by Terry Spear
Kate sat on the bed next to me and wrapped her arm around my shoulder, encouraging the strong friendship we’d always had.
Then it occurred to me. “What if there was a spell I could never master, but you could?”
“What good would that do? If you couldn’t master it, then we couldn’t do it together.” Kate stood up from the bed, finally realizing what I was saying. “But if you couldn’t master it, neither could she.”
I grinned. “Yes, Kate. What’s a spell I could never master? There were several, but I can’t think of anything that would be useful to us now.” I hated how jumbled my thoughts were.
She folded her arms. “You never were good at turning objects to stone.”
I lifted my brows. “Nor were you.”
“Yeah.” Kate stared at the floor for a moment. “You could never enchant a vicious animal and make them docile.”
I shook my head.
“Yeah, right, neither could I.” Kate ran her hand through her golden curls. Then she waved her finger at me. “You could never turn an animal into another form.”
“Won’t work on a witch or warlock.”
“Yeah.” Kate looked into space, then her face suddenly brightened. “You were never good with your Cupid’s arrow spell.”
“Uh-uh. It would work only on someone who was good of heart. You can’t make someone evil love someone who’s not. Well, actually, you can’t make someone who’s filled with wickedness love anyone, period.”
“Hmmm, I’d forgotten that part of the spell.”
I stood up from the bed, and Kate’s mouth curved upward. “The berserker spell!” we both said in unison.
“Why didn’t I think of that before?” Kate asked, her cheeks full of color, her voice enthusiastic and filled with hope.
“Me neither. I could never do that spell because I always said it wrong. Not that I have dyslexia, but I always transposed the key words. Even now, I can’t remember how to properly cast the spell.” Even though we didn’t have much use for it, if a gang of humans tried to hurt a witch or warlock, we could cast the berserker spell in self-defense. The humans would then attack each other, giving the magic user time to escape.
“But we can work on it! I can get you to remember it, and then we’ll nail her butt!”
Her enthusiasm bolstered me. “And her minions too.”
“I don’t know the spell correctly either then, Marissa. Have Kate tell it to you slowly, and repeat the words, each one in the right order for me in your mind.”
I could sense the excitement in his telepathic communication. “Dominic wants us to use the spell.”
Kate beamed. “Sure is cool how you guys can talk to each other like that. All right, girl, let’s do it.”
By the time we had finished memorizing the spell, my watch showed it was a quarter of midnight. But Lynetta had no intention of waiting for Dominic to arrive before she disposed of Kate and me.
She threw the door open, letting it bang against the wall. Both Kate and I jumped. Lynetta wore a black sequined evening gown that reached her ankles, and four-inch stilettos that I couldn’t imagine fighting in. Time to party?
Chill bumps covered my arms and my heart thundered. We didn’t have a choice. It was now or never, despite Dominic not being here.
Six more vampires surrounded her, all of them baring their canines, all male and wearing tuxes…a nice formal affair.
My throat grew dry. But I tried to keep my wits about me, as lightheaded as I still felt. I assumed she’d told them it was feeding time, and we were the main menu. I steeled my back, trying to gather the courage I needed to face the challenge. Protecting Dominic and Kate remained at the forefront of my concerns.
At once, Kate and I began our chant, silently, in our minds. If we repeated the words out loud, the vamp could copy us and do the same to us. So we had to use the utmost caution.
“Shelingriadan, Parcel, Evilosian, Rarificat, Michelob, Minooson, Phat!” I heard them repeated in my mind. Dominic had copied them, word for word. Then he appeared beside me. My heart raced when I saw him, but the menace before us was still too real. We only had time for a quick squeeze of hands.
Lynetta and her bloodsuckers stood still at first, as if they’d forgotten what they’d come here to do. The three of us repeated the words again, then the berserker spell hit full force.
Lynetta vanished for an instant, then returned with a sword in the next. With one swipe, she beheaded the tallest of the vampires, while another sank his fangs into a shorter man.
Like a madwoman and her crazed minions, the vampires tore through the house killing each other—the berserker spell had set the enemy against her own allies.
“Now what do we do?” Kate asked.
“When the last one is left, we’ll have to kill him or her,” I said, determined to end this now.
“Her,” Dominic explained. “Lynetta is the ancient one. Unfortunately, she’ll survive all the others.”
A grandfather clock downstairs struck midnight with an eerie twelve bongs while we searched five bedrooms, three bathrooms, the kitchen, a den, just about everywhere, looking for any sign of Lynetta. Then we found her in a large living room filled with four couches and several chairs upholstered in black sitting beside dark mahogany tables.
Seven dead men in tattered tuxes rested at Lynetta’s feet. She’d beheaded every one of them and their skin had shriveled up like white wrinkled raisins.
The place smelled musty, like an old antique shop filled with mildewed books, the home of millions of dust mites.
Lynetta had a strange look of madness in her ebony eyes while she seemed to stare straight through us at the wall behind us. Her hands still clutched the sword, blood dripping from its shiny steel blade.
“If we attempt to disarm her, she’ll kill us,” Dominic warned.
Lynetta looked sharply at Dominic as if she finally noticed him and took a step toward us. Was the spell already wearing off? Was she no longer under our influence to kill her own people?
She snarled. Blood dripped from her yellowed fangs. Her black hair hung tangled and matted and part of the hem of her satin gown clung to her ankles in ragged shambles. Now in bare feet, she leapt at me, swinging her sword.
“It’s seconds past the hour of midnight,” Kate screamed, grabbing my arm and shaking it. “Call your patron demon, Marissa! Call your patron demon!”
Chapter 23
DOMINIC
I began to chant for the water demon when Marissa didn’t respond. Did Lynetta now hold some power over her? As soon as the vamp leapt for Marissa, I grabbed my girl. We fell a few feet away onto one of the feather-filled couches, breaking our tumble.
I scrambled to my feet and continued the chant. Marissa quickly followed behind me, beseeching her patron demon to aid us once more.
Lynetta had barely missed us with the sword and sliced the couch instead, sending a flurry of feathers flying. Then she charged for a second time, but stopped abruptly and stared at the demon that appeared before her.
“What is this?” Lynetta shrieked, slashing through the watery figure with her sword.
The water demon wavered in her liquid blue shape, showing off her satiny curves. She laughed with the force of the rush of a waterfall, but hesitated in front of Lynetta, studying the vamp. What was she waiting for?
Lynetta seemed transfixed at the sight of the demon also. Or was she trying to control it with her black gaze as she focused on the creature’s blue eyes? She might not be able to mesmerize a human, but the entity wasn’t human. Could she succeed?
“Suck the water from her body,” Marissa pleaded.
Her patron demon’s words washed over me like a summer’s silky rain. “She’s the one.”
“Yes, yes, please, destroy her before she destroys us,” Marissa said, waving frantically at Lynetta.
The vamp still didn’t react, maybe unsure as to what to do with the creature. If she couldn’t slice it in two with her sword, or bite it, what could
she do? Yet I was feeling panicked like Marissa and wanted the entity to work faster. But I didn’t say a word, concerned if I forced the issue, the demon would turn on me. I bit my tongue.
“With pleasure.” The demon’s words slid over her slippery tongue, and her watery arms reached out to Lynetta as if she was welcoming a child into her loving embrace.
Breaking the spell the demon seemed to have over her, Lynetta moved backward. But the demon rushed forth like a tidal wave, and with the strength of a typhoon, wrapped herself around the vamp.
Lynetta’s black snake eyes bulged. Her clothes grew wet and clung to her body. Water puddled on the floor around her feet. Then she struggled as if she suddenly realized an embrace from the water demon preceded death. Did she sense the water being pulled from every molecule in her body? Did she feel the life force being drawn from her, absorbed by the demon, leaving her cells empty and ready to collapse? Shrieking, she attempted a last struggle.
Her voice suddenly shriveled. Drained of water, her wizened body crumpled to the ground.
I stared down at the vamp. Her wet gown clung to skin hanging loose around her bones. Her eyelids were shut, thank the stars. I didn’t even want to know what eyeballs zapped of fluid would look like.
“Thank you,” Marissa said, getting nearer to the demon as if she wanted to give her a hug to show how grateful we were. To my horror, the demon smiled and slipped her arms around Marissa, soaking her to the skin.
My mouth dropped open in astonishment, but even more surprising, she released Marissa unharmed and turned to me.
Instantly, I worried that she didn’t appreciate that I’d called her instead of Marissa.
After all, she wasn’t my patron demon. I glanced down at Lynetta and envisioned the life being sucked out of my body in the same agonizing way. My skin chilled in the damp air.
Before I could utter a cry or word, Marissa’s patron demon reached her watery arms out and hugged me, too. I felt I’d been immersed in a warm tub while the water pressed in around me, gently and with a caressing, silky touch. “Keep her safe forever, warlock. Keep her safe.”
“With every ounce of strength I possess,” I promised.
Kate whispered to the demon, “Thank you.”
The patron demon released me, then nodded at Kate with a small smile on her liquid blue lips. Then she whirled into a spinning circle of water and vanished.
For a moment, we stood staring at Lynetta’s dehydrated body as if she still held some power over us, then I broke free of the spell and spoke first. “We have to get her to the tanning bed at once. As powerful as she is, I doubt she’ll remain in this state for long.”
Marissa patted her pocket. “I have the key to the nail shop right here. Let’s go.” Though she tried to sound unafraid, her voice trembled.
Worried that more of Lynetta’s minions might be returning from feeding any time now, I carried her body outside to my Bug at a sprint.
Marissa hurried to get the car door for me. “I thought you just popped in from the hospital or somewhere. I didn’t realize you drove here.”
I arched a brow. “I’ve been waiting right outside the house all along. I had to bring my car so I could take you both back home after this was over.”
“You were that sure it would all work out well?”
I sighed heavily. “We haven’t finished tonight’s work yet.” I glanced at the shriveled body of Lynetta, its former beauty robbed by the embrace of the water demon. With fervor, I hoped she would be a pile of ashes before she could do any more harm to anyone.
“But you thought we’d succeed,” Marissa insisted.
“Working together—the three of us—I had no doubt we’d make it.” Yet we weren’t out of danger. If Lynetta revived before we could use the tanning bed to put her to rest permanently, I feared we were all doomed.
I climbed into the backseat of the car with Lynetta, neither Kate nor Marissa wanting the job. Then Marissa drove toward the nail shop. We all hoped we wouldn’t be stopped along the way, though I sensed Marissa speeding a little. How could we explain the dehydrated mummy in my arms? Witches’ and warlocks’ science project?
Twice we passed a police car waiting in the dark, patrolling for drunks out at the late hour. With her vampiric night vision, Marissa caught site of them and slowed down, driving slightly under the speed limit.
Then we arrived at the nail shop. I noticed my brother’s car right away, and nearby, a police car.
“Great,” Marissa said, her voice hushed. “Now what do we do? If we try to carry a body into the nail shop to destroy it…”
“If my brother is here, maybe he can help us get out of this mess.”
The lights in the shop turned on. James bolted out the front door with a policeman following him—our older cousin, Bill, his nearly black hair cut short, his blue eyes smiling in greeting. He and James had always been fishing buddies, so what were they here fishing for now? Bill waved at me while I sat glued to the backseat, my mind frantic as to how we were going to explain this.
Marissa parked the car, then jumped out to try to head him off from seeing Lynetta’s shriveled body in the backseat with me.
“What’s happening?” James asked, his voice concerned.
Marissa tried to block him from nearing the car. “We’re all right, but…” She looked over at Bill who hung on her every word.
James waved a thumb at him. “He’s all right.”
Marissa folded her arms. “Hmmm, if it turns out he’s not to be trusted, I guess I could wipe your cousin’s thoughts from his mind.”
“If James trusts Bill, he’s okay. Someone needs to get the door for me, like quick. I think Lynetta is stirring,” I conveyed to Marissa as Lynetta’s body wiggled slightly in my arms. My heartbeat had already quickened to racer speed.
“Ohmigod.” Marissa bolted for my car door and jerked it open. Kate squealed. But I hurried out of the car toward the building with the mummy dressed in an evening gown, not wanting to delay our work one more second.
“What the…?” James said, but let his words trail off and rushed after us.
Lynetta began to squirm. Her skin began to plump up. Sweat built up on my brow.
“Ohmigod,” Marissa said silently. She couldn’t call her patron demon again. Not for another month. We had to destroy Lynetta for good on our own.
Kate ran behind the others. “The last room!” she hollered, though Marissa seemed to already have the situation well under control, having done this the night before. She led the way.
To my surprise, Bill just followed the group, never uttering a word. I know he was used to some pretty bizarre situations, being a cop, but I didn’t figure he’d seen anything this weird.
“In here!” Marissa nearly screamed.
My anxiety level grew as the wrinkles in Lynetta’s skin began to fill with fluid like air pumped into an air mattress.
When she began to fight my confinement, I struggled to get her into the tanning coffin. She hissed and bared her grizzly teeth as I shoved her into the bed.
Together, the whole group of us slammed the lid down, but she thrust her hands out of the end of the tanning bed. With claw-like fingers, she grabbed the lid and tried to squirm out.
I grabbed the only weapon available. A rubber wastebasket. I pounded her head with it, trying to knock her back inside the bed. My brother tried to peel one of her wicked claws from the tanning bed lid while Kate worked on the other.
Marissa dashed to the setting on the unit and shoved it onto high, while the others held the lid shut as tightly as they could.
As soon as light emitted from the tanning bed, the creature screamed bloody murder. She pulled her arms inside the bed and shoved against the lid for several minutes. The searing of flesh burned in the air. My eyes watered while the pungent smell filled the room and curls of gray smoke rose from the ends of the bed.
James, Bill, Kate, and Marissa held the lid down. I could hear their hearts beating rapidly like mine, and sw
eat dribbled down James’s and Bill’s faces while I maintained vigilance with the wastepaper basket at one end of the bed, just in case the vamp stuck her head or arms out of it again.
When the time was up, Marissa quickly set it again. “Hold the lid. Don’t let it up whatever you do.”
“Surely she’s dead,” Kate whispered. “Isn’t she?”
“I’m not certain. I fried Joshua twice, but assume the first time turned him to ashes. He didn’t come to like she has. Lynetta is so much stronger. I’m not sure one tanning session will do it.”
Then a thump sounded in the bed and the lid began to rise. Not dead.
Everyone but me grabbed the lid while I readied my wastebasket weapon.
Then silence. No more smells, no more sounds, except for our heavy breathing.
When the timer had gone off a second time, Marissa set it again. Questioning her actions, I waited for an explanation.
“I have to be sure. I have to know she can’t get you.” Tears pricked her eyes as she fought to hold them back.
I leaned over and kissed her cheek, glad she cared so much about me. But the paleness of her skin worried me. I kept my wastepaper basket at the ready to clobber Lynetta just in case she poked her head out again, but I wanted to hold Marissa tightly instead. She seemed ready to collapse.
After frying the vamp five more times, Marissa finally consented to allowing us to open the lid, albeit reluctantly. But then she shouted, “No! Wait!” She quickly cast a protection spell, and Kate and I both repeated the chant to help increase the strength of the spell.
James and I lifted the lid while Bill held a gun at the ready. Didn’t he know bullets wouldn’t do a thing to a vampire? What had James told him? Maybe Bill hadn’t ever read vampire lore.
The glistening bed was empty. The room was as silent as a breezeless snowy day.
We all stared at the empty tanning bed. No ashes. No black evening gown. No dead vampire. My heart sank with defeat.
Marissa’s knees buckled, but before she crumpled to the floor, I grabbed for her and lifted her in my arms.
