Magic Breaks

“Bar the door, please,” Ghastek said. “Also, just in case you’re wondering, I have no idea how to open that outer gate.”

“We’ll deal with it when we get there,” Jim snarled.

Thomas picked up the broken wooden bar and slid it back into the rungs. It wouldn’t hold for long, but anything was better than nothing.

Hugh’s face was grim. His cloak was black. His armor was black, too. Clearly he had a theme going. The armor didn’t look like either modern tactical gear or medieval plate. It looked woven, as if tiny metal threads had been somehow made pliant, painstakingly crafted together into a fabric, and molded to Hugh’s muscular frame. The fabric thickened into dense plates, mimicking the large muscles on his chest, stomach, and arms, and flowing over limbs and midway up Hugh’s thick neck. Part of my aunt’s blood armor looked like that, except hers was red. It looked like something my father would make, which meant claws, fangs, and blades wouldn’t cut through it.

I unsheathed Sarrat. It fit perfectly into my hands.

Where to strike? Back of the arm, covered. Inner thigh, covered. Midsection, covered. His face was about the only thing not protected, but he wasn’t going to just stand there and let me take a shot at it. I wasn’t at a hundred percent either. I had a hard time standing.

Hugh’s eyes promised death, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking to the right of me. At Curran.

Curran snarled. His irises went gold. All rational thought fled from his face. His expression turned savage. He grinned, baring his teeth.

Holy shit. Apparently they were happy to see each other.

Hugh reached behind his back and pulled out two short black axes. He pointed one at Curran and roared, “Lennart!”

It was the kind of roar that would cut straight through the chaotic noise of battle. It bounced off Mishmar behind us, and far above the giant birds screeched in alarm.

“Come on!” Hugh screamed.

“Curran?” I asked.

Curran didn’t even hear me. He had already started forward, pulling off his jacket as he moved. The jacket fell on the bridge. Muscles on his back and shoulders bulged under the dark shirt. He broke into a run. Curran was gone. Only the Beast Lord remained.

Hugh gripped his axes. He must’ve decided swords couldn’t do enough damage to Curran, so he went for something that could cleave a limb off in one blow.

“Why isn’t the Beast Lord shifting?” Nasrin murmured next to me.

“No point,” I told her. Curran had fought my aunt with me. He would remember the armor. “Claws won’t penetrate that armor.”

“Shoot anyone who interferes!” Hugh roared and charged.

They tore toward each other. There wasn’t a force on the planet that could stop them from colliding. Here’s hoping the world didn’t end when they hit each other.

I wanted to cut Hugh into pieces. I owed him for Mauro, my broken sword, and seven days in the hole. But Curran owed him for seeing me disappear, for finding out where I went, for running after me across half the country not knowing if I was still alive, and then for fighting his way to Mishmar only to find me half-dead. Curran had a much bigger score to settle.

Blood rushed through my veins. I could hear my own heartbeat. The familiar metallic taste of adrenaline coated my tongue. Come on, Curran. Hit him hard. At least the magic was down.

“Can you take out the gunners?” Thomas asked Andrea next to me.

“No,” she said. “Not while they’re hiding behind the blast shield. I could get one, maybe.”

The two men collided.

Hugh spun the axes as if they weighed nothing and chopped with the right axe straight down, putting all of his power into the swing. Curran blocked the haft with his forearm, but Hugh’s left axe was already moving. The axe head bit into Curran’s stomach and sliced sideways right to left.

No!

The world slowed. I saw the bloody blade of the axe slide free, flinging the fine mist of Curran’s blood into the air. My heart was beating too loud in my head.

Curran dropped his guard. Hugh continued the stroke with his left axe, bringing it up and cleaving with dizzying speed. Curran knocked Hugh’s arm aside before Hugh could bury his right axe head in Curran’s side. Instead, the blade grazed Curran’s side. Move faster, baby. Move. Move!

Curran leaped back. His left side bled. The cut on his stomach couldn’t have been deep, but it bled, too.

Hugh flicked his axes and flung the blood at Curran. Red spray splashed over Curran’s neck and chest. He’d flicked Curran’s own blood at him. Asshole. Hugh smiled. Curran stepped forward, his hands raised, aiming for Hugh’s face. Hugh spun, picking up momentum, and sliced at Curran’s midsection in a horizontal cut with his right axe, leaving his face wide open. It’s a trap, Curran. Don’t!

Curran dodged and rammed his forearm into Hugh’s jaw. No.

Hugh staggered back, leaning back, turning the energy of the impact into his own blow, and chopped at Curran’s left side. The axe bit into flesh at least two inches deep. Damn it all to hell!

Curran danced back. Hugh lunged forward, slicing at Curran’s leading leg. Curran dodged left, jerked his fists up, and brought them down like a hammer toward Hugh’s head.

What was he doing? I kicked the snow. Curran was better than this. I fought him every day in our gym. He was better than this.

Hugh jerked his axes up, hafts crossed, caught Curran’s arms, and pulled the axes apart, letting Curran’s blow slide off. Curran kicked with his left leg, sweeping Hugh’s leading leg out from under him. D’Ambray rolled on the ground and sprang back up. Curran chased him. They moved across the overpass, cutting and blocking, each blow fast and hard enough to knock most fighters out of the fight.

The undead horde behind us was growing closer and closer.

Curran was cut in four places. His blood was all over the overpass. Hugh favored his right leg, but he showed no signs of tiring. His axes cleaved, chopped, and carved, one second aiming to sever an arm, the next threatening Curran’s chest. I began to pace back and forth. It was that or I’d explode.

Another graze of the axe. Another open wound. More blood.

Curran was taking too much damage, even for a shapeshifter. I wouldn’t lose him on this stupid bridge. This wasn’t the way it ended. It couldn’t be. Hugh would not take him from me.

The door behind us shuddered under the press of undead bodies. Finish it. Finish it, Curran.

Hugh reversed the blow and rammed the top of his right axe head into Curran’s midsection. Curran staggered and Hugh smashed the haft of his left axe into Curran’s skull.

My heart clenched into a painful hard ball.

Curran bent forward, dazed.

D’Ambray smiled, his grin demonic, and swung the two axes at once. Stupid flashy move. In my mind the blades connected, like razor-sharp scissors slicing closed. Curran’s head slid off his shoulders . . . My throat closed. I couldn’t take a single breath.

Curran surged up, grabbed Hugh’s wrists, planted his foot into the left side of Hugh’s stomach, and fell back. Hugh tumbled forward, pulled by Curran’s weight. Curran swung his right leg over Hugh’s neck. Hugh crashed to the ground on his back and Curran rolled up on top of him, Hugh’s arm clamped in his hands, one leg over Hugh’s throat, the other over his chest. Juji Gatame, the most powerful armlock in judo.

Curran bent back and pulled the arm. Hugh screamed as his shoulder joint came apart. His rotator cuff must’ve torn. Triceps too, probably. Curran arched his hips. Hugh’s elbow joint popped like a chopstick snapping. Yes! Heal that, you sonovabitch.

Hugh roared and tried to chop at Curran with his remaining axe.

Curran rolled clear.

Hugh staggered to his feet. His left arm hung useless. It was over now. Curran would take him apart piece by piece. Hugh’s face was ashen. He was beaten and he knew it.

Hugh swung his axe. Curran leaned out of the way and hammered a quick punch into Hugh’s face. Ooo, broken nose. Curran spun and kicked him in the chest. Bone crunched. Hugh flew back and crashed into the snow.

The door creaked. In my mind, the space behind the door was just a wall of undeath.

“Shoot the left gunner,” Ghastek said quietly.

Andrea blinked.

The two gunners stood together, the right hidden by the blast shield, the left standing so just the top of his face protruded above the shield as he craned his neck to watch the fight. It was an impossible shot. We were too far away and the target was about the size of a large matchbox.

“Shoot. The left. Gunner,” Ghastek repeated, pronouncing each word exactly.

Andrea snapped her rifle up and fired.

The bullet punched the left gunner right between the eyes.

Ghastek’s scarred vampire shot out from under the bridge and knocked the remaining gunner off his feet. His second vampire leaped onto the Iron Dogs from the other side. Ha! He must’ve sent them under the bridge while we were watching the fight. They had crawled on the bridge’s sides out of sight, and now Hugh had no gun.

Hugh rolled to his feet.

Curran pounced on Hugh. The preceptor of the Order of Iron Dogs tried to kick him. Curran grabbed Hugh’s foot and kicked at the leading leg. Hugh’s knee popped.

In front of me, two of the four remaining Iron Dogs jerked their guns up. Andrea’s rifle barked twice, the shots so close they were almost one sound, and Hugh’s people fell.

The door creaked and groaned under the press of the vampires. We were out of time.

I sprinted to Curran and Hugh.

Curran knocked Hugh off his feet and ground his face into the bridge. I grabbed Curran’s arm. “We have to go.”

He bared his teeth.

“Now!”

Christopher, the two wererats, Nasrin, Naeemah, Ghastek, and Andrea dashed by. Behind us the door burst. An avalanche of vampires poured out onto the overpass. They tumbled over each other, a single huge mass of writhing undead flesh.

Jim landed next to me, his eyes pure green. “Come on!”

We ran.

The undead avalanche rolled over the overpass, dropping loose vampires. Hugh tried to rise. He got to his knees, saw the vampires, and froze. The undead wave crested and swallowed him whole. Bye, Hugh. Have fun with my father’s vampires. It was nice knowing you.

Andrea dropped into the E-50’s gunner seat. Jim landed next to her. The rest of us ran by the gun. I looked over my shoulder. The E-50 whirled and spat a steady stream of bullets, ripping the front line of undead into mush. But the undead horde itself hadn’t even slowed.

I reached behind me with my magic, trying to hold back the horde. It was like trying to block a tide with my fingers. There were too many, and their magic blended them into an unstoppable cataclysmic force.

“Fuck it!” Andrea leaped out of the gunner seat. Jim followed her, abandoning the gun.

Curran grabbed my arm and hauled me forward. I didn’t run, I flew, the air turning into fire in my lungs.

A door to the outside loomed before us, the only break in the sheer wall. We were about to run out of the bridge.

Christopher reached the door and screamed something. Robert dashed to the left, to the other side of the door, and grabbed a lever protruding from the wall. A square section of the wall, about a foot wide, slid open next to Christopher, revealing a complex mechanism of gears and metal dials. Christopher began to turn the dials.

We crashed into the gate. I vomited on the ground.

The mechanism next to Christopher clicked. The door swung open, revealing a narrow stone passageway. An identical door blocked it just twenty feet ahead.

“Hold the lever,” Christopher yelled. “Turn the right gear on your side when I tell you. If you let go, all doors close. They’ll be trapped.”

Robert leaned on the lever. I had no idea how Christopher knew the combination to the gates of Mishmar, but if we survived, I would find out.

Christopher turned the dials.

The second gate opened.

The vampires were almost on us. They swelled behind us, climbing on top of each other, biting, fighting. If they could run, we’d be dead already, but there were too many of them and they trampled each other.

“Go!” Christopher yelled. “Go!”

We wouldn’t make it. I halted by them and pushed the undead horde back. It was like trying to hold back a train. The writhing mass slowed, but it still kept rolling. Curran stopped by me.

Nasrin ran past us. Thomas and Naeemah followed. Jim and Andrea dashed by. Ghastek, his face a mask of complete concentration, moved back slowly.

The pressure on my mind ground me. I shook. I couldn’t hold them. There were too many. Even if we made it through the gates, the horde would chase us. We couldn’t kill them all.

“Go now, mistress!” Christopher yelled.

In my mind, I saw Aunt B standing in front of the gate. No. Not today. Nobody is sacrificing themselves on my account today. I couldn’t go through that again.

Curran pulled my arm. I pulled back. “I’m not going without them.”

The undead minds blended into a single red fire. My mental defenses broke. I staggered back.

Curran swept me off my feet and ran through the passageway.

“Put me down,” I snarled.

“No.” Curran clamped me tighter. “I’m not losing you.”

The third gate opened ahead of us. Beyond, a wide, snow-covered field stretched. Curran carried me outside, dropped me to my feet, and clamped me to him.

“Robert!” Thomas screamed.

Robert leaned into the doorway. I saw Christopher next to him. The slight blond man smiled, his face mournful. Behind them the vampire wave crested, feet away.

No! No, not again, no, no!

Robert looked over his shoulder at the undead horde, then back at Thomas.