by Massey,M. D.
22
Journal Entry— 9 Months, 23 Days A.J.
Leticia came through. But now I owe a skinwalker a huge favor. The guy’s name is Ernesto, and for a malefic soul-sucking sorcerer who comports with spiritual denizens of evil from the nether realms, he’s actually not a bad sort of fellow.
But all pleasantries aside, you don’t become a skinwalker by holding charity bake sales and collecting blankets for the local orphanage, so I don’t even want to think about what he’s going to ask of me someday. All I know is that one day he’ll call this favor in, but it’s totally worth it to help Jesse.
Belladonna has turned out to be one hell of a good friend. Hopefully Jesse won’t be too pissed that we’ve been spending so much time together. Right now we’re headed back to central Texas, and we called ahead to tell Maureen to sober Finn up before we get there so he can tell me how to make this concoction that’s supposed to allow me to talk with ghosts.
-McC
Austin, Texas—Present Day
The barrier around the summoning circle fizzled and dissipated, and Crowley’s face beamed with self-satisfied delight.
“Dude, please tell me this wasn’t a ploy to get Belladonna the gaudiest engagement ring ever,” I said, standing up and taking a good look at the jewel Crowley snatched from the air. The two halves of the Tathlum fell to the floor with a thud as soon as he grabbed the gem, which appeared to be a baseball-sized ruby that looked suspiciously like a twenty-sided die. He stared at it intently as he spoke.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” the wizard replied. “I told the fachen to keep you away for another half-hour at least. Once I started the ritual, there was really nothing you could do to interrupt me, but by arriving early you kind of ruined my dramatic timing.”
“Yeah, well—he got distracted when the barn caught on fire, so I snuck past him while he wasn’t looking.” I knocked on one of the walls and looked around. “By the way, I admire what you’ve done with the place. Those copper sconces downstairs are killer. Personally, I would have gone with the Colonial style, but the sort of steampunk-slash-modern-farmhouse-slash-Saruman’s tower thing you got going on here is really working for me.”
He frowned and glanced at me briefly, then returned to gazing at the jewel in his hand. “That’s what I can’t stand about you, McCool. Everything’s a joke to you, isn’t it? You’re a walking, talking, magical weapon of mass destruction, and yet you gallivant all over the city as if you’re not a constant threat to millions of people.”
“Hey, let’s just get one thing clear—I do not gallivant. What I do is more like vagabonding. The difference is subtle, but it’s there.”
He sneered at me and grasped the gem in his upraised fist. I thought I saw something moving within the gem, like a light darting around inside. If I didn’t know any better, I would say the gem was looking around the room.
“Go ahead and crack jokes, McCool, but know that I’ve been planning this day since I first heard you’d moved to the city. The Circle wanted to hunt you down and destroy you as soon as they learned how you murdered your partner. But the old man pulled a few strings and called in a few favors, so the Circle was forced to stand back, and watch.
“But I wasn’t about to just sit back and wait for your ríastrad to erupt again—oh no. I’ve a sworn duty as a Circle mage to protect the innocent from supernatural dangers of all kinds.” He pointed at me with his free hand. “And that means you, McCool, and that damned curse you carry within you. So I waited and planned, and prepared.”
I sniffed and stifled a yawn. “Alright, I’ll bite—how’d you steal the Tathlum? And furthermore, what’s with the gem?”
He chuckled. “My mentor is far more powerful than any Circle mage on the ruling Council, even more powerful than Maeve, I think. Suffice it to say that I had adequate help in getting past her wards and spells.”
I nodded. “Fair enough. And the gem?”
He smiled. “You’ll see in due time. Any other questions?”
“Are you one of the people behind Ananda Corp and CIRCE?”
He shook his head. “No, that’s one of my mentor’s projects. It was how we first learned Maeve had been entrusted with the artifact. According to one of the fae we killed, Lugh himself granted it into her possession for safekeeping before the old gods disappeared from the mortal realm.”
“Ah, so you were trying to start a war between the Pack and the fae. You failed, you know.”
He sneered and curled his lip. “Merely a distraction. The real plan involved bringing you here, tonight. Everything else was secondary to this moment.”
He was completely engrossed in that gem, but I needed to keep him talking while I put the finishing touches on the spell I still had hidden in my hand. So, I kept stroking his ego with questions.
“Why’d you kidnap Sabine? She didn’t have anything to do with any of this.”
He shrugged. “The time was right. I’d figured out how to crack the Tathlum, and I needed a way to bring you here. Not that you wouldn’t have made it here eventually, but—” he gestured around him dramatically, “—timing is everything, you know. And I’ve been waiting for this moment, for a long, long time.”
“Kind of stupid to throw the Dullahan at me then. If it would have killed me, it would have made all this moot.”
He cackled and quickly cut his laughter off. “Oh, that wasn’t me. Obviously, you’re not as well-informed of your enemies as you think.”
I nodded to concede the point. He was right, I didn’t have a handle on all the players; heck, I didn’t even know what the game was, exactly. Still, none of it mattered at the moment, because Sabine and Belladonna were both safe and I was about to get Maeve’s rock back so I could get out from under her thumb. Tired of the verbal back and forth, I prepared to release the spell I’d been readying for the last few minutes.
“Well, it’s been nice chatting with you, Crowley, and I have to admit that for a sociopath you’re actually not a bad guy. But I have homework I’ve been neglecting and I’d really like to get this over with. So why don’t you tell me what that gemstone is?”
He rolled his eyes. “The fae girl was right. You are slow. Let me bring you up to speed, then.”
Fae girl?
Crowley clucked his tongue, and the imp carefully folded up his magazine and set it down next to him. He was sitting on the edge of his seat now, grasping the shelf with both hands and looking back and forth between us, like a cat watching a tennis match.
“Oh, this is going to be good,” the imp whispered.
“It’s time for the big reveal. You ready for this, druid?” He stood up straighter and held the gemstone aloft in his fingers, revealing it to me fully for the first time.
“Behold, the Eye of Balor!”
That’s when I knew I was about to get ass-raped with a jackhammer.
For those who don’t know Irish mythology, Balor was a king among the Fomorians. I might have mentioned that already, but what I didn’t mention was that he was also an inspiration for many of the comic book superheroes and villains of our day. See, not only was Balor a giant, massively strong, god-like creature, and likely the monster from whose seed the fachen sprang; he also possessed an insanely destructive magical power that was said to be able to slay entire armies at a glance.
Ever hear the name “Balor of the Evil Eye?” Yeah, well, that’s where they got the idea for every superhero power that ever involved shooting anything out of a hero or villain’s eyes. According to legend, Balor was the original super-powered badass. With one glance his eyes could burn up forests, melt stone, and catch entire swathes of the countryside on fire. No army was ever said to resist it, and his gaze was powerful enough to slay gods. Nuada, high king of the Tuatha Dé Danann, was killed by Balor’s magic laser heat vision. The legends say that Lugh shot out Balor’s eye in revenge before beheading him and ending his menace for good.
But now it looked like the legends were a little off. Who knew?
&
nbsp; As Crowley held the Eye aloft, I saw that it was an eye. The thing I’d seen moving around inside it was a pupil, a bright orange circle of light surrounded by a glowing red iris. And that thing was looking around the room like the eye of Sauron, presumably searching for targets of opportunity.
Crowley crowed in triumph as he continued his villainous monologue. “You see, Colin, Lugh didn’t pierce Balor’s eye. He merely knocked him unconscious with his sling. And once he’d beheaded the giant, he plucked that eye out and kept it in reserve as his own personal WMD, just in case another threat ever appeared to match that of the Fomorians. Of course, he created the myth about shooting out Balor’s eye to fool those who might want the weapon for themselves.”
Crowley polished the gem on his sleeve and admired it. “Personally, I thought hiding it inside the Tathlum was a particularly nice touch.”
I smiled. “I appreciate the history lesson—fascinating stuff, really. But I just have one more question for you.”
“Sure, whatever. I can wait a few more seconds before I burn you to ash.”
Once I had his undivided attention, I plastered the most serious look I could muster across my face and asked: “Tell me, Crowley—can your pussy do the dog?”
“Whah—?” Crowley’s brow furrowed as his mind attempted to process the most ridiculous and entertaining question ever asked in the history of punk and rockabilly music. And in that split-second of confusion, I threw the small ball of enchanted ice I’d been hiding with all my might, hoping like hell that the Eye needed a moment or two to rev up before unleashing its power.
Thankfully, my gamble paid off. The ice struck him in his chest and the spell triggered, immediately coating him in a thick covering of hoarfrost and icicles. He instantly froze in place like a statue as I bolted across the circle, pulling a tranquilizer pistol from my coat and firing it at him from a few meters away.
Unfortunately, the imp had flown across the room to protect Crowley as soon as it realized I was attacking its master. Likely being under a geas, it would be bound to defend Crowley with its own life. It hovered in front of Crowley’s chest for a moment with the bright-green fletching of the tranquilizer dart quivering in one of its butt cheeks. Then, it fell to the ground with a thud, snoring loudly and drooling with its tongue sticking from its mouth. Apparently, injecting a 20-pound imp with enough M99 to put down a 13,000-pound African bush elephant resulted in near-instantaneous unconsciousness.
To my dismay, that left a temporarily frozen but still very conscious Crowley to deal with, and he did not look happy. Worse yet, the tranq gun held only one dart. As I began backing away, the gemstone in his hand fixed that creepy pupil on me and began to glow.
“Oh, shit!” I yelled, running for the nearest window and hoping I’d land on something soft after falling thirty feet. Anyhow, breaking a leg or two was better than being fried like a bug under a magnifying glass on a sunny day. I was almost to the nearest open window when I felt a tremendous heat on my back. The wards I’d placed on my dad’s overcoat flared briefly and shattered under the sheer power of the Eye’s magic. Then the concussive force of the Eye’s gaze blasted me out the window, straight through the burning ruins of the barn next door.
Fortunately for me, and unfortunately for anything that was stuck inside there with me, my ríastrad had already kicked in before I’d even hit the barn.
As I felt the change coming over me, the bottom dropped out of my stomach. Everything was moving in slow motion; I was aware that I was airborne and crashing through the roof and walls of a burning building, but I didn’t feel a thing. All I felt was pain—not physical pain, but the emotional kind, and a deep, mind-numbing dread. Every memory of that awful night two years ago came rushing back in a flood, and I relived it all in an instant.
The cave. The dragon. The fight. Jesse’s death.
Then the ríastrad took over. Suddenly all that pain and anguish was gone, replaced by an endless rage that rose from a ravenous pool of hate inside me. It had no beginning and no end—it just was. I looked at my hands and arms and watched as they began to warp and disfigure. One arm grew hideously larger and more muscular than the other, and yet the smaller arm still bulged with muscles and tendons that strained against my skin until I thought it would burst. My limbs lengthened as they gained girth, and my bones cracked and ground as they shifted and thickened within my body, straining against clothes that stretched and shredded to accommodate my transformation.
My back arched and seized with tremendous pain, and I grew a kyphotic hump in my upper spine that threatened to displace my neck. I felt the bones in my face and skull realign, and groaned as my jaw thickened and lengthened. I raised my hands in front of my face—two monstrous, misshapen things, one a hammer and the other a claw—still with all five fingers and toes, and vaguely human. Thickened, leathery callouses and hard, bony protrusions stuck out of every knuckle.
Finally, I felt the skin all over my body thicken and transform. I grew hair, thick curls of it, from my knuckles, face, chest, and feet. My boots were tattered and hanging from my now massive ankles. I shook them off like a dog shaking its leg after a good long piss, just before I hit the ground. I landed in a corn field like a meteor come to earth and left a deep, dark furrow of freshly turned soil behind me as I slid to a stop some thirty meters beyond where I’d landed.
The rational, human part of me was still inside, but riding along like a passenger. I had no control over my body and no say-so in what would happen next. And that deeper, darker, primal part of me, the one that felt nothing but hate and rage, now sat fully in the driver’s seat.
And it wanted revenge.
23
Journal Entry—9 Months, 25 Days A.J.
After all that trouble we went through to sober him up, it turns out Finn had the alchemical recipe tucked away in one of his grimoires. Wish he would have just told us that in the first place. I can’t even stand to look at him, so I’m kind of glad we don’t need his help to finish this up. Maureen volunteered to help me prepare the formula, or potion, or whatever you want to call it, and we’ve been working away in the lab at Finn’s warehouse where Jesse and I used to train.
I hadn’t been back here since it happened. Cooking and distilling all the various components of an alchemical concoction like this involves a lot of waiting, so I’ve been roaming around the place remembering old times. There’s a layer of dust over everything, but the smell of leather, iron, blood, and sweat stirred up a lot of memories. I can still remember the first time she brought me in here; it was right after we defeated the Avartagh. We were just kids then, and it was going to be the adventure of a lifetime.
If only I’d known then what I know now.
So, tonight’s the night—I finally get to see Jesse again. I’ll probably be tripping balls when it happens, but still.
I can’t wait.
-McC
Austin, Texas—Present Day
I howled Crowley’s name into the night, and was answered by a roar that came from my left and behind me, in the direction of the still blazing remains of the barn.
A challenger! My huge, malformed lips parted and my mouth pulled itself into a terrible rictus of a grin. Spittle flew from my lips and my eyes bulged from their sockets. I pivoted toward that sound, screaming obscenities. Something was coming at me, and fast, and the hate inside gleefully welcomed the brawl that was sure to follow.
Thrum… Thrum… THRUM!
Suddenly the fachen collided with me, like a freight train hitting a dump truck. Transformed by the ríastrad I was better than three meters tall, but the fachen was easily half again my height. Yet I was nearly equal its mass because I had four limbs, while it had only one arm and leg attached to its slender half-torso. Still, when the fachen struck, it took me off my feet. I rolled with the force of the collision, coming up in a three-point crouch bellowing my family name as a battle cry.
“MacCumhaill, MacCumhaill, MacCumhaill!” I roared.
Then the b
east came at me again, and although I couldn’t see it, I could sense it and smell it. It smelled of rotten flesh and death, yet nothing inside me felt the least amount of fear—because pure elemental hate leaves no room for fear. I carried nothing inside but unbridled fury. As I heard the fachen approach again, I focused it all into one mighty punch, digging my toes into the ground for leverage and rotating to drive all my mass behind that great meaty battering ram of a fist.
The timing was perfect. My fist struck the giant and stopped it dead in its tracks, sinking satisfyingly deep into muscle and gristle. As my fist sunk into its torso, I felt something snap with a metallic ping under my knuckles. I assumed it was a charm of some sort, because just then the fachen shimmered into view before me, folded in two over my fist.
Its face had to have been a match for mine in sheer ugliness, because it was twisted and deformed and terrible to behold. It had one eye in the center of its massive forehead, and a shock of thick black feathers on top of its skull in place of hair. I smelled rotting meat as its breath escaped from its mouth, and there were flecks of masticated flesh and clothing stuck between its numerous crooked teeth.
I took in the scene in an instant and continued my assault. But the way I attacked, I wouldn’t even call what I was doing “fighting,” because that would be too tame a term. As I swung my next blow, words jumbled around inside my head to describe what I intended to do to the fachen:
PulverizeRendTearMaimPummelDismemberMangleMutilateSunderTortureEviscerateDestroyBrutalize… KILL.
And it was all just as natural as breathing to me.
I pivoted ninety degrees and brought that other, claw-like hand down on the side of the fachen’s head, ripping skin and tearing its ear clean off its head. I shifted my weight and kicked out with one foot, collapsing the fachen’s massive knee and bringing it further down to my level. Then I leapt on top of it and began beating it with both fists in a furious, unrelenting attack.
