Days Gone Bad (27 page)

Devon. That unholy bitch was standing between the small granite headstones of my family, dressed in all-business black slacks and a white button down shirt. She was partially obscured by the small rowan tree between the graves. Her face was angled away, looking toward a nearby crypt. If I had to guess, Foster was pulling double duty by creating a distraction. The wind shifted and I could hear a tiny ringing of metal on metal. I smiled as adrenaline pounded through my veins. My grip tightened on the demon staff in my hand as the wind picked up and I moved.

I drew the pepperbox from my shoulder holster as I stood. Devon was only about twenty yards off. I stopped, leaned my staff against my jacket, and aimed. My finger slowly squeezed down on the second trigger. I already had a speed loader in my left hand.

Sam launched herself over Devon and snarled as she closed on me. I cursed, slammed the pepperbox into my pocket, and dropped the speed loader. I grabbed the shield markings on the staff and slammed power into it a second before Sam reached me. She leapt into the air and came down hard, feet first, on the upper half of the shield. A blur of static ripples cascaded around the shield as it redirected the blow.

On a whim, I pushed the staff forward and slid my hand away from the shield runes. My protection fell and Sam pounced again. This time I caught her in the chest with the staff, turned underneath her, and let her own momentum slam her into the ground. She was on her feet again in seconds.

“Shit.”

“Damian, by the crypt!”

At some level, my brain recognized Foster’s voice, knew I trusted him, and started my legs backpedaling toward the crypt while the rest of my brain shielded myself from Sam’s assaults.

I could hear Devon laughing. I caught movement from the corner of my eye and saw Zola raise her hand.
“Pulsatto!”
she yelled and a wave of force brushed across the graveyard and crashed into Devon. I didn’t see what happened next because Sam pounced on my shield again and took three fierce swipes at me. There was a flash of light in my peripheral vision and something struck Zola. I couldn’t tell if she had a shield up when it hit, but she’d fallen behind a small hill so I couldn’t even tell if she was alive.

“Aideen!” I screamed. “Help Zola!”

Devon shifted toward the crypt and Foster.

“Son of a bitch,” I muttered. “Sorry sis.”

She leapt at me again. I dropped the shield and rolled to the side. Before she landed, I struck her with a ferrule and screamed
“Pulsatto!”
The blast knocked her off her feet and bounced her like a ragdoll into the side of the crypt by Foster.

“Foster, catch!” I said as I launched the staff like a wobbly javelin. It was a straight enough flight for him to snatch it out of the air. I saw his lips move, and I’m pretty sure he said “Sorry Sam,” just before her stomped on her forearm. I could hear the snap from twenty-five feet away. He grabbed her and wrapped his left arm around her body in some kind of tangled submission hold. His right hand was free to hold the staff. He raised it into the air and a shield flashed up around them.

He was barely in time. Devon bounced off the sphere of power and rolled a few feet to the side. “Your shield should have fallen, little bug. So many tricks. Some things never change.”

I took a step toward her and fished the pepperbox out of my pants. Two more quick steps and I pulled the second trigger. Six barrels roared to life at a distance less than thirty feet.

I slid to a stop as Devon raised her hand and the bullets careened off to the side. I could hear two shots ricochet off stone somewhere in the distance as my brain tried to process how in the hell Devon had just called up a shield.

“Vampires can’t use magic.” It took me a moment to realize I’d said it out loud.

“Because we
are
magic?” Devon said with a brutal laugh. “You will die before my master awakens. The glory of striking down the seventh son … it will be mine!”

No vampire had ever been able to use even a simple incantation without utterly destroying themselves. Oh, there were rumors of warlocks over the years, vampire practitioners, but Zola had never encountered one and neither had I. It was about then I noticed the thin reed of Magrasnetto in her hand.

“A wand,” I whispered.

Devon raised her arm as her face turned into an atrocity of a grin.

My brain switched gears into defense. There aren’t many ways to defend yourself when it comes to magic. Circles and shields were my only options. My skills at forming a circle without drawing a semblance of it on the ground first were unreliable at best, without the staff. It would have been nice to have that reassuring weight back in my hand right about then. I threw up the next best thing.

“Impadda!”
I screamed as Devon launched a bitch of an incantation at me.

Purple lightning so bright it was nearly white roared from her Magrasnetto wand. Thunder and sparks battered my defenses. The shield grew heavy, like holding a twenty-pound weight with my arm fully extended. As my limbs began to shake with the effort, the lightning dissipated with a crack.

I blinked and shook my hand out. “You’re a fucking warlock?” I snarled as I dropped my shield and took another shot.
“Tyranno Eversiotto!”
Wands, bah, who needs ‘em? Thanks to a cemetery full of auras and nearby ley lines, red lightning roared from my right palm. Devon moved, just like I thought she would, but I wasn’t aiming at her. Devon’s arm lingered a second too long and my incantation obliterated the wand in a shower of sparks and flames.

She roared, and her eyes burned as she met my gaze.

“Give it up. You’ve got nothing.” Why did I hesitate instead of removing a few limbs? Who the hell knows, but the next thing I knew I was flat on my back with fangs an inch from my neck. She’d closed the distance fast enough I’d barely registered the movement. No vamp should be
that
fast.

“Vesik
,”
she hissed while her tongue licked the back of my hand. I tried to hold her off, but it was futile. “Now who has nothing? You’re just practice little man.” Her breath was rank and I almost gagged on the rot rolling off of her. “My lord has been generous with his gifts. Once you’re dead, only the Watchers stand against us. Imagine the rewards when I kill you all.”

She flipped her hand to the side and I could see Sam start struggling against Foster’s grip again. His face reddened and his arms shook with the effort of keeping her bound. If he lost his grip, the shield would contain her, but if he lost his grip, she’d tear him apart and the shield would fall anyway.

Devon laughed inches from my face. I gagged on the odor of roadkill left out in the sun for too many days. I would have told her that, but my vision was starting to dim as she throttled my neck. Twice in two days? Go me. I was beginning to think my plan was falling apart until someone started screaming.

The grip on my neck suddenly released as Devon fell back with a tiny, shining sword stuck through her eyeball. My lips curled into a snarl.

“Now, Damian!” Aideen screamed as she flew away from Devon.

I didn’t hesitate. Calling down the fires of hell would have been merciful compared to what I did to that vampire. The spells Cara had worked on with me were the stuff of life. They were not a necromancer’s calling, but even necromancers could use a ley line. As she morbidly noted, if the power of life could be called to cause harm or death, why shouldn’t it be a necromancer’s domain?

I called to the rowan, the tree my parents had planted at my grandparent’s graves so long ago. I felt its power, its lifetime, and I fed it the auras of the dead, the willing dead, speeding its growth to infinity. The rowan grew where I wanted it to grow. I guided its limbs and roots with a caress of power and they responded in vicious whips and cracks. They tripped Devon as she tried to run and, as she hit the earth, thirteen saplings burst up through her arms and legs and torso. I’ll never forget her screams.

“Damian!” Foster said.

I didn’t even look up. I knew what was coming; it sent ripples and waves through the mixed gathering of necromantic energy and Fae power surrounding me. My staff. My demon staff slapped into my left hand as I methodically stepped up to the vampire’s head, stared at her and cocked my head to one side. I slammed a ferrule into the dirt by beside her ear. Her screams had broken down into hiccupping tears and tremors of pain. She was shaking uncontrollably, with only whispers and blood pouring from her mouth.

“Azzazoth, Azzazoth, Azzazoth,” she said. Her words broke down into nonsensical mumbling.

The rowan would be burning Devon from the inside out, crisping her flesh and nerves and even damaging the flow of magic that kept her “living.” I didn’t smile or laugh, because I knew what I had done was terrible. I had used Fae magic for a terrible purpose. I considered how wrong that had been, but every doubt was erased as my thoughts returned to Sam. At that, my lips did break into a smile. Mirthless, dark, and vengeful.

“You don’t fuck with my sister.” I held the staff out and whispered the incantation in a dead voice.
“Minas Ignatto.”

I called fire to sever her body at the hips and both shoulders. It was slow. I let some of the power dissipate from the staff so the fire would crawl through her joints until the limbs fell off. Almost a full minute later, they did. Once Devon was defenseless, I gagged her, stuffed her torso into a potato sack, and dragged it away from the scene.

I didn’t kill her.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Zola was rubbing her arm when she crested the hill. She glanced at the potato sack and her lips twitched. “Ah didn’t know that bitch was a warlock.”

Foster took a few quick steps over to Zola and crushed her with a hug. “Bloody hell I’m glad you’re okay.”

She pushed the fairy away with a smile and a wave of her hands. “No need to get all sappy now.”

We started back to the car with Devon’s torso and head in tow. I had a hand around Sam’s shoulder, guiding her along with us. Aideen stopped to torch Devon’s arms and legs next to a pile of cigarette butts some jackass had left in the middle of the road. There wouldn’t be anything remaining but a pile of unidentifiable ashes.

“I don’t think I like timewalkers,” Foster said as he watched the flames spring to life.

“You and me both,” I said.

“What about Edgar?” he said.

“What do you mean?”

Foster’s fingers began fidgeting on the hilt of his sword. “We could ask the Watchers for help.”

Zola chuckled quietly.

“What?” he said.

“Foster,” Aideen said. “We’re dealing with demons. We have dismembered bodies in the trunk of Damian’s car. The Watchers would probably kill us before we finished explaining.”

“That would probably not help,” he said.

Zola laughed and patted Foster on the back. “Ah want to stop by a friend’s home, Damian.”

“Huh?” I said.

“A friend buried here,” Zola said. “He’s just at the top of this hill.”

I nodded and turned toward the slight incline with her, guiding Sam by her elbow. Foster hefted the sack of vampire onto his shoulder and followed. A minute later we were standing beside a modest tombstone. Zola knelt down in front of it, on an in-ground plaque. She kissed her right hand and placed it on the name of the upright stone. Aideen landed on the tombstone, shifting a small pile of pennies beneath her feet.

I read the name and my eyes widened. “You knew him?”

“Yes, him and Harriet,” she said as the edge of her mouth curled into a smile. “They helped change a lot of things for us. He was a good man. Taylor was too, although he picked the wrong side in the war. Ah’ve known some men thought Lincoln may not have been elected if it wasn’t for their struggle. If that had happened …” She closed her eyes and shook her head.

I read the rest of the stone.

DRED SCOTT

BORN ABOUT 1799

DIED SEPT. 17, 1858

Freed from slavery by

his friend Taylor Blow

I bowed my head and watched Zola from the corner of my eye. She smiled and touched the headstone once more before standing up again. My god, the things she must have seen.

I blew out a breath and traded Sam to Foster for a sack of dismembered vampire. We headed back to the car and left Calvary Cemetery.

***

“Sam’s not coming out of it.” Cara stood on the footboard of the bed, held her hand out in front of Sam, her fingers splayed, and narrowed her eyes.

Sam just sat on her bed and stared at nothing.

Cara fluttered around Sam’s head and back. I knew she was looking at Sam’s aura; I couldn’t take my eyes off it, either.

“She’s still bound to Devon and the demon,” she said.

I sighed and turned to my master. “Would two vampires be enough, Zola?”

She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Ah don’t know, Damian. What you’re planning … Ah just don’t know.”

I felt the emotion bleed out of my face before rage boiled up to replace it. “Then they all die tonight.”

 “How?” Zola said as she looked up at me. “How will you even find the demon? Or its host, if it’s even bound still.”

“Azzazoth. Bait he can’t resist.”

Zola’s eyes turned hard as understanding blossomed in them. “You will use me for bait.” She nodded. “He would come for me, one of his captors. We will bring the book as well. Even so, how do you intend to inform him bait is waiting?”

I stared at her until her expression faltered.

“You’ll need a blood letter,” she said as she closed her eyes.

“I figured I’d write it in my own blood on a blank page from Philip’s book.”

“Yes, it would prove you have the book.” She sighed and patted my shoulder. “Sometimes Ah think you are very brave, boy, and sometimes very stupid.”

I laughed.

“Hopefully it is more of the first,” she said sincerely.

“I would not count on that fact,” said a deep voice that sounded like its voice box had been run through a meat grinder.