The Caitlin Chronicles Boxed Set
Page 23
Hank found himself once again lifted off his feet and pulled back to Trisk’s face.
“Well?”
He saw his life flash before his eyes.
“I thought I had the situation handled, sir.” Hank’s legs flailed in vain, seeking purchase on the floor which remained out of reach. “I thought I’d deal with it myself. I didn’t want to worry you.”
“Well, look how well that worked out, fuck-sack. Now the bastards have burst through my door, and they have a fucking vampire with them. My vampire. Do you know how hard it is to kill a vampire?”
Hank shook his head.
“Me fucking neither! Especially when they’re not on your side.” Trisk let Hank fall to his knees and looked down at him.
He groveled on the floor. “I’m sorry, sir. I’m so sorry. If there’s anything I can do, please tell me. I’m forever yours.”
The governor knelt with some effort. He placed a sausage-like finger under Hank’s chin and lifted his head so that their gazes met.
“I want that girl’s head on a spike and that goddamn vampire ready to suck my dick come sunrise,” he said, his voice dark and low now with not a hint of amusement. “Because if I don’t have them, I’ll use your head for both.”
Hank nodded, bowed low, and ran out of the room before his leader could say another word. He took a deep breath of the midnight air, feeling its cold energize his body, then ran to gather his troops.
The bell rang loudly about the town. It had been installed when the town was fresh and new to warn of impending attack.
The townspeople had learned the bell meant danger and that every available citizen should flood to the source of the attack.
Whatever kind of supernatural army that bitch had, Hank had to believe it wouldn’t be able to beat sheer numbers.
Prison District, Silver Creek
Caitlin, Kain, and Jaxon made their way along the parapets of Silver Creek as quickly as they could. From afar, they looked like nothing more than three shadows.
Not that anyone looked their way at all.
When the bell began to ring, Kain had clapped a hand to his ears, his hypersensitive hearing overwhelmed by the sound. Down below, they could hear people rousing and making their way through the streets. A few minutes later the people flooded towards the front gates, bleary-eyed and nervous.
“They’re not soldiers,” Kain grumbled. “They’re sheep.”
“Right,” Caitlin replied. “Those are soldiers.” She pointed ahead to where a pair of guards ran straight at them.
They both moved their hands to their weapons but needn’t have bothered as the guards sprinted straight past them and down the stairs, disappearing into the throng below.
“Huh,” Caitlin said.
“Guess the bigger threat is at the gates.” Kain sounded amused.
“We need to hurry. The Revolutionaries will need all the help they can get. Come.”
They sprinted along the walkway. Caitlin had never been to the jail cells before, but the road was easy. One way in, one way out, with stone walls and iron bars. When they descended the same set of stairs that Kain had used to escape and run, Caitlin ran down two at a time.
“Halt, who goes there?” A voice spoke in the dark, and Caitlin watched as two guards stepped forward into the torchlight. One was considerably shorter than the other.
“I am Caitlin Harrison, founder of the Revolutionaries,” Caitlin said, standing straight and putting on her most authoritative voice. There was no more time for mucking around with care and politics. “I’ve come to release my brother.”
The guards looked at each other, then laughed.
“You?” the taller one said.
“You hear that? A woman has come to release her brother from the governor’s prison.” The shorter one wiped a tear from his eye. “Look, I’m sorry, miss. We haven’t got time to deal with you. Rumor has it there’s a raid happening outside, and we’re all that stands between the people and chaos. Now, trot your little tush back round to the stairs and…”
His words trailed off as Kain stepped out from behind Caitlin and lowered his cloak. “Hello, my old friends.” His eyes pulsed a low amber.
“You?” They gasped, reaching for their swords.
“Uh-uh,” Kain said, reaching for his own. “Don’t even think about it, scrubbers. Now, we can either play this the easy way or the hard way.”
His eyes glowed again, and he sniffed dramatically. Caitlin smiled, recognizing that the guards interpreted the small gesture to mean that he could smell their fear.
To her surprise, the shorter one looked at his comrade, then fell to his knees and began begging. “Please…okay, fine. I give up. Please don’t kill me.”
Jaxon walked over and begin licking the guard’s face.
“What are you doing?” the taller one barked. “Get your ass up.”
“No, no, no. You remember this is a Were, right? A fucking Were.” The shorter one beat his fists on the floor like a baby.
The taller one rolled his eyes. “Yes,” he said, approaching Kain. “You’re here to overthrow the governor, right?”
“Actually, that’s my agenda,” Caitlin said, raising a finger. “I just brought him along for the ride.”
“You need me,” Kain said.
“Like a hooker needs syphilis,” Caitlin replied.
The guard bent to his knees. “I pledge my service to you, cloaked princess and canine warrior.”
The shorter guard raised an eyebrow. “Why are you talking like that?”
The taller guard smacked him.
“Oh…okay. Me too,” Shorty added.
Caitlin looked down at them with pity, hoping that their words were true. “Why?”
“Trisk treats us like shit, ain’t that right, Ace?”
Ace replied, “We’re here from dusk until dawn with barely a drop to drink and hardly a morsel to eat.” He waved his arms around the cells. “This isn’t what we signed up for. We wanted to fight for glory. We wanted to serve Silver Creek. Now, we’re glorified babysitters, with little more thanks than a visit once a month from a governor who’d rip our heads off as soon as look at us.”
Kain raised his eyebrows at Caitlin.
“You want some pets, you keep them,” Caitlin said.
“Caitlin?” The voice called out of the darkness ahead. It sounded weak, hoarse and dry.
It made her heart leap.
She ran past the guard folded over on the floor, grabbed a torch, and headed into the darkness ahead. Her footsteps echoed in the silence until she stopped and whirled, listening into the darkness for some sign of movement.
“Dylan?”
“Is that you?” Dylan’s voice came from her left. She turned to see her brother at the bars wearing the biggest smile she had ever seen. “What took you so long?
Caitlin reached through the bars and hugged him. “I…er…had to take care of a few things. I’ll fill you in later. First, we need to get you out of here.”
“And me, please,” another voice called from behind her.
Caitlin twisted around to see Sullivan standing at his bars, his face pressing through the metal.
Caitlin giggled.
“Wait right here.”
Dylan opened his mouth to speak, but Caitlin had already made her way back to the guards.
“Where is it?” she commanded, holding out her hand.
“Where is what?” Ace replied.
“The key.” Caitlin’s face darkened, and she advanced on him. “No fucking around. Give me the key now.”
Ace shifted uncomfortably on his feet. He looked at the taller guard. “We don’t have it.”
“What do you mean, you don’t have it?” Caitlin asked, panic rising to almost choke her. “If you don’t have the key to your prisoners, then who fucking does?”
“I do,” Dylan called.
Caitlin turned to see him and Sullivan standing in the doorway.
Ace slapped his forehead. “Do you gu
ys just shit keys out now?”
Sullivan caught Kain’s eye, mouthed the words, “Thank you,” and winked.
They all headed up the stairs and out into the night. At the top, they stopped and looked out over the town below. The final dregs of the crowds were filtering through the streets, late-wakers who even the bell had failed to rouse quickly.
“What the hell is going on out here?” Dylan asked. “Is there something that you want to tell me?”
Kain chipped in, counting story points on each of his fingers. “Rescued a vampire, liberated a small town, trained a small army, met a Werewolf, now overthrowing the governor. That about cover it?”
Dylan’s eyes widened. Clearly, he was more than a little impressed.
“What are your orders, captain?” Sullivan asked, apparently eager to get stuck into the action.
Dylan threw an arm around his sister and pulled her close. “I’m not your captain today, Sullivan. Today, we follow Caitlin. Ain’t that right, sis?”
She blushed before a determined expression settled on her face.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The Gates, Silver Creek, Toronto
The battlefield was a little crowded now.
Not solely with fighters, though the guards kept coming, and Mary-Anne, Alice, Ash, and the Revolutionaries did their best to fight them off. But the more people who came, the more they were drawn into a tight circle, their backs to each other.
Around the edges of the fight, a flock of people had gathered—citizens of Silver Creek whose curiosity was greater than their will to fight.
Either that or they were terrified that a fucking vampire would rip their throats out.
A lot of them had heard stories, heard rumors of a time when vampires were as common as their brothers and sisters. Legend had it they had flown the skies around Toronto and even set up small groups on Prince Edward Island. But that had all fallen to rumor and myth.
Or so it had seemed…
It certainly seemed incredibly real now that they watched a woman with glowing red eyes and dagger-like fangs tear a man’s head off and then toss it at another one of his comrades like a baseball.
“Home run!” Mary-Anne yelled with a wicked grin on her face.
“That way,” Vex’s voice cried back.
“No, not home…run… Never mind,” Mary-Anne replied, rolling to her left to avoid another arrow as it flew towards her. It grazed her just enough to leave a small scratch down the back of her leg.
She looked up into the terrified eyes of the archer, put two fingers to her own eyes in a V, then pointed back at him.
The man jumped off the parapets of his own accord and splatted on the ground below.
“She doesn’t even need to touch people to kill them,” Ash said between clangs of his sword on his enemy’s. “How is that even fair?”
Mary-Anne tossed her hair back, reminding herself of a commercial she had once seen years ago. “Because I’m worth it.”
She was elated, energized by the heat of battle. As she twirled around and took people down, their blood drove her forward as if it surged through her veins. She felt as though she had been made of rusted metal, and every kill made in the name of justice shined it just that little bit more until she gleamed like silver in the starlight.
How had she waited this long to taste human blood again?
It became easier for her, too. The guards and citizens—those who were brave enough to get involved, at least—began to avoid the vampire and focus on the Revolutionaries. Through sheer numbers, their odds weren’t great. Mary-Anne did her best to make her way around the field, and on several occasions, saved the lives of those about to be stabbed or cut. But it was getting messy now, and while a few more guards entered the scene, she realized that their people were growing tired.
“Formation!” Mary-Anne shouted, an idea coming to her head. “Fall in! Fall in!”
The Revolutionaries turned to their surrogate leader and whacked, bashed, and walloped their way together. They stood tight in their circle now, their eyes narrowed.
For a moment, they had some breathing room, the guards surprised at their formation. Beyond the circular wall of brown leather armor, they could see onlookers craning their necks to get a better look at the action.
“Stay together,” Mary-Anne said as an arrow whistled towards her, falling short and landing directly on the floor at her feet. She plucked it from the ground and tossed it back up the wall like a dart. An archer to fell back to the ground.
“Woah,” Belle said in awe.
Mary-Anne ignored the comment. “Stand steady,” she grumbled, feeling the others behind her. “As long as we band together, we’ll be fine.”
Alice leaned around and spoke softly. “Where is Caitlin? Shouldn’t she be here by now?”
Mary-Anne scanned the line of guards—pissed off and terrified. She knew it would only be a matter of time before they charged again, and she wondered how long they could hold them off.
Somewhere, Silver Creek, Toronto
“This way,” Sid, the taller guard, said as they ran along the parapets and down the stairs. Though Caitlin already knew the way, she didn’t have the heart to tell him that his services weren’t required.
I mean, hey, if he wants to join us and work against Trisk, who am I to tell him he can’t make himself useful?
There was no need to hide anymore. All attention was on the bells and the front gates. Guards overtook them without a second glance. The six of them raced past residents who didn’t seem to notice them at all. They made great time, and with every step, Caitlin’s heart pulsed in her chest.
This is it. This is the moment it’s all been leading to. Let’s see if I’ve got what it takes.
She pictured herself standing on the platform that the governor used every week to deliver his messages—only this time, it was her dishing out the news. She would be respected amongst the people, seen as a savior and liberator. Silver Creek would reign as the place to flock to for safety in the world gone Mad.
And the Revolutionaries would stand by her side, spreading hope and joy amongst the masses.
All these thoughts flashed through her mind in an instant. There was only one thing blocking her way: Trisk.
Or so she thought.
Where just a moment ago they could hear the sounds of battle at the gates, a quiet now fell. They rounded a corner and found a street emptied except for a perfect V of men clad in the armor of the guards. At the center of the V was a face that made Caitlin’s blood boil.
She looked at Hank Newman, hardly recognizing the man standing there. Where he had been fresh-faced and energetic when they raided Mary-Anne’s manor, his hair was now unkempt. His beard looked scraggy, one of his eyes twitched, and the bags that hung beneath them looked more like bruises.
“Caitlin Harrison,” he croaked. “I thought I’d catch you here.” He turned to Dylan. “Seems we’ve got both the Harrisons, too. Both of the biggest pains in my ass I’ve ever had—and I’ve suffered from hemorrhoids.”
One of the guards to his right gagged a little.
Hank turned and was on him in an instant, his rage exploding. He socked the guard in the face, then turned his attention back to Caitlin.
“Play time’s over, girl,” Hank continued.
Caitlin hated the way he said that word. It grated on her like the sound of metal scraping against metal.
“When we’re through with you, you’ll be nothing more than a flesh sack dummy for the training ground.” Hank spat on the ground.
Flesh sack, Caitlin thought, remembering the last time she had been called that. That seemed like years ago now. Mary-Anne had said it, standing at the top of the stairs of her manor just moments after saving Caitlin’s life.
Back where it all began.
They had come full circle, back to when Kiera was used as nothing more than a dispensable tool in a larger game.
A game led by the governor and fueled by Hank and his men.
Hank lunged, drawing his sword and going for a stabbing thrust.
Caitlin parried on instinct, stepping to her right as he fell left. He was strong, she’d give him that, but she drove the advantage and swung at Hank’s middle, then his neck.
He was prepared, though, his anger sharpening his own senses. He roared, deflected, and went for her legs.
Caitlin jumped.
“She’s an agile little thing, no doubt about it,” Kain marveled, his knees bent and poised, ready to jump in if needed.
“You look at my legs again, and you’ll have a foot in your face,” Caitlin shouted back, narrowly missing another attack from Hank. He turned, he swung, and he arced, but nothing he could do could come close to breaking her. She was fitter than he was and wore clothes which weighed considerably less. No matter what he tried, nothing seemed to work.
After another attempt at aiming straight for the heart—in which Caitlin batted the sword away and mouthed a yawn—Hank roared, “Okay, you dickless monkeys, get involved, please.”
Kain, Dylan, Jaxon, Sullivan, Sid, and Ace poised, ready to jump in. But to their surprise, there was a moment of hesitation from the troops.
“What are you waiting for?” Hank shouted, his voice hoarse. He was dangerously red now, moments away from a coronary, or so it seemed.
“They’re not going to help you,” Caitlin said, holding up the Colt Python in her hand and aiming it at the captain’s face.
A flash of fear flooded his features, then dissolved as a realization dawned over him. “Oh, I see. Can’t play with the big boys, so you need to get old gunny on your side?”
He took a step towards Caitlin and her arm tensed, her finger poised over the trigger.
“You think that shitty butt-plug scares me? They don’t work anymore, hasn’t anyone told you? There’s only one gun left in the whole of the known world that still manages to spit a bullet, and that little toy is locked away safe and sound. Even ol’ Monica is too batshit crazy to put those things back together anymore.”