Blood of the Demon (The Silver Legacy Book 3) (21 page)

Suddenly Denny started putting the pieces together...why Peyton had been such a bitch and hadn’t wanted Denny to help.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want the help.

She was hiding something.

“So all you want is Farquar and everything else falls into place. Is that it?”

“That’s it.”

Denny laughed. “If you think I’m bringing another hunter here so you can kill her, well, you’ve got the wrong girl. Just kill me now because you aren’t getting shit from me.”

The Hanta struggled now, knowing this fight might very well be its last.

“Hunter, we’ve already killed the Miami hunter. We are not afraid of Peyton Farquar. We don’t have to kill you as well.”

Denny wondered if they were afraid
of her
.

The leader stepped to within inches of Denny’s face.

“Be wise, Hunter. There are many, many lives at play here, and you cannot be in all places at once. One hunter is all you need bring to spare those witches their lives. One hunter and this can all be over.”

There was more to it, but Denny couldn’t put her finger on it. What piece was missing? What was hiding in the shadows, just out of her reach? “Well, I think you’re a fool for not fearing Peyton. She’s pretty fucking tough and has shown herself to be quite an amazing killer of you ass-wipes.”

The Hanta was on the move.

“
Was
. She is very weak at the moment. It is the right time to strike. Bring her before midnight tomorrow or the hundreds of demons who have come here will strike your safe house and kill everyone inside. Your witches won’t be safe. Your demon hunters won’t be safe. We will come after you all. The streets of New Orleans will be awash in the blood of innocents.”

Denny found herself nodding, but she was having a hard time filling in the blanks. Why weren’t the demons even remotely afraid? Because they were Dybbuks? Because she was marked? Because...?

At least she knew Iris escaped or they wouldn’t be threatening her. She must have taken off at the first sign of the Vodouisants.

“Where’s Annalee’s body?”

“Where we left it.”

Denny stared at him.

“Oh. Where she went down. We left it there. She was killed swiftly. Respectfully.”

“So let me make sure I am clear here: you are actually willing to let me go in order to bring Peyton here. Have you any idea how good I am?”

He smiled. “Your Hanta is ancient, but you are a nubile hunter with very little idea of what you are up against. You are also a hunter who cares deeply for those two witches. That will always be your undoing.” He pulled back and studied her. “Peyton Farquar has lost her humanity. She does not care for anyone or anything. She has become as cold as the demon within her. You have not. That makes you weak. Your love of others makes you vulnerable. Because of your humanity, we do not fear you.”

Denny pushed the Hanta back. Attacking now would only result in her death.

“Fine. If it’s Peyton you want, it’s Peyton you’ll get, but I’m taking Annalee’s body with me. If you try to stop me, I don’t give a shit how many of you there are, I’ll fucking crush the hell out of all of you.”

He motioned for two of them to cut Denny loose. “Midnight, Hunter, or the streets will become rivers of blood and gore.”

When her hands were free, Denny felt the bump on the back of her head. It was tender to the touch, but she knew it would heal faster than an unpossessed person’s head would.

Unpossessed.

Slower healing.

Something kept niggling at the back of her brain, but she just didn’t have the luxury of focus right this moment. “You’ll have your hunter at midnight, Dybbuk.” Denny held her hand out for her weapons.

The Dybbuk laughed. “Even if I had them, I would never give them back.”

Denny stepped right up to him. “You won this round Dybbuk, but someone’s going to pay for Annalee’s death and you’re as good a choice as any.” With that, Denny looked around before heading in the direction where she and Annalee had been attacked.

As she walked through the darkness, her heart hurt. She hadn’t realized the tears on her cheeks until she came upon Annalee’s still body.

The moonlight cast a soft, sorrowful light on Annalee’s small corpse.

“Oh Anna, I’m so, so sorry.” Denny said kneeling down and touching the top of her head. She looked like a child laying in a fetal position. “So, so sorry.”

Calling on her Hanta’s strength, Denny gently picked up Annalee’s small frame in her arms and carried her across the length of the park, never once feeling the weight of her in her arms, but feeling the weight of the loss in her heart.

“I don’t know what I’ve missed, Annalee, but whatever it is cost you your life, and I’m so sorry.” The tears ran down Denny’s cheeks now as the full brunt of Annalee’s death caught up to her.

Denny carefully set Annalee’s body down and reached for her phone. She needed to talk to Ames. Needed to call Cassandra and, and...

The only text was from Iris.

Stay right there.

Denny look around her. She was a good half a mile from the demons now.

“Iris?”

“Over here, DH,” came the hushed response from behind a small grouping of trees.

Denny looked to her left and there stood Iris, her hood up, her hands folded in front of her. There was something...otherworldly about her.

“Iris?”

Iris nodded as she ran over to Denny and embraced her in a bear hug.

“I’m so glad you’re safe.” Denny said softly. “I wish...I wish I could say the same for Annalee. I failed to keep her safe, Iris. I lost my weapons. I lost a friend.” The tears came freely now. “I am so very sorry.”

Iris pulled away and gently touched Denny cheek. “Oh, DH, don’t cry. All is not as it seems, sweet hunter of mine. What good would having a witch be if she couldn’t protect you and those you care about?” Iris handed the cylinders to Denny.

“My weap—how?”

“I
am
a witch, DH, though seems like everyone keeps discounting that.” Iris walked over to Annalee and muttered Latin in her ear. “And I may be young, but like you, I am far more powerful than anyone gives me credit for.

“Iris—”

“Shhh.”

Laying her hands on Annalee’s still chest, Iris spoke softly in Latin before helping a groggy Annalee to sit up.

Denny’s jaw dropped open. “But...she...she was...”

“Not dead, DH. I merely cast a deep sleep spell on her to make them think they’d killed her. The heartbeat is barely discernible, but they were not concerned with her, so they left her for dead. The sleep spell kept them from feeling the Hanta, so they assumed, incorrectly, of course, that they had killed them both.” Iris inspected the flesh wound on Annalee’s shoulder. “They nicked her with a bullet and she went down. I was able to project an image of the bullet going through Anna’s forehead, so they believed her dead.”

Denny wrapped her arms around Iris and lifted her off the ground. “Oh my God, you are amazing.”

“Well,
that
was unpleasant,” Annalee said. “What’d I miss?”

Denny and Iris helped Annalee to her feet before Denny pulled Iris to her and whispered, “You fucking rock. You know that, right?”

Iris pulled away and smiled. “You’re right, I so fucking do.” To Annalee she said, “I need to tend to that wound, but you won’t die from it.”

Annalee glanced down at her shoulder. “You saved my life, Iris. Those wily rascals would have surely blown my head off. Thank you.” Turning to Denny, Annalee said softly, “And they are wrong, Silver. Caring is the reason we do what we do. Don’t you ever forget that. We headed back to the safe house?”

Denny shook her head. “Hell no. We’re going to get some goddamned answers from the Mambo.”

Annalee chuckled. “Mambo Jambo, Toil and trouble, soon your houses gone be nothin’ but rubble.”

With that, they all headed back to the bayou in search of answers.

***

A
fter calling Valeria and letting her know they were alive and well, Denny found her tattooed face gave her easy access to a boat and boatman needed to get to the Haitian village.

Once there, Hélène listened intently, pausing every now and then to ask a question. When she finished, Hélène motioned for them to sit at the small picnic table. A young girl hustled over and set down four bottles of soda.

“What are we missing, Hélène? We just got thrashed by your kids. What don’t we know that we need to know? What the fuck is going on here?”

Hélène slid a bottle over to Denny. “I want to make certain I understand what you have conveyed to me here, Hunter. You say my youngsters have been possessed by these Dybbuk demons. Your friend here was nearly killed, saved by the quick thinking of your witch, and you think someone is withholding information from you? I assure you, it is not I.”

Iris steadied her gaze at Hélène. “I don’t mean to be disrespectful, Hélène, but you
are
withholding something, and if my hunter was put in danger because of it, you and I are going to have more than words.”

Tense moments ticked by as Hélène studied Iris.

Hélène held her hand up to stop three Haitians who didn’t seem to care for Iris’s tone. “It is all right. The young witch is simply protecting her charge as is her duty and obligation.”

Annalee popped open all the sodas and handed them out. “I’ve got a hunch the ‘young’ witch just nailed it. You sent us into a trap.”

Hélène kept her gaze on her hands folded on the table. “That is untrue.”

Denny leaned forward on the battered table, coke in one hand. “If you knowingly sent us into a tra—”

“Heavens no. Absolutely not. I knew they had opened a rift, but do you honestly think I would have sent you to round up our young, knowing full well the demons within you would wish to kill them as soon as they’d seen them? Does that make any sense to you?”

“But you had an idea about
something
. What was it?”

Hélène shooed her people away. “I give you my word, I had no idea any of this had been going on.”

Denny sipped her soda. “But you think something is going on under the surface of all of this. Surely there’s some piece of information you could give us that might clear up some of the mystery.”

Sighing heavily, Hélène lowered her voice. “Don’t you know? Can you not sense it yourselves? The Vodouisants youth told you what you have seen with your own eyes and refuse to believe, Hunter. Haven’t you noticed anything strange about Farquar? Anything at all?”

“Other than that she’s mean?” Iris asked.

Hélène steadied her gaze at Denny. “I thought she’d have told you, but I am beginning to see that I was mistaken, and for that, I am truly sorry. Farquar was having...some issues, and so she came to me.”

Denny’s back straightened. “Came to you? For what?”

“The hunter came to see me two weeks ago. She was...in a bad way. All of the demons were descending upon her city and she was weary. She was having a difficult time keeping her own demon down. She was losing the battle and knew it was only a matter of time before she lost the war.”

“What did she want?”

Signing, Hélène picked up the bottle and looked at it. “Well, she had a most unusual request. She asked for help I could not give.”

Denny leaned forward. “What help was that?”

Hélène looked out over the bayou a moment before answering. “Your friend, the hunter, asked if I could send her own demon some place where she might have some respite if only for a moment.”

“Respite? You mean...have it
removed
from her?”

“Only temporarily yes, but I do not have the tools to create such an opening or a place, and I told her as much.”

Denny thought back to the pages and pages of kills attributed to Peyton. All along, she’d thought Peyton was just an awesome hunter, a killing machine, but somewhere along the way, she, too, had become lost in it all, just as Denny had done.

Peyton wasn’t the killing machine––her Hanta was.

“She just wanted a rest from it...a moment to catch her breath.” Hélène sipped her soda. “But I do not have that ability.”

Iris leaned in. “But you know of someone who does.”

Hélène nodded. “Of course. You are in the land of Voodoo and magic, witchcraft and darkness. Enobaria, the Swamp Queen, is one person who has managed to meld all of the magics into one. Only she has that kind of power, and even so, I don’t know if she could or would help Farquar. She is cagey, that swamp woman, but well versed in many different rituals and spells.”

Annalee and Denny looked at each other before Annalee said, “Let’s back up a second. Peyton’s losing her marbles and she came to a Vodouisant for help?”

“The witches and their covens will have nothing to do with her, right? She has ostracized everyone she comes in contact with. Where else was she to go?”

“So you sent her to Enobaria.”

Hélène nodded. “She could not have made it all the way through the swamp unescorted so I sent some of my kids with her. I am so sorry, Hunter. I thought you knew all of this. I don’t have any idea why Farquar would have kept this a secret from you.”

Denny reached over and laid her hand on top of Iris’s. “Could be pride. Could be fear. What happened in the swamp, Hélène?”

“You have to believe me that I did not know exactly what happened with Enobaria. They went, Farquar spoke with her, they returned. I learned from one of the boys that Enobaria did have a suggestion for Peyton, but the boys suggested they were not privy to it.”

“So she returned from Enobaria’s with the boys. Might she have told them of the ritual?”

“Enobaria?” Hélène chuffed. “Not a chance. That woman, like Farquar, shares nothing with nobody. That’s why I asked
you
to find them before she does. Peyton Farquar will kill them all, especially if they are possessed, as you say. You must believe that I had no idea they were possessed.”

“I believe you, Hélène,” Denny said. “They learned part of a spell from someone, opened a rift with it and were immediately possessed by the Dybbuk demons that came through.”

“They are youngsters, Hunter. They were merely mischievous, not malignant. They do not deserve to die.”