by ST Branton
“Don’t lose her!” Brax bellowed from off to my left. He used the massive head of his hammer like a battering ram to barrel down on the god who had controlled his fate for so long. She stood in a protective circle of her strongest lackeys. The grin on her face stretched from ear to ear. The scene of utter death and destruction was what she’d been waiting for, what she lived for. The promise of it had been the thing that lured her to Earth.
Now at long last, she’d get a well-deserved piece of the action.
I cut my way through her inner circle, stepping over the fallen. She turned toward me, her horns nearly decapitating whoever had the misfortune of standing in their way.
“Ah, swordbearer,” she said. “God-slayer. The king’s heir. I’ve been anticipating this encounter for a long time now.”
“So have I. But not as much as Brax.”
Rocca laughed. “That’s too bad because I have no interest in him. Abraxzael is a fool who thinks he’s mighty, and yet I see him dragged back to Asphodel time after time. You’d think he’d have learned by now.” She snapped the heavy chain along the ground. “It doesn’t matter. You’re the one that I want.” Her hand made a dismissive gesture toward the minions around her. “I’m sure they would love to take care of him.”
“You bitch!” Brax lunged for her, bringing his hammer down in an overhead smash. Rocca deflected the blow without batting an eye. Brax was flung backward into the seething crowd.
“Enough of this.” Rocca wrapped a length of the chain around the knuckles of each hand. “We’re not here to talk.” She punctuated that sentence with a flurry of punches that cracked through the air toward me. I did my best to parry with the sword, but she was too fast and attentive to slip up and hit it. The edge of the chain grazed under my chin, clicking my jaws together.
A warm trickle of blood oozed down the outside of my throat.
“First blood already?” Rocca jeered. “I have to say, I’m disappointed. I thought the one who robbed me of my kill would have held out a little longer than that.”
Her footwork surprised me with its lightness and intricacy. Outwardly, she looked like she belonged in the same school of bulky clumsiness as Frank. Then she took a jab at me, and the illusion dissipated entirely.
I barely managed to lean to the side quickly enough to avoid taking the brunt of a strike to the temple. I moved in to counter with an underhanded slash when I thought she was vulnerable, but Rocca locked down on my arm, pulling me into a grapple up to the shoulder. She twisted, and the joint screamed under pressure.
A jarring hit threw me to the side, and my arm dropped free. Brax had circled around and pounced on her from the back, barring the long haft of his hammer across her horns. She grunted, both hands grasping for any part of him or the hammer, bucking and tossing like she’d been possessed. Brax clung on stubbornly, but he struggled to use his leverage to snap her head back like he wanted to. Rocca was too strong, too angry, too undaunted.
But she was also distracted. Her hands being busy with the pest on her shoulder, she’d left her torso and the lower half of her face unguarded. I darted in, slashing diagonally from ribs to shoulder. It was a good strike, but she had some tough, leathery hide that let only a thin spindle of blood escape the insultingly shallow wound.
It did, however, hurt, and the pain galvanized Rocca in a way I hadn’t expected. She threw herself back into the waiting, clutching hands of her army. I watched in horror as Brax was torn off her by half a dozen vamps. He managed to keep a hold on his hammer, and clouds of red erupted wherever it swung.
Then he was gone, swept off by the tide of the fight. Only Rocca stood before me. She was pure muscle topped by those mean, goring horns. The only hit I’d landed had been more or less inconsequential, except to rid me of my one ally. Now she grabbed for the hilt of the Gladius Solis. I jumped backward. The churning wall of the war going on around us felt uncomfortably close.
“Scared?” Rocca taunted. “I just want to see it.” She grabbed for it again. “Come on, swordbearer. Don’t tell me you’ve let the sword be the source of your power. It was for Kronin, and look where he is.”
I lashed out at her hand. “Strong words from someone who only fights with a whole army behind her.”
Her face darkened for a moment. I could see her push down a flare of anger. That gave me an idea. If she was prone to becoming a slave to her emotions, maybe I could use that to force vulnerability from her impenetrable façade.
“It’s working, isn’t it?” she demanded. The chain whipped at my feet. I hopped, pirouetted, and cut her in a smooth arc across the wrist. The sharpest edge of the blade carved through the corner of one of the chain links—the sound of it hitting the ground caught Rocca off guard. Something foreign flickered in her eyes when she noticed the broken link. Was it a new, deeper level of rage?
Or was it fear?
“Tell me something, Rocca.” It was my turn to jab at her, the sword leaving a whirl of singe marks. “What happens when the chain breaks?”
“Your friends are dead!” she screamed, shoving right up into my face. Spit flung from the corners of her mouth. One hand closed around my neck. “And now you die alone. After I watch you suffer for it.”
I kicked at her, holding desperately on to the Gladius Solis in my right hand. My foot struck something incredibly hard at a weird angle, sending white hot spears of pain up my leg. Her grip was iron, unyielding. My vision began to blur.
“That’s it.” Rocca leered inches from my face. “No quick death for the swordbearer. I couldn’t waste this opportunity.” She adjusted her hold on my neck.
Half a breath squeaked into my lungs, and that was all I needed. The moment of clarity gave up an idea that I hoped was just a little too clever for her. I opened my watering eyes, looked her square in the face, and then I let them roll back. The arm holding the sword went limp at my side. I uncurled my fingers from the sword.
The moment it was free of my grasp, I called it back, but instead of securing it in my palm, I willed it to jam into Rocca’s side. She gave a huge, wheezing gasp, and in the next instant, I was on the ground. She stumbled backward, clutching at the hilt. “How? How did you…”
The tunnel splayed out above me, cocked at an odd angle. Maya’s Were-form towered over the others in all its awful beauty, tearing through a constant stream of Marked. Even from my current position, I could see her cherry-picking the humans out of the onslaught and tossing them aside. Whether or not that maneuver actually saved their lives, I couldn’t say, but it was nice to see more of Maya shining through.
She snatched up two Marked and smashed them together, and as she turned, I noticed Jules doing the same thing I’d done at the pharmacy, turning the werewolf into cover. At first, I thought for sure she wasn’t really shooting, but the muzzle of the gun jumped and flashed. A swell of pride engulfed me. There was my mild-mannered, exceedingly polite best friend, pumping some vampires full of lead.
Rocca yanked me to my feet, snapping things back into focus. She still had the hilt protruding from her side. It had stuck at an angle that wouldn’t let her just pull it out. I ducked under the fist she threw at my head and grabbed at the sword, wrenching it free. Dark blood splattered onto the road.
“Turns out a quick death would’ve been the smarter choice.” My voice was low and gravelly from the throttling. I kind of liked it.
Her anger boiled over, and she threw me in rage and disgust. I angled the sword in the air, catching sight of Deacon and Steph back to back, turning smoothly like a human turret. Steph reloaded in about half a second without missing a beat.
“Damn,” I said, impressed. Then I chucked the sword. As I’d hoped, Rocca lifted her hand to either catch or block the projectile. She didn’t realize I had undershot it on purpose so that the blade would strike the chain still dangling from her hand. The last thing I saw before hitting the wall was the slow-motion separation of two links. A clean cut all the way through.
The chain was broken.
I crumpled to the ground against the wall, fully aware of how bad that was going to feel in the morning. My adrenaline mitigated the worst of it for now, but the shock of impact disoriented my senses for a few seconds. I pushed myself upright and shook my head to clear it.
“Get up, soldier.” The smoking man stood over me, hand outstretched. In the other was a cane with a blade hidden inside. The exposed edge was stained crimson. “You took a pretty big hit, but you can take more than that.”
I seized his hand and steadied myself on my feet. The Gladius Solis wavered a bit on its way back to me, but it came back. Rocca stood where I left her, staring dumbfounded at the fragment of chain she held in her fingers. All of the Marked who had been standing around her were turning to look at their former master, dark recognition blooming in their black eyes.
“No! No!” Rocca thrusted the chain out on all sides, bunched up in both her hands. The broken ends hung pathetic and loose, swinging with her frantic movements.
“Leave her!” Brax commanded the other Marked. He pushed them aside as he approached. “She’s ours. You can have the rest.”
The Marked set upon Rocca’s horde with vigor that would have been frightening if I had time to focus on it. I was too busy witnessing Rocca’s ultimate fall. Seeing her empire disintegrate before her eyes and weakened by the wounds I had inflicted, Rocca backed away from Brax. She seemed to wither without the power of the chain at her disposal. The ground around her was slick with blood soaking into the blacktop.
Brax came to a stop in front of her. “At last, Rocca. At long, long last, someone is going to give you what you deserve.” He motioned to me. “You’re the one who brought her down. We can do this together.”
I didn’t step forward. There was a brutality in execution that I didn’t like—that part of me that had sought vengeance for five years had finally melted away. “No, Brax,” I said. “This one’s all yours.” Turning my back, I kept my eyes to the ground, shutting out the resonating crush of hammer on bone.
The next time I looked, Rocca was dead. Brax gazed down at the body, then up at me. “Thank you. I won’t forget this.”
The legions fighting around us were drastically thinned now, on account of the Marked turning on their former battle brethren. A new atmosphere began to roll in, still not pleasant, but at least not drenched in bloodlust. I allowed myself to breathe the beginning of a sigh of relief, thinking the next phase was about to start. It’d be a chore to shepherd the remainder of the refugees all the way to Weehawken, but I was lucky to be able to do it. I looked down the tunnel, seeking to pinpoint any potential obstacles in our way.
What I saw was a tall, slender woman, her beautiful face dominated by golden eyes. Her pupils were diamonds instead of slits. She was staring directly at me.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Her forked tongue licked the air, lips curling into a little smile. A harsh rattle took over the air, bouncing over itself off the walls. “I never said you could leave.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Tahn’s laughter was musical and enchanting—but also deeply unsettling. Her smile widened into one of genuine delight as she stepped lightly across the bloodied tunnel. She paused in front of Rocca’s lifeless body, reached out one long hand, and touched the side of Rocca’s face. “You poor, dumb cow. Was it cruel of me to use you in such a way? Perhaps. Do I regret it? Not at all! In fact, I am so proud of you, dead Rocca, for exceeding my expectations. You are the one who has prepared the feast on which my magnificent beast will dine and grow strong. For that, I thank you. I would be in your debt if you were anything more than a rapidly cooling corpse.”
I blinked, unsure of what I was seeing. What I had learned about Tahn from Marcus wasn’t enough to prepare me for how cold and callous she really was. Watching her talk to Rocca’s body, I knew she’d have no qualms about murdering everyone in New York City and beyond. She would raze the Earth flat if she wasn’t stopped.
Tahn spun playfully to face the tunnel’s surviving inhabitants, her dress billowing around her. The forked tongue flicked in and out. She seemed to eye each and every one of us in turn. When she got to me, her gaze lingered. “I’m so glad you could be here to see this,” she told me. She raised her hands. “All your hard work, your blood, sweat, and tears, reduced to nothing.”
A great, collective thump reverberated through the tunnel as every human dropped prone, including Deacon and Jules. Were-Maya and I remained standing among the Marked, who glared daggers into Tahn with baleful eyes. Despite their evident rage, not a single one attacked her.
“Do you know what I’m doing?” Her smile widened even further. “I’m draining their life force. I confess I didn’t have high hopes for Rocca, but in the end, she brought me exactly what I needed. Copious amounts of life that I can use however I see fit. I could bring back the dead. I could heal all the ills that plague this unspeakably frail world. Or I could harvest it to feed to the Titan in the depths. An insatiable creature from the old days, devourer of worlds, and forgotten, like the rest. For so long its appetite has been blanketed by sleep, awaiting a master’s call. It hungers, you know? So terribly. And it is a hunger that drives the poor thing mad, such that it can’t even follow simple commands.”
“Fortunately, there is a way to fix this: provide the creature with a feast, and then while it is lulled into a stupor, lock down my control. Still difficult, yes. But so much easier once the Titan has been fed. It is indomitable, this great serpent of the water, and once it is mine, I shall rule all indisputably!” She dissolved into laughter. “I should thank you, too, swordbearer. Lorcan had the idea. He set everything up. It was to be his own little secret, infiltrating law enforcement to make it easier to round up the masses. But then he died, and his work was left unfinished. That’s where I came in, to finish what he started. Rocca was the one who penned the livestock. But you herded them directly to me, didn’t you?”
I gasped. “It was a trap! Madison Square Garden really was a trap!” The revelation hit me like a truck going ninety miles an hour. Tahn had taken her ambush to a level beyond any we had even considered. All this time, she was playing the long game. We walked right into it.
“What else could it have been, darling? For a swordbearer of Kronin, you’re not terribly bright. Hundreds of people—thousands—gathered all in one place for you to conveniently rescue? Who would do that for you but I?” She tapped her cheek with her index finger. “Actually, it strikes me as quite a fair trade. My starving Titan is fed and subdued, and you got to feel like a real hero for a little while. Like you were making a difference. Like there was hope. It was nice, wasn’t it? You’re welcome for that.”
My fists clenched at my sides, and the blood rushed to my face. “When I’m done with you,” I snarled through gritted teeth, “you’ll wish you were in Asphodel, you conniving, devil-tongued witch!”
Tahn arched her perfect eyebrows. “Asphodel? I see someone’s been cavorting with the Marked. That is very interesting.” She peered at me serenely. “As for those threats you’ve so cavalierly thrown my way, you may have to hold off on such bravado. I think you’re about to have your hands full.”
I blinked, and she was gone. The tunnel quaked violently around us. Maya bounded for the exit first, followed by Brax and me. We were greeted by the sight of water from the Hudson River pouring over onto the freeway and an ear-splitting, discordant shriek. Something enormous loomed up from the river, blotting out the new dawn with its shadow.
“Fuck.” Brax spit on the blacktop. “I was hoping it was all a bluff. But she actually did it, the crazy wench.”
“And now we have to undo it.” I twirled the Gladius Solis idly. “How hard do you think this is gonna be?”
Brax smirked. “Depends on how long you stand there asking questions instead of killing it.” He looked up at the indistinct silhouette. “Here it comes. Try to keep it off the bridge so the whole thing doesn’t just collapse inward. And whatever you do, don’t fight i
t in the water.”
I rolled my eyes. “Thanks for the tip, Captain Obvious.” To Maya, I said, “Can you run interference for us so that we can chip it down?” If she held its attention for long enough, Brax and I could do the bulk of the damage.
Were-Maya grunted impatiently. She put her nose to the breeze, sniffed, and let out a piercing howl. Another deafening screech blasted into us. It was closer now, and unlike Beleza, close range only made it seem that much bigger. A huge fringe of gleaming teeth curled over the edge of the tunnel’s roof. Cracks appeared in the stone moments before it was wrenched from its foundations, chewed up with an awful, harsh crunching. The front of Lincoln Tunnel lay exposed under the sky, its covering eaten.
“Hey!” I waved the Gladius Solis high, hoping the Titan might be attracted to it. “Over here, ugly!”
The Titan swung around to locate the source of my voice. Four red eyes, two on each side of the elongated, serpentine face, gleamed above a maw full of fangs still crusted with concrete. The eyes didn’t blink all at the same time. One always remained open. A stubby pair of vestigial wings stuck up out of its narrow back.
“Keep it away from the tunnel!” Brax yelled. “If it gets in there, everyone’s dead!”
The beast stepped down onto the freeway, pursuing me and the sword. River water fell in sheets from a sharp ridge protruding along its spine. The fin on the end of its tail lashed into the embankment of the tunnel, gouging it through sheer force. The SUV belonging to Steph and the Smoking Man rolled like a kid’s toy. One wrong move, and it could be all over for any of us, even Maya.
The Titan squatted on the freeway, its tongue darting in and out. Army vehicles disintegrated underneath it with every move it made toward us. The great, clawed feet left cracked imprints in the road. About fifty feet away, it stopped, hunkered down, reared back its head, and expelled a raging torrent of water from its mouth. I rolled away from the worst of it, and when I came up drenched and sputtering, I shouted, “Maya, go!”
