Chapter Fifty-Four #2
On either side of him marched Daniel Carpenter and Father Forthill. Both of them held up crucifixes before them, and the holy symbols glowed with the silver fire of faith.
Behind them and on their flanks came the forms of Will and the Alphas, four timber wolves in variegated grey and brown fur. They stalked forward with steady purpose, focused, fangs showing, low growls rumbling in their chests.
“My people went in on the other side of the castle,” Lara said quietly. “My sisters, Freydis, and Gard.”
“I was surprised to hear about Gard,” I said. “What’s Marcone’s bodyguard doing here?”
“Representing his displeasure at the presence of belligerents in his territory,” Lara said. “Besides. Valkyries get annoyed when they aren’t allowed to take the field from time to time.”
We were in time to see the last of the Malvora fleeing, vanishing into the fog and mist. The ghouls were running—or dragging themselves away—as well. They knew better than to try to stand in a fight where a hostile force had arrived on their flank by surprise.
They were being hurried on their way by the angry hornet buzzing of hundreds of the Little Folk, striking them with straight pins and X-Acto knives and razor blades, mostly at faces and eyes.
I saw Major General Toot-Toot soaring in among them, directing organized swarms of Little Folk with waves of his sword and shouted commands.
The pixies rarely showed themselves in battle, but when they did, they played hard.
Though the ghouls were too resilient to be easily brought down by their little weapons, they still inflicted pain, and the flashing spheres of light swooping everywhere induced confusion, keeping the ghouls from gathering their wits into any kind of organized resistance, turning a retreat into an absolute rout.
Except for the two Black Court vampires and half a dozen Renfields that stood their ground.
One of the Black Court still had its hood covering its face. The other was Cleo. Cleo had one of her arms raised against the light of the Sword of Faith and the glowing crucifixes on either side of it, as though the light burned her eyes unbearably.
As Butters and company approached, Cleo pointed her other hand and screamed, “Kill them!”
The Renfields lunged forward. Renfields are just regular mortals, but they don’t feel much in the way of fear and they will keep trying to carry out their orders as long as they’re still capable of moving.
There was a blur in the air, and Carlos Ramirez emerged from behind a veil of magical energy off to one side, unseen until that moment. He wasn’t wearing his Warden’s cloak, though he bore his enchanted Warden’s blade in his hand, and I didn’t need my Sight to know what he was about to do.
The Wardens’ blades were made to cut through enchantment and disrupt magic, and Carlos did a smooth step and sweep with the sword, speaking a single word, and sent a wave of disruptive energy through the air, across the Renfields at more or less head level.
The Renfields’ minds had been badly disrupted by hostile psychomancy, courtesy of the Black Court, and that disruption had effectively made them into puppets.
Ramirez had just cut the strings.
The Renfields collapsed as a single body, falling limply to the ground, immobile, their expressions confused, eyes open and staring and unfocused.
Cleo shrieked and spun toward Ramirez, unleashing a bolt of white-hot flame from one hand.
Carlos, smiling grimly, whirled his rapier in a tight circular parry, caught the flame on its blade, and promptly sent it hurtling back into Cleo like a miniature comet—which is why sorcerers, even very powerful, very experienced ones, hadn’t ought to square off on wizards.
The fire smashed into Cleo. The rain I’d called down had soaked her shrouds, and a cloud of steam burst out of her as fire met water. Cleo shrieked, reeling back. Black Court vampires are pretty close to physically indestructible, but heat gets to their eyes, and hers had just been boiled.
Ramirez flicked his sword to his other hand, his expression furious, and threw out his right forefinger, barking another word, and a pale blue beam flashed out toward Cleo, striking her center mass—and simply melted a hole in her as shroud and undead flesh alike fell apart into their component elements.
Carlos let out a cry of pure rage, walking forward, dragging the beam across more and more of the vampire’s body, melting more and more of it into dust that quickly became a slurry in the misty air, until all that was left was a withered head—eyes burst, mouth gaping, jaws trying to mouth something.
Carlos spat on the head and said, “For my friends.”
Then he disintegrated the head, too.
And lifted a murderous gaze to the last vampire there.
The other withdrew a pace at a time as Carlos kept moving forward, and her hood fell back.
It was Mavra. Black Court vampire of old acquaintance. And she was smiling.
She let out a delighted cackle and blurred into motion, avoiding another disintegration beam from Ramirez, and vanished into the mist, leaving only an echo of her rasping laughter behind.
Ramirez looked up at me and nodded, pointing his sword at what was left of the front gates. “Three more!”
“Make sure she doesn’t come back!” I said, pointing after Mavra. “I got them.”
Then I turned and swept down the stairs.
I got to the bottom of the stairs, rushed down the long hallway to the next set, and went down them.
I passed an exhausted Fitz and Matias along the way.
Bear was with them, face red, covered in sweat, breathing like a steam engine, but she shoved herself to her feet as if she hadn’t been shot several times a few moments before, took Matias’s shotgun with a nod, and came lumbering along behind us.
We went down the stairs by the gym into the great hall and found it full of thunder and fury.
The gargoyles had gathered by the entry door.
Cinnamon was lying in a heap—a literal heap of broken stone—against the back wall, and as I watched I saw Basil in the doorway, wrestling a Black Court vampire and being forced slowly inward, his lion’s face set in an expression of noble determination.
Sage tried to step in, only to be struck by a bolt of lightning that snaked through the doorway, driving him back several paces, and a second vampire added its power to the one struggling with Basil, driving the gargoyle back.
The others closed in, but they weren’t as physically powerful as Basil.
Lightning struck again and again, and the third vampire shoved its way in through the doorway.
Excellent. They were all inside.
“Boys!” I snarled. “Get out of the way!”
The gargoyles flew back and away from the entry door, vanishing into the walls, the floor, as though the stone had been no more substantial than water.
I slammed my open right hand against the wall of Merlin’s fortress as the three corpses whirled toward me, reorienting after the sudden absence of resistance. There was an instant of frozen silence.
“You should have come on a school night,” I said harshly.
And then, at my will, the enchanted, obdurate stone of the second floor, that entire portion of the second floor, tons and tons and tons of rune-etched rock, slammed down more swiftly than a blinking eyelid, like a vast and ancient sledgehammer coming down on three doomed cockroaches.
It was messy as hell.
Black ichor, thick and sticky as tar, sprayed everywhere in a fine mist.
And that was that.