The Devil's Soldier (21 page)

Lucien turned around, still trying to fight the dizziness in his head. In the center of the group, he spotted a woman different from the rest. She wore a short black dress and was thrashing her head back and forth, whipping long red hair to the side in time to a musical beat. He approached her slowly, having to physically move people away from him. No one protested, as they all seemed to be in some kind of a trance.

Lucien was almost to the woman when her eyelids snapped open. The intense stare coming from her blue eyes nearly dropped him to his knees. He flexed his muscles in concentration to fight off the power she seemed to be having over him.

She moved forward, her full lips threatening to break into a grin. She came to stand inches in front of him, her eyes scanning him up and down.

"You are magnificent," she purred. "A perfect," she said, leaning toward him until her mouth was only a breath away, "specimen."

The sweet smell of her breath, and the way her gaze held his further clouded his mind. What was it about her? She was not familiar, and yet… her exposed skin, her slender fingers, the tiny diamond pendant around her neck. He reached up as if to touch it, but she caught his hand and entwined her fingers into his while her other hand trailed up his side and slipped beneath his shirt. He would've shivered had he been in his right mind. No one had ever touched him like this except for Eve.

Eve.

He pictured her now. Imagined that the woman in front of him was Eve. It was an easy illusion, especially when the red-haired woman's eyes flashed brilliant green, just like Eve's. She lifted on her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his. He didn't fight it, not when Eve felt so
close
. He snaked his arm behind her back and pressed her to his body, making her gasp.

The kiss turned deep and passionate and seemed to last forever. There was a moment, small as it was, where Lucien sensed something else in the kiss—a probing on his mind. He thought he should fight back, but then he would have to let go of the illusion of Eve that felt so real.

The kiss ended and the woman said, "Thank you for the magic. Now sleep."

Lucien closed his eyes and dreamed of Eve.

A moment later, his eyelids flew open to a sharp sting across his cheek. Liane was standing in front of him, yelling something. She slapped him again. Charlie was standing next to her, his eyebrows pulled tightly together. Slowly, Lucien's hearing returned.

"Snap out of it!" Liane said. She raised her hand to slap him again, but he caught her wrist.

"What happened?" he asked. He was back in the club, standing alone in front of a large speaker. The red-headed woman was gone.

"You completely lost it, that's what!" she said. "What is wrong with you?"

"I don't understand."

Charlie placed his hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "You need to shake off the magic. She really did a number on you."

"Who?"

"Who do you think?" Liane snapped. She glanced around anxiously.

Charlie leaned forward and said into his ear, "Alarica is here."

35

Alaric melted into the crowd, her hair slowly changing from red to black. Even her dress changed to gray. She kept her eyes on Lucien, and whispered his name, the syllables sliding from her tongue. There was a beautiful darkness inside him, buried deep within, and it had tasted good. Maybe she could tap into that dark magic somehow. Before she killed him, she would try.

He was standing in front of the speaker, his head down as he was still in a trance. She had expected him to put up more of a fight when she had stolen his magic, but he had easily caved, and all it had taken was a single image of Eve. Alarica would very much like to kill his love for Eve. Maybe then she could eat that darkness inside him.

Charlie appeared in front of Lucien, along with a woman. Alarica searched Eve's memories until she came up with a name: Liane, another witch. She was yelling something at Lucien, and then she slapped him. Lucien shook his head, as if trying to clear his mind. Charlie whispered something in his ear. Lucien straightened, completely alert now, and by the way he was suddenly scanning the audience, he must know about her.

Time to make her move. This was going to be so much fun. The first thing she needed to do was change the music.

Toward the back of the room, a DJ was standing behind a table, his head bobbing up and down while his hands played with several of the dials on the electronic equipment. The song he was playing, a mix from a popular boy hand, was giving her a headache. She reached her hand up in his direction and began to squeeze, focusing her energy on his throat. The DJ's eyes widened, and he clawed at his neck. Alarica squeezed tighter. Blood vessels in his eyes burst,
turning
the whites of them red. His face grew scarlet, then a deep purple—almost to the color she loved, but she didn't have time to wait for the shade of death's gray.

The DJ fell backwards, dead. Alarica mentally changed the musical tracks so quickly a loud screeching sound vibrated the room, making everyone cover their ears. She stopped only when she found a song she liked. There were no voices, only a fast pumping beat and several violins. It took a few seconds for the crowd to recover from the screeching and to get into the music. Their bodies swayed and thumped to the rhythm.

So did she.

She stood in the center of the room, surrounded protectively by others. When Lucien finally noticed her, he tried to break through the crowd, but Alarica didn't allow anyone to move. She held them fast with magic knowing that neither Lucien nor Charlie would hurt a human to get to her. But then all of a sudden, Lucien was shoving humans across the room, and by his stone expression, he didn't seem to care about any of them—only getting to her.

If she was capable of love, she could love this vampire.

Charlie took hold of Lucien and attempted to pull him back. Alarica glanced to the crowded balcony above them. With a flick of her wrist, she exploded the metal poles that held it up. The whole side began to fall. Several people on the balcony screamed and clawed at anything they could grab onto. A few fell the twenty-foot drop to the floor. The rest of the balcony should have fallen, too, but it was curiously still in place.

Impossible!

Alarica glanced around. The whole room had become a mob; people pushed and shoved to get outside. On the other side of the room, Charlie and the witch Liane were trying to get
people
off the broken balcony as quickly as possible while Lucien was searching for a way around the crowd. It would take a minute for him to find his way over to her.

High up on the opposite side of the great room, near the edge of the balcony that still stood, was—she narrowed her eyes—a vampire. An extremely old and powerful one:
Henry
. Alarica's smile grew as she remembered who he was. Henry was just the vampire she needed to remove the curse, and she knew exactly how to make him do it.

She snapped her arms downward and whispered, "
Ascendo
."

Her whole body lifted and continued to rise until she was standing on the balcony near him, but not close enough that he could make a grab for the necklace.

Henry had one hand pointed in the direction of the fallen balcony and the other turned toward her in a defensive position.

"Do you really think you can do both?" she asked.

"Do you care to find out?"

She smiled, wanting very much to know the answer to his question, but she needed something else first.

"Henry," she said, "I'm surprised you showed yourself to me of all people. You know I'm working with Boaz, right?"

His eyes flashed to the broken balcony where many people were still scrambling to get off. "You could do better."

Alarica laughed. "Very true, and that's why I need you."

He frowned. "I don't understand."

"You see, Boaz put a spell on this necklace that is making me do whatever he says. I need that spell broken." Alarica sensed Lucien coming up behind her. She quickly spun around and shocked him from the balcony. His body flew through the air and hit the ground. She turned back to Henry. "So, how about a trade? You get rid of this spell, and I'll keep your secret."

"Maybe we can discuss this another time," Henry said. Deep creases etched his forehead as he continued to concentrate on telepathically holding up the balcony. She didn't appreciate the distraction while she was trying to have a conversation with him.

She turned toward the balcony and stretched forth her hand. With a spin of her fingers, the entire structure collapsed to the floor, sending a plume of dust into the air. Several people screamed in terror. Their sounds only added to the macabre music playing from the DJ's table.

Henry's face twisted into both horror and anger. "Fine. Come close, and I'll fix your little problem."

"Do you think I'm an idiot?" she asked. "The second I come near you, you're going to try and get my necklace."

She touched the dangling orb hanging from her neck. To everyone else it appeared as a tiny jewel.

Out of nowhere, Lucien leapt up and over the railing, his fangs barred. She barely had time to raise her hand, trapping him midair within a tight ball of energy.

"It's not time for you," she growled at Lucien.

Henry lunged for her, his hand outstretched toward the necklace. Alarica back-handed him across the face with such force that his body spun around.

"Enough of this!" She cast her arms downward, propelling her once more into the air.

Lucien fell from her mental cocoon and landed in a crouching position upon the floor.

"There's nowhere for you to go, Alarica," Henry said. He was following her slowly along the remaining balcony while her body floated high in the center of the room.

"Who said I'm trying to leave?" She glanced down at a woman who was crying and holding her ankle. A man was trying to help her to stand. His efforts were pointless. Only Alarica could help.

She mentally took hold of the woman's leg and twisted hard, flipping the woman onto her stomach. The woman cried in pain and clawed at the concrete floor as Alarica drug her to the center of the room. Charlie and Liane rushed to help her, but Alarica sent a burst of energy toward them, knocking them both into a wall. She raised her left hand high, her fingers pressed together. Just before she snapped them apart, she turned to Henry and winked. Her fingers parted. At the same time, all five extremities of the woman, her legs, arms and head, were torn from her body, spraying blood across the room, but it looked more like ink beneath the room's blue lighting, which disappointed her.

Henry growled low and pushed forward with both of his hands. An invisible force smashed Alarica in the chest, sending her spinning across the room until she smashed into a metal pipe near the ceiling. She grunted but then smiled. It was nice to have a little competition.

Lucien was below her, his face straining in concentration and hands pointed toward her.

"It's useless, Lucien," she called to him and laughed. "Your magic is mine for the time being. And it
feels
good inside me." She rubbed her hands across her stomach seductively.

Henry shifted his body weight, not much, but enough to make Alarica think he was going to try and attack her. She was about to strike first, when people dressed in black and dark green uniforms came pouring into the room, brandishing weapons. This must be the DSRD.

Time for the show.

Alarica blew on her hand then closed it into a fist. She spun her wrist round and round, faster and faster.

"Everybody freeze!" a tall man below yelled. He had a gun pointed at Lucien's back. The other men with him had their weapons fixed around the room.

Charlie and Liane stood in front of a group people huddled into a corner. Henry backed up against the wall, out of their eyesight.

"Somebody kill the music!" the same man shouted.

"My pleasure," Alarica whispered. She opened her closed fist toward the DJ's table and released a ball of fire. It exploded into the back of the room, knocking most of the people to the floor. She released another one toward the corner where Charlie and Liane stood with several others, but Liane lifted both her hands and whispered something Alarica couldn't hear. The approaching fire changed to water before impact.

Alarica scowled and turned to release more flames, but at the last second she caught Liane smiling and winking at her. It was an odd reaction, one she would have to explore when there wasn't other things for her to do.

All of a sudden, a gust of wind slammed her from above, knocking her from the air. She dropped to the ground on all fours, her knees cracking against the concrete flooring, sending a wave of pain throughout her body. Henry was looking at her over the railing with his hand raised as if to strike her again.

She rolled over and concentrated on the column holding up the balcony Henry was standing on. Just as she exploded it, Lucien leapt into the air over her, but before he landed, a shot rang out. A bullet tore through Lucien's shoulder, and he fell to the ground near her.

"I said freeze!" the DHRD man yelled.

Alarica could barely hear him over the loud crashing sound of twisted metal and debris from the second fallen balcony.

Another man appeared behind the leader of the DHRD, wearing the same uniform, but this one wasn't holding a weapon. Instead, long fangs filled his open mouth and sharp claws grew from his fingers. He must be part of the special team Tom had mentioned.

Alarica rose from the ground. Lucien reached for her, but she stepped over him and said, "No one commands me."

The gun fired again, but she stopped its progress with a mere glance. With a twist of her fingers, the bullet changed directions and shot through the air. It hit the DHRD agent directly between his eyes, but it didn't just leave a hole—it exploded his whole head.

The vampire next to him charged Alarica. She let him come to engage her in hand-to-hand combat. She wanted to see what was so special about him, but before she could, she needed to make sure the other DHRD soldiers stayed busy. With the back of the club already on fire, she quickly sent another fireball to the bar where two DHRD agents were attempting to circle around her. The explosion was made worse by the copious amounts of alcohol behind the counter. Even she stumbled a bit when the ground shook, but she managed to right herself just as the vampire reached her.

He punched hard and fast. Alarica blocked the move and countered with her own direct hit to his chest. He flew back a few feet and rushed her again. She blocked his many punches and kicks, and
all
of his spins and jumps proved useless, as she was able to maneuver around them. His face turned red, and he snarled just before attacking her again.

In his mind, he probably thought he was fighting ferociously, but to her, his moves were slow and clunky. What did concern her, however, was Lucien. He looked calm as he slowly circled them, yet she could feel the storm brewing inside him. His magic was returning faster than she expected. She better hurry. Dealing with both Lucien and Henry might be more than she could handle.

Just as the vampire lunged a tight fist at her face, Alarica moved to the side and gripped the vampire by the throat. With a quick upward tug, she tossed his body into the raging fire not more than thirty feet away. He hadn't been so special after all.

Another small explosion burst near the bar, as the fire must've found another supply of alcohol to burn. By the intense heat she felt licking at her skin, the building didn't have much longer.

Lucien came to a stop not
far
in front of her. Henry was close behind him, hidden in the shadows. To the right of her, Liane stood tall, watching with casual indifference, another strange reaction. Alarica wasn't sure where Charlie was. Probably trying to help the last of the humans escape.

"What are you going to do, Lucien?" Alarica asked. "It's not like you're going to hurt this body. Although, I don't think I would mind a little pain from you."

"Just fight me," he said, his voice low.

"I already learned my lesson not to get too close to you, but that doesn't mean I won't fight." She lifted her arm and curled her fingers into the air while imagining Lucien's arm, the one that had been shot, being jerked to the floor. It did just that, with Lucien squirming to get free.