I glanced at my companions, noting the tension in their necks and shoulders, and realized Othello was right. I took a deep, calming breath, trying to see things from the wolves’ perspective. Their pack was massive, but even they stood no chance against the Council’s retribution if they took on a Master in his territory to save a bunch of Regulars. It was total and utter bullshit, but it was also completely true. Power structures needed checks and balances, which is why duels like these had been established in the first place—otherwise the bloodshed would never end.
Which meant our survival hinged on Alucard winning.
Goodie.
Gunnar settled his massive paw on Alucard’s back and pushed him forward. “Go get ‘em, Glitterotti.”
Alucard rolled his eyes as he headed towards the center of the field. “Hah hah.” He stripped off his leather jacket and began rolling up the cuffs of his shirt, the red color stark against his pale skin and dark hair. “Same rules apply, right, Maggie?” Alucard called out. “I win, Othello and the girls are ours? We walk away?”
I could tell he was saying this more for Magnus’ men than Magnus himself; if Alucard won, Magnus would be dead. Still, it was necessary. If Magnus lost and the vampires took it on themselves to avenge him, the girls would be the first to die. This way, no one would be tempted to do something stupid.
Magnus’ eye twitched. “Of course. However, I’d like you to know that as soon as I’m done tearing out your throat, I’m going to execute the girls one at a time while Miss MacKenna and the ex-Shepherd watch. Then I’ll find out if either of them can last longer than Gladstone. He’s at fifteen days, and counting.”
“Always the threats with you people,” Alucard said, rolling his shoulders. “Let’s see what you’ve got, Mags.”
Chapter 43
The two vampires fought with such ferocity and speed that all I really caught were the blows themselves. Magnus, with his height and experience, clearly had the advantage in terms of close-quarters fighting. But what Alucard lacked in range, he made up for in tenacity; I watched him take a right hook to the face, only to gouge into Magnus’ forearm with his teeth a moment later, tearing at the bastard’s arm like a pit bull with a chew toy. By the time the Master shook him off, Alucard had a gob of flesh to spit out.
To be honest, I may have gagged a little.
Of course, Magnus didn’t seem to care nearly as much as I would have about missing three percent of his body; he sprung forward and landed a kick that sent Alucard listing sideways, then used his momentum to slam Alucard’s face into the dirt. Magnus held him there, his arms quivering with tension.
“Is that all you have, Daywalker?” Magnus ground out through clenched fangs.
Alucard snarled and spun, snatching Magnus’ wrists as he went, and ended up on top of the Master vampire. He fired punches, clipping Magnus’ face and tearing divots into the earth when he missed. Magnus laughed maniacally, blood marring his pale face.
“Better!” he yelled.
The Master vampire thrust his arms to either side and shot up, hovering nearly ten feet off the ground. Alucard lost his balance, slid off, and rolled back onto his feet. Magnus rotated slowly until he faced his adversary.
I glanced at my companions only to find that none of them seemed remotely surprised. The bastard was defying gravity—not to mention everything I’d ever learned in school about physics—and no one but me was the least bit shocked. I cursed, realizing I’d never really seen two vampires go at it—at least not at this level. What determined who had the upper hand? Was it age? The strength of the one who turned them? The quality and consistency of their diets?
I was seconds away from asking Roland when Magnus roared and flung himself at Alucard, clawed hands outstretched—but the Master vampire never reached him. Alucard, floating several feet in the air, had pierced through Magnus’ gut so forcefully that his arm had come out the other side, his fingers wet with blood and bile. He spun in slow circles, like a jewelry box ballerina.
A pale, bloody ballerina.
Who could fly.
“You aren’t the only one who figured out that trick, Maggie,” Alucard said, teeth bared.
Magnus grunted and coughed up blood, splattering it across Alucard’s shirt. “I wondered how strong you would be. The legendary Daywalker. And yet, still so much weaker than I had anticipated.”
Alucard frowned and yanked, drawing his hand out and leaving a gaping wound behind. The Master gasped and plummeted to the dirt. The fight, it seemed, was over. The crowd of vampires on the other side of the tent began murmuring amongst themselves.
Alucard landed next to Magnus’ limp body. “Your Master is through! Release—”
Magnus’ laughter interrupted Alucard’s command. Alucard spun, but not in time to avoid Magnus’ hand as it wrapped around his throat. Except it wasn’t Magnus at the other end.
Not really.
What had Alucard by the throat resembled Magnus the way an eagle resembles a sparrow. Sure, they were both birds. They both had wings and flew. But one was easily the better hunter, the faster flyer, with the longer, sharper beak.
Where Magnus once stood there was now an ungainly, bald figure with bat-like ears and thick, wide shoulders. His face was pockmarked and sunken, with row upon row of rat-like teeth, eyes beady. Black veins pulsed visibly beneath his skin—veins I’d seen before.
When he spoke, it was with Magnus’ voice, “You know, when Gladstone told me he was an alchemist, I confess I was more amused than anything.” The hand around Alucard’s throat began to squeeze and I saw what little color Alucard had begin to fade. “But then he tells me the legend of the Nosferatu. I’d heard this ridiculous myth before, obviously, but—come to find out—it was true all along. Vampires given alchemical potions created by wizards to augment their strength and appearance. To make them more frightening. Can you imagine? Those must have been dark times.”
“What time is it?” Gunnar asked in a hushed voice.
“Seriously?!” I hissed.
“It’s still too early for the sun to be up,” Othello said, ignoring me.
I frowned. Were they planning to fry all the vampires in attendance? I glanced at Roland, then Alucard, who was moments away from blacking out. It would solve the immediate problem, but unless we could get those two to safety, it wouldn’t make much difference. Roland, on the other hand, seemed to take to the idea.
“I think I can do something about that,” he growled. “Hold on.” The ex-Shepherd held out a hand and, high above us, a gateway began to form, its edges hemmed in blood. Then, before I knew it, a beam of pure, brutally bright sunlight shot out at an angle, hitting Alucard full in the face.
“Ye missed, ye idgit!” I shouted angrily.
Then something very fucking strange happened.
It seemed Roland hadn’t missed at all.
Because Alucard was a Daywalker.
And I was about to learn what that meant.
Chapter 44
Magnus fell back with a hiss, clutching his hand, which had gotten seared by the sunlight from Roland’s gateway. Even though it only came from one point, I still had to shield my eyes to see. “Where the fuck did ye find a sunlamp like that?” I asked.
“Egypt. The Gobi Desert.”
Gunnar chuckled. “That’s brilliant. This ought to be fun.”
“Fun?” I asked, whirling.
The Wolf King pointed. I followed his clawed finger, settled my hand above my eyes, and squinted in time to see Alucard rise. Remember when I compared Magnus’ transformation from a sparrow to an eagle? Well, Alucard’s was more like seeing a sparrow turn into a fucking phoenix. Or an angel.
Only, like, a proper angel, the kind I’d always wanted to see—a being made of fire and light, wings unfurled, eyes streaming flame, alien and breath-takingly beautiful.
I turned to Othello. She giggled at whatever my facial expression conveyed and nodded. “I told you not to be dazzled by him, didn’t I?”
“Aye. But I didn’t realize ye were bein’ literal,” I confessed.
“My children!” Magnus called, interrupting our conversation, his eyes wide with fright at the sight of Alucard in his new form. “The interlopers have broken the rules of the duel! Kill the women! Kill the wolves!”
Before the vampires could react to their boss’ command, Ashley barked and a contingent of wolves I hadn’t even noticed leapt up to attack those vampires holding the girls. I realized they’d been slinking closer and closer during the fight, preparing to strike the whole time.
Pandemonium broke loose as wolves and vampires squared off against one another. Paradise and Lost shifted and bounded after a few vampires making for the hole in the tent, hoping to escape. I found Ashley directing her wolves with a series of verbal commands. Yips and barks, mostly.
“I thought ye said ye wouldn’t go to war?” I asked Gunnar, who seemed to be preparing to join the fray.
“And let those girls die? We’d never do that. Besides, we were never going to let Magnus live. He could go to the Council and report whatever he wanted. Without Alucard or Roland to support our side of things, we’d end up on their hit list. This way, we control the narrative. Gotta love a bureaucracy,” Gunnar glanced down at me. “Nice meeting you.” Then he took off, leaping at a small cluster of vampires who were trying to get to the confused and screaming girls. I saw Terry among them.
Roland tapped my shoulder. “Hey, do you still need to be somewhere?”
I looked around at the chaos around me and felt completely torn. On the one hand, Othello and the girls were still in danger, even if it seemed like our side had the advantage. On the other, if I didn’t try to stop Chapman I’d have let Hemingway down and, in the process, failed to stop Armageddon.
No pressure.
“Do it,” Othello said, rising from her chair, the silver chains falling away like tinsel. “I’ll make sure we get the girls back home.”
Roland and I gaped at her.
“What? Oh, right.” Othello held out her hand to reveal a tiny, thin tube—no bigger than a juice box straw—of pulsing blue lights. “Nanobots,” she admitted. “Forgot I’d left some in my back pocket from when Hemingway and I…actually, nevermind. Not important,” she said, clearing her throat and blushing.
I turned to Roland, shaking my head. “Alright. Can ye make a gateway to the Brooklyn Bridge?”
Roland nodded. “Do you need backup?”
“Oh! Right!” I ran towards Dorian’s monitors, not surprised to see that the immortal had fled and taken his most expensive camera equipment with him; I was willing to bet he’d have a lot of pissed off customers demanding their money back after that service disruption. I got what I needed and hurried back to Roland’s side. “Alright,” I said, patting my duffle bag. “Ready whenever ye are.”
Roland grumbled something but weaved his hands in the air until a gateway appeared in midair, a few feet in front of me.
“Um, could ye lower it, maybe?” I asked, grinning. “I’d rather not have to jump.”
The grumbling continued, but eventually it was low enough that all I had to do was step through. I turned to Othello. “Be careful.”
“You too,” she said, gripping my arm for a moment before releasing me and walking over to Ashley, who seemed to be in control of the situation.
“Whenever you’re ready, Miss,” Roland said teasingly, his rough baritone not too dissimilar from Bogart’s.
I grinned. “Here’s lookin’ at ye, kid.” Then I ducked through the portal—glad to get away from the mayhem of terrified screams, pained grunts, and piercing yelps.
Only to step into a warzone.
Chapter 45
The sky above the Brooklyn Bridge was on fire.
I stepped out onto the walkway that ran the length of the bridge—which ordinarily allowed pedestrians to peer down at passing traffic as they crossed from Manhattan to Brooklyn. Except there weren’t any pedestrians. Unless you counted the man with a sword.
“Get thee behind me, Satan!” The man screeched, swinging at me.
I ducked and spun away on instinct, shocked to find the man dressed in dark military fatigues, covered haphazardly in pieces of armor—like one of those amateur Renaissance Faire attendees who want to participate, but are too broke to fully commit. Except his armor looked eerily functional, as did the sharp ass sword he was wielding.
He took another swing at me and I danced backward, stumbling awkwardly with my duffel bag weighing me down. “What the hell is the matter with ye?!” I screamed at him.
Before he could answer, a winged shape careened down, and a set of clawed feet snatched the man around his breastplate and took him screaming off into the night sky, which—as I mentioned before—looked as if it was on fire.
Everywhere I looked, there was fighting. Men and women wearing various pieces of armor and wielding various weapons, each of them uncannily fast, took on creatures straight out of a Guillermo del Toro film—monsters with scales, too many or too few eyes, tails, wings, anything imaginable. A nearby fight had devolved into a stalemate as the woman held her enemy back with an upraised crucifix, her lips reciting what I could only assume was a prayer.
Nephilim.
The name came back to me from my conversation with Karim. These were the Nephilim. Which meant they were fighting demons. Actual demons. I glanced up at the sky. It wasn’t burning—it was full of figures made of light.
The Grigori.
What the hell was going on?
I tossed my bag on the ground, opened it, and fetched the assault rifle and sawed-offs. I didn’t have much time, or even a plan, really, except to find Chapman and get the fuck out of there. But I wasn’t about to walk across the bridge unarmed. Though it physically pained me, I left the rest behind and tore off towards the other end of the bridge, where it looked like the fighting was fiercest. My bet was that Chapman, if he was here, would be smack dab in the middle of that mess.
I rushed past the woman reciting scripture. Her eyes widened, and she momentarily forgot what she was saying. With her defenses down, the demon attacked, launching itself at her, swinging its barbed tail at her face. I left them to it, feeling only slightly guilty for ruining her concentration.
Whoops.
I dipped, dodged, and even dove in my effort to get across the bridge. Demon and Nephilim alike, fortunately, were too busy taking each other on to molest me as I went, although I did have to hunker down every now and again and wait for one or the other to fall off the edge of the bridge or take their battle to the sky.
To be honest, part of me felt compelled to help the Nephilim—especially when I saw an opportunity to put a demon’s eye out or yank someone to safety—but Karim’s assessment of their militancy, not to mention the asshole who’d swung at me without warning, made me reconsider; getting mowed down by friendly fire would be an embarrassing way to die after all the shit I’d gone through in the last few hours.
Near the first of the bridge’s two platforms, I saw several demons gathered together, launching themselves at two Nephilim huddled behind their shields. I tucked myself up against the iron grating, holding myself up by the steel cables, and waited. The trick to making it to the other side, I knew, was to be as sneaky as possible. I was super outclassed here, and I knew it. One false move and I could end up falling off the bridge and dying in the East River—not the most glamorous way to go.
A jingle from my pocket tore through the din of the fight ahead and—as one—the demons and Nephilim swiveled to find the source of the noise. Me. I blinked, cursed, and fumbled in my pocket for my phone.
“Of all the stupid fuckin’…” I muttered.
“Who is that?” One of the Nephilim asked.
“Is she one of ours?” A demon hissed, nudging the scaled creature beside him with a barbed elbow.
I swiped to answer the phone. “Little busy here,” I said.
“Miss MacKenna!”
“Serge! Where are you?”
> “Serge follow. Near Brooklyn side of bridge. They are—” a chorus of noises on the other side of the line made it difficult to hear what Serge said next. “Must hurry,” he finished.
I groaned, hanging up the phone. The platform I was near was the one on the Manhattan side—which meant I had the length of the bridge to go before I made it to where Chapman and Serge were. I eyed the demons and Nephilim ahead, who seemed to care less about who I was than how I’d made it this far.
“You shall not pass,” one of the Nephilim said, hoisting his shield and sword.
I rolled my eyes and swung my assault rifle around, aiming for his breastplate. “Okay, Gandalf, whatever ye say.”
The Nephilim charged, bringing his shield up to deflect my rifle fire. I wasn’t trying to kill one of God’s soldiers or anything, but I damn sure wasn’t about to get impaled by one, either. I drew my pistol and aimed for his legs; a flesh wound would likely be enough to slow him down. I fired three rounds and watched in disbelief as he used his sword to deflect all three.
Because apparently God’s soldiers were also ninjas.
The Nephilim roared, only a few feet from me, and I dropped to one knee, sighting down the scope of my assault rifle; I needed to put him on the defensive until I could come up with a plan. At that precise moment, however, a scream drew us both back towards the platform.
The demons, it seemed, hadn’t been idle. The other Nephilim was desperately fighting for her life, fending off furious blows from three fronts. I grimaced. If this went on much longer, she wouldn’t stand a chance.
“Peace be with ye?” I yelled at the Nephilim nearest me, recalling the lessons of my Catholic childhood as I extended my hand. Honestly, I had no idea if he’d take the truce offer or try to stab me, but I was willing to risk it if it meant avoiding a fight I couldn’t win.
I was good, but my God-given talents didn’t include superhuman reflexes.
The Nephilim spun around and eyed my hand with disdain, then confusion. He reached out and clasped it. His hand was surprisingly cold and dry. “And also with you,” he replied. “Don’t make me regret this.” With that, he took off to help his partner.
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