Demon Squad 7: Exit Wounds (12 page)

Besides, the view was
way
better than the salmon sea of hard wood around us. I settled into a casual pace and let fangs and his newfound companion lead the way, the group shuffling along in relative quiet. But of course my moment in Happy Town was short lived. Slowed down by the caravan of misfits we’d gathered, we couldn’t have traveled more than a couple of miles before Katon brought us to a jarring halt. Ilfaar coughed and spit out some inventive comment as to the breeding habits of someone’s mother, which I presumed to be Katon’s, before the enforcer slapped a hand over the angel’s mouth. After a short stare down, resulting in the angel biting his tongue, Katon passed Ilfaar to Rahim to babysit.

“You’re with me, Frank,” he whispered, turning to the others as they came together in a tight circle. “The rest of you, stay just inside the tree line when we reach it,” he met everyone’s eyes in turn, “and out of sight, understand?”

CB bobbled on Rala’s arm as the others nodded. I could see the question of what we were doing burning in their eyes, but like me, no one asked it. Katon paused a moment to make sure he had our attention before waving us forward. It only took another minute or so before we figured out what had spooked him as he stopped again and motioned for the group to hold. A short distance beyond the cluster of tight tree trunks stood the answer.

We’d found Gilligan’s vacation home.

Much like the set of the original
King Kong
, great planks of wood rose into the sky of the broad clearing. Easily fifty feet high, and coming to a carved point at the apex, they were lashed together with stripped branches that had been woven between the boards by the millions. The pink, blue, and purple of the source materials made me wonder if we’d stumbled across the secret headquarters of My Little Pony. The place might have looked right at home in El Paseo, but slapped in the middle of an alien forest, the DYI Channel abortion looked more playhouse than fortress. At each of the corners waved an oddly plain flag, little more than a slash of red across a black background. The slim wooden poles they fluttered on creaked in the breeze.

A reinforced wooden gate stood about dead center of the place, recessed behind the walls. It wasn’t exactly a marvel of engineering, but it was sufficiently bolted against us by the looks of it. The thing looked super heavy, so I figured there was some sort of primitive pulley system hidden out of sight that allowed them to raise it.

“I don’t see anyone,” I said, my eyes scanning the fortress. The only movement was the sullen flap of the flags.

“Neither do I, but can you smell that?”

I took a quick sniff and realized I could. “Is that…blood?”

Katon nodded. “Would appear so.”

The sharp tang of it was suddenly so obvious I wondered how I’d missed it before it was pointed out to me. Clearly I needed more practice as a vampire before I could hang with Blackula.

“What is that?”

“It’s fresh, whatever it is,” he answered with a shrug. “And there’s a whole hell of a lot of it stinking up the place.”

“Can we eat it?” Rala asked, sneaking up on us. She sniffed the air, a mix of hunger and excitement on her face. It was damn creepy.

I glanced at the others. While there was a bunch of uncertainty pursing lips and squinting eyes, there was no doubt the mention of food had sunk in. If we’d have crashed in the Andes I would have feared for my ass cheeks. As it was, it was obvious we needed to find something for everyone to chow down on soon before things got desperate. I clenched my teeth as I thought about our baby starving in Karra’s belly. My gaze slid away, heavy with shame.

“Let’s check it out,” I said before I could change my mind. It didn’t matter that it was what Katon had wanted me to do since he’d ferreted out the place. It was simply what needed to be done. If there was something to eat inside, we had to have it, end of story.

Katon gave me a knowing nod, but Ilfaar held up a butchered hand.

“Is this wise?”

“We’ve been traveling for a while without sustenance,” Katon answered with a cool glance at the angel, “and it would appear we still have a long way to go before we’re free of this place, so—”

“It stands to reason we plan for the worst,” Rahim finished. “Go, find what you can, but be careful.” His eyes shifted to me. “Both of you.”

Katon grinned and slipped off through the foliage without a sound. I sighed, blew Karra a kiss, and followed after him,
mostly
not making a sound. We were committed.

The enforcer wasted no time once he was in the clearing. He bolted across the killing field—a medieval term that popped into my head like the makeshift arrow I kept expecting—and pinned his back to the wall, eyes surveying the sky above. I turned on the afterburners and reached the fortress just a split-second behind Katon, plastering my spine to the boards so tightly I was afraid I might ooze through the cracks if I didn’t stop pushing. Katon seemed unimpressed by my inner dilemma. He laid a hand on my arm and pointed toward the far corner of the fortress before mimicking a climbing motion. He was the king of charades because my mind immediately jumped on the image of my dumb ass scaling the wall like a ninja.

“Seriously?” I mouthed.

He nodded, and I felt the empty space that was Hobbs’ undead stomach tighten. Katon didn’t bother to stick around and help me work through my performance anxiety. He ran down the line of the fortress, cast a quick glance around the corner, and then scrambled up the wall as if he’d done it a million times. Knowing him, he probably had. All throughout, there hadn’t been a single noise anywhere around us. There was only the stench of something newly dead. That didn’t bode well for whatever was inside, but it sure was good news for us.

Not wanting to be left behind—or at least telling myself I didn’t want to be—I rushed to the opposite corner and followed his example. Nothing lurking that I could see, I stuffed my spear into the waistband of my thong and imagined I had on my Spiderman Underoos. Once I was set, I grabbed a couple handfuls of vine and pulled myself upward. It was easier than I expected. With plenty of places to wedge my toes and fingers, I was a blind kid on a first date.

A quick glance over at Katon told me he was keeping pace with me so I could just climb and not worry about it being a competition. The stink of copper grew thicker and thicker until I couldn’t smell anything but it and the vaguely bitter, weather-worn wood I pressed my face against. Despite the space between the boards, I couldn’t see shit through the cracks. A second layer of wood blocked the inside of the fortress from view no matter how I angled to peek through. Bob the Builder must have been proud.

A few short feet from the top, I saw Katon wave. I stopped and looked over at him, still surprised by how comfortable it was clinging to the outside of a wall and dangling four stories above the ground. He raised his hand, fingers splayed, and started counting down. All my comfort faded in a pucker of undead rectum. My mind seized on a million images of corpses lining the inner fortress and some weird critter turning them into lunch. And while I’d seen plenty of death in my time, wholesale slaughter didn’t tend to leave behind environments conducive to continued existence.

Katon hit one and leapt the last little bit to the top of the wall. I did the same without hesitation. If I’d given myself any time at all to think about it, I wouldn’t have gone so willingly. As it turned out, that would have been the smart thing to do.

The stench hit me full in the face. All around the inside lip of the wall were strung dozens of rat-looking creatures, each the size of a small pony. They’d been cut open from the neck down to their shriveled little giblets, guts hanging out like morbid wind chimes, swaying in the air and stinking up the place. Their skin was a moldy strain of black. The green woman’s comment as to there being plenty to eat came to mind, and if I had a working stomach, I’m sure it would have revolted

“Up there!” a shrill voice cried out, slicing through my awkward non-nausea before I’d even stopped looking at the carrion. Barely balanced on the sharp points of the wall, my gaze snapped to the shouter.

A milling sea of milky eyeballs stared back from what must have been sixty or more green faces. I recognized one in particular. Mia.

“Not so bold now, are you, meat?” she yelled, waving her hand in the direction of the crowd. “Get them!”

Just as I’d pictured, a pulley system was rigged to the gate, interwoven vines providing the leverage. Green people tugged and the slab of heavy wood jumped and started upward. I hated being right.

“Run, Frank!”

I sure didn’t need Captain Obvious’ advice to go fumbling asshole over elbows down the wall while the pissed off horde of greenies waited impatiently to storm through the creaking gate. I hit the ground at a full sprint, barely feeling the impact, though I was suddenly reminded of the Battle of Little Big Horn.

We were so gonna get Custered.

Twelve

(Scarlett)

The dread fiends roared as they advanced, trails of froth about their mouths like rabid dogs, snapping and snarling. I counted twenty. Brutal, savage creatures, the sub-demons have been the shock troops of Lucifer’s army ever since he was cast from Heaven. Fearless and utterly without morality, they made efficient killing machines, storming the field until they won or were put down, never breaking. Had I been alone, I would have chosen retreat over an uncomfortable slaughter at their hands, but with Uriel at my side I stood my ground. Despite their numbers, we held the advantage of an archangel.

The animals drew close, and I reached out to meet them, impaling one through his snout. Revulsion stirred my stomach as the wretched odor of it hit me, though admittedly, I was more disturbed by Everto having to touch such foulness than I was to smell it. The sword would need a dire cleaning after the fight. I yanked it free at an angle, cleaving nearly half of the fiend’s head off in its wake. The creature stumbled and fell into the path of the others, but I didn’t let that slow me. Another met death when I punctured its eye with a
pop
. It shrieked and went stiff mid-scream as steel struck brain, the fiend toppling to the side inert.

That was when Uriel stepped in. Unlike Metatron, who’d repelled the assault upon Eden by turning all of the combined powers of the angels against the invaders, Uriel had no such link to the Choir or the powers of God’s throne to channel it. He did his job more directly.

Flames burst to life as his blade ignited, a sudden, cloying heat stealing the moisture from the air. He said nothing as he slid past me. His words would be dust in the fury of his attack. The dread fiends kept coming and paid for their aggression.

The two closest lost the tops of their heads with a single swipe. Uriel’s blade cleaved through skull and flesh, freeing the gray slabs of their primitive brains. They slopped wetly to the asphalt as the stink of charred meat replaced the sour scent of the fiends. Uriel wasted no time dispatching the others, leaving me to snipe the last remaining few that dared to flank the archangel. Bodies fell without fanfare, limbs and heads missing, torsos exposed and oozing. The fight was over in less than a minute.

“Hardly a challenge.”

Uriel stared at the place where Azrael had disappeared. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

His answer confused me. “Then why bother?”

“Because the Angel of Death is hiding something,” he answered with a slight grin.

I stared where Uriel did, trying to see what he had, trying to determine what had brought him to that conclusion. “Because he ran?”

“Partly, yes,” Uriel nodded, “but more because he bothered to confront us at all.”

His rationale did nothing to ease my confusion. “I don’t understand.”

“Longinus’ magic seeps from Azrael’s stolen pores. I could feel it gnawing at my skin as he made a show of it, assuring us he was as much a threat as we had been told to expect. But still—”

“He used none of it,” I finished, beginning to pick apart the pieces of Uriel’s puzzle. “He unleashed dread fiends rather than fight his own battle, a battle where he should have held the advantage.”

“Exactly. “ Uriel turned to Rachelle who hovered within the confines of a ghostly portal at our backs. “Did you not tell us Azrael stood on the field while you and your companions waged war against him?”

“He did,” she answered, her voice barely above a whisper. It was as hard for her to speak of DRAC’s defeat as it was for me. A cold chill prickled my skin.

“Did he appear wounded, battered?” Uriel went on without pause. “Had your people harmed him?”

Rachelle nodded, anger glimmering in her narrow eyes. “He was winning, but we were wearing him down.”

Uriel met her righteous fury with a sympathetic smile. “And I believe you would have defeated him had the odds only swayed the slightest in your favor.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked, unable to hold it in. I’d fought Azrael directly, and though I’d left him with his fair share of wounds, we were clearly fighting a losing battle. Whatever Rachelle had seen, it hadn’t felt like victory.

“Do you think Longinus would have been so hard pressed to put you in your graves?” he asked me.

I didn’t even have to think about it. “No,” I had to admit. “He would have flayed our souls for even daring to defy him.”
Then why did Azrael struggle?

Uriel gave me a curt nod as though he knew my thoughts. “I feel that whatever process he used to transfer his soul into Triggaltheron’s flesh failed to some degree or is, perhaps, not yet complete. Or maybe it took its toll on him in transfer.” He gestured to the corpses of the dread fiends. “These were obviously a distraction, all starting with his arrival. Were he truly as fearless as he would have us believe, he would have simply attacked. There was no tactical purpose to the dread fiend assault save to give himself time to retreat.”

“Had he truly been confident with his power, he might still have used the sub-demons but they would have been cover for his own assault, not for his flight.” Hearing all this spoken aloud filled my heart with hope. “He fled to Hell to prepare or to let his powers manifest fully, I believe.”