07- Black Blood Brother

by Morgan Blayde

  She whispered, “Shut up. It will work. We got this far, didn’t we?”

  I stayed leaning into her, staring.

  She pushed me away, setting fire to my coat sleeve. I patted out the flames. There was no damage, of course; all my suits were spell warded against fire, bullets, and other inconveniences.

  I resumed watching Solstice. Maybe she’d heard us; her face was red, her chanting louder. A cool wind gusted up, fanning her hair. The crystal swung toward a section of warehouse that had a loading bay with a rolling steel door drawn down and padlocked. She pointed. “There!”

  “I hope so.” I drew a Beretta Storm, holding it at my sides. I wanted my other hand free in case I needed to summon my demon sword. “If this turns out to be just a sweatshop full of illegals, I will feel a teeny bit embarrassed. And then I’ll have to kill everyone inside so I don’t wind up in a video on YouTube.”

  “I’m not wrong,” Solstice declared. “The spirits say this is the place.”

  “Let’s go see.” Briskly, Imari strolled away, her body igniting to match her orange hair.

  Vivian hurried to catch up. She wore the machine pistol on a shoulder strap, the Magnum rhino-killer handgun clutched in both hands.

  I glared at Colt. “Stay with your grandfather unless it looks like I’ve miscalculated and I’m about to die.”

  He smiled like a little angel. “Sure. Whatever you say.”

  “I’ve got this,” the Old Man said. “Go.”

  Surrounded by my four demon guards, I went chasing after the girls, dragging Solstice along by one arm.

  She stumbled along, squawking. “Hey, I thought I was supposed to stay behind, too. What’s the deal?”

  I explained as we crossed the concrete apron. “You can stay outside when we go in, but I need you to tell me if there are magical wards or a magical alarm system of some kind.”

  “I’m not sure I can do that,” she said.

  “What? Your coven palmed off a second-rate witch on us?”

  “I’m a witch apprentice. And I’ve done all right so far.”

  “Keep doing all right,” I suggested, “and you’ll avoid a shallow grave.”

  Her eyes grew huge. “You’re threatening me?”

  “At least you’re not stupid. I make stupid people suffer longer.”

  That shut her up.

  Our forces gathered, divided by the closed loading dock door. Solstice, my demons guard, and I were on the side leading to a second, normal door with no windows in it. I gave our hippie-witch a meaningful stare. Shed swallowed and turned to face the gray brick wall. She took the crystal off the dreamcatcher and pointed it at the wall. The clear crystal didn’t glow, or wiggle, or anything. I was disappointed. She turned to me. “It’s clear. You can go in.”

  It had better be, or I will hunt you down and kill you later.

  I smiled and patted her shoulder in a friendly fashion. “Okay, you’ve done your job. We’ll take it from here.”

  She scurried off with a falsetto shriek. Surprisingly, my smile hadn’t calmed her at all.

  I nudged Stinky. “You and Imari, burn a hole in the steel door.”

  Quartz, Thorn, and Misty skulked along with me to the normal door. I tested the knob. Locked. I twisted harder. It broke off in my hand. Quartz kicked the door. It exploded inward, flying off the hinges, a huge dent in the middle.

  We ran in. No sweatshop. No illegals. Just a damn big space made to seem small by a silver dragon no longer in human form. His wings were folded. His tail languidly waved as he popped a couple of dead steers into his toothy maw. Dinner time. His silver scales were glossed with yellow-orange light from the fire demon flames that had burned through the loading dock door.

  DeSilver’s massive head swung our way. He stared, swallowed his raw cows, and turned our way, an awful smile on his face.

  He thinks we’re desert.

  Channeling Xena, The Warrior Princess, Vivian let out a yodeling battle cry, leaping toward the dragon at vampire speed, the Smith and Wesson hand-cannon at full extension. The revolver boomed five times, running empty.

  The dragon’s head jerked back, riding the impacts, deflecting the rounds. He let out a roar of rage.

  We moved in, the fire demons throwing lances of fire ahead of them. Misty kept pace, hiding in a mass of cloud. Quartz was slower, strong, but not fast on his stone feet. Thorn pointed an arm and projectile thorns shot off his hand, rattling off the dragon’s tough eyes. Demon fire curled over his scales, but silvers were tough on defense; it would take prolonged exposure from demon fire to burn through.

  Vivian dropped the empty revolver and sprayed 9mm slugs at the dragon with the machine pistol. They didn’t do a lot either.

  I holstered my Beretta and called my demon sword to me. He popped into my hands, a black metal blade wreathed in a demonic red aura. His hunger stabbed, a sensation I felt through our soul-link.

  “Got a dragon soul for you,” I said.

  Gimmee-gimmee-gimmee!

  The dragon roared again, opening his mouth surprisingly wide.

  I had a bad feeling.

  Golden eyes opened in the back shadows of my mind, my inner dragon taking an interest. He said: I know you don’t have much experience with silvers, but you should remember that they breathe—

  I shielded my eyes with a forearm. “Light!”

  Solar wind, my inner dragon said.

  A roiling silver jet of incandescent plasma spewed out of DeSilver’s mouth along with a beam of light that superheated the air. From under my raised arm, I watched the light shaft cut into the concrete floor, melting a channel that swept our way, cracking the edges of the trench. The dragon must have wagged his head, trying to get us all, because his vomit of light whipped side to side.

  I leaped with my dragon-half strength, hoping to get above the dragon’s mouth. I could only hope everyone else got themselves clear. Flying high above the glare, I saw Vivian next to me. She’d taken the high road as well, a crazy smile on her face.

  She yelled. “Fun, huh?”

  I didn’t answer, trying to figure out where I was coming down. We passed over the dragon’s head, arcing toward the extended neck. We hit silver scales, bounced, and hit the neck again. I skidded right. Vivian skidded left, dropping from sight. I hit the dragon’s left shoulder and stabbed at the same time.

  The dragon squealed. The light-stream cut off. The beast whirled in place like a dog chasing its tail. I didn’t let go of the sword, but the blade tore free of the shoulder.

  My sword cursed. Damn, I barely got a taste!

  TWENTY-ONE

  “Okay, not the effect I was going

  for, but at least someone’s dead.”

  —Caine Deathwalker

  Falling to the concrete, I rolled and came back to my feet, my demon sword dripping dragon blood at my feet. The dragon’s tail caught Vivian and slammed her away. She hit a far wall, bounced, and fell on her face, lying there with no attempt to get up.

  I hoped she’d be all right.

  That feeble flicker of compassion cost me; the tail continued at full speed. A broadside sent me tumbling away as well. It only hurt as much as being run over by a bus. My sword fell from my hand, clattering as I skidded across the concrete, rolling to a stop.

  Really getting old.

  On my knees, I reached toward my sword.

  Come.

  It scraped a few inches, flying into the air, coming to my call—point first. I rotated shoulders and hips so it missed my heart. I grabbed the hilt in passing.

  Nice try.

  Can’t blame a starved sword for trying.

  Yes, I can. I’ll take care of you later. I sent the sword into the ether, to return to my armory in Malibu.

  Jumping to my feet, I returned my attention to the fight. The fire demons and Misty held a defensive barrier, curved walls of magical flame and cloud that took damage while deflecting a fresh blast of solar-storm breath.

  Slinking low, Thorn crept behind DeS
ilver. Nature magic forced the concrete under the dragon’s stomach to buckle. In an orgy of growth, demon vines burst up, winding around the dragon. Selene could have done better, but she wasn’t here. Her vines wouldn’t have snapped, but these did. As the dragon struggled free, new growths grew in.

  Quartz leaped in and grabbed the vines, climbing hand over hand. I wasn’t sure what he thought he could do, but it was an added distraction to the dragon if nothing else.

  I thought about the time I’d need to turn into my own dragon form and decided I’d be too vulnerable, too big a target, before the change finished. And the delay might cost me some of my people. What I needed was a new sword, one that wouldn’t try to kill me.

  Inspiration hit. I held out my hand, closing it around a bar of shadow. The bar lengthened, acquiring a razor edge above my grip. Adding to the shadow magic, I pulled raw golden magic out of me, pushing it around the shadow sword so that it had its own aura, just like my demon sword. Two magics, normally incompatible, were forced into alliance. I didn’t believe anyone else could shape such a thing.

  Now I only had to use it.

  I ran toward the beast as it reared, beating massive wings.

  Misty caught the wind with his magically stiffened clouds, slacking it enough so I kept my feet.

  Imari picked up molten globs of concrete and flung them at the dragon’s eyes.

  Somehow, Quartz made his climb to the dragon’s snout. Positioning himself, he slammed a punch between the eyes, trying for a nerve center. Merely startled, the dragon crossed his eyes to see the stone demon. Beams blazed from those eyes, catching quartz, thrusting him away like a stone from a sling.

  The dragon dropped to all fours. His tail lashed in fury.

  By then, I was underneath DeSilver’s body. I stabbed upward, not for the heart, but just below where a navel would have been if he’d had one. One thing I knew dragons and humans shared: chi, life force running through chakra channels. This was the center nexus, the core of that force. With my sword searing its way deep inside, one task remained. I expanded my blade by a dozen feet, widening the wound, flushing shadow magic and raw golden-dragon magic into the nexus, consuming the energy there.

  The dragon gave a horrific scream of pain, not rage. It staggered away and collapsed on its side. It took a few minutes of twitching for the beast to grow still, for the chest to relax, for lungs to give up on breathing, for death to still the creature’s mighty heart.

  We gathered near the head to stare into his dead eyes. They glowed. The pale, washed out light dimmed and went out, the last part of the dragon to go.

  No one said anything. More than a few of us were trying to get our breathing back to normal. Vivian limped over to join us, holding her arm across her chest as if it hurt. It probably did. If it were broken, she’d need to feed to heal. I wasn’t going to volunteer my neck.

  It’s not like there aren’t a lot of hookers in Las Vegas for her take advantage of.

  That’s when I noticed the Old Man and Colt right beside me, just suddenly there. Colt’s eyes were wide. He stared at the dead dragon. “Wow. That was so awesome!”

  I looked at the Old Man. “Cloaking spell?”

  He shrugged. “Colt wanted to watch you fight. I made sure he stayed far enough away not to be in danger.

  “If he’d gotten even a light burn from the silver dragon’s light-storm, you would be answering to Selene for it. Ever seen her dungeon where she does experimental magical reconstruction on unwilling test subjects?”

  The Old Man frowned. “Hmmm. Perhaps I was incautious after all.”

  Colt looked at me. “What are you going to do to her body?”

  “Her?” I asked.

  The pronoun went around the group, spilling from lips.

  “What do you mean, her?” I asked.

  He pointed at the huge corpse. “That’s a female dragon. Mom home schools me. I get top grades in bestiary. Last week, in biology, mom even let me help her dissected a boojum. You gotta be careful with those because they can come back to life just to annoy you.”

  I looked back at the dragon I’d just killed. “If that’s not DeSilver, who is it? There aren’t many silvers running around Earth, eating cows.”

  The Old Man shrugged. “Not that it matters now, but she could have been a wife or mistress.”

  Vivian caught my gaze. Her eyes were hazed red from pain, not their usual pink. “I still get my money, right?”

  I started walking toward the loading dock. And smiled in cold satisfaction. This was still sending a message. Not the one I’d intended, but it would do.

  Vivian called after me, repeating her question. “Caine, I get paid, right?”

  “Sure, check’s in the mail.” I imagined DeSilver’s face when he found his loved one dead, her soul burned out from the inside. My smile widened. If only there were some way to increase the impact from all this. I stopped and turned, gesturing Colt to come closer.

  He stared up into my face. “What’s up?”

  I placed a hand on his shoulder. “I’m wondering if you can do me a couple favors.”

  “It will—”

  “Cost me, I know. You said you wanted a red Mustang with yellow flames painted on it.”

  Imari butted in. “He’s not old enough to drive. And his mom will have a cow.”

  Colt shot her an angry glare that all but screamed: Shut the fuck up, this is man talk. The kid’s glare softened as it came back to me. His excitement returned. “Who do I get to kill?”

  I pulled him away from my nosey minions. “First, all stray weapons go back to the vans, and I need all the forensic evidence of our presence here to vanish—a cleaning job. I don’t want to trust this to Solstice True.”

  He didn’t do anything I could see, but said, “Done. What’s next?”

  “Just a little delivery job.”

  “Not interested.”

  “It will piss off a lot of powerful people.”

  “That sounds fun.”

  “That hyper-temporal portal of yours, how big an object can it transport?”

  “Well, there was that time at the family reunion when we ran out of hamburgers and hot dogs, and I pulled in that t-rex. Mom gave me heck for that, but everyone said it was damn tasty.” There wasn’t an ounce of repentance in his expression.

  “Okay, do you think you can find the dragon world?”

  “Piece of cake. You took me there once.”

  “I will? Never mind. We’ll take about my future self some other time. Next question; do you think you can drop the body in the middle of the throne room, sort of a gift for your great-grandfather?”

  “Well, yeah, as long as it’s in this temporal dimension. Great-grandfather’s retired in my time.”

  “Who’s on the dragon throne then? Me?”

  He leaned in and whispered. “Sorry, I can’t endanger the temporal multi-verse.”

  He doesn’t know I’m onto him about that.

  I nodded sagely. “Probably wise.”

  He said, “I do this, I get the car, right?”

  “You have my word of honor.”

  He gave me a cold stare. “I’m not falling for that again. Swear to Mother. A promise made to a goddess is binding; Mom says so.”

  The kid’s known me a lot longer than I’ve known him. It gives him an advantage.

  I crossed my heart. “Fine. I swear...”

  Something or other.

  I didn’t mention what it was I swore to. The kid needed to learn to deal with the ever twisty fey, among others. This was good training for a son of mine.

  A copper-red flare of light engulfed him and he was gone. I looked over at the dragon. Colt had gotten it too, except for about six feet of tail.

  Oh, well, good enough.

  We went out to the vans and stared into the distance. The air was shredded by the approaching screams of fire trucks and police cars. With all the pyrotechnics, some dumb-fuck had called in the disturbance.

  People just don�
��t mind their own business anymore.

  I yelled, “Load up. We’re moving out!”

  The demons moved swiftly with no fuss. Limping swiftly, Vivian still held her arm against her chest. The Old Man ran around to squeeze into his vehicle’s driver’s seat.

  I yelled at him, “Take Viv to the hospital. Tell them she fell down the stairs.”

  “No,” she said. “Take me to Noctem. I’ll find a blood donor at King’s nightclub.”

  “Fine.” I grabbed Solstice Truth’s arm. “You ride with me.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “You’re still on the clock. I’ve got another small job for you to do before you go home.”

  I slid into the second van, slamming my door. I started the engine, as Solstice took the seat next to me. Once the van filled, we drove to the street and kept going, clearing the area fast enough to avoid entanglements, but not at a speed that looked suspicious.

  Blocks away, heading back toward the Strip, Solstice looked at me. “What else do you need?”

  “First, we just killed the wrong silver dragon. Your spirits of darkness were slightly off, Mum-Ra.”

  “What!”

  “Thundercats reference. Classic literature. I sighed. “They don’t make them like that anymore. You’d have done better if you’d had a Sword of Omens.”

  She stared blankly at me as I drove.

  I said, “Never mind. The point is, there’s still a bad guy to find.”

  “Both dragons had to have been using that place,” she said. “The spirits weren’t wrong. Our timing was just off to catch them both.”

  “Both didn’t need to die, but I’m good with that. Mistakes happen.”

  She slumped in her seat. “So, I’m not in trouble?”

  “No. We’re good.” I braked at a red light. “Just break out that charm again and find DeSilver for me.”

  Quartz’s gravelly voice came from behind me. “We going to kill another dragon?”

  “Nah.” I smiled to myself, a better idea fluttering around in my head. “We’re going to let him think we killed his woman on purpose, punishment for his sins.”

  Thorny spoke up from the back. “He’ll be majorly pissed. He’ll want blood.”