Cursed: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Thrice Cursed Mage Book 1) (12 page)

I flattened myself against the debris-covered metal as they opened fire, filling the air with bullets as their guns jerked around in their hands like flopping fish. Jack’s swerving wasn’t the only thing that kept them from mostly missing the truck, but it was what caused Duane’s shotgun to fly across the bed and hit the wall next to me.

I flopped forward on elbows, ignoring the pain that flashed along my forearms and snatched the weapon even though the tiny burst of movement made my guts revolt. I pushed down my nausea and concentrated on pointing the shotgun at the Camry. It swerved back into view, and I fired into the car’s windshield. The sound of busted glass filled my cotton swabbed brain. The car swerved sideways, clipping an old VW bug and tearing off its driver’s side mirror in a spray of sparks.

“Good shooting,” Duane called, giving me a thumbs up.

I tried to smile at him and wound up throwing up into the dirt. Thankfully, there wasn’t much inside my belly because a moment later, I found myself lying face down in the mess. Duane scrambled over to me and reached out for the gun clasped in my right hand. The moment he touched me, my tattoos flared to life and a surge of energy shot through my body, bringing with it the smell of oak and a vision of multicolored leaves dancing in fall breezes.

The cotton filling my brain vanished as Duane snatched his hand away like he’d been bitten by a snake. Shakes overtook him in an instant, and his flesh paled.

Before I could ask what the hell had happened, the Camry swerved back behind us. Adrenaline surged through me, and I threw myself on top of Duane, knocking him flat as a spray of bullets passed over our heads and smacked into the toolbox at the back of the truck before ricocheting inside the truck bed like a pinball machine of death.

I don’t know how I avoided getting perforated, but I didn’t stop to find out. Feeling better than I had in a while, I cocked the old pump action and let loose another blast of silver buckshot into the shooter on the passenger side. It caught him full on in the chest. His Uzi fell from his hand, hit the asphalt, and disappeared under the tires of the Camry.

As I tried to pump the shotgun again, we swerved around a school bus. I lost my balance and fell. The weapon slipped from my grip as I toppled ass over elbows toward the back of the truck. I hit the tailgate and kept going as the Camry veered back into view in time to catch me with its spider webbed windshield.

Pain exploded through my back as I busted through the windshield in a spray of gummy safety glass and crashed into the dashboard. The movement made the driver slam on his brakes, and the car jerked to a stop hard enough for me to fly forward across the hood and fall to the pavement. I landed hard on my elbows, and even though my insides felt scrambled, I looked for Jack’s truck. It skidded to a stop several meters away, but I instantly knew they were too far away to possibly help me. I was on my own.

That thought filled me as the car doors opened. A surge of anger ran through me as my arm flared bright enough to blot out the sun, and a sudden calmness descended over me. I wasn’t alone at all. A smile crossed my lips as I leapt to my feet, no longer bound by things like injuries and pain. My mind focused in an instant as I met the charge of the closest werewolf, tearing his Uzi from his hands and driving my right first through his chest with one blow. My knuckles punched out his back in a shower of gore as I whirled around, careful to keep the screaming thug’s body in front of me to block the spray of bullets coming toward me while firing my stolen Uzi at the shooter.

My rounds caught the shooter in the chest, throwing him backward into the path of an oncoming minivan. The driver of the vehicle must have seen what was going to happen because she slammed on her brakes and tried to swerve around him, but it was no use. The blue Honda Odyssey smashed into the werewolf, pitching him up onto the hood and over the top of the vehicle with bone crunching force. He smacked into the pavement on the other side with a wet slap and lay there unmoving.

Sirens filled the air, and off in the distance, I could see at least one more Camry flying toward us ahead of the blue and red gumballs. Giddy laughter tore from my throat as I inhaled the smell of blood and death. Power leapt from the bleeding werewolf still stuck to my arm, healing me in an instant and my tattoos flared like star fire. I jerked my arm backward, ripping it free of the werewolf’s corpse in one smooth motion while I emptied the rest of his gun into the driver who was still struggling to get free of the seatbelt twisted around him.

The cars were almost upon us now, but strangely, I wasn’t all that worried. I spun on my heel, dropping the empty gun onto the ground before sprinting toward Jack’s truck. I caught the flash of Jack’s eyes in the mirror and the wheels started spinning. I reached down, feeling for the power coursing through my body and leapt the last several feet. I crashed onto the bed and lost my balance, toppling over as the old pickup took off in a squeal of tires.

“What the fuck are you?” Duane asked, mouth open in awe. “I’ve never seen someone move like that before, even a Cursed.”

“Didn’t you hear? I exchanged my soul for power. It wouldn’t have been a good deal if it wasn’t for a lot of power,” I said sort of hoping the power thing was true.

Before Duane could respond, Jack stomped on the gas pedal and sent us flying up onto the sidewalk and around the gawkers. We hit open road a second later as the other cars skidded to a stop behind the mess of cars we’d left behind, and somehow, I didn’t feel that bad about it. No, scratch that. I was downright giddy wondering how the werewolves, who had no doubt already healed, were going to explain a car full of automatic weapons.

“Yeah, I heard, but I’ve seen lots of Cursed in my time. Buddy, I’ve never seen someone’s eyes go as dark as yours did. When I looked into them, it was like the void itself was staring back at me, threatening to rip out my soul just for the fun of it.” Duane kept his shotgun pointed at my chest as he slumped to the bed on his ass and braced himself against the sidewall. “It’s not cool.”

“It’s a little bit cool,” I replied weakly. Inwardly, I was terrified he was right. I knew nothing about the demon who had given me this power. For all I knew it was Lucifer himself, and for Duane to be as scared of me as he was after everything we’d been through only reinforced my terror. What the hell had I done? And worse, why had I felt the need for so much power just to save one mother and her child? It didn’t make any sense… unless the mother and child I was trying to save were being held by someone way more powerful than a centuries-old Cursed.

“No, son, it’s not.” He didn’t even smile as he braced the shotgun against his knees so he could keep it leveled at me. The movement gave me the sneaking suspicion he didn’t plan on lowering it. “Not even a little bit.”

Chapter 15

It was dark by the time we reached the location Ricky had specified earlier, partially because we’d had to switch vehicles a couple times. Jack had been more than a little upset to exchange his classic Ford for a “Japanese piece of shit” as he called it, and his ensuing whining had been so annoying that when we’d stopped for gas, we wound up boosting a Dodge Charger, which evidently, was little better.

Still, it was a good thing we’d switched vehicles because every time I saw a black Camry on the road, I was pretty sure it was manned by werewolves. I had seen a lot of them. Too many for it to just be coincidence.

Now, I stood on the street outside a massive wrought-iron gate that blocked access to a hugely expensive looking gated community. A guard shack sat square in the middle of the gates, and even from here, I could make out several video cameras. I wasn’t one hundred percent sure how well trained the guards were, but being that I could see an honest to god Ferrari in the driveway of the first house beyond the gate, I was pretty sure they weren’t going to let me in even if I showed up with a van full of pizzas to deliver. No, this was the type of place where they escorted the pizza delivery boy to Mrs. Robinson’s door.

“You got any way of getting in there? Or are we going to go with the whole shoot our way in thing?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder at Duane. The druid stood there chewing on his lip and let out a slow sigh.

“I do, but you won’t like it,” Duane said, rubbing his chin with one hand as his gaze swung back to a manhole cover a few feet away. “And shooting our way in probably won’t work. The cops’ response time to a place like this can be counted in seconds.”

“Is this where you seriously suggest we go in through the sewer?” Jack asked, raising one dark eyebrow and giving me the impression the two of them had engaged in the particular conversation before. It made me wonder what they did when they weren’t in the bar, and as that thought crossed my mind, I realized I knew next to nothing about them. God, I was an idiot. Here I was about to break into a millionaire class gated community with a couple guys I’d met only a few hours ago.

“Well, we can’t go over the walls.” Duane pointed to the razor wire lining the twenty-foot-tall cinderblock wall. “I don’t know if you can see it, but I can actually feel electricity running through that wire. I’m pretty sure it’s a Waldorf system which means if it gets disturbed by so much as a pigeon, not only does it send fifty thousand volts running through that razor wire, it also sounds an alarm. Underground is our best bet, places like these tend not to expect it.”

“What if there’s a defense in the sewer?” I asked, trying to decide how I felt about Duane’s knowledge of alarm systems. Part of me was impressed, but most of me was worried. No one good knew that much about them.

“Look, your only other option is to charge through that gate, but you see those steel cylinders in the ground on either side of the gate?” He gestured toward it, and I spied the six-inch-diameter cylinders just poking up from the cement. They were spaced about three inches apart the entire length of both gates.

“Yeah?” I said as a bad feeling crept down my spine.

“I’m guessing those will shoot up and provide some kind of barrier that will be very difficult to get through. You could likely punch through the gate, but not before they came up, spearing your car.” Duane rubbed his chin and his eyes twinkled mischievously. “No, we need to go underground, unless you both want to give me a few days to figure out a way inside.”

“Well, we ain’t got time for that. Ricky’s no doubt on her way here right now. Hell, I’m sort of surprised she and her wolves aren’t already here,” I replied, wishing not for the first time, I hadn’t lost the Beretta. Not having the gun left me feeling naked and exposed. “But remind me later to have you help me rob a bank.”

“Banks are small time,” Duane said, and a smile broke across his aged face. “I get into them all the time when I’m feeling lazy. Mostly, I break into big corporations and government agencies.” I’m not sure what kind of look I was giving him, but his eyes twinkled. “I’m the guy they pay to try to break into their facilities to test their security.” He shrugged as if to say, “Hey, it pays the bills.”

“Why don’t I just walk up to the guards and lay my vampire whammy on them?” Jack asked, pushing past the two of us and sauntering toward the guard shack. “Even if it fails, which it won’t, it isn’t like I’ll show up on the cameras.”

“Jack never wants to go in the sewers.” Duane let out a small huff of breath as he eyed me carefully as if expecting me to comment on the vampire’s antics.

I was about to reply when the vampire sauntered over to the shack’s window and a portly man with dark eyes and a red and gray streaked Viking beard poked his head out. I couldn’t hear what was said, but as Jack made two fingers on his right hand walk across his left palm, a buzzing sound filled the air and the gate swung open. Jack gestured for us to come over, and as we caught up to him, the Viking gave us a glassy-eyed smile and waved us through.

“Vampire trumps bank thief every time,” Jack said, smirking as Duane grumbled next to me. “Now we just need to find the house.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Duane replied, practically snarling as he walked through the gate. He made it about three steps inside the compound before a sound like busting glass filled my ears. Duane’s face twisted up in agony before he was thrown forcibly backward about twenty feet. He landed hard in a grove of azaleas and lay there dazed.

“What the hell?” I mouthed as a high pitched ringing split the air like an air-raid siren and the gate started to close.

“They’ve got some kind of barrier spell,” Jack cried out as symbols all along the ground lit up with that same sickly green light I remembered seeing from Vassago’s Cursed. Jack’s gaze swung from the still unmoving Duane to the glowing green fire and horror passed over his features. “Damn.”

“What is it?” I asked, but before the words had even left my mouth, Jack had grabbed me by the collar of my trench coat.

“We tripped a magical trap that won’t let me in. They must have known I’d come after Sera. Looks like you’ll have to do this on your own,” he said, taking a step forward and using all his vampire strength to fling me through the closing gate.

My shoulder crashed into it with a bone cracking squeal that caused the metal to shudder, but my momentum kept me going anyway. I hurtled through the opening like a broken mannequin and crashed to the cement on the other side as the metal door slammed closed, leaving me alone on the other side.

I tried to shake the cobwebs from my brain as I turned back toward the wrought-iron gate. I couldn’t see through it. The entire structure was alive with green flame hot enough to turn the asphalt beneath it to slag and burn all the plant life to ash. The siren was still going off, but it seemed a lot quieter inside the compound, and as I looked around, I realized there were hazy lines of energy drifting up from the pavement, reminding me of heat lines cast from the sun in the desert.

“Did Jack seriously just throw me through a gate of burning hellfire and tell me to save Sera by myself?” I said to myself, and as the words left my mouth, an assertion of truth rippled across the back of my brain. Still, I got the impression Jack wouldn’t have thrown me through the gate if he didn’t think I could do this. He expected me to be able do this on my own. Was it because of my demonic arm? It had to be.