Last Breath

by Debra Dunbar

  I ignored calls from Tremelay. I ignored calls from Janice. I cancelled my nighttime meeting with Dario, knowing I’d need to prepare. By the time it was eleven o’clock and time to go, I’d worn a groove in my apartment carpet. Would Dark Iron even show up? I had nothing beyond Chuck’s note, no way to confirm the meeting without tipping the mage off that something was amiss. All I could do was go and hope that surprise was on my side.

  I brought the soul trap. As much as it creeped me out to have the thing in my pocket, I knew it would guarantee that Dark Iron would speak with me, even if I wasn’t the mage he expected. He needed it back. I had a feeling it was the only thing keeping that Argentina mage from cursing him to a fiery death.

  The address Chuck had given me was north of where I lived in Fells Point. I passed Patterson Park where we’d LARPed this past weekend, parking near the CVS on Fayette so I could cover the rest on foot. From there, I walked for blocks, with my sword on my back. It wasn’t the only weapon I was carrying but it was the most obvious. And it was the one I’d rely upon the most if this turned bloody.

  I knew it was going to turn bloody.

  The building was a two-story brick, on a street lined with identical homes. I was glad I walked since the street was so narrow that with even with cars parked half-on the sidewalk there would have been barely enough room to squeak by. Feeling very exposed on the empty street, I checked the numbers and ducked down a narrow space between two buildings. In the walkway was an entrance that led to what would have been called a garden apartment—fancy word for basement.

  Ten minutes ’til midnight. I was early, but I was sure Dark Iron was even earlier. It was his style, and I was counting on him being here, waiting for Chuck. Slowly I eased open the unlocked door, counting to three until I stepped a foot over the threshold.

  “Haxa luz.” A ball of light appeared before me and I sent it forward to better see the room. It was a cheap, low-rent apartment, a twelve-by-twelve room with a door that I assumed led to a bathroom, an open doorway to a shadowed kitchenette, and a back bedroom. Tiny, without a lot of room to hide. It should have been encouraging, but I was far from confident.

  I drew my sword with one hand, touching my finger to the third charm on my bracelet. Heat surged through me and the room lit up, every magical trap and ward highlighted in white.

  I’d expected to see some sort of magical protection in the room. I wasn’t disappointed. One spot lit up right in front of my feet past the threshold, and another midway through the room. The windows had some kind of charms on them as well.

  And a figure in the corner, previously invisible, glowed. He saw me, and now I saw him. I dropped the charm, jabbed my finger on a needle I’d hidden in my pocket, and palmed my butter knife. “I’ve got something you want.”

  The figure shifted, becoming fully visible. Dark Iron stepped forward to the dusty metal table. “And what am I expected to do to get it back, hmm? Confess my sins?”

  “Why kill Raven?” I asked him. “She was loyal to Haul Du for over a decade, loyal to you. She wouldn’t have said anything about the soul trap or the Dupont Circle mages. There was no reason for you to kill her.”

  He leaned against the table. “Me? All the evidence points toward Fiore Noir. Your friend Raven was just one more in a long line of their victims. Sad, really.”

  “Even I could tell Fiore Noir didn’t conduct that ritual. Don’t bullshit me, Mitchell.”

  Dark Iron winced as I used his real name. “Raven was a good mage, but she knew too much, and I couldn’t trust her. The last few days she was busy filling your ears with confidential information—things Haul Du mages vow to keep within the group. Her loyalties were elsewhere. She knew the price she’d pay.”

  “The price was being thrown out of Haul Du,” I snarled. “Not being stripped naked, bolted to an office floor, and sliced up with a knife. Nothing she knew about the Dupont Circle murders, Bliss, or the stolen soul trap was worth killing her over. It was all conjecture, what she’d heard from others. It’s not like she could bear witness on any of that.”

  He shrugged. “No, but it was a matter of time until she found something and took it to the Conclave. The timing was right, with all the Fiore Noir mages being accused of murder.”

  “Was it worth it? You’ve lost Haul Du all because of a stolen soul trap. Why would you even need such a thing? You’re a Goetic mage.”

  Dark Iron scowled at me, his hands steady by his side. “There are magics that can’t be worked through demons, or charms, or hexes. Some spells need death magic, and some spells need soul magic. You’re an idiot if you don’t recognize that.”

  I glared back. “I’m an idiot because I think there’s nothing magic can bring that is worth murdering someone? That’s worth stealing their soul, taking away any chance at eternity?”

  The scowl turned into a smirk. “Yes. Because there are times when the blood of a few must be spilled for the greater good. Go on with your naïve Templar hopefulness. Go on thinking you’re saving the world when you’re just making it worse.”

  “Well it’s all for nothing. You’ve lost your magical group, you’ve lost the soul trap, you’re about to lose your freedom, and if I’m reading the situation with that mage in Argentina right, you might just lose your life.”

  “I think not.”

  Magic sparked in the air. I had less than a second to act. He was too far for me to reach with my sword, so I ran my fingers along the butter knife as I threw it at him. It wasn’t a sharp weapon, so instead of stabbing into him like a dart, it bounced off his chest and onto the floor.

  “Combustio.”

  Nothing happened. Dark Iron blinked in surprised and looked down at the knife on the ground. I’d blown all the spells from it breaking into Eleanor’s garage hideout last night, and hadn’t had time to do more than one simple spell, one every Templar knows how to use—a null spell. Activated with the blood from my poor, needle-jabbed finger.

  The mage kicked the knife away, but the room was small enough that he’d need to actually leave to escape its radius. And leave he couldn’t—at least not without going through me.

  I pulled the soul trap from my pocket. “You confess to Raven’s murder, turn over evidence to the police, and I’ll give you this. Maybe it will save your life.”

  Dark Iron backed up and put a hand in the pocket of his jacket, his eyes on the soul trap. I edged closer, sword at the ready. Not that I expected him to do anything. As long as the null spell on the knife held, none of his magic would work.

  “No.”

  And with that word he shot me. There was a bang, flash right through his jacket pocket, the smell of burning fabric and pain like a hot knife across my arm. I might not have faced actual combat before but I’d spent years training and instinct took over. I jumped on top of the table and swung, my vision blurring with the pain that came with the motion. The mage jumped backward, the blade slicing a narrow, diagonal line from shoulder to chest.

  My arm burned like fire. A second shot rang out, but I didn’t feel it. It all seemed to happen in slow motion—the jerk of the hand in his pocket, the swing of my sword as I tried to bury the blade in his shoulder. The gunshot went wide as he jerked backward. The momentum of my swing pulled the injured muscles in my arm and I nearly threw up.

  Gunfire rang out, over and over. I jumped off the table, still swinging as I came at the mage. He stumbled backward, dancing away from my sword and shooting from the hip. My arm was in agony, my aim just as bad as his at this point.

  We rounded the table, his pistol clicking empty. I darted to the side, kicking the table to make sure he didn’t have a clear path to the door. And then I brought the sword tip to his chest.

  “I yield.” Dark Iron dropped to one knee, taking the empty gun from his pocket and sliding it across the floor before lifting his hands. “I yield.”

  Blood dripped from his shoulder and waist where I’d cut him. It didn’t seem to bother him. In fact, he didn’t even wince as he shi
fted his weight.

  I hesitated. There was nothing the police could do. There’d be no evidence that he killed Raven, and nobody alive in Fiore Noir had seen his face. Magical divination wasn’t admissible, and neither was the confession delivered at the point of a sword. Raven’s death looked a lot like yet another Fiore Noir murder. All Dark Iron had to do was appear shocked and angry, and there would be enough doubt to set him free. He’d wiggle his way out of the legal system. He’d never serve a day in jail. But could I stand here and coldly drive my sword through his heart? As much as Raven’s death ached, as much as I hated this bastard, I’d never been a killer.

  Some Templar I was. Although, to be honest, Knights hadn’t been warriors for centuries. We were rich academics, playing at arcane martial arts.

  Dark Iron shifted to the other knee, the blood a red stripe down his shirt. “Arrest me. I’ll come willingly. You know how useless that will be, though. I’ll walk right out of that police station just as quick as I go in. Call the police or let me walk out of here now. Your choice.”

  He was right, but what was my alternative to calling Tremelay? Let him go and hope that mage in Argentina caught up with him? I couldn’t execute a man who knelt in front of me, unarmed. As evil as he was, killing him wouldn’t be like banishing a demon or sticking a lance through a sandwyrm.

  Raven would have taken his head off for killing me. I’d promised her I’d have her back. I’d promised her I’d avenge her death.

  Dark Iron stood and brushed the dust from his pants, giving me a stiff bow. “Until next time then, Templar.”

  He turned to leave, turned his back on me, and something snapped. I remembered Raven, her eyes and mouth fierce, her hands balled into fists with her skin sliced.

  I couldn’t let him just walk away.

  The tip of my sword slid through his back like it was a sawdust practice dummy. His arms flew wide, time seemed to stand still.

  I couldn’t have placed my aim better if I’d tried. I’d impaled him right below the fifth rib. Blood flowed like a river out along the blade of my sword. His lungs made an odd sound, a cross between a whistle and a bubbling noise. I stared at his back, fascinated, noting how his shirt puckered into the wound, how his hands, empty of any weapon, flailed helplessly around.

  I yanked my sword out, watching the blood out of the corner of my eye. So much blood. He crumpled to the ground, and as his head hit, it turned sideways—enough that I could see his expression. The surprised look on his face finally faded. In its place wasn’t anger, or hatred, or fear, just a sort of emptiness.

  I heard my sword clatter to the ground, felt the sticky blood on my hand and looked down, realizing with an odd detachment that it was a mixture of Dark Iron’s and my own. The pain from my gunshot wound dulled to numbness.

  I’d killed a man. I’d stabbed an unarmed man in the back.

  It always seemed so easy in video games, in books, and in movies. How many times had I shouted at the television for the hero to just go ahead and put a bullet through the villain? But this was different. This was real and I’d just made the decision to end another’s life. I’d taken my sword, with its spells, my consecrated sword, and put it through a man’s back.

  I slumped to the floor in a pool of blood and pulled my phone from my pocket, smearing the screen with red as I frantically tried to get the touch-screen to work. I would face justice for Dark Iron’s killing. What I’d done… well, I’d face whatever consequences my actions caused. Jail didn’t worry me, as much as the state of my soul did. The demon mark. My family. Oh God, my family. How would they take this? Templars weren’t supposed to judge, and this took judgement to a conclusion, down a path we hadn’t walked in centuries. We’d once paid the price for our bloodshed. I’d pay the price for this, too. Eventually.

  But right now I was scared and there was only one person I could think of to call, only one person who could understand what I was going through, only one person who wouldn’t condemn me or think me evil, or a bad person for what I’d done.

  Dario picked up on the first ring, just as I knew he would.

  “I’m in trouble,” I told him, tears filling my eyes. “I need you.”

  Chapter 37

  THERE WERE A million things I expected Dario to say—things like how I should have let him handle this, or about the waste of perfectly good blood. I didn’t expect him to sit down beside me on the sticky floor and remain silent.

  It helped. Just having him beside me helped. After a while I began to notice that the wet coating my pants and arms was congealed and cold, that the pain in my arm was growing in intensity. I’d bandaged the wound as best as I could, counting myself lucky that Dark Iron had been such a poor shot.

  Taking a deep breath, I unclasped my hands, flexing my fingers and taking shallow breaths.

  “I’ve never killed anyone before.” My statement was partially for Dario, partially for me. The words seemed abnormally loud, echoing in the room.

  “It gets easier,” the vampire replied. “I know you don’t want to hear that, but it’s true. Eventually it’s the quick and easy solution to a lot of problems.”

  I didn’t want it to be the quick and easy solution to a lot of problems. I thought about the necromancer last week, avenging the murder of his family and remembered the chain of death one murder had set off. “There will be repercussions. It seemed like the only solution, but…”

  He sighed. “You weighed the risks of leaving him alive and made a decision. Most likely he would have killed you and killed more people that you love. Was Raven the first? I doubt it. I doubt a man can go from scholastic study of the occult to bolting a colleague to the floor and stabbing her to death without hundreds of black marks already on his soul.”

  I’d knew I’d made the right decision—the only decision I could. But that only made my choice slightly easier to live with. The bad in the world wasn’t always nonhuman monsters. I’d been prepared to kill monsters in self-defense, or while in battle. I’d not been prepared to kill a human. I’d stabbed him in the back. I’d stabbed an unarmed man in the back.

  I’m sure my ancestors had done the same. I thought back on the Crusades, of the shameful acts some of us committed in the name of God, claiming the loss of life was for the greater good. That was dangerously close to the justification the death mages and Dark Iron had used. I’m sure the Knights back then felt equally justified. I’m sure eventually killing was easier for them too, just as Dario had said.

  I didn’t want it to be easier. I’d come here knowing I wanted to kill Dark Iron. I could guarantee that I was going to face this choice again. I didn’t ever want that choice to be easy. I wanted to agonize over it each time. If I made the choice to take a life, I wanted to always known the serious nature of that act.

  I stood, wincing and gently touching my arm as I did. “Can you all assist with clean-up? It’s probably best if the police think Dark Iron slipped away. He’s not their main target in this anyway.”

  Although he should have been. The Stranger. The man behind the curtain. The man who had killed at least five people. I’d have to make up some excuse for Tremelay about why we didn’t need to keep pursuing him.

  Dario stood beside me. “We’ll need a lot of bleach. You humans are so messy about these things. Such a waste of good blood.”

  I rolled my eyes. And there was the blood joke I’d expected. “I hear evil mage blood isn’t good for you. Your cholesterol would go through the roof. You should be thanking me.”

  A faint smile curled the corner of his mouth. “So, do you want this to just disappear, or do you want to send a message?”

  “Message to who? I’m the only Templar in town, putting his head on a spike with a note stapled to his forehead is only going to land me in jail.”

  Dario shook his head. “Nothing so obvious. Body parts with broken magical items delivered to certain individuals could ensure no mage east of the Mississippi would ever think of messing with you.”

  Vampi
res. I don’t even think drug cartels did such things. Or maybe they did.

  “No, that would probably get every mage east of the Mississippi to band together and kill me. Mages are rather sensitive about being threatened. Bullying techniques don’t work with them.”

  Dario pursed his lips and nodded. “Okay. Gone-gone it is. By sunrise, there won’t be a trace that this happened. I’ll send a doctor by your house in the morning to stitch you up, too. That one’s not going to heal on its own.”

  The vampires had a doctor on retainer, one who made house calls. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. They wouldn’t need to be stitched up, but I could imagine their Renfields did on occasion.

  I stooped and picked up my bloodied sword, thinking that I had a lot of cleaning of my own to do. It was a bit too hot to drive around wrapped in the blanket from the trunk of my car to hide the fact that I was covered in blood, but that’s what I’d have to do.

  “Thanks,” I told the vampire, feeling guilty about leaving him with all this. He nodded, his eyes warm and full of affection.

  What kind of affection, I didn’t know. That spark was still there between us, and as much as I wanted to tamp it down and keep our relationship businesslike, I wasn’t sure how that was going to work out.

  “Tomorrow night, one hour after sunset at Sesario’s,” he reminded me.

  I blinked. This was over. Done. Why would he want to continue to meet me every evening when there was nothing left to report?

  Oh.

  “I’ll be there.”

  I drove home, sweating and sticky in the musty trunk blanket, my sword rolled in the extra cloth by my feet. Watching carefully for passersby, I dashed up to my apartment, thankful it was dark and that my cheap landlord didn’t bother with adequate outdoor lighting. Once in my apartment I washed all the red down the tub drain, knowing it would take much longer to wash the stain from my soul.

  It was close to sunrise when I got the text from Dario indicating I could rest easy.