Authors: Justen Hunter
“Interesting.” I echoed. “Why do I feel like you’re trying to toss me into being a
pawn?”
“That’s the irony. You wouldn’t be a pawn. Far from it. In fact, I’d be unable to
influence you. Politically, you’d be independent, able to make requests and bargain
as an entity worthy of respect.”
“Just so long as I’m alive long enough to do it.” I deadpanned.
“Well, yes,” He said, without humor. “Granted, the job's hazards are many, but you’ll
obviously grow into the role. You seem the type, I think.”
“What, suicidal?”
“No, noble.” He said the word with a little mocking in his tone. “But I have high
hopes for you. You’re a quick learner, it looks like.”
“So, how do we go about this?” I asked. “Do I need to take a test or something?”
“Nothing so intricate.” Teresa said. “An official of one of the Arcane races, Ishmael
in this case, will appoint you. We’ll say it’s an emergency case, and we can have
the other leaders confirm you when we next convene.”
“All right. So, what do I do?” I asked him.
“I’ll knight you. We can go do it out in the parking lot. Teresa will supply you,
and you’ll engage Lucien this evening, with my warrant to hunt and kill him.”
“Wait, that's it?”
“That's it.”
“All right, then, let’s do it.” I said. “Let’s head outside.”
The parking lot was vacant, for the most part. It was quiet, as most of the night
crowd hadn’t shown up yet, and it wasn’t exactly a dinner spot. We walked out to the
Jeep.
“So, how do we do this?” I asked.
“First, you kneel.”
“Do you knight me with a sword, like they used to?” I asked, more out of a curiosity
than anything.
“No, that’s something we did away with after a lord tried to behead a man who was
supposed to be inducted. And granted, much has changed.”
“How so?” I asked him.
“Well, eight hundred years ago, we might have done this in a manor, or on the field
of some great battle.”
“Instead, you get a parking lot for a hippie coffee shop. Take what you can get, Count.
You want this Knight? You’ll have to deal with it.”
He shrugged. “Well, I suppose so. Eric Carpenter, would you kneel?”
I did so, taking a knee in front of him. Even in designer clothes tailored to his
frame, the man still seemed like a power incarnate from where I was.
“Eric Carpenter, by the power invested in me by the King of my race, and by the Night’s
Accord, I, Ishmael, sired by Gregor, appoint you, temporarily at least, to the position
of Knight of the Bay.” He placed his hands on my shoulders. His fingers pressed into
the muscle, and I could feel the power behind them. “Do you accept this appointment?”
I thought of something then. Choice. In most medieval cultures I remembered, appointments
were often just there, never offered. You were expected to accept. Instead, with the
Arcanes, the choice was freely given.
“I do.” I answered, my head bowed.
“Then may you serve the Arcane by answering to none. May you be the law that holds
our kinds together, that keeps us from war, injustice, and wrongs. Justice is your
ally, as is the will to mediate between us. You serve by being above service to any
one power. Rise, Eric, and may you be the embodiment of justice in troubled times.”
I stood up. Well, for someone who’d just been appointed to be the Clint Eastwood slash
Henry Kissinger of the Arcane world, I sure didn’t feel different. I moved to rise,
and I looked over at Teresa.
“So, he said you had gear for me. Let’s go.”
Teresa popped open the trunk on her car. She pulled out a pair of vests this time,
one of them that was closer to my size. “For you.” She said.
“Seriously?” I looked at the vest. It was black, and made out of a fabric I didn’t
recognize. Then again, how many tactical vests did I try on as a part of regular life?
“It’s Kevlar. It will stop most handgun rounds, and will stop a knife, anything other
than a full thrust. It’s got pouches for your magazines on the pistol, and a pouch
for larger things like a grenade.”
“Got any more of those nice little stun grenades?” I asked.
“Not for you,” she said.
I looked down at the armor, and tossed it into the back seat. “I can put it on when
we get there. But, seriously, you guys bought me armor? That’s, well, I’m flattered.”
“No need to be.” Ishmael said. “I consider it an investment. I’d rather spend a few
thousand equipping you, and have my Knight intact.”
“I’m not your Knight.” I said. “I’m just the Knight. You said it yourself, I’m not
beholden to you or anything.”
“No,” He smiled. “But you still owe me a favor. And I have every intention of collecting.”
“That’s in the future. I’d prefer we focus on the present, at least for the time being.”
“Of course.” He said. “Teresa, if you would also give him the bullets?”
She nodded. “Yes, sir.” She withdrew a small plastic case. “It’s more ammo.”
I opened the case. The color was odd. “What’s special about them?”
“It’s a special alloy that a defense company has developed.” Teresa explained. “A
standard silver round doesn’t offer as steady ballistics as the usual full metal jacket.
Instead, they have developed a silver-lead ammunition that is in a prototype stage.
It’s a halfway point. The silver’s still there, but it’s a heavier round.”
“That’s sort of hot hearing you explain it.” I grinned a little. “All right. I guess
I’ll reload now.” I opened up the jeep and retrieved the pistol magazines.
“You two seem to have the situation covered.” Ishmael nodded to both of us. “Teresa,
I expect a full report from you when this is resolved. Sir Carpenter, I look forward
to our next meeting. Au revoir.” He bowed, and with a flourish, started to walk off.
“He just walks?” I asked when he had turned a corner.
“He’s doing it for your benefit. He’s actually got an appointment near here.
Ishmael likes his exercise.” Teresa chuckled a little. She got the rest of the gear
from her car. She suited up in the Kevlar, which had the terrible property of hiding
her feminine body. Though, I would suppose that any sort of body armor that looked
stylish was bound to get you killed.
“So, what’s the plan?” I asked her after we got in the car, and I started to drive
us back to the warehouse.
“Plan?” She arched a thin eyebrow. “Why, now you’re thinking like Ishmael speaks of
witches. Yes, a plan. We’ll take a look, and figure out our plan.”
“You have no idea how hard it is for me to resist doing a Hannibal impression right
now.”
“Hannibal?” She inquired. “As in, Carthage?”
I laughed. “Good Lord. I’m about to storm a warehouse with a master vampire, an unknown
number of his goons, and Lord knows what else, with a woman who doesn’t even know
about the A-Team. We are so boned.”
We started around nine in the evening. The sun had been down for an hour now, and
we figured that whatever else, we needed to act before too long. Teresa and I strolled,
clad in Kevlar underneath our jackets, towards the warehouse.
I walked with Teresa to the employee entrance. Her hand disappeared inside her jacket
for a moment, and came out with a lock picking set, much like the one Amy had used.
“Seriously, do you guys just like have meetings or something?” I deadpanned.
“What?”
“You and Amy. Badass women in my life…Matt was right.”
“Yes, well, whatever this Matt said, you can tell me later. I need to focus. Watch
my back.” Whereas Amy had been fast about picking the lock, with that crazy-fast supernatural
skill of hers, Teresa seemed to be more natural in that regard. She worked slowly,
methodically.
I leaned against the wall of the building, looking around. I was about ready to ask
how long it would take, when a man turned around the corner towards us. “Teresa.”
I hissed. “We've got company.”
She stood up, and whispered into my ear. “Follow my lead.”
I was about to ask what, but Teresa quickly pinned me against the wall. Before I knew
it, she was kissing me. Out of all the plans I had thought of, that one certainly
wasn’t the one I expected.
Teresa’s lips were warm, delicious, just like last night. I returned the kiss, half-heartedly
at first.
Teresa’s tongue took care of that problem. I groaned against her, and my hands went
to her back. I pulled her against me. The Kevlar both of us wore precluded me feeling
the shape of her, and it drove me nuts. My libido had been shut down for way too long,
and here I was, kissing a girl in body armor.
“God,” I moaned between kisses, when I needed air. “Been way too long.” I murmured.
“You really need to work on your dirty talk, Eric.” She murmured out. “Just keep kissing
me.”
Out of the corner of my eye, between kisses, I spied the man getting closer. He walked
to us, and put a hand on Teresa’s shoulder. “Hey, you two need to go find somewhere
else to-“
Teresa didn’t let him finish. She whipped out her gun, and spun away from me. The
butt slammed against the man’s head, effectively knocking him to the ground. The pistol
disappeared back into her vest. “Well, that was a minor inconvenience.”
“What…” My brain was still trying to process exactly what was going on. “You kissed
me.”
“I needed him not to call it in. He sees a couple kissing? It’s San Francisco, people
kiss all the time. Picking a lock? He would call it in, and I’d need to shoot him.
I didn’t want to shoot him.” Teresa flashed me a grin. “By the way, Eric, yum. I didn't
say that last night. Definitely not bad.”
“Uh, thanks.” I said. “So, what happens now?”
“We have two options now,” she said. “We can try to continue picking the lock. However,
I’m not sure how long that will take. Alternatively, we can go for a much more…dramatic
entrance.”
“What did you have in mind?” I had taken out my pistol now, racking the slide slowly
to chamber a round.
“We kick the door in, toss in the flash bang, shoot the legs of the people by the
entrance, and try to just do this fast and hard.”
“Fast and hard.” I echoed. “Yea, I think that might work. Would they seriously expect
it?”
“It doesn’t exactly happen as an everyday occurrence, as much as you might think.”
She grinned. “And it’s a bit more chancy, though with a bit more payoff, I think.”
“Let’s go for it. We don’t need them sending another guy out to look for this one.”
Teresa nodded. “I’ll break down the door, toss the flash, and we go in. On my mark,
alright?”
I smiled. “Yea, ready as I’ll ever be.”
She held up three fingers, then peeled each down in a slow count. Three, two, one.
She slammed her shoulder fiercely into the door, and a crashing sound filled the air.
The door caved in, flying off the hinges to the ground. Teresa reached into her pouch
and pulled the pin on the flash bang.
“Cover your ears.” She said.
I did so, but the bang still seemed to shake my chest. It was powerful, even more
so than a gunshot. I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of one of those things,
for sure.
Teresa’s voice went past my ringing ears. “Move!” She said.
I brought my pistol up, and we moved in. The warehouse itself wasn’t too complex.
It was mostly full of boxes, crates stacked up ten feet or so high on large shelving
units. There were probably hundreds like it in the Bay Area. The place was dimly-lit,
but I could still make out the scene just fine.
Two men were on the floor, and I put a bullet into each of their legs. Better have
them in the legs than have them recover and come back for more, I figured.
We moved in, past what was apparently a trucks’ loading dock. The sound of boots on
concrete came from further down near the end of one of the rows of crates. Two men,
dressed in black and sporting were tattoos on their necks, came into view.
Teresa yelled. “Get down!”
I got behind a crate only scant seconds before I heard the buzzing of an automatic
weapon. It took a moment for me to register what it was, at first, but it was freaking
scary. The
sensation of having a whole bunch of bullets fly by you is just terrifying. Combined
with just the sound of automatic fire?
I was surprised I didn’t soil myself.
“Trigger control,” I heard Teresa hiss. “They have none.” She popped out from behind
a forklift, popping off shots down towards the men.
I popped off out from behind the crate. I shot off a pair of rounds towards one of
the men, who was reloading his gun. Whether it was one of my shots, or one of Teresa’s
he went down. The other gunman, who I couldn’t see, started to take shots at me. The
bullets tore up the crate, and I found myself clinging to the ground behind the crate,
not wanting to give the gunman any sort of target.
I looked back behind me, and was instantly glad I did. Another were with a handgun
was rounding the corner. “Teresa!” I yelled, trying to alert her I let loose with
more shots, and the slide locked back on the gun. I hadn’t landed any of them, but
he had a free shot at me.
I heard two shots, both coming from different sources. I felt a force in my gut, and
almost immediately, I felt like I was going to throw up. I bowled over, and tried
to reach for my stomach. Please, I thought. Please, God, don’t let it be bleeding.
It took an eternity for my hand to reach my stomach. When it reached there, though,
there wasn’t any fluids. Instead, I could feel a hot piece of metal in my hand, singing
it. “Ow!” I hissed, and pulled my hand away. A shell casing had fallen on my stomach.
Well, I was okay. There was that.
Without a doubt? One of the scarier experiences in my life. I looked back up, wondering
why I hadn’t continued to be shot at. I saw the guy, on the ground, with blood straining
his blue work shirt.
Teresa’s voice called to me. “Reload, Eric!”
I realized Teresa had covered me. Thank God for that. I ejected the magazine, and
loaded a new magazine into the gun. I hit the slide release. Back in action. I popped
out over the top of the crate, and just peeked before more shots drove me back down.
I realized then that Hollywood totally gets it wrong. You don’t get to be John McClane
and rage through the bad guy’s lair. No, you hide behind cover like a scared little
wuss. Well, if it meant not getting shot?
I was cool with hiding like a wuss.
Teresa kept firing, popping out, firing, and ducking back down like a pro. “Eric.”
She hissed. “I’ll keep them down here. You go search the rest of the place, all right?
If you see Lucien, don’t engage him directly.”
“Gotcha.” I moved to a crouched position, and started to move back away form the fight.
I moved from one piece of cover to the next, behind pillars, crates, and anything
else that would shield me from fire.
The end of that row of crates led me to a wall with a number of doors. I quickly opened
each one. The first was an office, empty and holding only a few card board boxes.
No kidnap victims in there. I turned back, checking my back to make sure that no other
werewolf goons were sneaking up on me.
I hurried down to the next door, and opened that one. I breathed a sigh of relief.
On the floor was Sam Coolidge. She certainly looked the worse for wear. Her hair had
been shaved bare, leaving her with that sickly sort of bald look that comes with being
fair-skinned. Bruises covered her body, nearly as much as her normal skin color. The
poor girl was being beat to within an inch of her life. I rushed into the room, and
knelt down next to her. She wasn’t bound in any way, but I knew, somehow in my mind,
that they’d drilled it into her head that escape wasn’t an option. Maybe she had already
tried.
“Samantha?” I whispered. “It's Eric. I’m here to help.”
She looked up at me, and I saw the fear in her brown eyes. “ No, it’s a trick.” She
insisted. “Just another of his tricks.”
“No tricks.” I promised. “I’m here to rescue you. Hear those shots? That’s my back
up.”
“You’re serious.” She laughed, though it was weak and pained. “You’re freaking crazy.
Eric, you know that?”
“Just maybe a little crazy. I hear it helps. Teresa!” I called. “Teresa, over here!”
I spun around, focusing my pistol on the doorway. “We’re going to get you out of here,
Sam, and we’re going to get you away from Lucien.”
She shuddered at that name. “He drank from me. A lot.” She murmured.
Shit. I think I realized, in that moment, just how timely my arrival was. She didn’t
seem to have a lot left in her, mentally. She would either break, or give up soon.
A few things rushed through me, a reaction to it. I was sorry for the girl. Sorry
for the fact that someone had decided she was his, property to be abused, so he could
gain power. The other party of me was just angry at it. Who had the right to do such
a thing to another living person? I figured that it would have taken someone dead
to do it.
Where did that leave me with Teresa, and allying myself with Ishmael, at least in
some way or shape?
Teresa slid into the room about a minute later, popping a shot off to someone out
there. “They’ve thinned out, I think,” she said.
“Why do you say that?”
“He can’t have an infinite supply of these goons. Oh, it’s been too long since I’ve
had a good fight.” She looked down to Sam. “Hello, Miss Coolidge. We’re here to rescue
you. I am, of course, assuming you would like rescue?”
She nodded. “God, yes.”
“Fantastic.” Teresa smiled. “Can you stand, Samantha?” She asked, and she offered
the woman her hand.
Sam gritted her teeth. She put her hand in the vampire’s, and the two of them slowly
worked her up to her feet. “I’d rather die than let a vampire stand when I couldn’t.”
Sam grumbled.
“That’s the spirit.” Teresa encouraged her. The vampiress seemed almost manic in the
heat of battle. “Eric, I’ll get her out of here. Do you think you can find Amy?”
“Yea, I can. Think you can draw off some of the weres with Miss Coolidge here?”
Teresa nodded. “Yea, I think we can manage. Well, Sam, let’s go. We’ll make a three-legged
were-vampire. Allons-y!”
“Here, take the keys.” I tossed them the keys to the Jeep, and Sam caught them. I
popped out of the room to cover them as Teresa started to carry Sam back towards the
employee entrance. When they reached the corner, she said. “Good luck, Eric.” She
and Sam charged ahead, moving with an odd sort of grace.
I heard one of the guards yell. “They’re taking her!” Taking that as my cue, I started
off in the other direction. The next few offices I checked were empty. I was starting
to feel my edge rise. What if Amy wasn’t alive? What if she wasn’t safe? What if Lucien
had taken her somewhere else after she got here?
I shook any form of doubt from my mind. No, I couldn’t be fearful. I had to think
positive, tell myself that, no matter the situation, I would find her. She had given
me a purpose in life, she’d made me realize what it was that I wanted to do with my
life. I wanted to save people.
I had saved one person tonight, so far. Just one more to go.
I had circled around half the warehouse. The guards, I supposed, were either dead,
wounded, or following Teresa out to wherever she was leading them.
The last door I came to was one of those large vertical doors for a loading dock.
I found the controls, and hit the button to open it. It was my last hope. The door
screeched to life as it slowly, almost painfully so, opened up.
I ducked under the door as it rose, too eager to find out what was in it. I realized
that, had I known, I would have preferred to wait.
Amy was there, all right. But what had happened to her had left her hardly what I
would call well. Lucien had suspended her from the ceiling on a long chain of black
iron. She hovered about a foot off the ground, dangling there like someone’s puppet.
Her body, at far as I could tell in the dim light, was in pretty bad shape. She wore
only a sports bra and jeans. Her back was a whipped mess. Red marks, some of them
streaked with still-fresh blood, covered her back in an intricate crisscross.
“Amy?” I whispered. “Amy, it’s me.”
“Eric.” She winced. “Oh, you stupid, stupid witch.” Ger gray eyes still had the same
eerie light in them. “Run.”
“I’m not running.” I said. “I’m here to rescue you. Would you rather I just leave
you here to die?”
“I would really rather not, but if it means protecting you? Lucien, Lucien is too
strong.”
“The goal is to get the hell out of Dodge before he gets here.” I leaned up on tiptoes
to reach the fastenings for her shackles. I worked at them, finding the release on
them. When I hit the release on the cuffs, they seemed to hiss with steam. It was
only when I looked down at Amy that I realized it wasn’t from the cuffs.
Amy’s wrists were severely burned. She whimpered, and when she touched them, she recoiled.
“Bloody...” She hissed. “That bastard.”
“What was on those chains?”
“Something my being does not take well to.” She said. “Come on, we need to go. Fast.”
“All right. Do you need me to carry you?” I asked.
She shook her head. “I should be fine. Just give me a moment, and a weapon.”
I nodded. “All right. You want the knife, or the gun?”
“Give me the knife. If I am fighting, I do not want a gun. I want a blade in my hand.”
“Sure thing, Quixote.” I gave her the knife. Amy stood, and said. “Let’s go then.”
“Oh, but Amy.” Said a voice from behind me. “We were only just getting started. Can
you imagine how rude it would be for you to just up and leave right now?”
I turned around, and I found myself face to face with a man who could only be Lucien.
I can’t think of many men who would wear eye patches and could look that evil.
Well, maybe evil wasn’t the best descriptor of him. Cruel, definitely. Lucien did
in fact wear an eye patch. A scar ran across where his bad eye was, that continued
down into his jaw. He stood of an average height, but he was very gaunt and thinly
styled. He wore a simple black shirt, and a pair of dark blue slacks.
His hair was kept back in a slick, giving him the look of a businessman from the eighties.
His uncovered gray eye twinkled with amusement. And when he took a step forward towards
us, he moved with a quiet, subtle manner. He definitely moved, at least, like a vampire.
“Lucien, give it up.” I said. I brought my pistol up at him, aiming at his chest.
“Sam’s already gone, and we outnumber you here. I’m here acting in the name of the
Arcane peoples, as Knight of the Bay, to dispense justice.”
“WHAT?” Amy asked, disbelief in her voice.
“You, a Knight?” He sniffed at the air, as if trying to tell something from it. “Ah,
Ishmael’s doing, I can tell. He always had such a fondness for your kind, witch.”
“You know what I am, then?”
Lucien nodded, a stiff motion. “I have encountered your kind. I am old enough to have
known them before their race fell into decline. A pity, but considering what they
were are, it left us with a better world.”
“A better world?” I asked.
“Well, yes. You witches are quite the troublesome folk. They always cause disaster
wherever they go.”
“Yea, well, this one is here with trouble in mind. You’re here to answer for your
crimes.”
“Well, yes.” He smiled. “And as the accused, I know my rights. I request trial by
combat.”
Amy answered before I even had a chance to think about it. Gone was the reason in
the voice. Gone was any of the Amy I had seen mentor me, who taught me how to spell
craft. “He accepts. I stand as the Knight's Champion. We fight now, with whatever
weapons we have on hand.”
“I was hoping for this.” He grinned. “I’ll drink your blood when I’ve killed you.”
“Are you going to fight me, or just keep talking like a coward?”
The two nodded, and they took several steps away from each other. Amy directed me
towards the side of the room.
Amy then explained, at least in part, what would happen. “We fight, to the death,
or until one of us yields,” she said. “You will be here as a witness. If he wins,
he is exonerated, and if he loses, he is, obviously, guilty and punished.”
“Okay.” I nodded. “So, how do we start this?”
“Say begin.” Lucien said, his voice as cool as could be.
“All right, then.” I raised my hand, and then dropped it. “Begin.”