The Circle Gathers (Veil Knights Book 1)

by Rowan Casey

  “I hope so,” the newcomer said, and his voice had a touch of a British accent hidden in it. “Are you Jessica Grace Noble?”

  Good Lord, but it was strange hearing him call her by her given name, and her full name at that. It had been years since anyone called her that; she’d long ago stopped thinking of herself as anything other than Jessie.

  She swallowed, and then nodded.

  The newcomer grimaced. “I’m sorry, but my instructions were quite explicit. I need to hear your reply aloud, if you don’t mind.”

  Jessie said, “Yes, I’m her,” before she realized that this man, this stranger, could be anyone from a court process server to a federal agent.

  Thankfully, he was neither of those things.

  “My name is Hautdesert. I represent an individual, a sponsor if you will, who has seen several of your recent fights and is interested in hiring you for a, shall we say, more legitimate match.”

  Jessie could feel her heart starting to race in her chest. A legitimate fight?

  “I’m listening.”

  “This will be a private, exhibition-style fundraising match against an up-and-coming contender in the bantamweight division. Because it is just an exhibition, it will not impact rankings for either you or your opponent, which is unfortunate. On the other hand, because it is a private match, there will be a weigh-in just before the fight, but there will not be a need for a drug test or any of the other such formalities.”

  Her visitor paused and then, seeing that she didn’t yet have any questions, went on.

  “The fight will be held at the Wilshire Arms Hotel and both a trainer and a corner-man will be made available to assist you during the match. A suitable wardrobe and equipment will also be provided.”

  “Sounds like you’re pulling out all the stops, which makes me wonder what the downside is. Who’s the other fighter? And what’s in it for me?”

  “You’ll be fighting Sheila Dellacroix. Your share of the purse, even if you lose, will be ten thousand dollars.”

  Jessie had been out of the fight game, the legitimate one at least, for several years now but she still kept track of the who’s-who and current rankings. Dellacroix was ranked fourth in a field of fighters twenty-six deep, which meant she wouldn’t be any kind of pushover.

  “And if I win?”

  Her visitor didn’t even bat an eye at the question. “My employer has authorized an additional five-thousand-dollar bonus if you manage to defeat Miss Dellacroix. He’ll double that if you can do it in the first two rounds.”

  “Standard match? Three rounds of five minutes each?”

  Hautdesert nodded. “Correct.”

  It was an absolute no-brainer from Jessie’s perspective. Even if she walked into the ring and got knocked on her ass with the very first punch, she’d still bring home more money in one fell swoop than she’d seen in months of fighting in the underground circuit. And if she won, maybe she could…

  Don’t even think about that, she told herself. Focus on the fight. Deal with what comes after once you’ve won.

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me who this mysterious benefactor of yours is, are you?”

  Hautdesert shook his head.

  “So how do I know that this isn’t just some scam?”

  “Good question.” The big man reached into his pocket and pulled out an oversized cell phone. He touched a few buttons and then handed it over to Jessie.

  The video-conferencing app had been activated and Jessie found herself staring at a man sitting behind a desk in what was obviously a bank. He smiled when he saw her.

  “Hello Miss Noble. A pleasure to meet you. My name is Owens and I’ve been asked to tell you that ten thousand dollars has been deposited in an account in your name, accessible at any time after you set up a digital passcode for access purposes.”

  What the…? “You’re serious?”

  “I assure you, I’m quite serious.”

  Figuring she might be able to make an end run here, Jessie asked, “Where did the money come from?”

  Owens smiled again. “I’m sorry, Miss Noble, but I’m not at liberty to divulge that information. But if you call this number,” he said, holding up a piece of paper with a ten-digit number on it, “you can set-up access to your account and see the balance for yourself from any cell phone app or computer terminal.”

  She didn’t have either, but she didn’t see that as a major issue. She could always go to the library or something. Not that she was going to leave her money there for long; the minute she could withdraw it she full intended to do so. Something that just magically appeared could just as easily magically disappear, she thought, not knowing just how close to reality her thinking actually was.

  Jessie committed the number to memory, her thoughts whirling.

  “Will there by anything else, Miss Noble?”

  She glanced back down at Owens, then shook her head. He smiled – again! – and said, “I’m just a phone call away if you have any questions.” He rattled off a number and then ended the call with a quick, “Good day to you, then.”

  He reached out and disconnected the call, which caused the screen to go black.

  A bit stunned at it all, Jessie stood there for a moment, still staring at that blank screen, until Hautdesert reached out and reclaimed his phone.

  Ten thousand dollars. Sitting there in my name. Jesus!

  A thought occurred. “What’s to keep me from just walking off with that money and not showing up for the fight?”

  Her visitor shrugged. “Nothing. Though I would certainly advise against it.”

  For the first time since he’d entered the room, the man sounded…uncomfortable.

  Jessie considered pushing the issue, but then decided against it. Hautdesert had made Dex nervous without even trying. She didn’t want to know what he might do if he thought there was a chance that he’d be double-crossed.

  With that, there was only one question that hadn’t been answered yet.

  “When’s the fight?” she asked.

  “Thursday evening.”

  Thursday? That was only five days away! She’d never be ready…

  “Done,” she said.

  And then shook on it to seal the deal.

  7

  Ordinarily, five months wouldn’t have been enough to prepare for a fight like this. Five days was utterly ridiculous. Then again, these were not ordinary times, Jessie reminded herself. After all, the result wasn’t going to affect her record, even if she was knocked out in the first ten seconds, and that provided a certain freedom that her opponent wasn’t going to have. And of course there was the fact that the money was going to allow her to get out of that hovel she’d been living in and find someplace decent to live. That alone was incentive enough.

  She’d been fighting regularly for months now. Even if the matches weren’t against opponents of Dellacroix’s caliber, they were still fights, sometimes dangerous ones at that, and they served to keep her on her toes. Combined with her near-fanatical dedication to keeping her body in shape – a must given the drugs that she was pumping into her system on a regular basis – she felt like she was about as ready as she was going to get for the match to come.

  That didn’t mean she was going to sit on her ass and eat Bonbons for the next five days, however. After she’d agreed to the fight, she’d gotten Hautdesert to throw some cash in Dex’s direction in exchange for him giving her a key to the facility so she could work out there any time day or night. Dex’s place was only a couple of miles from her apartment, so she took to working out there twice a day, once in the morning and once in the late evening after the fights were done for the night. She’d jog to the facility, go through her workout routine, focusing primarily on speed training and cardio, not wanting to exhaust her muscles in the days before the fight, and then she’d end the session by jogging back to her place again.

  The routine worked well for the first three nights before the fight.

  On the fourth, t
hings got a little odd.

  Jessie pushed herself pretty hard at Dex’s that night, wanting one last workout before the fight, and was feeling the effects as she set off for home. She kept to a steady pace, but didn’t try to push it.

  No sense in rushing. I’ll get there when I get there.

  The streets around Dex’s place weren’t very busy. The traffic, both vehicular and pedestrian, was slim, even on the main drag a block over. She stuck to the less-traveled byways, enjoying the evening air and the steady rhythm of her feet pounding the pavement. Dressed in dark sweats and a hoodie, she imagined herself a shadow passing through the night’s darkness and for the first time in years began to feel a sense of hope that the dark days of the past might at last be behind her.

  She’d covered about half the distance to her apartment when she stopped for a moment for a quick rest. She paced in a circle on the corner, hands on her hips, sucking air into her lungs in long, slow breaths, and then spent a few moments bending over and stretching a kink out of her left leg.

  As she straightened, she glanced at the storefront beside her and was surprised to see her reflection staring back at her from the glass. She took a few steps closer, studying herself, noting the sharp lines and angles of her face and the way her eyes seemed to have sunken deeper into their sockets than she’d noticed in the past.

  Whether she wanted to admit it to herself or not, the drugs were taking their toll and in a rare moment of introspection she wondered just how much longer she was going to be able to keep it up. It had been awhile since she’d had a hallucination of any kind; perhaps it was time to take a break? See if the chemical imbalance or whatever the fuck it was that as causing the shit had managed to work itself out? This fight could prove to be the opportunity she’d been waiting for to get her life back on track. She’d have the cash to get a better place, and start training regularly again. With a new sponsor and the right strategy, she might even get things lined up for a comeback of some kind or another.

  She stared deep into her eyes and said softly, “Well, what do you think? Can we do this thing or not?”

  The last thing she was expecting was any kind of response, so when the edges of her reflection began to glow, softly at first and then brighter, she stepped back, her mouth open in surprise.

  Another figure slowly swam into view behind her own reflection. The warrior was tall and broad-shouldered, with long blonde hair and a beard to match. He wore an armored breastplate with the symbol of a two-headed eagle emblazoned upon it, the image partially obscured with a splash of what looked to Jessie to be dried blood.

  The man’s focus shifted, as if noticing her for the first time, and Jessie felt a shock of recognition pass through her as their gazes met; yet she was equally certain that the two of them had never been in the same room together. The guy looked like he’d stepped out of the pages of a fantasy novel, for heaven’s sake!

  And yet so real, so solid did he appear that she was suddenly overcome with the sense that he was standing right behind her, just as he was in the glass, and she spun around, certain she’d find him standing there.

  The street behind her was empty, of course.

  She spun back around and was just in time to watch the man’s image fade from view.

  “Fuck!”

  She had to resist the urge to smash the glass with her fist; it seemed her thoughts of having maybe gotten past all this shit were premature. At least this hallucination hadn’t frightened the shit out of her, the way they usually did. Which was good, because with the fight coming up so quickly she couldn’t afford to dose up again and risk screwing up the first genuine break that she’d had in years. She was just going to have to tough this one out and hope for the best.

  Still cursing beneath her breath, she turned to get underway again and in the process happened to glance back the way she had come.

  To her surprise she noted three figures coming down the street toward her. They were in the middle of the street, about two dozen yards behind her. Because the lights from the buildings lining the road didn’t reach far enough into the street, the trio was lost in shadow, making it hard for her to get a good look.

  Something about them didn’t feel right though and Jessie had long ago learned to trust her instincts.

  She turned and began walking in the direction she’d been going moments earlier, not wanting to look frightened by the knowledge that they were behind her. There was no telling what they’d do if they thought they had an easy mark. She concentrated on listening for sounds of pursuit and chanced a look behind her when she’d gotten about fifty feet further down the road.

  The trio was still back there and now Jessie was picking up a definite sense of danger from them, a feeling that was confirmed when they visibly picked up the pace after realizing they’d been spotted. From Jessie’s perspective, it looked like they were trying to close the distance as quickly as possible without breaking into a run.

  She, on the other hand, had no such reservations. She’d been out on the streets long enough to recognize trouble when she saw it. She might know how to handle herself against an opponent in the ring, but taking on three unknown individuals at the same time, especially when she didn’t know if they were armed or what their intentions might be, seemed the height of foolishness.

  Time to get the heck out of here!

  All thought of the figure she’d seen in the glass vanished as she picked up the pace, the slap of her sneakers against the pavement making it clear that she wasn’t waiting around to see what the newcomers wanted.

  Behind her, the trio gave chase.

  Jessie picked up the pace, cutting left down a side street when the opportunity arose and then taking a hard right when she reached the next intersection. She kept changing course, hoping that in the process she’d either lose her pursuers or lead them out onto a busier thoroughfare where they’d be less likely to attempt anything untoward.

  So far, no luck; they seemed to be gaining on her in fact.

  Pushing herself harder, Jessie ran on.

  She spotted an alley half-hidden in the shadows of an overhanging fire escape a half-dozen yards ahead. Her pursuers still hadn’t rounded the last corner, so she took a chance and cut into the alley, hoping like hell it wasn’t a dead-end.

  It was, as it turned out, but not in the way she expected.

  She managed to get halfway down the length of the alley and just as she started to think she might just get away from her pursuers, something stepped into view ahead of her, blocking her way forward and forcing her to come to a skidding halt.

  At first, her mind refused to make sense of what she was seeing; balking perhaps at the impossibility of it all. The thing stood twelve, maybe fifteen feet tall, looming over her on legs that resembled two massive tree trunks, each one so thick around that if she’d been foolish enough to wrap her arms around one of them her fingers wouldn’t have been able to touch on the other side. Half-a-dozen tentacles, each a good twenty feet in length and at least six inches in circumference extended from a torso that was topped, in turn, by dozens of smaller ones. The latter were whipping about in agitation, twisting and turning and writhing around one another like an angry hive.

  She didn’t see any eyes on the thing – where the hell would they go anyway? – but she had no doubt that it could see her, a notion that was proven correct when the creature took a step forward and shrieked out a challenge that echoed off the buildings on either side of the narrow confines of the alley.

  It seemed so real…

  Maybe it was her new-found purpose. Maybe it was just the simple fact that logic told her that nothing like that thing in front of her could possibly exist in the middle of an alley in Los Angeles at night.

  Either way, it didn’t really matter.

  Jessie had had enough.

  “Fuck you, you ugly bastard!” she shouted at it, jabbing a finger in its direction. “You’re not real! You’re nothing but a figment of my imagination and I’m not going to
let you rule my life any longer!”

  Full of righteous purpose, Jesse strode confidently forward, determined to show her own mind just who was boss.

  She’d barely taken five steps forward, however, before one of the thing’s many tentacles lashed out, quick as a whip, and wrapped itself around her mid-section.

  The thick stench of sulphur and fish guts filled her nostrils and Jessie could feel the suckers on the underside of the tentacle trying to lash onto her through her clothing. Revulsion filled her as she shoved her hands against the tentacle, trying to push it away and free herself, but it was far too strong.

  In the next instant, it snatched her off her feet.

  “Fuck me,” she breathed as the beast lifted her ten feet off the pavement and swung her around like a child’s toy, the tentacle whipping back and forth, rattling more than just her teeth in the process. She caught a glimpse of her pursuers standing at the entrance to the alley. They took one look at what was happening and turned tail to run, a sight that ordinarily would have filled her with relief but which only made the whole situation in which she found herself even more surreal. Her mind fought with the reality that her body was experiencing even as she struggled to free herself from the grip of something out of a nightmare.

  She placed both hands against the tentacle that held her in its grip and shoved with all her might, trying to loosen its hold on her enough that she could drop to the ground below, but the more she pushed the tighter its hold became. Air was being forced out of her lungs with every passing second and it wasn’t long before her vision started to grey around the edges.

  If she blacked out she was a goner; her “hallucination” would suffocate her to death before she could get free!

  She stopped pushing and began pounding her fists against the rough flesh of the thing holding her instead, hoping to hit a vital spot but to no avail.

  Finally, in a fit of desperation, she bent her head forward and bit savagely into the thing’s flesh, sinking her teeth into the cold, damp flesh, clenching her jaw, and yanking her head backward with everything she had left.