Birthright - Book 2 of the Legacy Series (An Urban Fantasy Novel) (30 page)

“This one took a little coaxing, but he was worth it. That snake tail serves as a surprise counter attack, and once they get running, nothin’ can stop them. Poison claws, poison fangs, and poison snake - this guy’s perfect to stop someone with your powers, Erik. And they never make a sound. Ain’t predators awesome?”

The nue made its noise again. I would have told Crowley to go blow himself, but I was too busy trying not to die. As long as that overgrown gorilla kept pumping venom in me, I’d never be able to move. Crowley might be a creep, but he’s a good hunter. A smart one, and those are the worst kind.

Trust me, I grew up with one.

“Why?” I have no idea how I managed it. A smart person would have conserved his energy.

But I’m not a smart person. I’m a curious one.

Crowley appeared very happy with my question and did a little dance.

“Why?” he repeated. “Tell me, Erik, have you figured out what it is, exactly, that I do? Or what I am? Or why I look like this?”

I didn’t answer for reasons I already explained.

Giant monkey. Stabbing. Poison. Erik dying.

“I ain’t no vampire if that’s what you’re thinking. Nah, I’m human, just like you.” He paused for effect, and when I didn’t get it, he kept talking. “I’m a specialist, and my magic
du jour
is abjuration. It’s that class of magic that amplifies energy, playing around with it like a musician. We take stuff that’s already there and make it better. Yeah, not that impressive, I know. We’re like some damn Japanese corporation.”

He spun and spread his hands, like a stage magician preparing for his final trick.

“But,” he hollered with glee, “the true essence of abjuration is the pure, core energy. This is too abstract for most wizards to grasp, which is why we don’t get a lot of customers. But I have figured something out. What if I could reverse the process? Instead of hitting the amplify button, what if I were to press mute?”

Reverse of amplification? That would mean…

“You seem to have figured it out, by the look on your face,” Crowley hollered. “I decay magic. If I see it, it’s dead meat. No energy, no juice. No juice, no spell, and all you’re left with is some retard who thinks he’s better than you cause he’s a pyromancer or somethin’.” He licked his lips.

“Why, you ask? Because I get off on it. I get this tingly feeling in my naughty parts when I feel all that powerful, powerful magic just… die.” He laughed manically and shivered.

Tenzin let out a string of heartfelt laughter.

“The hell you laughin’ at, Mr. Chink?” said Crowley. “You snap or something?”

“No, no,” said Tenzin in between laughs. “It’s just, ever since Erik told me about you I’ve been very concerned about you. Now I understand you, Mr. Crowley, and that will be your downfall.”

“My downfall? You’re being humped by my goblins and
I’m
losing?”

“Yes,” replied Tenzin, serious again. “Like most men, you talk a lot. But you never pause to listen. I have listened. Here is what I discovered.”

Light erupted from Tenzin like a flash bang grenade, and a small monkey made out of an ethereal, translucent material flipped twice in midair before spinning and diving right through Tenzin. A goblin tried to grab it, but his hand just passed through.

The earth shook violently, and vines, each thicker than my entire body, emerged from all around us. Trees and vines grew from between the concrete of Carson Mansion, each wrapping around the weird towers. The ground beneath us leveled. A particularly vicious root smacked against the nue and whipped into me. I went airborne for a second before slamming against a tree stump. The vine wrapped around the nue. It tore the vine off, but others encased the monster, tightening around its neck and torso like a constrictor. The nue’s movements slowed down, and soon, sluggish became still. I found that I could move slightly again, with the poison-pumping claws now out of me. It was still painful, and I wasn’t in any shape to run or fight.

Crowley seemed to be the only one to have it under control.

“Hold him steady,” he roared at the goblins. They screamed, but held Tenzin fast.

“I grew up in Vegas,” said Crowley as he grabbed a vine. “I know a bluff when I see one.”

The raging foliage ceased growing, and Carson Mansion looked like something out of Jumanji. The vines began to recede and wither away as Crowley began focusing his magic, and soon the entire mass of vegetation disappeared.

“It was no bluff, Mr. Crowley,” said Tenzin. “You may be able to make yourself invulnerable to magic, but the same cannot be said for your surroundings.”

Crowley figured it out and let go of the vine as if it were plague-infested.

Behind Tenzin, a flash of light became a bovine with a pair of horns. It snorted and charged, once again disappearing into the Asian man. Tenzin’s bones cracked and I saw his muscles bulging - no, growing. His body grew bigger and thicker, going from frail old man to Schwarzenegger.

“Thank you for weakening the foundations for me,” said Tenzin with glee.

Then, he did one of the most badass things I’d ever witnessed in my life.

Completely ignoring the goblins latched onto him, the steroid-infused version of Tenzin stood, one leg at a time, muscles bulging and veins popping. He yelled and fell forward, slammed both fists, and the goblins attached to his arms, into the ground. A loud blast rang out like a hundred cannons going off at once, and I felt the vibrations punch into my gut like that feeling you get when a jet breaks the sound barrier.

Then, there was silence.

Exactly one second later Carson Mansion, as well as the surrounding buildings, came crashing down.

Now

“You’re responsible for Carson Mansion falling down like a house of cards?”

Amaymon’s feline eyes held mischief in them. “Man, I got new respect for you.”

“I would be more concerned about Erik and his mentor being buried under a house,” said Sun Tzu.

Amaymon made a mewing noise. “Who gives a damn about him? Look at him, ain’t nothin’ gonna break that ugly mug. I’m just glad that ugly piece of shit got down like the London Bridge in the good old days.”

Sun Tzu and I glared at him, giving him the usual “what-the-heck-is-wrong-with-you-you-twisted-cat?” look. Amaymon shrugged and flicked his tail.

“What? It was tacky.”

“They rebuilt it,” I said. “Almost instantly. Now, it’s even tackier.”

“Just goes to show,” replied the cat. “People are dumb asses.”

Sun Tzu cleared his throat loudly. “May we get back to the subject at hand?” He looked at me directly. “How did you survive this particular ordeal?”

Approximately 8 years ago

I did not black out. I’d expected to black out when a house like a Disney castle fell down on me.

No, I did not black out.

I felt debris cover every inch of my body. Pain didn’t register in individual bits. It was more like a wave, as if a ton of bricks had been dropped on me.

Well, a ton of bricks did just drop on me, so I suppose I know what I’m talking about. The dust settled quickly. I could move, slowly and painfully. But I could move.

I guess I was lucky — that, and the healing magic. My clothes had some rips in them, and a boulder with a jagged edge had blood splattered all over it. My leg was trapped under rubble. I wedged Djinn between flesh and rock, and levered. My broken, swollen leg was already healing.

Around me was a massacre of debris and colorful plaster. Crowley and his goblins were completely buried. The nue’s ugly face was beneath a plank. The monster was unconscious, but still breathing raggedly. Occasionally a finger on its hand, the only thing not buried from sight, would twitch. I could have killed it right then and there, but something, a benevolent voice in my head, told me to forget about it. Tenzin was rubbing off on me.

I went to where I saw the Asian priest last and began hauling stones away. There was no way a person could have survived that, but Tenzin had a knack for surprises. The old man was resilient. He was alive, I knew it.

He had to be.

I found him inside the storehouse, or rather, where it once stood. He was lying face up with one hand across his chest and the other on his stomach. His eyes were closed, and there was no sign of breathing.

“Tenzin.” I went to shake him awake. As soon as my hand reached him, his body enveloped in light, which dimmed just enough for me to make out a long serpentine shape.

The snake had Tenzin wrapped inside it, like a cocoon. It reared up, exposing a long, thick neck, twice my height and as wide as my shoulders. It had a segmented underbelly with light emitting a slightly different hue than its incandescent scales. Its head was hooded, like a cobra’s, with Ba Gua elemental markings on each side — three horizontal lines, either long or divided, placed on top of each other like a box. It had of two of these symbols on each side, blazing gold, the same color as its eyes.

The snake deva, which is what I assumed it was, opened its mouth, revealing a pair of very long fangs and a forked tongue. It brought its head, and those scary fangs, down. My instinct kicked in, and Djinn was already swiping at the snake’s throat. The blade passed through, although it did leave a thin blue line across the brilliant white scales. The serpent flicked its tongue over me once before rearing back. It wrapped around Tenzin, creating a spiral light show. And just like that, it disappeared.

Tenzin opened his eyes and sat up.

“Erik,” he said with a glint of happiness in his eyes. “I knew you would survive, my friend.”

“I wasn’t so sure,” I replied as I helped him up. Tenzin looked fine. More than fine, he looked better than usual.

“What was that thing?” I asked.

“I’m afraid you will have to be more specific.”

“Snake thing. That a deva, too?”

“As a matter of fact, it is,” replied Tenzin. “It serves the purpose of healing and protection.”

“How many of those things do you have?”

“Oh, there are about twelve. But the word ‘deva’ means ‘representation’. Each of the devas is an aspect of
Kami-sama
, like an avatar, if you will.”

“So, in essence, you got twelve mini-gods you can call up at any time?”

“Broadly speaking, yes,” replied Tenzin. I made a mental note to never cross the man ever again.

“You son of a bitch.” Crowley rose like a ghoul from the rubble. One of the swamp goblins threw away a boulder and helped another goblin limp forward.

“You ruined my favorite suit,” continued Crowley as he held up a torn sleeve.

“Mr. Crowley,” said Tenzin as he assumed a fighting stance. “You are just like a cockroach. It seems I would need something on a nuclear scale to get rid of you.” His aura flared into a supernova of painfully bright light, before transforming.

Fire surrounded him, and a tiger’s roar echoed.

The flames coalesced together, and a large tiger, the size of a young elephant, crouched in front of Tenzin like a wild cat protecting its cubs. Crowley’s eyes widened. The goblins bumped into each other in their panic. The tiger leapt over them and exploded into a wave of fire. Soon, the area they occupied was a blazing inferno. Fire rose like a tsunami, and the rock boiled. All the oxygen was sucked away from us. The heat scorched my skin. A pair of steady hands clenched my arm and pulled me away from the fire. Tenzin pushed me behind a corner, two blocks down. I snuck a peak. The entire Carson Mansion area was one giant bonfire.

But not even a blazing inferno was enough to get rid of Crowley. He stood in the middle of the pyre with his arms outstretched and a malignant grin on his lips. His gloves shriveled up into ashen dust, but his creepy, gray-blue hands were intact. Next to him, the goblins screamed and ran as they were burned alive. Their rubbery hides seemed to melt, and once the flames died down, all that was left were two piles of cooked goo and a whole lot of stink. Then I smelled the third goblin, this one long dead under the rubble, as well. Worst of all, I heard the nue scream — the fires must have woken up the beast. It let out a sound that was a lot like sonar, if sonar had a roar mixed into it. The serpent tail reared up like a telescope and hissed at the empty air.

“Kill them!” screamed Crowley. He pulled out the chunky revolver and shot two of the goblin corpses. The shriveled husks swirled with a dull burst of light and reared up, moving like broken marionettes.

“Oh no,” whispered Tenzin. “The kamaitachi act like puppeteers controlling their host body until nothing is left.”

The nue slammed its knuckles on the ground and prepared to charge at the source of our voices.

“I know of a ritual to dissipate the kamaitachi,” said Tenzin. “But I cannot do it with that nue around.”

“Can you do it with just Crowley around?” I asked.

“Yes. He is too weak to cause me any trouble at this point,” replied Tenzin.

I understood what he was trying to say. He relied on me to take down the nue, but he couldn’t ask me to do it. It just wouldn’t be the same. It wouldn’t mean anything.

I squeezed Djinn’s handle. “I’ll do it.”

Tenzin looked up.

“I’ll distract the nue,” I repeated. Tenzin placed his hand on my forehead and muttered a few words of prayer in his native language.

“For good luck,” he said.

Everything, even a ten-foot tall gorilla monster coming at you at a hundred miles per hour, halts suddenly when something jumps in front of them. A streak of azure energy crashed against its forward arm. The nue tipped forward, crashing painfully on its elbows. A second streak shot forward, and I ran off after it, using the light as cover. Hyped up with adrenaline, I remembered a meme I once heard my sister say.

“Monkey see, monkey do.” The nue raised its arm against the streak of energy. Djinn’s magic had absolutely no effect against the monster’s thick hide.

But I had it right where I wanted it.

“Cause monkey has low IQ.”

Still blind from the second energy streak, the nue held its arm raised and its eyes closed - which meant it couldn’t see the awesome Jackie Chan stunt I pulled.