Chapter Twenty-Five #2
Walter walked toward Shiloh, his camera jittering and jumping, still coughing, something off about his gait. He turned to his right, around a corner into a narrow alley. Shiloh followed.
Between coughs, Walter said, “We have to stop the police vehicle.”
On his cam, the law enforcement unit passed in front of the alley and slowed.
“Gimme a sec,” Shiloh said.
“Don’t hurt them,” he said, as she popped away.
Walter followed at speed. A thump came over comms. On the cam, Shiloh wrenched open the cops’ driver’s door.
The sound of tearing metal screeched into comms. The vehicle went silent as it was turned off.
The door squealed shut. Shiloh reappeared.
“Sleepy-time working activated,” she said.
“We have half an hour-ish. The car’s warm enough to keep them from freezing.
The Sacred Heart of Mary Mission Church is just around the corner.
” Shiloh twirled my staff. Her gold fangs glinted in the streetlights.
“The children are two blocks away,” Walter managed.
“Cleanup after a battle is always nice,” Shiloh said. “Konstantin is mine. As agreed, Willim is yours.”
The words hit me. As agreed. And Dad’s order to stay behind. They had intended to go up against possessed vampire witches alone. They all had a plan that didn’t include us. So did the queen. I opened a private channel and said, “Grizz. Are your orders to help us or try and stop us?”
“We’re yours. That was the agreement between us and our queen.”
“Good.” The queen had a two-part plan. Two elixired-up vamps against the enemy. Us as backup if it all went to hell. I clicked to general comms.
Walter’s cam tilted toward the ground. His coughing worsened. Transmission ended. Comms cut off.
EJ said, “Something’s—Angie?”
“I don’t know anything. Don’t see anything.” Didn’t feel anything except that something was wrong.
Just ahead, caught in the headlights, a police car blocked the street at an angle in front of us, Rocas and her partner, the rookie, whose name I couldn’t remember. Boots eased to a very slow stop to keep from sliding. “Check it out?” she asked.
“We’ll have a devil of a time getting around it,” Raccoon said. “I’ll recce it and move it, or we can go on foot.”
“We need the car to carry out wounded,” Peewee said.
I froze at the thought. I had brought plenty of healing and specialized trauma amulets, and the team had their own, from my family, but…our people wounded. God forbid, dead.
It was likely.
Letting in a blast of frigid air, Raccoon slipped from the car. Cautiously, he approached the police car and peered into the windows. He opened a door, the sound of twisted metal carrying on the night. Pulling off a glove, he leaned in, then stretched farther.
He was checking pulses. It had looked like a sleepy-time working. Had Cousin Wacko killed them?
Pulling on his glove again, he waved Peewee over.
Together, they dragged a body from the car, opened the back door, and placed the bulky shape on the back seat, before laying the one in the passenger seat over.
They covered each cop with what looked like jackets.
They wouldn’t do that if the officers were dead.
Some of my tension left on an exhale.
Raccoon put the cruiser in gear and let it roll through the next intersection, into a snowbank.
He set the vehicle to full battery backup, little red lights on the dash glowing through the windows.
The door squealed as he tried to shut it.
When Raccoon climbed back into our vehicle, he said, “Hinges look like the jaws of life had a go at ’em.
Cops’re okay, no signs of injury, sleepy-time working as reported. ”
Boots eased through the intersection, passed the cop car, and on down the road. EJ’s vehicle followed a half block behind. I would have words with my dear cousin for using a knockout working on cops, for taking my staff, and my DNA.
“Who you thinking about killing, girl?” Boots asked. “You have a snarl on your face that would curdle milk.”
I smoothed my features but didn’t reply. I readjusted my null cloak, eyes on it, thinking null thoughts.
“Whoever it is,” Boots said, “Grizz has a backhoe. Just saying.”
Despite myself, I chuckled and slanted my eyes at Boots. “That’s your way of saying you have my back?”
“The queen offered our unit this temp gig.” Boots compensated for a slide, still talking.
“She said you might keep us on. We’re getting a little old to keep up the pace of HQ and all the young guard brats who think they’re better than us.
They have more muscle mass but less brains.
Keeping them in their places is wearing us down.
So we’re all in for a semiretirement. Spouses and SOs are on board for a move.
We like Nooga. Slower pace. Lots of hiking and paddling close by.
Housing isn’t outrageous. Good school system. ”
A growing sense of shock washed through me.
Damn it, Aunt Jane. You planned this whole thing.
Planned out, ready, and waiting for the first opportunity to set it in place.
She did crap like this to keep her people safe, but it also smothered the people she was protecting.
I didn’t know what to say or do, but what came out of my mouth was unexpected.
“I don’t want to be responsible for people.”
Boots chuckled softly. “Dayum, girl. You sound just like her.”
Just like her. Just like my aunt.
The car slowed. A shadow slammed into us through the darkness. Landed on the hood with a thump that rocked the car.
I flinched at the noise and shoved against my seat, away from the silhouetted form crouching in front of me, denting the vehicle.
Boots cursed. Hit the brakes. Spun.
The car slid to a diagonal stop, blocking the road. The shadow didn’t shift, one hand gripping the hood, one pressed against the windshield, talons scratching the ice on the glass.
Male. Armored.
Like a wraith, he leaned close, and his gaze stole mine.
Walter. But a Walter I had never seen before.
Raw magic wafted off him in wisps of black smoke, leaving trails in the air.
He was vamped out. His fangs were nearly three inches long.
His eyes, which should be black in the night, pupils wide, the sclera scarlet, were covered by a sheen, a silvered glow of a shadowed magic mist. His brand was a vibrant green, so bright a human could see the glow.
And then I saw his sword lying beside his feet on the hood. It was bloody.
The elixir had done something to him. That coughing. And the camera on his gear had pointed to the ground as if he fell.
My three guards leaped from the car, Boots’s and Raccoon’s weapons aimed at him. Peewee stepped into the snow, a shortsword in her offhand. She kicked the car door shut.
Walter chuckled in the back of his throat. It wasn’t a human laugh. It was all predator, part growl, part challenge. His eyes tracked the guards who ringed him.
“Walter,” I said, knowing he would hear me even through the glass and the soft sound of the car.
His eyes swung back to me, dismissing me. I wasn’t a threat, not to his predator eyes. I had no claws, no teeth.
“Walter,” I demanded, putting force into the soft word. When he shifted his body a fraction away from me, I remembered the tone my aunt used to use in the royal receiving room to do…whatever magic she had done to command vampires. I shoved power into my voice. “Walter. Attend me,” I commanded.
His spelled gaze returned to me. He snarled, but he didn’t turn away this time. Didn’t disregard me.
“Your sword drips the blood of your enemies and mine,” I said, pushing with my magic. No working, nothing but power and intent. “Who have you killed?”
“Three lower-level Mithrans who guarded the back.” He removed his hand from the windshield and shook his sword. The blood was frozen on the blade. “Shiloh killed the one who had Peg. The vampire was playing with him, rather than turning him over to Konstantin for questioning.”
I went cold and stiff at the words. “Playing with him.” That meant blood and pain endured by Peg. Gorge rose in my throat. Peg had suffered enough in the war. He didn’t need pain because of us.
A fleeting thought. Did Peg encourage the vamp to play? To keep himself alive and demon-free? Hoping we would come in time to save him?
“The vampire’s head is resting on the hood of one of their vans as decoration,” Walter said, merciless satisfaction in his voice. “Shiloh forced the vampire who was hurting him to give Peg enough blood to survive and close his wounds before she eliminated him. Good enough in the short term.”
This was a new, dangerous Walter. I squashed guilt and fear deep inside, chaining the dark emotions, and forced my limbs loose, freed my breathing.
The driver’s door opened. EJ slid into the seat beside me. He held out his hand and I placed my hand into his. He hummed a soft note. Warmth eased into me. Pale yellow light swept across me. His magic. I reached toward it with mine. Instinctive.
“Walter,” my brother said, without inflection, without censure, as if seeing a vamped-out Walter on the hood of a car, gripping a frozen bloody sword, were an everyday occurrence. “Do our enemies know we’re here?”
“No cameras. No attack when their people died. Shiloh is inside, reconnoitering.”
“Four entrances available,” Shiloh said over comms. “Church window, car-sized service door at the back of the old service station with an entry for people, and a second entry on the building’s side near the feeding frenzy.
I’d have thought they’d want their demon working to be in the churchy part of the building but there’s nothing there but blood and bodies.
Front entrance is blocked by a stack of them. ”
“Three teams,” EJ said. “Walter and Shiloh enter from the church access window. Angie with Pretty Thang and Grizz at the service door. Raccoon and Boots with me on the far side.”
“What about me,” PeeWee asked, sounding vaguely insulted.