Rose: Briar's Thorn (15 page)

I pushed myself to my feet.  “We best get into position.  We only have minutes before sunset and Daria needs to be ready.”  I was curious what she looked like in human form.  Her wolf was gorgeous so I theorized that her human form followed suit.

Mari cocked an eyebrow. “You're recovering from that monumental task fast.”

I shrugged as I opened the car door for Nicole to slip in. “Unfortunately, there is plenty of evil for my curse to feed upon in the world.”  They all regarded me in silence.  I could feel their empathy for me as I could them.  Then we loaded up and were off.  I exerted a tiny amount of will and the briars parted to let us through, then reformed after us.

I explained.  “That barrier will not hold against sustained assault.  Unlike the shield I made around Nicole's crypt, it will not regenerate.  I had used a piece of what doubles as my heart for hers.”

We wound up in the city center, where Gretta calculated the center of the focus to be.  As we all stood, assessing the area, she looked from side to side and thrust out her hands.  Saplings burst from the Earth, spaced so tightly they formed walls across the roads between buildings.

I understood what she was doing as she repeated it over and over.  She was trying to contain whatever was coming, to keep them in one area for as long as we could.  Her barriers would fall eventually, but every minute would count.  I assisted and blocked off a few openings with my vines.

We purposefully left an avenue of ready escape to the south-east, where any enemy that got past us would head for the city walls to get out, not knowing that they would be transported into solid stone of the walls.  The druid circles in that direction were the ones Gretta disabled the corresponding outer circles of.

Red took off the wolf's backpack and pulled out some light clothing. And laid it out behind the car.  Daria looked at the last rays of the sun over the Sound and trotted over to the clothes.  We all followed Mari to the front of the car to give the wolf some privacy.

Daria's growling yelps of pain signaled sundown.  As her yelps slowly became the screams of a woman being tortured with red hot pokers in her eyes, I felt the thrumming of dark magics as each of the druid circles started activating.  Unnatural clouds started rolling in over the city, drawn by the large amounts of black magic gathering above us.  Lightning started striking the structures at the center of the building ball of energy that was forming, setting them aflame.

The atmosphere grew heavy and rain started falling as a tall, fit woman with the eyes of Maireni's hellhound, stepped out from behind the vehicle to stand next to Red.  I could feel a subsonic growl building from within her as she stared at the ball of seething energy.  Wow, Daria was stunning, or maybe it was her formidable presence making her seem so.

Gretta checked her body armor and her weapons, and we all spread out to form a loose line.  I glanced at Nicole and shot her a loving smile which she returned with interest.  I heard the howling of werewolves outside the walls of the city just as the ball of energy became a shimmering wall, a portal larger than any I had ever witnessed.

Nicole drew both of her gleaming short swords and started striding forward as thousands of creatures from hell came pouring out of the portal.  She shouted over the baying, growling, and snarling of the creatures.  “Shall we ladies?”  And we charged.

I saw all manner of beasts as we collided with them, spreading our line wider.  Most were werewolves who had groups of druids and witches behind them.  Other beings tasted like black magic constructs.  Huge golems and swift gargoyles and a couple I couldn't identify.  Then there were the ones that I couldn't feel except peripherally.  They were the lesser demons subject to Styche the Trickster's will.

They certainly looked and smelled like they came from hell.  All manner of beasts, all of which had almost human eyes.  The souls of the damned inside each.  They were all shapes and sizes.  Some were two legged, some four.  There were a few insectoid looking ones.  And they all stank of rot, death, and brimstone.

If I still had any humanity left in me, I'm sure I would have been terrified.  But I was more a monster than them so I found them fascinating.  I could feel them assaulting our senses, trying to project despair and fear.

We all shuffled a bit, going against our instincts until we knew if they had targeted talismans that were specific to each of us.  If so we wouldn't give them ready targets until we eliminated the magic, users.  They were our main targets, then we could face the enemies we were best suited for.

Parker, Nicole, and Gretta stood ready as Daria called out in a voice that was brimming with persuasive power that washed over the battlefield, “Come face me wolves!”  I could even feel the urge to turn to her.

I just caught the initial blows when most of the thousands of wolves seemed to converge on the four women.  I was about to wonder what weapons she carried, when she raked her hands like claws across the first wolf, tearing its throat out.  I could see the fur, flesh and blood burning and foaming white.  Her touch was silver?  Parker mirrored her move and tore into a wolf with her diamond-hard nails.

Gretta was just stepping forward calmly, emptying out many magazines of silver rounds from her pistols and skewering wolves with saplings and roots.

Nicole's blades sliced through the air, beheading two wolves with the same move as she spun away.  God, she was magnificent.

I turned away and picked my target as I flowed over the enemy like a wave of thorny black death.  I'd delay the golems.  Those druids forming up behind them were most likely anticipating having to deal with Ella.  I started through the seeming ocean of evil.  There was so many enemies and they were still arriving.

I saw a blur of red as Mari dove over some enemy in a spinning pirouette which made her red cloak flare out like a specter of death. She landed on the back of a large construct that looked to be a cross between a panther and a snake.  She grabbed its head and placed her feet on its back and heaved with all of her augmented strength.  I could hear the snap of its neck over the din of battle and she was off in a blur toward a group of lamias.

The witches cast a powerful spell at her.  But they weren't ready for the Red Hood, the magic slammed into her and spun her around, but it didn't slow her charge as she dove into the group snarling like a wolf.  I saw the confusion all over the battlefield as the enemy were not met with the Avatars they expected.

I had to chuckle a little, then I wondered where Ella was.  I heard someone bellowing, “I said, get off you sodding wankers!”  Then a pile of wolves exploded outward in a great whump of force about ten yards away with crystal spikes embedded in their skulls.  Ella roared out in rage and flung her arms wide.  A hailstorm of crystal shards exploded from her arms and mowed a path through the oncoming enemy, twenty feet wide.  She ignored the larger creatures and charged straight at a group of magic users.  That's the last thing they would expect from Ella Deathbringer.

I saw some fluttering in the air and yelled out, “Fliers!”  As my vines shot skyward to pull two of the gremlins which had just arrived, out of the air and pull them apart.  Any flying enemy were the most immediate danger to the civilians and police over the barrier of briars.  They were our priority.

I kept snatching the swift creatures out of the air as a rain of crystalline shards shredded others in the sky.  I even saw one that was getting past us come spiraling out of the air with an arrow sticking through its body.  I grinned at Red with her crossbow as she let it slide back under her cloak.

The golems started their attacks.  I could feel the force of their blows in the shields my thorny vines kept throwing up to intercept.  They were just magic constructs of mud, large and insanely strong, but as such were not affected by my toxins.

I could see stains on their fists where at least the black magics were burning them where they connected.  This normally would have kept a mortal creature from making more contact, lest they get more burns, but golems felt no pain.  They actually felt nothing at all as they were just puppets of the druids hiding behind them.

There were hundreds of them.  With one last glance at the portal where the flood of the enemy had reduced to a trickle, I turned back to the golems and thrust my hands forward.  Some of my thickest vines, with thorns the size of my fingers, sawed out of me and burst through the chests of the ten unlucky beasts between me and the smirking druids.  I spread my fingers and my vines all split and tore the golems in half and they slumped into the mud they were created from.

Before the druids could react and have their puppets close the line, I skittered forward on spidery legs as more of my vines repeated the process to make the hole larger.  I flowed into the large group of druids.  Their anguished cries sounded above the chaos of battle as my toxins killed them before they could fall tot he ground.

I caught a glimpse of the women battling the wolves, there were so many of the cursed, but they  were holding their own.  My distraction almost cost me as one of the remaining druids in this group pulled out a talisman that looked to have a tuft of blonde hair on it.  Ella's?  How did they get Ella's hair?

He chanted a trigger and a large hammer of pure black magic slammed into me, the pain was worse than when my briars tear out of my skin.  I was blown off my spidery legs and sent tumbling across the ground.

I knew pain, though, and this was almost debilitating,  but I lived with pain every day of my life, it was no stranger to me.  Layers and layers of vines and brambles were burned away from shielding me.  My skin started blackening as it died and necrosis started setting in.

As I tumbled to a halt, I looked up at the man now fifty feet away.  He had an almost euphoric look on his face as power continued to slam into me from the talisman which was beginning to smoke.  Then I smiled at the man and he faltered as I started to stand inside the torrent of energy.

Sweet black magic swirled around me I could hear the whispers of countless voices, like a siren's song, tempting me to use the magic or be consumed by it.  This was a double-edged attack tailored specifically for Ella.  It had more than enough black energy to kill her if she resisted but if she took the darkness into her and used the magic instead, it would seduce and corrupt her, and the Alphas would have her.

This man's mistake, though, was that he was using it against me, not Ella.  Once I understood it, I started laughing maniacally as I forced myself forward on my spidery legs, as the look on his face turned from euphoria to panic.

My briars were holding the golems away as I approached him and the necrosis of my flesh started reversing itself as I took the black magic of the attack inside of me.  Into the reservoir of death and malice, that was the swirling black mass of my heart.  He was just supercharging the curse that the Romanian witch,  Alina, had laid upon me.

He dropped the talisman as it burst into flames and the spell fizzled, then turned to run, but a web of vines shot around him in a loose cage.  I lowered myself to my feet and took the last couple steps up to him as I grew a small thorn out from my index finger.

I stepped through my vines and put my face right in front of his and said, “Boo.”  As I stabbed the thorn into the side of his neck.  He was dead before he even realized it.  I took a deep breath and looked around.  The enemy was in disarray, I couldn't fathom the full-scale carnage I was witnessing.  The seven of us were cutting swaths through their masses.  Most of the magic users were down so we could start concentrating on our strengths.  We thought this a suicide mission, but did we actually stand a chance?

My question was answered moments later as I was making a tidal wave attack with a rolling wall of briars through the heart of them, with all the extra energy the druid had inadvertently given me.  I heard a bone chilling bellow that didn't come from the mortal realm.  It was like the screech of a million moaning souls.  Then I realized that we hadn't been as clever as we thought, we had been played by the Alpha wolves.

A creature that looked like a cross between a grizzly bear and a gorilla who stood maybe ten feet tall came charging out of the portal leading a hoard of demons with two absolutely huge werewolves at their rear.  The brothers Marcus had arrived.

The ground shook as under the bear demon's feet.  The other demons with him radiated a sick power, unlike the ones we had been fighting in the mix on the battlefield.  Another demon flew out of the portal on bat-like wings.  It was roughly the size of a man, but it flew up to the top of one of the towers of Seattle to crouch and observe.  This was their real fighting force.

I glanced back at the mass of werewolves, the others had seen too.  Nicole looked so tired, but she stood up straighter and caught my eye, then re-engaged the wolves.

Then a howl that washed over the battlefield with power sounded out and it was joined by a second.  I could feel a wave of despair trying to get under my skin.  The compulsion buried in the howl was nothing like Daria's.  It was something dark and insipid, seeking to control rather than a suggestion.

Daria paused with a wolf dangling from each arm as she snapped their necks and tilted her head back and howled herself.  Her power subtly rippling over theirs and degrading, gnawing away at it bit by bit until they canceled each other out.

The demons charged directly at her.  Shit!  Nicole!  We were all on the move and arrived at the others and we formed a loose arc around the weaker women.  I threw my arms wide and a briar patch exploded from me in all directions. It flowed over hundreds of wolves and other beasts and created a barrier between us and the demons, while preventing the others from getting to our backs.

This gave us a moment to breathe.  The Red Hood looked around as I saw burns and cuts on her face, healing before my eyes.  She said, “Hi ladies, fancy meeting you here.”  We chuckled.

Then Ella said, “Can we fight to our bloody strengths now?  Cuz in case you missed it Red, the big bad wolf has come to play.  I want a go at that sodding bear.”  Mari nodded and we all shifted positions a bit.