*
Vanderson Park was about fifteen minutes out from our house in the Belles-Faire district of Seattle. Thank the gods, traffic was scarce, so we made good time. I reached the parking lot first, but Camille and Delilah were close on my heels, and they swerved into the parking lot behind me. As we slipped out of our cars, we could hear shouts coming from beyond a nearby copse of trees.
“Fuck, let’s hope that there aren’t any joggers out here braving the chill for a late-night run. And speaking of weather, the calendar says it’s May, but it feels like March tonight. Where are the temps in the seventies that the weather guys promised us?” Camille neatly slid her dagger into the sheath strapped to her thigh, over the leg of her catsuit. She started jogging toward the shouts.
“News report said the warm front is stalled off the coast but should move in by tomorrow afternoon.” Delilah joined her.
I caught up to them. We followed the curve of the sidewalk, twisting around the bend to see Morio and Vanzir in the middle of a copse of maple trees, caught in midbattle.
A host of bone-walkers swarmed around them, magically animated skeletons that were dangerous and hard to kill. Hack them to pieces and the bones would still skitter until the spell wore itself out. The goblins hung back, shouting encouragement to the bone-walkers. They were using the skeletons as cannon fodder to take the brunt of the damage, which made total sense. Wearing out the enemy before you have to face them was never a losing proposition. Just then, a shout from the other direction told us Shade and Trillian had arrived. Smoky and Rozurial would be on the way.
“We have to prevent the goblins from getting out of the park.” I moved toward a pair of the ugly brutes, but they dodged behind a big boulder.
Camille headed toward Morio. The two of them could do far more damage working together than separately—their death magic was growing stronger every day, it seemed. Delilah unsheathed Lysanthra—her sentient dagger. The blade hummed with a shrill growl of hunger as it smelled goblin blood. As she jockeyed into position with a bone-walker, I sped into a run, then, using the boulder that was standing between us as a springboard, launched myself into the fight, landing square in front of two of the goblins. Their eyes lit up until I smiled, my fangs descending. A sudden lack of enthusiasm flashed across their faces and I smiled, satisfied.
“The oh-shit-it’s-a-vampire look works for you, boys.” I darted in, ignoring their blades. Unless they clipped me in the heart or cut off my head, they couldn’t do anything to me that couldn’t be repaired.
One of them managed to dance out of my way, but the other was within easy reach. I barreled into him, knocking him down and landing on his chest. Throwing my head back, I bared my fangs and lunged at his throat, savagely tearing into the flesh. As muscle was severed from muscle, veins ripping, the blood stained my lips, sending me into a frenzy. I’d been doing a lot of this lately, and each time, it seemed to get easier. I caught a mouthful of the fountaining liquid, hot and coppery and fresh on my tongue and gulped it down. Ignoring the aftertaste—goblin blood was nasty at best—I staved off the desire to stay and drink deep. I rolled to the side and came to my feet. The goblin gurgled with one last burbling noise and collapsed.
His buddy took one look at his dead comrade and raised his sword. I recognized the look in his eye. Vengeance mixed with stupidity did not for sanity or safety make. He tossed the sword from hand to hand, showing off, a shit-eating grin on his face.
“Oh, sugar, you really don’t want to waste your last minutes trying to impress me.” I sauntered toward him. “I’ve taken down creatures far bigger and badder than you. And maybe you should remember what just happened to your buddy. After all, a vampire’s gotta do what a vampire’s gotta do.”
I bent my knees slightly and launched myself into the air, flipping over his head to land in back of him, very Bruce Lee. As the goblin let out a surprised grunt and struggled to turn around, I slammed against his back, knocking him forward onto his own sword. He shouted “Oh crap!” in Calouk—the common tongue of Otherworld—but I cut him off. I grabbed his head and wrenched his neck to the side, the resounding crack putting a stop to anything else he might have to say.
On my feet again, I turned, staring at the host of creatures surrounding us.