I didn’t hear Justin’s police siren. That should have been my first clue.
Justin, why aren’t you arresting these fucks? Or shooting somebody?
I had the flare in my left pocket. I angled my body to lead with my right side, hoping I could get at the flare and strike it without too much fuss.
Yeah, right.
The .45 in my right hand, I slipped down the first few steps. Hannah followed close behind. Drake was at the bottom, waiting for us. Surrounded by five of his lackeys, he stood, palming the copper disk. I pointed the gun at him.
“I don’t think so,” he said, raising the disk.
My right hand exploded in a burst of sudden heat. The pain was so intense I had to check to make sure my hand hadn’t actually vaporized. It hung at the end of my wrist, bright red and throbbing. My gun tumbled down the steps. Drake lowered the disk, and the pain ebbed. It did not disappear.
“I’m afraid your backup has been detained,” he said.
There was a smattering of snickers from the group around him.
Great. Just fucking great.
“So thoughtful to save us the trouble of coming to get you. And now, as I said, we will use you for our ceremony, and her for our entertainment,” Drake declared.
He was performing. I really fucking hate that.
“Yeah,” I said, “Mister thoughtful, that’s me.”
He started raising the disk again.
“Wait,” I said, desperately stalling for time, “Don’t you want your lap dogs here to know how superior you are to me?”
I know, sounds like feeble old spy movie lines, but it was the first thing that came to mind. It seemed to work. He lowered the disk.
“I mean,” I said, slowly reaching into my left pocket, “I got in here, through your web of whatever. I would have gotten out too, without you knowing anything. Let’s face it, it’s just dumb luck that you got the drop on me.”
Laying it on pretty thick Caleb.
Sure I was, but Drake seemed to be nibbling at the bait.
“Isn’t there something in the cultist handbook that says you have to prove you’re better than me or something?” I asked.
Maybe I could push him into a display of power. I had no idea if I could use it to my advantage, but just then I needed time. Maybe I could get him to make a mistake. All the while, I was slipping the flare out of my pocket. I held it behind me as discreetly as I could. Hannah took the hint and plucked it from my fingers. Drake looked like he’d rather not bother with this, but I could see the anticipation in the faces of his followers. They wanted to be blessed with a show.
“Come on,” I said, “If I’m going to be sacrificed or whatever, don’t let me go out thinking it was just bad luck.”
I studied his face as he thought it over. He couldn’t have been a day over twenty-four. Too young to have that kind of power and not want to show it off.
“Very well,” he said.
A ripple of what can only be described as merriment ran through the cluster of greasy minions around Drake.
Good.
Good? What’s so good about it?
I didn’t know, but at least he wasn’t using the mojo on me. Every second he didn’t act gave me more of a chance to escape whatever he had planned for us.
Chance favors the prepared mind.
I don’t know why I had that thought at that moment. I couldn’t even remember where I had heard it before.
Drake raised his left hand, fractionally, and began murmuring under his breath. The room, already dim, got darker. Every pool of shadow extended, reached out as if to swallow as much of the light as it could get in its gaping maw. Drake’s audience fell into an expectant hush. The shadows grew blacker still and flowed towards us at the top of the stairs like an unstoppable wave. The air took on a chill. Then it got colder. It became difficult to breathe. I closed one eye.
“Now,” I tried to shout, but it came out at less volume than my normal speaking voice.
Hannah heard me all the same.
She struck the end of the flare. It sparked into red, exploding life. The light was so intense it pushed back against the swell of shadow like a physical force. Hannah yelped and flung the flare away – right over my head. It flipped end over end, towards our hosts. The cloud of shadow howled. The booze-soaked handle of the flare caught a spark and ignited in a blaze of blue. The flare cartwheeled through the intervening space, sending off showers of red and blue sparks in great gouts. It missed Drake by inches.
She’d been tied up for ages. In retrospect, it was a better throw than I should have expected. It was close enough.
Boots scattered as lackeys and lapdogs scrambled for cover. The darkness did not relent.
Well, not right away.
The flare, amped up by whatever was going on between fire and me, had missed Drake by inches, but it had hit the wall dead on. It bounced off the wall and rolled back to rest at the base of the banister. The banister on which I had dumped the rest of the pure grain alcohol.
In rapid succession, the banister torched a beautiful azure flame. The wash of blue quickly raced down the walls and floor of the hallway I had sprayed on my way upstairs. Alcohol doesn’t burn for very long, at least not the kind you can safely drink, but fire and I had an arrangement, and that gave the alcohol enough of a boost to be seriously dangerous.
Everyone’s eyes had adjusted to the darkness. The shadow had dissipated. With the dried, rotted wood and wallpaper in the hallway now ablaze, anyone not keeping one eye closed was temporarily blinded. Without bothering to catch my breath, I rocketed down the steps two at a time. Near the bottom, I grabbed a baluster and yanked hard. It came free with a sickeningly soft and dry-rotted crack. One end was still on fire. When I hefted it, the flames flared up like a Fourth of July finale.
I was off the steps and headed for Drake. He had stopped muttering and was raising the disk. I swatted it with the burning baluster. Drake yelped in surprised pain. The disk scattered out of his grip.
Now it’s my turn, motherfucker.
I brought the burning hunk of wood back up and swung for his head. He dodged, right into one of his crew. They both stumbled backward against the wall. I advanced on them, hoping their night blindness would hold out for another few seconds. I swung. Drake ducked and let his lackey take the brunt of the burning blow, right at the juncture of his neck and shoulder. The kid cried out in pain. And then his shitty dyed black hair went up in a blaze.
He screamed, ran, and slapped his head hard enough to knock himself senseless. Unfortunately for him, the fire licking his scalp was not going to allow that. He ran amongst his brethren, looking for help. He didn’t get any. They scattered from him like beads of water on a hot plate.
In the confusion, I lost count of Drake. That didn’t last. He was bent over, picking up his copper toy, when I found him again. I rushed him. He raised the disk and the fire at the end of my makeshift club went out. It didn’t even sputter. He shot me a satisfied look and raised the disk higher. Then the pain started.
It was worse than any of the times before. I dropped to my knees, struggling to breathe. My brain just stopped working. I was only dimly aware that the fire was consuming the house, much faster than it should have been. I heard footsteps, clunking boots maybe. I looked up and saw it as it happened.
“Son of a bitch,” Hannah screamed while launching a slender foot into Drake’s groin from behind.
He collapsed to the ground, vomiting.
Hannah plucked the disk from his weakened grip. The hot pain disappeared. She kicked him again, harder this time, right on the tailbone. She spat something in Greek and kicked him a third time. I picked myself up and put a hand on both her shoulders.
“I think that got him,” I said.
“Which one?” she asked, catching her breath.
“The first one, probably,” I said.
She nodded in approval and almost fainted. I caught her before she fell. She came around quickly and took back possession of her feet.
“I’m ok,” she said.
“Good,” I said, picking up my gun, “I think it’s time to leave.”
“Good,” she said, “I’m never eating barbeque again.”
Me, neither.
“Keep hold of that,” I said, pointing to the disk.
“Sure,” she said. “What do we do with him?”
“Could leave him here,” I said, already reaching for his limp body. “He might burn up with the joint. Then again, he might consider that a heroic death.”
“Better take him along, then,” she said, remarkably calm for the situation.
“Yeah,” I said, wrenching his arm behind his back in a hammerlock, “Prison will be so much more fun.”
“As pretty as he is,” she said as I looped my other arm around Drake’s neck, “Maybe burning alive would be preferable to repeated anal rape.”
“Nasty mind on you,” I said, shoving Drake’s barely conscious body to the door. “Still better than he deserves.”
“I’ll never see the inside of a cell,” Drake choked. “I have powerful friends. You will pay for this insult.”
Did he just say, “You will pay for this insult?” What kind of movie does he think we’re in?
I didn’t bother to respond to his threats, just cinched up the hold on his throat and walked him towards a non-fiery death. With every step and every breath I took, my ribs shot pain around my chest and up through my skull. Blood ran from where I had broken open my nice new stitches. I was running on a mixture of adrenalin, and pure willful spite. And I just wanted all of this to be done. But I couldn’t help but feel like I had forgotten something.
The fucking knife!
I decided to go back and get it once I had Hannah safely outside. We got to the threshold and out onto the porch without incident. Apparently, the would-be minions had beaten us to the escaping. They were nowhere to be seen. Then again, neither was Justin.
Where the hell is Justin?
The word ‘detained’ rang off the inside of my head.
Again, shit!
Not far from Justin’s cruiser was a lump of a person. No, not a lump, but two people. One standing behind the other, much like the position I was in with Drake. Just like us, with one exception: the guy holding onto Justin had a very big knife pressed to his captive’s throat.
Short, Dark and Stupid.
I should have fucking known.