Red Moon Demon (Demon Lord) (31 page)

THIRTY-ONE

“Finally, all my experience in bar

room brawls will come in handy.”

—
Caine Deathwalker

I concentrated my fire on their ankles, slowing the zombies down to a creep. Normal zombies you can take out by splattering their brains. I’d tried this. Didn’t work. These guys were driven by a potent form of necromancy that kept pulling them back together regardless of the damage. I was only buying time.

I called to Osamu, “The best we can do is to lure them past a room with two doors and use our greater speed to get behind them.”

“I’ll find such a room.” He ran off and left me.

Still retreating backwards down the hall, I changed clips and sprayed another rapid burst of exploding rounds. This time, I concentrated on knees.

My shield flickered, warning me a massive attack was coming that required agility to escape. I jumped diagonally backwards, ducking low for extra measure. A chunk of concrete ceiling fell where I’d been,
whumping
into the carpet. My shield continued to flicker. I danced to the side. A concrete spike burst up through the carpet in my wake.

Damn, going for the family jewels!

I heard Osamu’s battle cries mixed with breaking wood, and knew the savage pack of furniture was back for blood—and that Osamu was doing something about it. Karate exhibitions routinely had students breaking boards and bricks. I didn’t have to turn from the zombies to know what was happening. If the building thought attacking us separately was going to be effective, it had miscalculated.

I could have used my stealth magic to become invisible to the zombies, but that would have meant abandoning Osamu, and that didn’t sit right.

He took a moment between breaking up chairs to yell at me, “Deathwalker-san, the next two doors…”
Crac-crack!

“My right side or left?” I asked.
Gotta know if I zig or zag.

“Either,” he sounded winded.

My mind flashed to Gloria’s bar, back to the conversation I’d had with the half-angel Gray.
He’d said,
“When it comes time to take a helluva risk, zig, don’t zag.”
He’d also said,
“Leave the red moon alone. No good ever comes from screwing around with alternate dimensions.”

Back then, I hadn’t known about the lotus-dragon tattoo. I had the feeling that
this
was the battle he’d been advising me about, not that it did me a lot of good. I could only take the best shot open to me and hope for the best.

Still … his warning implies something other than my usual response is needed.

By habit, I enter unknown spaces to the left, not the right. This time, I’d go against custom.

My guns ran empty. I holstered them in my shoulder rig. I drew the ones from my thigh holsters and started splattering zombie eyeballs.

“Right,” I called out. “I’m going to my right.”

“Hai-iiiiya!”
Ccrack!

I took that as an acknowledgement. I passed a set of doors and continued retreating until I reached the next set. By then, I was
stepping over shards of broken furniture. Unlike the zombies, when the furniture got smashed to kindling, it stayed down.

Osamu returned to my side, listing with fatigue. “The last few chairs…” he wheezed, “ran back around the corner. We’ve taught them fear at last.”

“More likely they’re trying to suck us into another ambush.” He looked slightly depressed by the news. I whispered, “Fake left, spin, and go right.”

We lunged left, but didn’t cross the threshold. The floor inside the room shattered and dropped, piling on the next floor down which also shattered. From the crashing sounds, I could tell a chain reaction had been started. We flung ourselves across the hall, through the opposite door, and raced past the zombies, separated from them by a wall. We came out another door and wound up behind the zombie horde. They didn’t seem to realize this.

Guns useless, empty of ammo, I holstered them, and
ran to the stairwell, Osamu staying close as my shadow.

When my shield didn’t react to danger, I led the way inside. Several flights later, we reached the roof access. By then, Osamu was laboring for breath, blinded by sweat. His gun hand shook. I was half afraid he might accidentally shoot me. The old geezer was done in. I pushed him against the wall, beside the roof door.

“You stay here,” I said. “You’ve done enough for your honor. Leave the rest to me.”

He shook his head to the side and back. “No, Death-walker-sama, we are in this to the end.”

The fire in his voice and eyes told me he meant it. Because I admired his loyalty, I punched him on the point of his chin, rocking his head at an upward angle, knocking him out. The angle was important. I didn’t want to break his jaw and have to hit him again, fun as that might be. He sighed and collapsed. I caught and lowered him so he sat against the wall.

Fighting the building had been bad. Fighting Salem was going to be worse. I couldn’t do that if I had to divide my attention, also keeping Osamu alive. Besides, what would I do for a combat butler if he died?

I drew both swords from the back of my harness, filled my lungs, and let the breath escape slowly. I stepped out onto the roof. Air-conditioning units edged one side of the roof, hugging a wall. I barely registered them, my gaze drawn to the well-lit helipad where Salem waited, wide-legged, baring the weight of the sky on his shoulders, fists on his hips in jaunty defiance. Behind him, Vivian knelt as I’d last seen her, except her head hung, hiding her face, and the black leather had been

peeled down to her waist, hanging in clean-cut strips. Her
breasts and stomach were drenched in red.

Friggin’ warlock has been busy
.

A tingle raced across my skin, followed by a feeling as if something heavy and wet had wrapped around me. I tried to awaken my
Dragon Vision
but the tat stayed cold. Salem was doing something that cut me off from my magic. He seemed to have better control over the necklace he’d stolen than Sarah ever had, or maybe he simply knew better spells.

Only the lotus and dragon tat on my arm felt alive—with anticipation. The thing had too much power to be suppressed. That scared me into saving it as a last resort, so I only had my short swords and Old Man’s training left to draw upon.

Have to be enough
.

In the absence of cover, I walked straight toward him. Nothing came; no gunshots, mystic bolts of bedevilment, he didn’t even throw a rock—I’d never have wasted such an opportunity.

His voice came, thin and sharp as the knife he held. “Caine, she’s not so pretty now, but if you want her, you can have her. All you’ve got to do is go through me. Do you really think you can do that?” He gestured with his empty hand. A spectral green light lit up the helipad, and in that glow, he became weightless, floating into the air. His midnight-blue long coat whipped in the cool night breeze as he looked down on me.

So theatrical...

About twenty feet still separated us.

Using my wrists, I spun both swords in lazy circles, weaving a web of death in front of me. “You’re above us all, aren’t you?” I said.

“Well, above
you
, certainly. I told them you’d be no challenge.”

“Told who? Who set you and the succubus on me?”

He shook his head. “Ah, that would be telling.”

“Think of it as a condemned man’s last wish.” I kept the swords in motion. “Who’s trying to start a war in my territory?”

“It’s not about your precious city. It’s about the crime committed by your parents in giving birth to a half-breed like you. It’s about the reward I’ve been offered for taking you down.”

Ten feet left to go.

I stepped onto the helipad, into the watery zone of light. I felt
nothing new. Gravity did me no favors. I stayed earthbound.

Half breed. He was saying one of my parents hadn’t been human.
The idea didn’t distress me. In fact, it might actually explain a few things I knew about myself.

I stopped, with him hovering just above my head. I stilled the swinging swords, and offered him the one in my left hand, hilt first. “You said you wanted to play. What’s wrong? Scared?”

“Of you? No. I attended a military academy in Europe. Fencing was part of my daily regimen. I’m quite good, actually.” He sank until his feet were only a few inches above the concrete. He reached for the sword I offered. “I hope you’re fond of scars, not that you’ll live long enough to enjoy them.”

His hand closed on the hilt.

I went from utterly relaxed, to an explosive movement of my entire body. My right hand shot straight out, driving my sword forward. Though he wheeled sideways—never moving his legs—my edge managed to slice across his chest, through the left lapel of his long coat.

Like an action figure moved by an unseen hand, he orbited me, extending the sword I’d given him. He kept its point centered on my torso. “Nice,” he said. “You just might last long enough to amuse me.”

I turned with him, not giving him access to my back. “One can only hope.”

He stopped in front of me, angling his body the way European fencers do. Western swordplay is all about what’s in front of you.

I slid diagonally back. I wasn’t about to let him pull me in into his kind of fight.
Now I was the one circling, forcing him to continually adjust
his
stance. I thrust at his hip, testing him. His blade clattered against mine. I rode the energy of the blow, and spun, slapping the flat of my blade against my ribs so that as I came around, I could shove my point straight out in a blinding flash of speed.

The tight turn and strike forced him back a step. Blood dripped from his badly slashed hand. He stopped smiling. Even the little blond spikes of his over-styled hair seemed to quiver in rage. He looked at his hand while putting distance between us. The wound took a second to heal. Apparently, I was going to have to cut his heart out, or lop his evil head clean off.
No problem.

“Interesting,” the warlock said.

“Oh,” I said, “there’s a lot more hell to come.”

The warlock flew forward, his sword aimed at my heart.

I dipped my sword tip and turned my body at the last second, stepping inside his guard. I slammed my right elbow at his neck. He caught the blow with his left hand, redirecting it to the side. I went with the motion
, riding his energy while conserving mine. Slashing, I tried to take his head. The amulet sparked red-violet and he shot high into the air faster than humanly possible. His shirt was slashed, the material wet and red with a growing stain of blood. His face took on a grim cast.

“You have a nasty fighting style there, Caine.”

I smiled, “What can I say? Sometimes I even scare myself.”

He floated back down, drifting backwards toward Vivian. I don’t think he realized that, or that she was awake now, head lifted, eyes ablaze with unconquerable fury. If looks could kill, she’d have finished Salem off in that second. But maybe I could help her out.

I ran at him headfirst, my sword held in a relaxed grip, dragging on the concrete, trailing sparks. I leaped, my sword sweeping up before me to clear my way. Aloft, I reversed the blade and brought it down full force. He blocked, but I drove him down. His feet skidded on the helipad. This brought him crowding against Vivian.

Fangs yawning, she struck at his neck.

He screamed like a drop-kicked poodle.

I laughed.

At least he seemed to know he’d tear out his own throat before he pried her jaws apart; his strength
was
only human. He stabbed at me with his sword to keep me off while his free hand clutched the necklace. Its edges whirled as it clattered through rapid-fire changes like a Rubik’s cube with rabies.

Salem’s whole body went spectral green like the weird light generated by the helipad underfoot. Like glass he could be seen through, actually filtering the light. Every artery, vein, bone, ligament, tendon, organ, muscle, and webbing of nerve fiber were on display in way too much
detail for clarity, especially as he thrashed, keeping only his neck still where

Vivian had attached herself.

The necklace clattered a little more, fine-tuning its form, then grew silent and still.

Vivian’s teeth gnashed.

The sword Salem had been wagging didn’t slip from his fingers—it fell through them. He’d shifted his molecular structure slightly out of phase, becoming a living ghost.

He straightened and moved effortlessly away from Vivian, as if picked up by the wind. Since this wasn’t possible, I figured there was a ghost wind in whatever side pocket of reality he’d shoved his density.

Vivian thrashed in rage as her prey escaped, coming loose from the effect that had bound her limbs, making her a prisoner. Apparently, his necklace was less effective reaching us from an altered space.

I staggered as my tats warmed, reconnecting their magic to me in a violent rush, as if I’d been drinking cleaning fluid. Again. I went to one knee, and kept my eyes on Salem.

The green glow of the helipad thinned and died, allowing shadows to rush in. The main light now came from the lights mounted over the stairwell entrance, and the city surrounding us.

With a smirk in place, he waved goodbye. Drifting off the darkened helipad, he rose a little higher, sliding sideways against the black face of the moon.

Bastard’s running. No way am I losing him after all this.

There was only one way I might still reach him.

I focused my life force on the lotus-dragon tat on my right forearm. The new tattoo began a slow burn, taking its sweet time waking up. I ran toward the edge of the building, trying to stay close to the warlock. I growled at the lotus. “Come on, how much time are you going to take?”

My stare slid past Salem to the moon, and I stopped running. The moon was changing. A wet layer of blood dripped from its top, soaking the whole thing as it spread downward. The dark orb became an infernal crimson, bleeding red light into the night sky.

What the friggin’ hell! Did I do that?