Night's End (17 page)

I looked at him. He was old enough to be a grizzled grandpa, but his gaze told me he'd seen his fair share of trouble. “It's dangerous out here. You should go back inside and bar the door.”

“If we don't stop them, there won't be any door they can't break down, or any barricade strong enough to withstand them. I want to help. I'll take orders.” His jaw set, he gave me a steely-eyed stare.

I glanced at Check, who nodded.

“Fine, but you do as you're told. Is anybody inside your house?” I nodded at the open door.

“No. Bastards took my wife this morning. I managed to get inside before they caught up to me. There wasn't anything I could do to help her.” His voice quavered. “Forty years. Maddy and I withstood fights, we broke up three times and got back together. Our son died overseas, and our daughter was in and out of jail all through her teen years, but now we have three grandchildren from her. I bounced back from a heart attack, and Maddy made it through breast cancer. But here, in what's supposed to be a safe and cozy town . . . in our front yard . . .” His voice trailed off, and he dashed his hand across his eyes.

“What's your name?”

“Trevor. Trevor Grant. My wife was named Maddy.”

“Welcome to the front lines, Trevor.” I would have smiled, but there wasn't much of anything to smile about at this point. He gave me a short bow, and I realized he knew who I was.

“Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“Get in line, soldier.” Grieve clapped him on the shoulder. “You're with us now.”

The older man seemed to appreciate the order, and he proudly marched back to Fearless, who showed him where to go. Chances were he wouldn't make it through this alive, but if he did, he'd have a place in my Court if he wanted one. Yummanii though Trevor might be, he had what it took to be a member of the Winter Court.

As he worked his way to the center of the line where Fearless had assigned him, another call startled me. I turned, as did the guards, in time to see several men and women straggling out from behind a thick patch of brambles. They were scratched and bruised, with some bleeding, but they were alive.

“We want to join you, too.” The man in front stepped forward. “We're magic-born and have a smattering of spells that might help. We'll do whatever you need.”

Grieve tapped me on the shoulder. “They could be spies.”

I gave them the once-over. Could be, might be . . . But if they were, what better place than to have them where we could see them?

“Report to Fearless. You do what he says—that's the one order. You break it, I won't vouch for the consequences.” I held the man's gaze, challenging him slightly, but he merely nodded and led the brigade of ten back along the line, where Fearless interspersed them, making certain our guards were surrounding each one of them. He also perfunctorily patted them all down to make certain nobody was carrying anything like explosives. Once they were in place, we quickly covered the remaining distance to the edge of police headquarters.

The building was functional, yes, but the architect had also had vision. New Forest's police headquarters was crafted out of concrete, but with pillars and an embellished façade that gave it a feeling of importance. No run-of-the-mill building, this. A statue of a woman holding the scales of justice stood out front, ten feet tall and towering over the courtyard. Because the police were headquartered in city hall, there were concrete benches and picnic tables surrounding the courtyard, and what looked like sculptures—all buried under the heaping mounds of snow.

The lights were blazing from inside, through the open double doors. One of the heavy metal doors had been ripped off its hinges, and an uneasy feeling hit the pit of my stomach. There were bound to be Shadow Hunters still in there, though I doubted they would deliberately set out to occupy the building. They weren't like a regular militia, and Myst wasn't attempting a political coup. At least, not in the usual sense of the word. No, she was out to destroy the existing structure, not just take over. Myst wanted a new world order, where her people were free to hunt as they desired.

As we strode through the courtyard—they had to know we were coming—signs of butchery were everywhere. Blood galore, and bits and pieces of what were once people littered the snow, turning the pristine white fields into gruesome burial mounds.

I shivered. Myst was taking no prisoners this time. She might keep someone she thought would be useful to her—turn them if they worked magic or had special abilities—but the rest of the populace? Cattle food.

We strode through the snow toward the open doors. Rhiannon and I fell back a bit, allowing some of the elite guards to go in front with Grieve and Chatter. I looked at my cousin.

“Are you ready?”

She shrugged, a mirthless smile on her face. “Are you?”

“Always and never. Is this our life then? After Myst, will there be another upstart? Or will things quiet down?” Feeling particularly grim, I stared at the future as an unending string of battles and blood. Maybe we'd luck out, but right now, I had the uneasy feeling that leading a kingdom meant that we would always be at war with somebody, somewhere. Maybe I was just tired, or scared—or both, but for a brief moment, I just wanted to change into my owl form and go flying away, into the night.

But then we were through the door and into the mess that had been city hall. The Shadow Hunters hadn't just destroyed police headquarters and the officers within: it looked like they had ravaged most of the building. Which meant that, considering they had come in during the day, most of the city workers had probably lost their lives. At least the ones who hadn't managed to get away. The blood smeared on the walls and floors attested to that. The smell was stuck in my nose by now, and I wondered if I'd ever get rid of it.

Here and there, the Shadow Hunters were still feeding—one munching on a hand, another on what looked like someone's cheek. Our men fell to them while Rhia and I were cloistered against a wall, guarded by our personal guards. As we watched, there was a noise to our left, and suddenly, a group of three Shadow Hunters broke through the barricade of guards, surprising them from above as they dropped through the ceiling tiles.

Rhiannon shouted, and the next thing I knew, she held out her hands and let loose with a volley of fire, aiming it squarely at the center of the trio. The flames were white-hot, and they scorched skin as they hit the Vampiric Fae. They did not extinguish, however, but clung like gel, the heat blistering as the Shadow Hunters screamed and began to stagger.

Rhia's face was contorted, her eyes ablaze, and I could feel her anger rising. “You will not win—do you hear me? You will never win!” And with that she sent another bolt of fire at them, and this time, our guards fell back as it landed in front of the creatures and exploded, showering them with the smoldering gel. The minute the goo touched their skin, it exploded, and they became fiery pillars, dancing back as they tried to free themselves of it.

I felt my own fury rise to match hers. I caught sight of more Shadow Hunters above in the crawl space and called up the winds. As they buoyed me up, I began to spin, the vortex created by my wake sweeping into a twister. I was becoming a tornado—no longer simply riding at the helm but creating my own tidy funnel cloud. I spun up and into the crawl space, turning, sweeping through, shrieking as I went. The Shadow Hunters there tried to scurry out of the way, but there was nowhere for them to go, and I barreled through them, sending them through the ceiling to the floor below with my force. As they hit the floor broken and battered, I began to lose steam. The next moment, I doubled back and dove through the opening to land near Rhia as I once again took control of the currents and shook away the rage.

Our men finished off the injured Shadow Hunters, taking them down before they were able to come to their feet.

I turned, shaken. “I've never done that before.”

“You became the tornado. I saw it—you weren't just controlling it.” A look of fear crossed her face, but it was immediately replaced with a fierce pride. “We're evolving.”

“That we are.” I wasn't sure how I felt about it, but there was no way to stop this train ride we were on. Whatever we were becoming, it was our destiny, and we had accepted it. “Come—we're done here. Let's go.”

Grieve caught my gaze, as did Lannan. Both men stared at me, silent, unspeaking. I said nothing but motioned for us to move forward.

“Fan out and search for both survivors and more of the enemy. Destroy any Shadow Hunters you find!” Grieve ordered our warriors and the vampires to spread out and begin searching for any of the Vampiric Fae still hiding in the shadows or corners of the rooms as we passed.

Shrieks and screams punctuated our passage as our warriors routed the remaining Shadow Hunters. We killed every one we found, giving them no opportunity to escape. There would be no mercy here, or compassion. Full-scale war demanded ruthless precision.

An hour later, we held the building and radioed for the cops to return. As we waited, our men began fortifying the entrances and boarding up windows and unnecessary doors. The fewer chances for the enemy to penetrate our defenses, the better. By the time all fourteen units returned and had checked in, we were ready to turn it over to Lannan's men and some of our warriors, who would sleep till morning and take over when the vampires had to return to their lairs at daybreak.

Lannan walked us to the door. “I can take this from here for now. I suggest that you call me when you get back to the Veil House. We need to know what Luna and the Petros woman are doing. It's imperative we keep in contact at this point, and I'll have Regina pick one of our strongest and most trusted day-runners to take any messages during the day so that we get them upon first moment's waking.”

“Makes sense to me. How many do you think we killed today?” I stared at the bloodstained floors around me.

“Not as many as they took out. Probably fifty . . . maybe sixty. But I estimate they killed at least two or three hundred townsfolk. Make no mistake, Cicely—this is war. Outright war. There's no room for mistakes.” And with that he shook his head and turned away.

We trailed out the door, leaving twenty of our best there. Whether it would be enough, who knew? But we'd have to chance it. As we stepped out into the darkening night, a howl echoed through the air, from far away. A woman's shriek, but it wasn't pain. No, it was anger and fury and madness. And right then, I realized Myst knew we were on the offensive, and she was letting me know that she was aware of our actions.

We left those who had joined our army behind with Lannan and his men, and now, as one mass, we began to run.

When the Fae run, it's like the Hunt. A blur of motion, a blur of speed. Fleeing treachery and danger on the wind, we flew. Racing through the snow, we sped through the town. The Summer Fae ran right alongside us, though they traveled through the warmer months of the year faster than us, and we traversed the Winter realm in the blink of an eye. But we ran as a group, faster than any magic-born or yummanii could hope to see or even keep up with. The guards caught Kaylin and our other yummanii troops up and carried them with us.

We raced the length of town back to the Veil House. When we came to the end of Vyne Street, where my aunt's house stood at the end of the cul-de-sac, we dropped out of the slipstream and stood, filling the yard, listening for any sign of Shadow Hunters. But none were about the property. Ulean checked and verified that fact for us.

While the warriors waited outside, Check, Fearless, Rhiannon's personal guards, Grieve, Chatter, Kaylin, and I went inside. As we entered the house, a cloud seemed to descend—a darkness I'd never before felt in the Veil House. It wasn't gloomy, but dense, and alive, and prickling at the back of my neck.

One of Lannan's men nodded for us to go on through to the living room, and we did, cautiously approaching the Circle in which Luna sat. Ysandra stood outside the chalked outline, on the left, and Peyton on the right. Both were dressed in black dresses, and Luna was in a silver gown. Ysandra glanced over at me and the look on her face was enough to freeze water. There was no warmth, no compassion in her expression. Peyton's expression matched Ysandra's.

Luna turned then, her arms outstretched. The gown shimmered across her full breasts, caught at the waist by a simple black belt. Her hair was down, cascading around her shoulders, and the look on her face was feral and fierce. Her eyes gleamed with an unnatural light, and I had the feeling we weren't facing Luna at all, but someone who had taken possession of her.

“Who are you?” I stepped forward.

“I am not harming your friend, so do not interfere.” The voice echoing out of her plump, crimson lips was not her own—was not even human, but lush and opulent.

“What are you doing here?” I cocked my head, knowing better than to intervene before I knew exactly what was going on. There were rites and rituals that you just didn't go stomping into—no matter how afraid they might make you feel. One wrong move and whatever—whoever—this was, might turn back on Luna and hurt her.