“He means friend,” the Witch said. “The toxins have muddled his speech. He likes you, Harold.”
“Friend?” Harold said, heart thumping inside of his chest.
The Witch started to head towards the rundown building formerly known as the Lake, Old Hanging Eyeballs trailing closely behind her like a puppy.
“FRENNNNN!” the mutant bellowed.
Now the guilt burned deep inside of Harold. He let his head fall down, and shook it. “Friend,” he returned. And something like a frown passed over the mutant’s face, which if Harold had been hanging upside down, he would’ve seen how happy of a smile it was.
The mutant turned and followed the Grand Witch.
Soon they were back inside of the Lake. Sahara was sprawled out on a table that looked so old and creaked so loud that Harold was sure it would buckle under her mass. Surprisingly it didn’t.
Roberta nodded towards the mutants, and they nodded back and the two of them hobbled toward the lake. Harold glanced out of a cracked window and saw the two of them join the ranks of what looked like a great, green wall surrounding the building.
“Now, Harold,” Roberta said, “this will be messy and unpleasant and all manners of gross. I advise you to leave.”
Harold looked onto the corpse giving him orders and thought if he could stomach the presence of her, he could stand whatever was going to happen to him now. Then he remembered her telling him her name, like she’d read his mind, and his thoughts quickly shifted to something else. Nothing good. He thought of the gate from his dreams. Those black branches curling, closing in on him, wrapping their harsh limbs around his throat, squeezing with force a million times greater than that of a possessed Vampire.
He closed his eyes, took a shaky breath. He’d be alright. He could handle it.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you, Protector.”
She turned away from him, showing him that white hair that hung scraggly down the rippled flesh of her back as she opened a cabinet under a counter and dug through its contents. Harold watched her muscles flex under the black dress she wore, tattered and chewed on by the maggots.
Something you’d get buried in four-hundred or so years ago, Harold thought.
He would’ve leaned in closer because he swore the clothing had been a little crisped, like maybe a certain group of frightful Colonials had tied her to the stake and burned her in that very dress, but the fear was too great. Her back was turned to him, yes. But there were eyes in the back of her head. She was all-knowing, all-seeing.
Harold slowly learned to never underestimate a Witch.
When she turned back, she held a few lengths of a chain. She tossed him a couple which flew at him with enough force to make him dodge out of the way, and they landed amongst a pile of broke, rotting wood, and coiled like metal snakes.
“Harold Storm, a Protector of the Realms, afraid of a few chains,” Roberta said, she smiled. And for a second, Harold caught a slight hint of the woman she’d been in the 1970’s.
He shrugged. “Sorry, I’m a bit on edge, if you can’t tell.”
“Oh yes, Harold, I can. I know you are infected with the venom yourself. I know of the dreams you’ve been having,” she said as she began to wrap the chains around Sahara’s upper torso and under the table. The smile never faded, and she said: “I may have had a little say in what you dreamt about.”
“The Lake. I dreamt about the lake and a key. You were there in the water.”
“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry it couldn’t have been a little more…pleasant. But if I had flooded your mind with fairy tales and unicorns, you might’ve gotten complacent. And a comfortable Protector is not an effective Protector.”
“Thanks,” Harold said sarcastically.
“Wrap her legs,” she said, pointing a gnarled finger to Sahara’s blood and dirt stained jeans.
“What are you going to do to her?”
“Magic,” Roberta said. “A bit of white magic to combat the black magic inside of her.”
“And that entails…?”
“Forcing the Shadows out of her. Inside, a Demon grows and it is nearing adulthood. If we let it go on much longer, we will be too late. It’s a wonder you let it go on this long; a wonder she’s still herself.”
She paused, regarded Harold carefully.
“It wasn’t my fault,” he said. “How was I supposed to know? I don’t know anything.”
“It is okay, Harold. But I am warning you now, this will get messy.”
CHAPTER 20
Frank King walked around like a new man. There would be flashes of his old self, yes, but lately, as he toed the shoulder of the highway, now without his trusty steed, and weaved in and out of the destruction, those flashes were coming few and far between.
Soon after the dying man who’d attempted to steal his car dropped dead, and stayed dead, the black water still soaking his charred body, Frank left with a purpose.
His truck had been obliterated. The crash had left the Motel 8 off of the highway looking like a construction site. And Frank left it behind him, heading towards the skyscrapers he could see in the smoky, orange horizon. Heading towards the Lake. Heading towards a path he could not return from once his deed was done.
But the possessed man had promised his son back. A normal Frank would’ve known that was nothing but bullshit. The new Frank didn’t. The new Frank gripped at the idea of his long-dead son back in his life. He craved it, actually. And didn’t care if his son came back as a Zombie, a Ghost, or an entirely different person altogether.
Yeah, the flashes of his old self were few and far between, and he walked for what seemed like hours, head lost in a black cloud of possibility, until he heard the whimpering of a person up ahead. Then he stopped; the joyful whistling from his lips stopped too.
“Ryan,” the voice said.
Frank felt the smile on his face widen. Somehow he knew who Ryan was — or used to be. And now Ryan was as dead and cooked as a steak at a Fourth of July barbecue.
Frank tiptoed towards the upturned minivan, made sure to avoid stepping down on the stars of broken glass glittering among the blacktop. The van was the color of seaweed. Its underside was rustier than the Titanic at the bottom of the ocean. And it was propped up against the guard rail.
A hunk of meat sizzled and smoked a few feet away from the crash site. Frank stopped. Curiosity had been piqued. That wasn’t a deer up there, smoking. No, that was something unholy, unnatural — wholly supernatural. The very thing Frank had been called upon to Hunt. But as his eyes ran over the smeared corpse, he felt a hint of sadness, and took a shaky breath.
Fallen brethren, flashed across his mind.
It was a sadness like a lost family member — like a dead son, but somehow so different.
The Demon was smaller than the one that had nearly chewed him up back at the Vampire’s kingdom.
You’re welcome, that voice said in his mind. For stopping him. We knew you’d be of use.
Frank shook his head.
A wave of rage rolled over him. No. The sadness. It was so wrong. He hated these bastards.
Serves you right. Lookin like fuckin’ roadkill. You bastard. Deserved a worse death than that. Lucky. Lucky. Lucky, he thought.
He fell to his knees. Head throbbed. A battle of good and evil raged in the recesses of his mind. A storm brewed. Thunder clapped. Black streaks of lightning struck blacker trees.
He yelled.
“Ryan!” the man screamed again, but his voice seemed far away, lost in the wind. “Ryan, the blood. It…it won’t stop. Ryan!”
Frank breathed heavy, hands stuck in the black oil on the road. Tiny rocks and pieces of glass sliced into the flesh of his palms.
He found his eyes flittering over the corpse. The large mound of the black skin sizzled. Then his hand reached out to it, the rocks and glass fell like tricks from a magician’s sleeve. His teeth ground against each other so hard that he feared they might turn to dust.
No. No.
No. This isn’t right, Franky.
Rule Seven: Can’t beat them, join ‘em, his father said.
No. That wasn’t a rule.
It is now, Frank King.
He screamed, felt his pupils expand, flood with the blackness.
“Ryan!”
The heat from the corpse seemed to transfer into his hand — a big rush of energy. He found himself standing ramrod straight. The pain inside of his body, from the collision with his now dead Ford pickup, from the attacks at the Vampire’s Haven, and from the years and mileage piled upon his bones, muscles and joints just up and vanished.
Blackness seized his chest, closed around his windpipe. The Shadows —
Shadows, that whisper invaded him.
— gripped at his throat. He no longer breathed fresh air. Now he breathed the air of the Demon. Walked the walk of the Demon. Spoke the speech of the Demon.
His knuckles cracked as he squeezed his hands into fists. He didn’t want it; he didn’t ask for it. It just happened. Why? Why?
Someone tell me why.
The man’s hair was the color of pissed-on snow, and he grabbed it in two handfuls. He didn’t come easy out of the broken van. And he screamed like he’d been set on fire. Skin scraped against the beads of glass, the jagged metal.
“I’m sorry. I-I’m sorry,” Frank said.
He didn’t remember what happened. He’d been by the corpse of the Demon, then he was there.
The teenager looked up with wet eyes. His body shook.
“Please, please, leave me alone. Ryan — he went to go get help. He’ll be back any s-second now. He has a gun.”
Frank spoke. It was his voice, but the words weren’t. “Ryan’s dead. I made sure of it.” He reached in his pocket — not his movements. It was like watching himself on video, or being used as a puppet. In his hand, was a lock of wild brown hair.
The teenager set to screaming again.
And the words came, not his: “Yeah, he squealed just like that. Like a little piggy. Oink! Oink! Oink!”
Frank clutched his stomach, doubled over.
“No. No. It was an accident. The fire and the lake, it poured from his mouth,” he said. “He stole my truck. I tried to stop him. Just wanted to beat some sense into him, not kill him. Mortals shouldn’t k-kill Mortals.”
Quit fighting, Franky. Rule Number Seven: Can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.
He swung at him again. Open palms connected against his face. Frank recoiled, sucked in breath through gritted teeth. The pain was sharp and stinging. The rage stung even worse. It was something wholly unnatural and alien. He hated it, yet he craved it. He craved blood, wanted to watch it spill from the kid’s throat. Wanted to wear his soul like a used coat from the thrift store. Would never wash it. Always want the stench of death wrapped around him.
No. No. You won’t kill your own.
But his hands closed around the teen’s throat. He squeezed with a strength he had not known he had.
How he flailed — kicked and screamed like a child caught in the current, drowning.
His wild piss-colored hair whipped in every direction. The muscles in Frank’s hands burned. Forearms popped. The boy’s white face turned to a devilish red, then purple, then black. His eyes bugged. The hits lost their momentum, and soon he hit him with the force of a playful tap.
He felt the kid slacken in his arms.
Saw veins of red in the whites of his eyes burst with firework tenacity. Blood ran from his sockets, thick drops of red like paint. They rolled over Frank’s locked fingers, warm and terrifying.
He sobbed, dropped him like he was nothing but a life-sized doll. And the glass crunched underneath his limp body.
Frank looked at his hands, brought them up to the kid’s face.
“Why?” he said, barely a whisper. Then he looked up into the orange, fire-laced sky, and screamed at the top of his lungs: “Why?”
Nobody answered, no voices. Nothing but the sounds of birds shaking the branches of a nearby tree. Were they fleeing him, or were they fleeing the world? Scared of what was to come, like Frank had been.
The blood was blindingly red and fresh against the paleness of his hands.
“Why!” he said, not a question.
Because you’re special, Franky, the voice answered, but he wasn’t sure if it was his father or the Dark One’s. The two had seemed to blend together now.
Yes, the Dark One. It was all clear now. His master. The one he’d serve until the Sacred King was satisfied.
Frank brought his bloody hands to his forehead and smeared it all over him like warpaint. Four vertical streaks ran from his eyebrows to the middle of his cheeks.
Yes, accept us, Frank King.
You’re making your old man proud, Franky. Your initiation has been complete, now take us home.
Above, a storm cloud broke open. Raindrops pattered down against him, washed the blood away. And Frank King was born again.
This time, as a monster in a man suit.
CHAPTER 21
Sahara’s flesh glowed red down the middle of her arms, and down the middle of her legs. The chains creaked and clashed together.
Harold was pressed against the wall now back in his trench coat, still wet and beaten. Bursts of frigid air whipped around the ruined restaurant. Old napkins and rusty silverware swirled around the table as if caught in a mini-tornado. Harold’s hands tried to find purchase on the old drywall, but he scrabbled so hard that his fingers punched straight through, the wall crumbling underneath them.
Roberta, the Grand Witch, the time-traveling mystical ball of white light and a filthy corpse dressed in a deathly black gown, stood by with a slight smile on her face. Like the crazy old bat actually enjoyed the show.
“What’s happening?” Harold shouted over the noise.
“The purging, Harold Storm. I told you this would not be easy.”
Sahara flipped her head up, that head full of dying red hair hung across her face like a veil, and she screamed at the top of her lungs, nearly muting the sounds of the harsh winds. Harold found himself backing up until he felt the drywall buckle against the force of his spine. It took everything inside of him not to tuck tail and bolt out of the Lake, get back into the Audi, and drive until he reached the untouched horizon.
But Sahara, despite the blackness in her eyes, the deathly, hollow cheeks, was still Sahara, was still his partner, and yet, so much more than that, even if she didn’t realize it. He brought her this far and he didn’t intend to leave her out to dry in the hands of a shady Witch.
Her mouth gaped open, neck craned up, as the rest of her body was held down by the thick, creaking chains.
“The branches will force themselves down your throat, Harold Storm. And you’ll scream and scream until they come out of your toes.”
Not Sahara’s voice; something much more sinister.
Roberta swung the handle of the blade she held in her right hand, and the bluntness whacked Sahara’s head.
Her hair whipped back, and for a second, Harold thought he could see the woman he’d begun to fall in love with. That sweet, innocent, yet still wise and powerful look he could only liken to a pale Egyptian queen — his redheaded Cleopatra.
She blinked, and the blackness inside of her pupils, that empty look, floated like the liquid inside of a lava lamp, and her brown eyes were back, the ones that had seen so much. They spoke life until she blinked again, and the blackness floated down, and she bared her teeth.
“The Gate is open, Storm. Come meet us. Come die.”
Harold recognized that voice — somehow it…it sounded like Charlie, the Shadow Eater he’d sacrificed his hand, his key, his Deathblade too.
And the fire raged inside of Harold. He found himself walking closer and closer. Debris bounced off of him, clattered to the floor, then the wind swept away whatever fell once more. He could smell that rotting stench of death, the fear, the loathing, the self doubt, the Shadow Eater.
He placed his hand on the meta
l table, now blazing hot from the Hell burning inside of Sahara.
“That Gate won’t be open much longer,” he said, and he spoke with a confidence only a Protector could speak with — only the new Harold could speak with.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Roberta smiling.
The voice roared out of Sahara’s open mouth. A spray of black venom went in Harold’s direction, but he’d seen it before it happened…somehow, and dodged it as if it were one of the rusty forks caught up in the gusts.
“You wish,” that Demonic voice said.
“You’re gonna beg me to stop. And you’re gonna go crawling back to your master’s cell,” Harold said, but even he was surprised at the words coming out. Almost like they weren’t his words at all, almost like someone more brave and confident — the new Harold — had a hand up his back and worked his mouth like a puppet.
“That will be mighty tough without your precious Wolves, Storm. Oh and your Deathblade — I love it. Fits me perfectly.”
Harold raised a hand, was about to strike the source of the voice, but then Sahara’s almond eyes flashed once again.
But nobody talks about his Pack. He was the Alpha Male. The Alpha was not supposed to lose his troops. They were his. His.
His.
His.
Mine.
They howled in his head, an empty sound — artificial. Not the real Wolves.
It was not Charlie, he knew that. Just his voice. Sahara was the victim. He had to compose himself. Calm down amongst the chaotic atmosphere, which was not an easy task.
“Oh no,” Roberta said, just a whisper, but somehow Harold heard her as if she were inches away from his ear.
His mouth dropped open, and he looked to her. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Were losing her. The Shadows are taking her.”
A sound like splitting paper ripped through Harold’s ears.
Sahara’s screams followed.
He snapped his head towards her. Saw the black snakes wriggling from where the streaks of red had glowed against her pale skin. Four long, coal-colored lines the size of a garden hose hung in the air, their backs arched like capital S’s, and uncoiled from the undersides of her arms and legs, still bound by the chains.
Shadowbound: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Realm Protectors Book 2) Page 11
