“I thought that was just a parlor trick,” Cara said.
“So did I,” Zola whispered.
I glanced at my master and grinned. “I’ve been working on it for a while.” My grin faded as I saw what had been groaning. Vik was leaning against the wall at the base of the staircase. To say he was a torn-up, bloody mess would be a gross understatement.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
I took a step toward Vik and didn’t even notice the blur out of the corner of my eye until I was airborne. I contemplated the stupidity of not checking the area with my Sight before I bounced off the banister, distantly impressed it didn’t break, and tumbled down the stairs across from Vik. I could hear the clash of metal on metal by the time I stopped falling.
I cursed and started up the stairs as soon as I gained my footing. Zola was crouched beside Vik. Foster and Aideen were both dueling with a single, monstrous vampire. He was close to Foster’s seven-foot height, a spiky crown of blond hair snarling from his head. The muscles writhing in his arms were scary as hell, and didn’t slow him down at all. If I’d ever had any doubt about the swords in the Pit’s coat of arms being real, it was gone now. Muscles fended off the two fairies, one sword in each hand. He swung the short swords like they were rapiers, thrusting and arcing in overhand blows that moved the blades faster than they had any right to move.
Foster dropped below a lateral swipe and lunged with his claymore. Muscles intercepted the thrust by crossing his body with his left hand. He followed through and lowered his body into a sweep. Foster cursed as his legs were knocked out from under him.
Aideen leapt in with a two-handed overhead slash that would have cleaved through a boulder. Muscles managed to follow through his sweep and deflect the blow with the sword in his left hand. If he’d tried to block Aideen outright, I was sure her sword would have split his like a toothpick.
I raised my hand to call on my necromancy. There was no sense in risking Foster or Aideen.
“No!” They both shouted at once.
I hesitated and, as I glanced at Foster, I noticed the shadow creeping around the chandelier.
Unfortunately for Muscles, he didn’t. Cara put her battle face on about ten feet above him and came down with a fury. Her sword sliced through his left thigh and sent the limb spinning down the stairs.
Muscles didn’t even scream. He just propped himself up on one leg and one sword, then swiped at Cara with his free arm. Her wings flared as she jumped back and dodged the attack.
Foster relieved him of his right arm. Muscles grunted as Aideen took care of his left arm, and Foster followed through a split second later to remove his right leg, just below the hip. Cara pulled back for a killing blow.
“Don’t kill him!” I yelled.
She paused and stared at me. “If I don’t do it, the Pit is going to.”
I shook my head and glanced at my master.
“Minas Ignatto,” Zola said. I felt the power move through the room as fire sprang from her hand. She dragged the line of flame across the severed stumps of lost limbs.
“He’s still going to die, just not now,” I said. “Foster, you alright? Aideen?”
They both nodded and hugged each other briefly.
“You two mind adding this vamp to the collection I’m starting in my trunk?”
Foster laughed. “Not at all.”
I nodded and threw him my keys.
“It is not safe, boy, leaving them alive,” Zola said. “The demon is attached to them.”
“It’s our best shot,” I said, a little sharply. “I won’t ask Glenn for help, and you already said Aeros can’t fight a demon.”
“Ah said he can’t beat this demon.”
“Either way,” I said.
“These creatures are strong,” Cara said.
“He is not a puppet,” Zola said as she leaned over the vampire, “but he is corrupted.”
I looked at his aura. It was thin, tinged with sickly red hues, but it still moved outside his skin.
Cara was still staring at Muscles when I heard a low groan behind us and what sounded like very weak words. I glanced at Vik and was surprised to see his eyes open.
“Vik!” I walked over to him quickly and knelt down on the bloody rug.
His voice was only a whisper. “Damian, thank God.” He was on the floor, leaning into a person-sized dent in the white wainscoting. There was blood splattered everywhere. The mustard carpet looked like someone tried to repaint it with ketchup. Two bodies were on the ground in pieces around Vik. I hadn’t noticed them. Being distracted by a psychotic vampire can do that.
“Thank God,” Vik whispered again.
I couldn’t help but smile at a wounded vampire thanking God. “What happened? They ours?” I asked, indicating the other bodies in the hall.
He shook his head and flashed a bloody set of fangs. His grin faded. “Devon, she had Sam with her. Devon, that fucking whore, she laid me open and left that lout to finish off the Pit, but–” He cringed and his hand jerked to a wound in his side. “Most of them went down to the Loop, to the monster movie marathon.” He leaned his head back against the wall, blood streaming down his cheek. “Only three of us stayed here. The others are locked in the safe room downstairs. Devon …” he swallowed hard and grimaced, “said to tell you to meet them for a family reunion with your grandparents.”
My smile disappeared. “Calvary Cemetery,” was all I said.
“Sorry, Damian. Couldn’t stop her. I think she’s done something very stupid. She’s always after power … so …” He winced and sagged deeper against the wall.
“Don’t worry Vik. It’s not your fault. You’ve been good to Sam.” I squeezed his undamaged shoulder and turned to look for Cara. She already had her sword sheathed and was heading toward Vik. “Can you help him?”
A golden glow flashed around her as she inspected Vik’s wounds. “Yes, but it will take some time.”
Vik’s eyes rolled back and he slumped onto the floor in a pool of blood.
“Take care of him, Mom. We’ll go to the graveyard.”
Foster slammed his sword home with a sharp nod and led us out of the Pit.
Chapter Thirty
Calvary Cemetery was a little over thirty minutes from the shop. We traveled in silence across Highway 70 East as the sun abandoned us. My grip alternated between the steering wheel and the demon staff stuffed between my leg and the door. A few minutes later we were in front of the gates to Calvary, just off West Florrisant Avenue on the north side of the city.
I hadn’t visited Calvary much since our grandparents passed away. Just seeing the huge marble pillar, surrounded by eagles, crowned with a towering crucifix, sent shivers down my spine. Centered at the front of the pillar’s base, between two eagle statues, stood Saint Louis IX with his cross-like sword point down between his feet. The figure looked out over the entrance with a serene expression. Basic armor, a stone cape, and stone headgear complimented the body. I have nothing but bad memories of that gate. I ground my teeth together and deliberately looked away.
“What is it?” Zola said.
“I’ve never come here without Sam.” I took a deep breath. “I never want to have to come here without her again.”
Zola patted my knee and nodded. She pointed off toward a mausoleum and said, “Park there. We’ll go behind the hills and come up by the rowan tree.”
I nodded once and pulled Vicky over to the edge of the asphalt drive.
“They’re here,” Aideen said from the edge of my headrest. “I can feel them. The power is … it’s wrong.”
“Yes, it is,” Foster said from the same general direction as Aideen’s voice. I couldn’t see him in the rear view mirror. “It feels more like the gravemaker in Pilot Knob than a vampire.”
“No,” Zola said in a harsh whisper. “It feels like a demon.” She got out and gently closed the door, leaving it unlatched. “Look at the ghosts.”
I focused my Sight and cursed under my breath. The cemetery
was a thick fog of spirits. All of them were turned away from us, focused on something in the distance. The combined mass of energy was opaque enough I couldn’t see through it. I let my Sight fade.
Aideen and Foster took up posts above each of my shoulders as they flew out of the car. I closed the door like Zola. I was tempted to lock it, but decided not to in case we needed a fast getaway. Plus, slamming the doors would make more noise than our arrival already had.
We left the asphalt in silence, creeping through the short lawn and up to the side of the mausoleum. I crouched down near the corner to peek around at the hill and absentmindedly placed my hand on the marble wall. I stiffened as the auras of the dead flashed up into my senses. It was a domino effect from there. The auras in the mausoleum spread out to the graves nearby, which sent bits of my power cascading to another field of graves and then another as I tried to rein it in. In moments, I could sense the change in the slow, calm flow of the cemetery. The dead were, frankly, pissed as all hell about a demon-worshipping vampire being on their turf.
I looked up at Zola and she smiled. “They don’t want the vampire here,” she said in a shallow whisper. “They want our help.”
“They’ll have more than two necromancers tonight.”
Foster grinned at my comment. He shifted the golden armor on his shoulders and set out around the corner.
“Remember, you stay out of sight when this starts,” Zola said.
Aideen nodded in confirmation, her coif a quiet slither of metal on metal in the night.
We moved quietly, as stealthy as we could be in the darkness of the cemetery. Moving from the mausoleum, we stayed low and crawled to the top of the hill behind my grandparent’s graves. The grass was longer there, and we could see the wind patterns as a cool breeze whipped through the area, sending the blades of grass and the trees nearby into a wobbling frenzy. My face was close to earth and the dirt filled my senses. I was sure my pounding heartbeat would betray our location as my eyes crested the top of the hill.
They were there.
Sam was staring right at us, but she didn’t react. She just stood there, dressed in white leather from head to toe, a blank expression carved onto her face. Rage boiled in my gut. I wanted to run down there, grab Sam, and blow Devon’s head into something more closely resembling pasta sauce.
Devon. That unholy bitch was standing between the small granite headstones of my family, dressed in all-business black slacks and a white button-down shirt. She was partially obscured by the small rowan tree between the graves. Her face was angled away, looking toward a nearby crypt. If I had to guess, Foster was pulling double duty by creating a distraction. The wind shifted and I could hear a tiny ringing of metal on metal. I smiled as adrenaline pounded through my veins. My grip tightened on the demon staff in my hand as the wind picked up and I moved.
I drew the pepperbox from my shoulder holster as I stood. Devon was only about twenty yards off. I stopped, leaned my staff against my jacket, and aimed. My finger slowly squeezed down on the second trigger. I already had a speed loader in my left hand.
Sam launched herself over Devon and snarled as she closed on me. I cursed, slammed the pepperbox into my pocket, and dropped the speed loader. I grabbed the shield markings on the staff and slammed power into it a second before Sam reached me. She leapt into the air and came down hard, feet first, on the upper half of the shield. A blur of static ripples cascaded around the shield as it redirected the blow.
On a whim, I pushed the staff forward and slid my hand away from the shield runes. My protection fell and Sam pounced again. This time I caught her in the chest with the staff, turned underneath her, and let her own momentum slam her into the ground. She was on her feet again in seconds.
“Shit.”
“Damian, by the crypt!”
At some level, my brain recognized Foster’s voice, knew I trusted him, and started my legs backpedaling toward the crypt while the rest of my brain shielded myself from Sam’s assaults.
I could hear Devon laughing. I caught movement from the corner of my eye and saw Zola raise her hand. “Pulsatto!” she yelled and a wave of force brushed across the graveyard and crashed into Devon. I didn’t see what happened next because Sam pounced on my shield again and took three fierce swipes at me. There was a flash of light in my peripheral vision and something struck Zola. I couldn’t tell if she had a shield up when it hit, but she’d fallen behind a small hill so I couldn’t even tell if she was alive.
“Aideen!” I screamed. “Help Zola!”
Devon shifted toward the crypt and Foster.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered. “Sorry sis.”
She leapt at me again. I dropped the shield and rolled to the side. Before she landed, I struck her with a ferrule and screamed “Pulsatto!” The blast knocked her off her feet and bounced her like a ragdoll into the side of the crypt by Foster.
“Foster, catch!” I said as I launched the staff like a wobbly javelin. It was a straight enough flight for him to snatch it out of the air. I saw his lips move, and I’m pretty sure he said “Sorry Sam,” just before her stomped on her forearm. I could hear the snap from twenty-five feet away. He grabbed her and wrapped his left arm around her body in some kind of tangled submission hold. His right hand was free to hold the staff. He raised it into the air and a shield flashed up around them.
He was barely in time. Devon bounced off the sphere of power and rolled a few feet to the side. “Your shield should have fallen, little bug. So many tricks. Some things never change.”
I took a step toward her and fished the pepperbox out of my pants. Two more quick steps and I pulled the second trigger. Six barrels roared to life at a distance less than thirty feet.
I slid to a stop as Devon raised her hand and the bullets careened off to the side. I could hear two shots ricochet off stone somewhere in the distance as my brain tried to process how in the hell Devon had just called up a shield.
“Vampires can’t use magic.” It took me a moment to realize I’d said it out loud.
“Because we are magic?” Devon said with a brutal laugh. “You will die before my master awakens. The glory of striking down the seventh son … it will be mine!”
No vampire had ever been able to use even a simple incantation without utterly destroying themselves. Oh, there were rumors of warlocks over the years, vampire practitioners, but Zola had never encountered one and neither had I. It was about then I noticed the thin reed of Magrasnetto in her hand.
“A wand,” I whispered.
Devon raised her arm as her face turned into an atrocity of a grin.
My brain switched gears into defense. There aren’t many ways to defend yourself when it comes to magic. Circles and shields were my only options. My skills at forming a circle without drawing a semblance of it on the ground first were unreliable at best, without the staff. It would have been nice to have that reassuring weight back in my hand right about then. I threw up the next best thing.
“Impadda!” I screamed as Devon launched a bitch of an incantation at me.
Purple lightning so bright it was nearly white roared from her Magrasnetto wand. Thunder and sparks battered my defenses. The shield grew heavy, like holding a twenty-pound weight with my arm fully extended. As my limbs began to shake with the effort, the lightning dissipated with a crack.
I blinked and shook my hand out. “You’re a fucking warlock?” I snarled as I dropped my shield and took another shot. “Tyranno Eversiotto!” Wands, bah, who needs ’em? Thanks to a cemetery full of auras and nearby ley lines, red lightning roared from my right palm. Devon moved, just like I thought she would, but I wasn’t aiming at her. Devon’s arm lingered a second too long and my incantation obliterated the wand in a shower of sparks and flames.
She roared, and her eyes burned as she met my gaze.
“Give it up. You’ve got nothing.” Why did I hesitate instead of removing a few limbs? Who the hell knows, but the next thing I knew I was flat on my back with fangs an inch
from my neck. She’d closed the distance fast enough I’d barely registered the movement. No vamp should be that fast.
“Vesik,” she hissed while her tongue licked the back of my hand. I tried to hold her off, but it was futile. “Now who has nothing? You’re just practice little man.” Her breath was rank and I almost gagged on the rot rolling off of her. “My lord has been generous with his gifts. Once you’re dead, only the Watchers stand against us. Imagine the rewards when I kill you all.”
She flipped her hand to the side and I could see Sam start struggling against Foster’s grip again. His face reddened and his arms shook with the effort of keeping her bound. If he lost his grip, the shield would contain her, but if he lost his grip, she’d tear him apart and the shield would fall anyway.
Devon laughed inches from my face. I gagged on the odor of roadkill left out in the sun for too many days. I would have told her that, but my vision was starting to dim as she throttled my neck. Twice in two days? Go me. I was beginning to think my plan was falling apart until someone started screaming.
The grip on my neck suddenly released as Devon fell back with a tiny, shining sword stuck through her eyeball. My lips curled into a snarl.
“Now, Damian!” Aideen screamed as she flew away from Devon.
I didn’t hesitate. Calling down the fires of hell would have been merciful compared to what I did to that vampire. The spells Cara had worked on with me were the stuff of life. They were not a necromancer’s calling, but even necromancers could use a ley line. As she morbidly noted, if the power of life could be called to cause harm or death, why shouldn’t it be a necromancer’s domain?
I called to the rowan, the tree my parents had planted at my grandparent’s graves so long ago. I felt its power, its lifetime, and I fed it the auras of the dead, the willing dead, speeding its growth to infinity. The rowan grew where I wanted it to grow. I guided its limbs and roots with a caress of power and they responded in vicious whips and cracks. They tripped Devon as she tried to run and, as she hit the earth, thirteen saplings burst up through her arms and legs and torso. I’ll never forget her screams.
Modern Magic Page 87
