Homecoming A Montague & Strong Detective Novel

by Orlando A. Sanchez

  If I was going to face a mage intent on taking us out, I was going to have Valkyrie coffee in my veins while he tried it. The effect was immediate, as my senses and reflexes ratcheted up to overdrive.

  “No,” Monty replied slowly as he watched me drink. “Should you be drinking so much of that?”

  “What’s it going to do, kill me?” I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and then replaced the flask inside my jacket. “So this isn’t the passage?”

  “Good point. The passage transports you to the other side of the Sanctuary once you cross. Were you thinking of crossing it again?”

  The images of them dying flashed before my eyes.

  “Not for as long as I live. In fact, we don’t even need to discuss it again, ever.”

  “That is the usual response, from what I’ve heard,” he said with a short nod and adjusted the sleeves of his jacket. “We may not walk away from this one. Ready?”

  “No, but when has that stopped us?”

  THIRTY-THREE

  DEX REARRANGED THE runes on the door, made us step back, formed a large green orb, and launched it at the door. He gestured and cast a wall of energy between the door and us.

  “Dex, I think those doors are designed to withstand magical attacks—”

  The orb glided up to the door and stopped just short. I looked on in confusion.

  “Wait for it,” he said, holding up a hand. “Runic doors take a little coaxing.”

  The orb flowed into the door and disappeared. The next second, all of the runes shifted to green. Cracks appeared in the door, with green light shining through them. I felt the shift in energy as the door exploded. Shards of wood and metal flew by us, embedding themselves in the ground and walls.

  We walked through the doorway and saw the bodies of gray mages littering the courtyard entrance. Some of them moaned and groaned. All of them had injuries. None of them tried to move against us.

  The rectangular courtyard was enclosed with columns on four sides, forming corridors between them and the walls. The old stone glimmered with runes and ambient power.

  Alcoves lined each wall every few feet, each of them covered with runes and ornate stone work. Four tiered stone towers, one on every corner of the courtyard, enclosed the space.

  The center of the courtyard was dominated by a larger tiered stone tower covered in black runes and soaring twice as high as the corner towers.

  “If that’s coaxing, I don’t want to see you apply force.” I looked at the faces of the mages. Most of them appeared to be in their late twenties or early thirties. “They must have been standing too close to the door.”

  “Inner guard,” Monty said, pointing with his chin. “Incoming.”

  I ducked behind a column as a barrage of flame orbs tried to incinerate me. I drew Grim Whisper and peeked around the column I was using for cover. I counted several dozen mages dressed in gray robes. All of them looked eager to barbecue us.

  “Just how many of these mages does Oliver have?”

  “The Golden Circle is one of the largest and oldest sects.” Monty cast an orb around a column. It weaved around the stone pillar and slammed into an unsuspecting group of mages, knocking them unconscious. “He could have anywhere from one hundred to three hundred novices in the grounds.”

  “Three hundred mages?”

  “Not all of them would have agreed to follow Oliver’s madness.”

  “Faced with erasure, young mages would choose to follow,” Dex snapped as he caught a few orbs and tossed them back to their owners, blasting them into the walls with force. “Maybe you should let the pup out to play?”

  Peaches nudged me and nearly pushed me into a group of flame orbs that blasted the wall.

 

 

 

  I remembered the images of the passage and shrugged them off, shaking my head. Part of me wanted him to stay close where I could keep him safe. Then I remembered he was a hellhound; he was the one keeping me safe.

 

 

 

 

  I’d felt his ‘taps’ and almost felt sorry for the gray mages.

 

  He leaped into the courtyard and blinked out. I heard a bone-crunching thud followed by a strangled scream as he pounced on a gray mage and went to work on another. Some of the mages focused on Peaches, and I dropped them with Persuaders.

  Monty stepped from behind the column and unleashed an onslaught of tiny blue orbs about the size of marbles. They punched into the mages and knocked them off their feet, covering them in blue energy. He gestured, and the remaining mages, not stomped on by Peaches, convulsed on the ground.

  “Shockers.” Dex grinned as he tossed small discs at the incapacitated mages. “I remember when I taught you that spell.”

  “I’m sure most, if not all, of them can be rehabilitated.” Monty led the way past the incapacitated mages. “Erasure is a frightening option at any age.”

  “Aye, you sound like Connor.” Dex nodded and wiped the sweat off his brow. With a gesture, the discs flared bright green, and the mages disappeared. “Besides, it’s not the novices that worry me.”

  “Where did you send them?” I looked at the empty courtyard. “That is a handy spell.”

  “Aye, it is, and costly too.” Dex was looking a little worse for wear as he caught his breath. “I sent them someplace safe.”

  “The Elders could have fought back, but perhaps Oliver moved against them the same way he did with the library? By the time they realized what was happening, it would’ve been too late.”

  “People are intelligent, mobs aren’t.” I holstered Grim Whisper as Peaches blinked in next to my leg. “I think the Elders, after centuries of having it, probably found it harder to let go of power than these mages. Maybe he promised them even more?”

  “They betrayed the Sanctuary,” Dex said, flexing the muscles of his jaw. “They should have died or been erased before joining him or accepting any offers of power.”

  “Power tends to corrupt,” I said.

  “And absolute power corrupts absolutely,” Monty answered as he led the way up.

  We climbed the stairs to the central tower and stood in front of a pair of rune-covered black doors that glistened in the sunlight. They were larger than the library door and radiated an oppressive malignant energy.

  Unlike the library door, which informed you that it was foolish to attempt to open it, the vibe from these doors was more along the lines of ‘please try and open us so we can crush you like the bug that you are and laugh while we do it.’ For a second, I considered the airstrike option.

  “Oliver takes his security seriously. Where did he get these, Mordor Exteriors and Doors?” I went to place a hand on one of the doors, and Dex yanked my arm back, nearly dislocating my shoulder as he shook his head.

  “What?”

  “These”—he narrowed his eyes at the imposing slabs of wood and metal as he pushed me back—“are Suicide Doors. You don’t want to go touching them, even being immortal.”

  Peaches whined next to me and backed up.

  A crack of thunder made me jump, as arcs of white energy leaped off the four smaller towers around us. Each of the arcs struck the main center tower, making the stone and the doors glow with white runes.

  I looked up at the doors. “Dex, you don’t happen to have another one of those door exploders, do you?”

  “Ach. For one of my ‘door exploders’—as you call them—to work, I have to rearrange the runes on the door and exploit the weakness. I can’t even touch this door.”

  Monty gestured, and I noticed he was down to six rings.

  “What are you doing?” I pointed at the rings. “You have to save those. Dex?”

  “He can’t breach these
doors using his life force. Besides, he doesn’t know the spell.” Monty kept gesturing and retrieved the runic nanogen Ziller had given him.

  “How do you know a spell I don’t?” Dex crossed his arms and glared. “I taught you all the spells you know.”

  “Not all of them. You need to get safe, now.”

  Monty kept gesturing as Dex’s eyes widened. The sixth ring faded to gray on Monty’s finger, and he kept gesturing.

  “Bloody hell.” Dex grabbed me by the arm and led me down the stairs. From the bottom of the stairs, I saw a black cloud envelop Monty and hide him from view.

  “What is that?”

  “We need shelter.” Dex looked around as if trying to find a good place to hide. “And quick.”

  “From what?” I kept my gaze fixed on the dark area in front of the doors. “What the hell is that?”

  Dex snapped his fingers. “Your shield. Over here, hurry.”

  “What is that?”

  He led us to one of the alcoves in the wall behind the columns. The alcoves were deep enough to hold all three of us if we squeezed in. Peaches huddled by our feet as Dex gestured.

  “Get your shield up.” He wiped the sweat out of his eyes. “Hurry, before he lets that thing go.”

  I pressed the main bead on the mala, and the shield materialized in front of us. Dex grabbed the edge of the shield and whispered something under his breath. A green wave flowed into it, making it larger and curved, covering the entire alcove.

  “He’s using too much energy.” I looked to where the black cloud of energy pulsed. “At this rate, he’s going to burn through all the reservoirs. He won’t have anything left to face Oliver.”

  “I don’t think he’s worried about that too much at the moment.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Where in bloody hell did he learn a dark corsolis?” Dex squinted through the shield. “I never even taught him a regular corsolis, much less a dark one. This must be the work of that sorceress he’s sweet on.”

  “Roxanne?” I shook my head. “No, he learned the corsolis at his last shift. I was there when he faced Beck and exploded an entire level…. Oh, shit.”

  “Figured it out, have you?” Dex kept his gaze fixed on Monty. “Whatever you do, don’t let your shield drop.”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  ANOTHER CRACK OF thunder filled the courtyard, and a black wave of energy descended from the center tower.

  “Avert your eyes!” Dex yelled as he turned my head and looked away. I made sure Peaches’ eyes were covered, even though I didn’t know what effect the spell would have on a hellhound. The wave slammed into the shield, rocking us. It was the sound of an angry ocean, roaring and threatening to rip us out of the alcove as the energy battered the enhanced shield.

  After a few seconds, silence embraced the courtyard. I pressed the mala bead and dropped the shield. The floor of the courtyard was a scorched ruin. The entire courtyard looked like ground zero to a runic, nuclear bomb.

  Everywhere I looked, the stone was cracked and scorched. All of the columns had suffered damage, some of them missing entirely. One of the four corner towers had collapsed, and the other three were scorched and missing sections.

  I looked up the stairs but didn’t see Monty. The Suicide Doors had been blasted apart. I raced up the stairs with Peaches keeping pace. We reached the top and I saw Monty on one knee. Blood poured from his nose and the side of his mouth. I saw his hand and counted four rings left. He wiped the blood away and gave me a nod as he stood slowly.

  “I could really use a cup of tea.” He looked into the charred entrance of the center tower. “That was harder than I thought it would be, even with the runic nanogen.”

  I patted my jacket, pulled out my skull-covered flask, and handed it to him. He examined it, reluctantly at first, and then took a deep pull of what I guess was, for him, Valhalla Earl Grey.

  “That was refreshing.” He handed me the flask and shrugged out of his suit jacket. “Thank you.”

  His suit jacket was torn and ragged as he removed it and placed it on the floor beside him. Small blisters had formed on his hands and face. He gestured and a soft golden light enveloped the burned areas.

  “Are you bloody daft?” Dex yelled, climbing the last of the stairs and gasping. “A dark corsolis? Where did you learn—when did you learn that spell?”

  Monty motioned to the doors. Dex grabbed his hand, eyeing the remaining four rings. Monty removed his hand slowly. “We needed to get inside, and it was the only way.”

  “Not if it means losing you, boy. There’s always a choice.”

  Monty turned to enter the tower, when I felt an energy shift. For a split second, the memory of the passage raced in my mind. I looked as Peaches growled and entered ‘shred and crush’ mode. He was looking at the entrance of the tower. Inside the tower was an open space. Residual arcs of dark energy danced along the floor. The interior was dim, making it hard to see all the details.

  “There’s only one choice and it lies inside.” Monty stepped into the tower.

  “Monty, wait—” I started, as a blast of black energy hit him squarely in the chest and launched him across the courtyard.

 

  Peaches blinked out and reappeared mid-air next to Monty. He clamped on to his arm and blinked out again. They both reappeared behind the columns. I saw Monty get to his feet, using the wall for support. He coughed and spat blood as he looked in my direction, giving me a nod.

 

 

  I moved to the side and looked into the tower. My eye caught the movement of a figure approaching us from across the floor. Behind the figure, suspended horizontally several feet off the floor in a mid-air spread eagle, was Connor Montague. I switched out the magazine and loaded entropy rounds.

  Black bands of energy were attached to his arms, legs and neck, keeping him in place. On the floor beneath him, I saw five figures standing in the center of a large circle, gesturing. Black tendrils of energy shot up from the circle and embedded themselves in Connor’s body.

  I moved back down the stairs, fighting an overwhelming wall of force pressed against me. Dex grunted next to me as he tried to resist but found himself backing down with me.

  We were forced back to the courtyard floor as the figure emerged from the tower into the sun. For a moment, he closed his eyes, ignoring us, and faced the light, basking in the rays.

  He wore a simple black Armani suit with a black Brooks Brothers shirt and a Zegna tie made of gold silk. A pair of black Isaias finished the ensemble, and I wondered if maybe he and Hades were shopping buddies.

  His gray hair was cut short and parted on one side. If he ever decided megalomaniacal mage didn’t work, he could always model for a living.

  He looked down the stairs. I saw violet energy race across his eyes and realized the nightmare had officially begun. The voice in my head suggested that this would be the best time for the airstrike, particularly if I were standing directly under it when it hit. I took a step back, fully intending to run and not stop until I arrived at a minimal safe distance, like Antarctica.

  The fear must have shown in my expression because Dex grabbed my shoulder and squeezed hard enough for me to wince.

  “It’s poor form to blast open a door when a knock would’ve sufficed,” the man said from the top of the stairs. “Do you know how difficult it was to install those doors? I lost at least thirty or forty mages in the process.”

  Dex formed fists with his hands. “I’m going to enjoy watching you die, Oliver.”

  “No, I don’t think so, old man. Here’s what’s going to happen: I’m going to offer Tristan over there a choice. If he refuses, I’ll put him out of his misery, severing the Montague bond. Connor, in there”—he thumbed behind him—“is going to give me the permutation. Then, I’m going to put the rest of you down. After that, maybe lunch.”

 
“You bastard, let my brother go.”

  I drew Grim Whisper, and Oliver raised an eyebrow.

  “You are so far out of your depth, Mr. Strong, you can’t fathom the power you’re facing. I would try explaining it to you, but your poor brain would probably melt in the process.”

  “I get that a lot. Let Connor go.”

  “And then what, repent of my ways? Allow them to perform an erasure? Imprisoned for the rest of my days? Forgive me if I decline.”

  “A swift death will suit me just fine,” Dex growled and began to gesture, his hands glowing green.

  “Are you posing, or do you intend to shoot?” Oliver asked, staring at me and ignoring Dex.

  I emptied the magazine. Oliver raised a hand, stopping the bullets mid-flight and pulling off a Neo in my face. Except my rounds didn’t fall to the ground. He waved a finger around and flicked his fingers forward. I barely pressed my mala bead in time before all of the rounds pounded into my shield.

  “A shield—how quaint.” He slashed his arm across his body and I flew across the courtyard, slamming into a few columns along the way before crashing into a wall face-first, cratering it. “I’ll be right with you, Mr. Strong. Don’t go anywhere.”

  My body blasted heat as it dealt with several broken bones and critical damage. We were in trouble. I couldn’t even move my arm to reach for my mark.

  Peaches saw my epic landing and blinked out.

 

  Oliver gestured and surrounded Peaches with a violet lattice as he reappeared a few feet away, mid-pounce.

  “Good hellhound, stay.” He swiped his hand, and Peaches crashed next to me, landing on his side.

 

 

 

 

  He growled and rolled awkwardly to his feet, nudging closer to me.