Chapter 28
The old man repeated himself. “Did you not hear me, Barnabel? I said ‘kneel,’ and all this ends now.”
Ace stood there, rigid and unyielding.
Did he have a death wish? We were moments away from being torn apart by the masses, and he acted like we had all the time in the world.
“No.”
No? Had he lost his fucking mind?
My mouth fell open.
“No?” It seemed the only thing Crestpin and I had in common was our surprise at Ace’s unwillingness to submit.
This is it. This is how I fucking die. All because this son of a bitch won’t drop to a knee.
Everything stuck to my skin. My hair, my clothes, my damn dignity. Whoever sabotaged the fire alarms had been determined to destroy my appearance. I bet it was a troll, the one who sat in the cashier’s cage. Insufferable and grotesque bastard.
If I were going to die, the least the universe owed me was to do it looking spectacular.
“Does your pride truly override common sense?” the decrepit Knight asked incredulously. “All that you possess will be sacrificed needlessly, and yet you still refuse to kneel?”
A dark edge, heavy with something ancient, crept into Ace’s voice. “I kneel before none.”
Crestpin nodded in a manner that almost appeared respectful of the decision not to yield.
“Then all but your pride shall perish.” He stepped back, gesturing a single sweeping move like an executioner dropping the blade.
Ace’s runes became brighter than any of the neon lights across Superbia. When he moved, the streaks of color lingered in the air. There was no wasted effort when he lunged at the nearest body who posed a threat.
One after another, they staggered back. He moved with precision, speed, and strength.
It wasn’t enough. They kept coming, relentless and hungry for destruction.
One body pushed through the masses, knocking others aside, determined to be the first to get to us.
I searched for anything close by to defend myself with. An unopened beer bottle rolled across the floor, a remnant from the assault on all that Sevenfold had to offer.
Leaning over, I snatched it up by the neck. Raising it up, I turned to take a wild swing at the man who had just emerged from the mob.
Before I could make contact with his head, Ace grabbed my wrist, preventing me from carrying out my attack.
Confused, I glared up at Ace, but his gaze was fixed on the man who'd broken through the crowd.
With a critical eye and suspicion in his greeting, he asked, "Grier. What are you doing here?"
Shifting my focus to the man whose head I nearly smashed with a beer bottle, I took stock. He appeared just shy of middle age, looking battle-worn and in need of a decent moisturizer. Whoever the hell he was, he held the two swords I recognized from the display in Ace's living room.
“Thought you might need these.” Grier tossed both blades to Ace.
After releasing my wrist, he caught each sword effortlessly and responded, “I don’t need them.”
Grier smirked. “I know.”
From there, the attack got bloody. Ace wielded his swords with unparalleled brutality. The man who seemed to be an ally in the onslaught against us had the skill of a man who fought golems for a living.
The beer bottle I had in my hand went to good use. I swung it at a shrieking imp, the glass connecting with his temple and sending him reeling.
For every body rendered incapacitated, two more surged forward.
“Where are they all coming from?!” I shouted over the din at Ace.
He looked at me, wet strands of his dark hair plastered to his forehead from the sprinklers that had soaked us and everything else on the casino floor.
Ace’s chest heaved with the exertion of fending off each attacker while those calculating eyes of his scanned the area, seeing the same endless sea of figures as I did.
In the distant background, beneath the symphony of the ongoing assault, Crestpin’s shrill laughter cut through the chaos.
Ace grunted a sound of frustration. “This isn’t working!”
With two short strides, he stood in front of me, pinning me with eyes that burned bright with crimson rage.
“Listen good, Little Spade.” He used the blunt end of the sword handle to nudge my chin up so I had no choice but to look into his eyes. “You’re going to put what you learned in the grotto to use. Understand?”
I searched his eyes, seeing nothing but unshakeable faith in their depths.
“I’ve got it covered,” I replied, my confidence in ample supply, as it always was.
“Good girl,” he rumbled before stepping away from me.
He barked an order at the unexpected ally grappling with a demon in a server’s uniform. “Cover me!”
The faith he placed both in Grier and in me was absolute. Ace found a small clearing, raised both swords in the air, and rotated them before crouching down and slamming each point into the floor with a primal roar.
Two things happened simultaneously. I thrust my mind’s eye wide open, casting the net wide to capture Ace’s precognitive powers. Images ripped hard and fast through my head. Keeping up with the flashes of information was a challenge, but the message became clear.
Our visit to Forked Tongue Casino.
Argian nullifying the lease on Sevenfold’s foundation.
The crypt below us and all the spirits slumbering with unawakened power.
The ultimate defense against a siege on all that Ace considered his.
At the same time, a pulse rocked the building down to the very foundation on which it was built.
The force of it sent me stumbling, barely managing to brace myself against a support column to stay on my feet.
The impact jarred me, disconnecting my mind’s eye from Ace’s, and all visions went blank inside my head.
Ace’s body shook under the strain of summoning what lay dormant beneath us. He turned his head, voice straining as he shouted out to me, “Echo me!”
Pushing away from the column, I rushed up behind Ace. We had one shot at this, and I wouldn’t fuck it up.
My hands found his shoulders, anchoring myself to him. All the energy from the grotto stabilized inside me, amplifying our connection to a magnitude that felt unbearable to keep leashed.
I echoed him.
The metaphysical force erupted from me through any outlet it could. An otherworldly scream tore from my throat as Ace’s call to the crypt below exploded through the casino.
For a suspended moment, I felt like gravity itself was lost. A prism of colors blinded my vision. The roaring waves of energy inside my head were deafening.
Wind whipped around me, but I never faltered, and I never let go of Superbia’s Ace of Spades.
Echoes rippled through every cell of my body, creating a euphoria that left me gasping for air.
Then… silence—in all the ways that mattered.
I slumped forward, my body draping over Ace’s back.
My heart thundered in my chest with a mix of exhilaration and exhaustion.
Gentle hands came from behind me and eased me upright, allowing Ace to unfold from the crouched position he had taken during the onslaught.
Blinking back the moisture in my eyes, the blur of colors cleared, and I saw the full extent of what remained.
Tangled piles of bodies were strewn about. Some were bleeding out like fallen soldiers, but many still stirred enough to show signs of life.
Looking behind me, I noticed Grier looking equal parts impressed and horrified as he kept me steady on my feet.
“I’ve seen many things in my life, but I’ve never seen anything like that,” he said with a bit of awe. Then he added, “I think I’d prefer never to witness that many disturbed spirits rising up at once again if it can be helped.”
I continued observing the aftermath of what I’d helped inflict. When my eyes landed back on Ace, he was striding toward Crestpin.
In his haste to get out of the warpath, the old bastard ended up tripping on his robes several times. It was pathetic how quickly he went from thinking he held all the cards to realizing he never had the ones that mattered.
Once Ace had the elder Knight backed against an overturned table, the begging began. Something cold lingered in Ace’s stance despite the burning energy his runes still emanated.
When he spoke, his command filled the expansive space, ensuring all beings present heard what he had to say.
“As I said, those who kneel can take away your power the second they stand. So here’s your lesson, Crestpin: I don’t fucking kneel. Not to you, not to anyone. That’s where my power lies.” He leaned in a fraction closer, hissing venomously in the man’s horrified face. “Fucking reflect on that.”
Both of Ace’s swords skewered through the old piece of shit’s chest. The wet choking sound he made was immediate, death offering no mercy for him.
Hellfire flowed down Ace’s arms, pouring over the two pieces of steel. It gave them a brilliant glow of orange and red hues. The resulting intensity of the heat in the metal charred the immediate area around the entry points in Crestpin’s body.
One hard jerk pulled both swords free as Ace stepped back, the dying man’s body dropping to the floor with a sickening thud.
Ace stood there and watched, his swords down at his sides. Crestpin’s final words escaped as a gurgling gasp before his body jerked one last time and went eternally still.
“The House always fucking wins,” Ace sneered, pride radiating from the core of his words.
Turning his attention back to our surroundings, groans filled the air from the injured crowd of people slow to recover. Then his eyes found mine, and he crossed the space with purpose in each step.
Grier wisely chose that moment to back away as he saw the storm of a man approaching me.
Tossing his swords off to the side before he stepped up to me, Ace grabbed my face and pulled me in for a claiming kiss. It tasted like victory, blood, and something too vulnerable to belong to Ace Reynard.
His hands didn’t release me until his mouth had tasted every inch of mine, the kiss stretching on until I lost all sense of time. Even when that initial kiss finally ended, he drew me back for several more, his arms holding me securely against him.