Aces Wilde: Immortal Vegas, Book 5

by Jenn Stark

  But my focus was my undoing as my foot struck hard upon the earth and the unsteady terrain shifted beneath me, distracting my attention from our deadly flashing blades. I flailed forward with an ungainly lunge and clipped General Som’s hand, sending her sword flying even as she whipped back at me, a dagger now in her grip, her eyes fierce with loathing.

  “You’re already dead!” she snarled, and plunged the dagger deep into my gut.

  I fell to my knees, stunned, the Honjo loosening in my grip as the pain and blackness of General Som’s dagger revealed itself as a magical weapon crafted with deadly cunning. Pure evil leached into my bones, but General Som could’ve had no idea that pure evil was there waiting to receive its brethren. When her blade nicked the deep wellspring of Armaeus’s dark power I flung both arms out and back, consumed with the firestorm of energy as I gave myself over fully to the rage coursing through me.

  My own doubt no longer spoke in the madness of that roar, no longer taunted me.

  But that didn’t mean there wasn’t any voice.

  “Sara!” Nikki screamed.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The blade shoved deep within my abdomen twisted sharply as General Som spit a curse at me, and pain exploded in a ball of blue and purple light. I gasped, but there was no more breath within me to cry out, to deny the truth of what was happening. The surge of evil crested, then spilled forth, with nothing left to stem the tide.

  Som turned her blade on Nikki, and I realized in a heartbeat that my dearest friend had roared forward with nothing but her fists and the scabbard of my sword—no guns, no storming the castle—against a woman who had no honor, a woman made up more of drugs and hate than magic or sinew and blood.

  But I was made of magic, at least for now. I had drawn the darkest power into myself for exactly this reason. I flipped over on my back, agony ripping through me, and reached out my hand toward Nikki as General Som dove at her, pushing everything I had into the burst.

  Nikki caught that power full in the stomach, the force of it lifting her off her feet even as she swung the scabbard of the Honjo Masamune at Som. The burst of fire that raced along the scabbard slashed across the general’s face, melting her skin and making her scream. Nikki struck again and again, the fire burning through her but not damaging her that I could see, though my own pain lurched and tumbled around in the great dark hole that General Som had rent inside me, a hole that could no longer contain Armaeus’s dark magic.

  I staggered upright as Nikki spun away from Som, but this was not Nikki’s fight to wage. Not her battle to finish.

  I held the Honjo Masamune high. “General Som!” I roared.

  This time the burst of Armaeus’s power swelling inside me was infinitely bigger, stronger. When Som wheeled toward me, I didn’t hesitate. I had greater forces behind me, before me and above me, and I willed them all to bend to my command.

  This battle, it was over. Magic was here, I was here, and General Som would not live to draw another breath. So was it etched in my black-coated bones; so would it be.

  The general leapt, and I leapt with her, but in that same movement, I threw the benevolent sword, the Honjo Masamune. This time, it did not evade its target but sang straight and true toward the heart of its opponent. Som lifted her own sword to protect herself, and the Muramasa blade shattered into a dozen shards. Its violent magic crackled through the broken pieces, galvanizing them and turning them on General Som herself.

  She twisted and the benevolent blade shot by her into the bright sun, while the shards of General Som’s sword buried themselves into her body…

  Stealing even her screams.

  I sank to the ground, surrounded by utter silence.

  I’d won.

  I’d lost.

  Everything I had wanted, I had gotten, only nothing was good, nothing was right. Because something dark and dead now hung in my bones, refusing to let go. Armaeus had said the darkness would pass out of me when its need was past. He’d said it would go.

  It wasn’t leaving, though.

  I fell forward, even as the buzzing of a thousand angry hornets filled my ears. In my mind’s eye, I saw the Five of Swords, and my heart shriveled in my chest. A lone warrior standing on a rain-swept field, gathering up his swords as those he had destroyed turned and limped away from him. I had won this battle for the House of Swords. I had kept it from Gamon’s hands.

  But there was no victory here.

  Gamon was not defeated, only Som was. Lost, broken General Som, a warrior betrayed by her own thirst for war. She was Gamon’s minion, but where one follower failed, another would rise up. And another, and another, until there was only endless battle and endless pain.

  “Sara—” A voice cracked over me, and somehow it was Nikki once again. I blinked my eyes open and saw her standing there, her face black with smoke and soot, but there was no blood upon her, no blood. And her mouth was split open into a wild, feral grin.

  In her hands, she held the Honjo Masamune—which she brandished toward me. “Get up and take your sword,” she whispered. Her words spoke through me and into me, coming not from her but from the Honjo itself.

  I climbed to my feet. Nikki gave me the sword, and everything dark within me screamed in torment, as the lightness of the sword raged against the darkness of Armaeus’s magic. I had won. But I had lost. I was whole and yet still broken. And only madness lay in wait for me. Madness and endless, aching loss.

  Without thinking, I turned the Honjo Masamune upon myself and plunged it into my abdomen.

  Magic arced through me, and everything inside went up in a fiery conflagration. The benevolent sword did not resist my action, it did not stop but pierced me swift and sure, seeking and finding all that was dark and miserable that had leached inside my soul, and burning it clean.

  An eternity seemed to pass as I sagged forward on that blade, as screams and cries mounted around me. I looked deep into the constellation etched on the blade’s surface and saw a path picked out in the stars, as if it was a map.

  A map…

  “Enough, Sara.” The voice that spoke to me across the heavens was high and full, the softest murmur beyond the stars. It was a female voice, but something infinitely more than that, larger than a planet, deeper than a void. I felt the gentle touch of a hand caressing my face, drifting back my hair from where it was plastered against my brow. “There will always be more to suffer. It is enough.”

  The whisper of her touch sent a shiver of sensation through me, rippling through my forehead and curling along my spine. The darkness wrenched within me turned to hoarfrost and light, a brilliant winter’s day—

  “Sara…” The word floated over me, the softest mist, and I blinked open my eyes.

  In front of me were more people than I would have thought possible.

  There was Nikki, of course, the closest. She was clutching the Honjo Masamune to her breast. The sword looked as pristine as the day I had found it, and I frowned down at my stomach, confused. There was no blood. I was no longer wounded.

  More sounds rushed in around me. The chatter of people, the shouts and calls of official voices over bullhorns, insisting that we stop, that we desist, that we scatter, that force would be used and that this was private property.

  Another wave of noise broke through—a siren, as a battered sedan and an emergency vehicle bumped into the canyon, past the ring of black SUVs and the scatter of people standing beside them.

  I smiled as Brody shot out of his vehicle and sprinted across the valley. He ignored everyone, pounding directly up to me, only to stagger back when he got within three feet. “Jesus Christ, Sara, what’d you blow up?” he demanded.

  I looked down and only then saw the scorch marks in the earth all round me, radiating out from my body like the rays of the sun. I opened my mouth, but speech wouldn’t come. I stood, and my clothes fell in hunks and pieces from my body, holes burned in so many places that Brody was barking again, and somehow someone produced a reflective blanket. I to
ok a few wobbly steps toward him and Nikki, and half collapsed into their arms, my feet no longer working right.

  Nikki steadied me, then bent and slid the Honjo Masamune into its scabbard, the belt also somehow unmarred by fire or blood or gore. She handed the Honjo to me, and I somehow managed to tie the sword back onto my body. I rested my hand on its hilt, my thumb pressed against the guard. As if I had always worn it, always would wear it.

  Jiao stepped away from the knot of police cars, leaving two other generals who stood in respectful attention before the gesticulating cops. She seemed not to notice the scorched earth as she came to stand by me. I looked around but could see nothing of General Som’s body.

  She followed my gaze and gave me a deferent nod. “We have already created a story that will suit any seeking an explanation, Madam Wilde,” she said. “The technology that Gamon had set in place to blank this section of earth from satellite view was attached to General Som’s body with a set of transmitters. She was the center, for where she was, you would follow, whether she engaged you here or in another location. The box canyon apparently was not a good choice. The unit overheated, exploding in a highly concentrated blast that disintegrated her body and much of the surrounding earth.”

  Jiao gestured to the blackened ground, as if I needed any further explanation. “She died instantly.”

  “She—” I swung my gaze to Jiao, shaking my head. “Her sword,” I managed.

  “A fierce blade, to not have succumbed to the blast.” Jiao held up a hand, and a man stepped forward, proffering the sword. General Som’s Muramasa sword—no longer shattered into a dozen pieces, but pure and clean. Jiao touched the hilt with appreciation. “For centuries, a blade has guarded the shrine of Buddha in Angkor Wat, it would seem. It is fitting that a sword crafted for brutal death should seek its rest there, at last. It is our hope that this gift of faith to the temple will benefit both the shrine and the sword, each according to their needs.”

  She turned back to me. “We came as soon as we could.” Her smile faltered. “General Som had given me coordinates for the usurper’s attack on the other side of the city. Even in her last act, she deceived me. And there is no telling how much further her deception went.”

  Except, I already knew that. Knew what Som had done to the house, to Annika.

  I stayed silent.

  “We need to get you to a hospital,” Brody broke in, his words gruff with anger. “And then probably to jail.” He scowled over at Nikki. “You attacked four cops, Nikki. Four cops who were wearing regulation LVMPD uniforms.”

  “They so weren’t cops,” Nikki said, reaching ou for me again, her touch ginger. I pulled the blanket around me, grateful for the barrier between me and the rest of the world. “I bet you haven’t found those guys either, have you?”

  “We have not. As far as we know, they crawled off and died somewhere, making you both the subject of a homicide investigation.”

  Still, Brody’s voice held no heat, and Nikki pushed him on the shoulder. “You’re just mad because you missed the fight.”

  “A fight on national park lands, utilizing possible illegal weaponry and advanced tech weapons that are going to be lighting up the desks of every law enforcement agency from here to DC? Yeah, I think that’s a fight I’m awfully glad I didn’t see with my own eyes. Especially since we don’t have any bodies.”

  I winced. There may not have been a body for them to collect, but I knew the truth. I knew the reality behind the spin Jiao had set in place to cover what had happened here.

  Nikki’s grip firmed on my shoulders. “We’ve got one body right here, Detective, and that’s the important one.”

  Brody turned, flustered, but I shook gently free of Nikki’s hold. “It’s not over,” I said. “No one saw it. No one saw General Som die.” No one had seen the burst of magic that had come out of me, channeled through sword and sky, a dark strength so profound that I would swear it still lurked inside me, though Armaeus had told me it would not … It could not.

  Nikki grimaced. “Well, about that—”

  “Sara.”

  I turned, and Jiao was in front of me again. Beyond her, the cops were arguing, but the generals were beginning to disperse toward their vehicles. “There is much to discuss tomorrow, after you are released from medical care.” She tilted her head toward Brody as he glowered, effectively negating his argument before he could make it. “If you will come to the mansion, we can formally complete the succession process.”

  “I will come,” I said. “We have much to discuss. And to settle, once and for all.”

  Jiao blinked at me, but I turned away. She had seen what she thought was a battle fought with swords and fire. But I had fought a different battle these past several days. One that had tested my deepest convictions. One that had brought me to this killing field, where I had so quickly embraced a dark power that I could not control—only barely escaping it in the end. That fell magic was not who I was, not truly. There were other paths I would walk instead, other swords I would lift. I knew my place in this war, finally, though it was not the place I’d thought it to be. I had won, but I had lost.

  Then I had won again.

  I argued with Brody for another fifteen minutes about going to a hospital. In the end, I gratefully accepted the packets of aspirin and bottled water, as well as another blanket, then at length clambered gratefully back into Nikki’s SUV. Brody, apparently having given his keys to another cop, sat in the front.

  “You gonna give me radiation poisoning?” he growled as Nikki started up the vehicle.

  “Will you lay off?” Nikki protested. “She’s double wrapped in heat-reflecting blankets. She can’t help it if she’s a glow stick.”

  “I have sunstroke,” I grumbled.

  “Right. That’s what you have.”

  We cleared the edges of the box canyon and turned on the interstate back to Vegas, Nikki cruising along at a positively sedate eighty miles an hour. She kept grinning at me in the rearview mirror, but I was too tired to object. Brody, however, cracked after the first three miles.

  “What is your deal?” he asked, wedging himself into the door of the SUV, glaring at Nikki. “You look like the cat who ate the canary.”

  “So you know how Gamon had the whole tech net set up to kill observation? And our trucks died convincingly?” At my nod, she grinned over to Brody. “It was a great move and even had me going. But apparently, this particular SUV comes equipped with an onsite generator.”

  My gaze sharpened on Nikki, but she was reaching to the controls on the multimedia dash.

  “You wanna see what really happened out there, Brody? Or would you rather check it out when it starts trending?”

  “Nikki,” I said warningly, but Brody was leaning forward now too.

  “You got it on video?” he asked. “The whole fight?”

  “I haven’t looked at any of it since I headed out to the fight, but up to that point, it was all systems go.” Nikki flipped the video screen on and, for good measure, revved the SUV up another click of the speedometer. “You’re really going to love this.”

  I closed my eyes as Brody started cursing.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I should have known something was fishy when Jiao contacted Nikki the following morning to reschedule the meeting at Soo’s Lake Las Vegas mansion, but I was too busy recovering from Post Traumatic Honjo Disorder. I floated in dreams that found me searching miles of open territory—for what, I didn’t know. Armaeus was there, waiting patiently for me to find him, but I could never quite seem to connect with him across the miles that separated us.

  Nikki and I spent the day burrowed into Soo’s Vegas Summerlin mansion, overlooking the majesty of the Strip. The fact that we started drinking at eleven a.m. did not contribute at all to our reclusive moods. But it wasn’t our fault—the Council, most likely Simon or possibly Kreios, had sent over magnums of champagne to ensure we recovered suitably. Such was the life of the warrior.

  “Whi
ch would you choose for yourself, if you could?” Nikki said now, leaning forward, her elbows on her knees as she gestured to the Strip with her flute of champagne. The sun was setting, and all the world was alight with magic. “You go in for all that stone and glass with Armaeus? Or you like that lava-lamp casino the Devil’s got going.”

  I obligingly turned and frowned at the cascade of glittering towers along the Strip. “I’ve never been truly explored any of them except for Prime Luxe and Scandal,” I said. “I was in Viktor’s tower only briefly that one time and ugh—all that black.”

  Nikki nodded. “And you just know he has mirrors on the ceilings.”

  I pointed to the Council domain glittering above Bellagio. “No interest in anywhere Simon calls home,” I said, then glanced farther down the Strip, almost to the Palazzo, and smiled at the Hierophant’s white tower. “I would like to see what Michael is up to in there, though. I mean, what exactly does an archangel do for fun? Stop,” I said quickly, lifting my hand. “Don’t answer that.”

  “What?” Nikki protested. “I wasn’t going to say anything.” But her loopy smile betrayed the quips she had stored up to describe Michael’s possible activities. She took another slug of champagne, and her gaze steadied on me. I tensed, knowing what was coming.

  “You gotta stop, dollface,” she said, rolling what was left of the sparkling liquid in her glass. “It was always about the next job, the next gig. The next way to make a hundred thousand dollars. And all that was bad enough. You got banged up, but you recovered. Armaeus did his thing, and the next day, whammo, you were walking again, or at least you weren’t leaking blood from your ears. But this…” She shook her head, sitting back in the plush cushions. “This was bad. Ain’t nobody going to be there for Father Jerome like you are, if one day you turn up dead. I think losing you would break him.”

  I frowned. “Father Jerome was helping people long before I came around.”