Promise of Wrath (The Hellequin Chronicles Book 6)

by Steve McHugh

  “Come on, then,” I said. “You wanted to do this when you thought I was just some nobody you could threaten and hurt.”

  “This isn’t worth it.” He looked behind him, giving me the opportunity to dash forward and grab his wrist, twisting it until he released the blade.

  “You should have taken my advice,” I told him, releasing his hand before getting a better hold and throwing him into the wall behind me.

  “Get up,” I said, my rage bubbling over as the man got back to his feet.

  I hit him in the stomach with everything I had, knocking the air out of him and causing him to crumple to the ground. I picked him up and slammed his back against the wall. I hit him in the jaw, snapping his head to the side, but I kept hold of him to stop him from falling to the ground again.

  “You picked the wrong person,” I told him and hit him again.

  “Sorry,” he said through his ruined mouth, dribbling blood down his chin.

  “Fuck your sorry!” I snapped and smashed my forearm into his nose.

  He dropped to his knees, his eyes no longer capable of focusing on me. He needed a hospital—all four of them did—but I was in no hurry to get any of them attended to. They’d decided to hurt me and come off the worse for it, but the fight hadn’t made me feel better. Hurting four humans who were unaware of who I was, and were certainly ill-equipped to fight me, was no way for me to release the anger inside.

  I picked up a mobile phone that must have fallen from one of my attackers’ pockets and dialed 999, telling the operator to send a police car to this address as there was a group with weapons, threatening people. I dropped the phone onto the now-semiconscious man. Let the police decide if they required medical attention. I had better things to do.

  I was soon driving through London once again, looking for a suitable place to bed down for the night. I eventually found myself at the Savoy Hotel in Covent Garden, and after checking myself for blood, walked up to the reception and asked for a room with a large bed. They had a few available, so I passed over my credit card and they handed me a room key.

  I went back to the car first, removed a spare bag I kept in the boot, and took it up to my room, emptying the contents onto the king-size bed. It contained a change of jeans, some underwear and socks, and several T-shirts. There was also a black hoodie, some deodorant, mouthwash, and soap: everything I might need. A second pair of shoes was still in the car, along with my spare jacket. There were no weapons of any kind in the bag, mostly because on the odd chance the human police pulled me over for something, it’s much easier to explain why there’s deodorant in the boot than why you have a small arsenal.

  I took a shower, which did little for my mood, and once dried and dressed, I switched on my phone, discovering a lot of messages from Remy, Tommy, Kasey, and Olivia, all of whom were concerned about me and wanted to know where I was. I hated not telling them, but I didn’t need their help, nor did I want it. I explained to Tommy via text that this was something I needed to do alone and would be in contact soon. Sooner or later Tommy, at the least, would come looking for me, if he wasn’t already on the way, but I had a while before they tracked my number plate or credit card, and I hoped the text would give me a few more hours to find Kay.

  It took me until the early hours of the morning, but I eventually drifted off in a fitful sleep, and was woken by the vibration of my phone from an alarm I’d set to go off at half nine in the morning. I swung my legs out of the bed and stretched. Time to go to work.

  CHAPTER 4

  I threw on a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and my hoodie, putting on my trainers before I left the room, making sure I had the key with me. I jogged the hallway to the lifts, trying not to break immediately into a sprint. It wouldn’t do me much good to let my emotions get the better of me.

  Once outside the hotel, I took off at a run toward the Southbank. There was a possibility it would have been quicker to drive, but with London traffic, there was also a good chance I’d be no closer to my destination in the short time it would take me to run.

  I was at Blackfriars Bridge within a few minutes. I didn’t want to use my air magic to increase my speed as I wanted all of my magic available to me. Kay was an evil little sociopath, but he wasn’t stupid, and his taunts for me to come after him in London weren’t the words of someone without a plan. Either Kay had a way to counter my magic, or he had an ally to do it for him.

  I walked across the bridge at a brisk pace, but was only about halfway across when I first wondered what I was going to do when I got hold of Kay. What was my plan for taking him down in broad daylight on a busy summer day? I looked around me and saw kids with families, large groups of schoolchildren, all among those just out for a pleasant day in London. I needed to be able to neutralize Kay quickly, without fuss, and without him being able to hurt anyone else.

  By the time I’d reached the end of the bridge I’d decided that the best way was to watch Kay and follow him somewhere less open. I could sate my anger while I waited for my chance. He was clearly going to be expecting my arrival, and I really didn’t want to make my presence known until I was ready.

  Once off the bridge I followed the path toward the Tate Modern art gallery, blending in with the large crowds until I spotted Kay sitting on a bench by the entrance. I moved down a nearby path, hoping to be able to circle around him and put myself somewhere he wouldn’t be able to recognize me. At that exact moment, Kay turned toward me, smiled, and waved.

  He took off like a rocket, sprinting toward the Millennium Bridge, barging past anyone in his way. I ran after him, avoiding people as best I could. I was just over halfway across the bridge when I saw Kay only a dozen feet ahead. He grabbed hold of a young girl, picked her up off the ground, and winked at me. I took another step forward, and he tossed her over the side of the bridge as if she were nothing.

  The bridge railings were only a few feet high, and were easy to vault, using magic from my outstretched hand to try to slow the fall of the young girl as she screamed in terror.

  Using air magic to slow the movement of someone when both people are on solid ground is hard enough; doing it while both of you are falling through the air is exceptionally difficult. More than once I managed to slow her down only to have the magic slip past her. But on the third try, I wrapped tendrils of air around her and a microsecond later I caught her. I immediately stuck out my hand, throwing air toward the bridge railings forty yards above my head. The magic wrapped around one of the supports and I hardened it in an instant, yanking my shoulder out of its socket, and swinging me and the still-screaming girl down closer to the water only a few feet below us. Another quick blast of air magic sped up the swing, until I released the magic and we sailed through the sky, landing on the bridge with a thud.

  Dozens of people stood around us as the young girl, who I now saw was no older than five or six, got to her feet.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  “You’re like Spiderman!” she said with a mixture of awe and fear.

  “Except for the webs and spandex, just like him, yeah,” I said with a forced smile.

  “Emily! Emily!” a young man and woman shouted as they forced themselves through the crowd, wrapping themselves around their daughter the second they saw her. The woman looked up at me as I got back to my feet. “Thank you,” she said softly.

  I nodded as the sounds of people asking, “How did he do that?” began to reach my ears. It wouldn’t be long before people stopped whispering and actually started demanding answers. Answers I had no time or inclination to give.

  “Thank you,” Emily said as her dad hugged me, causing my arm to hurt again.

  “Take care of yourself,” I told her and started running up toward St. Paul’s Cathedral, tracking Kay’s last known movement. My arm was slowing me down. I could wait for my magic to heal me, which it was bound to do soon enough, but I needed my arm now, not in an hour. Healing is always quicker if the bone or joint is set first. I walked over to the nearest solid wa
ll and slammed my shoulder back into its socket. The pain was intense but brief, and I was soon running back toward the cathedral, hoping I hadn’t lost Kay’s trail.

  I stood opposite the cathedral and tried to figure out where he might have gone. I stared past crowded streets in a hope I’d spot him, and was rewarded with a glimpse of him getting into a dark-blue Volkswagen Golf. He saw me and waved before setting off along Cannon Street at a much more leisurely pace. Traffic in London isn’t exactly the best for a quick getaway.

  I took a step after him and stopped. I was angry—furious—both at Francis’s murder, and the fact that Kay was the man responsible, but I was acting like an idiot. I was charging in headfirst without a plan other than to crush those who opposed me. It had been something I’d been doing a lot of since I’d decided to bring back the Hellequin name: using brute force and wits to overcome enemy traps I willingly and arrogantly knew might eventually get me killed. I wasn’t going to do this with Kay; I couldn’t. He wasn’t some witch with delusions of grandeur, or a werewolf challenging me to a fight. Kay was someone who had serious power, and he was no slouch in battle.

  I put my hand in my pocket as the Volkswagen vanished from view and removed the micro-SD card I’d found at Francis’s. I jumped in a taxi and took the cab back to my hotel room. Kay would be incensed that I’d ignored his plan and gone my own way, but that was Kay’s problem.

  I’d wanted to show everyone that there was nothing I feared, that there was no obstacle too powerful for me to overcome, but that wasn’t going to work this time. I wasn’t going to be able to walk into Kay’s trap with the assurance that I’d walk out again in one piece. He had powerful allies, but so did I.

  I called Diane.

  “Nate. I heard you’re in London,” she said upon answering.

  “Hello to you too.”

  “No bullshit, Nate. What’s going on? Tommy has been calling every ten minutes looking for you. He’s driving up here. Apparently he gave up trying to get hold of you and decided I was the next-best contact.”

  I explained about Kay, Francis’s murder, and my run through London.

  “And you didn’t come to someone about this because . . . ?” she asked when I was done.

  “I’m an idiot?” I suggested.

  “Bingo. What do you need and where do you need it?”

  “I need to find Kay. He’s in London, and I have no idea what his plan is, beyond killing me.”

  “You think he’ll go after someone else?”

  “It’s possible. Not sure who, though. I doubt it’s you, unless he’s going up against Brutus.”

  “I doubt he’s lost all of his sanity since you last saw him, so I’m probably out.”

  “Okay. Who else is in London?”

  “Some of the Mesopotamians are in town. They’re helping with that exhibit in the British Museum. They got Brutus’s okay before they started sending pieces.”

  “Who?”

  “Irkalla and Nabu.”

  “Where are they staying?”

  “In the Aeneid.”

  The Aeneid was a five-hundred-foot-tall building near the center of London. It was designed to look imposing and inviting at the same time, and it served as Brutus’s place to live and work, along with hundreds of others. Diane also lived there as Brutus’s head of security, so if Irkalla and Nabu were there, then they were probably safe.

  “The Fates?” I suggested, not really believing that even Kay would want to start going up against Brutus, who was responsible for their protection.

  The Fates were, in fact, three related psychics who had been forced to undergo a ritual that allowed them to see either a person’s past, present, or future. The oldest, Cassandra, was the daughter of King Priam of Troy, and the other two Fates were her daughter, Grace, and granddaughter, Ivy. The latter had once been in Mordred’s company for several decades, if not longer, as he tried to harness the power of the Fates for himself.

  With the discovery of Mordred’s return several months ago, I was worried that he might try to get back to old habits and go after the Fates. The possibility of Mordred being involved in whatever Kay had planned wasn’t something I’d wanted to consider, although the sudden thought now made it impossible to consider anything else.

  After I’d managed to save the Fates from Mordred’s grasp, I’d left them in London, and asked Diane to keep an eye on them. They were powerful beings, and I didn’t want them to fall into the hands of someone like Mordred ever again. They mostly lived in the Aeneid, but left a few times a week to tend to their bookstore.

  “They’re at their bookstore today and yesterday. You think Kay would really go after them?” She sounded as convinced of the idea as I was. “There’s a round-the-clock protection detail on them. You’d need an army. I checked in with them an hour ago, and all was fine.”

  “I’ll go check it out anyway. Can you let your people know I’m coming?”

  “Can do. You want me to meet you there?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “I’ve told Tommy to come straight here, to the Aeneid. He’s got Kasey and Remy with him at least. I heard them in the background. Remy sounded thrilled about your disappearing act. I’ll meet you at the Fates’ bookstore in an hour.”

  “I’m going to head right over then. If the Fates are okay, hopefully they can shed some light on what Kay’s doing. Either way, it’s a worthwhile trip.”

  “They need to be in proximity to him to do that, don’t they?”

  “It’s not like my ideas are in abundance.”

  “Obviously. Otherwise you’d never have run off like an impatient toddler.”

  I winced. “You’re not going to let that go, are you?”

  “Depends if you stop being an idiot or not.”

  “I deserved that. I’ll see you in an hour. Just make sure your guys know I’m coming. I really don’t want to be shot trying to knock on their door.”

  “That actually might be entertaining.”

  I knew she was grinning, but I wasn’t in the mood for much frivolity. “Diane!”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll make sure. Don’t get all pissy with me. Just be careful. If Kay has a plan for the Fates, you’d better believe he won’t want you there.”

  She hung up and I removed the micro-SD card from my pocket, placing it in my phone and opening the video file it contained. For a moment I thought it was going to be another film of Francis being murdered, planted there by Kay to screw with me, but instead it was just Francis in front of a camera.

  “Hi, Nate, it’s been a while.” He ran his hand through his long hair, and adjusted his eye patch. “I’m hoping you got this okay.” He paused. “That’s stupid, if you hadn’t gotten this, you’d never have seen it. Okay, scrap that.”

  He looked upset, tense, as if something was bothering him but he was unsure how to get the words out.

  “There are some things you need to know. And I’m a coward and can’t tell you to your face, so it’s going to be done like this. I have no idea how you’re going to react—angrily, I imagine. But I’ve kept this for a long time, and I can’t keep it to myself anymore.

  “When you last saw me, I asked you to do three jobs for me—that they would make us even. Well, I remove that burden from you. We’re more even than you can possibly imagine.”

  I sighed and wondered if Francis was ever going to get to the point.

  “I knew who you were—the whole time. I told you I had no idea who you were, but it was a lie. I knew, Hellequin.”

  The knowledge hit me like a truck. Ten years of lying to my face, of keeping me in the dark.

  “You’re probably furious with me, and rightly so, but I didn’t do it for personal gain. When I found you, I knew that second who you were; I’d seen you before with Brutus. So, I went to him and he told me to keep it silent—to not tell you anything, or tell anyone else that you were there—that you were alive. He was worried that whoever had tried to kill you—Mordred, as it turned out—would continue
the search for you, would still try to finish the job. It was a fear that was well founded, as that was exactly what happened. Brutus knew that Ares and Mordred were working for Hera in his city; he’d allowed it, after all, and he wanted to know if Hera was planning on trying to invade London. He was scared of it; terrified, in fact. He was even more terrified of the idea that you were the precursor to it all. So I kept your identity secret, asking you to go on jobs to steal for me, keeping up that pretense while I hoped one day your memory would just come back to you on its own, that it would absolve me of having to worry about it.

  “I’m sorry for that, Nate. But there’s more. I think Brutus is under attack again: a more subtle attack this time.”

  Brutus was the king of London. He was in charge of the whole city, and while he allowed humans to go about their daily lives, the nonhumans were bound to treat him with the respect he commanded. He was powerful and dangerous, but his position was not without its own concerns. Chief among those was the idea that someone would want to take his position from him. And if I was honest, I could think of no one more dangerous to have in charge of London than Hera. London would be a very deadly place for anyone she considered an enemy. Me included.

  I pushed the thought aside and went back to watching the video.

  “I know you must just think ‘Screw them all’ for what we did to you, but I think Brutus needs your help. Diane and the others are all sure nothing is happening, but Brutus? He’s tense, concerned. I’ve never seen him like it.”

  Francis closed his eyes and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly.

  “I think Jerry is up to something, too. I’m not sure if he’s working against me, or whether it’s anything more specific than a gut feeling, but something is wrong there. Laurel sees it, but refuses to acknowledge it—refuses to do anything about it. But she’s scared of him. I can see it in her eyes. He spends less and less time here. He’s gone for days—weeks—with no word, and when he comes back, he’s changed. He’s more intense. I’m not a powerful vampire, no matter how many I’ve sired, but I can sense when something is wrong. And he’s going through something. He needs help, and won’t ask for it. I’m hoping you could come here and talk to him. I know I’m asking a lot for you to come here, to see Brutus too, but I know you, Nate. You always try to do the right thing, even if it’s not very nice. And I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.”