“Duncan!” Lucy screamed. “Duncan!”
Her eyes flared red as her head snapped around again, but they quickly faded away. Lucy fell to her knees and pounded the ground in frustration, cracking the concrete.
“Why can’t I see his magic?” she breathed raggedly, her voice choking a little. “My powers… are they diminishing? Is it because I’m not using it for dark reasons? Duncan… No…”
“Calm down, Lucy.” Jonathan placed a hand on her trembling shoulder. “We’ll figure out where your brother took him.”
He walked over to Anya, who was kneeling beside Paul. Jonathan bent down as well and felt for a pulse. His body had already gone cold, lying serenely with four large holes that went through his chest. They oddly leaked no blood, though nothing at this point felt strange to Jonathan anymore. He bowed his head in condolence.
“How do you intend to handle this?” he asked Anya.
“We handle it by not handling it. I’m out of my jurisdiction here,” Anya replied curtly. “I just gave the local police an anonymous tip, so we better leave this place before we get detained.”
Man, she really is one tough lady. Jonathan marvelled internally at how well his friend was adapting to her new situation.
“What does Michael O’Cornell want?” Anya mumbled to herself. “Why did he take Duncan too?”
A bulb went off in Jonathan’s head so brightly that he could have sworn his head was glowing.
“Lucy! Remember what the ‘Ax-r-pul’ guy said at the witch market?” he called out to the moping woman. “Michael, or Leofric, was searching for some kind of talisman to separate soul from body. Could he be after Duncan’s elixir of life?”
“It is possible, but the elixir does not function like a soul. It cannot be separated with a mere Fulu.” Lucy tilted her head. “Unless… Axtrrpuq wasn’t the only vendor he visited!”
“So we have an investigation on our hands.” Jonathan turned to Anya. “Do you want to come along?”
“Come along where?”
“She needs to.” Lucy held both of their hands. “Anya still isn’t safe from her pursuiters, right? The witch market is the best place to hide from mortal dangers.”
Dark particles wrapped their wrists.
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Maximus sipped the last of his latte and stood up quickly, leaving a fifty dollar bill on the table. He briskly strode out of the coffee house before the beaming waitress could thank him for patronising their store. The doorbell rang in the distance as he briskly turned into an alley.
Remnants of the afternoon rain splashed against the brick walls as a boot stepped carelessly into it. The man glanced behind furtively, acutely aware of the shadow following him from the second floor of the abandoned warehouse beside him. He kept his hands in his pocket as the figure chased him closely. And then it stopped.
Maximus stopped walking and turned around, flashing a narrow beam of light from his cellphone in the direction of the shadow. A spot of light reflected back in his eyes and he stepped to the side, narrowly dodging the bullet fired at him.
“Are you going to come down?” he shouted at the window. “Or do you need me to fetch you, champ- Oh? I thought you preferred to work alone.”
He swivelled around and grinned at the pistol silencer in front of his nose. “Put that down before you hurt someone.”
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“That’s the idea, you lying bastard.”
“Words hurt, Quentin.” Maximus raised a finger to push the gun aside, but the man cocked the pistol threateningly in response. The smile slipped off his face quicker than a thief into the night.
“Ingrate. I gave you what you wanted, and this is how you repay me?” he said in barely concealed anger.
“Gave me what I wanted?” Quentin retorted. “I don’t recall asking you to send another goddamn vampire after me.”
“I haven’t the foggiest what you’re talking about-”
“Lucy Carpenter, she’s a member of your association,” the assassin snarled. “Yeah, your little club isn’t as secret as you think. You let me go after her brother, but you sent her to stop me. You wasted my only opportunity at getting my revenge.”
“Come now, are you really going to blame me for your own incompetence? And if I recall correctly, you coerced me into revealing my business partner’s location. It’s only normal that I show him some professional courtesy.”
A muffled gunshot rang out. Maximus grunted and doubled over, but he quickly regained his composure and stood up again. He touched the hole in his bloodstained shirt gingerly and glared at the assassin.
“This shirt is from the 1800s, arsehole.”
“I should just shoot you in the head then.”
“Go on.” Maximus chuckled slightly. “We both know that’s not going to work.”
“Yeah?” Quentin lowered his weapon. “But I know what does, werewolf.”
“Perhaps you do. But that will not help you get your revenge, will it? Your venture was doomed from the beginning,” Maximus said. “Face it, there’s nothing you can do to kill Leofric. Nothing with all your assassination techniques and weapons. His power grows far beyond that of any vampire, and you don’t even stand a chance against an ordinary one. You have nothing to threaten immortals with, puny human.”
“Then I’ll find someone more powerful than him,” Quentin spat. “And I’ll send him after you next.”
Maximus threw his head back and laughed maniacally as the clouds parted to reveal a full moon. The white glow from the gem on his necklace slowly faded away as fur began to creep over his pale skin. Quentin cursed and fled into the main street.
“Please do,” an inhuman voice emanated between the growls of the huge wolf pacing the empty alleyway. “And bring her back to me.”
It leapt onto the roof in a single bound and took off into the night.
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“Bloody hell…” Jonathan whispered, looking at the overturned tables and lingering flames that still licked the rocky walls of the cave.
“I don’t suppose this is how the witch market normally looks…” Anya muttered.
“Looks like Leo was one step ahead of us. That monster,” Lucy said while helping one of the occupants up. “He’s too far gone.”
“Thank you so much, Auntie Lucy,” Gelfant’s voice drifted over the buzzing of people slowly recovering themselves. “Don’t worry, we’re used to this. A few stores get destroyed every now and then by disgruntled customers. But this man… I don’t know who pissed him off so bad he had to burn down the whole first floor.”
“Every now and then? Isn’t there some sort of security here? Or a police task force?” Anya exclaimed, passing the stack of wooden boards to the fish humanoid. If she was shocked at his physical appearance, she was certainly doing a world class job at concealing it.
“No, no. We’re all just here to do business in our free time. Rarely do we have troublemakers in the witch market, though it’s inevitable at times.” Gelfant let out a gurgly laugh. “We’d love to have a local sheriff to guard the place, but nobody ever steps up.”
“I see,” Anya mumbled. “Speaking of which, did anyone recognise the man that attacked the market?”
“I do!” a voice sounded from behind.
“Me too!”
“So did I!”
“He patronised us a few days ago!”
The trio looked at the occupants beginning to gather around them. Jonathan turned his head in bewilderment while Lucy tensed up apprehensively at the growing crowd, but Anya raised a hand and stood behind Gelfant’s store.
“Everyone form a line and report to me what he bought from you,” she projected her voice over the crowd.
“Let’s bring this man to justice.”