Chapter 22

 

The plan was simple—Pauli zaps his snakey self to wherever Hailey is, snags her, and brings her back here. I didn’t have the advantages I’d had before—none of Isabelle’s powers. But I did still have multiple aspects from several Loa. Even without Isabelle, I could be a force to be reckoned with. The biggest downside was that without her I also lacked the ability to heal myself. That ability had probably conditioned me to be a bit more reckless in the past than I should have been. Sure, wounds hurt. But I could handle the pain. If pain was all I had to risk, I was more inclined to risk my body than when my life might be on the line. I was vulnerable—and Kalfu and Hailey both knew it. To put it plainly, I had to be careful. My friends were all assigned to their various tasks—Sauron and Mikah were off soaring through the clouds gathering Voodoo practitioners from all over the region. Mercy needed to go gather more vampires—but I couldn’t afford for her to leave the ones she had gathered alone here. Someone had to take responsibility for them in case any of them got hungry. The one thing I didn’t want was to turn Vilokan into a vampire buffet.

Ellie, Ashley, and now Tressa, who had apparently joined our little crowd, were trying to get the influx of new Vilokanians settled, organized, and oriented toward what New Vilokan was going to be about. I just came up with that now, by the way. New Vilokan. Kind of has a ring to it, don’t you think?

Bottom line was, I’d have to depend on Mercy—once again—even in my most vulnerable condition, to get through to Hailey. Getting her here wasn’t going to be the problem. Convincing her to betray Kalfu, fuse herself to Isabelle, and then let Isabelle take the reins was going to be another thing entirely. If we couldn’t do that, there was always plan B.

With the plan in place, all we had to do was dispatch Pauli and wait. We went to the academy gymnasium. The place had been warded against several different kinds of magic—mostly to keep students safe—but it wasn’t a completely magic-free zone. Still, if it took a few things out of Hailey’s arsenal, it was worth it. Besides, we needed a good open space, one where there weren’t a lot of gawking newly arrived citizens who might be mildly perturbed to find out we’d brought someone from the enemy’s camp into town on day one. Pauli wouldn’t take long. He’d gotten increasingly proficient at wielding his aspect, and he could practically teleport anywhere so long as he could visualize the place he hoped to go. Pauli zapped away from us—Mercy stood there with her wand ready, just in case she’d need to engage in a witch’s duel once Hailey returned, and I was ready to summon Beli if need be. But I didn’t want to greet her with a blade—usually when you’re trying to convince someone that you’re really on their side, the last thing you want to do is greet them at the point of a blade.

I stood there in awkward silence as we waited. Even ten seconds can feel like ten minutes when you’re in a room, alone, with a vampire like Mercy Brown.

A light reappeared, and Hailey was there, Pauli’s boa constrictor body wrapped around her. Depositing her in the room, Pauli zapped away again and came back into the room a few seconds later.

After momentarily regathering her wits and processing what happened, Hailey looked up at Mercy and me and started laughing. “I should have known! Momma hen and her vampire pawn.”

“I’m no pawn,” Mercy said, narrowing her eyes.

I raised my hand—a subtle gesture meant to diffuse the tension. We were trying to get Hailey on our side, not escalate the conflict. Mercy nodded, and I lowered my hand. “I saw the look on your face when Kalfu took my dad’s power. He’d promised you that power, didn’t he?”

“You think I’m going to talk to you?” Hailey asked. “In case you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m not on your side. And I don’t need your help.”

“You weren’t happy,” I said. “When Kalfu took my dad’s power for himself.”

Hailey shrugged. “It was nothing. Just a bit surprising.”

“Because he’d promised you that power?”

Hailey laughed. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Because when he took that power for himself, it meant he couldn’t acquire Isabelle.”

Hailey bit her lip for a second—her vampire fangs were just starting to come in. “It’s just a minor complication. He’ll get her eventually.”

“Not if you stop him,” I said.

“And why would I do that?” Hailey asked.

“Because he broke his deal with you already. He promised you power, and he took it for himself.”

Hailey rolled her eyes. “Your dad’s ability was just one opportunity. When we saw what your dad could do, and we knew that if Kalfu took that ability it would complicate his ability to absorb Isabelle… well, seemed only natural that I should take that ability myself.”

“You realize it wouldn’t have worked,” Mercy said. “You’re a vampire. You don’t get abilities by biting other vampires.”

“I have my ways,” Hailey said.

“Necromancy?” Mercy asked.

Hailey stared blankly at Mercy. “What is it to you?”

Mercy pulled out her wand and twirled it in her fingers. “I’m a witch too, you know. That makes us pretty unique, you and me. Both vampires. Both witches.”

“Then you know it wasn’t necromancy,” Hailey said. “Not exactly.”

“You were going to try to make him human again,” Mercy said. “That’s the only way. Turn a vampire human, bite him almost immediately while the powers still linger, then you can get them. Tried that once, too.”

“Didn’t work so well for you, did it?” Hailey asked, as if she already knew the answer.

“I did manage to acquire Nico’s abilities when I did that… for a moment.”

“Then Kalfu bit your stupid ass,” Hailey said.

Mercy narrowed her eyes. One thing about Mercy—you don’t want to insult her. It wasn’t that she couldn’t take it, but she wasn’t the sort who relished having her past failures thrown back in her face. I mean, who does really? But with Mercy, if there was one way to guarantee she had a conniption, it was to expose her failings, her weaknesses. She was a power junkie, just like Hailey, just like Kalfu. Only difference was that she had interests on the opposite side of this particular conflict. “You guys think you have this all figured out,” Hailey said. “Poor girl got caught up with big bad Kalfu, if only we can show her that we really care!”

I stared at Hailey, trying to emphasize the point that we did care—but she wasn’t buying it because, well, she didn’t care.

“Truth is,” Hailey said, “Kalfu isn’t the one you should be afraid of.”

Suddenly Hailey’s eyes glowed green—I knew that green. Holy shit… she’d already been fused with Isabelle! She extended her hand as if she intended to release a torrent of Isabelle’s magica… but the green faded.

“She cut you off,” I said. “She can do that, you know.”

“Stupid bitch!” Hailey screamed.

“Hey, that’s my friend you’re talking about!” I protested. I needed to cut a gate to Guinee—if Mercy could throw her through the gate, I could join her there and try to get Isabelle in the driver’s seat.

“Beli!” I shouted.

Nothing happened.

“Fuck!”

Hailey laughed. “Isabelle knows why it won’t work… it’s because she’s with me now.”

The elementals that had formed Beli—some of them came together because they were drawn to me, some of them because of Isabelle. Now, I had nothing.

Mercy extended her wand and cast something at Hailey—I wasn’t sure what it was. Hailey raised her wand and deflected Mercy’s spell with one of her own.

“Just wait until I get control over this, bitches! In the meantime, we’ve got a war to wage.”

“A war?” I asked.

Hailey smiled wide. “Kalfu’s goal is to take over Guinee, eventually. But he figured why not have a little fun here first. Take over this world. You know, just for practice.”

“It won’t work. You have the power he wants. He will betray you again.”

“Again?” Hailey asked, incredulity bathing her words. “Looks to me like I got even more than he’d promised. Once he and I conquer this world, he can have Isabelle and take Guinee for himself. I’ll be free to rule here. Sounds like a deal to me.”

Hailey dropped something at her feet, a cloud of black smoke billowed around her body, and she was gone.