraining her before she could react. Blue Rag tapped Lucy’s Fitbit. “GPS.”
Great, I thought.
From my right shoulder, Simon shifted his eyes from side to side. “Theo, we’re trapped!”
“I’ll think of something,” I whispered back. Garfunkel clicked his fingernails together as if ready to attack.
There was a pause and Blue Rag said, “Now here’s what’s gonna happen. You owe us a job. Said job is ready right now. You’re coming with us. Capeesh?”
I shook my head. “This is like literally the worst timing—I can’t go with you right now.”
“Look,” the leader said. “My associate …” He indicated Spider Face. “… is going to whisper something into your ear.”
My eyes flicked between the two men. “Huh? Whisper what?”
Blue Rag chuckled. “An offer you can’t refuse.”
Some of his assassin-thugs laughed. I didn’t. I studied Spider Face’s slow steps as he made his way toward me.
“Theo!—” Lucy blurted out but a goon clamped his hand over her mouth. She bit it. “Don’t—”
Spider Face leaned in close, one hand rising slowly to cup around my ear, the other darting up fast toward my face.
I kicked out and knocked the attacking arm away as an additional thug sprang at me. Sidestepping him, I shoved him to the ground with my foot as he lunged past me. He toppled into some shrubbery.
In my peripheral, Lucy struggled against her own captors. One of her fists crashed against a hooded thug’s face and he staggered, but as soon as he fell another took his place, twisting her arm back until Lucy gasped.
Spider Face came at me again but I ducked out of the way and was pressed to the ground, hard, by another goon. I rolled onto my back and kicked upward, knocking my new attacker back as a pair of strong hands pressed my shoulders into the earth.
“Do something!” Simon said.
I struggled and kicked but Spider Face was already bending down toward me and shoving a chloroform-soaked rag against my mouth.
I blacked out.
“Bed and Breakfast (Minus the Breakfast)”
“Theo! Theo wake up!”
I opened my eyes. The world spun and a hundred pale faces stared back at me. Where am I? I thought as I blinked and rubbed my head. I was lying on a bed, the thick quilted pattern of a comforter soft and warm beneath my palms. My hands weren’t bound, so that was good and I felt safe. Am I at a friend’s house? Wait, I didn’t really have too many friends, did I …?
“Theo! You’re OK!” Simon said.
“Yeah,” I said, blinking again. I felt at my sides; I still had Lucy’s scroll but now wasn’t the time to inspect it.
As the world stopped spinning and my vision focused, I jolted into a seated position, clutched my knees to my chest. Surrounding me like a ghostly sea were the cracked graying terra cotta faces of a hundred dolls, their blank eyes tracking my every movement. They were sitting and standing on the floor and desk and wooden shelving along the walls, some with abnormally tall necks, others with moveable arms and legs. They looked ancient—a few of them fashioned out of rags. The creepiest ones had what looked like human hair poked into holes in their clay heads. I got up from the bed and spun slowly in the center of the room to better take in my surroundings. Still, the eyes seemed to follow me.
“Yes! The horror!” Simon said. “Get us out of here!”
Even Garfunkel looked uneasy. “Yeah, Theo. This is just wrong.”
I agreed. Just where the hell was I? The harder I tried to focus, the more my head hurt, and I realized I couldn’t even remember how I’d gotten there. Had I been drugged? That would’ve explained the grogginess and my parched throat. I’d certainly never been in this room before, that much I was certain. But despite that, I detected a familiar scent in the air creeping up from beneath the closed bedroom door but my head was still too foggy to place it—sort of spicy, but sweet.
My eyes narrowed on the bedroom’s single window next to the bed, and I went to it, careful not to stray too close to any of the dolls in case they had a mind to leap out at me with a butcher knife—as irrational as that sounded, a pair of “living Ken dolls” resided on my shoulders.
Oh and Chucky. Let’s never forget that horror.
There wasn’t much to see out the window. An expansive yard. Landscaping lights close to the base of the house two stories below, which meant I was on the second floor of a house that could be literally anywhere, considering I didn’t know how long I’d been out. But it was still dark out, so unless we’d been driving for twenty-four hours, we couldn’t be too far from where … we’d been abducted from the mine’s entrance.
Things were starting to makes sense again. “How long were we driving?” I asked my familiars.
“I wasn’t exactly paying attention to the time—” Simon started.
Garfunkel cut him off. “A little over three hours, according to the car’s dashboard. I think we were heading north.�
��
That’s a start, I thought, trying to figure out where we might be based on that time estimate. We could be several states away by now: Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut …
Simon shuddered on my shoulder. “They put a cloth bag over your head even though you were unconscious. It was so scary!”
Garfunkel whistled. “Not as scary as this doll room. I’m not scared of much, but—”
There was a knock at the door and I turned from the window. Ol’ Blue Rag, leader of the Brotherhood of Zeus gang, stepped inside, closing the door softly behind him. Before it shut, I caught a glimpse of a dimly lit hallway, and for just a moment, that familiar scent was almost strong enough to identify.
Almost.
The gang leader wore a ceremonial dagger sheathed at his hip. The ceiling light glinted off the dagger hilt and the gold ring piercing his temple. He rested his hands on his hips. “I trust you’re enjoying your stay?”
“About that,” I said. “I’d like to request a different room.”
“Hah! You’re full of spunk. I like that. But the boss said to keep you here until he got back.”
I laughed. “You have a boss?”
“We all got a boss, Babes.”
“Don’t call me that.” With arms raised defensively, I stepped toward him. To my satisfaction, he took an equal step backward. “Where’s Lucy?” The last I’d seen of her, several Zeus thugs were restraining her.
“She uh, got away. Along with a pixie.”
Typical. Lucy excelled at two things: fighting and slipping away unseen.
“Penny for your thoughts, Babes?”
“I said don’t call me that.”
His features hardened and a watermelon grin curved across his face. “Or what? You want to tussle?”
“No,” I said. “I want to break your bones. You kidnapped me.”
Blue Rag threw up his hands. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Firstly, we did not ‘kidnap’ you. We was just reclaiming something that belonged to us.”
I balled up my fists, gritted my teeth. “I don’t belong to anyone.”
“As a matter of fact,” he sneered, “you do. Remember that cemetery job? The cops are still following up on all those werewolf howls. And let’s just say the interested party we hoped to keep in the dark … well, they found out we got the ring now.”
“Why does it matter so much?” I asked, bouncing on the balls of my feet, waiting for an opening to spring at him. “You’re one of the two strongest gangs—”
“Associations,” Blue Rag corrected.
“—in New York,” I finished. “Typhon’s gang being the other. And I just happen to be working for a mysterious guy who owns a mansion in Poughkeepsie who really, really hates Typhon …” I flashed my antagonist a knowing nod. “Is that where I am?”
Blue Rag’s face reddened. “I don’t have to answer that.”
“Already did.” I shot forward, lashing out with my fist. A subtle blueish glow flashed just before my blow connected, my knuckles crunching as they met my aggressor’s hastily constructed magic barrier, as evidenced by his glowing arm tattoos.
“Ow,” I managed weakly as Blue Rag’s own fist pummeled my temple, sending me to the ground, the multiple rings on his fingers no doubt leaving their mark on my skull.
If I thought I was disoriented after waking up from the chloroform, this blow stung even more. See, I had an advantage over most men; they tended to hold back a bit when they were trying to hit me, seeing as they were facing a girl much weaker than them. The gang leader hadn’t held anything back. Of course, the next words out of Blue Rag’s mouth surprised me even more.
“I’m sorry. It’s this damn temper of mine. My mam, bless her, always said it would get me in troub—”
I didn’t let him finish. He was holding out his hand to help me up as if he’d just realized he’d made a grave mistake.
He had.
I reached out and pretended to accept his help, instead pivoting my body and using his weight against him as I heaved him to the ground over my shoulder. He landed on his back with a thud. My hand went instinctively to the dagger strapped to his hip, and a moment later I had him pinned down with the blade’s pointy edge against his neck.
“You’re going to let me walk out of here. Now,” I said, my eyes like … daggers.
“I can’t … do that,” Blue Rag sputtered. “I can’t defy his orders.”
I applied pressure, drew a drop of blood.
“Theo! What are you doing?” Simon yelled.
“Teachin’ him a lesson,” Garfunkel said with his arms crossed and his Hello Kitty sunglasses covering his eyes. “Punk’s got to learn. Atta girl, Theo.”
I shook my head. “I’m walking out of here with or without your permission.”
Blue Rag didn’t say anything as I regarded his eyes. There was a coolness in them that said he would die trying rather than let me leave. Of course, I wasn’t a murderer. So when he swept his arm out to the side to try to disarm me, I backstepped and gave him a swift kick in the side. He grunted and rolled onto his hands and knees and I kicked him across the nose, wincing at the resulting crunch. He put out a hand and steadied himself upon the bed, one hand clutching at the quilted fabric, the other cupping his nose.
I drew back my shoe one more time.
And stopped as muted clapping suddenly filled the room. I searched for the source of the sound without any luck.
Blue Rag groaned. “He’s back … shit.”
“Who is—”
“Miss Apollonia,” a raspy voice grated over a speaker hidden somewhere in the room and I immediately recognized it as my latest benefactor, Gan’s master. A shiver glided down my spine. “That is enough,” my mysterious employer’s disembodied voice continued. “I am on my way up. Please don’t injure my worthy acolyte any further as I make my way to you. He is only following orders. As are the numerous acolytes stationed outside your door.” He paused. “Although it may not seem like it, I do not wish to harm you. We have much to discuss.”
My fingers gripped the dagger I still held in my hand. Fight or flight or … wait?
There was a soft click like that of an intercom switch being flipped, and I dashed over to a shelf of ancient dolls staring lifelessly at me, through me. After a closer look, I spotted something. I picked up two of the dolls and tossed them to the bed; behind them, on the shelf, was a tiny nanny cam, and beside it a tiny speaker.
These sickos had been watching me this entire time …!
I glanced at Blue Rag eyeing me warily, sitting on the floor, his back against the base of the bed. He wouldn’t be giving me any more trouble. I walked back over to the window. Standing two stories below, on the lawn, several hooded “acolytes” with blue bandanas on their arms now stared up at me, the moonlight reflecting dully off the blacks of their eyes. Creepy …
I backed away and headed to the door, threw it open, stared at the hooded Zeus gang members standing ramrod straight in silent rows. Man, what had my employer done to them to get them like this? Extensive mental conditioning? And there were so many of them.
The familiar scent of my employer’s incense entered my nostrils. Yep. I was in my employer’s mansion, in Poughkeepsie, New York alright. What was this place? Some sort of training grounds? All the same, none of the acolytes made a move to stop me as I stepped into the wide hallway and made my way past them like life-sized toy soldiers.
I passed the last of them in the hallway and came to the top of a curving grand stairwell, filled with more obedient Zeus gang members staring at me. None of them lifted a hand as I ventured past them.
Halfway down the grand staircase, I stopped as the gang members filling the bottom few steps parted slowly, almost reverently to the sides.
And between them, my benefactor made his way up the stairs. Toward me.
His blind unseeing eyes locking onto mine …
“Where’s the Beef?”
My employer made his way up to me and I froze, held stationary by
his deformed face. Eyes that flickered like lightning behind a storm cloud. Partially melted nose. Thin skinless lips like that of a snake. The first—and last—time I’d seen his face was in his dimly lit drawing room.
“Simon,” I whispered, as the mansion’s master drew closer to me. “What kind of Other is that thing?”
Silence.
“Simon?”
I’d feared he’d passed out due to the gruesomeness of the face when he stunned me with a soft, “Theo, that’s not an Other. He’s a human. Or rather … was a human …”
“What does that mean? I need more.” But my question was left unanswered. Simon was simply overwhelmed.
Incense wafted up my nostrils from the mansion’s foyer. It was cloying. I felt sick. I felt that things couldn’t get any weirder.
My employer opened his snake-like mouth, the skin at either side stretched taut like translucent paper. At least his teeth looked normal. “My children,” he grated. “At ease. Dinner is prepared.”
The hooded acolytes nodded simply and they started to press their way past me down the steps in an ordered drove. At the bottom of the steps, they turned in the foyer and headed dutifully down the hallway that contained my employer’s drawing room.
I now realized that I smelled warm, cooked food, its pleasantness overpowered by the sickly-sweet scent of smoky incense. My stomach rumbled, betraying the nausea creeping up my throat.
No matter how hungry I was, I didn’t think I’d be eating anything. I didn’t trust these people and I definitely didn’t want to indebt myself further to them.
The last of the Zeus gang members passed me, leaving just my benefactor and me. He raised a hand in supplication. “I do apologize for the methods used to bring you back here, but your actions confuse me. You swore allegiance after the cemetery job. Willingly accepted a magic tattoo with which to contact you. And when my acolytes came for you in that nightclub, they found you …” His voice tensed. “Conversing with the enemy!” he all but spat—but it came across as more of a choking sob. I almost pitied him.
Axes and Angels: A Snarky Urban Fantasy Novel (Better Demons Series Book 1) Page 29
