Faith Hunter - Blood Cross

“Good. Stay safe and out of the way.” I clicked off and hit the speed dial for Derek.

He answered with the words “We’re two klicks out.”

“Meet me. And, Lee? We got five sane vamps in charge, two insane ones in shackles that need to stay that way, one bled-out and starving clan master who’ll drain us dry if she gets half the chance, and three hostage witches.”

“Girl, you do know how to throw a party.” He disconnected.

I didn’t know how long it would take seven former marines to find me, but I figured it wouldn’t be long. It wasn’t. Watching the moon, I waited. Beast alerted me that they were close, moving in two small, parallel groups. I turned toward the south and waited. When they didn’t appear when I thought they should, I said softly, “Y’all waiting for engraved invitations?”

Derek laughed just as softly and stepped through the foliage nearly as silently as Beast. I looked the other direction and waited. Hicklin stepped out and pulled off low-light-vision goggles. “Not bad, girl. Not bad.” He held out a strip of wire, which turned out to be a headset. Obscurely pleased, I took it, hoping it was the same one I’d used before, because otherwise, well, that was just icky. But fear of losing my current approbation made me not ask. I checked and all the men were wearing the low-light-vision goggles. They’d be able to see as well as my Beast. Maybe better.

I knelt, found a sharp length of wood from the tree trimming, and began drawing in the dirt. One of the men aimed a narrow-beamed flashlight on the drawing. “I’ll take point. We’ll approach from downwind so they won’t smell us coming. When we get there, we’ll find a ten-foot-diameter circle with a pentagram in the middle, crosses at head height. Path the vamps will use to enter is here.” I tapped the earth. “We stay south, from this location to here, and we’ll be downwind of them unless the weather changes. They shouldn’t smell us coming.

“The crosses will be glowing so night vision will be compromised for us. Not sure what will happen for the vamps. Under other circumstances they’d be blind and in pain, but this group is seriously different.” I heard an affirmative grunt from my left. “If the paintings are correct, the hostages will be in the center of the pentagram, bound and likely unconscious.”

“I guess that means we should leave behind the RPG launcher,” one of them said from the dark. They laughed but I wasn’t sure he was joking.

Pretty Boy Hicklin settled a fully automatic machine pistol on a strap over his shoulders. “The witch patrol?”

“Will not be joining us. But I do have a single, one-use protection spell. Ten feet in diameter.”

“Impermeable?”

I wasn’t sure what he was asking but I took a chance. “Bullets out, none in. Magic . . . I’m not too sure about tossing out magic, but none will make it in.” I forced down the vision and remembered the scent of Molly’s singed and torn ward. Bad luck to think of failure in the face of battle. “You ready?”

“Girl, we are always ready.” The small group laughed, sexual innuendo in the tone.

Great. A bunch of macho soldiers. But then, for what I needed, nothing could be better.

“What kinda spell are they working? What are we going up against?” another guy asked. His eyebrows were shaved, with short strips of dark skin showing through. He had other bald symbols shaved into his scalp. “This a hostile spell?”

“Something to bring sanity to young rogues or the long-chained. Probably not hostile. But it might be hidden behind a ward, hard to break. We’ll need to intervene before they complete the circle, but I’d like to see how they start.”

“Guards?” When I shook my head, Derek said, “We find any guards, take them out without blood. The vamps’ll smell it otherwise.” To me he said, “We’ll go in on your mark. Location?”

I knew he was referring to the GPS numbers. I sighed. “You’ll just have to follow me. One column, when you see the glowing crosses, spread out to my right.”

“You didn’t use the GPS, did you?”

Beast didn’t have fingers to carry it or the mind to understand a bunch of numbers. Not that I could say that. And I wasn’t about to offer excuses. “No.”

Before they could reply, I headed into the forest, drawing on Beast’s senses and silence. The forest folded itself around me. The soldiers followed, quiet even to Beast’s senses. I controlled an amused hack and let the forest take me.

It felt like a much faster trip back to the witch circle, perhaps because I was surrounded by more firepower than I’d ever seen. Even without the rocket-propelled grenade launcher. Or maybe because I was sure of my bearings now. Whatever. It worked. For once, I felt safe going into battle against vamps. I had the marines. Ooh rah.

The crosses glowed just ahead, pale and silvery, bright enough to steer by, alerting me that the vamps had already arrived. Derek stopped us with an upraised hand and a whisper into his mike. I smelled humans, some close to us. Moving like a wraith, Derek approached me and whispered, “Gangbangers. Crips. I count three. You?”

“I smell four.” Which should have come out another way, to protect myself, but then Derek already knew I wasn’t human. The Crips’s presence was proof that the coup d’état would start soon, and that Leo’s enemies had been using the gangs to steer NOPD attention to other matters and away from vamps. The vamp war was ready to begin.

He breathed out a laugh and sent his men out in a circle. I heard a few faint scuffs, one breath sighing into the night, but no screams, and no scent of blood. I guessed that the Crips were goners.

I double-checked my crosses to make sure they were still covered. I felt more than saw the soldiers flow out to my right. Silent. Deadly.

They surrounded the southern side of the witch circle, downwind of the vamps, positioning themselves so they wouldn’t catch cross fire. And they waited.

The blood-servants packed up the shovels, empty shell-sacks, and wheelbarrow, and trundled nosily out of the artificial glen as the vamp witches milled around, talking in low voices. In the wake of their passage, I moved closer to the witch circle, knowing their noise covered any I might make. I sensed Derek’s men moving in as well, but I heard little; they were pretty good for humans. Head tilted, I followed the sounds of Sina and Brigit for long minutes. The sound of doors slamming. Then nothing from the distant humans. In the circle, the vamps took their positions at the five points of the pentagram.

I moved in until I could see Angelina, Little Evan, and Bliss, visible below the tree foliage. They were lying on the ground, tied and gagged in the middle of the circle. Bliss looked more than half dead, pasty pale, unconscious, sprawled, arms behind her back. She was naked; fang marks showed at neck, inner elbows, and groin. Angie and Evan Jr. were barefoot, in unfamiliar pajamas, and they were tied, their eyes closed. I could see the energies of a spell over them, Evan’s pink-tinged, Angie’s a dull gray. The surprise in the circle was Bettina, also naked, white as a ghost and half bled out, tied, her wrists behind her back. She was shackled to Bliss.

I remembered the smell of her in the Damours’ bed. I wasn’t sure why Bettina was there, but then these vamps were being chased and harassed. Maybe they needed more vamp blood for the ceremony. Maybe they had changed it yet again, added another factor. But it was clear that Bettina wasn’t intended to last the night.

There wasn’t a lot of room in the circle for all the bodies. I was glad the children were unconscious. They shouldn’t have to see this kind of thing. No one should.

Kneeling to see through an opening in the leaves, I got a good view of the witch circle. The crosses were bright, shining on the trees, but the vamps seemed impervious to them. Not in any pain at all despite the close proximity. They all wore dark mirrored sunglasses, and I smelled sunscreen on their skin in addition to a protection spell. They had devised a spell to keep them safe from the crosses. If sunlight and crosses didn’t stop them anymore, how long before they came up with a way to magically fend off other vamp weapons: wood to the heart, silver shot? My job was gonna get a lot harder if we didn’t get these guys stopped.