Hell Hound

by Matthew Sylvester

  I looked over to Dawn. She was looking a little green around the gills, as well, and I could see her throat bob as she rapidly swallowed. Reaching out, I pulled her to me and whispered an Incantation, casting a bubble of air over her nose.

  It would last long enough for us to do what we needed to do without throwing up every time something stinky appeared. Holding her close, I did the same. To anyone watching, we were just having a private moment. I bloody wish.

  Breathing deeply now that we didn't have to worry lifted a weight off my shoulders. Only a small one, however. We were still in one of the most dangerous places under the earth. And no matter how many times I'd been here, there was always something new to worry about.

  The old gate loomed large as we approached, the gates themselves each about six-foot wide. One of the reasons that the building no longer stood up above was because the Victorians had decided it was too narrow an entrance for the city. So, they'd pulled it down. Bastards.

  Exeter was full of plaques stating that so-and-so historical building had stood there for hundreds of years before being pulled down by the Victorians. After them, the Germans. And then, incredibly, the bastards on Exeter Council. They pulled down a row of Tudor buildings just so a Sainsbury's could be built. Un-fucking-believable.

  'Oi! Move!' A hand far bigger than it should have been pushed me forward none-too-gently. I wasn't about to turn around and give someone that big a slap. Instead, I just went in the direction of the shove, which helped me get through the gates and past the guards a little quicker than decorum usually allows.

  Mud squelched underfoot, although by the smell, some of what we were walking on wasn't mud. Exeter had had mud-covered streets for far longer than it had paved, and so we were stuck with it. Literally.

  'I thought you said we weren't to stand around gawping like grockles?' said Dawn.

  'Do as I bloody say, not do as I do, you cheeky mare.' I grinned. She was right, though. That had been careless, and careless got you dead. It was just that events had been moving so quickly that I was still trying to parse what happened yesterday, let alone today. Marks never normally escalated into what felt like all-out war. I was so tired even my bones were yawning, and if I felt that way, God knows what Dawn felt like.

  'Anyway, make sure you take everything in. I'm fairly certain there's an essay on UnderCities coming up in your studies at some point. Most people never even travel to them, so you'll have a huge advantage.'

  'Right,' she said, mouth turning down, 'essay. Fucking brill.' Still, she kept her head up, and I could see she was taking mental pictures of everything around us. Which included George's Meeting House in all its remembered glory.

  A place such as that, a place of worship that ended up becoming yet another 'spoons, had a permanence that was reflected in the UnderCity. What had been there before, I didn't know and didn't really give a toss, but the fact that so much belief and so much life had been concentrated in the building meant that it was going to be reflected down below.

  'What on earth is that?' Dawn's voice was so filled with awe and a sexual longing that I couldn't do anything but look in the direction she was pointing. When I saw what she was referring to, I had to work hard to keep my jaw from dropping.

  'It's an orc. A bloody orc,' and even I had a hint of awe in my voice.

  'He's bloody gorgeous!' I had to agree. Roughly seven-foot tall, a powerful longbow held in one hand, built like Dave Batista in his fighting prime, and with a light purple skin covered in fine tattoos, the orc was the definition of deadly beautiful grace. It glided through the crowd with a grace that would make cats weep as it placed its feet toes first.

  Wearing trews with his clan tartan proudly demonstrating his lineage and loyalty, his upper body was naked bar the leather strap keeping his sword and targe in place on his back. His musculature was truly amazing. I'd never seen a picture of an orc who wasn't in shape. Knowing their culture, I doubted that such a thing existed.

  Tearing my eyes away from his muscles, I looked closer at the tartan. He was from Clan MicLoades. All orc clans were Mics. Mundane clans were Mac. Whereas Mac meant 'son' in Scottish, Mic meant father in orcish. They viewed themselves the fathers of Scotland and the clan structure and were key leaders in the Jacobite rebellion.

  'How come you haven't seen them before, Dawn?' I asked, turning a raised eyebrow on her. 'After all, I'm fairly certain that your studies required you read the Encyclopaedia of Magical Races?'

  'Well,' her face darkened, 'I've got up to M.'

  I continued to stare at her, eyebrow now perfectly arched.

  'Fine,’ she sighed, ‘I'll finish it when we get home. Especially now I know about orcs. I thought I was an elf girl, but hell no.'

  I wasn't going to admit it to her, but I also found orcs—the female kind—incredibly attractive. Unfortunately, they were incredibly xenophobic and would never dream of soiling themselves in such a way with a mere human. Magical or otherwise. Shifting my attention now that I'd got her apology, I saw that the orc was out of sight. Making a mental note to let John know what I'd seen, I returned to the task at hand.

  'Christ, I could really do with a pint,' she said, wiping her hand over her mouth. Come to think of it, I couldn't remember the last time we'd properly sat down and had a meal. It could have been just five minutes, or as much as five days away. My stomach rumbled.

  'Well, how about we go to the White Hart?' I pointed to the historical pub as I spoke. Now, there was a building that would stand for all time. Taking her arm, I led her into the pub.

  'This is proper bloody medieval!' whispered Dawn as she took in the cobbled courtyard, exposed wooded beams and a group of pissed goblins arguing over who got to drink the piss next. 'What are those things doing?' She inclined her head towards the goblins.

  'They're literally getting pissed. They drink human piss, the fresher the better. Bloody love it.'

  Dawn's skin turned a lighter shade of brown, 'Um. Wow. Haven't got to the Goblin in my grimoires yet. That's…' she flapped a hand, 'really not cool.'

  'Babes, there's far worse to come. Sit in that snug over there. I'll get us a couple of pints.' She nodded somewhat vaguely, and I was reminded once again as to just how much she had to learn.

  The culture shock of being introduced to the Magical world was clearly overwhelming sometimes. It was probably exactly how a member of the Magical community would feel when stripped of their powers by the Merlins and cast out.

  Although those never really lasted very long. Being stripped of your powers, usually only after committing some heinous crimes, was essentially a death sentence. You'd have had to cross some very nasty beings for such a punishment, and without any powers, you'd be a sitting duck.

  The bar in the White Hart, was a fabulous construction of ancient wood, the top polished by thousands of hands and arms resting upon it. The barman, a gnome called Bartlett, popped up and down as he darted along serving people drinks. With two lower fangs jutting up through his mutton chops, and red eyes with white pupils, he looked positively demonic but was quite a sweetie. Once you got past his guard, that was. And the best way to do that was to buy his beer and compliment him on it.

  'What's you 'aving?' he rumbled, his voice so deep I swore I felt it coming up through my feet.

  'Pint of Gutbuster and a Grumble Tum,' I took out gold shilling and dropped it onto the bar. 'And a couple of shots of your Gillray Whisky.' He smiled at that. It wasn't exactly what you would call a pleasant smile, but it was a genuine one. Gnomes can't help how they look, after all. They probably find us just as disgusting.

  'Good choice, one tick.' He dropped back out of sight, and I could hear him scurrying about behind the counter. A couple of seconds, he was back up plonking the drinks onto the bar.

  Gnomes, aside from a somewhat demonic appearance, could also move incredibly quickly. They were the Flash of the Magical world. No one could beat them in a race, not even using Magic, and many had tried. As a result, they weren't allowed t
o take part in the Paranormal Olympics unless they were racing their own kind.

  ‘Thanks.' I took a sip of the Gutbuster. It was glorious. A chocolatey-hoppy-dark beer, it was perfectly chilled. It was like taking a bite from a drink every time you sipped.

  The name came from the fact that it was so damned rich that if felt like you were busting your guts the next morning. One pint was more than enough for me and Dawn to share, as was the Grumble Tum. I'd gone with the latter because of the hilarious results we'd get later tonight when back home. Hey, shits and giggles. Literally.

  'Help you with anything else?' He cocked his head at me. I didn't come to the Undercity that often, but every time I did, I'd go to the White Hart. He knew who, and what, I was.

  'Yeah, I'm looking for Stinky Pete have you—'

  A woman to my right leaned in toward me. 'Your girl. How much?'

  'I'm sorry, what?' Not the most eloquent reply, but she'd got me on my back foot. Bartlett dropped out of sight faster than a blink of an eye. Not a good sign.

  'The girl you brought in with you. How. Much.' Not a question this time.

  'Nothing,' I held up a hand as the woman smiled, and my stomach filled with lead as I realised that I was talking to a Vampyre, 'because she's not for sale.'

  'Come now. We talk. Everything is for sale. Everyone is for sale.' I could feel the sweat beading on my forehead. A fucking Vampyre had taken a liking to Dawn. This was not good.

  'Not her. She's her own person, and I doubt she'd be tempted. Catch you later.' I wouldn't like to say that I was running away, but I gathered up those glasses as quickly as possible. Vampyres in the real world don't suck blood. Well they do, but not for the actual blood. They do it so they can drain their victim's soul. Which makes sense. Consume a soul and you can live forever if you do it regularly enough. Makes no sense that drinking blood should keep you alive for centuries.

  Those victims that they keep on tap have to go through the agony of having their soul taken from them slowly. They're acutely aware of the loss of their soul, and it causes pain on a spiritual level that no one should ever suffer. Well, really bad people should, but not your average Bert Bloggs.

  Unfortunately, Vampyres do have victims that they drain slowly. The Merlins naturally frown upon this practice and make every effort to close such places down when they find them. They also ensure that the Vampyres running such places are permanently removed from society through the judicious use of a shed load of Magic and violence.

  The victims never return to normal. Once you lose part of your soul that's it, it's never coming back. Lose too much and you'll either turn into a ghoul or die. Either way, you're not going to get to whatever afterlife you believe in. Victims also speak about how they lose the colour of life.

  The first things to go are sense of smell and taste. After that, colours are lost in the order of the rainbow until the victim can only see in monochrome. Finally, emotions start to go. Perversely, the last emotion to be lost is fear and as they lose the other emotions, those that remain are heightened until they, too, are lost. Rescue raids have found many victims driven mad by their fear. Others are found dead, their hearts unable to cope with the terror they experience every moment of their life.

  And so that’s why I fucking hate, and fear, Vampyres. Even though there are treaties in place to ensure we don't see another war like that of 1563, and that Vampyres don't roam the world killing people at a whim, we still find those who want to return to the good old days of pre-history when they were one of the ruling races. Bastards.

  'Oh, you'll be seeing me very soon, bitch.' I nearly dropped my beer at that point. At least I didn't let out a squeal. Vampyres were bad things. So bad.

  Moving through the crowd to the snug that Dawn had chosen, I plonked the glasses down on the table, spilling a lot of the beer.

  'Hey, watch it, boss! That's good beer you're wasting!' said Dawn.

  'Forget the beer, just slug the whisky down, we're going. Code Black.' The whisky was snatched from the table and tossed down her throat as soon as I spoke. We used a traffic light system to gauge the level of danger we were in at any given time.

  Green was the safest colour of all. Amber was to be on alert. Red was threat spotted, and black was ‘we're in the shit.’ It was only useful if we weren't actively fighting something because by that point it was patently obvious we were in black.

  'What are we facing?' she said as she stood up, rolling her shoulders as she did so.

  'Vampyre.'

  'Vampyre!' she gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth for a moment. 'You don't bloody do things by half! What did you do to piss him off?'

  'Her, and I refused to sell you.'

  'Oh. Well, that's good. Thanks.' She stroked her face with a hand, eyes closed for a moment. 'What's the plan?'

  'Get out of here right now. Hopefully, she won't bother,' I stopped as Dawn's eyes widened, looking at something over my shoulder.

  'She really is lovely. I'll give you one last chance. How much for her?' The Vampyre's voice was cold, filled with the all too obvious message that I'd better reconsider and sell Dawn. Not a fucking chance.

  'Look, I don't mean to be rude,' said Dawn, stepping forward despite the arm I'd put out to stop her, 'but why don't you piss off? I'm not a fucking slave.'

  'Oh, but you will be. You're positively ripe for fucking.' The Vampyre smiled, but it was more of a revealing of teeth than anything else. Lots of teeth. All growing sharper by the second.

  Glancing to my left and right, I saw that the other patrons of the pub had drawn back, giving us plenty of space. I could have sworn a couple of them were making bets. Bastards weren't going to be any help. Not that I could truly blame them. If everything went well, we'd be back up top. They'd have been left in the UnderCity with everyone knowing they'd crossed paths with her. They'd be pariahs and dead in a matter of days.

  'Listen, you fucking nut job. I'm not for sale.'

  I let Dawn hold the Vampyre's attention whilst I slowly Shifted, growing my nails into claws, and adding teeth of my own. I kept my head down to hide the change in my eyes. There was nothing I could do about that. Any slight change saw them change into tiger's eyes, and I didn't want her to have any warning, since she didn't seem to know who I was. That, or she didn't care who I was, which was something I wasn't prepared to think about at that time.

  The Vampyre reached out, Dawn slapped her hand away, and things went south.

  'Manners maketh man,' I said as I snatched up one of the pints and smashed it against the Vampyre's head. I followed this with a teep—a Thai boxing front kick—to the gut. The bitch flew away from me as I landed the kick perfectly, hips thrusting right into it, my Shapeshifting having added mass and muscle. Her eyes widened in surprise as she careered across the bar. It was fucking glorious.

  'Run!'

  Dawn was way ahead of me on that. Spring out of the bar and into the courtyard, she turned left and headed back out onto South Street. We ran, heading up the hill as quickly as we could, dodging through the crowd, people seeming to step in our way every pace we took.

  'Bitch!' The crowd suddenly parted as her shriek filled the air. My legs felt as though they were made of jelly, and my guts turned to water.

  'Maybe you should have sold me, then come and rescued me later,' panted Dawn as we pushed up the hill to the High Street. People were scattering in all directions, pointing back down behind us.

  'Shut up, babes. Stop. We're going to have to fight for a bit. Then we're going to sprint for Parliament Street and get lost amongst the alleyways there,' I said, ignoring the confused look she gave me. Naturally, she didn't know that the Guildhall shopping precinct wasn't in the UnderCity, it still had a lot of the old Exeter. And it was perfect for losing a pissed-off Vampyre. I turned, grabbing a Shield Icon for defence, and readying a Sword Icon for offence. I couldn't risk using Lightning or Fireballs, or any of the other effective Spells I had.

  It was also the first time that I'd got a proper loo
k at the Vampyre. Before, I'd been all too busy trying not to offend and concentrating on getting the hell out of Dodge.

  Now, I was damned desperate to spot anything that would give us an advantage. She had lovely ebony skin, and an afro that must have taken a lot of looking after. She wore a floral-patterned shirt with massive cuffs and collars, an all-in-one trouser with flares, and boots that had soles at least two inches thick.

  'What, we going to have a disco battle off?' said Dawn with a nervous laugh.

  'Oh, we're certainly going to be dancing. Contact shots only until the crowd has gone. Which, by the look of it, won't be too long.'

  People were scattering from the street, diving into shops, or under market stalls. Once safely in cover, most were eagerly waiting for the fight to begin. A contact shot was made by holding a firearm as close as possible to, but not touching, the target before pulling the trigger. That way, the gas from the actual firing of the shot was used to open a cavity into which the bullet would then go, causing its own cavity. Truly fucking nasty. Truly fucking effective.

  I watched out of the corner of my eye as Dawn stepped back to my five o'clock. She'd swing from there to seven o'clock depending on which way I turned. That way she would always have the target in sight. Because she had a pistol, I didn't want her getting behind the Vampyre when she took a shot. At that range, it was all too possible that the bullet would carry through the Vampyre and into whatever was in front of her. Me. If we'd been using just hand weapons, it would have been a totally different fight.

  'Bitch! She shrieked again, rather like a stuck record. She was walking towards us, taking her time, swaying with each step as if she was an extra in Shaft, or Boogie Nights. It was easy to work out when she got Turned, that was for sure.

  Fucking bring it, I thought, breathing deeply to try and channel the adrenaline that was turning my legs into water. Vampyres were tough cookies, and injuries in the UnderCity could be fatal. Sharks. Water. Blood. You know the sort of thing.