by Nazri Noor
“Right,” Gil said. “Then that’s the way we go.”
We moved at a brisk pace. The arrow was flying now, a smoky guide to lead the way.
“Normally I’d check through my stick men, but there aren’t enough of them to see everything.”
“Whatever happened to your smoke grenades?” I asked, eyeing her cautiously.
She shrugged. “I’ve got a limited supply, okay? If other sources of smoke are available, I’m using those to work my craft first. Sorry, not sorry.”
The cigarette fell from my fingers. I stomped it to death, glaring accusingly as the last of its embers died in the damp grass. Fine. I was quitting smoking, forever. I smoked so much around the guys that it’d probably help them live longer, anyway. Fine, already. Asher won.
We took off. Everyone was running, but I flagged towards the back of the pack. Asher, who was still recovering, kept pace with me, then elbowed me in the ribs.
“I warned you about the smoke thing,” Asher said, his hand over his mouth, hardly covering his grin. I wanted to smack the smirk right off his face. But he was right, and now it looked like we’d be seeing a lot more of Tabitha. I’d tell him about deciding to quit smoking later. I didn’t need him gloating just then.
We hadn’t been running for very long, following the strange smoking arrow in its flight. Seven minutes at most. Teleportation would have been faster, but a mage needs to know the destination to successfully complete the spell. I didn’t want to end up with half my torso embedded in a pine tree, or worse.
The arrow disappeared in a sudden puff. I nearly protested, and then realized that there was no further use for guidance. The noise of flutes and drumming was enough of a lure to bring us in the right direction. There was a clearing, just up ahead.
Our group slowed as we approached, Gil flexing his fingers like he was about to engage his wolf claws, Bastion gesturing similarly as he prepared his telekinetic magics. Tabitha’s hand was halfway in her pocket, no doubt reaching for another one of her smoke grenades. I gripped my sword tight. We stepped into the clearing. I could scarcely believe my own eyes.
The ghost of Uriah Everett stood at its center, pulling his eerie puppet strings, making his decayed corpse dance in a flopping, twitching circle. The seven faces, along with the Filigreed Masque, were arranged in a ring on the ground, around mounds upon mounds of fruit. It was a summoning circle. Just outside it, kneeling in the grass, was Olivia Everett, the blood-stained journal in her hands. She lifted her eyes to meet mine, then smiled sweetly.
“Gentlemen,” said Uriah Everett’s shade, beaming happily as he played with his marionette of rotten meat. “So kind of you to join us.”
Olivia clutched the journal to her breast, then rose to her feet. “Friends. It’s so good to see you again. Welcome to your doom.”
30
I slashed my sword through the air, sparks flying in the wake of its blade. I pointed it at Olivia’s throat.
“What the fucking shit is going on here, Olivia? I thought we were friends.”
“But we are, Sterling.”
“Friends don’t keep secrets about their dead face-collecting grandpappy who lives under the floorboards.” I tugged on Asher’s wrist, holding up his gore-spattered hand. “Friends don’t give each other boobytrapped books, for that matter. You’re a bad lady, Olivia, and I don’t like you.”
Asher pulled back his hand, rubbing lightly around his wrist. “For the record, Olivia, you’re kind of an asshole for that.”
“Don’t you see?” she said. “It was necessary. You helped bring the founder back, and now you can witness his true resurrection.”
I ran a hand under my nose, wiping the sweat off my top lip. “I liked him better when he was dead.”
Tabitha pushed past me, throwing her hand out accusingly at Uriah. “Your evil isn’t welcome in these forests, Uriah Everett. I should have sensed your foul hand in all this. Your stench corrupts the land itself.”
Uriah tilted his head, blinked, then sneered. “I recognize the fire of your spirit, woman. Are you of the Bridges clan? The true corruption in these lands started with the arrival of your ancestors, you know.”
“Lies,” Tabitha hissed. “We kept these lands safe long before the silver rush, long before you came and set up a town on the forest’s fringes. Which, thank you, I suppose. It makes it easier to get groceries, for sure. But you’re still a no-good bigoted supernatural-hating bastard.”
I looked between them, confused. Is that what this was all about? Was that what Uriah had meant when he mentioned cleansing? Wow, fuck this guy. Fuck this guy right in his ear.
And speaking of ears, Gil had a finger stuck in his. He wiggled it around, turning his head this way and that as he scanned the clearing. “Do you guys hear that? The drumming and the flutes? It’s like it’s coming from here, but it isn’t really.”
“It’s the circle,” Bastion muttered. “They’ve started a ritual of some kind to commune with something big and bad. What you’re hearing is its servants playing in celebration.”
Gil sniffed at the air, wrinkling his nose. “And that smell. It’s faint, but it’s there. Rotten eggs.” He sniffed again, then blinked. “No. Sulfur.”
“Fuck me,” I grumbled, getting a hint of the acrid smell myself. “Olivia, are you and your asshole grandfather really out here trying to summon demons?”
She shook her head, smiling earnestly. “No, no. Just the one. If it sends its servants to help us, well, we have no qualms with that, really.”
“You don’t know what you’re starting here,” Bastion said. “You’ve already killed enough innocents.”
The light of Uriah’s body flared brighter as he laughed. “Innocents? No. Those were our servants, recruited by my sweet Olivia. I sent our people to dismantle and destroy those insufferable bundles of twigs that litter the forest.”
Tabitha leaned in and whispered into my ear. “I fucking told you I was the good guy. Head witch in charge.”
“Not the time,” I whispered back. “And sorry I doubted you, damn.”
“The ultimate prize,” Uriah said, “would have been to claim the Bridges witch’s face and add it to my collection. I knew there was still one lingering in these woods. Her death alone – her face alone would have been enough to fuel my resurrection, to give me new life. The Bridges blood is cursed, but strong, after all.”
“Kiss my ass, Everett scum,” Tabitha said, baring her teeth. “Not my face. Not in a million years.”
Uriah laughed. “That is why Olivia sent our people to bring down the stick men, to dismantle the fetishes. To weaken the forest, to weaken the Bridges witch, and to leave her vulnerable. If they had succeeded, it would have been so simple for my hounds to penetrate her home and tear off her face. But our servants failed, and so my pets claimed their faces instead. Their punishment, and their tribute. Seven faces from inferior mortals, of inferior power.”
This piece of garbage had been pulling the strings from beyond the grave all along. “Well, your pets are gone now,” I said. “We’ve put them to rest.”
Uriah sent his hand out, his fingers curling over invisible lengths of chain, but this time they found nothing to hold. His eyes went wide with fury. “You killed my children. My babies.”
“No,” Gil shouted. “We released them from your hold, you monster.”
“The true monsters,” Uriah boomed, “are you and your tainted ilk. I built this town so that it would serve the purposes of man and man alone. Look at what these mountains have become. First witches, and now werewolves, vampires, valkyrie? It is strange, alien, unnatural. No. Silveropolis was made for man and man alone.”
I squinted at Uriah, glancing around at the others. I muttered loud enough for them to hear. “Are you guys listening to this fucker? I didn’t think he’d be this big of a bigot, but here we are.” I straightened myself up, raising my sword again. “Time marches on, Uriah. It’s called progress. We’ve learned to live among humanity without doing t
hem harm. Why can’t you leave well enough alone?”
Uriah shook his fist, his corpse dancing in a grotesque pirouette. “You have no right to question my principles, you wretched creature.”
Olivia held a calming hand out towards the ghost of her ancestor, who, to my surprise, immediately cowed, the blue flame of his spirit wavering and dimming ever so slightly.
“What Grandfather means is that the people of Silveropolis would be much happier without the constant dangers of the supernatural lurking in every corner. You do understand, don’t you, Sterling? Having your kind in town puts our neighbors at quite the risk.”
I threw one hand up in frustration, tempted to flip both of them off. “There was no danger here until Uriah started sending out his monster mastiffs to eat people’s fucking faces off.”
She stiffened. “Well, that was only to punish them for failing at such a simple task.”
“Was that really how you saw Timothy? As just another pawn to further your goals? Humanity doesn’t even know about us. They have nothing to fear.”
“They have everything to fear from you,” Olivia shouted, her hands shaking as they grasped the journal. “You are a threat to us all. You just don’t know it yet.”
I could tell that she believed in Uriah. She thought, with every fiber of her being, that he was right. Faith could be a frightening thing, but I’d never seen faith quite so blind.
“And here you are, arbiters of justice, champions of the clean and mighty, turning to fucking demons to do your dirty work for you. Don’t you see any of the irony in this, Olivia? You’re hypocrites. Turn away from this. You don’t have to help Uriah. It’s not too late.”
“No,” she said, squaring her shoulders. “No. Grandfather rises with the blood moon, and the cleansing will commence with its coming.” She flipped open the journal, her eyes hard and black as she scanned the pages. That wasn’t hyperbole. Her eyes really had turned solid black.
“Fuck my life,” Bastion said. “She’s continuing the ritual. They’re going to summon something, and soon.”
The grass inside the circle had already been tinged bloody red from the moon, but now it was turning the same black as Olivia’s eyes.
Bastion raised his hand, his fingers grasping at the air. I might have cared to stop him one night ago, but at this point it didn’t matter to me if he planned to pop her head off her neck or crush it like a grape. I wasn’t that desperate for a thrall, especially one who approved of genocide.
But Olivia raised her hand in retaliation. A beam of black pulsed from the center of her palm, throwing Bastion across the clearing. His eyes went huge with surprise as he flew. Then his back struck the trunk of a tree, the awful sound of the impact cracking through the woods. His lashes fluttered, and he collapsed, unconscious.
“Holy shit,” I shouted. Bastion wasn’t my favorite person, but I didn’t want the guy dead. Asher made a mad dash for him, his hands already wreathed in green fire as he prepared a healing spell.
“We must stop her,” Tabitha shouted, her finger thrusting towards the earth. “Bramble wall.”
Thorns and vines rushed out of the grass, closing in on Olivia. This time she didn’t even react. She only shut her eyes, and the low hedge of prickly death approaching her simply withered into brown and black dust.
Uriah’s laughter echoed through the woods. “You see how my own blood uses your vile magics against you? Just this once. Just tonight. And when this is ended, we turn our backs on your taint forever. Now, sweet Olivia. Call him.”
I sped across the clearing, sword drawn. Olivia didn’t even acknowledge me coming. I slammed into an invisible wall, pulses of black light gleaming where I made impact. My sword flew from my hand. I crumpled to the ground, muscles aching, bones rattled.
Olivia raised her head to the clouds. The ends of her hair lifted above her head, floating, as if in water.
“Glasya-Labolas,” she shouted. “Come forth.”
Damn it.
31
The circle widened, the black ring of grass expanding, killing any plant life it came in contact with. What had previously been distant strains of music sounded so much closer this time, the drums and flutes seeming to emanate from the ground itself. The earth was trembling, too. Par for the course. Something big was coming, and it was coming fast.
I dragged myself to my feet, retrieving my sword and rushing back to join the others, far away from the circle. Everything still ached, but I’d be close to fighting condition soon enough. In a different situation, knowing that Olivia could use force blasts and erect arcane shields would have been a massive turn-on. But again, the murderous tendencies were an enormous dealbreaker.
Olivia’s offering of fruit remained mysteriously untouched by the withering plague, still brightly colored and fresh. That is, until the bottom suddenly fell out of the earth. Grass, dirt, fruit alike fell into the sinkhole, swallowed to the tune of ominous growling and groaning. From deep inside it, I thought I heard sounds of snarling, chewing, something with huge jaws eating its sacrifices.
Uriah Everett, his corpse, and the disembodied faces remained hovering above the pit, suspended there by an unearthly force. His expression was one of calm, a serene understanding that things were going entirely according to plan. I couldn’t wait to cut the smile off his smug face.
It was just Gil and Tabitha with me. Asher was tending to Bastion, running his hands in the air above his torso. I could tell that Bastion was still breathing. Good. That was a start. I turned to the others.
“Any clues about what’s coming?”
“Glasya-Labolas,” Tabitha said, glowering at the Everetts. “These people are insane. He’s a demon noble, nowhere near a prince, but still a clear threat.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “And you know this, because?”
“Because I’m a witch who knows my shit. Excuse me for keeping up to date with demonology. This Glasya-Labolas is a problem. He appears as a great dog with wings – and he’s a member of the Court of Gluttony.”
My mouth fell open as I stared between her and Gil. “You’re joking. This is their plan?”
Gil’s eyebrows were furrowed hard, his eyes burning black. “They’re summoning him to devour us all.”
Tabitha rummaged through her pockets, her neck covered in a thin sheen of sweat. The guardian of these woods was nervous. Oh. Not a great sign.
“It’s almost clever, when you think about it,” she said, pulling out a couple of her glass globes. “The point of summoning Glasya-Labolas is also part of the offering. The Everetts want him to eat every supernatural creature in Silveropolis, and we all count as a morsel in one colossal offering. It’s a win, win situation.”
My lips drew back as I focused my gaze on Olivia. She was muttering, concentrated completely on the task of calling Glasya-Labolas out of his hell. Black wisps of infernal power threaded through the locks of her hair. It stunned me, how she and her grandfather simply couldn’t see the irony.
“What I wouldn’t give to slit her throat myself. Gil, what are the chances we can take down her barrier if we hit it at the same time? You too, Tabitha.”
“It’s not invincible,” Gil said. “Worth a shot. We’ve shattered shields before. You just need to apply enough force.”
“That’s nice,” Tabitha said. “But we’ve got other problems just now.”
She lifted her hand towards the circle, now enlarged to the size of a helipad. My stomach swooped. Tiny shapes were darting in and out of it, flying among the disembodied faces and Uriah’s corpse. Their metallic bodies gleamed in the crimson glare of the moon, their skins colored like iron, copper, brass.
“Are those imps?” I said. “Fucking imps?”
Gil narrowed his eyes. “They brought instruments, too. The little bastards.”
So now we had those to deal with, too. Imps were among the lowest of the demons on the infernal hierarchy, minor nuisances, individually. But working together, and in larger numbers? Vermin. Locusts. Dangerou
s pests. We had to contain them to the clearing. If they broke out into Silveropolis, we’d have to deal with chasing them down, too.
Not to mention that godawful banging and tooting. One of the closest imps leered at me, then blew on its flute. Flames came out of one end.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I shouted. “They’ve weaponized the instruments.”
Gil cracked his knuckles. “I’m going to enjoy killing these things.”
One imp with a small flamethrower was a problem. But a dozen of them out in town? You’re looking at arson. And now the larger issue.
“How the fuck are we supposed to take down Olivia and stop her from completing Glasya-Labolas’s summoning and fight off these tiny bastards at the same time?”
“By fighting hard,” Gil growled. “We fight hard.”
He launched himself towards the pit, claws extended. A tiny scream pierced the night as he slashed the first imp in half, its drum exploding in a puff of demonfire. So the drums were grenades, too? Awesome. Just fabulous.
“Let’s follow his lead,” Tabitha said. “Won’t get anything done sitting on our asses. You take the girl. We’ll help where we can.”
She smashed three of her glass eggs on the ground, the resulting wisps of smoke braiding themselves into a single mass. Tabitha sent the cloud roiling across the clearing with a single command.
“Choke.”
The imps didn’t even have a chance to react. They dropped like flies back into the pit, flutes and drums bursting into gouts of fire. From somewhere below came more sounds of growling, chewing, and cracking bones. Glasya-Labolas sure did appreciate his employees.
I dashed towards Olivia Everett again. This time her barrier was visible, sculpted around her in the form of a tall black cylinder. It was like looking at her through dark fog, or smoked glass. The journal in her hands flipped its own pages, no longer required. Olivia’s words were coming from someplace else entirely. She kept up her chant, protected in her magical bell jar. I raised Susanoo’s sword – my sword – high above my head, then brought it down for a vicious strike.
