Day of Execution

by Lily Luchesi

  “Do you feel it?” Vincent asked. “The world, magnified for your consumption. Open your eyes, Daniel, and feel the hunger burning within you.”

  Daniel opened his eyes then, seeing the world as though for the first time. His vampire eyes caught every detail, even the single loose thread on Vincent’s collar. This was the world, the real world. Vibrant, full of life, and his for the taking.

  He moved, standing still but no longer weak and filled with pain. He touched his neck to see that the wounds were gone. Strength welled within him, power combined with a newfound confidence. This world was his, and God help anyone who stood in his way.

  Sean was getting worried. It had been an hour since Danny and Angie had gone down the portal, and he hadn’t heard anything.

  He picked up his phone to call the two witches who had gone down to protect the portal until Daniel could seal it up again, and neither witch answered.

  This is not good, he thought. All his time in the war had taught him to be vigilant, and to never take things with a grain of salt when it came to going against the enemy. He had told Angelica this was a trap, and she had agreed but gone anyway. He should’ve tried harder to stop her.

  “Fuck this,” he muttered, standing up so abruptly that the chair crashed into the wall behind him, making his degree rattle in its frame. He went to the elevator, trying to call Daniel, who also wasn’t answering.

  It seemed like it took a week to get down to the ground floor, slip around to the secret back entrance of the building, and walk down into the sub-basement. And when he got there, he smelled the blood before he saw the two corpses lying on the floor with five bullets in their chests. And the portal was still open. Anything or anyone could have escaped. Daniel was nowhere in sight.

  “Fuck!” he cried. He couldn’t jump down into Hell to see what was happening, because the portal couldn’t stay unguarded. He couldn’t stand there and do nothing, either.

  Just as he was beginning to pace, having picked up Angelica’s bad habit, the portal made a sound like air being sucked out and it reeked of death and decay.

  He cocked his gun to shoot at whatever came out of there, but was able to breathe easy when he saw it was just Angelica and Danny, who looked relatively unharmed. They were both bloody, but he could see wounds had already healed, and he was sure that some of that blood hadn’t been theirs, anyway.

  Danny stood up first, rubbing his bruised and bloody head. “What the Hell happened here? Where’s Daniel?”

  Angelica glanced around and saw the witch corpses, but her eyes didn’t change from their wide, hurt stare.

  What happened down there? Sean wondered, having never seen her look that way.

  “I don’t know what happened to him. I came down here to check after no one answered their phones and found them like this, and your grandson nowhere to be seen,” Sean explained. “I don’t know how long he’s been gone. But the portal was left unattended. Anything could’ve come out of it.”

  “Not anything,” Angelica said, her voice so low he could barely hear it. “We were right: this was a trap. But not to harm us. It was to get us to open the portal.” Her hands clenched into fists and Danny bent down by her, lifting her up and into his arms as she leaned heavily against them.

  Sean recognized the look on her face, like she’d seen a ghost. He’d seen the same look on his own face when the demons and Nazis had returned seventy years after World War II had ended.

  “What happened?” he asked, directing his question at Danny.

  “The new Lieutenant … it’s Vincent. It’s Angelica’s father.”

  8

  Angelica came up from the portal with seconds to spare, Danny at her side. During the ascent upwards to Earth, everything started to really hit her and she could feel her emotions shutting down.

  When they got topside and she saw the dead witches, no Daniel, and a worried Sean, she knew then that getting them to Hell had been an elaborate ruse to allow the portal to open up wide enough for someone as powerful as Vincent to get through.

  He was right, she thought. The student has yet to surpass the master, but he’s not going to win. I killed him once and I’ll do it again!

  Safe in Danny’s arms, she feared that this time their partnership might not be enough to win this battle. Because Vincent now had a legion behind him.

  “Wait, hang on,” Sean was saying, bringing Angelica’s attention back to the present. “Vincent Cross, the vamp who started this whole thing, is back? You killed him!”

  “Death doesn’t seem to stick in the Cross family,” Danny said, and Angelica managed a smile, remembering her own near deaths and fake deaths.

  “I’m scared,” she said, unaware that she was even going to say it. “I’m scared that this might be my undoing, but you two have to promise me you’ll fight with me. That bastard has taken enough from me; I won’t let him hurt me anymore.”

  Danny squeezed her and said, “You know I’ll never leave you.”

  Sean reached out and gently tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ears. “I might not have been a Marine, but semper fi, my friend.”

  “I need a moment to collect myself. I —” She took a shuddering breath. “I haven’t had a chance to process this. And I know I don’t have much time to do so. Just a few minutes alone, please. Get the ghouls for disposal and two new Coven members to remake the wards around the portal.”

  Sean went off to do as she asked, and Danny escorted her to one of the apartments meant for agents who needed a safe place to stay, leaving her alone in there as she requested. She discarded her filthy clothes and found new ones. No matter how many times she leaned over the sink and washed her hair, nothing seemed to remove the stench of sulfur from the inky strands.

  Finally, as clean as she was going to get physically, she collapsed onto the sofa and drained three bags of blood from the refrigerator to replenish what she’d lost in Hell. She leaned her head back and let the blood work inside of her, the moment of rest bringing all her emotions back in a flood.

  She didn’t even know she was going to cry until the first desperate sob escaped her throat and she couldn’t stop the rest that followed. Her whole body was shaking, unable to stop, as tears fell like raindrops onto her cheeks and she couldn’t catch her breath.

  Angelica had been through a lot, but there were two instances she’d been unable to get over: when the demons had kidnapped her, and when she’d watched Vincent kill Veronica. And she’d been deeply reminded of both thanks to her father’s reappearance in Hell.

  All her strength seemed to fade away in that moment as she sank deeply into the soft cushions, her legs curled under her as though she was a small child again and she sobbed so hard it hurt.

  She cried for her mother, for the victims of her father’s she couldn’t save, she cried for herself and the family she’d lost, and most of all, she cried for Vincent, a man she’d looked up to for so long and who had torn her life apart in a single moment.

  Eventually her tears had dried and she was left weak-limbed, her head pounding like a drum, and her throat sore from sobbing. She needed more blood already, but couldn’t work up enough energy to get it from across the room.

  Eventually Danny came into the room. He didn’t say a word, just walked over to her, lifted her head, and then sat down, cradling her head in his lap as he held her tightly. Somehow he knew that she needed the physical comfort more than his words, and she let herself be held by the only person who would ever be allowed to see her like this, weak and vulnerable and human.

  “We’re going to kill him,” Danny whispered. “I promise you, my love, that he’s not going to be able to hurt you anymore.”

  Danny stayed where he was, holding his wife as she came up from the depths of her despair, and he felt like a louse. How had he not known all of this was still inside of her? All this pain had been buried so deep, but he still should’ve been able to see it, to help her work through it.

  How long had she held it in, hidden
so far into the black depths that she herself never seemed to feel it? Too long, that he knew. And he hated that there was nothing he could do aside from hold her and reassure her that he loved her, and that even if she didn’t need it, he would protect her. He hoped it was enough, because it was all he could offer her.

  Eventually, Angelica sat up, her eyes still red and face stained with bloody tears. She wiped her eyes, devoid of makeup and even more beautiful, and leaned in and kissed him. Her lips were cracked from crying and the hand she left on his face was still trembling.

  “How do you always know just what I need?” she asked, nearly breathless.

  “I don’t,” he replied. “But I do my best because I love you.”

  She didn’t respond, and he figured that she didn’t have the words. And that was fine, because emotions spoke louder in silence than they did in conversation.

  “I need blood again,” she muttered, starting to stand.

  Danny grabbed her hand and said, “That’s not enough, drink from me. I had blood and I’m all right.”

  She shook her head. “You need your strength.”

  “You need it more than I do,” he said, holding his wrist out to her.

  She smiled at him, though it didn’t reach her eyes, and then sank her fangs into his skin, piercing veins and draining his life into her. She closed her eyes and he watched as his blood gave her the life and strength she needed. There wasn't much he could do, but at least he could do this. He could give her strength.

  Angelica healed his wound when she was done drinking, and he was glad to see that she looked much better. “Let’s go to Sean’s office. Right now, we have a fugitive on the run and a missing person. No more time to wallow.”

  Danny nodded and stood, taking her hand in his and trying not to let his own worry show. His great-grandson was missing, possibly kidnapped by the same evil bastard who had ruined Danny’s life once before.

  How can one man cause so much devastation? he wondered as they entered Sean’s office.

  The siren was furiously typing at his computer and didn’t even look up when they entered.

  “I’ve got a BOLO out, looking for both Daniel and Vincent. Even to human police and FBI. Do you think he might’ve fled the city?” he asked.

  “No,” Angelica replied. “This is where he came first when he got to America, this is where I killed him. He’s still here, festering like bacteria in the city’s bloodstream.”

  “Not when we flush him out,” Sean said. “Danny, do you have any contact info for Daniel aside from his number and address?”

  He shook his head. “I have his school information, but he’s not going to be missing any classes till morning, so no one there will have noticed anything. Plus, his roommate recently moved out.”

  “Okay, we should check his apartment, our penthouse, and anywhere else you can think of on the fly,” Angelica said. “Sean, leave a message for Alec to be on alert. Vincent may come after him.”

  Sean nodded. “Okay, are we all going now?”

  “Yes. We can’t afford to split up when it comes to Vincent,” Angelica said. “Never let your guard down from now till we catch him. He can sense weakness like a shark can sense a minute trace of blood in the water.”

  They readied their weapons, loading up on holy water, and set out for Daniel’s apartment first. It was unlikely that Vincent would take Daniel there, or anywhere overly obvious, but they had to be sure.

  Angelica was betting that if Vincent had kidnapped Daniel, he’d take him somewhere out of the way, where Angelica would have to search. That had always been how the bastard had stayed ahead of her every step of the way when she was initially hunting him: she could never sniff out his hiding places. Where did he go? What did he do during the daylight hours to hide from the sunlight?

  Angelica didn’t waste time picking locks, she kicked the front door to Daniel’s building in and ran up the stairs. The moment she stopped outside Daniel’s door, she noticed three things at once: the door was open a sliver, and didn’t seem to be forced in; and she smelled sulfur and blood.

  “They were here,” she whispered. She couldn’t hear anything inside, but Vincent could be quiet and if Daniel was with him, chances were he was dead and unable to make any noise ever again.

  Despite her love for blades, she switched her knife for a gun, because she could shoot quicker than she could stab and opened the door quickly, glancing around the small foyer and living room. The kitchenette was visible from there, and looked to be undisturbed. Turning the corner to view the rest of the living room, she saw where the stench of blood was coming from: there was a spray on one wall, near the table and chairs, leading down to pool on the carpet. It was fresh, and not enough to have killed whomever it had come from.

  “Fuck,” Danny said. “Daniel?”

  “Most likely.”

  Sean went to check the bedrooms and bathrooms and he called, “Hey, this door’s locked, but I don’t think there’s anyone in there. Reeks of air freshener, though.”

  Angelica took a deep breath and realized that, yes, under the blood there was the cloying scent of artificial flowers. Daniel never struck her as the type of guy to want his place smelling like April Rain or Lavender Sunshine, however.

  “Knock it in,” she said, leading Danny to stand behind Sean in case there was someone in there.

  Sean did as she asked, and the air freshener smell came at them in a nauseating wave of sickly sweet florals and … more blood?

  “Motherfucker!” Sean cried, stumbling backwards.

  Angelica peered around him into the room. It was another bedroom, which must have belonged to Daniel’s former roommate. Every outlet was plugged with air freshener, it hung in the air in a mist, and the bed was covered with the kind you hang on car rearview mirrors.

  Now it made sense why there was so much of it used: there was a corpse laying on the neatly made bed. It looked to be about a week old, if not less, and the decay smell wasn’t overly noticeable under the overpowering scent of Glade. The young man’s eyes were wide, as if his death had come as a shock. Judging by the second mouth that had been made in his throat by a serrated blade, it had.

  “Now I’m confused,” Sean said. “And disgusted.”

  “Call our CSU ghouls,” Angelica said. “Tell them we need a full autopsy done ASAP. There’s too much decay for this to have been Vincent’s doing.”

  “You wanna know when the kid died and how?” Danny asked.

  “Well, how is evident. By whom is my question,” Angelica replied.

  He took a deep breath and said, “Well, we don’t need ghouls for that, do we?” He grimaced against the barrage of stenches as he walked into the room. He gently placed his hand on the corpse’s bloody neck and beckoned her closer.

  His visions, I had already forgotten the psychometry was back, Angelica thought. She walked up to him and took his free hand, so she could see what he saw.

  It took a moment, but suddenly she was taken out of herself and watching, as though a ghost, as the sun shone brightly into the living room. The dead kid was at the table, writing in a notebook while a textbook lay open nearby on the table.

  From the directions of the bedrooms, Daniel appeared, carrying a worn composition notebook with his page marked with a pen.

  “Hey, you done with whatever weirdness you’re up to?” the roommate had asked jovially.

  “Uh-huh,” Daniel muttered.

  “Can you toss me a Red Bull while you’re in there? It’s only two in the afternoon and I’m already exhausted.”

  Daniel took out a large clay bowl and a carving knife from the kitchen, doing everything as silently as possible. He walked over to the table and put the bowl down, plopping it right on top of the roommate’s notebook.

  “Dude, what the fuck?” The roommate looked up and that’s when he saw the shining silver knife being brandished. He tried to get up, but in his haste hit the table with his knees, stumbling back into the chair.

  Da
niel grabbed him by the hair, struggling a little but not much. It was over in a second, the knife slicing into the roommate’s throat like butter, blood pouring out directly into the perfectly placed bowl.

  The roommate gurgled and choked but the light in his eyes died quickly and he slumped into the chair.

  Danny and Angelica were both ejected back into the present, and Danny backed away from the corpse quickly, clinging to Angelica.

  “That couldn’t have been true!” he cried.

  “Are your visions usually wrong?” she asked, turning away and going to Daniel’s room.

  “Um, wanna tell the class what’s happening?” Sean asked as he and Danny followed her.

  “Daniel murdered that kid and collected his blood,” Angelica said, trying to keep the panic at bay. She peeked under the bed, saw nothing but the usual dust bunnies and discarded socks, and then her boot snagged on a little throw rug. She kicked it away and saw that a few of the boards were lighter in color than those around her. A trapdoor. How Nancy Drew.

  There was faded blood on it, a sigil to protect whatever was inside.

  She yanked it up and saw herbs, more clay bowls, and papers onto which spells had been copied. Spells to contact demons, specifically.

  “Oh, my God,” she said, rummaging through everything. “That’s why he wanted Crowley’s books. He wanted those spells.”

  There was the same notebook she’d seen in Danny’s vision there as well, and she took it out, rifling through the pages. There were two sets of handwriting, one in black ballpoint pen, and the other in dark red calligraphy that looked like blood. She immediately recognized the handwriting as her father’s, having seen it her entire life.

  “What is that?” Danny asked.

  “Daniel’s been talking to Vincent,” she said. “Listen to this: ‘They didn’t care what happened to you with the skin changer. Your brains could have liquefied and they’d walk over your corpse as long as your usefulness to them had ended’.”