"Nixie," Detective Amelio said carefully, his handsome face flushing red. "Where exactly are we going to find Ameilkas? And is it in our jurisdiction, how we...err...," he made the universal gesture for murder, sliding one finger across his sturdy throat. "get rid of her?" He seemed uncomfortable in the Faerie’s presence, which made her grin. His chiselled features and muscular body were pleasing to Nyxvira, and she found her great golden eyes constantly looking him up and down. She doubted they had much in common, and that they’d ever be able to discuss anything other than business, but he had certain aesthetic charms that made her want him beneath her and ontop of her and in several other, more explicit, positions.
"Does she need anyone? For her pack, I mean. Any replacements." He added in a cautious voice.
“The lads tell me she’s parading around Dawn Peek Heights, stomping about on some fountain.” Vincent spoke up, gesturing to his smartphone.
“Make your way discreetly through the back entrance, keeping your arms where we can see them.” Imarus said sternly “We’ve got a taxi to take you where you need to go. The driver will give you a Python with silver bullets. Ameilkas is built like so many brick shithouses, but silver should still stop her in her tracks.”
“If you’re planning on trying to sneak your way in to her little group, then forget it.” Lady Sharrahonzu croaked “She’ll be able to smell the city on you, and the Hunters despise city wolves.”
Nyxvira’s eyes flickered briefly to Charlize.
“I’ll have my people drop Ann off somewhere out-of-the-way, once we’ve had confirmation that you’ve held up your end of our little bargain. Make sure you’re nice and thorough, or you’ll get your lady love back in pieces through the mailbox.”
She turned her attention to the Lost Boys, trying to mask her surprise as she spotted the goblin who’d been lurking about behind them.
“You two and your…little green friend get your arses over to the Red Lights district. Some prozzies, and a good slice of my weekly income, need saving.”
Her golden gaze fell upon the goblin. His kind were extremely useful for sneaking into tight spaces, and getting about unnoticed. She’d have to keep tabs on him, maybe reach out to him with a proposition once this whole business had cleared itself up.
“Now, if you’ll all excuse me; I have a hot tub that needs my attention.” She smirked. The Faerie gave Chase one last lingering look “I’ll have my guys text you the address.”
Having been dead for a good 74 years, it had been a long time since Madeline had felt hungover, but as her eyes slowly fluttered open, and the world flittered back into her vision, a hangover was all that the vampress could liken the thundering throbbing sensation in her skull too.
The room around her was small and cramped and dark, and through the pounding hammers that were raging in her head it was impossible for Maddie to make out its finer details.
A door swung open, letting a searing crack of light spill into the room, forcing Madeline further back into the corner, all bundled up on the floor as her eyes slammed shut. She tried to move her hands, but cold steel shackled her to the wall behind her, clinking and jangling with each frustrated jerk.
“You are resilient, even for a child of the night.” A thin voice seeped through the darkness, and only then did Maddie become aware that there was a tall, statuesque figure standing over her.
“Take these chains off me and I’ll show you how fucking resilient I can be.” She hissed, her vision blurred and hazy.
“You mean like how you showed the Barrison’s?” The figure chided, disapprovingly “their only crime was attempting to liberate this city from its oppressors, yet you saw it fit to paint their living room walls with their brains.”
It took Madeline a long moment of deep pondering for her to remember why the name ‘Barrison’ held significance.
“You mean those fucking deadbeat cocksuckers in their shitty little apartment?” She spat with a harsh laugh “Let’s get one thing straight, disembodied voice; they stole from me, and those bastards got what they deserved.”
“I agree entirely.” Said the voice, the smile that graced its face evident in the manner which it spoke.
Madeline’s vision cleared now, and she became aware of the figure who was standing before her.
A graceful being, poised elegantly in a long crimson riding coat, and trousers as black as coal, which tightly hugged her muscular legs, stood over Madeline. She had a delicate, sculpted neck, a long braid of milky white blonde hair which hung loosely over one shoulder, and piercing blue eyes that whirled and crackled like a thunderous monsoon, even within the dark confines of the cell. Her skin was deathly pale, smattered with the faintest hint of grey, and the ghostly indication of a grin twisted at the edges of her smooth lips.
Madeline stared daggers up at the woman, her fists clenching.
“When I get out of here….” She began to fume, her words failing her.
“By all means.” The figure responded with a thin smirk, removing a long silver key from her coat pocket, undoing the manacles that bound her to the wall.
No sooner had the shackles clattered loosely to the floor, then Madeline had shot forwards, wrenching the woman up off of her feet with supernatural strength, and dangling her in the air by her throat.
“You think you can just sweep me off of the streets like some fucking rabid dog?!” Maddie hissed, tightening her grip around the woman’s delicate throat.
The woman’s hand moved swiftly forwards, her palm resting gently on Madeline’s forehead, and then a jolt of hellish electricity shot through her, sending her thoughts veering backwards into the past.
In her mind’s eye the bombs were falling, cascading downwards all around her as her home was bathed in fire. She sat, weak and frightened in Daddy’s special room, listening to her neighbourhood melt into the ground.
When she came to, she was sprawled out across the floor, a limp little girl from Liverpool in a frilly dress with tears in her eyes.
“Who the fuck are you..?” Maddie choked wearily, gazing up at the woman whilst bitter tears poured down her cheeks.
“I have gone by many names,” she said nonchalantly “but you may call me the Canoness.”
“Well then, ‘Canoness’” Maddie wheezed, her head lolling backwards “If you’re planning on torturing me can we just get this show on the road? And it had better be a pretty fuckin’ good show; I’ve been dead most my life after all.”
The Canoness laughed plainly “I don’t want to torture you, Madeline Hollinghurst,” She assured her softly “I want to empower you.”
“I don’t know how, but you sent me back to a place I never wanted to go to again.” Maddie laughed without humour “And I haven’t felt this weak in a looooong time, so you’re fuckin’ failing, missy.”
“You’re no creature of heaven’s light, Miss Hollinghurst.” The Canoness observed “so you’ve bathed yourself in the embrace of the darkness, and run across half the world to burry your head in the sand, and forsake your true purpose.”
“And what would that be?” Maddie asked.
“To punish those who’ve hurt you.” The Canoness replied.
She walked steadily towards Madeline, and, for some reason the vampress couldn’t fathom, she let her.
“You couldn’t punish the Nazi’s who left your home in rubble.”
“My home was with the Blackwood’s!” she roared, renewed life coursing through her frail body.
“And what did you do to punish the man who took the good Doctor from you?” The Canoness asked plainly.
“You are about to push a nerve you don’t want to, sister.” Madeline hissed through tightly gritted teeth.
“Your passion and grace are wasted upon such minor obstacles, Miss Hollinghurst.” The Canoness chided “You could be an instrument of vengeance, sweeping through the coiling tendrils of darkness, and leaving the dammned nowhere left to hide, yet instead you’ve spent your entire un-life trying to conquer battlefields which no longer exist.”
“You sound like my therapist.” Madeline remarked drily.
“Which one?” The Canoness queried “The man who you bled dry to absorb his power, or the woman who tried to pull you apart and stitch you back together again?”
“Fuck you, blondie.” Maddie snapped effortlessly.
“You have a savage side to you, Miss Hollinghurst.” The Canoness said after a pause “One which this city has yet to see.”
“Hah!” Maddie spat “This city and my savage side are in bed together, bitch! Ask anyone on the street who the mother fuckin’ Reapers are and they’ll shit their pants.”
The Canoness shook her head.
“You’ve been in control, without a real challenge, for far too long, Miss Hollinghurst. There is a beast inside you, but it’s taken the backseat in your psyche, and you’ve let it grow slow and complacent.”
Maddie stared into the woman’s whirling monsoon eyes “If we’re talking about the same thing, then that’s not a beast you ever want to let off of the leash, sister.” She said, almost pleadingly.
“I disagree,” The Canoness shot back “You can’t kill a dragon with a pheasant. You need a bigger dragon.”
“What dragon are you planning on catching?” Madeline asked cautiously, her maroon eyes narrowing into slits.
“The Elfchewer has been sitting on his golden throne for far too long.”
The Canoness reached into her breast pocket, pulling out a clear-glass vial full of a molten red liquid, which seemed to bubble and boil and scream all at once, fighting against its container.
Maddie could feel the vial of hellfire howling to her, begging to be inside her.
“The fuck is that..?” she asked in a slow, dulled voice, wide-eyed and mesmerized.
“Demon’s Blood.” The Canoness replied.
“I’ve seen demon’s blood,” Maddie said, shaking her head. “I’ve taken it from a needle before, gives you a nice buzz. That ain’t demon’s blood, sister.”
The Canoness smiled, a cold, knife-like grin of a smile. “What you get off of the street is watered down and pumped full of so many drugs and narcotics that it’s nothing like the pure, unaltered specimen. It has taken me over two hundred years to acquire this, and it is –to my knowledge-, the most potent sample of Demon’s Blood on this planet.”
Maddie’s maroon eyes danced around in the frothing concoction, watching it hiss and swirl.
“A very, very, very long time ago, a green star fell to this earth.” The Canoness explained “Inside that star was
Yultierow the Howler. Yultierow’s presence on this planet is the most recent recording of an Arch-demon setting foot on mortal soil. During his residence, Yultierow destroyed three of our most prominent and sophisticated civilisations, all but erasing their memory from existence.”
The Canoness gave the vial a gentle swirl with the flick of her wrist, and its contents began to thrash about like a raging whirlpool.
“In my hand I hold all that remains of Yultierow the Howler, and I want you to have it, Miss Hollinghurst…”
Maddie moved forwards, ready to snatch her prize, but the Canoness raised one finger to stop her.
“On the condition that you help me drown my enemies in a tide of blood.”
Madeleine Hollinghurst locked eyes with the Canoness, grinning darkly.
“Brownie’s honour.”
The Canoness tossed her the vial, and she caught it in a vivid blur, pouring its hellish contents down her through, and glutting herself on demonic power.
“This part might hurt a little.” The Canoness said dryly.
*
Ruzghul Elfchewer sat in the darkness of his bedroom, glowering at a nearby wall. Humiliated. Cast aside. Beaten. He seethed, a tide of red hot anger coursing through his hulking body.
“That Elf cunt will get what’s coming to her.” His second head sneered, gnashing its crooked teeth together.
“Oh, don’t be so Gods dammed melodramatic.” Grumbled his first head, limping forwards.
“What good are brains if we don’t fuckin’ use them?!” Roared the second head, spraying a tide of frothy spit across the room.
“You focus on being big and imposing, I’ll deal with the rest of our problems efficiently, like I always have.” The first head snapped back sternly.
“All our smarts and long words did fuck all against that twig bitch and her zombie fuckboy!” The second head bellowed.
“Keep your voice down,” the first head sighed, rolling its eyes “we’ll be even more of a laughing stock if the entire bloody house can hear us bickering.”
“There is no
US!” The second head hissed, slamming down one powerful fist. “We’re one being! You’ve never understood that! You’d be just as limp and worthless without me as I would without you, yet you always put yourself above me, you arrogant fucking prick!”
A fist wrapped gently against the door.
“Come in.” boomed the first head.
Talavoil, his Sardinian bodyguard stepped into the darkness of the room.
“Sirs, you may want to see this.”
*
I tear through the night sky, clouds whipping past me like so much cotton wool, an icy wind unlike anything I’ve ever felt dancing across my body. I open my mouth and laugh at the world bellow, a furious growling that booms out of me, dark and powerful.
My new wings beat fiercely behind me, propelling me forwards as I watch the city lights flicker away beneath me, buildings spilling out in a tide of steel and concrete and glass.
The great tiled roof of the Martovanni estate phases into my vision and I come hurtling down towards it, bolting through the air and zipping back towards the earth, my wings bunching up as I plummet down to the front lawn.
I land in the great green field with a deafening crash, sending grass and mud exploding out around me as my clawed fight bite into the ground, tearing up huge chunks of lawn.
“Ruzghul!” I bellow, my voice carrying on the wind “come out and face me, you greasy fucking cunt!”
A shot rings out from somewhere inside the great white mansion, but the flimsy metal bullet pings harmlessly off of my hide, tumbling softly into the grass with a wet thud.
A furry of gunfire comes screeching towards me, Ruzghul’s private army of thugs taking pot shots at me from their hiding places, but none of them do so much as scratch my skin.
I feel so alive!
I go tearing forwards, bounding up the lawn, the world melting away around me, until I’m standing right infront of those garish mahogany doors, my bare feet pressing down on the marble steps beneath me.
More gunfire.
I yank the door off of its hinges, sending it sailing backwards over my shoulder, and stride triumphantly into the enormous lobby.
A line of men in suits greet me, stood at the bottom of the great winding staircase, aiming meekly up at me with their shitty little handguns.
More bullets ring out, and then I’m dashing between them, severing their pathetic shivering bodies with my new claws, feeling the sweet sensation of hot blood washing over me once more as I cut them in to bloody ribbons.
I clear the staircase in one huge leap, landing boldly at the top of its winding enormity, before going stomping off in search of the Ogre himself, slinking through the great corridors of his home, slashing and stabbing whoever gets in my way, until I’m standing in his bedroom, some Italian-looking bloke lying in two mangled and bloody pieces at my feet.
“Too pussy to come face me, Ruzghul?” I sneer, my eyes dancing across the great Ogre’s body.
He’s not as tall as everyone made him out to be.
“You’re something new.” His first head observes, caressing its thin black goatee.
“You must have a death wish, bitch!” Hisses his second head.
“I’ve been dead a long time, cur.” I say with a toothy grin “Care to join me?”
My clawed hand shoots forwards, tearing through flesh and bone, ripping the second head straight from its bloody stump and sending it tumbling to the floor, a fountain of dark red spurting everywhere.
Its fleshy lips muttering and splutter as the head thumps to the soft carpet, splattering the walls with blood, but pretty soon they stop moving.
Ruzghul falls to his knees, clutching at his bloody stump, gawking and gasping at the air.
“I only need one head.” I laugh.
“K-kill me…” he wheezes.
“Soon enough,” I assure him. “But first, you’re going to sing for my new friends.”
The Canoness stood in her chambers, gazing into the great fireplace that was assembled before her. A searing flame was crackling amidst the long wooden logs, shifting about and coiling as it blazed upwards. The fire let out a sharp roar, and the slithering tendrils of inferno began to find form, leaping out of the fireplace and crawling across the stony floor. They leaked into the air, bursting upwards as they began to take shape, twirling towards the ceiling. A trio of loose fiery bodies stepped out into the chamber, vaguely human shapes garbed in long hooded cloaks of crackling flame.
“It has been a long time since you answered our summons, Chaerina.” One of the illusions hissed in a tepid voice.
“I’ve been otherwise preoccupied.” Chaerina Somabra replied in her soft tone.
“Self-important imp!” snarled another figure “You would seek to defy the Pale Circle?!”
“I’d say we’re long past defiance now,” Chaerina smirked “your council of doddering old fools no longer holds dominion over me.”
“Then you answer our call simply to mock us?” spat one of the other conjurations.
“I’ve answered your call to warn you that once I’m done here I’m coming for you.” She replied darkly, flashing her knife-like smile.
“Insolent girl!” one of the fiery voices screeched, sending rouge sparks pitter-pattering on to the chamber floor “you are but an instrument of our order!”
“It was Grigori I shackled myself to,” Chaerina snarled “and the changeling has been dead for nearly a century.”
“You forget yourself,” snapped another of the arcane projections “It was the Pale Circle who breathed life back in to your broken body.”
“I remember well,” Chaerina shot back “and that is why I shall be giving you all quick, and merciful deaths…although I cannot speak for what comes next.”
“Your arrogance will be your undoing, wretch.” A flaming mouth cackled “our agents shall soon be upon your doorstep.”
“Send whomever you like.” Chaerina laughed sharply “by the time these lupine mongrels have finished smashing up cars and lampposts you’ll already be too late to stop me.”
“You are about to cross a threshold that bares no returning from, girl.” Frowned one of the figures, its eyes narrowing into searing slits.
“You have all exceeded your use to me.” She yawned “I thank you for your tutelage, and bid you farewell with the promise of your imminent destruction.”
She cast her delicate hand forwards, sending the flaming conjurations reeling back in to the fire place, vanishing in a great burst of crackling reds and yellows.
The hingeless stone panel which served as an entrance to her chamber slid open, and a tall, dreadlocked figure came striding in, his marron eyes snapping about with gleeful abandon.
“Mistress,” he tittered “news from the other Disciplines; The Lady Hollinghurst has retrieved her prize, as commanded.”
“Excellent,” Chaerina exclaimed with a sharp grin “so begins the dissolution of this wretched establishment, and the birth of the empire of the common people.”
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