Demon Accords 10: Rogues (20 page)

Hutch and Carl disappeared inside the lodge to pack their gear.  An attack by werewolves effectively ended their hunting aspirations for the season and Mrs. Dox wasn’t coming back to work pretty much anytime.  Shorty gave Declan the password for the Wi-fi and went, with Stacia to guard him, to check the generator’s fuel.  Declan took a stroll to the main power line that fed the property, moving along it till he sensed rather than saw the break.  Someone—with claws, based on the marks in the wood—had climbed the pole and cut the lines.  Declan stood on the ground below and placed both hands on the pole.  Above him, the cut lines suddenly slithered together, the cleanly sliced ends fusing themselves with a spark.

“Sheeeeit,” he heard, turning around to find Shorty and Stacia by the garage, staring at him.  Shorty was open-mouthed but Stacia just watched him with her head tilted ever so slightly.  That made him more nervous than the guide’s open amazement.

“You are, um, a handy individual, Declan,” Shorty said.

“Thank you, Shorty.  According to my aunt, striving to be useful should be a personal goal.”

“Do you think
they’ll
come back?” the guide asked.

“I’d love to hope that they would, but sadly I think not,” Declan said, moving back to his car.  The back gate stood open and he pulled the green duffle out and set it on the ground to unzip it.  It appeared to be heavy.  Something emerged from the bag, shook itself like a cat or a big bird of prey.  About as big as a medium-sized dog, the creature unfolded wings that were each at least seven feet long. It was too dark for Shorty to see any details, but he could tell it had a long neck with a good-sized head that swiveled to lock onto Declan.

“Guard and hunt,” Declan said to the thing, which instantly launched itself into the night sky.  Flapping strongly, it quickly climbed up above them, the outline of its wings much more bat-like than birdlike.  It screamed once, the sound an exact match for the pterodactyls in a dinosaur movie that Shorty couldn’t recall the name of.

“Now, if you have a bunch of old nails, I’d like to ward your lodge,” Declan said.

The guide was still staring open-mouthed at the circling creature overhead.  He brought his attention reluctantly down to the young witch who waited patiently.

“Nails?”

“Yeah, I’ll ring the main building and lock it up with a ward that will stop a werebear at a full charge.  But I need quite a few.”

Shorty rubbed his unshaven face, looked from the young man to the beautiful woman, and then glanced once more at the night sky where the flying creature had disappeared.  Then he grunted and led the way to the garage hut, where he pulled out several large coffee cans of assorted nails.

“Perfect,” Declan said with a smile.  “I’ll just get these in the ground and then we’ll call it a night.”

“I’ll help you,” Stacia said, taking one of the cans of nails.  The witch and the werewolf looked at each other, grinned, and headed off into the dark.  Shorty shook his head and then went into the lodge to face the disaster that had been left behind.

He found Carl sweeping up the debris; several large contractor-sized bags of garbage had already been bundled in the main room.

“The food on the tables was unsalvageable, but Hutch is reheating the stuff in the kitchen.  He mopped the bloody hallway, although it seems the federal guys must have sprayed some kind of disinfectant when they took the… ah, bodies,” Carl said.  Then he glanced at the lights overhead.  “Nice to have the power back on.  Ah, where are the other two?”

“Declan is doing something with nails that he says will protect us tonight, although I honestly think he would like it if the werewolves came back.  He, ah, sent some kind of flying thing up to protect us,” Shorty said.

“A flying what?” Hutch asked, coming out of the kitchen with a tray loaded with food.

“It’s an elemental,” Stacia said from the doorway behind them.  “He’s finishing the ward and should be right in.  Is that food you got there?” she asked, intently interested.

“Ele-what?” Carl asked.

“Elemental.  A spirit of the one of the main elements of magic; earth, fire, water, and air.  Draco is an Air elemental,” Stacia said.

“Like a familiar?” Hutch asked.

“Not even close.  Elementals are extremely powerful entities with their own… minds.  They are decidedly not familiars, and most witches want nothing to do with them,” she said.

“But Declan of course messes with them?” Shorty asked.

“Declan seems to
create
them.  By accident—of course,” she said.

“Of course.  That thing will alert us if a werewolf comes around?” Shorty asked.

“Nah.  If it were just one werewolf, Draco would just kill it.  A pack would be different.  Then he would alert Declan and the two of them would kill the pack,” she said.

“That thing can kill a werewolf?” Shorty asked.

“It’s much stronger than it looks, it attacks from the air like a giant eagle and it is, at least in form, a fire-breathing dragon.  Gentlemen, I suggest we eat and then go to sleep.  It’s a little past midnight and you don’t want to go anywhere tonight.  I absolutely promise you that this lodge is now the safest place to be.  At first light, you two can hit the road while the kid and I go meet the sheriff and feds to sort out that witch and the remains of the pack,” she suggested.

The door opened before they could answer and Declan came in, rubbing his hands together briskly.  “Cold out there,” he said.  “The building is now warded.  Please don’t leave until morning or it’ll break the ward.”  He smiled as he said it, looking around, then heading for the cold fireplace.  Silently they all watched as he piled a bunch of logs on the andirons and then waved a hand.  With a whump and a whoosh, fire flared up and fully involved the cold logs in a split second.

“That’s better,” Declan said, holding his hands out to the flames.  “Is that food I smell?”

Some time later, everyone had eaten something and gone to their rooms.  Carl, Hutch, and Shorty had been concerned about sleeping without a guard but Declan, backed up by Stacia, had assured them that the watchful Draco would be sentry enough and Declan felt he, himself, would be up for several hours more.

Now the two of them were up in Declan’s room, which was between Stacia’s and the one with the broken window and door.  A sheet of plywood covered the shattered window in the trashed room.

“Who are you going to call?” Stacia asked as she watched him power up the same large tablet that he’d used with the tracking spell.  They were sitting on his floor, which had a large Western rug.

“Erika’s roommate Tami,” he said as he activated the call. “It’s still a bit before one a.m., and most of Arcane doesn’t go to bed till two or two-thirty.”

Fifteen seconds later, the screen cleared to show an unsmiling girl with rich black hair and Native American features wearing a yellow t-shirt that said
Get a Taste of Religion, Lick a Witch
across its front.

“Warlock,” the girl said, unsmiling.  She might be pretty if she ever animated her face, Stacia thought.

“Witch,” Declan answered evenly.  “Nice shirt.  Erika’s, I’m guessing?”

She looked down at it and then shrugged.  “Of course.  I was naked when you called,” she said.  Most attractive girls speaking to an attractive male acquaintance would either blush, make the statement flirty, or make it a challenge.  She just delivered it matter-of-fact.

“What do you want?” she asked brusquely. “And where are you?  The teachers have been asking.”

“Death magic and northern Maine.  There’s an air witch up here who has surrounded her lair with it.  I’d like some pointers,” he said.

“I see.  What do I get out of this?” she asked.

“What do you want?” he replied.

“Screw Erika,” she stated bluntly.

“Not happening,” he said.

“Didn’t think so, but it was worth a try,” she said, glancing for the first time at Stacia.

“How about you owe me a favor?  Largish favor.”

“Too open-ended.  How about upgrades to your avatar?” he offered.

“How about upgrades to my
team’s
avatars… plus a small favor?” she asked, then pushed on before he could respond. “The favor won’t break rules, won’t cause harm, and doesn’t involve you boinking any witches.”

“Acceptable,” he said.

“Okay.  What’s your sitch?” she asked.

“Young witch.  Hooked up with a pack of rogue weres.  They’ve taken over an old factory space, a paper mill, I believe.  I could feel death and possibly spirits.  Stacia smelled dead flesh,” he said.

“That’s remarkably vague, Warlock.  I would expect more detailed information from the Master of the Wytch Wars… unless… ah, holding back on purpose,” she said, tapping her lips with a finger.  Stacia noted that her fingernail was painted glossy black.

“Garbage in, garbage out, as you programmers say, right?” Tami asked.  

“Yeah, I can live with that.  I’m looking for general approaches and things to watch out for.  For instance, I know death magic wards generally suck life from anything that trips them,” he said.

“Exactly, so the easiest thing is to send something living into the fray and when it dies, you move in.  Some wards will get stronger from absorbing life, some will be one-hit wonders and disappear.  If you sensed trapped spirits, those will be the ones that gain strength,” Tami said.

“So I’ve got to sacrifice living things to the spells in order to get by them?” he asked.

“That’s the quick way.  If you have lots of time, you can erode them safely from a distance by taking apart the foci of the spells, but your witch would likely notice and attack back,” Tami said.  “So go to a pet store, buy like twenty mice, and toss them into the spells. It might distract any big nasty enough to get past it.”

“Yeah, not happening,” he said.

She smirked, the first real expression Stacia had seen on her face.  “Bunny-loving tree hugger can’t harm itty bitty mice?”

“If I had to, I’d do it.  But I’m in the backend of nowhere and pet stores are few and far between,” he said.

“Hmmm, I still think you’re just soft.  Is he soft, werewolf?” she suddenly asked Stacia.  “Or can he get hard at all?”

Stacia just raised one eyebrow.  Declan answered before she could.  “Alternatives, Tami?” he asked.

“Spoilsport.  Cut switches from living saplings, preferably evergreen, ideally juniper or holly.  The trees will live but the branches take a long time to die.  That resistance works well against many death spells.  Plus, you can hold them out in front of you like a detector.  When you see the needles at the tip turn brown, you know you got a problem.  Since you aren’t tough enough to sacrifice mice, which I know damn well you could call by the dozens, you’ll have to erode the ward.  Salt and herbs.  Best if you can deliver them from a distance, like with hollowed eggshells. Captive spirits can come at you in disembodied form or may take some type of physical construct.  Salt, some of the stronger herbs, and draining spells are useful in slowing them down and weakening them.  But to completely banish, you’ll need to find and burn their remains… with more salt.”

“How about shotgun shells stuffed with salt and protective herbs, plus a few pressurized paintball grenades filled with more of the same?” Declan asked.

“Yeah, maybe.  What herbs do you have?” Tami asked.

He looked around the room and then frowned.  “I left the herb kit in the car.  I’ll be right back.  Just gotta let myself out of the ward and then repower it.  Talk to Stacia while I’m gone,” he said, jumping up and heading out the door.