Magic Rises kd-6 Page 35

  “No!”

  Curran veered, avoiding the flames at the last second. Oh good. I exhaled.

  Desandra shrieked, and then a child cried, a weak mewling sound. I glanced back. Saiman lifted a newborn boy, wet and bloody. A moment later Doolittle handed a second infant over to Aunt B. She turned. The thing in her arms wasn’t a human baby. It wasn’t a wolf, it wasn’t a cat, it was a strange creature covered in soft scales, the beginnings of rudimentary wings thrusting from its back. The creature screeched and tried to bite Aunt B.

  “Your firstborn is a wolf,” Doolittle said.

  The bewildered expression peeled off Radomil’s face, leaving a hard ruthless intelligence in its place. “That does it,” Radomil said. “Kill them all.”

  The Volkodavi snarled in unison. Their human skins ruptured. Flesh and bone boiled out, scales covered the new bodies, and a dozen lamassu took flight.

  The flames exploded with bright orange. Heat bathed me. The castle rumbled again. Another peal of thunder rolled, dazing the shapeshifters. The crack split sideways, cutting half of the lamassu from us.

  “The castle is breaking apart,” Aunt B said. “We need to go.”

  “Not without Curran.” I pulled the magic to me. Maybe a power word would work.

  On the opposite side Hugh said something and staggered back, as if someone had thrust a sword through his gut. Ten to one that was a power word that backfired. I felt nothing. The flames remained unimpressed. Okay, scratch that idea.

  “Kate?” Keira asked. “What do we do?”

  We had to get the hell out of here, before the castle fell apart and plunged off the cliff. In the hallways, the lamassu couldn’t swarm us. We’d have the advantage.

  I spun to the flames.

  “Go!” Curran yelled at me through the fire. “I’ll find you.”

  There was nothing I could do to help him. I had to get our people out of there and then I’d go around and I would find him.

  “I’m coming back!”

  “I know!” He waved at me. “Go!”

  I turned to the shapeshifters. “Grab Doolittle, George, and Desandra. We’re getting the hell out of here.”

  “Don’t lose her,” Hugh bellowed at the Masters of the Dead. “Go around! Take her alive!”

  “You won’t touch her,” Curran snarled, and charged Hugh.

  * * *

  I wanted to stand and watch. I wanted to know he would be okay. Instead I ran for the door. The sooner I found a way around, the sooner I could help him.

  Barabas grabbed the wolf newborn, thrust him into Desandra’s hands, and picked her up off the floor. Derek grabbed Doolittle out of his chair, Aunt B picked up George, and Christopher somehow ended up with the baby lamassu. They followed me.

  A lamassu swooped down on us. Andrea fired. The bolt bit into the beast’s eye. The lamassu spun, careened, and flew into the fire. Her body burst into white flame. The fire grew, widening the gap.

  A door blocked our way. I drove my shoulder into the wood and bounced off.

  “Eduardo!” I yelled.

  The werebuffalo rammed the door. Splinters flew.

  Another lamassu dove at us. Keira jumped, turning in midleap. A sable-black panther in a warrior form slapped the lamassu out of the air. He crashed. We swarmed it. I stabbed into the orange flesh. Keira bit into its throat, gouging huge chunks of flesh out.

  The lamassu convulsed, beating one wing against the floor.

  “Go!” I barked.

  The shapeshifters fled past me into the hallway.

  “Keira!”

  She tore herself away from the lamassu, reached the door in two great leaps, and ran. I followed her.

  “Kill him,” Hugh bellowed in the hall. Curran’s roar answered. He was saving me again. I had to find him. I’d get our people out and then I would find him.

  We were on the south side, facing a sheer cliff. Flames blocked the hallway to the right. Running left, east, and then north was our only option.

  A lamassu crashed into the doorway, skidding into the wall, and chased us. No room to maneuver for him or us.

  Keira tried to push past me. I held out my hand. Hugh or not, I had to get my people out of the castle.

  I spat a power word. “Aarh.” Stop.

  Magic ripped from me. It hurt so much, the world blinked.

  The lamassu froze, its limbs locked. Keira dashed past me. A huge spotted bouda leaped over my head and tore into the lamassu, savaging its neck with a flurry of strikes. “Run,” Aunt B yelled. “We’ll catch up.”

  I ran and turned the corner. Four different hallways branched from the main one. Damn it, Hugh. If I survived this, I would find him and I would beat his head with a brick for building this damn labyrinth. I spun and saw Barabas’s white shirt as he disappeared behind a corner to the right. I ran after him.

  Keira and Aunt B caught up with me, both bloody. We galloped down the hallway. Almost to the corner.

  Barabas whipped about the corner, carrying Desandra, running full speed. I threw myself against the wall. They dashed past me.

  “Vampires!” Andrea yelled as she passed me.

  Undead magic lashed me, swelling like a tidal wave around the corner. Damn it all to hell.

  I did a one-eighty and followed them. Next to me Christopher was smiling, running with a now-human baby in his hands. “This is so fun!”

  This had to be some kind of twisted nightmare.

  We made a sharp left, then another, and burst into another hallway, parallel to the first one. The revolting undead magic washed over me. The bloodsuckers were coming from behind us and from the right, trying to box us in. One, two . . . Fourteen. Fourteen undead minds.

  We had Desandra, who was barely conscious; two infants; Doolittle, who couldn’t walk; and George, who was out like a light. There was no way we would win that fight.

  I stopped and turned.

  “Mistress?” Christopher called.

  “Kate?” Andrea crashed to a halt next to me. “What are you doing?”

  “The vampires are chasing me, not you,” I said. “Go. I’ll lead them off.”

  “Don’t even think about it,” Andrea said. “I’ll carry you if I have to.”

  “I’m your alpha.”

  “The hell you are.”

  I drew Slayer across my left forearm. Blood swelled, its magic sharp. “Take our people and Desandra out of this castle. Secure the panacea. That’s an order.”

  She hesitated.

  “I know what I’m doing. Go.”

  “I’m coming back for you.”

  “Good. Go!”

  She ran. Who said I wasn’t a good liar?

  The undead were drawing closer. I turned and walked into the side hallway, moving slowly, shaking my left arm once in a while. Come on, sharks. There’s blood in the water.

  * * *

  The short passage ended in a stairway. Might as well. The more time I bought the guys, the better.

  I reached the next floor. A round room lay before me, the top floor of a low tower under a simple roof. Arched windows turned its wall into a latticework of stone and night sky. As good a place as any.

  The air smelled of thick smoke. To the left and to the right, the castle burned. Flames shot out of the fissures fracturing the stone walls.

  The vampires were almost at my heels.

  I stopped in the center of the room and raised my sword. I could probably grab a few of the undead with my mind, but any trained Master of the Dead would be fighting for control, and Hugh’s guys were unlikely to be weak amateurs.

  The first vampire scuttled out of the opening and moved to the right of me. It moved on all fours, as if it had never walked upright. A thick pallid hide shielded its body, the network of lean muscle running over its back and limbs. I could count every rib. A spiky ridge thrust along its back. Its head stretched forward as if someone had taken the bones of its skull and pulled them to support the oversized jaws. A pre-Shift vampire.

  The older t
he vampire, the more the Immortuus pathogen transformed the original human body. This one was really far gone. No traces of a person remained.

  The bloodsucker stared at me with glowing red eyes, like two coals in an old fire. I’d encountered pre-Shift vampires before and always in connection with my father. They shouldn’t have existed. Before the Shift we had no magic, but there it was, a lethal, undead abomination.

  Another bloodsucker joined the first. They stared at me with starved eyes, filled with mindless, endless hunger. Given free rein, they would slaughter me and keep going until they ran out of things to kill. Only the steel cage of the Masters of the Dead would keep them in check.

  The undead horde spilled into the room.

  The first bloodsucker unhinged its jaws and a clear cold male voice issued forth. “Lay down your sword. Put your hands on the back of your head.”

  I simply looked at him. I could feel the undead mind, a hateful penlight in the nearly empty skull.

  “Lay down your sword or we will be forced to subdue you.”

  Subdue me, huh. “Why don’t you try?”

  A vampire lunged for my legs. I cut across his neck. My blade barely grazed it. The bloodsucker withdrew. Undead blood dripped on the floor. It called to me, the magic in it shivering and twisting, alive on its own.

  “There is no need for violence.”

  I laughed. The glowing sparks of the vamp’s mind taunted me. I’d always wanted to crush one. Just squeeze it with my magic until it snapped like a flea caught between two fingernails. I’d never tried it. I always had to hide my power.

  The undead shifted in place, moving into position. They would rush me in a minute.

  “When a vampire dies while the navigator is controlling its mind, the navigator’s brain thinks he died instead of the vampire. Two outcomes are possible,” I said, gathering my magic. “One, the navigator goes catatonic. Two, he goes mad.”

  The vampires stared at me.

  “Which one do you think you will be?”

  “Apprehend her,” the male said.

  I reached with my magic, grabbed the nearest undead minds, and squeezed. The heads of the three vampires right in front of me exploded. Bloody mist splattered onto the stones and neighboring bloodsuckers. Undead blood spilled onto the stone floor. Two vampires in the back screamed in a high-pitched female voice, a mindless gibberish howl.

  A vamp leaped at me. I sliced it with Slayer, grabbed more minds, and squeezed again. More heads exploded, the undead blood spray blossoming like crimson carnations. Its magic begged me to touch it.

  Another bloodsucker leaped, while the third raked its claws down my back. I crushed their minds one by one, until only one remained, the one whose navigator had ordered me to surrender.

  Hot crimson painted the stones of the tower around me. Its scent enveloped me. Its magic called to me, pulling me, pleading, waiting and eager, like a cat arching its back for a stroke. What did I have to lose anyway?

  I reached out and answered the blood’s call.

  The undead crimson streamed to me, pouring out of the headless corpses, merging together into currents like capillaries flowed into veins. The thick, viscous liquid pooled around my legs. I pumped my left arm and let the blood from the cut drip into the puddle of red below.

  The first drop landed and the reaction it set off sparked through me, like a rush of adrenaline. The blood twisted about me, suddenly malleable. It coated my feet, my legs, wound about my waist, and climbed higher, covering my body. It wasn’t well-formed, not an armor yet but a flexible coat that felt like an extra layer of skin, that wrapped around me like crimson silk. It felt like I was dreaming.

  The lone vampire knelt on one knee and bowed his head. “My lady,” the navigator said.

  I raised my hand. The blood silk ran down my forearm, hardening into a three-foot spike. I shoved it forward. The bloodsucker’s eyes flared bright red—the Master of the Dead had fled its mind—and I rammed the spike into its skull, scrambling its pitiful excuse for a brain.

  The spike crumbled into dust. The bloodsucker toppled over. I moved and the blood moved with me, pliant and light. So that was how one made blood armor.

  A roar tore through the night. A giant lamassu swept through the sky toward me. The scales on its stomach glowed with orange, reflecting the flames below. Beautiful . . . So large, like a dragon come to life. It swooped closer and rammed the tower’s roof. Stones rained down around me. A chunk hit my shoulder and bounced off the armor. The wind from the lamassu’s wings buffeted my face.

  It flipped around, diving for me.

  Reality smashed into my magic-addled brain, shattering the dreamlike haze. Oh shit.

  * * *

  I ducked, but too late. The claws hooked my shoulders, piercing the thin layer of blood armor. My legs left the ground. I gritted my teeth and stabbed straight up with Slayer, right into the beast’s gut, not enough for serious damage but enough to make him pay attention. Fire flashed below me, the sections of the castle like stone islands in the sea of flames. The lamassu careened, swinging above a tall square tower. The top of the main keep. Now was my chance.

  I strained and stabbed straight up, again and again, mincing muscles with Slayer. Blood ran down the pale blade. Drop me. Drop me, you sonovabitch.

  With a thunderous roar, the beast let go. I plunged through the air, bending my knees. The impact punched my feet. I landed on the balls of my feet, rolled forward, trying to spread the collision force, and scrambled up.

  We were on the top of the keep, a square of stone. The lamassu landed at the end, its distinctive green eyes furious and familiar. Radomil.

  The lamassu walked paw over paw, his cavernous mouth open wide.

  I flexed my left wrist, popping a silver spike out of the wrist guard into my palm. I used to have needles, but I could afford more silver now.

  Radomil bent his head low, his muscles tensing.

  “Bring it.” I pulled magic to me. I’d timed it last time. I’d have a second and a half.

  He charged.

  I sprinted. “Aarh!” Stop.

  The pain of a power word exploded in the back of my skull. Blackness mugged me. My momentum carried me through it. I tore through the haze.

  Time slowed to a crawl.

  Radomil stood frozen in midstep. I punched the spike into his throat, stabbed Slayer into his gut, and dragged the blade, wrenching it with all my strength, ripping a gap in his stomach from foreleg to hindquarters.

  Radomil’s legs trembled. I yanked a bag of powdered silver granules from my belt, ripped it, and emptied it into the wound.

  Radomil whipped about. Claws scoured my back. It felt like someone had dripped molten metal down my spine.

  I ran.

  Right now silver was burning his insides. The longer it melted his innards, the less work I’d have to do. The sound of huge feet thumping behind me chased me, blocking out the roar of the fire. I lunged to the side. He hurtled past me and whirled, snarling. Gray blood wet the cut. Singed with silver, the laceration refused to close, and his body sped up the bleeding, trying to purge the poisonous metal from his system.

  Radomil swayed and charged me. A big feline paw raked at me. I sliced with my sword. He swiped at me again, like a housecat trying to shred a toy, except Radomil was forty times the size of a housecat. I cut across his paw.

  Radomil rammed me. I clutched onto his scales and stabbed into his chest with my sword. He leaped up, the wings beating, roaring in pain. I hung from his neck fifty feet above the fire raging below. To let go was to die. Radomil bent in midair. The claws of his hind feet ripped into my armor, down my side, and deep into my right leg. My whole body hurt so much, I no longer cared.

  Radomil careened back toward the keep, screaming. The gap in his stomach hung open. Now or never. I stabbed my sword straight into the wound. Radomil plunged down. My hand slipped off the scales. For one desperate half-second I held on, and then I fell. There was no time to right myself. The orange body t
hudded onto the stone with a wet thud. I fell next to it.

  * * *

  The world swam. The air vanished, sucked out of the Universe. I gulped like a fish on dry land, trying to inhale and failing. Don’t pass out. Just don’t pass out.

  My lungs opened. I inhaled smoke-ruined air, coughed, and rolled upright. My left arm hung limp. It hurt so much, I couldn’t tell if it was broken. Hot wetness ran down my back. I was bleeding.

  The orange body shivered and melted back into human form. Radomil’s beautiful face looked at the sky.

  Everything hurt. It hurt so much, I could no longer tell what hurt the worst. But I was still breathing. Without the armor, I would’ve been dead. His claws would’ve finished me.

  I staggered to my feet and dragged myself to the door leading down. A wall of fire greeted me. The heat pushed me back. Out of the question. The flames would cook me two steps in.

  I limped to the eastern side of the keep and looked down. The wall was sheer, the stones fitted together so closely they might as well have been a single smooth block of concrete. No way. With a rope, maybe, and even that was risky. Bleeding, ropeless, and with one bum arm, no.

  Flames filled the courtyard. The roofs of the side towers had crashed down and the blackened beams popped like logs in the fireplace. Cracks filled with orange-and-blue flames fractured the huge building. The castle was breaking apart. It looked like hell on Earth.

  The doors of a side tower burst. Furry shapes ran out—shapeshifters in half-form making a break for the gates. I saw Christopher’s blue shirt. The familiar gray werelion was missing. Curran wasn’t with them. He hadn’t made it out. Where are you?

  I inhaled a lungful of sooty air. “Hey! Andrea! Look up!”

  They didn’t hear me. They were running too fast, the way one ran when chased.

  People in black and gray poured out of the doors. The Iron Dogs, at least fifteen, probably more.

  The shapeshifters ran through the fire. Derek’s shaggy back flared, the fur igniting in a flash. He kept running, carrying Doolittle forward. The Iron Dogs followed as if the fire weren’t even there.