The Phantom Queen (The Guardians of Tara Book 3)

by S. M. Schmitz

  “Yeah,” Selena sighed. “I didn’t want to pull her away from Lugh so soon, but I don’t think we have a choice.”

  “What the hell is going on?” Badb asked. “And where are we?”

  “Good news is that this is definitely not Hel,” Cameron assured her. “Surprisingly, not a single thing was on fire there.”

  “Cameron,” Badb sighed.

  “We’re in Austin,” he explained. “Nergal has joined the Cameron-hate-train because he apparently thinks Ninurta and Enlil should have been allowed to kidnap and kill people. And he’s recruited help from Veles and Tarhunt, both of whom brought dragons because Fate thinks it’s funny to make me fight every giant serpent from every world.”

  “I really wish you’d stop pissing people off,” Badb told him.

  “I really wish people would stop kidnapping my girlfriend, forcing me to fight giant serpents, and invading places they have no business being in.”

  “I’ll protect Selena,” Badb said. “Go find your dragons.”

  “Just for that,” he retorted, “if she bursts into flames again, I’m not coming back to help you.”

  “If she what?” Badb demanded, but Cameron pulled Thor with him to a different district in Austin where Tyr, Macha, and Nemain were still looking for Nergal. The Greek gods had also joined them, which told Cameron they weren’t having better luck in finding Veles.

  “Has anyone seen either of them?” he asked. “Hey, Gatekeeper, tracking is supposed to be your specialty.”

  Nemain rolled her eyes and pointed to a closed club across the street. “I did track Nergal. He’s here, but so are Veles and Zaltys, which is why the Greeks are here. But killing snakes are your specialty so go ahead…we’ll wait outside.”

  “I hate you,” Cameron told her.

  “No, you don’t,” Nemain responded.

  “So how are we supposed to kill this asshole?” Cameron asked. “The serpent, not the god. I’m pretty sure I know how to kill Veles.”

  “Um…I don’t actually know this myth,” Nemain admitted sheepishly.

  Cameron arched an eyebrow at Macha who just shrugged at him. “This has nothing to do with escorting our dead warriors to Findias so I have no idea either.”

  Cameron sighed heavily and pulled his phone out of his pocket again. “None of you are ever allowed to pick on me about Wikipedia again.”

  “If it turns out to be wrong, I’ll never stop picking on you about it,” Thor promised.

  “Dude,” Cameron retorted, “it’s Wikipedia. It’s never wrong.” He scrolled down the screen then sighed heavily again. “And occasionally, it provides answers we don’t want. Supposedly, Zaltys, who might have actually been Veles himself, was killed by Perun’s lightning, and Perun is most definitely dead.”

  “Well, I didn’t kill him,” Macha said. “Blame the Dagda.”

  “And I am a god of thunder,” Thor added. “Which means I can summon lightning.”

  “Yeah, but they’re inside a building,” Cameron protested. “You can’t summon lightning inside a building…it’s too dangerous for us and can bring the whole structure down.”

  “Maybe our weapons will actually work on this one,” London interjected. “We’ve gotta try something.”

  “There are other entries about this harmless little green snake that was associated with some fertility goddess or something, but honestly, no snake is harmless,” Cameron added.

  Thor nodded seriously and said, “I’ve heard that story, and it’s bad luck to kill it so we should probably go.”

  “Definitely,” Cameron agreed.

  “Not leaving,” Macha scolded.

  Cameron grunted at the dark club across from him, but his Spear appeared in his hand anyway. In his peripheral vision, he noticed Macha and Nemain pulling their swords from their sheaths. On his other side, the Greek gods produced their own swords and spears as they crossed the street with their allies. Before they could reach the doors, a fourth explosion rocked the city of Austin.

  “Athena,” Cameron said, “go back to Selena and Badb. Find Tarhunt and get this asshole to stop leveling neighborhoods.”

  Athena nodded and disappeared. Cameron took a deep breath and pulled the doors open. The club’s interior was completely dark and quiet, but Cameron could sense the presence of the other gods…and one of the monsters they’d brought with them. He ignited a fire in the center of the club, which cast eerie shadows into the black corners. He had just enough time to glimpse Nergal shooting a self-satisfied, smug smile in his direction before the gods disappeared, leaving only the giant serpent behind.

  “Of course they did,” Cameron muttered as Zaltys lifted its head and opened its mouth, revealing the monstrously long fangs and wide, cavernous throat. “And that is not a harmless little snake.”

  He threw his Spear toward the serpent, but the Spear hit an invisible barrier and fell to the ground with a sharp clang.

  The snake hissed at him so Cameron yelled back, “That’s cheating, asshole!”

  “Try burning it,” Macha suggested.

  Cameron lit another fire, this one beneath the snake, but the flames didn’t touch it either. He glanced at Macha and asked, “Any other ideas?”

  “We have to get it outside,” Thor announced. “I can’t summon lightning from in here. Like you said: It’s too dangerous for everyone.”

  “I’m sure it’ll just follow us,” Cameron snapped. “Just summon the lightning anyway!”

  “Chase it out!” Thor yelled. “It’s still a snake…I think. It’ll react if it’s being chased.”

  “I hate being a god,” Cameron groaned. He snatched his Spear from the ground and ran behind Zaltys, which turned his head and hissed at him again.

  “Thor,” Cameron warned.

  London appeared at his side, gripping her spear. “What do we do if it doesn’t flee and eats one of us?” she whispered.

  “This is literally my worst nightmare,” Cameron groaned again.

  The other gods flanked the giant serpent and closed in on it, allowing only one possible route of escape for the Slavic beast: the same doors Cameron had left open. From somewhere in the city, the gods heard a fifth explosion.

  “Screw it,” Thor thundered. “Everybody get out!”

  “Thor,” Cameron tried to protest, but the air was already filling with the electric charge of the lightning Thor was summoning.

  “Leave, Cameron!” Thor yelled again.

  This time, Cameron listened to his friend and transported himself out of the club. Macha touched his arm gently and said, “It was a mistake for us to leave him alone in there. We should go back in.”

  Cameron nodded just as the sharp crackling of lightning broke the silence from within the club. The windows briefly illuminated the giant green serpent, but Cameron flinched and turned away because the lightning was too bright for his eyes to handle.

  As the club quieted again, Cameron’s palms began to sweat. “It’s too quiet. Something’s wrong. We have to save him.”

  A second sharp crackle answered him. A high-pitched screech accompanied the lightning this time, and when the third bolt of lightning lit up the dark windows, Cameron squinted into the club.

  Zaltys was clearly hurt.

  Cameron smiled as another bolt of lightning struck the giant serpent and its massive body slumped below his line of sight. The interior of the club stilled once more and the gods waited breathlessly for any sign that their Norse friend was all right. Finally, his large frame filled the doorway and he called across the street, “Good thing snakes are such dumbasses. Never even tried to get away from me.”

  “Well, now that Satan has been slain…” Cameron started, but Nemain interrupted him.

  “Still not Satan.”

  “Do your weird tracking thing again,” he finished.

  “Anybody else have a horrible feeling this was just a diversion while Tarhunt and whomever he’s with is destroying the city?” London asked.

  “Yeah, but what
choice did we have?” Macha asked. “Veles and Nergal set off their own explosions, too.”

  “I know, but this was almost too easy,” London countered.

  All of the gods groaned and shook their heads at her. “You really need to learn not to say shit like that,” Ares told her.

  “He’s right,” Veles answered. “You really do need to be more careful about what you say.”

  Cameron looked down the empty street where he could feel Veles although the god kept himself hidden. But Cameron had grown tired of their cowardice and dragged the god out of hiding…only the god he pulled onto the street with them didn’t resemble a man at all but a large wolf, which snarled angrily at them.

  “So…this is new,” Cameron observed smartly.

  “I’m really starting to hate shapeshifting gods,” London complained.

  “Hey!” Macha and Nemain protested.

  London grinned sheepishly at them and shrugged.

  Cameron’s Spear lit up the dark street with its blue flames, and he prepared to throw it at the wolf-god who disappeared. A low growl behind them was joined by several other throaty growls. He turned around slowly and narrowed his eyes at an entire wolf pack.

  “Okay, I give up. Who are your asshole friends?” he asked.

  Veles growled again in response.

  “I really don’t care who they are,” Macha said. “They aren’t exactly the Sixth Street welcoming party so let’s kill them and find…”

  “We’re not on Sixth Street,” Cameron pointed out. “That’s three blocks away.”

  The wolves growled specifically at him.

  “Hey,” Cameron shouted at them. “I just like for everyone to have their facts straight. Show some appreciation for preserving accuracy.”

  “When they eat you first, I’m not going to even pretend to be upset by it,” London told him.

  Cameron sighed in her direction before sending her across the city to join the goddesses looking for Tarhunt. Macha threw her hands up as if to ask, “What the hell was that for?” so he shrugged and said, “She was annoying me.”

  Nemain gestured toward the wolves advancing toward them and snapped, “Can you worry less about your allies and do something about this?”

  “Fine,” Cameron agreed. “Although, I’d just like to point out you have a sword. You’re not helpless.”

  But Cameron didn’t bother throwing his Spear at the wolf he assumed was Veles. He sent a fire down the entire street, and the wolves leapt from the burning ground, transforming once again into their regular forms.

  Cameron blinked at them and nudged Thor with his elbow. “They can fly? Can you fly?”

  Thor shook his head. “They’re not exactly flying,” he replied. “Look at the fire underneath them. It’s being pushed outward. I’m willing to bet one of them is either telekinetic or a wind god.”

  Cameron nodded in agreement and raised the flames higher in an effort to reach the gods, but the higher the flames rose, the higher the gods traveled into the night sky. Finally, he let the fire die, hoping they would return to the surface of the Earth and they could combat them with their weapons.

  “If one of those gods has a bow and arrow, we are so screwed,” Nemain muttered.

  “Still want to know who those other gods are,” Cameron responded.

  Macha shrugged. “Slavic gods probably.”

  “Huh,” Cameron said. “I’ll bet we know someone who can tell us.”

  “Cameron,” Ukko sighed. “What the hell am I doing here now?”

  Cameron pointed to the group of gods in the sky and asked, “Who are they? Aside from Veles?”

  “You pulled me out of Findias for this?”

  “Obviously,” Cameron told him.

  Ukko squinted at him and put his hands on his hips. “Let me go home.”

  “Answer my question.”

  “I hate you,” Ukko told him.

  “There’s a lot of that going around,” Cameron agreed.

  Ukko grunted at him but pointed to one of the figures in the sky. “That one is Chernobog, the god of calamity and disaster.”

  “Whoa,” Macha interrupted, and for once, Cameron was glad he wasn’t the one doing the interrupting. Ukko seemed pissed off enough at him. “No wonder Austin is being destroyed.”

  Ukko nodded in her direction and added, “He can level a neighborhood simply by thinking about it. If I were you, I’d kill him first.”

  “He’s already leveled five neighborhoods,” Thor said. A sixth explosion punctuated Thor’s announcement and all of the gods on the ground glared in Chernobog’s direction.

  “The only other god I recognize is Koschei, the Slavic god of death,” Ukko finished, still glaring at Chernobog as if daring him to try it again while he was around. But Cameron suspected he was actually attempting to read the Slavic god’s mind to either find out who the other gods were or what neighborhood had just been leveled now.

  “Did you know they can all transform into wolves?” Cameron asked him.

  Ukko shook his head. “They can’t. Not really. Veles most likely transformed them himself. These other gods are minor deities. I’m sure you already sensed that. They’re the weakest of the group and any one of you could easily take them all. The three out front…” Ukko finally let his gaze shift from the sky back to Cameron. “Be careful. Considering Finland’s proximity to Eastern Europe, I’ve encountered these gods before. They’re merciless and cruel just for the sake of being cruel.”

  “You could stay and help us,” Cameron pointed out.

  Ukko glanced toward the sky again and indecision played across his face as he bit his lip and considered the ramifications of staying or leaving. “No,” he decided. “With another invasion of the Otherworld likely, I’m staying with Anita. I need to be alive to protect her spirit.”

  “Yeah,” Cameron sighed. “If anything happened to her, I’d be pretty damn pissed off, too.”

  Ukko almost smiled at him before returning to Findias. Cameron made a mental note to be twice as obnoxious the next time he saw him just to ensure they didn’t actually become friends…not until he was convinced Ukko’s days of kidnapping people and impressing them into his service was over.

  Macha gestured toward the deities in the sky and asked, “How do we get them down so we can kill them?”

  “Well,” Nemain retorted, “say that a little louder. That ought to do it.”

  “Actually,” Cameron said, “it might. I’m willing to bet gods like them have massive egos so let’s use that to our advantage and challenge them.”

  Thor looked him over quickly and teased, “Gods like them? Because you’re so…”

  “Oh, for God’s sake,” Veles shouted down at them.

  But Cameron had to do it. He raised his hand as if he were seeking permission to ask a question and Veles blinked back at him. When the Slavic god didn’t speak, Cameron waved his arm at him. When he still didn’t speak, Cameron let his arm fall and shouted back, “Dude, don’t you know you’re supposed to call on someone when they have their hand raised? It means they have a question.”

  All of his friends sighed heavily and shuffled their feet impatiently. Veles just continued to stare at him.

  “Fine,” Cameron relented. “Don’t call on me, asshole. I’m asking anyway.”

  Macha and Nemain groaned before he could even ask. Cameron ignored them.

  “Which god?”

  “Which god what?” Veles snapped.

  “You said, ‘For God’s sake,’ so whose sake?” Cameron explained. Really, he thought his question had been perfectly understandable the first time. And people had the nerve to tell him he was the annoying god.

  Veles opened his mouth then closed it, drifting closer to the ground as he glared at the young sun god. “What is wrong with you?”

  Cameron lifted a shoulder and pointed his Spear at him. “Still don’t know. But I’m only annoying. You’re attempting to commit mass murder so what is wrong with you?”

 
“Attempting?” Veles scoffed. “Look around, Sun God. This city will be wiped from the Earth by morning.”

  “Maybe the buildings,” Cameron argued. “But not the people.”

  Veles snickered and drifted lower to the ground again. “Not even your girlfriend can heal this many people that quickly.”

  “Actually, she can. And she is,” Cameron insisted. “All you’re doing is giving us the chance to prove to the world that some of us are their allies after all.”

  Veles’ eyes shot over Cameron’s head toward the neighborhood where the sixth explosion had gone off, but with the Slavic god of the underworld distracted, Cameron threw his Spear before he could disappear again. The other gods immediately vanished as Veles’ body fell from the sky, landing on the asphalt of the street with a muffled thump.

  Cameron approached it carefully and yanked his Spear from the dead god’s chest. He could no longer sense any of the other Slavic deities, which meant they’d most likely left Austin altogether. Thor kicked Veles’ body before looking around and muttering, “Cowards.”

  “Is that true?” Macha asked. “About Selena?”

  Cameron nodded and took a deep breath. “Don’t ask her about it, okay? I mean, you can ask her about healing hundreds of people at a time, but not how she’s bringing humans back from the dead. It’s kinda freaking her out and if some of those people she’s saving claim they died…it’s not going to help us get along better with humans.”

  “One of the worst things that ever happens to any group of people is when they all start questioning their faith,” Nemain agreed. “We’ve seen it before.”

  “And we can’t prove anything,” Cameron added. “So we need to stick to the same story: These people were badly hurt, but she got to them before anyone could die.”

  Ares and Thor exchanged nervous glances, but all of the gods agreed to keep Selena’s secret.

  Because whatever was happening in Austin had never happened before, and none of them knew why a goddess of healing could suddenly accomplish the impossible.

  Chapter Seven

  After searching the city for Nergal and his accomplices, the Guardians finally decided he’d left as soon as he realized he couldn’t slaughter Austin’s citizens as he’d planned. As the sun began to peak above the horizon, Selena reluctantly agreed to stop her own search for any survivors she might have missed and return to the Otherworld for some rest.