by Jenn Stark
Nigel reached me a second later, but we were still surrounded by demons. I hissed something unintelligible at him, and he backed off, his expression tight with the first sign of alarm I’d ever seen on his British mug.
I tried again. “Down!” I screamed, or tried to scream. Something wasn’t working quite right with my lungs.
At least Nigel heard me, because almost before I finished wheezing, he bellowed out my command. “Everyone down!”
The witches dropped, but so did enough of the demons that it wasn’t a perfect solution. Still, the wave of blue fire that I blasted across the space at thigh level was enough to clear out a good two-thirds of the scourge. With their bodies nothing but black stains on the stone floor, I could get my bearings.
Unfortunately, Nigel was at my back again. Literally at my back.
“Get off me,” I gasped as he wrapped a strong hand around my midsection, hauling me up to his chest.
“You bloody heal yourself, and I’ll let you go. As it is, I can see your goddamned spine through that rent in your back, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you drop a spleen out of your blasted arse while I watch. Back off, you slimy git!”
I blinked at him, startled by Nigel’s lapse into the rough accent and language of a street urchin—proof positive he was beyond worried about my injuries. This last bark of decidedly un-Nigel-like ranting wasn’t leveled at me but at some creature diving at us from our left, the demon’s gargling scream cut short as Nigel sliced through its throat with the athame he held in his free hand.
I snarled something back at him, but I didn’t stop layering fire. The demons sprawled and flailed away, hacking at the remaining witches. It took another five minutes to reduce them all to smoke.
Then I collapsed, falling forward as Nigel arched with me. His body had moved. It was now pressed against my side, plastered with my own blood and gore, but he didn’t seem to realize the danger he was in. “Now,” he gritted out.
I braced my hands on the stone floor and turned my focus inward.
The process of healing myself was one that had taken many iterations to get correct. Fortunately, I’d had a lot of experience recently. With my third eye flickering open, I was able to see my body as a series of interconnected electrical currents, many of which had been cut by the good graces of the hook-clawed demon. I acknowledged Nigel’s body pressed against mine as an extension of my own form because it was too difficult to pry the two of us apart, so the healing surge perforce extended to him as well. At least I assumed that was why he was screaming.
Heat suffused both of us, seeming to melt the sticky blood that adhered our bodies. After a mind-frying immolation of power, the implacable Brit finally fell away, twitching with the reaction to whatever I’d done to him. If ever someone deserved a raise…
The bolts of healing energy fused my shattered electrical connections and sent new energy slipping along them. My third eye slowly blinking back into focus, I fought past the nausea to truly see the carnage that lay around me. Someone had relit a few of the torches, and the surreal landscape illuminated by its flickering warmth was seared into my memory.
There were far too many still witches lying on the ground. Their bodies, once rippling with muscle and sinuous grace, had been dragged into a semblance of their original unbroken forms, though there was no hiding the crushed and crumpled bones, the burned skin, the yawning gashes. Only the witches’ eyes remained unscathed. So serene in life, they were now open, glassy and staring toward the moon high above us through rock and brick and steel. Of the original twelve members of the coven—thirteen including Danae—only four remained remotely upright.
Four.
“No,” I groaned, and I staggered away from Nigel toward the fallen forms. Not all of them could have died—not all—
I swept over their bodies with my hands, searching for electrical signatures of any type, anything that would indicate there was still life, still hope. The first three bodies were burned and rent beyond recognition, for all that their faces were spared. In their naked states, there was no missing the violation that had been done to them. The next two had been disemboweled, their hearts wrenched out of their chests and—gone. I queasily stumbled to the final three, shoving away the living witches as my eyes swam with tears.
These members of the coven still gasped with gargled breaths, and I dropped to my knees, my hands passing over first one, then the next. The first two flinched, but the third, an older woman with snowy white hair, her eyes an impossibly clear shade of blue, merely shifted her gaze to mine and held it for a long moment. In that breath, her soul slipped free from her broken body and soared upward with a rush of hummingbird wings, and I saw her forgiveness and peace even as she escaped the ruined shell that could no longer hold a spirit so strong as hers.
With an inarticulate cry, I turned back to the remaining witches. As someone shouted a startled word behind me, I grabbed both their shoulders and poured my energy into them.
By now, I’d done my share of healing, but this was by far the worst damage I’d ever encountered. The claws of the demon had entered the young woman to my right in a flailing grab, five deep fissures wrenching through her midsection. How she was even still flickering with life, I had no idea. I seared each of those wounds closed, repairing the electrical connections with bursts of fire that made her convulse in agony before I had the sense to drop her into unconsciousness.
The man by her side had fared equally poorly, though for far different reasons. He’d caught the impact of a fleeing demon full in the chest and had appeared to have tried to wrench it bodily to the ground. He was covered with burns that went all the way through his skin and deep into the muscle, blackening his bones. He was much easier to slip into soundless sleep, then I went about the task of rebuilding his body from the inside out. As I worked, I could feel the strain on my own newly healed body, the pain returning in fits and starts as my electrical circuits threatened to overload. There was more shouting behind me, but I pushed it away, pushed everything away. At length, someone pulled me back from the restored souls at my knees, the witches’ hearts fluttering with possibility even as their minds were still wrapped in the heavy gauze of slumber.
I sagged against Nigel, surveying the bodies that lined the floor. Two. I had managed to save only two.
“Danae…” Guilt and horror choked my words as I turned to face the queen of the Deathwalkers, but Danae’s face was more ashen than I’d ever seen it, her dark skin mottled almost gray in the dissipating smoke and flickering torchlight.
“This was not your fault, Mistress of Swords, Council-born,” she intoned, and her eyes did not flash with the fire of hatred or even revenge. They were filled with sorrow but also acceptance, a combination I couldn’t wrap my head around. “We were not strong enough to attempt what we, in our pride, thought of as merely another summons, another demon to bend to our will, as we have bent such demons to our service for these past millennia. We were torn asunder for our hubris, too many lives returned to the goddess to be reformed and granted to this earth anew.”
“No…” I countered, though I didn’t know why I was protesting. “You couldn’t have predicted Llyr—”
Danae held up an imperious hand. Bruised, dirty, her hair knotted and tangled, her robe shredded, her skin caked in blood and filth, she was still captivating. “We could not have predicted Llyr, but we knew that the powers beyond the veil were building. It is why we summoned a demon from the dead and not any of the countless other souls who bore witness to the fall of Atlantis. Our choice was deliberate, but our preparations fell short.” Her smile was dark. “Not that any earthly wards such as we can craft could withstand the Lord of Atlantis in his full fury.”
“But you did hold him.” Nigel’s implacable voice filled the smoky space. “He could barely get his head into the space of your circle. Enough to open his jaws and release that pestilence, but not to get his claws and wings and body into the space to attack as well. He was reduced to l
etting his plague do the damage for him.”
“It did damage enough,” Danae said, casting her gaze over her fallen sisters and brothers. Now a look of sorrow did steal across her face, and my shoulders sagged. I should have acted more quickly. I should have done more.
“And that damage will be a rallying cry for the other covens of your people,” Nigel said, his words so strident that they crackled in the heavy air. Danae turned to him, startled, and in that moment, my heart sang for the resolute Brit. He’d snapped back to his icy confidence just that quickly. Danae needed that confidence. If I was honest, so did I.
Nigel held Danae’s gaze. “As you and your coven knew already but learned again this night, war is coming.”
“No,” I interjected, though the voice that emerged from my throat didn’t sound like mine. It was too quiet, too resolved. “War is not coming. It’s here. With the release of those demons into the streets of Chicago, the balance of magic has already been altered. The Council must be informed, and more than that, everyone willing to fight with and for the Connected must be mobilized. I know there are demons that walk the earth even now, but they’ve remained hidden from sight. Even the Syx stay hidden, though…” I faltered. What had the demon Daniel said? That Viktor had trapped them? Intended to betray them?
Danae shook her head. “The Syx cannot stay hidden. They go where they’re called, bound to serve. Until you freed them from their prison beyond the veil, Sara, the only reason they were allowed entry to this plane was to kill their own. Which they did over the millennia, frequently and well.”
“Then it looks like they’re going to have some job security.” I grimaced, thinking of the scores of demons that had burst out of this cavern, too many of them to be held back by the lead bars. “What I just let loose…”
“You no more set it free than we did, and no less,” Danae corrected me. “The veil is tearing. Llyr used this summons because of his own pride, not because he had no other way to release the disease of the horde.”
“How many were there?” This question came from the man who’d welcomed us at the opening of the ceremony. “I couldn’t count them.”
“You cannot count demons. They are smoke and water,” another witch replied. “Fear and shadow. What we saw as hundreds could have been three, and what we saw as dozens could have been thousands.”
Call me legion, for we are many.
I pushed the familiar quote away. “I don’t think so. The demons we blasted back beyond the veil had a definite form and specificity to them. They might be able to shift in size and appearance, but I don’t think they could increase or diminish their numbers. There are well over a hundred of them, though, that managed to get out.” I’d felt each demon, one by one, as they’d poured through the opening to the upper world, and as I’d returned those that had been left behind to their prison. “I don’t know if there are other points through the veil where Llyr will vomit up additional members of the horde, but that’s who came through here, and I got the impression these were the best of the best.”
“They came from within him,” spoke up a young, clear-eyed witch still kneeling over one of her fallen sisters. “You could see it from the story of their skin. They were born into this world from a place of pure fire, scarred and charred and still lit from within.”
“Did he give birth to them?” Nigel asked, sounding sick.
“I don’t think so.” Danae’s voice had turned thoughtful. “The rage in their eyes was not something that is fomented by creatures born into captivity, never having known anything else. Far more likely Llyr took it upon himself to absorb them into his body while he still walked the earth, when the reality of his situation became clear to him. That he was going to be banished, and his army banished with him.” Her gaze swiveled to me. “The Syx were also banished.”
“Viktor referred to their location as a bolt-hole,” I said. “One he discovered on his own and used to his advantage, placed beyond the veil, from which they couldn’t leave unless, as you say, they were specifically summoned to kill something.” I winced. “Until I showed up, anyway.”
Danae nodded. “So it is likely that when the demons were swept from the earth, they were not killed. Instead, they were banished with the same energy that ripped the gods from this plane. If Llyr suspected that would happen, given his power, it is not unreasonable that he would have amassed his own army and swallowed them whole against the expectation that one day, he would return.”
“How many centuries ago did Atlantis fall, though?” Nigel asked. “That’s an awfully long time to be living in an oven.”
Danae looked at me, and I shrugged. “I’ve never actually gotten a straight answer on that. It could be five thousand years, it could be ten, it could be a lot longer. If you buy into the idea that the Great Flood precipitated the drowning of Atlantis, there’s some proof that that could have happened around seven thousand years ago.”
“Seven thousand years,” Nigel muttered. “No wonder they’re in such a foul mood.”
“The Hierophant would know for sure,” I said. The remaining witches in the room tensed, and I frowned. “We have to tell the Council.”
“We do,” Danae said, but her manner had, if possible, turned even graver. “But first, before you leave this place…there’s something you must know.”
Chapter Four
We tabled additional discussion until we could reconvene upstairs and, as Nigel pointed out tersely, put clothes on. Danae had apparently warded the stairway and the elevator more successfully, and with the remaining witches carrying the two of their brethren who were still passed out cold, we debated moving upstairs in waves. There were nine of us, and the elevator only held about five comfortably.
But I didn’t like it. “How do we know that the demons didn’t escape into the main portion of the house?” I asked, peering up the long staircase. After expending so much energy to heal others and myself, there was no way I could hoof it up that way. “What if they’re waiting for us?”
Danae shook her head. “Just because you didn’t see anyone when you entered my house doesn’t mean you were alone up there. I have guards watching every entry at all times.”
“Uh-huh. And they know how to get ahold of you when you’re naked in a cavern performing a ritual summoning? Because I don’t see any intercoms down here.”
She inclined her head. “They would have reached me if there was any concern. But if you prefer, you and I can go up first, then send the elevator down for the others.”
“I do prefer that,” I said, nodding at Nigel. “Him too. One other, then the rest come up after.” I didn’t need to tell Danae to make sure that the witches she left behind were the most competent fighters of the lot. I hadn’t seen the queen of the Deathwalkers wield her athame during the battle, but I hadn’t missed the fact that she had very few injuries compared to the rest of her coven. I suspected she could more than hold her own in hand-to-hand combat.
Not that I truly expected any more fireworks tonight, but I was tired of being caught unawares.
We rode in the elevator in absolute silence, my gaze tracking the slow crawl from the basement to the main floor of Danae’s home. As curious as I was about how much retrofitting she’d had to do to the property to meet her coven’s unique needs, I didn’t like the dead-zone nature of the place. It protected her from the Council’s prying eyes, no question, as well as shielding her from the psychic searches done by her own kind. But it also meant that we couldn’t call Connected-911 either.
A soft ping indicated that we’d reached the appropriate floor. My stomach knotted as the doors whooshed open.
No demons leapt out of the shadows to attack us. So far, so good.
Still, the place seemed quiet. Too quiet.
“Where are the guards?” I asked. “Wouldn’t they have picked up on the chaos below?”
“Carriage house,” Danae said. “It’s a locked-down security hub. They have eyes on us, but no one can get in.” She flicked a g
lance to me. “No one. We’ll meet in the conference room. It doubles as a panic room, if that will make you feel safer.”
“It would. Get the others up here, and let’s talk there.” We stepped out of the elevator, athames pulled, and Danae punched the button on the wall to send it back down. Another long set of moments passed, and I glanced up to see the numbers resume their upward climb. “They’re in.”
“Good.” Nigel released a tight breath, loosening his grip on the knives he’d purloined. “I’ve got guns and technical gear in our bag. Let me go get those, and my clo—”
The attack came with no more warning than a fetid and overheated rush of air. Danae reacted first, her hands whipping up, each bearing a wicked-looking athame. She spun around with a whirl of flashing silver and then the hallway was no longer silent, with spurting blood and startled screams ricocheting off the walls. Even as she moved, Danae kicked out with her heel and jammed the emergency button on the elevator, stopping it in its tracks. Hopefully, the carriage was, in fact, filled with the injured witches and their coven mates, because if the demons had found their way back into the house, they could easily have found the stairwell down to the cavern as well.
Nigel bent and slashed at a trio of creatures racing toward us, but by then, I had my hands up and aflame—though this time, with spectral light versus true fire. Nevertheless, it had the same effect it’d had in the cavern far below, seeming to affect the trajectory of the demons attacking us—at least at first. Several dove straight for Nigel, while I threw fire high, taking advantage of the fact that most of the demons were several inches taller than their human foes.
At the top of the hall, Danae and a female witch continued to thrash and spin, their work with knives far more impressive than I would have expected. Despite their fell-sounding name, the witches of the Deathwalker coven had struck me as a remarkably civilized lot, almost elegant in the way they moved and spoke. They may have been dangerous, but they were refined.
