Their self-proclaimed adversary stood straighter and continued to point his staff at the hunters. “What do you think you have accomplished here today? Hmm? You think you have stopped a demon.”
“That would be exactly what we did, you old fool,” Kendra snapped.
“You have cost our lord a servant, a soldier in the war to return the world to what it should be!” he all but spat.
“Our lord? I can’t say I serve any lord.” Nemo jerked his thumb toward Kendra. “She most likely does, although I doubt they are the same.”
The warlock thumped his staff on the ground and pointed at Nemo. Light flashed red to cover the necromancer, who fell to his knees in pain. “Enough of this!”
Rika and Chatan instantly attacked, she with her flames and he with spikes created from the earth. The warlock absorbed the flames into his palm and simply moved his head to dodge the spikes, revealing himself to be much more nimble than his appearance suggested. As Kendra tended to Nemo and used her light to dispel the curse, Dimitri stepped forward. “Kala, Anasi, get at him!” he ordered with a thump of his cane as he slid his hand inside his jacket.
The snake and spider lunged at the warlock, who snapped his fingers. Two red imps appeared and engaged the familiars as Dimitri withdrew several shards and threw them at the hostile mage. They transformed into shadowy daggers in the air. The enemy absorbed the last of Rika’s flames. He sucked in his breath and released the flames through his mouth to burn the daggers and force Chatan back. Kendra carried Nemo away.
Rika merely walked through the flames and let them bind to her fists as she moved to attack. Her opponent grinned menacingly in response and flung his staff at her. She knocked it aside, but it began to warp as she passed it and became a winged serpent that coiled around her and took flight. She punched it in the head with her enflamed fists.
Faro had snuck behind the warlock using the crops as cover. He had no more of his alchemical weapons, but he still had his wrist blades, which he unsheathed as he prepared to attack. When he was close enough, he leapt from the crops and aimed his blades at the warlock’s head. The man reached an arm back, snatched the alchemist in mid-air, and forced him to the ground.
Red lightning began to course down his arm and he smiled wickedly at the struggling man before his gaze darted away. He raised his other hand to form a red shield, and something struck it almost immediately. The warlock rotated his hand and the shield took the form of a claw and grasped something in the air. Dimitri appeared, his chameleon on his back. “Poor tricks from the both of you,” he accused.
“I agree!” Faro muttered under the tight hold as the electricity sparked close to his face. “Allow me to have a second shot.” He pointed his hands at his captor and pushed his thumbs forward to fire the blades in his gauntlets at the man’s face. The warlock moved but a blade still sliced his cheek and sank into his shoulder.
Dimitri’s blade vanished and allowed him to get away from the warlock’s grip. Bink sent out his tongue and it snapped around the warlock’s chest to haul him off Faro and toward the shadowcaster, who reformed the blade and thrust it into his adversary’s chest. The warlock uttered an angry roar and cast the lightning in his fist toward Dimitri, who tried to jump out of the way. Unfortunately, the energy followed him. Bink vaulted off his master’s shoulder to intercept the bolt and vanished in a blast of darkness and red sparks.
The mage straightened. He let lightning form in both hands and prepared to attack when a shot rang out. His eyes widened and he glanced disbelievingly to where a bullet had pierced his chest. He looked at Nemo, who held his pistol and stared in return. The wounded man placed a hand on his chest and the electricity traced his wounds and seemingly repaired them in a rather rough way.
Rika landed with a loud impact and the winged serpent retreated and hissed at her. It returned to its master as Kala and Anasi finished their respective fights with the imps and joined Dimitri.
The serpent transformed into a staff once more and settled into the warlock’s hands, who uttered a ragged, vicious growl. “I am beyond finished with this!” He held the staff out, and the crystal on top turned red. Rika could feel heat surrounding her as the entire team looked at a large dark boulder above. Pillars of fire surged from it. “This is the very earth from the plane of demons!” the mage shouted and scowled at the team of hunters. “We shall turn this realm into the same. No mortal can survive living on such a damned world!”
“Then why are you turning it into such a place, dumbass?” Rika shouted and delivered a streak of fire that he blocked with a shield. “You’re a mortal.”
He grinned. “Why do you think I follow those I do?” he questioned and lowered the staff to the ground. “I will be made immortal.”
Chatan held his hands up to see if he could control this unnatural element, but nothing came to him. It wasn’t needed, however, as the ball of damned earth and cursed fire simply vanished before it had a chance to fall. The hunters were momentarily confused and looked at each other to see who had done what before they focused on the warlock again. His wide eyes betrayed that he was equally as confused as the others.
A pink light surrounded him and his arms folded in a way that they crossed his chest and his hands were placed against his head. “What is happening?” he shouted and struggled as his legs crossed before he fell. He chanted a spell hastily, but it only shocked him instead. A blue portal opened behind him, and none other than Isadora stood in front of.
“Sorry I’m late. I had to delay the nova, then it was a pain to cross over until I found another portal line here. I’m guessing thanks to this guy.” She kicked the warlock for emphasis. “You beat the demon. Nice work!”
The hunters looked at each other. “Uh, thanks. I guess for the compliment and taking care of the lock,” Nemo said and gestured at the entangled man beneath her feet.
“Thanks for getting him to come out of hiding. It saved us a lot of work.” She pointed her hand at the prisoner, then at the portal. He was dragged away and flung inside the gateway as he cursed the hunters and the sorceress until he disappeared. Isadora clapped and placed her hands on her waist. “Well then, shall we get back and discuss an increase in your rewards?”
“That sounds grand!” Faro stated as he moved behind the team from his position among the crops and dusted himself off. “If you don’t mind me asking, is there a way we can do this without portals? I’m sick of them.” Nemo and Dimitri chuckled but nodded, as did the others.
“Well, we can either take a portal or walk back through the forest,” Isadora offered and pointed behind her. “Although I don’t think it’s been cleared yet.”
Rika groaned and shook her head. “To hell with it. Open the damn portal.”
Chapter Fifteen
“I’ll kill all of you. You do not understand the powers I have been blessed with!” These were the first words Rika heard when they traveled through the portal to the room they had all first met in. She looked to where the warlock was ushered away by a group of Twixt operatives, captured in runed manacles that must have suppressed his abilities.
“He really is mouthy, isn’t he?” Isadora mused and waved her hand to tell the operatives to hurry and get him out of the area.
“You will not stop my masters!” he shouted while his captors struggled to get him to move. “The new reign shall come. Kharaz shall be the seat of the new world—gak!” A pink line formed around his throat and choked him and the operatives finally dragged him down the hall.
“I guess I get to look forward to that interrogation later.” Isadora sighed. Rika was concerned. He’d said Kharaz? Memories of her brief tenure there flooded back to her. She had known there was something going on there but she had been disproven and they had kicked her out. More importantly, her sister was there now. Maybe she shouldn’t give credence to a madman. And it wasn’t like anyone would believe her when she said she had intel from a warlock who tried to summon a demon, but she couldn’t shake the odd feeling. She wa
s snapped from her thoughts by a loud clap from Isadora.
“All right, everyone, let’s debrief,” she said with a smile.
“Uh, what?” Nemo questioned. “We ain’t operatives. We were only hired to get rid of the demon.”
“Which we did with aplomb, I must say,” Dimitri noted as he studied his suit and noted the damage. “And with tenacity as well.”
“You did say we would also get extra pay for taking care of the warlock, right?” Kendra asked.
Isadora threw up her hands and nodded. “I probably should have cleared that with my superiors, but it is standard protocol. Let’s say you each get an extra fifty thousand. Does that sound fair?”
Nemo tilted his head and frowned. “That’s typically what I charge for a small infestation. Is that all the bastard’s worth?”
The sorceress pointed to him. “It’s not like you took him down by yourself. In fact, as I recall since it was only moments ago, I was the one who took him down. I said I would pay you extra for drawing him out. Considering the circumstances, this is more than fair, right?”
Rika chuckled. She agreed and Nemo nodded, albeit reluctantly.
“You said you wanted a debrief?” she inquired. “What about? You were watching, weren’t you? You said you had to stall the nova. That means you were watching, right?”
Isadora turned to the center of the room and brought a chair closer to sit on. “We were able to get some clairvoyance toward the end, right around the time the demon got all big and really began sticking it to you.”
“Thanks for the kind words.” Faro sighed.
“That was kind. It looked like some of you got really knocked around.” She chuckled and glanced at Kendra. The cleric looked at Nemo, who shrugged.
“So you saw it speak?” Chatan asked and folded his arms.
This seemed to catch her off-guard. “Wait, what? It spoke?”
“I thought you said you were watching at that point?” Nemo questioned.
“Watching but I couldn’t hear anything,” she replied and placed a hand under her chin. “A demon that speaks. That’s unsettling.”
“You’re telling us.” Rika sighed and leaned against one of the posts. “I had heard that some could but hadn’t run across any in my jobs. To be frank, this was my first job with a demon.”
“Persistent bastards. I’ve fought a couple but never one like this,” the necromancer added. “The magic it was tossing around. I’ve never seen one use magic like we do. Theirs is...more like dragon’s breath fire. They simply cast it out. This one was changing spells and had different abilities. A nasty piece of work.”
“Indeed. I’ll be spending the next week or so having to restore my familiars. I believe this might be the hardest loss since my younger days.” Dimitri took his coat and hat off, placed them on one of the benches, and took a seat. “From what we fought and from what we’ve heard from the warlock, I take it we had a hand in stopping something much bigger than an errant warlock with egomaniacal aspirations, then?”
Isadora shrugged. “Probably. We weren’t hiding anything and only gave you the info we knew. There have been other instances like these. Other organizations have taken care of them but through the grapevine, we learned that the number of demon summonings has been increasing. And the power of the demons coming through has increased as well. Even summoning a lesser demon is a chore and a half, and to summon the ones that have been reported so rapidly, there has to be some kind of collective or organization involved in the background.”
“Got any idea who it could be?” Faro asked.
Isadora shook her head, took out a small golden case, and opened it to reveal cigarettes. “Not a damn clue. There are no calling cards and it’s mostly small groups that use gangs to do their dirty work. Honestly, we got kind of lucky with this lock, even if saying that is rather weird.”
Nemo took a cigar from a pocket on his vest, frowned at the broken end on the front, and ripped it off. He fumbled for his lighter before a small flame appeared in the air before him, thanks to Rika. He inhaled and nodded to her as she moved the fire to Isadora, who nodded in thanks as well and lit her cigarette. “He worked alone from what we can tell, probably due to pride or trying to show off. It cost him time, which allowed us to round up all of you.”
“He said he worked for some lord,” Kendra reminded them. “Nothing specific, though. I guess your collective hunch probably has merit.”
“Or a particularly large cult,” Chatan reasoned.
“I hate organized evil.” Isadora sighed. “It’s so much more of a pain to deal with. Errant monsters, specters, and the lone psycho is much easier work with less long nights.”
“You’re preaching to the choir.” Nemo chuckled, took a drag of his cigar, and nodded at the cleric. “Well, maybe not hers, specifically.” She simply ignored him.
“Anything else of interest?” Isadora asked.
“Not really. You saw how we defeated it right?” Rika inquired and received a nod from the sorceress.
“Yeah, great work there. We made a deal with another organization to go and clean the area and make sure nothing remains. Hopefully, those fires aren’t too much of a hassle. But I have to say that was clever work.”
“I suppose the summoning of the demon itself was an anomaly,” Faro began. “There wasn’t a traditional anchor. It was basically recycling the energy of the portal.”
Isadora nodded. “Blood magic is a tricky thing. The power of magic in the right hands is wonderous, but if you add the power of life into it, then it goes absolutely insane.” She rolled her cigarette in her hands. “There was another report a couple of weeks ago of a similar incident. They were able to stop the demon from coming through but said that it looked like the portal was bonding with the demon.”
“It sounds like what happened with ours,” Rika concurred. “It didn’t so much come through the portal as come with it. It was kind of its downfall. I was able to dispel the portal energy inside it using the remains.”
The sorceress pointed to her. “Good thinking. I should probably recommend disenchanters for any future cases to be safe.”
She ran a hand through her hair. “It wasn’t that simple. I probably wouldn’t have realized it myself and the others kept me safe while I put everything into place.”
“You’re being modest there, Rika,” Nemo quipped and grinned with his cigar in his mouth. “It’s not like any of us could have pulled off that trick.”
“Speaking of which,” she responded with a firm look at the necromancer “Thanks for those skeletons, but I thought you said that wasn’t your thing?”
He shrugged. “I learned the basics so might as well put them to use. I couldn’t think of another way to stop a big bad ball of darkness. It’s not like those Deja corpses were having a busy night or nothing anyway.”
Isadora perked up at the word “Deja.” “Oh, right. Did you find any more of the Deja in the forests?” she asked.
A few of them snickered and looked around. Chatan was the one to answer. “We were attacked by ghouls wearing Deja robes and markings. I would guess the ones who weren’t used in the ritual were turned into those creatures. We took care of them and we were not attacked by any more while we were in the forest or during the fight with the demon.”
“Along with scarecrows in the fields, but they were fodder. Then there was the big boy we fought with the ghouls,” Rika recalled. “I don’t wanna think how many parts were required to build that monstrosity.”
Nemo blew out a plume of smoke. “I can give you an estimate.”
Rika, Kendra, and Faro held up a hand to stop him. “Deja was a small gang, to begin with. My guess is that any lucky enough to survive won’t be rushing to get the gang back together,” Kendra stated.
“That’s safe to assume but then again, those wrong enough in the head to start a cult to begin with aren’t that easy to read,” Isadora replied, tossed her cigarette down, and stamped it out. “Well then, you are all free to go,
with the exception of those without a contractor. You’ll get paid by one of our ops near the teleportation room.”
Rika groaned. “To hell with that. No more teleportation or portals or whatever. You got a phone? I’ll call my contractor and have him get me out of here.”
Isadora laughed. “He mentioned to the operative with him you would feel that way. There is a car waiting for you outside. It’s not like we need to keep this place a secret anymore.”
“So is that it?” Faro asked sullenly. “We all simply leave?”
“First team mission, alchemist?” Kendra asked. He looked aside for a moment before he nodded. The cleric smirked. “I’m glad you liked the outing, but don’t worry about it. Stay in the area and I’m sure we’ll run into each other eventually.”
“Hopefully for a gig that’s a bit more casual.” Nemo chuckled and patted Chatan on the shoulder. “Get to know each other, but if any of you feel like it, I hang around a bar on the edge of town called Legend’s. Come on by if you wanna chat or team up again. It’s a real nice place. Good booze, pool, and fights break out at least three times a week.”
“I might take that offer,” Rika said, pushed away from the pillar, and headed toward the exit. “I don’t think my bar will want me around for a while.”
The operative opened the door out of the building for Rika and nodded to her as she passed. She looked behind her. It was merely a lobby building but looked kind of familiar. Maybe it had been a research facility or something at some point? It was clearly abandoned now and hopefully, she wouldn’t have to return anytime soon. She intended to take a long break after tonight, this one with money to spend.
“Ms. Albright,” a firm voice called and she looked at another operative who approached, this one familiar. She walked down the cement stairs in front of the building, met him at the bottom near a black sedan, and hummed cheerfully, ready to accompany him. “Shall we depart?”
Magic Hunters: The Operatives Page 9
