by Charley Case
The chest was full of gold coins. He picked one up to examine more closely and saw that it was a Spanish doubloon.
“Man, this is like the seventh treasure made up of Spanish gold I’ve found. How the hell did they not go broke losing all this money all the time?”
He looked around, feeling a bit odd that nothing had attacked him so far, and saw that the coast was clear. With a shrug, he began moving the coins from the chest into his pack. He was careful not to overload it after the talk he and Mila had had about Penny’s concerns that he would hurt himself empowering his body with magic in order to carry so much. Normally he would argue that they were worrying too much, but he respected their opinions, and he had to admit that he was not always the best judge of what he should and shouldn't do. Besides, he had a good ten- or twelve-mile hike down the beach to get back to town. There was only so much his body could take while hauling two thousand pounds of gold on his back, so he kept it down to a half-ton.
As he pulled out the third chest, he finally heard what he had been waiting for.
A branch snapped close behind him. He started to spin around, reaching for the front of his Speedo, but a club smashed into the side of his head and knocked him to the ground.
To his attacker’s surprise, the hit didn't knock him out. They jumped back in fear as he sprang to his feet and roared.
The roar faded, and his eyes widened when he saw that his attackers were five naked and skittish men and women.
He looked the closest man—the one still holding the club—up and down but stopped and stared at the man’s feet. Or not feet, hooves… He stopped and stared at the man’s hooves.
“What the fuck?”
“Goddammit, Harry!” the park ranger from the beach yelled as she stepped into the clearing and marched towards them.
“Ranger? Who are your naked friends?” Finn asked, a grin on his face.
She narrowed her eyes, then flipped a hand his way. “Sleep.”
Finn closed his eyes and tipped over backward, slamming into the ground like a felled tree.
Soon after, the meadow rumbled with his snores.
Chapter Twenty-One
A million swarming black flies slammed into a lower-level side door of the factory at full speed, causing no harm whatsoever to the door or the surrounding structure. The resulting explosion from the four wards closest to the flies blew chunks of cinderblock out into the empty tarmac surrounding the building while at the same time vaporizing about fifty pounds of common housefly.
It also set off an alarm that screeched through the interior of the building, drawing every occupant’s attention and causing a mad rush of Rougarou and thrall towards the now destroyed door.
Yaminah froze, her fist cocked back to deliver another blow to the limp, hanging form of Victoria, who mumbled something about getting free in a pain-induced delirium.
Yaminah narrowed her eyes and glared daggers at Victoria. “Is this your doing?”
If Victoria did attempt to say something, it just came out as unintelligible babble along with a stream of fresh blood that splattered on the floor to add to the already sizable puddle.
Yaminah pushed her away in disgust before running toward the breach, leaving Victoria to swing and twist alone in the dim factory.
The relief of not being worked over was too much for the Valkyrie, and her head dropped to her chest as she passed out.
Mila pulled her awareness from the fly she had been using to see when Yaminah joined the other minions and gave the signal they were clear to go in.
Next to a different door, Jenny hit the button of a detonator remote and three shaped magical charges went off, causing a barely audible popping sound, followed by a sizzling purple puff of smoke as magical acid was blasted out of the charges to burn through the door hinges in half a second. The job done, the acid evaporated into the aether as the heavy metal door fell out of its fame.
Carl caught the door before it hit the ground and gently laid it down, then signaled Howard to move in.
The giant orc made a fist, cracking the knuckles of one hand while holding a pair of bolt cutters in the other, and stepped over the door. Jenny moved in behind him, a satchel full of explosive traps over her shoulder. Remmy went next, her daggers held in a reverse grip, followed by Mila, who held Gram extended in one hand. Finally Carl, his rifle to his shoulder, stepped through to cover their rear.
Once inside, after checking that the area was clear, the team got to their assignments. Mila moved up beside Howard as Jenny sprinted across the room, her elven foot falls unnaturally quiet, and begin placing traps at key choke points.
“Go,” Carl whispered to Mila. “Tina and Nick are set. I’ll cover our exit.”
She gave him a nod and stepped between a steel form-press and a stack of molding crates to head deeper into the factory, Remmy and Howard close on her heels.
Mila led them through the old crates and machinery as quietly as she could, painfully aware of the time crunch they were under.
They rounded a bank of shelves, and Mila came eye to eye with a pair of unmoving thralls who either hadn’t got the message that they were under attack or didn’t care. She skipped to the side to avoid crashing into them and barely made it. Howard wasn’t so lucky and crashed into the pair. The contact must have knocked something loose because both blank-faced men suddenly snarled and leaped at Howard’s throat.
Mila’s reaction speed surprised even her. Before the thralls could take a full step, she lashed out with Gram and removed both of their heads in a single stroke.
The bodies collapsed to the floor at Howard’s feet. He and Mila’s eyes met, and he gave her a nod of thanks.
Mila continued down the aisle and stepped out into the cleared central area of the factory floor to spot Victoria’s still swinging body thirty feet further away.
“Looks clear.” Howard scanned the dark corners.
A ripping sound tore through the air from the far side of the factory, followed by the sound of rushing air. Dust kicked up all over the factory and flew toward the corner where they had set up the distraction with the flies. Remmy’s duster flapped in the sudden wind, and they were all forced to turn their heads or have twenty years of dirt and dust blast them in the face.
Just as suddenly as it started, the wind stopped, to leave the air hazy with dust.
“What the fuck was that?” Mila hissed as she looked toward the source.
The two-story building-within-a-building where she and Remmy had run into the thralls the first time they had been there blocked her view. A flash of blue light and a chest-thumping shockwave tossed dozens of broken thralls and Rougarou in every direction from behind the inner building. The bodies slammed into the ceiling or the far wall beyond the factory floor, where they left blood splatters from the impacts.
“One of Jenny’s gravity grenades,” Howard took off at a jog towards Victoria. “Come on, we need to hurry. They don’t have enough to hold that horde off for long.”
Mila and Remmy took off after Howard, and Mila passed him at a run. She slid to a stop, to catch Victoria mid-swing and steady her body. Howard arrived, immediately lifted the bolt cutters, and got them between one of the shackles and Victoria’s swollen and bloody hands. He wasn’t being careful, opting for a quick escape.
Mila cringed when Victoria’s wrist was bent at an odd angle so he could get the blade into place. He pulled the handles together, straining with everything he had until a vein popped out on his forehead from the effort, but the shackles didn’t so much as flex. He pulled the blade out and decided to just cut the chain, and deal with the shackles later, but the chain had the same resistance.
“What the fuck is this shit made of?” Howard readjusted the cutters.
When he moved the cutter blade, it scraped across the chain link, sending out black sparks of magical energy.
“Infernal magic?” Mila bit her lip. “They must have some sort of reinforcement woven into them.”
An idea hi
t her. She held out her hands for the cutters. “Let me try something.”
Howard gave her sidelong glance but handed over the red-handled bolt cutters without a word.
“Yeah, I know.” She rolled her eyes. “Just give me a sec.”
Mila had been able to infuse her body with celestial magic to enhance her reflexes and strength, so why not an inanimate object? The concept made sense to her, but she didn’t know if the magic would bind to something mundane or if it had to be alive. The shackles weren’t alive but were very obviously infused, so it should work for her too.
She focused on the cutters, and channeled a stream of power into them, willing it to reinforce and empower the cutter blades. At first, the magic just kind of pooled in her hands, not knowing what to do next, but with some forceful direction on her part, the power finally made the jump from her to the cutter handles. Once the connection was made, the power rushed from her at an alarming rate. Her eyes snapped open, and she saw that the blades of the long-handled cutters glowed with golden light that grew in intensity as more and more magic flowed into them.
Mila cut off the flow, a gut feeling telling her that she could put so much power into the cutter that it would eventually destroy the metal blades and release all that power in one go. Not something she wanted to experience.
As soon as she stopped feeding power, the light dimmed rapidly. Evidently, the cutters couldn’t hold it, so it just evaporated. Maybe the craftsmanship could become a factory to permanently imbue things with magic; she would have to have a conversation with Penny about it later. Right now, she needed to get Victoria free.
“I can’t reach the shackles, and I can’t hand the cutters off to you without them losing the charge I gave them,” Mila turned her back to a slack-jawed Howard and lifted her arms. “I need you to lift me up so I can cut the shackles myself.”
He put his massive hands around her waist and squeezed tightly to lift her a good four feet off the ground and give her plenty of height to get at the double set of shackles.
As she wedged the blade under the first shackle, a gold and black spark popped as the residual magic in the blade reacted with the infernal magic in the metal.
Mila channeled power into the cutters again and forced the handles together with everything she had. Being held up didn’t give her much leverage, but she discovered she didn’t need much.
As soon as the blade began to glow, a shower of black and gold sparks flew from the metal, and with minimal effort, she cut through the cuff.
Mila pumped a fist in victory, and whispered a quiet, “Yes!” before moving to the next cuff, which came off just as easy as the first, though Mila did notice burn marks on Victoria’s pale and bloody skin.
The next set of cuffs actually held up her unconscious body, so working the blade between the metal and skin ended up stabbing the blade into the swollen skin of Victoria’s hand. Mila gritted her teeth and pushed it in until she had enough to cut through in one go, then channeled magic and pulled the handles closed.
The cuff popped off, and Victoria’s arm, along with her entire left side, fell, now that her body wasn’t being suspended evenly. When all that weight slammed down, Mila heard a loud pop from Victoria’s right hand as the thumb and a few bones in her hand broke under the stress. Her hand, now slimmer without the bones in the way, slipped from the cuff on its own.
Her body fell lifelessly to the ground.
Mila sucked in a breath, hoping Victoria’s head hadn’t hit the concrete floor. It would be a hell of a thing if they got to her, but she died from being freed.
Relief washed over Mila when she saw Remmy slide in and catch Victoria’s head and shoulders in her lap.
Howard put Mila down, and she dropped to her knees to place a hand on Victoria’s chest. As she had imbued the cutters, she forced healing magic into the broken Valkyrie.
It took a second and a lot of her power, but Victoria’s eyes fluttered open and she looked around in confusion, then spotted Mila. A pained expression crossed her face.
“He caught you too?” she asked in a rasping voice that sounded nothing like the strong woman that Mila had gotten to know as her sister.
Mila shook her head. “Not if I can help it. We’re here to rescue you, but you’re in a bad way, Victoria. I need you to drink this, okay?” She pulled one of her healing potions from her corset and pulled the cork.
Victoria opened her mouth and Mila poured the red liquid in, letting her swallow once before pouring the rest.
Victoria swallowed hard and looked up with tears in her eyes. “I didn’t think anyone was coming. I thought I was going to die. Actual death.” She coughed, and blood spattered out onto the floor.
“You’re okay. The healing potion will kick in in a second.” Mila stroked Victoria’s blood-soaked hair out of her face.
“This is going to suck,” Victoria groaned, before clenching her teeth as the potion kicked in, and the bones in her hand and toe began to set themselves with loud popping and crunching sounds.
An explosion roared from the far end of the factory, but this time it was out on the factory floor. Mila looked over her shoulder to see Carl and Jenny running her way as a horde of Rougarou raced around the corner after them. Another explosion blew five of the tightly packed wolfmen to bloody chunks as they passed over a tripwire Jenny had set up.
“We have to go!” Carl shouted and waved, all pretext of stealth abandoned in the face of the charging monsters behind him.
Victoria let out a cry as the healing potion did its painful work. Mila scrambled to her feet, grabbed Victoria under the arms and began to drag her to the cover of the maze of crates and machinery. Remmy took one of her arms to help pull while the team opened up with spells and silenced gunfire.
“They overran our first way out, head for the second egress point,” Carl ordered, calmly laying round after round into the oncoming Rougarou.
Mila nodded, even though he couldn't see her, and began dragging Victoria towards two particularly large machines that formed an alley between them that butted up against an outer wall.
A black bolt of magical return fire hit Jenny in the thigh, knocking her to the ground. Carl kept firing with one hand and reached down to grip the back of Jenny’s collar and drag her while still firing. Jenny opened her bag and pulled out a healing potion, downing it quickly before selecting a glass orb filled with a green liquid. She cocked her arm, ready to throw but waited for the most opportune time.
Carl got them around the corner and picked up his speed, dragging Jenny at a slow jog. Howard was still out in the open, slinging spell after spell and glancing down the aisle they retreated through to judge how far to let them get before taking cover himself.
Mila heard Yaminah let out a scream of anger before three of the black diamond-shaped missiles came at Howard’s chest. He was able to put up a bubble that deflected two of them, but the third hit him in the left shoulder and exploded. His shirt was shredded at the impact site and green blood sprayed against a pillar behind the orc, but the pain didn’t seem to register as he continued to send bubble after bubble from his right hand.
On judging the rest of them had moved far enough, Howard broke off and sprinted down the aisle, to catch up with Carl and Jenny. He reached down and took over dragging duty while Carl took aim as he walked backward.
The horde crested the corner, Rougarou leading the pack, but thralls mixed in as well, their jerking motions gone now that they had a target in sight.
Jenny threw the glass orb.
It tumbled through the air and looked like she had thrown it too high and was going to miss the leading enemies. Carl, however, took aim in a move they must have practiced many times to pull off as flawlessly as they did.
A muffled shot rang out and the glass orb exploded, the green contents fanning out and letting off black smoke. In the blink of an eye, the liquid burst into flame as it rained down on the charging Rougarou and thralls.
The front line went down, howling
in pain as the caustic liquid not only seemed to burn, but acted as an acid as well, dissolving any flesh it touched.
“Nice shot,” Jenny chuckled, holding up a fist that Carl bumped.
“Let’s go,” Howard said, downing a healing potion with one hand while he began dragging Jenny again. “That’s not going to hold them back for long.”
Smoke and flame filled the aisle, the heat so intense that it peeled the paint from the machinery. A figure walked through the flames and came to stand in front of the horde as if she hadn’t even noticed the fire and acid that was holding back the rest of her fighters.
“You’re right,” Yaminah growled. “It won’t.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Yaminah slashed at the burning ground with her left hand. A black wave of magic fanned out and smothered the flames, revealing the gathered thralls and Rougarou eager to get back to the hunt.
As she pointed a finger at Carl, Yaminah smiled. “Leave the Valkyries, but the others are fair game.”
The horde rushed forward, talons extended and teeth bared.
Howard shot a bubble out of his fingers that zipped across the gap and morphed into a net made of thin silver wires that glinted in the light as it flew directly toward the disciple.
Yaminah waved her hand and a thrall was pulled from the ranks streaming past her, as if the hapless thrall had been pulled through the air by the hand of a god. The flailing husk of a person flew into the net to be wrapped up tight an instant before the fine mesh of wire crackled with blue arcs of electricity. The thrall hit the ground and flopped around like a fish out of water.
“Nice try,” Yaminah said. “My turn.”
She raised her hands to cast, but her eyes went wide when Carl, Howard, and Jenny all threw spells at once, then immediately switched to their guns, mowing down thralls and the occasional Rougarou by the dozens.
Yaminah threw up a shield to block the barrage of attack spells but was quickly lost in the pressing mass of bodies streaming past her.
