Dread Nemesis of Mine

chapter 25

Adam looked down. That was all he had time to do before the blast.

"No!" I shouted, arm extended toward him as if I could prevent his death with the force of my will. Nauseating sickness swept through my body and I felt as though I were holding a superheated bubble of molten liquid in my hand.

Adam flew back a foot, landing in the ruins of a crate. The air in front of his shield rippled like water disturbed by a thousand tiny rocks.

The pain and pressure in my hand increased. Almost by reflex, I flicked my hand away from Adam and toward Amanda's position. A concussive blast shattered stone and wood, sending vampires flying back against the cages. Adam sat up on his elbows and looked at me with pure astonishment.

Fausta yelled, "Frag out!" Tossed two metallic spheres at the vampires' position, and turned her face away. Blinding light flashed through the room. Spots danced in my eyes. I fell to my knees, gagging and heaving while my stomach groaned. I wondered if I'd eaten something spoiled, though this sensation felt much different from spicy Indian food surprise. Half-blinded, I pushed to my feet and saw Elyssa and Fausta pumping vampires full of the silvery lancer darts as the fallen bloodsuckers moaned and wallowed on the floor, severely weakened by the flash grenades.

Adam strode into the fray and found Amanda. He stood over her, feet planted to either side of her body, and pulled her partially upright by her pink T-shirt. "Where's Felicia?"

Amanda let out a weak snarl. "Go to hell, Arcane."

He punched her in the face, wincing as he did. Dropped his staff and jerked her shirt with two hands. "Tell me, you bitch."

She spat blood in his face.

Adam roared and slammed her head against the floor. His fists pummeled her face as an animalistic cry ripped free from his lungs. Elyssa and Fausta grabbed him by either arm and pulled him, kicking and flailing, off the bloodied vampire.

"Adam!" Shock filled Meghan's face. "What's wrong with you?"

Tears streamed down stricken man's face. He slumped in the grasp of the two Templars holding him. Elyssa gave Fausta a sad look and nodded. They let him go as Meghan rushed to his side.

"I failed her," Adam said, wiping at his face, hands clenched into white-knuckled fists. He stood, breathing heavily, obviously fighting the pain.

My heart almost broke looking at the man. I knew how he felt. I understood what he was going through. Felicia had died saving me. I walked toward Adam, my throat constricted with guilt. I remembered Maximus's text to me. Had he been lying, and already killed Felicia? Or might she still be alive somewhere? Maybe Amanda was just trying to push our buttons and had lied.

I didn't know if I should tell him and give him hope, or let him grieve. What would be worse, I wondered—having hope and finding her dead, or never knowing? I knew what my choice would be. I'd want to know. For me to keep this from him would be wrong, so very wrong. I'd been an idiot to keep it from him earlier.

"Adam, I—"

He turned on me. "You could have saved her," he said, voice quiet and broken.

His words stabbed my heart. I knew if he was angry now, he'd be even angrier when I showed him Maximus's texts. Pulling out my arcphone, I retrieved the messages and held it out to him. "I'm sorry. I should have showed this to you earlier. Amanda might be lying. Maybe Maximus locked her up somewhere and she's okay."

"Why the hell would you keep this from me?" Adam stared with disbelief at the phone before flinging it back at me.

I caught it before it bounced off my chest. "I was afraid you'd go over the edge, man. I didn't know whether it would matter or not."

He turned away, taking deep deliberate breaths. "We have to find her then." His voice broke. "Or find her body. I can't leave her here. I have to take her home."

"Wait a minute," Fausta said. "Maximus is gone?"

"Through the arch there." I pointed to the obsidian structure. "But when I freed the leyworm Dash had hooked up for its energy, it took the power with it."

"Where did he go?"

"Atlanta, I think."

Fausta cursed. She pulled out her phone and walked away, speaking in urgent tones.

Elyssa squeezed my shoulder. Kissed me on the cheek. "Are you okay?"

I nodded.

"This place is a mess," Bella said, leaning against her staff as she emerged from the tunnel. "And I'm pooped."

Healer Delgado knelt beside her, running a wand over her. "You've overextended yourself." She shook her head. "You'd better rest or you might burn out."

Bella nodded with a resigned sigh. "I know."

Michael appeared in the large hole which had been the original entrance before Amanda blasted it wide open.

"Where have you been?" Fausta said.

He took in the destruction without so much as batting an eyelash. "We've got another problem."

"Another one? Haven't the others subdued the remaining OPFORs?"

Michael nodded. "Some escaped into the tunnels beneath us. I saw them breaking the lock on a metal door. They got it open before I could stop them."

Fausta bit her lip. "And what's on the other side?"

"Let's just say this place is about to be overrun. By vamplings."

Screams echoed from far down the tunnel. My blood went cold, and the hairs on my neck bristled. Elyssa's porcelain skin went a shade whiter. She took a step back, hands grasping the hilts of her sai swords in a manic grip.

I put a hand on her wrist. "Are you okay?"

Her pupils were wide and dilated. "I—I'm sorry. The memories. Almost dying…"

I enclosed her in my arms. "I'll save you again if I have to."

She managed a weak smile. "You'd like that, wouldn't you? Another gold star for your fridge?"

I replied with a long deep kiss. "I don't need gold stars, just the touch of your lips."

"I really must write that down for the romance novel I'm writing," Bella said.

Embarrassment flushed my face and I pulled away, having forgotten the world didn't really stop when I kissed Elyssa. "We'd better move out."

"We need to contain these things ourselves," Michael said, face grim. "The space is too narrow to bring down a large force of Templars." His eyes locked onto the cages at the back of the room and the vampling there. In a few quick steps, he closed the distance, and impaled the zombified vampire's head. The vampling hissed and flailed, despite the sword jutting from its skull. Michael slid his sword free and stared at the creature. "They don't die easily."

"Da nah!" screamed the cherub, its nubby arms grasping at Michael's legs.

He ran it through with his sword.

A shrill scream tore from the creature's mouth. A tortured face appeared beneath the smooth oily surface on its head where the nose and eyes should have been. Smoky black wings, insubstantial apparitions unfolded from its back. Despite the scream, it didn't die.

Michael slid his sword from the cherub's flesh with a sick, wet sound. His eyes met mine. For a moment, I almost sensed understanding in his gaze. Respect. And then the moment was gone.

I looked around for my lost gun, but settled for an assault rifle left by a fallen vampire. If I could avoid shooting myself or my companions, it might come in handy. Elyssa adjusted the straps on my scabbard, tilting the sword so I could reach it.

"Thanks."

She kissed me on the cheek. "Michael and I will take point. You help guard the rear."

Fausta raised an eyebrow. "Unless I'm mistaken, I'm the one in charge here, Borathen."

Elyssa rolled her eyes. "Fine. Orders, sir?"

"Michael and I will take point. Bella, you and the Healers will barricade yourselves in here and keep an eye on the prisoners. Borathen, you and incubus boy guard our flank. I've ordered squads to block all the exits so the vamplings can't escape and infect the populace."

"Sir, yes, sir!" Elyssa said, tossing in a sarcastic salute.

"You really don't make a good soldier," I said in a low voice. "You're too used to bossing everyone around."

A confident smile spread her lips. "Because I'm usually right."

"Move out," Fausta said.

"I'm coming, too," Adam said, anger burning in his eyes. "I've got plenty of juice left."

Fausta nodded. "Let's do it."

We headed for the door, leaving Meghan and Bella behind. Then my stomach heaved and cold sweat broke out on my face. I staggered, taking deep breaths to keep from upchucking all over the place.

"What's wrong?" Elyssa said, gripping my arm to keep me upright.

Meghan came to my side, and ran her wand along my body. "Magic poisoning." She took my chin and turned my gaze into her blue eyes. "Did you do any spells recently?"

"Yeah." I told her about the camouflaged hole.

"I think he saved me from that explosion earlier too," Adam said. "Because my shield wouldn't have done a thing to protect me from a blast like that."

Meghan's eyes grew wide. "A complete novice containing an explosion? Impossible."

"The boy has potential," Bella said.

"Can you make me feel better until we get through this?" I asked, though the nausea seemed to be fading again.

Meghan sighed and pulled a piece of bubblegum from a pouch on her side. "Chew this. I give it to first-timers to help with the sickness. But they usually don't have it this bad." She pulled out another piece. "On second thought, have two."

I tossed them in my mouth and chewed. "Minty."

"Is he okay to fight?" Fausta asked, eyes narrowed.

"The gum will help." Meghan pursed her lips. "And he has more spirit than most, anyway. Considering what he's been through, I wouldn't hesitate to trust him with my life."

I felt my face flush. "Uh, wow. Thanks, Meghan."

"If you're the best of your kind, there is still hope for the world." She smiled. "Good luck."

Adam pecked her on the lips. "I'll be back."

Her smiled vanished, replaced by a worried frown. "Keep your mind, Adam."

I wasn't sure what she meant by that, and didn't have time to ponder as Fausta stomped her foot and waved us on. We ran down the tunnel. Screams and shouts echoed from ahead. Once we reached myriad hallways, grunts, shouts, and shrieks seem to come from all sides. We came to the bottom of the stairs leading into the courtyard. A groups of Templars in black Nightingale armor stood, swords ready, at the top. Fausta saluted them, and we moved on.

We found the first bodies a couple-hundred feet in. I recognized the care-free kids who'd been smoking weed from earlier. Their throats were torn open, their mouths open with horror in the final moments of life. Four vamplings with mouths fastened to the dead, sucked the blood from their veins with greedy slurping sounds. One of the vamplings, formerly a female, as evidenced by the filthy tattered skirt and blouse she wore, slurped at a pool of blood on the floor.

None of the undead creatures looked as bad or smelled as ripe as the ones Elyssa and I had faced when saving my father from Maximus. These couldn't have been turned for long. Michael's sword blurred, taking the head of the nearest creature. Fausta flashed the other way, dropping two as Elyssa's brother finished off the last one. The headless bodies thrashed wildly, arms groping. The head of the female vampling landed in the pool of blood. Her tongue continued to lick at it, as though nothing had changed.

"Templars are still immune to the vampling virus right?" I asked Elyssa as Michael and Fausta beheaded the people murdered by the vamplings, and then dismembered the undead, even as their body parts continued to struggle.

She nodded. "Far as I can tell, once the Divinity—Daelissa—granted us our abilities, she couldn't just take them away, or I think we'd have noticed."

A shuffling noise sounded behind us. We turned and saw two more of the walking dead shambling our way. Elyssa grunted twice, her sword a silver blur, and both vamplings dropped headless to the floor, their fanged mouths snarling as they bounced off the stone. The bodies squirmed, hands grasping blindly while gouts of thick rancid smelling blood drained from the necks. I'd hoped they would go still and just die. Instead, we had to butcher them as Fausta and Michael had done the others.

My heart pounded like mad and sweat broke out on my forehead. These things were relentless. Why wouldn't they just die? A flashback from the fight in the catacombs beneath Maximus's Atlanta lair gripped me with claustrophobia. The stench. The press of fetid bodies. The pure rot. The grunting and hissing and biting. They just kept coming and coming and coming and they never ever stopped.

"Justin, are you okay?"

I jerked back into focus on the present and Elyssa's concerned face. I nodded. "Yeah. Sorry. Guess it freaked me out more than I thought it would."

A nod. "Me too." She touched my hand. "I hate these things."

Even Fausta's look of grim determination couldn't hide her shaking hands as she and Michael walked past the still-twitching bodies on the floor. Adam put a hand over his mouth and looked away from the slaughter. Looking away did nothing to help me. I still smelled the coppery scent of death, the blood of the newly fallen, and the stagnant blood of the vamplings.

Our progress turned into a slog. Fausta called in other squads of Templars to clear any side halls, making sure to clear every room and passage of the foul creatures as we made slow progress down flights of stairs and toward the room the things had originated. I remembered the red metal door from my escape with Katie. Now, at least, I knew why Maximus had kept it shut.

I wondered if he could really be so power hungry as to unleash a vampling plague on the world. Remembering our little talk and his grand sense of ego, I realized how stupid a question that was. Of course he would. If he couldn't win, nobody would.

The hallway ended at the now warped and broken red door. The hinges and lock had been blasted off. Groans, shuffling feet, and most of all, the stench gave away the occupants of the room beyond. Several feet behind me on the left, a familiar spiral staircase led down to the room where Maximus had imprisoned me, now dark.

"We'll contain them at this chokepoint," Fausta said, nodding toward the broken door. "No sense going in that hellhole." She pulled out her phone. "I'll call for the Custodians to come down and clean up the mess with some flamethrowers."

"They don't need flamethrowers with me around," Adam said, brandishing his staff. He gestured, and a glowing white ball hovered in the air before him. With a wave, he sent it inside the room.

Something roared. A vampling lunged from the doorway.

Michael's sword flashed, cutting the thing's arms off before it could reach Adam. The Arcane jumped back with a shout.

More snarls echoed as Adam's globe of light hovered a few feet inside the doorframe.

"Turn it off!" Fausta hissed.

It blinked out.

"It's not the light," Michael said. "They smell our blood."

Pattering feet sounded from within. Shuffles, heaves, and groans built into a growing cacophony as the monsters felt the draw of the life force pumping through our veins and homed in on it.

"Positions," Fausta commanded, readying her sword.

Michael took up a position opposite her while Elyssa took up the center.

The creatures attacked in a mob. Fausta and Michael butchered scores of them as they reached the door, forced back only by the volume of bodies as they stacked up at the door—dismembered heads, arms, and legs thrashing thanks to the unholy magic giving them false life.

I took a few steps back down the hall toward the spiral staircase to give the Templars more room. Adam growled out a command and shot a fireball from his staff. It turned the fallen bodies into a roiling pyre. The sickly sweet odor of burning flesh filled the air.

Something cold grabbed my ankle and jerked. I tumbled backwards down the stairs, rolling to a stop partway down. A sharp agonizing pain lanced into my calf. I jerked my leg, but failed to free it. A rush of fire seared my veins, seeming to catch my entire body on fire. I looked up and saw with horror the source of the agony.

A vampling, feasting on my blood.