Kevin Hearne - Hexed

Shaking off my astonishment, I advanced to help, as the two downed hexen clambered to their feet and the flamethrowers were finally registering that nothing was burning inside that purple cone.

The answer to enemies who heal annoyingly fast is always, always decapitation. That is why swords will never go out of style. Fragarach sang through the neck of one of the flamethrowers, and I added a stab for Junior in the gut before the body fell. That reminded the remaining three that I was still around. Their minds and their jaws became unhinged as they bellowed hot roars of red ass-breath and charged me all at once, forgetting entirely about Klaudia. She hadn’t killed any of them yet, after all, while I’d been responsible for quite a number so far.

These last three had very little of their humanity left. They were old, old witches, and they’d been selling wee parcels of their souls to hell for so long that nothing but a single forlorn box of humanity was left in what was once a full warehouse. Something else occupied their skins now, something that made their eyes burn in their heads and black claws grow from their fingers.

I gave ground before the charge, whirling the blade in front of me in a defensive pattern. One, then two of their cursed faces dropped out of my vision, due no doubt to some guerrilla effort of Klaudia’s, but I still had one more to deal with—and she was faster than me.

Perhaps I’d slowed down. The pain of my injuries was building, for I’d done no real healing to any of them; I’d just continued fighting and probably exacerbated them in the process. The witch lost her left hand to Fragarach in order to get a good shot at me with her right. Her claws tore down through my flak vest at my left shoulder, ripping not only through it but also through my pectoralis muscles. I fell backward and she clung to me on the way down, trying to dig in farther with her nails, attempting to turn the claws up under my rib cage and do serious damage to my organs. Her left side, however, was unguarded and vulnerable. I shoved Fragarach sideways through her guts as she straddled me, twisting it madly to make sure the demon felt the blade. She convulsed spastically and vomited blood before her eyes finally cooled and she fell still. On top of me.

My left arm didn’t want to move. I tried and it hammered me with pain. I used the last of my stored magic to shut it off; I couldn’t think in a cloud of agony. I yanked Fragarach out of the witch—a messy business—then put it down long enough to shove her off me with my right hand. I sat up to see if any hexen were left.

There weren’t. Klaudia had eviscerated the last two, killing the demon spawn first, and then she’d slashed their throats for good measure. Now that the battle was over, her purple wards were gone and her waifish charisma was back. We were the only living creatures on a floor strewn with bodies, and yet she made it all cool somehow just by standing there. Even covered in blood, her expression had the sleepy, languid sensuality of an underwear model.

“Thanks for the assist,” I said. “Where did you learn to fight like that?”

She shrugged. “Vietnam.”

“You’ve got to be shitting me.”

She grinned and her eyes sparkled mischievously.

“Yeah, I am.”

I shuddered as I came down off my adrenaline high and exhaustion set in. But when we heard a thin scream and the pale lavender glow outside the northeast windows abruptly winked out, we bolted for the stairs and hoped we wouldn’t be too late.

The situation outside was a giant bowl full of gloom and grim. I got around to the north side first, because Klaudia had run around to collect Berta, Roksana, and Kazimiera. I saw no sign of Leif. Bogumila lay dead on the concrete, looking old and terrified in death, and Malina was righteously pissed. My earlier suspicion of the rabbi’s beard now appeared justified, for it exhibited all the qualities one might associate with a distant relative of Cthulhu, with four long, hairy tentacles squirming radially from his jaw, two on either side of his chin. The two on the left were wrapped tightly around Bogumila’s throat, and now they were trying to disentangle themselves from the woman they had strangled to death. The other two were trying to reach Malina, but she was laying down some heavy-duty protection as I approached.

She chanted four lines in Polish, and since I was finally in range to hear, I recorded it eidetically for reference. As she reached the end of each line, a booming clap thundered from her palm along with the colors violet, blue, red, and white, swirling around her in sequence like exuberant streamers in a gymnast’s floor exercise:

“Jej miśoć mnie ochrania ,

Jej odwaga czyni mnie nieustraszona ,

Jej potęga dodaje mi sił ,

Dzięki jej mięosierdziu żyję!”

Malina translated them for me later and explained that each line was a spell in itself, affording her “certain strengths and protections” through the benediction of the Zoryas. Her words meant: By her love I am protected, By her courage I am made fearless, By her might I am made strong, By her mercy I am spared .

When Malina finished, there was an impenetrable yet translucent shield around her, and she looked like she was just getting warmed up. It was far beyond the conic wards I’d seen from Bogumila and Klaudia.

Rabbi Yosef’s crazy squid beard had seen enough; the tentacles quailed and would go no further. They started to retreat, rolling up quickly into the rabbi’s face as he considered how to deal with a far more accomplished witch, then he startled and took a step back as he saw me coming, covered in the gore of witches and demons and my own blood, with Fragarach held ready in my hand. I didn’t hesitate, didn’t say hello, just raised my sword to his throat and said, “Freagróidh tú.” He froze up in the blue glow of the spell and started spluttering something at me in Russian. “You will not speak except to answer my questions,” I said, and he promptly shut up.

“Thank you, Atticus, that will make this so much simpler,” Malina said.

“No, stop,” I told her, as she was gearing up to lay him out. “I need to talk to him first.”

“He must pay for Bogumila’s death!” Malina blazed from behind her shield.

“Yes, he must. But first he will speak plainly to me for the first time. What is the name of your organization, sir?”

He fought it, of course, but eventually he said, “The Hammers of God.” Understanding clicked in my head. That stylized P on the hilt of his knife had been a hammer.

“Where is Father Gregory tonight?”

“He is on a plane back to Moscow.”

“How many are in your organization?”

“I do not know the exact number.”

“Give me your best guess. How many might show up to avenge you should you disappear tonight?”

“At least twenty Kabbalist fighters like me. That is standard when one of us disappears. But they may send more if they think the threat warrants it.”

I turned to Malina with a wry grin. “It is prudent that we stopped to chat, is it not?”

“He still must pay,” she insisted, as Klaudia, Kazimiera, Berta, and Roksana raced to join us and surround him.

“You want to face twenty or more of him?” I asked.

“He is lying about that.”

I shook my head. “You’ve experienced this spell yourself, Malina. He cannot lie. Perhaps there is another way we can make him pay yet avoid a confrontation that may lead to more bloodshed on our side.”