To Hell and Back (Hellcat Series Book 4)

by Sharon Hannaford

  She wove through the light traffic, scanning for police. She didn’t want to be pulled over for riding without a helmet, but the cops seemed to be elsewhere tonight. Perhaps Byron had them otherwise occupied, or perhaps it was because this was so far on the outskirts of the City that they didn’t bother with patrols. This time of night very few people were heading out this way. It was the direction you took to go hiking or cycling in the outdoors on weekends and holidays. It wasn’t a long drive to the Source from the stadium; as the crow flew it was even shorter. Athena had told her that the convergence of ley lines that made the stadium such a supernatural hot spot was, in fact, one of the main power feeds to the Source. At least four others existed close by as well, but they were too far underground to have their effects felt above ground.

  Just before the off-ramp that would take them to the mountain reserve that hid the Source, she caught up with the red Dodge pickup.

  Caspian cursed silently in every language he knew, and he knew several. He’d thought he’d timed it perfectly, lying in wait and following them on their top-secret mission. The high and mighty Julius had been too preoccupied to bother sending someone to find him. If he’d even sensed Caspian’s return to the City, but it seemed unlikely that he hadn’t. Through his enthralled Werewolf, he’d learnt about the threat to the Magi and the plan to fend off the Dark Ones, and had known it would be the right time to reinsert himself into the fold. When everyone was too busy worrying about other things to worry about him. And he had his backstory ready. It was so finely tuned he almost believed it himself. But despite his saving the Dhampir’s life, she seemed to suspect his feelings for his Sire. It had somehow already driven a wedge between them.

  He glared at the back of his Sire, hatred seething through his chest. The man had only grown in power since his appearance at the Princep Court, way beyond what anyone at Court would believe. His Werewolf spy hadn’t been privy to exactly what was going on with the Vampire Master, but there was no doubt that something was. If he didn’t know better, he would say the man was also a Magus, but that was impossible. There was only one Vampire Magus in the world. Come to think of it, he hadn’t noticed Benedict at Court while he’d been eavesdropping. Where was he? Was he the one doing this, aiding Julius?

  He searched the shadows around the room, but turned up nothing besides the Vampires watching him with suspicious eyes, the Werewolf finishing off the last of the demons, and the dratted cat. Julius’s face showed strain as the twin weirdos stood in the circle of flame with insane grins on their faces. But as he watched, he could see the strain behind the hideous smiles of the Dark Magi, the tightness of their knuckles where they gripped each other, and slowly he realised that the fire surrounding them wasn’t protecting them; it was closing in on them. The one who had control of the fire was Julius. The truth hit him harder than the cudgel had, like a direct blow to the chest. His Sire wasn’t just a powerful Vampire—he’d sworn unwilling fealty to a Vampire Magus, probably one of the most powerful beings on the planet. The unfairness of his life speared him through the heart, further blackening the already seething, jealous mass that existed in his chest. He would find a way to destroy this man. “Yes, we will,” the cold hard voice in his mind whispered. “But we must be patient. We must find a way to stay close. Until the time is right.” The whisper faded into the dark, and calm resolution replaced his boiling rage.

  As he refocused on the ravaged room, Gemini collapsed as one to the ground, their eyes rolled back in their heads, staring at the ceiling, mouths ajar. They didn’t appear to be breathing. Julius walked forward, a hot, dry breeze whirling around him, and at a flick of his hands, the fire disappeared as though it had never existed. He knelt and placed thin woven cords around the entwined hands of the twins.

  Gabi closed in on the truck as they both took the off-ramp. It wouldn’t take Mariska long to realise she was there. As they rounded the curve, Gabi pulled even closer to the tailgate, judging the distance to leap from the bike onto the truck bed. A flash of red taillights was her only warning; the truck braked sharply, and Gabi looked up to see Mariska’s narrowed gaze in the truck’s rear-view mirror. Gabi jammed on her brakes too, veering to the left, the bike’s front tyre shuddering as it grazed the back bumper of the pickup. The bike wobbled, and Gabi flung out a leg, throwing the bike into a quick spin on the smooth tarmac, steadying it and herself before revving and speeding back down the road after the truck once more. She needed to get onto the truck soon.

  Although she’d never actually driven this road, she’d seen the reconnaissance photos. She knew the tarmac ran out just a couple of kilometres after the turn-off; then it was dirt to the car park of the popular hiking trail. And the cave system that was home to the Source. The Fireblade wouldn’t do so well on a dirt road; it was a tar-road kind of bike.

  She closed the distance again, staying to one side this time, but as she neared, Mariska veered the truck towards her once more, cutting off her line and trying to force her off the road. Gabi tried the other side, striving to stay in Mariska’s blind spot, but the truck cut her off a second time. A road sign flashed by warning Gabi that the tarmac ended in less than two hundred metres. She gunned the bike directly for the back of the truck one more time. This time anticipating Mariska’s ploy, as soon as the red of brake lights flared, she leapt from the bike. The timing was difficult. She landed cleanly on the open deck, but had no way to stop her momentum. She tucked her shoulder and tumbled into the back of the cab with a bone-jarring crunch. She’d been ready for the pain, but the shock of the impact still left her seeing stars.

  The pickup bucked as it ploughed onto the dirt road too fast. Flicking her tangled hair from her eyes, Gabi steadied herself and scanned the back of the truck. Nothing, it was cleaner than a bored cat. Trust that one man to be a neat freak just when she needed something. She grimaced. There was nothing else for it. She tucked her right hand into the sleeve of her jacket and punched out the glass from the small window between her and the Maleficus. The truck swerved wildly. Mariska apparently hadn’t realised she’d made it off the bike. Gabi grabbed for the top of the cab, hanging on as the movement flung her first one way then the other. When Mariska regained control of the truck, Gabi leaned inside.

  “Stop the truck,” she growled. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

  Mariska answered with another purposeful yank on the steering wheel. The edge of the window Gabi was leaning in caught her shoulder, snapping her head back to crack painfully against the metal frame. More stars. The truck bounced and bucked as it left the road. Mariska fought to hang onto the steering wheel, but her panicked yanking only forced the truck further out of control. They struck a signboard pronouncing the car park ahead, levelling it into the ground, but the flustered woman still had her foot on the accelerator. The engine whined, and Gabi braced herself with every muscle she had.

  The truck ploughed into a small copse of trees, nosediving straight into a large felled tree trunk. The noise of impact was followed instantly by the whomp of an airbag and accompanied by the squealing protest of an overstressed engine. The abrupt stop lifted the rear end of the truck into the air and catapulted Gabi straight over the front of the vehicle and into the dense foliage of the edge of the City Forest Reserve. There was no other way to land except badly.

  She must have blacked out for a few seconds, but opened her eyes to find herself face down in a mound of leaves and twigs a few feet shy of a large oak tree. The crashed truck was several metres away, smoke and steam issuing from the crumpled front end, but the engine had finally stopped whining.

  Gabi could hear something crashing through the forest not far from her. Reacting instantly, she rolled onto her back and sat up, brushing dirt and wet leaves from her face, and made to stand, but instead collapsed back onto her butt. There was something wrong with her left leg. It wouldn’t hold her weight. She ran a hand down it, checking for damage. It was hard to feel anything through the tight-fitting leather, but her knee was now radiating
agony, and her ankle was numb. The numbness was more worrying than the agony. Numb just meant it was working up to worse pain, or it could mean nerve damage. Either way, she wasn’t going running anywhere. But she still had to get to the Dark Magus. She was feeling around in the dark for something to use as a crutch when she heard something move in the underbrush near her. She stilled, sending out her senses. Then she smiled. A fair-sized bobcat stood, still as stone, staring at her intently, only its nostrils moving as it scented her warily. A few quick mental commands sent the cat off on silent paws, the scent of its quarry strong in its nose.

  As the cat left, Gabi continued to rummage in the undergrowth. It wasn’t long before she found what she was looking for, a sturdy branch, one that had recently been torn from a small tree. She wondered which of her bruises it was responsible for. Well, it would make it up to her now. She pulled a small dagger from a sheath on her thigh and quickly divested it of sharp edges and side shoots. A high-pitched shriek reached her ears, and she grinned despite her discomfort.

  Using the makeshift crutch, she dragged her abused body upright; then she took a few seconds to catalogue her remaining arsenal. She was missing a couple of weapons, but Nex was still in her sheath, and she still had a MacDart and a couple of spare daggers. The thought of so few weapons set her to grumbling, but as she began her clumsy hobble in the direction of the shriek, the moonlight glinted off something metallic on the ground. The discovery of her MacBow actually brought a hint of a smile to her lips.

  She found Mariska backed up against a large grey rock. The bobcat was growling low in its throat, several wary feet away. The Maleficus had a rock in one hand and a small tree branch in the other. Gabi quickly sent the cat off with a sharp command, not wanting to see it hurt on her account. Then she limped into Mariska’s view.

  “Running away as usual,” Gabi sneered at the cornered woman. “Not this time, Maleficus. You’ve fucked with me and this City for the last time.” The woman was bleeding from the nose and a cut above her right eye. Her hair was a mess, and her robe was torn from her run through the forest. She stared back at Gabi with vicious, barely human rage.

  “Do it,” the Magus screamed at her. “Try to kill me. I dare you.” She bared her teeth in an animalistic snarl. Then she inexplicably dropped to her knees. Letting the rock and branch go, she dug one hand into the soil in front of her, lifted the other to the sky, and threw her head back. As Gabi stared, the grass and weeds around Mariska drooped and withered, even a small tree nearby began losing leaves. And then lightning arced from the clear night sky straight into the Dark Magus’s hands, illuminating her entire body with a pale blue light. When she moved her head back to face Gabi and opened her eyes, they too were glowing blue and utterly devoid of sanity.

  Gabi knew she had only seconds to act. If Mariska managed to strike her with it, that much electrical power would fry her brain, stop her heart, burn her from the inside out. Mariska would be the conduit for the power, but the woman was so far gone she didn’t appear to care that she may die in the attempt. She wanted to go down swinging. Gabi steadied herself on her one good leg, drew the compact bow from her belt, released the safety, and aimed for the kneeling woman’s heart.

  “NO!” a female voice screamed to her left, and in the microsecond before she loosed the bolt, light exploded between Gabi and Mariska. The bolt shot wide, as though something had physically knocked it off course, missing Mariska and exploding into a small, orange fireball against the rock behind her.

  Surprised and angry, Gabi swung to her right, automatically notching a second bolt.

  “Athena!” Gabi roared, staring at the newcomer in disbelief. “What the Hell?”

  “Duck,” Athena yelled at her, and Gabi reacted instinctively, throwing herself sideways.

  The movement threw her off balance, and she cried out as pain lanced through her injured leg. She collapsed to the ground, taking the brunt of the fall on her good knee and hip. An ear-splitting crash of thunder exploded over her head, blinding and deafening her. The smell of ozone and burnt things seared her nostrils. She yanked Nex from her sheath as she pushed herself into a sitting position, waiting for her night vision to return. When the ringing in her ears subsided, she could hear Athena yelling an incantation as an unnatural wind began to swirl around them and the air thickened with the feel of a coming storm.

  Sure Mariska was going to get another blast of lightning energy to throw at one of them, Gabi desperately patted the ground, trying to find her crutch. Her hand bumped something metal, the MacBow. She dragged it towards herself, but before she could get it into position, it was yanked from her grasp. Gabi reflexively brought Nex up, but it was only Athena, and she was already walking over to Mariska. Gabi’s night vision had returned, and she could see both women clearly. One pale haired, one dark, both their hair whipping around their faces in the unnatural wind. One standing, though just barely by the way she swayed on her feet. The other still on her knees, but defiantly confident, her arms upraised as she called for more lightning.

  Gabi froze, waiting for either of them to strike with Magus powers, but then Athena lifted the bow and struck the Dark Magus across the temple with it. The blow had been perfectly weighted, and Mariska’s eyes reflected shock for just half a second before her eyes rolled back in her head and she crumpled to the ground.

  Gabi wondered if she’d had a blow to the head and was seeing things. She shook her head and blinked, but when she looked again, Athena was leaning down over Mariska’s prone body. The air had fallen still; the sudden calm was a shock in itself. Distantly, the sounds of the main battle could now be heard. Gabi finally spotted her makeshift crutch. Dragging herself over to it, she managed to get herself upright, swaying slightly as Athena slipped the magical lariat over Mariska’s head and tightened it. Then she spoke several quick unintelligible words, and Gabi felt a tingle in the air.

  “What the fuck?” Gabi burst out when Athena turned to face her. “I had her. She was mine to take down. You and the Council are just going to kill her anyway.” She should’ve been too exhausted for anger, but she wasn’t. She couldn’t understand Athena’s interference, putting lives at risk just so the Council could do things their way.

  “I…” Athena drew a deep, deep breath and met Gabi’s eyes. “I couldn’t let you kill her, but not for the reasons you think.” Athena walked towards her, away from Mariska, and held out the MacBow to her.

  “Then what?” Gabi demanded, rudely grabbing back the weapon. “What would make you put all our lives at risk to save her? After all she’s done. To you? To us?” Gabi stabbed a finger towards the noise of fighting. “You know that there are casualties down there on all sides, including the Magi?” She was half a step shy of screeching in fury. She made an effort to bring herself under control before the red mist moved in.

  “Yes, I know all of that,” Athena said calmly enough to rile Gabi further. “But I couldn’t let you kill a pregnant woman, no matter what she’d done.”

  “You couldn’t let me…” Gabi’s tirade broke off as Athena’s words registered. “Wait, what?”

  “Mariska is pregnant,” Athena repeated, her voice tired.

  Gabi gaped at her stupidly for a moment, then glanced at the woman still unconscious on the ground. “Pregnant?” she finally asked. “How do you know? She doesn’t look pregnant.”

  “She’s not very far along, probably only a couple of weeks, but I can sense their life forces,” Athena told her. “She’s carrying twins.”

  A faint movement to Gabi’s right had her bringing Nex up reflexively.

  “Athena’s right,” Benedict said, coming forward out of the shadows and staring down at the unconscious woman. “And despite the nature of their parentage, one of the babies is a pure white light.” His face held wonder and…something else.

  “And the other?” Gabi asked, befuddled by the discussion of what could, in reality, be little more than a few cells as though they were people. With souls. The rapture left Ben
edict’s face in an instant, and when Gabi glanced at Athena, she could see the answer in the other woman’s expression.

  “The other isn’t the same,” Athena said carefully. “But that doesn’t mean, with the right upbringing and training…” She trailed off.

  Gabi knew the reality. They’d tried with Mariska, and look at the clusterfuck that had caused. Gabi shifted, trying to relieve the ache in her ribs and hip, accidentally putting weight on her bad leg. She gasped in pain, and Benedict was instantly at her side, reaching out to steady her. Then she felt Julius in her mind, concerned. Relief flooded her in a happy tsunami. He was exhausted, but alive. She sent him a flash of reassurance, wondering where he was. Then her brain got past first gear.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked Benedict, hopping with his help to a nearby rock and leaning her butt against it. “What’s going on at the Source?”

  “The worst is over,” he told her. “One Elder is dead. The other is injured but alive. The remainder of the Dark Magi have surrendered or run. The last of the demons are being pursued. The ploy with the Null worked ridiculously well. I wish I’d thought of it; I’m sure I’m not the only one feeling stupid not to have considered using him. All we had to do was get him close enough to the Dark Ones, though it took a while to fight through the sea of demons and Dark Magi. Athena hid him in a force of Vampires and Werewolves; the old bastards never even saw him coming. Once their power was negated, it didn’t take the Vampires long to bring them down.”