Clean Sweep (24 page)

"And once he sees us, it will be a challenge," Arland said.

We stood shoulder to shoulder. "Shouldn't we have set some traps?" I asked.

"He's too mobile," Arland said. "He'd avoid whatever we set up and we'd stumble into our defenses in the fight. Besides, we are the trap."

He and Sean had planted an energy disruptor a few hours ago. According to Arland, it would negate whatever energy weapons the dahaka carried, and apparently, dahakas didn't care for projectile technology.

Sean raised his face to the moon and inhaled. His ears twitched. "Incoming. About two miles out." He glanced at me. "Dina, remember, stick to the plan, no matter how hard it is. It's a good plan and it will work."

A shiver ran down his spine, like fire down a detonator cord. His skin split. Mist swirled around him. For a long moment his face remained human and then it too burst, bones growing, flesh stretching. His back expanded, layered with thick, hard muscle. He raised his new massive arms, which were covered with gray fur, and held them out. The armor burst out of his pores, sheathing the body in a tight dark sleeve. Reinforced plates formed over his abdomen. Flexible darkness covered his massive neck. He pulled his clothes off, ripping them off almost as an afterthought.

The armor sheathed him, dark like tar, but unlike glossy tar, it swallowed the moonlight. The black turned, twisted, lightened, and a pattern of gray and blue formed on its surface, matching the trees and the grass so exactly he became practically invisible.

"Try to keep him still," Sean-wolf growled.

"Worry about yourself," Arland said.

Sean nodded, sprinted across the clearing, and jumped up, scrambling up the tree. His armor shifted, adjusting, and I could no longer see him.

A low, murmuring growl, like a dozen voices speaking at once, rolled through the trees. The stalkers were coming.

"Just like we rehearsed," Arland said and walked over to the side.

"I remember," I told him.

Pale eyes ignited at the other end of the clearing. Thin shapes dashed through the trees.

"No fear," Arland said.

One says be afraid, the other says don't be afraid. Perfect.

The first stalker emerged into the moonlight, an ugly, alien thing. It sniffed the air tentatively and looked at me.

Arland stood perfectly still.

More stalkers joined the first, condensing from the twilight. Wow. I hadn't expected this many. Alarm squirmed through me.

The lead stalker dipped his head, unsure. Behind the horde, a dark shape rose, taller and standing on two legs. The dahaka.

Stalkers were predators. Like dogs, like cats, like bears, they all reacted to the same behavior. It was an instinctual reaction and we were counting on it.

I turned and ran.

The growls behind me raised the hair on the back of my neck, whipping me into a frenzy. I dashed across the field. The noise behind me swelled. They chased me.

I shot through the inn's boundary, sending the magic in front of me in a wide fan. The tops of the Anansi pearls cracked in unison.

I spun around, the broom in my hand shifting into a halberd.

More than half the stalkers ran across the field in a ragged wave, ignoring Arland. The rest lingered at the edge of the field.

The dahaka strode out of the trees. If he called them back now, it was all over. Both Arland and Sean didn't think he would --he would want to take me out before I reached the inn and turned its defenses on him.

Red lines ignited in Arland's armor. The blood mace whined, priming.

The dahaka roared, the remaining stalkers echoing his voice.

Arland snarled back, a harsh, primal challenge.

The stalkers were almost on me.

The tops of the pearls pulsated. Please be ripe, please be ripe...

Arland trotted forward like a tank that was trying to build up speed.

The first stalker crossed the boundary. I let it come.

It leaped at me. I spun my halberd and sliced across its ribs. White blood flew. The stalkers howled in unison and sped up. That's right. Come closer.

The injured stalker whirled and fell as tree roots wrapped around his body and throat.

Beyond the mass of stalkers, the dahaka charged out of the trees and struck at Arland.

The stalkers mobbed me. I cut the first, then the second, spinning the halberd around me, playing for time. Claws carved my leg. Someone ripped at my back. Now.

The ground gave under the stalkers, sucking them in. It wouldn't hold but for a few seconds. That would have to be enough.

The tops of the Anansi pearls burst. Spiders as big as my fist, their backs glowing with electric green, poured out of the eggs. They swarmed the stalkers. Their jaws punctured flesh, injecting lethal poison. The stalkers screeched in unison as their tissue began to liquefy.

In the field, Arland and the dahaka clashed. The alien dwarfed the vampire, towering a full foot above Arland's head. Arland wasn't slow, but the dahaka was so fast. He snarled, turning back and forth, slicing at Arland with a short blue blade. The blows rained on the vampire, but he stood his ground. The stalkers snapped and lunged at him, their claws sliding off his armor.

A chunk of Arland's armor fell to the ground, wet with blood.

The vampire grunted, teeth bared. His mace connected with the dahaka's shoulder. The impact threw the dahaka back. He stumbled, then charged again. Arland braced himself. The alien turned, whipping his massive tail. It smashed into Arland, staggering him to the side.

"Faster," I whispered to the Anansi's children. "Kill faster."

They didn't understand my word, but they understood my tone. The spiders fed faster, gorging themselves. The stalkers inside the inn boundary convulsed, moaning. There was nothing I could do until the stalkers were dead. Both Sean and Arland had stressed to me that this was my part of the plan and it was essential I killed them all.

Another chunk of armor flew from Arland. The dahaka was carving him out of it, piece by piece.

Where the hell was Sean? Come on. He wouldn't chicken out. He just couldn't.

Arland took another tail hit on the side. His head hung. He shook it slowly, as if dazed.

"Faster," I pushed the spiders. If I moved without them, I'd lose control of the swarm. They would live just long enough to fill the Avalon Subdivision with the lifeless husks of its former inhabitants. "Hurry."

The dahaka spun around the vampire like a bladed whirlwind. Blood drenched Arland's armor. He gasped. The dahaka sliced across the back of his legs. Arland went down on one knee.

The largest of the spiders fell on its side. Its legs jerked spasmodically and became still. I had pushed them too far too fast. Damn it.

The last stalker wailed and died.

I strode across the boundary and the rest of the spiders followed me, intoxicated by my magic. Behind me the last of the stalkers sank softly to the ground, dry shells of their formerly impressive selves.

The dahaka barked a short command. The remaining stalkers charged at me.

The alien swung his blade, aiming for Arland's bowed head.

I ran. The spiders surged forward, heading for the alien, and washed over the remaining stalkers.

Three things happened at once: the dahaka struck, bringing his blade down; Arland spun out of the way; and a lean shadow appeared behind the dahaka as if by magic and sank a sword into his spine.

The alien screamed. Sean sliced at him, cutting and slashing with his swords. The dahaka counterattacked with fast, brutal cuts, but Sean was too fast. The assassin's sword whistled through the air, cutting nothing.

The two spiders by my feet cringed and fell over. One by one, my spider horde began to die.

Arland rose to his feet, suddenly fast and limber, and smashed the dahaka's side with his mace. Together the werewolf and the vampire began pushing the dahaka. The blood mace whirred and struck home and for every blow of Arland's weapon, Sean landed two or three cuts. The dahaka fought back with vicious fury. Blood sprayed, and I no longer could tell whose. They kept pressing him, driving him across the clearing toward me.

He should've been disabled by now. That was the plan. But he danced back and forth, fully mobile. At any moment, he could break away and run, and we would have to chase him. Neither Arland nor I would be fast enough. The dahaka was outnumbered and wounded. He was losing and he knew it. I could feel him teetering on the brink of a decision. If he ran, it would be all over.

I melted my halberd in a bundle of blue filaments. It spiraled around my hands and waist, extending to sink deep into the ground behind me. I sent my magic down through it. My power streamed from me like electric current through the wire and back into the inn, forging a connection.

I cried out. It was a small, scared noise.

The dahaka spun and saw me, standing alone and weaponless outside the inn's boundary, my spiders dead around me. The purple eyes gleamed. In the split second he stared at me, I saw the calculation plain in those alien eyes. Sean pressed him from one side and Arland from the other. I was the only possible exit. He could maim me in passing or grab me and use me as a hostage, and either way the two men would abandon their pursuit and concentrate on helping me. It was a win-win scenario.

The dahaka whipped around and charged at me.

Sean chased him, but the alien moved too fast.

I stood still. My heart was pounding too fast to count. Blood thudded through my head. The air tasted like metal.

The dahaka came toward me, fast, unstoppable, like a train flying off the rails.

I spread my arms and leaned forward, bringing them together, my fingers reaching for him. All of my power, everything that made me an innkeeper, moved with me. Behind me the house creaked, mimicking my movement. Every tree branch, every blade of grass, and every stray root reached forward with me. Wind bathed the dahaka like the breath of a giant clearing his lungs just before he inhaled. The alien realized it was a trap and spun around in a desperate rush to get away. Sean cut at him, but the alien batted him aside. For a second the way to his escape looked clear, and then Arland drove his massive shoulder into the dahaka, knocking him back toward me.

I straightened and pulled the empty air with both hands. The wind roared as the entire inn pulled with me. The dahaka howled, straining to resist the storm made just for him. His feet sank into the soil. He dropped down to all fours, clawing at the dirt, screeching in pure terror.

The house and I pulled, trying to drag him into the inn.

The dahaka slid across the grass, straight to me. Somehow he flipped and leaped straight up at me, claws out, teeth bared. Filaments bristled like narrow javelins and shot from me, piercing him in a dozen places. The dahaka howled, suspended in midair, flailing like a fish on a hook. Behind him, Sean leaped ten feet up and severed the dahaka's head with one precise blow.

It rolled to my feet. The purple fire went out of the alien's eyes.

My knees buckled and I sat on the grass. It reached to me, rubbing against me like a cat arching its back, eager for a stroke.

We'd won.

*** *** ***

Sean sat on the grass next to me. Blood slicked his skin. The dahaka had gotten in a few good cuts.

We watched as Arland searched the dahaka's armor. He found something, examined it closely, and came to sit next to us. In his hands was a vampire's crest. He showed it to me. "I activated it and sent a message. He's coming."

"He?" Sean asked.

"My cousin."

"How did you know?" Sean asked.

"He'd opposed the Pact of Brotherhood. Nothing forceful, just a snide comment here and there, enough to let us know he wasn't happy about it. Orig has poor impulse control. As a child, he got into fights for frivolous reasons. As an adolescent, he had to learn the hard way that women don't enjoy being assaulted. He is at his best when he is set loose on the battlefield in the ranks, but in his mind, he is the Marshal. He spoke at the feast in my aunt's honor after we buried her. It was all outrage and bluster and how we would find those responsible and make them regret ever crawling out of their mother's womb. After the funeral I saw him standing by himself. I was above him on the terrace and he thought he was alone. He was smiling. I thought it was odd at the time. I used your terminal to check with the House. They pulled his flight plans for the past six months. A month before the wedding, he'd taken a trip to Savva. The idiot had charged the House for the fuel. There is one in every family."

Sean glanced at me.

"Savva is the mercenary capital of the galaxy," I told him. "If you wanted to hire a killer, that would be the place."

Arland grimaced. "Now I'll have to mop up his mess."

"Now?" I asked.

He nodded. "I want to get this over with."

"Don't you want to heal up?" I asked.

"No, I don't." The way he said it made it clear he wanted the questions dropped.

We sat together, bleeding quietly onto the grass. I hurt in half a dozen places. Funny how in the fight I hadn't noticed, but apparently, I was all cut up to hell. The inn could heal the magical injuries but not the physical ones. Well, this would cure me of looking for trouble for at least a few weeks.

The screen door clanged. I turned around. Lord Soren, out of his armor and limping, struggled forth. He crossed the property and lowered himself on the grass next to Arland.

Arland nodded to him. "Is there a precedent for outsiders serving as witnesses?"

"Yes," Lord Soren said.

"Good."

The sky above us split. A bright red orb formed in the air and drained down in a silent, glowing waterfall of red, leaving three new vampires on the grass. The tallest looked a lot like Arland. If they were human, I'd say the cousin was about six or seven years older, but with vampires, nobody could tell.

Arland rose and walked over. "Why?"

The vampire snarled back.

"Engage your translator," Arland said. "My witnesses don't speak our language."

I leaned over to Lord Soren. "Orig isn't your son, is he?" Because that would be awful.