by Jake Bible
“Gil?” Hannah said. “I will let you and the rest take us back to the tunnels.” Gil’s eyes widened. “Yes, we know about the tunnels. Lead your new friends there and we’ll be right behind you.”
“Good idea,” Jon said. “Keep an eye on us just in case.”
“Yes,” Hannah said as they got moving. “Just in case.”
9
“I GET TO BE demolitions,” Tessa said as she bounced a fragmentation grenade in her hands. “I like it when things go boom.”
“You don’t know a damn thing about things that go boom,” Nissa said, snatching the grenade out of the air before Tessa could catch it again. “Obviously.”
“So?” Tessa responded, reaching for another grenade, but pulling her hand back after a quick slap from Nissa. “Bitch. I’m demolitions if I want to be demolitions.”
“Fine. Whatever,” Nissa said. “I’m not going to argue with you. What was the count?”
“Huh?” Tessa asked.
“The grenades? What was the count? How many are there?” Nissa asked.
“Oh, shit, I don’t know,” Tessa replied. “I wasn’t counting.”
“Dammit, twat, the whole reason we’re here is to take an inventory of the armory,” Nissa snapped. “What have you been doing this whole time?”
“Thinking about blowing stuff up,” Tessa admitted. “What have you been doing?”
“I’ve been counting the guns on the walls and in the racks and all the ammo,” Nissa said, her voice haughty and quite superior.
“Oh, is that right?” Tessa asked. “Huh, because, and correct me if I’m wrong here, but since we’re connected at the hip, and I’ve been standing next to the boxes of grenades and that putty stuff there, how the fucking hell have you been counting ammo?”
“I’ve been guestimating,” Nissa said.
“Bullshit,” Tessa replied.
“Tessa, my lovely little bitch, you doubt me?” Nissa asked, the haughtiness replaced by feigned shock and offense.
“You’ve been thinking of shooting possessed into little tiny fleshy bits, haven’t you?” Tessa asked. “Come on. Admit it. You want to shoot the shit out of some demons as much as I want to blow the shit out of them.”
“Maybe,” Nissa said, a sheepish grin on her delicate, stone face. “That could be fun. I mean, we have all these guns and weapons down here and we never get to use them. I so want to use them!”
“Me too,” Tessa said and grinned along with her stonemate. “I so want to!”
The Gs giggled and laughed as they went about actually completing their assignment and taking a full inventory of the weapons that filled the large, cold room occupying a good portion of the cathedral’s basement.
10
ELISA HAD NOT been happy to be ordered inside and made it very clear as she gave Geffe a swift kick in the ass before storming through the cathedral’s doors.
“Feisty,” Geffe said as he stood on the steps next to Coins. They both flinched as the doors slammed shut hard enough to send a crack echoing across the sanctuary grounds. “Yikes.”
“There’s more,” Coins said. He was seated on the steps and flipping his coin up in the air, over and over again. He nodded to the front gates. “Another twenty or so just showed up. Came walking up to the bar like it was happy hour.”
“Are they anywhere else?” Geffe asked.
“Don’t know,” Coins replied. “Xue is on patrol. He insisted that he be the one to survey the fence line. All those years guarding a palace back in China have come back to him. He’s Mr. Serious G now.”
“Xue’s always been Mr. Serious G,” Geffe said. “That little doggie has to learn to relax.”
“Not the time for relaxation, bub,” Coins said. “Time to brace ourselves for the brawl that’s coming our way.”
“You’re looking forward to the fight, eh partner?” Geffe asked. “Finally get a chance to flex those gangster muscles and show the possessed what a tough you are.”
“Maybe,” Coins said. “But, maybe not.”
“How so?” Geffe asked.
“We got a good thing here,” Coins said and shrugged, catching his coin one last time before slipping it into its pocket. “Might be boring, and the wards are annoying, but when you think about the world out there, this sanctuary gig ain’t so bad really. I know I was all for leaving before, but where the hell would we go, right? Might as well stay here.”
“I see what yer saying,” Geffe replied and twitched his donkey ears. “But don’t get comfy. We’re Gs. We ain’t been made to sit on our butts and wait things out. We’re made to fight.”
“We’re made to protect,” Coins countered.
“Protect, fight, same thing in my book,” Geffe said. “Neither one of which is the same as waiting. I’m kind of looking forward to a little action, if I’m being honest.”
“How about the others?” Coins asked. “What do they think about it all?”
“The faeries are rip-roaring ready to smash something,” Geffe said. “I bet they’re down in the armory right now daydreaming about what they get to do to the possessed if the protection falls.”
“You think it will?” Coins asked.
“I think they think it will,” Geffe said and gestured with his donkey chin toward the possessed, who were busy hooting and hollering around the rotten bar like it was Super Bowl Sunday. “We’d be dumb as tumbleweeds if we don’t expect it.”
“I can see your point,” Coins said. He looked back over his shoulder at the cathedral’s doors. “How many you think will die?”
“None,” Geffe said.
“None?” Coins asked, more than surprised.
“Coins, my friend, the point of this siege is to take the humans alive as vessels,” Geffe answered. “The wards are no use to the demons if they’re dead.”
“Maybe,” Coins said.
“What? You got some inside knowledge?” Geffe asked.
“Maybe,” Coins said again as he patted his gut.
“You and your gut,” Geffe said.
“The thing I’m worried about is that we’re the ones that may not make it,” Coins said.
“Damn,” Geffe said. “Not liking how that sounds.”
“Not liking how it sounds either, to tell ya the truth,” Coins said and shrugged. “But that’s how I see it, so that’s how I’m saying it will go down.”
“You need to work on your fortune-telling act, partner,” Geffe said. “You’re supposed to leave the mark feeling good, not feeling like they should jump off a bridge.”
“I’d never call you a mark, Geffe,” Coins said. “You got too much of the scoundrel in ya.”
Geffe smiled a toothy smile, stretched, and flicked his ears back and forth a few times. “Gonna go check on Jack,” Geffe said as he descended the stone steps. “Poor soul can’t be having a good time all alone down there with the scum of the earth.”
“Tell him hi for me,” Coins said.
“Will do,” Geffe said and started off across the grounds.
11
“SO I SAID TO her, if you call those boobs then what do I call these?” Jack said and laughed hard enough to shake the gates. He went on for a good minute before petering out and realizing that none of the possessed were laughing with him. He sighed. “It’s funnier if you have hands. It’s a sight joke.”
“Why would you tell a joke where you need hands when you got no hands?” an extremely drunk possessed woman asked. “Where I come from, if you give a setup like that and don’t deliver, you end up in one of the pits lined with polyester. Not the new kind, but the original kind that chafes like a bitch.”
“I invented that,” a possessed man said.
“You did not,” another man responded. “You’re not old enough.”
“No, not my meat suit, asshead,” the first man snapped. “Me. The me inside here. I invented polyester. It was to be the greatest torture device ever, but then the stupid humans went and tweaked it so it wouldn’t be so hot and sticky and scratchy. They took the torture right out of it.”
He punched himself in the nuts and fell to his scabbed over knees.
“Oh, was that needed?” Jack asked. “That could not have been pleasant.”
“It wasn’t,” the nut-puncher replied, his voice an octave higher. “But I hate humans so much, I have to hit this one every once in a while or I’ll give in and slit his throat.”
There were several murmurs of agreement from the crowd.
“You know any jokes that don’t require hands?” the woman asked Jack. “Come on, green man. Share some jokes!”
“Share some jokes! Share some jokes,” half the crowd of possessed began to chant.
Jack grinned uneasily, but actually put some thought behind it.
“Okay, okay, it’s a little bawdy, but I expect your kind doesn’t mind that,” Jack said.
“You just told a boob joke,” the woman said. “What’s bawdier than that?”
“This one,” Jack said and cleared his throat. Or made a sound like clearing his throat, since he didn’t actually have a throat. “A zebra, a python, and a giraffe walked into a bar—”
“I heard this one,” someone shouted from the crowd. “It’s stupid!”
“You’re stupid,” someone replied.
“Fuck you!”
“No, fuck you!”
A fight quickly broke out and Jack sighed.
“Hey, Jack,” Geffe said as he stepped up to the gates. “What’d you say to get them so worked up?”
“I was trying to tell a joke,” Jack said. “They were receptive at first, but now it’s all devolved into stupid violence. It’s to be expected from their kind.”
The brawl stopped quickly and all possessed eyes turned on Jack.
“Their kind?” one of the possessed asked. “What the fuck does that mean?”
“Yeah, like you can talk, you iron-faced asshole,” a possessed woman growled. “You think you’re special or something?”
“To be matter of fact, yes, I do think I am special,” Jack said. “Or something. Do you know any other green men who adorn iron gates and can talk and tell jokes?”
“I have yet to hear a joke from you!” someone yelled.
“Yeah, you suck. Get off the stage!”
“Boooo! Boooo!”
Empty liquor and beer bottles pelted the gates and Jack closed his eyes.
“Oh, my, how rude,” he yelled, and caught a shard of an Old English bottle in his mouth. He spat it out and kept spitting as more and more glass shattered on his face. “Stop that!”
“Hey! Y’all better back off,” Geffe yelled. “You don’t want to be around Jack when he’s angry!”
“What? He gonna turn into the Hulk?” someone yelled and laughed.
“Maybe,” Jack replied. He was about to yell some more, but he stopped as an almost painful vibration shot up from the ground, into the gates, and through his whole face. “Geffe!”
“I felt it,” Geffe said and spun about. He took off running as fast as his short legs could carry him.
Not that Jack could see the G’s progress up the grounds and to the cathedral.
Jack shivered in the gates. He ignored the continued barrage and focused on the jolt he’d received. As the last rays of the day’s sun set behind the mountains, Jack realized that the sanctuary was about to receive its first new wards in a very long time. Which was strange and troubling timing considering the company who had decided to show up at his gates.
12
JON AND HIS men were frozen in their tracks the second they stepped over the threshold and entered the cathedral’s tunnels.
“What the hell is this shit?” Jon barked.
“Magic,” Hannah laughed. “You didn’t think you could just walk in here, did you?”
“Gil? Kid, come on, help a brother out,” Jon said.
“Nothing I can do about it. You have to be invited by a G and offered sanctuary,” Gil said. “It keeps everyone safe that way.”
“Then get me one of those, what did you call them? Gs?” Jon said. “Get me one of those.”
Scythia appeared, almost as soon as Jon had asked, stepping out from behind a dried-out juniper bush that sat close to the tunnel’s entrance.
“Yes?” she said, a feathered stone eyebrow arching above her eagle eye. “And you would be?”
Jon stared. His men stared. The rest merely smirked. It was always fun watching the reactions of new people when they first encountered a G.
“I, uh, I’m . . .” Jon began then shook his head and let out a long breath. “Okay, I’ll bite. What the hell are you?”
“What the hell am I?” Scythia asked. “It would be wise to introduce yourself to me, sir. I have no need to introduce myself to you. Nor must I define my form.”
“She’s a gryphon,” Gil said.
“Ah, come on,” Scythia snapped. “You ruined the fun, Gil. Why you gotta be a dick?”
“Scythia, will you extend protection to these men?” Hannah asked.
“Can you vouch for them?” Scythia asked.
“I cannot,” Hannah admitted. “But they do seem to know where caches of supplies are hidden. You know how low we are on supplies.”
“Aren’t we supposed to be saving people?” Gil asked.
“Yeah, like, aren’t any humans not possessed supposed to get sanctuary?” Brian said.
“Do you think it is that simple?” Scythia asked.
There was a cracking from the bushes a few yards off and a man stumbled out, stopping almost in mid-stride as he saw the group around the tunnel’s entrance.
“Beautiful,” the man said and grinned. His eyes turned pure black and his teeth elongated into warped and twisted fangs. “So very beautiful!”
He rushed the group.
“Sanctuary granted,” Scythia shouted as the man came at them. “Get inside! I’ll hold him off!”
The man, obviously possessed by something more than an average demon, was on the little grotesque before Hannah could get the door closed. She saw the possessed’s fingers stretch into finely sharpened talons.
Scythia leapt into the air and the last thing Hannah saw were talons on talons.
Hannah slammed and bolted the tunnel door then turned to frown at the rest. She didn’t get the chance to say a word as a pipe came swinging at her head.
“Jon! What are you doing?” Gil shouted as Hannah threw herself to the ground, catching the pipe across her shoulder.
“I’m doing my job,” Jon said as he went in for a second swing.
The kids stood there, shocked. Parsons and Birchstein were immobile as well. Until Jon’s men came at them with box knives, short blades, and lengths of metal. Kimmy screamed as she watched Parsons take a blade across his throat, hot blood spurting everywhere, spraying the kids in a shower of deep, dark red.
The shock was broken and the kids ran.
Jon brought the pipe down at Hannah again, but she managed to get a foot up into his crotch before he could complete the swing. He squealed in pain, which distracted his lackeys as they turned to see what had happened to their leader.
Birchstein grabbed a man’s wrist and snapped it, snatching the box knife from the suddenly limp grip. He slashed and hacked, cutting the man’s lips and cheeks to shreds. Birchstein dropped his shoulder and slammed the bleeding man backward into the others. He reached down and snagged Hannah by her hair, pulling her up onto her feet without worry for the pain it caused.
Hannah didn’t complain. She was grateful to be up and away
from the doubled-over Jon.
“We have to warn the others,” Hannah shouted.
“I know,” Birchstein said. “Go!”
“What?” Hannah cried, but Birchstein didn’t answer, only shoved her back toward the cathedral as he stepped between her and Jon’s gang.
Hannah paused for half a second. In that half second, she saw Birchstein holding a bloody box knife, Jon’s gang rushing at him, and Parsons’s dead body still leaking blood on the tunnel’s stone floor. She understood what Birchstein was doing and why.
Hannah didn’t waste his sacrifice and bolted for the stairs. She ran as hard as her less-than-in-shape body would allow. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she heard the screaming. Then it was cut short. Hannah didn’t know if it was one of Jon’s men or if it was Birchstein. She only knew that whoever had screamed would probably never scream again.
She bolted up the stairs to the library to warn the other wards.
13
XUE HEARD THE shouts of the wards inside. He tore his attention from the ever-increasing horde of possessed who were gathering outside the fence and looked over his muscular shoulder at the cathedral doors. Elisa was opening the doors to see what was happening and Xue caught sight of torches being lit throughout the gallery.
“What is it?” he cried.
“I don’t know,” Elisa cried back. “People are screaming!”
The stained-glass windows that lined the cathedral’s walls became bright with more torchlight. The illumination was happening too fast for it to be the wards lighting them. It had to be Artus. And if the ancient gargoyle was lighting the cathedral, then that meant something very bad was happening indeed.
Xue was halfway from where he had been sitting and observing the possessed when he saw Elisa rush back out of the doors and scramble down the stone steps toward where Coins was crouching, flipping his coin over and over as he stared back at the cathedral.
