“Don’t you two have a car?” I asked.
“No,” Lilith answered simply.
“Then how did you get here?” I asked. There was silence in the car for a long moment, then I thought about it for a second and got the mental image of Phil carrying Lilith as he flew along Independence Boulevard during rush hour. “I bet that was something for the commuters to see, huh?”
We rode in silence across town to the school and pulled into the far end of the parking lot. Sabrina popped the trunk and pulled out a pair of pistol-grip twelve-gauge shotguns. She handed one to me and started loading oddly colored shells into hers.
“What are those?”
“Bean-bag rounds. Non-lethal, but they’ll take almost anyone out of the fight. Plenty here for you, too. Let’s try not to kill any civilians if we can help it.”
“I don’t mind that in concept, but in practice, the civilians are likely to be the only things we can kill. I’ve got a bad feeling about whatever is in there waiting for us.”
“Me too.” She looked nervous, and I reached out to touch her arm.
“Hey. It’ll be fine. We’re the good guys.” I tried to manage a smile filled with bravado and cocky charm, but I think I looked more like I was about to puke.
I felt more like I was going to puke, for sure. And as our motley crew made our way across the parking lot, I felt worse. The closer we got to the school, the worse I felt. It wasn’t nerves, or a bad bag of blood. Something was messing with me. I looked around at the rest of the gang and saw that Greg was decidedly green as well. Even Phil and Lilith looked like breakfast wasn’t settling well in their stomachs. We were about twenty yards from the entrance to the school gym, when I saw the huge banner across the front of the building proclaiming, “Fall Carnival for Christ!—No HELL-oween here!”
“Ahhh, crap,” I said. “We’ve got a problem.” I waved everybody together. Sometime between leaving our place and getting to the school, Phil and Lilith had magiced their outfits into something more early 2000s yuppie than late ’80s goth porn. I didn’t ask how they managed that trick. I really didn’t care right now.
“What’s the problem?” Mike asked. “I mean, I certainly don’t agree with their odd bias against Halloween, but the rest of our plan seems to be solid.”
“Except for one thing—location,” I said. I looked around at my queasy partner, and the near-dead-looking Lilith and Phil. Mike and Sabrina looked fine, but that also made perfect sense. “The whole school seholy ground.”
“Oh crap,” said Greg. I watched the realization creep across the faces of the rest of our group as well.
“What do we do?” Sabrina asked. “How do we get in there and get the job done without our heavy hitters?”
“We just do it, my dear,” Mike answered. He reached over and took my shotgun, racked a shell into the chamber and pulled out his crucifix. “You and I go in there and drag our little demoness out into the parking lot where our compatriots can send her back to Hell. And don’t forget, I brought a little backup myself. And I daresay he’s the heaviest hitter of all.”
“I can personally vouch for that.” Phil handed Sabrina his pistol. “Silver rounds. I don’t know what effect they’ll have, but it can’t hurt.”
He passed a few extra magazines around to the rest of us from his apparently bottomless coat pocket. I didn’t question the supply, because I didn’t care how he got them or where they came from as long as the rounds gave us an edge in the fight to come.
“Thanks.” Sabrina took the gun from Phil, tucked it into the back waistband of her pants and nodded to Mike. “Let’s go.”
“As they say in the movies, my friends, we’ll be back.” My old friend looked a dozen years younger as he shouldered the shotgun and headed off to fight a demon in a school gymnasium. If I squinted, I could even make myself ignore the bandages he was sporting on one hand and the limp he had picked up fighting zombies all over town last night.
“Do you think they’ve got a chance?” I asked Greg. “I can only hope, bro. For all our sakes.”
Chapter Thirty
I wasn’t a patient man. I’m a less patient vampire. I paced the parking lot, growing crankier than hell with each passing moment and no word or indication of what was going on inside. I looked over at where Greg sat on the tailgate of a nearby pickup.
“How long have they been in there?”
He made a show of checking his watch and said, “About three minutes.”
“I hate waiting.”
“We can see that.” Phil was sitting cross-legged on the roof of a minivan, with Lilith beside him.
I started toward the door of the gym, in earnest this time, knowing that forces were in motion against my making it onto consecrated ground. But I’d never tested myself to my limit of endurance. Maybe if a vampire were determined enough, he could make it.
The place pushed back at me, like I was trying to walk through a hard wind. The closer I got, the harder it seemed to push against me, and the sicker I felt. I had gotten almost to the front door when I heard shots ring out from inside. The boom of a twelve-gauge shotgun is unmistakable, and the sound I heard was two of them firing in the kind of rapid succession that would require a fast reload if the job wasn’t done.
After about half a dozen shots, the gunshots stopped, and then it got quiet. Too quiet, as the cliché goes. No screams, no running feet, none of the sounds I would expect from a crowded school carnival whose attendees had to contend with a couple of nutjobs unloading a pair of shotguns. The silence reigned for about half a minute, as I kept pushing at the invisible barrier keeping me out. Then a low whir reached my ears.
The sound started slow and low, picking up in pitch and intensity, like a jet engine ramping up for takeoff. The noise built for a few seconds, then an explosion from inside sent blinding light out of every window and blasted me back from the doors.
I had almost enough time to gather myself for another assault when the doors of the gym opened up and a stream of people poured out, running like the hounds of hell were on their heels. Which, for all I knew, was true. A couple hundred people ran out into the night, a few of them getting into their cars and careening off down the street, but most just left their cars and ran for home rather than risk the traffic jam in the parking lot.
Phil, Lilith and Greg had pushed their way to my side, and as the stream slowed to a trickle, a familiar figure lurched into view. Mike bounced down the central steps of the building, holding onto the handrail like a sailor on shore leave. Instinctively I broke toward him, expecting the same intense pushback of consecration this close to the building, but there was only a slight roiling in my gut so I kept moving.
I shouted to the others as I ran, “I can make it. Whatever caused the explosion must have weakened the holy hold on the land.”
“Mike, are you okay?”
He had a dazed look on his face, and his eyes were out of focus. I had to repeat myself a couple of times to get his attention. When I got through the crush of people, I saw that my friend’s hair had gone completely white, like the good guy in a bad horror movie. “Are you okay?” I repeated, and he seemed to come to himself a little.
“What happened? Where’s Sabrina? Did you kill the demon?” Greg peppered Mike with questions faster than he could answer. I waved Greg off and then pulled Mike around to the other side of the car.
“She’s an innocent, Jimmy.” The words were less than a whisper, and I probably wouldn’t have understood what he said without my vamp hearing.
“Who’s innocent? The teacher? Nah, man, she’s the bad guy, I’m pretty sure. What happened in there?” I couldn’t follow Mike’s line of thought, and I wondered if he’d taken a smack to the head.
“No. Sabrina. She’s an innocent, Jimmy. In the full meaning of the word. That’s how she got caught.”
My borrowed blood ran cold as what he said started to sink in. “The demon has Sabrina? Because she’s a . . .”
I didn’t say “virgin
.” Just because I’d heard of them didn’t mean I necessarily believed in them any more than unicorns. Not grown women virgins. Sabrina was a grown woman. And hot. A hot, adult virgin in today’s society? I might be the vampire standing in the parking lot fighting a demon with a fallen angel and an immortal feminist, but pegging Sabrina as a virgin was a leap of logic I’d never have made.
“This is unfortunate.” Phil has a talent for understatement. Obviously.
“Yes. Belial has her. Her and a dozen children. We haven’t got much time, we have to get in there and stop the ritual before—” He collapsed against a nearby car, coughing. There was a little blood as he coughed, and I wondered what kind of beating he’d taken in there.
“Mike, I wish we could.” Greg was starting to freak out, and he always talks really fast when he freaks out. “But it’s sacred ground. We can’t go in and help. You’ve got to do it. You’re the only one that can save her.” That last bit was more like ‘theonlyonethatcansaveher.’
He hadn’t quite lapsed into “Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re our only hope,” but we were getting close. Mike tried to stand, but collapsed again.
“Well,” I said, letting Mike slide down to a sitting position beside the car. “I guess it’s time to test a theory.”
Chapter Thirty-One
“Oh, hell no!” bellowed Greg, as Lilith looked at me and said “What theory, little vampire?”
“Dude, it’s the only way,” I replied. I looked over at Lilith and said, “Come along, sister, I think you’re on this ride, too.” I walked towards the entrance, with Greg walking backward in front of me, both hands out.
“You can’t go in there, man. We’ve tried it before, and it doesn’t end well. Even if you make it, we can’t function on holy ground.” He finally got both hands on me and stopped my march to the gym.
“Yeah, but we’ve never figured out why, have we? Mike has always said that it was our subconscious hang-ups making us sick whenever we went near a church, not anything having to do with our vampirism.”
“Are you willing to take that chance?” Greg looked me in the face. “Is she worth it?”
“I don’t know, and yes, I’m willing. Now either come with me or get out of the way. And Lilith, get your immortal tookus up here. I need a little pick-me-up.” She came up beside me and gave me a sultry gaze. “Hold the smolder, appetizer. I just need the blood.”
She pouted a little. “You’re no fun when you’re being all heroic, little vampire.”
“Maybe after I save the world, get the girl and ride off into the sunrise we can play a different game. But for right now, give me your arm, please.” She stretched out her wrist to me, and I drank. Not a tentative sip like the last time, but a full gulp of immortal blood. I saw the look on Greg’s face, and it mirrored the fear in my gut. I didn’t want to end up a slave to an eternal succubus for the rest of my potentially very long life, but I had to get in there and rescue Sabrina. I’d gotten her into this mess, and if it took the end of my free will to get her out of it, well so be it. The power of ages crashed over me like a wave, and I could feel the sensation of it rolling through me. I could almost feel myself getting taller (the last thing I needed) and stronger (the intended result) and even sexier (a new sensation altogether). I drank for a few seconds, and let her go, feeling more alive than I ever had when I was alive. One step toward the gym and I knew the consecration was weakened. It was now or never.
I looked at Greg and said, “You might want to top off the tank, too, old buddy. I think we’re gonna need it. Now is not the time to stand on principle.”
Then I pushed past him and headed up the stairs into the church gymnasium to fight the demon that had kidnapped my maybe-someday-if-I-get-really-lucky girlfriend. I wasn’t certain which was least likely—besting the demon or winning the girl.
Chapter Thirty-Two
The gym looked like a cross between Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the lame movie, not the badass TV show) and Vacation Bible School. There were prom-style decorations from 1993, glittery letters and bunting strung all around the gym, and cheap poster-board signs over booths with slogans like “Bobbing for Salvation,” and “Baptismal Dunking Booth.” I couldn’t decide whether to laugh or cry at the crazy attempt to de-monsterize Halloween, and felt no small irony that a couple of monsters were crashing the party trying to save the children of parents who would most likely lead the pitchfork party if they knew we existed.
My attention quickly locked on to our friendly neighborhood demon summoning taking place right at center court. The bun-headed lady from the forest was standing in the middle of a glowing circle, and there were a dozen little girls playing ring-around-the-psycho. The kids all faced out, and they all had the same glowing eyeball thing going on as the first bunch we rescued. The kids ranged in age from high-school girls down to one kid that looked barely old enough to go to middle school, but that wasn’t the worst part.
No, the worst part was Sabrina. She was floating over the center of the circle, a good ten feet in the air over the bun-headed woman, and it looked like a rope of energy was flowing from each of the kids up to where she floated. As we watched, Bun-head twisted her hand in the air, and Sabrina turned in the air until she was looking straight at us. Her hands extended to the sides and her feet crossed at the ankles in a grotesque mockery of a crucifixion, and the look on her face was pure agony. I took one look at her writhing in pain and launched myself at the witch.
I flew a good twenty feet, landed and took another huge leap, crashing right into the invisible wall of the circle. I slid down to the floor like the coyote in one of those old cartoons, and heard the witch laugh maniacally as I lay crumpled on the hardwood floor. I heard several loud cracks like handclaps and looked up to see Greg shooting at Bun-head and screaming something that I couldn’t hear through the ringing in my ears and the chirping of those imaginary birdies that were circling my head. The witch kept laughing as the bullets bounced harmlessly to the ground.
“Did you morons really think you could come in here and stop me that easily?” she asked, as she started to glow herself. The energy from the twelve kids was passing through Sabrina and down into Bun Lady, making her eyes glow and her hair unravel.
“Well, I kinda hoped,” I said from where I lay on the floor. “Since our frontal assault didn’t work, I don’t suppose you have a better idea?” The last was to Greg, who had stopped shooting when it became apparent that he was doing no good.
“I got nothing, bro,” he replied.
I tried to come up with something, but between the throbbing in my face from crashing into the circle and the nausea in my gut from being on holy ground, it was getting pretty hard to think.
Bun-head began to chant in some arcane language. The lights coming from the little girls glowed brighter, and Sabrina screamed as the flow of power through her became unbearable.
I beat on the barrier and yelled at Greg for help to get her out of there. “Salt!”
He tossed a fistful at the circle, but it bounced off like everything else we threw at it. “No good!” he said. “The circle is complete and only the caster or someone stronger can break it.”
I didn’t care about the reasons it wasn’t working. I didn’t care about anything except that the one living person I’d felt any connection to in a couple decades was on the other side of that magic barrier about to be possessed by a serious bad guy while I was stuck on the outside, unable to do anything about it.
Then Sabrina started to spin, and the light flowing through her started to go supernova. The faster she spun, the brighter she glowed, and the louder she screamed. Bun-head chanted in the unfamiliar language as the ground beneath her began to glow in answer to the light pouring down out of Sabrina. The glowing bands of energy started off white, but shifted to red. Then I noticed the kids in the circle starting to change.
There was no way this was going to end well.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The only word I have for what the
kids turned into was demon. I don’t know if there’s a better word, or if there’s some type of hierarchy of Hell that I’m offending with my oversimplification, but when I see a four-foot-tall thing with red skin, horns and a spiky tail where a little girl stood a couple of minutes before, demon is the word that leaps to mind, and I don’t care what the ACLU has to say about racial profiling.
I was still kneeling on the floor when the herd of demons broke loose from the magical circle and charged me and my partner. I was trying to figure out how to beat the demons without hurting the little kids probably still trapped inside, when Greg stepped up beside me and, without hesitation, shot the nearest monster right between the eyes. It flew backward into the circle and lay still. I tried to process that my partner, the vegan vampire who wouldn’t even feed off bunnies, hadn’t given a rat’s ass whether or not a little girl was still inside the demon.
“I have a few issues left over from being tossed naked into the girl’s locker room in sixth grade. I’ve decided to think of this as therapy.” He turned faster than anyone but another vampire could follow and dropped another pair of demon girls before they could close on us.
“Dude! That was almost thirty years ago!” I yelled as I kicked a little girl across the gym.
“Some wounds take a long time to heal, man.” He plugged another kid, and I started to worry. This was too easy. The demon children were dying just like any human, only redder, with the pointy extremities I’d expected from evil minions.
Apparently I was right, because that’s when three of the demons got to me at the same time. I took one by the throat, and fended another off with the other arm, but the third one jumped on my back and bit the side of my neck.
Modern Magic Page 37
