Demon's Vengeance

by Jocelynn Drake

  The house looked empty. Of course, if the killer had murdered everyone on the premises like he did the last time, then the place would look empty.

  “Do you know where the local nests are located?”

  I shook my head. “One of them is on the west side, but I don’t know about the other one.” Vampires were notoriously secretive about where they slept during the day. But then, if you burned away to ash in the sun and were significantly weaker during the day, you’d be a little paranoid too.

  Gideon swore under his breath, taking another look around the silent street. “We’ll just be cautious then. No magic if you can help it.”

  “Whatever you say, boss.”

  Gideon glared at me for a second as he tucked his wand back up his right sleeve. “You take the back door. I’ll go in the front. We’ll search from bottom to top.”

  With a little wave of my hand, I started around the side of the house, heading toward the gate in the six-­foot wooden privacy fence that lined the backyard. The fucker had picked a pricy neighborhood in which to settle. He couldn’t have spent much time here because the neighbors would have definitely noticed something strange going on in the house. It had been my experience that the more money a person had, the more attention they paid to what their neighbors were doing. Or maybe that was just the neighborhood my family lived in when I was a kid, living in an upper-­middle-­class subdivision littered with houses just like this one. You couldn’t sneak out of your bedroom window without someone being there to call your mom two minutes later.

  The gate creaked as I pulled it open on frozen metal hinges. At the same time, a security light flashed on, flooding the back lawn and stone patio with harsh white light. I blinked a ­couple times, my eyes adjusting to the bright glare after walking for so long in the fading afternoon light.

  A high-­pitched laugh drew my eyes to a tall, thin man seated on the swing of a child’s playground set. He had hair as white as snow and his skin had a strange gray cast to it. His lank, stringy hair fell forward, covering most of his face, but one glimpse of his eyes revealed madness burning in their liquid black depths.

  “I can seeeeee you, warlock,” he called in a singsong voice. Using his feet, he pushed off the frozen ground, swinging slowly while his bare hands gripped the metal chains on either side of him.

  “Who are you?” I took a ­couple cautious steps into the yard while letting the gate close behind me. Was I finally faced with the madman who had been slaughtering ­people as he traveled north? He certainly didn’t look as if he was in his right mind. Could the Death Magic have driven him insane? There had to be a chance of that, but then didn’t you have to be insane to kill children in order to raise the dead?

  “You’ve been following me,” he continued. His voice had a strange melody to it, as if it would be extremely pleasing if it weren’t entirely creepy at the same time.

  “You’re the psychopath who has been murdering those children.”

  The white-­haired man cocked his head to the side so that his eyes were completely covered, but I wasn’t willing to bet that he was blind. “Psychopath? That’s not a nice word. But warlocks aren’t very nice. You’ve killed so many.”

  “Like you.”

  His laughter rang out, echoing through the silent neighborhood. There was a sickening child-­like innocence to that sound, which twisted in my stomach. The man kicked his feet out and lay back as he swung higher. His white hair fanned out behind him in a cascade of starlight, shining in the glare cast by the security light.

  I pulled some magical energy together, preparing to defend myself. I didn’t know where Gideon was in the house, but the warlock would realize that I hadn’t entered yet and would come looking for me. Right? He was my backup. And I was going to fucking need it. This guy was definitely not human. He wasn’t an elf, a siren, an incubus, or a shifter.

  “No need for that, warlock,” he called as he straightened, his hair falling back over his face when he leaned forward. “I’m not going to kill you yet. I need you alive to see my final creation. My moment of triumph.”

  “But maybe I’d rather see you dead now,” I muumbled before sending out a debilitating spell meant to incapacitate the fucker but keep him awake for questioning. One of the few spells I’d picked up from Simon during my studies.

  The madman laughed again, the sound like needles prickling along my arms. The spell just washed over him as if he wasn’t even there. My heart stumbled and for the second time I wished that I felt more secure in having Zyrus watch my back, because it would know what I was faced with.

  Gideon! I mentally reached out for the other warlock.

  “Calling for help?” he taunted with a soft giggle.

  “What are you planning?” I demanded, hoping to distract him long enough for Gideon to join me.

  “Oh, I can’t tell that now. It would ruin the wonderful surprise.”

  “Never been a fan of surprises myself.”

  “No, warlocks aren’t.” The man’s voice changed suddenly, becoming cold and biting like a sharpened blade slicing through the fatty tissue around your stomach. The singsong mocking was gone. “You don’t like anything you can’t control and manipulate.”

  “No, we don’t,” I said, grinning broadly at him. The boiling anger that lay just below the surface was something I could use. If I could get him pissed, then I might be able to get him to make a mistake. Lord knows I’d done that often enough in my life.

  “Your time is coming. We’re going to destroy you all,” he snarled.

  I gave an indifferent shrug. “And who is ‘we’? The Towers have got a lot of enemies.”

  The man chuckled. It had become a low and ugly sound as it tumbled across the lawn toward me. “But that would be giving away the surprise.” And then it was like he’d flipped a switch. His high-­pitched laughter returned as he started swinging again. “Nice trick, warlock, but you’re not going to get me.” His singsong voice had me clenching my teeth.

  At the sound of the back door opening, the man was consumed in a brilliant flash of white light. When I could finally see again, an enormous white owl was perched on the wooden beam that held the swing. The owl watched me and Gideon, who was now standing on the patio just past the back door of the house, and then the owl extended his massive wings and took to the air.

  I started to form a new spell that would pull the bastard back down to the ground. There was no way in hell I was going to let this prick out of my sight. I’d find a way to get some answers out of him. But I never finished the spell . . .

  A surge of raw energy blasted through the backyard, similar to what I had felt at Asylum earlier in the evening. The power of it threw me backward, tearing through the defensive spell I had erected like it was wet tissue paper. Pain exploded in my spine as I slammed into the wooden fence. Boards creaked and splintered under the impact, but I didn’t go through it. I collapsed in a heap in the yard, my face down in the dirt and snow. My organs clenched and burned while my brain felt like it was melting in my skull. My cheeks were wet, but I couldn’t tell if I was crying in pain or if my eyes were bleeding.

  It took all my energy to roll partially onto my side so that I could throw up without choking on my own vomit. When I had flushed both the coffee and old pizza I’d had from my system, my stomach decided that it needed to rid itself of stomach acid and then blood. Sheer exhaustion was the only thing that finally stopped the massive purge.

  Gage. . .

  Gideon’s voice drifted weakly through my head and I cringed. He didn’t sound any better than I felt. With some effort, I rolled onto my side, curled into the fetal position as I prayed for the pain to stop.

  Promise me I’m going to die, I sent back to the warlock. I hurt so bad in more ways than my brain could comprehend. I just couldn’t accept the idea of living much longer with this pain.

  You will . . . if you don
’t tap into the magic around you.

  “Good,” I whispered. There was an end in sight.

  Do it, Gage. Pull in just a little energy. You’ll feel better. It helps.

  I lay there. The pain was growing worse instead of subsiding. My bones were being slowly ground into dust and my lungs weren’t pulling in enough air. I couldn’t catch my breath. Too much pain. It was burning through me. I just wanted it over.

  Tap the magic. Or do you want that killer hunting Trixie?

  Gideon’s comment was barely enough to snap me out of my wallowing. Clenching my teeth, I released my last breath and opened up the little door inside of me that allowed the energy to flow in. Gideon lied. It made the pain hundred times worse.

  I screamed. My legs jerked straight out and my back bowed off the ground, but the energy rushed in. I gasped, sucking in my first deep breath since being hit. My heart pumped and life flowed through my body, shoving out the dark magic that the bastard had hit me with.

  It felt like I was on the ground, covered in sweat, tears, and blood for hours, but only a few minutes passed. My arms trembled when I pushed myself into a sitting position and looked around. The yard was a little darker now that the strange man was gone. Gideon had made it to his feet, but he didn’t look all that steady as he leaned against the side of the house. He was ashen and his face was streaked with what was probably both sweat and tears.

  “What the fuck was that?” My voice sounded like I’d been gargling broken glass for cheap thrills. With a grunt, I pushed myself to my feet and immediately fell back against the fence when the world violently shifted around me.

  “The bastard forced the Death Magic into us. The energy was trying to take over our bodies. It would have killed us.”

  “And then what? Zombies?”

  “Don’t know. Possibly.”

  I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing while my mind turned over the bastard who had tried to turn me into a brain-­munching, shambling horror show. He’d appeared pretty confident that he wouldn’t kill me, but I couldn’t agree with him. If Gideon hadn’t known what to do, I would have been quite content to let the Death Magic consume me in the hopes of death relieving my pain.

  When I was sure I had my bearings again, I opened my eyes and pushed away from the fence to stand on my own. My cloaking spell was gone, and I just didn’t have the strength to put it back into place. I was still using the energy I had pulled in to heal my damaged body.

  “What the hell was he?” I demanded, starting to slowly walk toward Gideon. I prayed that the neighbors didn’t pick that exact moment to look out their windows. Of course, I seriously doubted that anyone in this neighborhood frequented my parlor, but then I was taking enough chances in life, I didn’t need to add to my troubles.

  Gideon straightened, his eyes slipping back to the swing set. “I don’t know. I didn’t see him long enough to recognize any distinguishing traits. I also didn’t sense anything in his magic use that would have identified him. Did you?”

  “No,” I grumbled.

  Frustration was building. If I had finished my schooling in the Towers, I might have been able to recognize what the bastard was, but my knowledge was considerably lacking. As it was, I could only recognize most creatures if I’d met them in the past.

  Raking my fingers through my hair with a groan, I turned back toward the house. “On the plus side, I don’t think he’s planning to leave town. He mentioned having a surprise, a final triumph that he wanted me to witness. He’s sticking around to perform his final show here.”

  “Wonderful,” Gideon muttered. “Did he mention what exactly that would be?”

  “Nope.”

  “He give you an address of where he was staying?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then I guess we do some digging here before I report back to the council,” Gideon said as he turned back toward the door he had exited minutes earlier.

  “Why report back? We don’t know who or what this asshole is. We also don’t know what he’s planning.”

  “True, but they need to know if something bad is about to happen. We can call in more guardians to search the area.”

  “Is that really a good idea? Do we want more witches and warlocks running loose in Low Town? How many ­people do you think they’ll slaughter in their so-­called search for this prick? A few hundred?”

  “And what choice do we have?” Gideon shouted back at me, throwing the door open. “I don’t like the idea of it any better than you, but this guy has to be stopped before he opens up hell beneath us all.”

  And maybe that’s exactly what this asshole was planning to do if he was hoping to free Lilith. I shook my head. “We’ve got to figure out what this guy is and what his plans are before we tell the Towers. We saw what the guardians did to Indianapolis when they felt threatened. They’ll do it all over again, but this time it’ll be Low Town that’s a smoldering pile of rubble.”

  The warlock stood in the open doorway with his back to me, his head lowered. We were trapped. We needed more help, but the Ivory Towers’ preference for blowing things away and asking questions when the smoke cleared would result in too many deaths and not enough answers.

  “Let’s look around the house and do some more digging,” I said calmly, trying my best to sound reasonable rather than desperate. “Something helpful might be found in there, giving us an edge that we didn’t have before.” Anything so we didn’t have to call in more warlocks and witches.

  It was with considerable reluctance that Gideon nodded his head and continued into the house. I followed behind him, clinging to what little hope I could muster that we might actually get ahead of this prick and stop him before the Towers leveled Low Town.

  What we found didn’t help our cause.

  Chapter 6

  After a quick search through the ground level, where we found nothing, we descended the stairs into what appeared to be a family room and play area for the kids of the house. As with the other sites, the psychopath had been kind enough to leave behind some bodies in the basement. The only thing different was that he’d changed his style of murder, which left me torn between crying and wanting to level the city myself.

  In the center of the family room, we found children tied back to back in a pair of wooden dining-­room chairs. The little boy looked to be about four years old and the girl was six or seven. It was easier to guess because they both still had their heads. The fucker had punched into their chests and ripped their hearts out.

  Their young faces were still streaked with tears from where they had cried for their parents before being murdered. Their horror was a palpable thing, seeming to suck the oxygen from the air. Where were their parents through this? Had the children been forced to watch their parents being murdered before they finally met their own grisly end? Or was it the other way around?

  Gideon cleared his throat, dragging his gaze away from the tortured pair. “No writing this time.” His voice was rough and I pitied my companion. Sometimes I could almost understand the Towers’ edict against warlocks and witches having children. Bridgette had to be on Gideon’s mind, haunting him while he stood in the blood of children so close to her age.

  “He’s not experimenting anymore,” I murmured, trying to find my own voice through the sadness and rage.

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “He knows what he’s doing now. I think he perfected what he was attempting with the vampires.”

  “Then why do this?” I waved a hand at the two children, starting to lose my grip on my temper.

  “To get our attention. To taunt us. To bring us out so that we could finally meet, letting him show us that he’s not afraid of the Towers.”

  I sighed, rubbing my head as I turned away from the kids to trudge back up the stairs. “The Ivory Towers have pissed off every race on this planet. You care to take a guess as to which one has figure
d out how take on the Towers and win?”

  Gideon followed me up the stairs to the kitchen. The room was nearly spotless. There were a ­couple glasses and a plate with bread crumbs in the sink. A roast was defrosting on the counter. Someone had planned ahead for dinner that night. Our killer hadn’t resided in this house. No, he’d just stopped by to kill the kids so that we could meet at last.

  “You think there’s a reason he chose this house?” I asked, turning around the island in the center of the room to face Gideon. “I mean, he took some risks coming here in the middle of the day. ­People would have noticed someone strange in the neighborhood.”

  “Possibly. Of course, he could have been using a cloaking spell just like you.”

  I shrugged. “Maybe, but I don’t sense any of the magic residue from him like I did at the first location.”

  Pulling out his wand, Gideon started for the front of the house. “Let’s finish our search. The owners are around here somewhere.”

  I hope they’re dead. It sounded horrible in my head when I thought it, but I really didn’t think they’d want to know how their children died or why.

  I got my wish, but there was a price for that. We found the parents on the second floor, but one look at them confirmed that our killer now had a partner. The bitch who had been stalking pregnant women had been here and worked her horrific skills on the parents.

  The parents were found in a nursery. The husband was tied to the rails of the baby bed while the wife was across from him, leaned up against the dresser. She had been killed in the usual way; stabbed in the chest and slashed across the stomach. However, judging by the blood crusted to the man’s wrists and the broken rails, he had been forced to watch the death of his wife before our killer took him out with a long cut across the throat. His death had been slower.

  Looking at how the two victims were arranged so that they could clearly see each other, I was sure that this murder had been personal for our female psychopath. In all the other deaths, they had been terrible but relatively quick and completed in secrecy, taking limited risks. She picked the location, not the white-­haired weirdo.