Probably not a prayer circle.
There was silver everywhere. Fucking everywhere. Swords of it. Maces with heads of silver, with spikes of silver for added effect. Knives made of solid silver, or steel blades edged with silver. A female vampire by the far wall had a glove — gauntlet, if it’s a metal glove it’s a gauntlet — made of silver, sharp edges and needle points. It looked nasty, not just because it was made of silver. Or the vampire looked nasty. Or both.
Some of the vampires looked familiar. One especially so. Jeremy.
“Sup,” said Jeremy. He was standing on the other side of the room, looking like he’d just come through the door there. He was covered in blood and gore but none of it looked like it had come out of him. He didn’t seem to be carrying anything made of silver.
“In the middle of some important wolf stuff,” said Val. Jeremy here, alone, was bad—
Where is our mate?
—because Danny was supposed to be with him. “Aren’t you with the evac team? Is Danny okay?” Val took a step forward, and the vampire holding John gave him a cautionary shake. Val stopped.
“She’s fine,” said Jeremy. He looked around the room. “Looks like everyone’s here.”
“You know this … thing?” said the vampire holding John. He was looking at Jeremy as he said it.
“The dude you’re holding, or the dude who kicked the door in?” said Jeremy.
The vampire holding John looked at John, then at Val, then back at Jeremy. “Both.”
“Dude you’re holding is an extra in the action game of life,” said Jeremy. “I know him.”
“The werewolf?”
“He’s a werewolf,” said Jeremy. “Look, Anatolie, I’ve come for a chat.”
“You are in no position to make demands,” said Death.
“Kaylan,” said Jeremy. “Been a while. Look, I know you don’t grok people so well, so here’s a thing. I haven’t made any demands.”
“But—”
“It’s cool, demands are coming,” said Jeremy, winking at her. He looked at Val. “Did you come in here with any sort of plan?”
“I was going to kill everyone,” said Val, shrugging. “Seemed the right thing to do.”
“It’s a good outline,” said Jeremy.
There was a rumble from above, and everyone looked up. A moment later, the roof blasted in in a shower of rubble. Death’s sword, blade so pale you could see through it, was stuck blade-first in the floor, vibrating slightly in the shaft of light from above. Kaylan reached for the hilt and took up her sword. “I think I will take the first option. I am Death itself.” She held her pale sword in one hand. She swept the blade to point at Val. “I will take you up first.”
Volk pushed past Val. He hefted Stroke, then slammed the blade into the ground. “Nyet,” he said. He looked back at Val. “Next part is very important. Very. Do you understand?”
“No,” said Val.
“What you must do—” said Volk, and then Kaylan was on him. She came across the room in a beam of pale light, latching on to Volk with one hand. Pale wings, softer than moonlight, were at her back, and she lifted Volk off the ground. Her sword—
Ending. That blade is called Ending.
—Ending was held up and behind her, ready for the strike. Everyone started moving, running and screaming and yelling. Carlisle was already moving towards Adalia, the two vampires in front of her running to meet her. Rex was at her side, a step or two behind. Val knew they were outclassed, that they couldn’t win—
Believe in our Pack.
—but knew they were the best choice for an impossible job. He turned, started sprinting towards John, ducking under the fight above him as Kaylan and Volk wrestled in the air. She was screaming at him, and he was changing, turning from man to the thing they shared, the thing that was both more and less than a man. Volk had sunk claws into her in turn, and they were moving around the room through the air, borne up by Kaylan’s pale wings.
Val arrived at John and Anatolie as the vampire was baring fangs. Val grabbed at the creature, wrenching him free of John, kicked the back of Anatolie’s knee to make the vampire stumble. Anatolie shattered into a thousand locusts, and reformed ten paces away. He snatched up a silver sword, the blade long and thin. Great. These fuckers are fast, and he’s got the fastest possible sword you can imagine.
“Yo,” said John. “Good timing. Do your thing.”
Val gave a tight nod, lunging after Anatolie. The vampire was quick, like liquid light, moving from place to place. Val jumped and turned and ran after, always a step behind. Each time he paused, Anatolie would land a hit — a lash against his face, a cut with the swords razor tip against his leg. Each time, the cut burned like fire, pure pain, and he bled more. Not healing as the silver tore and jabbed and stabbed at him, over, and over, and over again.
Faster.
He picked up a chair, threw it, and the vampire dodged. Another vampire, the female with the silver gauntlet, snapped at him, and he wrestled with her — avoid the damn metal — and threw her at Anatolie. She dissolved mid-air into a locust swarm, the cloud coalescing somewhere behind him. Still with the gauntlet.
Rex was wrestling with a vampire, and it looked bored. Rex was putting everything into it, but it was like watching a five year old try to bend a steel bar. Carlisle was caught up by another, and it brought lips in to kiss her neck, and Val could see it almost smile. Almost, as the Eagle dipped under its chin. It bit down, and Carlisle was screaming, and then the Eagle roared, and roared, and roared, and the top of the vampire’s head was gone. Dropping Carlisle like a used rag. She didn’t get up. The vampire playing with Rex saw this, reared back to strike Rex, and there was a massive shot, and another, and another, and huge holes appeared in its head, its shoulder, and its chest as it fell back. Val saw Jessie on one knee, the barrel of her Light Fifty smoking. Adalia was at Carlisle’s side and screaming no, no, no over and over.
Kaylan was smashing Volk against the ceiling, but the werewolf seemed to not notice, snarling and snapping at her. It managed to get its feet under — or is that above — it, bracing against the roof the next time she tried. Put a massive claw around Kaylan’s throat, and with a roar threw her at the ground. She landed in a spray of stone, but Volk had launched himself after her as soon as he’d thrown her. Almost like gravity didn’t matter. He landed on her, the stone under her cracking, lines spreading out from the impact. He bent down, biting deep, and tearing. Tearing at Death’s shell.
Anatolie was back at John’s side, hefting Val’s friend up. Val found himself standing, panting, by Stroke. Anatolie looked at him, shook John, and gave a mocking smile. Drew back teeth. Jeremy was by Volk, moving like a dot of calm in the ocean’s storm, fangs bared, and was about to lean in, to bite … Volk.
Father. He is our maker.
Val couldn’t make it to either of them in time, but with the right weapon … he could save one. Could see the look on John’s face that said it’s cool, you can’t save the world with me, so make the smart choice, and the look on Jeremy’s face that said nothing but hunger and loss and endless torment.
What had Volk meant to say? He had wanted to say something about what was coming next. What was important. That he had a plan.
Blinding, crippling pain made of pure fire stabbed through him, and he looked at a hand coming out through his chest. The female vampire, behind him. Silver gauntlet punched through his chest. Val choked on blood. Felt his strength stutter like a broken machine. Time, though, for one last act. Val’s hand was on Stroke, the sword lifted as if it weighed no more than air. Born of strength of desperation, he made the only choice he could. The choice that was the smart one.
He threw the sword at Anatolie, the vampire sliced in half as the big blade turned end over end across the room. Save John. Because the smart choice was always the right choice, and the right choice was his friend, his real family. And damn the world. And then he fell to the floor, strength spent.
Jeremy’s fangs b
it into Volk’s neck, the blood spraying out. The werewolf howled, and shrank, and emptied, until there was a weakened, naked man. Maksimillian Kotlyarov, at the end of things, nothing more than a dying man.
Adalia was screaming, and tried to run to Volk’s side. Rex was holding her, holding her back from the edge of danger, or madness, or both, and Adalia was still screaming and trying to break free.
Jeremy’s head came up with a gasp and he took a deep breath. Blood ran down from his mouth, and he licked his lips.
“Dragomir Balan, you are my good friend, da?” said Volk, eyes up at Jeremy, before looking at Val. “This is plan.” He laughed, and coughed.
Jeremy clapped Volk on the shoulder. “This, my Russian friend, is a motherfucking plan.”
“I have small regret.” Volk looked at Val. “Regret is not killing Maynor Coen again. Please, do for me.” Then he leaned back, and Jeremy sank fangs in again. Volk’s eyes moved to Adalia, and he said something so soft and quiet only Val could hear. He said, “Moya lyubov' moya zhizn'.” And then said nothing else ever again, as Jeremy drank until Volk was dead.
Kaylan was rising from the floor, moving on broken limbs. She tried to claw at Jeremy, but the vampire stepped away.
Val’s vision was fading. He was almost done, he knew it. Tried to get up anyway, slipped back to the ground, where the stone was cool, and things were quiet. He hadn’t saved the world this time. The most important time, but that was okay, because Danny was still there, and she would get it done, and Adalia would be free, and John would make it out, and Carlisle would make sure they were all safe. He blinked.
“Dragomir,” said Kaylan, “what have you done?”
“I’ve gone and fucked everything up for you,” said Jeremy. “Absolutely, completely, totally everything.” He laughed, then coughed, and spat blood. “You made me first, but you didn’t ask. You took me, and then you made me kill my family. You and Maynor. You came to me. Do you remember?” He nudged Volk’s body with a toe. “You made him — through me — kill his family. It was only right that the two of us kill your family. Bring a virus here, that causes blood to explode.” He coughed again, his nose streaming red. “I needed him to get her—” and here, he nodded at Adalia, “—in here. To … see to you. I could have stood in the sun at any time, you know? But you need to be fixed, Kaylan. You’re broken.”
“No,” said Kaylan, then, “NO!”
Jeremy looked at Adalia, who was still crying. “I—” he stopped, coughed again, and then sagged to his knees. He gave a shrill scream, and then his eyes melted in their sockets as the virus Volk had carried all these years did its work. His chest sagged under its own weight, and all the blood in him dissolved, gushing out to the ground. The vampire above Val started screaming, then she tumbled into a red shower of chunks. There were other screams, of terror, and agony, and loss, as all the vampires under Jeremy—
Dragomir. The First.
—died. It was enough.
Val closed his eyes.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SEVEN
No, no, no, no. No.
Melissa was on the ground, and her heart wasn’t beating. Adalia could see it through the Other Place: There wasn’t anything left in her. Val was on the floor, and he was dying. Adalia heard a sound, a kind of keening, or a wail, or a cry, and realized it was coming from inside her. She was making the noise, and she couldn’t stop.
She wished Mary were here. Except Mary was made up, she wasn’t real, and what was real was Death, right there.
Maks was also real, and he was also dead. There, on the ground. And he’d said my love, my life, and then he’d died. She didn’t know what she felt about that, but the noise coming out of her was related to that, and that made it harder to stop.
Uncle John was next to her, and his eyes were sad. Like all of him hurt but he couldn’t let it out. He put a hand on Adalia’s shoulder, then reached down and picked up Melissa’s gun. Melissa, who wouldn’t be empty and gone, except that the universe had made her into a Shield, and being a Shield had brought her here and thrown her at vampires and she died.
Uncle John was walking towards Kaylan, who was standing up, and he lifted Melissa’s big gun, pointing it at Kaylan’s head. His hand was shaking.
Kaylan smiled at him. “You can’t kill Death, John Miles.”
“I don’t know,” said Uncle John. “What if I shoot you a few times and see how it makes both of us feel?”
“What if,” said Kaylan, “I brought my sister here? What if you saw her now?” Her smile was bitter, her face angry.
“Liselle?” said Uncle John.
Adalia heard it through the Other Place. Kaylan said Sister, come. Nothing happened for a second or two, then the ceiling ruptured inward, stones as big as chairs and small as pebbles showering the room. Adalia covered her eyes against the dust, blinking to clear her vision. There they were: Death and Famine, next to each other. And it was Famine and not Liselle this time, nothing soft left in her. Terrible, and beautiful, and not human, not at all human. Not anymore.
Famine looked around the room. Nudged Jeremy with her Louboutins, then leaned on her sword, like she was leaning on the edge of midnight. “They all lie. And they must all end. We should have done it two thousand years ago. Not with vampires. We were each given power over a quarter of the Father’s Eden. We were told to kill by famine and to kill by plague.” She tapped a manicured nail against the black blade. “We were to kill by the sword.”
“And you said no,” said Kaylan. “You let the words of our friend cloud your purpose, instead of letting his death confirm it.”
“We weren’t,” said Liselle, sparing Uncle John a look, “made to love.”
“Baby?” said Uncle John.
“I’m not your ‘baby,’” said Liselle. She hefted her sword. “You are a tiny, feeble thing, and your time has come.”
Uncle John’s face went blank, but his eyes looked more hurt. Adalia wanted to hug him, or make this go away. But these were the Riders, and she was … well she was just a person, and she couldn’t make them do what she wanted. She wasn’t strong enough, and they’d hit her on the head and now she was believing in people who didn’t exist, like Mary. All of this was because Adalia hadn’t been using the Other Place. Because when she did, people died. She couldn’t win, because people died either way. She didn’t want this power, she just wanted to be Adalia, having coffee with Mary.
You just need courage, Adalia. Not your mom’s courage, or Val’s, or Melissa’s. Just your own. Mary’s voice was soft in her ear, and she turned to look. There she was, in the Other Place. Just like Adalia had imagined her. Cheeks that dimpled when she smiled. Skin like dark honey. A ribbon in her hair. Adalia looked at her. She wanted to say it’s not that easy, but all that came out was sobs, because something in her chest hurt, and hurt, and kept on hurting. She looked at Melissa’s body, then back at Mary, as if to say see?
Your courage is to believe, said Mary.
Adalia believed. She did. She knew about a lot of crazy or weird or amazing things. The biggest of those was that someone as wonderful as Melissa would die for her. Because Melissa was strong and brave and smart and funny, and Adalia just made people get hurt. Melissa was amazing. More amazing than Horsepersons, or werewolves, or even vampires.
No, said Mary. You need to believe.
She wanted to say, I do, Mary. My failures are all really real! Mary, I believe in them. But her chest still hurt, and she couldn’t get the words out.
Mary leaned forward and whispered in Adalia’s ear, the tip of the Other Place brushing the side of Adalia’s skin. It almost tickled. My lover, said Mary, was a lot like you. A lot different too. But he didn’t believe. He made beautiful things, and the people around him became beautiful as well. But people are people, and some of those people that didn’t know him well came to fear him, and they killed him. Her face was sad, but it was a remembered pain from a long time ago. I think you would have found a lot to talk about. When you find you
rself, call me. You know how. I’d like to have that coffee. Then she was gone, like she’d never been there, because of course she hadn’t. But one last word was left. Believe.
Adalia realized no one else was moving. It was like time had stopped. Liselle’s sword was held out, pointed at Uncle John. Kaylan’s face was stretched into a terrible smile, almost a rictus, because she’d made her sister want to kill the one she loved. And what else was Death for? Like Jeremy had said — Adalia didn’t want to call him Dragomir, because he hadn’t been Dragomir for a long, long time — Kaylan was broken. But there weren’t any threads for Adalia to pull, nothing binding Kaylan or Liselle here. With them it was strength against strength, and Adalia was just a twenty year old woman with green hair and a broken heart.
She looked down at Melissa again, then at Uncle John. Oh. Okay. Maybe that would work. Adalia walked over to Liselle and touched her on the arm. The one that was holding Scourge, like she wanted to ram it through Uncle John. Adalia leaned in close, her lips next to Liselle’s ear, and said, “Liselle, I’d like to show you something.”
• • •
The earth was barren. Nothing would grow in it ever again. She had seen to that.
Liselle held Scourge in her hand and victory in her heart. Father’s Eden was finished, like it should have been. They had done their jobs, their eternal vigil rewarded. They had stood together, swords bared to the light, and then swept it all away. Not even roaches were left.
Still she came here. She didn’t know why. There was a stone sticking out of the blackened earth. It was a headstone, the last one standing in what had been a beautiful open space, grass once growing over it. A tree had stood just over there, its boughs shading anyone who’d come to sit for a time. Liselle hadn’t come to sit, or even to see it, because it was put there for humans, and the humans were to be killed. Like they had agreed. Like they were made for.
The Night's Champion Collection: A supernatural werewolf thriller trilogy Page 107
