> Maji are bound by the Laws of Majic, and, like the laws of physics, these laws are immutable. The First Law is that no one is immune to majic—not angel, archmaji, demon, djinn, familiar, immortal, maji, mortal, secondhand soul salesman, strigoi, volkodlak. It is this presumption of power over all creation which causes too many maji so much pain and failure.
>
> —Dorthmoriron’s Personal Notes
The twenty-sixth victim, Zeus, walked out of the dressing room. “Break a leg,” he whispered to himself, eyes blinking too fast—he wanted his dead maji, his dead husband, his dead Antonio to have said it once more. To hear it as he had heard it before his last performance as Prince Andrei Bolkonsky in War and Peace nearly fifty years ago. His career died as Prince Andrei laid in the hospital bed and the chorus of his heart went silent. A tragic necessity with world-wide television. A final curtain before everyone could record his voice. A last round of applause before his audiences realized he didn’t age. No one here would believe that I, with this body, am older than two and a half decades.
While not the worst he’d endured, the dressing room was merely a hotel meeting room with a few makeup chairs, vanity mirrors, clothes racks, curtain dividers, piped-in Christmas carols mangled by some pop star’s talentless auto-tuned voice.
Zeus flexed his legs and glutes to make sure his black jeans—as black as the others’ tuxedoes—were tight in all the right places. I have only tonight. Tonight is all about the persona that gets the job done. Already he smelled the brains and hearts and movements of others—the neuroelectrical sparks flowing from brain to heart to muscles. The orchestra of his life was falling out of tune.
His footsteps squeaked and echoed along the service corridor of white-painted cinderblock walls and freshly pine-solled yet sticky linoleum. He stopped and slipped off his black Ferrini alligator-belly cowboy boots. Just like the first days, back when I performed in death-trap theatres with rough-cut floors and walkways and stairs. Everything was held together more with prayers than adequate carpentry skills. No matter the shoe, it always made too much noise.
Nostalgia plucked his heartstrings, the cello of his voice and life.
Ah, to be that young and naive again. He snorted to himself.
He picked up his boots and padded along the hallway, past the doors with the muffled sounds of the MC prepping the crowd of Washington DC socialites, up the incline to the corner landing. Zeus walked as he always did—filled the space with his presence, some would say his ego. He turned at the corner. A glance back told him that the others were fumbling to get out of their dress shoes. That’s right, understudies—learn from the stars.
The stage manager, a lanky, perhaps local college theatre student, looked up from his checklist. “You are?”
“Zeus.”
The stage manager waited a few seconds, listening to his earbud.
Zeus put on his cowboy boots.
Applause filtered through the double doors.
Then the stage manager picked up the microphone dangling from his earbud, pressed the talk button. “We have Zeus,” the stage manager whispered. “Cue ‘Holding Out For A Hero.’”
The drumbeat, guitar, and keyboard oozed through the door.
“Thirty seconds,” the stage manager called to the stagehands. He returned his attention to Zeus. “Why Zeus?”
Zeus lifted an I-don’t-care shoulder and flashed one of his public smiles. “It was given to me.”
“A nickname?”
“No. My . . .” He managed to stop himself from saying maji. He cleared the pain in his throat. “My husband named me Zeus.” The desire and bane of every actor—to have but a single role for decades. But one cannot deny their maji.
“Husband?” The stage manager made a vague gesture beyond the double doors. “Is he out . . . are you sure about this?”
“He died three days ago.” Zeus touch-tipped his black Stetson Brimstone hat in affirmation. “Before him, I had a wife. I’m sure.”
“Are you saying . . . ?”
“I swing every way.”
“But, you . . . he . . . ” The stage manager’s hands flapped uselessly, failing to explain. “You’re here, and he isn’t even cold, yet.”
Zeus touch-tipped his hat again. “Zeus.”
The literary light dawned, and the stage manager gaped.
That’s right, child of memes; I’m the Greek bastard god who stuffed his dick into anyone who piqued him, and I’m prowling to be piqued.
The first drum fill rolled through the doors and crashed into their silence.
The stage manager scrambled to recover his place on the checklist. “Twenty seconds.”
Huh. I have been monogamous for probably thrice as long as you’ve been alive.
One of the stagehands rushed over. “Let’s see it.”
Zeus flexed his bare arms and chiseled abs—sculpted to the precise tastes of Antonio, his maji—his dead maji. His skin tone, hair color, eye color all selected and tinted into Antonio’s desired ideal.
The stagehand performed one last misting with cooking spray and gave a thumbs-up.
The second drum fill spilled through the doors.
“Fifteen seconds.”
The stagehand winked at him. “Remember, they bite if you want them to.”
Zeus did his hat tip as thanks. Mortals have no clue—even about their sexuality. I’ve lived . . . twice their lifespan? Thrice?
Third drum fill.
Zeus hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his barely broken-in 501s—just enough washings to make them flexible. His hands framed his rattlesnake-head belt buckle. Inhaled, splayed his legs, and spread out his chest and shoulders. Things had changed, but this was a stage—this was a home.
In their vernacular, I need a fix. He smiled wryly. Of course, they mean drugs, which I have done, too.
First long drum fill.
“Ten.”
I did opium. Just enough to dull the pain, to be able to think, to feel beyond the confines of suffering, to wish for death. Oh, Antonio.
Fifth drum fill.
“Five.”
But you are gone.
“Four.”
Taken from me.
The manager mouthed “three” and held out three fingers.
Tonight, I need to share someone else’s soul.
One.
The second long drum fill rumbled, the bars on the double doors were pressed down, and the doors swung wide. The limelight blazed through the doors; the MC reached his crescendo and gestured to the back corner of the stage. “Zeus!” The backup vocals switched from “dooo” to “ahhh.”
Zeus smiled, so blindingly the astronauts in orbit could see him, moved forward, and filled the stage with every stagecraft lesson he had learned from every star he’d met. He recognized the audience with his fingers-to-brim hat-tip.
The audience applauded.
Electricity ran through him. Oh, I have missed this.
He beamed and made his small gesture of regard to the various tables, to the various ladies of society barely visible through the hot glare of the spotlights, and savored every heartbeat.
Bonnie Tyler began the first verse, asking where had all the good men and the gods gone.
I am right here. And Zeus poured all of his presence into his persona’s pose of perfection—thumbs behind his belt, hands framing his belt buckle, displaying his designer physique—a marble deity made flesh.
Bonnie Tyler closed the first verse, dreaming of what she needed: a hero.
The MC sprang into action. “Let’s start the bidding at a thousand. One thousand dollars to have Zeus until the morning light. I have a thousand. Do I have fifteen hundred?”
Zeus acknowledged the bidder.
“Fifteen hundred.”
Another hat tip. I expected, for one with so much training, to be blasé at this event.
At two thousand, a new player entered the bidding.
Zeus did his hat-tip of thanks. He recognized, not the man, or, more accurately, not the boy, but the soul—not the exact soul, but it was a maji soul. Oh, my boy, we could have such sweet regrets together. He gave a slight shake of his head. Find another.
But the boy didn’t take the hint; he kept upping the bid.
At five thousand, the bidding stalled with the kid maji on top.
Maji, you will not do. Without losing his smile, Zeus took the microphone from the MC and whispered, “Let me be your hero.” He extended the microphone away from his mouth and sang “Hero” an octave lower than Enrique Iglesias had. He sang as he had on the last night he and Antonio were together, as he had when he portrayed Caesar in Vienna, as he had when he portrayed Prince Andrei Bolkonsky in Sydney.
The ballroom shivered.
His rich, powerful, operatically trained voice flooded deep into the baritone range. His voice quivered on “save my soul tonight” at the end of the first stanza.
From the general body movements of the audience, it seemed his emotional slippage had had a positive effect.
He made no arm movements—one hand barely holding the microphone, the other thumb tucked into his belt. Just his voice, a cappella, pure as if he had descended from Mount Olympus and needed none of the mortal accoutrements or flailings. He ended with, “I can be your hero,” soft, dark, golden, like the sharing of souls. A promise.
Silence.
And he let it be. He embraced the mortal need to savor what they had just experienced.
Then the applause rang out; they stood and applauded.
He returned the microphone to the MC and brought his fingers to his hat’s brim and dipped his head at the audience’s acclaim. Tonight, I am Zeus. Worship me. Buy me. Rent my love.
The MC recovered enough to stammer out, “Do I hear six thousand?”
The ladies returned to their seats and their cosmos and their Christmas sugar cookies, bidding resumed.
And the kid maji seethed. His anger and willingness to do violence curled like red smoke, diffused across his soul, causing sparks in his aura. He snatched up his bidding paddle. “Twenty thousand.” Harsh and ragged.
Gasps and silence. The room turned to study him, then the whispers began.
Zeus cringed. Oh, the impatience of youth. Then he straightened out his face, repaired his smile, and did his persona’s form of recognition.
The kid didn’t back down, but he brought his speech under control. “Twenty thousand.”
The MC looked for confirmation from elsewhere in the room. He acknowledged the bid. “I have twenty thousand. Is there twenty-one thousand? I have twenty-one.”
The kid crossed his arms and glared at Zeus. The center of his soul darkened such that the whole took on the appearance of a blood moon. “Thirty.”
A chill rippled throughout the room.
Zeus saw it then.
To him, the kid’s aura intensified and extended from his body like a heiligenschein or aureole—a halo, a glow about the observer’s shadow upon dew-covered grass or rippling water.
You’re using the heat of the room to power a spell? Are you insane?
“I have thirty-one,” the MC announced.
A darkness eclipsed the kid’s soul. The air about him distorted, pressed his aura into a hollowed area, and forced a circular rainbow to form. Tiny sparks like ribbons or miniature lightning bolts snapped between him and the rainbow’s edge. Distorting and flowing like rippling water or sequins on a billowing dress.
No one else in the audience or on stage seemed to notice.
Zeus struggled to keep his smile and fought against his instincts to flee. Power, he reminded himself. Antonio had drilled him on the first requirement of magic: Power. He looked about the ballroom and counted iced drinks. A maji without power is mortal.
A few dozen daiquiris, a few rum and cokes, and, of course, iced soft drinks for the designated drivers.
You can pull power from the room’s heat, but that requires some sort of endothermic engine. They are slow to reach peak power, as subtle as a Marvel Studios movie, need a steep temperature gradient like ice—dry ice is better, and won’t last long in a closed space like this. So, what is your game?
The kid looked at his watch and frowned. Worry lines congregated on his forehead. He raised his bidding paddle. “Sixty.”
Light intensified on the right and left sides of the rainbow, surrounding the kid like sundogs, or, since it was night, moondogs.
Are you forcing your soul to support all of this? Why do you want me so badly? Tell me why.
“Sixty?” The MC coughed, stammered. “Sixty-one? No? Anyone else? Sixty thousand. Going once. Going twice. Sold. Zeus.” The MC clapped.
Applause circled about the ballroom.
Zeus doffed his cowboy hat to the ladies and bowed.
Boy, what are you after? Doesn’t matter. I just need to placate him and then work the room for someone to share their soul with tonight.
Zeus heard the words in his mind. He managed his smile as he descended the stairs from stage to ballroom floor.
Zeus licked his lips. He had denied the iron tang to the air, and the out-of-kilter beats of a hundred and forty-seven hearts. Now he felt it all pressing down upon him, squeezing the life from his sanity. His eyes darted for the exits.
The kid had positioned himself near the best exit, the doors closest to escape. Closest to the night.
By sheer desperation to keep his dignity, Zeus managed not to stumble or fall down the stairs and kept from running from the ballroom.
Panic gripped Zeus by the throat and bodily dragged him toward the far doors.
He managed a few gestures, a few flirtations, a few pleasantries at the various tables, nothing more.
The smäg gnawed upon his spine as if it were a dog worrying a bone, pressing his back muscles upward against his neck, twisting his diaphragm into knots, swelling his tongue. It strained against the confines of yielding flesh.
Zeus quickened his pace and concentrated on his breathing. I’m the master of my body.
The kid gave him a smile dripping with pity.
Antonio had given him similar warnings.
What else am I to do? To Hell with placation. He stopped before the kid. “I don’t know what you want out of this date you just won. Ground rules: I do neither statutory rape nor do I do father figure.”
The kid reacted as if slapped, but the flares and rainbow about him remained steady—like a peacock’s plumage. “Neither. Do. I.” His voice, young, barely past the cracking of adolescence, chilled the space between them. “One threw me out like trash; actually sold me to a cult; told my brother lies about summer camp and had him drive me. My father hoped I would die.”
Tears pricked the kid’s eyes. “The next one died. Ripped apart by a rabid, majicked dog.” He swallowed. “The one after abandoned us—the entire family. Not my bio-family, a real family.”
He returned to speaking directly into Zeus's mind.
“Why can’t you just leave?”
“I’m an actor, not a hero.”
He took a visible breath.
“Fine. I’m at a crossroads. You are suggesting I follow the path of redemption and get myself killed.”
The boy shook his head. “The maji who killed Antonio wants to give you a soul.”
Zeus jerked his head up and away. His eyes burned. “What?” A growl, a hiss, a warning.
The kid walked out of the ballroom.
Zeus seethed but followed.
Without slowing or hesitating, the kid turned for the stairs leading up to the lobby. “The concept is based upon one of the cons the second-hand soul salesmen developed. The idea is to make the ensufflation permanent.”
“Why me?” It came out through clenched teeth.
“Because it is easier to make a volkodlak, a werewolf, than it is to find one. He knew where Antonio was, killed him, and transformed you from familiar into monster.”
Zeus glared at the kid’s back.
“Is this where I’m supposed to beg for the opportunity?”
“Worse. Than. A. Demon?” Incredulity and shock separated Zeus's words. “What is worse than a demon?”
The kid stared into someplace other than the here and now. “When a maji messes with souls, he opens the door to …” He shook himself free of the vision, but his face remained pale and taut. “You are becoming a volkodlak because Antonio bound your soul to his. Everything was fine until he died and took your soul with him. That which is left behind, you, becomes a monster.” He swallowed hard and shivered.
Zeus curled his lip down into a snarl. “What does that leave me?”
The kid shrugged and mounted the stairs.
Zeus started to follow, stopped himself, and kept his foot off the stair. “This is part of a spell. Isn’t it?”
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“Yes.”
Zeus nodded. “If I agree, can we keep majic out of it?”
The kid stopped halfway up the stairs and turned back to him, his face a mask of concern. “No. Tonight is all about majic. No matter your choices, you will be changed by majic. The question is, what do you want to become?”
“A volkodlak, an even worse-than-demon monster, or a pyrrhic, reformed character on stage for the last time?”
“Is that what awaits us beyond?”
“And what role are you playing?”
The kid dropped his head and sighed. He shook his head, turned, and continued up the stairs.
The kid brushed his cheeks.
“How do I know you are not lying?”
Zeus stared at the bottom step. Too many insecurities and feelings swirled just out of reach. He wanted to run. To find an exit not covered by the kid’s spell. And knew there were none—the spell was in his mind. It triggered based on his decision. He swallowed but found his mouth dry. “Redemption?” His voice cracked and wavered as the hoarse whisper it had been when the pain of cancer overwhelmed the opium.
Zeus placed his foot upon the step. A certainty, a clear, singular purpose settled within him—the effect of the spell. He understood the redemption role. One last performance—the performance of a lifetime.
. . .
The windowless cargo van drove through the night. Eleven males including Zeus in back. Two in front. Only three had normal heartbeats. The rest were slowed, lethargic—drugged or sleeping or ensorcelled.
From what little he had a chance to see, nine of the slowed heartbeats sat against the sides of the van in folded down “jump seats.” A crazy array of six seatbelts came together in a circular latch at their waist. They wore stereotypical bondage gear. Collar. Harness from a gladiator movie with a strap down the chest that disappeared into chastity boxer-briefs—complete with padlocks. Manacles. Hood. And enough O-Rings, D-Rings, and carabiners to open a climbing gear store. Each wore a number—one to nine.
One of the slowed heartbeats came from the sleepsack, a leather cocoon—the ultimate in bodily sensory deprivation and bondage restraint wear—and a hood with padded ears to eliminate sight, sound, and smell. Bungie cords, to reduce and delay the movements of the van, suspended the sleep sack within a wheeled metal frame.
These are the victims I’m to rescue.
The remaining three were odd. No scent of power. No whispers of secrets. No glow to their souls. Souls diminished to near nothingness.
What happened to their souls?
The three had changed Zeus into similar bondage gear as to the other seated occupants. Except his had chains connecting to a metal circle in the center of his chest. Except his didn’t come with a hood. Except his wasn’t numbered. The kid’s spell kept him expressionless, unresisting, and compliant to the demands—waiting for his time for redemption. They then buckled him into the last of the jump seats.
His body responded and Zeus wanted to smile. My relationship with Antonio never bent into bondage. After I became his familiar … if he had wanted this … aye, I would have done this for him.
The men in front chatted like normal delivery men, but the extra man in the back flitted and skitted about nervously.
Are we just cargo?
The van stopped and rolled through a checkpoint.
The skittish heartbeat moved toward the front of the van, and the man whined about being so close to a prison.
“Relax,” one in the front passenger seat said. “We install the scene and leave. We’ll never step foot inside the fence.”
“’Oesn’t hav’ a fence,” the driver said.
The van turned, from the sounds of the tires, on to another road. “Cousin’s ki’ is here. Buil’ings are the fence. Exercise yar’s inside them.”
“See? Don’t be a roach. Don’t check in.”
The van came to a stop, the front doors opened, closed, the backdoors of the van parted. Something grated along rollers then scraped along the bumper and fell heavily into place with a solid, metal thunk.
“Stand,” the fearful heartbeat ordered. “Take one step forward.”
The kid’s spell took over Zeus’s body, he rose and moved.
He was turned, a hand placed on his shoulder, and his right hand placed on the skittish man’s shoulder.
“Walk.”
He followed the man down a metal ramp out of the van onto an old sidewalk. Each of the numbered bondage victims followed him out of the van, through the winter air, along the cracked sidewalk, into a cold, echoing, abandoned church, down the aisle between the pews.
The wheels on the rack for the cocooned heartbeat rattled behind them.
They turned in the space between the lectern and the front row of pews, and the wheels rumbled up a plywood ramp onto the dais.
“Stop.”
The line came to a halt. His hand was removed from shoulder in front of him. And the one on his shoulder was removed too. The slow heartbeats were moved up the ramp. The cocooned heartbeat was hoisted into the air, and the rig squeaked. Once positioned, the rig was tied off, and the victim left dangling. Others were positioned around the central and cocooned heartbeat.
“Come,” the skittish man said.
Zeus followed the man with the fearful heartbeat, who kept tugging at him, up the plywood ramp to his position in a circle made of glowing rope.
Lights flowed along the rope away from his circle into a larger circle. There, lights swirled into a whirlpool of drifting patterns. In the center, the leather cocoon hung upside-down above a bird bath. Lights spiraled up the bird bath and up to a pilot’s breathing mask strapped to the man in the leather cocoon.
“Kneel.” The hands guided him down onto his mark. “Stay.”
And, if the kid did the spell he was supposed to do, I might well be stuck here. Now, let’s cue the maji.
A black leather asylum hood was dragged over Zeus’s head. It bent around his nose, leaving him to breathe through grommets. Its narrow collar slid past his chin to rest against his throat. He felt the hood’s laces being tightened from his crown down the back of his head. The collar fit snuggly.
Then he felt air blowing up through those nose grommets. Air blew against his mouth and chin.
Zeus saw the black, hard rubber breathing mask. It pressed through the leather hood covering his nose and cheeks and slid under his jaw.
The skittish man fumbled connecting the mask’s straps to the hood’s buckles.
Zeus heard it. A golden heartbeat. Strong with power. Pumping secrets.
The word “redemption” rang in Zeus’s head. He allowed the eyes of the smäg, the eyes of the volkodlak, the eyes of the Hunger-that-demands-a-soul to open. When fully awakened, no one can hide from a volkodlak.
Zeus grabbed the young fearful man’s wrist. He drew power from the smäg within, from the emptiness-which-can-never-be-filled. His hand flattened and elongated. Fingernails extended into vicious claws. A slight wrench and squeeze. His claws pierced the man’s wrist.
The man screamed.
Zeus applied more pressure.
Bones crunched, and the man’s scream turned from fear to pain and echoed throughout the chapel.
Zeus focused on just one heartbeat, the golden heartbeat, the maji’s heartbeat.
The kid claimed that heartbeat was the most important. Ending the maji’s heartbeat stopped the ritual. Stopped the creation of the monster-which-is-worse-than-demon. And brought about. …
“Redemption.” Zeus whispered it.
But the maji’s heart whispered secrets, writing them in glowing blood which passed through its chambers. Pounding out its beat—the maji's pulse increased with each passing second. Released the scent of power—the tang of ozone.
Zeus’s meticulously shaved body erupted with fine, stiff hair.
He tossed aside the offending broken wrist. He rose and stalked toward the maji’s heartbeat. “Redemption.”
More heartbeats crowded into the building. Threatened to drown out the most important one. To drown out the heartbeat with power. To drown out the maji’s heartbeat.
A 5.56mm bullet struck his body.
Because he was filled with the power of the smäg, he ignored it. Zeus lunged for the golden heartbeat.
More 5.56mm bullets fired from the furthest doors, from a dozen newly arrived heartbeats. The bullets pummeled his skin.
The maji’s heartbeat released a secret into the air, and the aura of the maji buzzed and snapped.
Two dozen more heartbeats entered the building. Closer. Able to set up deadly crossfire. Weapons switched to full automatic, and thunderous waves of 5.56mm bullets crashed over the room.
Zeus reached his target heart, and plunged sharpened claws then his hand through the maji’s protective spell and into the maji’s abdomen, reached up under the ribcage, and ripped the heart free of its arterial moorings. He grasped the convulsing organ—emptying itself of vital fluid. Zeus smiled. See your mortality and understand death has arrived. He held up the heart as high as he could as if an offering to a sky god, “Redemption!”
Another wave of bullets collided against his skin.
He felt a sting.
Blood escaped Zeus’s body. The smäg inside raged. Its power slipped beyond Zeus’s control. Its needs exceeded Zeus’s need for redemption. The smäg bled. The smäg hungered to replace his blood. The smäg turned, faced the men with assault rifles and charged.
Fearful fingers fidgeted on triggers.
Powered beyond his desire for physical form, the body of Zeus became volkodlak, the source of werewolf legends—part man, part wolf, part fog, all hatred. Fur emerged between the chain links and leather straps of his bondage costume. Eyes changed, and fangs grew within the confines of the deforming asylum hood. Nose and mouth protruded into a muzzle. Steam poured out of the hood’s grommets from his flattened nostrils.
Zeus flowed between and around the storm of shrapnel. More fury than man, the volkodlak solidified only parts of himself to slice, rend, and maim. But Zeus still felt every round passing through his mist. In his mind, the soulless rage, the smäg, increased its burning desire to fill the void created by the death of his maji, Antonio, the maji who forged him into a familiar.
Blood flowed from the wounds the volkodlak inflicted upon those firing weapons, and their souls leaked from their physical containers—escaping from their blood as it gushed.
The smäg licked and lapped and sucked at the souls even as the blood-coated, silver-furred volkodlak continued charging.
Terror took hold of the prey, heartbeats accelerated to dangerous rates, and they fled. Adrenalin. Panic. Glowing auras. Almost enough to transform their blood into golden maji blood. Enough to sweeten the blood. Almost enough to bring ecstasy and ease the smäg. But mortal blood never contained not enough soul to satisfy. The smäg always needed more.
Devoid of mortal limitations, part fog, part silver fur, and part physical, the Zeus volkodlak moved down the aisle between the pews like moonlight upon the water. Bounding at individuals, the mist swirled around them raking claws against their flesh ignoring the bulletproof vests and clothes. From the chapel and into the narthex—the entrance of the church—the fog, the volkodlak, solidified into a silver, two-hundred-pound wolf blocking the front entry, and he howled.
Primal panic pulsated and pushed the prey in the opposite direction—toward the apex and the doors off the sides of the chapel.
Half outside the old, abandoned church’s front doors wind ruffled Zeus's fur.
Light poured out of the dark sky to surround Zeus. The whirling blades of helicopters circled the church. Another three dozen heartbeats Zeus could stir into pleasurable panicked-sweetness filled the street painted in red and blue flashing lights. Bullets rained down.
A memory surfaced out of the Zeus mind—a legend of the volkodlak being tied to the moon being able to run across water on the light reflections. The volkodlak used light as bridges and during the ideal conditions with light beams or when devil’s rays appeared opposite the sun, the streams of light were used as stairs.
With a wolf grin, the volkodlak retreated into the shadows of the narthex.
The spotlight traced a path through dust, dirt, and debris stirred by the helicopters’ wind.
Zeus leaped. His feet touched the light beam. And ran upward into the night sky.
The helicopter pilot panicked and tried to veer away.
Like a dog chasing a car, the wolf chased the helicopter.
The crew’s fear drew him like a magnet. Faster than the movements of the pilot. Fright and Flight turn Freeze. Pulled faster and faster, until his claws sliced through the mortals within the cage of metal, rubber, foul fumes, and blinking lights.
Screams of pain accented the sweet surrender of souls spilling out with the blood. There were three. A hint of flavor and then nothing.
Another light blazed. A second helicopter.
He charged across the new light beam to the next flying cage of meat and souls. Three strikes and those screaming succulent souls drifted about him for seconds.
With more mortal morsels waiting for him upon the ground, Zeus jumped free of the helicopter becoming fog and drifted to the street, to the cordon of cruisers and tactical vehicles surrounding the abandoned church.
Here among the black vehicles, more hearts and souls waited for him.
With the area flooded with so many light sources, the volkodlak remained more solid, more fur, more flesh than mist. Zeus danced, drove his claws in deep through bone into hearts, and became the instrument of death.
He was beyond feeling the bullets which passed through his mist and pierced his body. Only the power of the smäg kept his wounded body moving.
Finally, he turned to the last of the prey—trapped by their sweet terror—inside the building, inside the church, inside the space of the transformation ritual. He entered through the front doors into the narthex—being solid only in the shafts of light shining through the stained-glass panes.
Somewhere Zeus had lost the cry of “redemption” in his mind, and the smäg grew satisfied, and the volkodlak moved slowly.
Through the inner doors. Into the sanctum.
Thirteen pews on either side of the aisle. Curved support beams ran from floor to the peak of the Tudor arch ceiling. Pendant lights hung uselessly from the curved ceiling. Beyond the opened side doors, the dais rose two steps. The lectern lay in splintered ruins.
Zeus no longer heard the heartbeats. No longer saw the souls. The ritual victims he was to protect were dead.
Whoever had been placed within the leather cocoon—which allowed no movement, no struggle, no escape—dangled, draining blood. Those who knelt about him lay limp upon the dais like islands in puddles of blood.
“No.” Failure tasted hot and bitter on his tongue. I can’t be redeemed.
The volkodlak and the smäg and Zeus knew who was responsible—the last of the assault rifle toting cowards. He heard their heartbeats, saw the glow of their souls driven by panic into hiding instead of flight. Hiding amongst the pews in the chapel. He howled.
The ragged hole where his soul had been ripped out with the death of Antonio, filled with rage, with hatred, with an unsated hunger for violence, for soul-enriched blood, for a soul.
He dug his claws into the solid wood of the first pews and threw the pews against the walls. Glass windows shattered. Steel struts rang.
Before the exposed crouching men could react, he sliced their throats. Then he sent the next set of pews flying. And moved to the next and the next and the next.
Some pews crashed into the ceiling. Splinters and broken boards from both the pews and the ceiling rained down upon the remaining prey.
Other pews became wrecking balls against mortal structures of flesh and bone.
One last heartbeat. One of power and filled with glowing blood. Trembling. Stinking. Another maji.
Like all maji in a dangerous situation, this one had a protective barrier.
Zeus reached through the spell barrier. It singed his fur. Burned his flesh. Ate away at the smäg and the dregs of Zeus’s energy.
He grabbed the maji by its thick vest. Pulled with one hand and threw a punch with the other.
Maji bones broke and cut through their wrapping of muscle and flesh. The glow faded. The lingering beat faded.
The volkodlak spent, the physical shell of Zeus fell to its knees. The smäg silent.
Zeus stared at his hands—soul-rich blood covered him to the shoulders. Down his chest. Coated his legs.
The kid was right.
Then Zeus realized that some of the blood coating his body was his own. Oozing from more holes than he could count.
He toppled into the growing pools of blood which still held traces of souls within the slowly congealing hemoglobin.
. . .
The kid sat down cross-legged on the concrete floor and set Zeus's head in his lap. He untied the knot and undid the lacings up the back of the asylum hood. By feel and practice. He loosened the neck collar and slipped it over Zeus’s chin. Being careful of the nose, the kid pulled the black leather hood free.
“One last task, Zeus.” The kid maji pulled electricity from his combat batteries, shaped it into a spell, pulled Zeus back to consciousness.
Red and blue lights flashed through the shattered windows of the chapel, colored the wood Tudor arch ceiling, competed with the work lights on the dais, and glared off the exposed, curved, steel supports. Smoke from the helicopter fires drifted between the shards and carried the stench of blazing rubber and burnt plastic and sickening, blackened meat. Stench of blood, fear, sweat, urine, feces burned the nose. Spent gunpowder left a gray tinge to the air. Cracked and charred electronics lent a blue hue. Twenty-six wood pews lay strewn like blocks scattered by a toddler. Broken bodies, blood, and ripped flesh littered the spaces in between.
Zeus's eyes opened and for a moment focused on the kid. “Is this redemption?”
The kid smiled. “You saved a lot of souls tonight.”
“I don’t hear any heartbeats.”
“You’re injured. They’re beyond your range.”
“I killed them all. Didn’t I?”
The kid’s smile vanished into pain. “One of my father figures, the one who abandoned us, decided to do something stupid. He got a bunch of drinking buddies together with the intent to break up the ritual. Then he crashed and burned at every step. His buddies panicked and shot up each other.” He rubbed his temples. “I never knew he was so incompetent.”
Zeus smiled. “Happens to the worst of us.”
“If you hadn’t done what you did, the monster my maji wanted would have torn through the city. Tens of thousands of people would have died. Hundreds of thousands by the end of the week. You saved them all.” The kid swallowed. “Let the curtains close. Take your bow to the applause.”
One last breath rattled out of Zeus's throat.
Tears stung his eyes, and a lump clogged his throat. The kid gently closed the eyes. “How many more?” He whispered to himself. He inhaled a shaky breath. To the empty air of the room, he said, “You don’t have to hide. I won’t do anything to interfere with you. I just ask you don’t make me a liar.”
Out of a drift of smoke, a man—sun-bleached blond hair, eyes of blue and cold as ice, thoroughly tanned, flawless smile, a Hawaiian shirt and florid, floral-print board shorts—emerged. “Dude, you really don’t understand how death works. Do you?”
The kid shrugged. “What will it cost? My soul?”
The man shook his head. “Nothing so cheap, dude. We’ll collect you soon enough.” He crossed his arms and glared down at the kid.
The kid sighed. “You’re the demon Atamehacho.”
Atamehacho laughed. “How do you know that?”
“I know your name …”
“Don’t go there, little dude. Name bindings don’t work like they do in the faerie tales.”
The kid shook his head. “I just want …”
“We know what you want.” Atamehacho ground the words into dust. “We’ll grant you your ‘truth,’ but you won’t like the price.”
“I accept it.”
Atamehacho crouched next to the kid. “That is because you stopped believing you have anything else to lose. You’re wrong. Humans always have more to lose.”
“What do you want? I’m already an apprentice to …”
Atamehacho sliced the air with his hand. “We know about him.” His smile turned contemptuous. “Your brother. We want your brother. We want his soul.”
The kid blanched and swallowed. “Too late. His soul has already been stolen.”
“Ah, little dude, we already told you that you don’t understand this death stuff.”
“But his soul …” The kid panted. “His soul is bound to a different monster.”
Atamehacho turned one palm up. “To suffer the consequences for lying.” He turned up the other. “To sell your brother’s soul.” With his hands, he mockingly mimed the motion of counterbalances. “Hard choice.”
“I’ll suffer.”
Atamehacho put on a pleasant expression. “Oh, you will, little dude. You will suffer. That was never in question. And, as for your brother. … The only question is: how much will you force him to suffer before you sacrifice him?”
The kid ground his teeth. “What if I bind you?”
Atamehacho laughed. He pointed at the kid. “You should see the look on your face.” He chuckled some more. “I’m just messing with you, dude. Zeus's soul is fine. There is an angel who is kinda sweet on you.”
The kid released all the tension in his body. “What about his son? Can he has his redemption?”
“No.” But there was a hesitation.
“How much would that cost?”
“Nothing which you can offer. But, little dude, it’s time for you to leave. I’ll give you one chance to keep your brother clear of the next ritual.”
“My brother? What does he has to do with any of this?”
Atamehacho frowned at him. “Think, little maji. Think.”
“But he won’t become a volkodlak.”
Atamehacho sighed and shook his head. “Give up?”
The kid held up a finger for time. Slowly his eyes widened. “Oh, shit.”
Atamehacho smiled, “You show promise.” He reached up as if to pluck a fruit. “Now, that master of yours, what do you think he’ll do when he discovers so many sacrificial victims just waiting to be …” He pulled an apple into existence. “… used?” He offered the apple to the kid.
The kid shook his head.
Atamehacho shrugged and took a crunchy bite and sucked on the juices. “We make the best apples.”
“He doesn't know about them.”
“Wait a few days and then try to convince me of that.” Atamehacho reached out and took the kid’s arm.
The apple vanished.
He turned over the kid’s wrist and slid up the sleeve exposing a slight discoloration on the inner forearm. “And you will give them to him.”
“No.”
“First your brother. It’ll be hard. But it will get much easier, because the next one will be your bio-dad. And you’ve been fantasizing about making him pay for years. And after that, you’ll be beyond caring. You’ll just transform them. One by one. Into the monsters from your nightmares.”
“No.” The kid yanked his arm free. “I won’t.”
Atamehacho pouted. “Darn.” He shook his fists in a mock infant tantrum. “Those pesky Laws of Majic.”
The kid blanched.
Atamehacho gave him a smile as honest as a certified used car broken down on the side of the road. “If only there were some way around them.”
“You know of a way.”
“Give your brother’s soul to me.”
“No.”
Atamehacho shrugged. “He would become the big brother he should have been. The loyal protector. The one you can always trust.” He rolled his eyes away from the kid. “Or … monster.”
“No. There is another way.”
“The fates say, ‘No.’” Atamehacho curled his lips inward. “I’m not supposed to interfere in any way. But that angel... ” He dropped his voice to a confidential whisper. “I’m looking for some fire-on-ice action—if you catch my drift.”
“Is that even possible?”
“Angel is the best kind of ass.”
The kid remained silent.
“Fine. In the hopes of horizontal dancing with our wings on, I offer you the only option to keep your brother from becoming the monster your master craves and you fear. Take it or leave. No, wait. I leave.” He stood and started walking toward the dais.
“Wait. You said he could avoid the ritual.”
“That offer expired. Not even I can open that closed window.” He turned back toward the kid. “Look, kid, one of us always gets the soul—unless your master gets his way. So, you can give me your brother’s soul. Or.” He smiled and sang, “Hello, Monster.”
“But.”
“There are no other offers. No one else will violate the edicts.”
“What about the angel?”
“Do you think angels are the type to break the rules?”
The kid shook his head. “I guess not.”
“Deal?”
“He’ll become …”
Atamehacho sighed. “A loyal protector. The big brother you can always trust.”
“You’re lying.”
“Not for this, kid. The Laws are explicit.”
“But you were lying.”
Atamehacho gave a sad smile. “Kid, humans weren’t meant to know too much about their future. It keeps them from wanting to live. We’re talking about making a deal which will change his future, and that will affect yours. Look too closely. …” He held his thumb and finger barely apart. “You’ll stop wanting to accomplish your tiny little goals.” He flexed a shoulder. “Or your not so little revenge.” He walked back and set a hand on the kid’s shoulder. “Long ago, you gave up on your future. You need to understand. I’m offering a future to your brother.”
“As what? Your slave? Your next body?”
Atamehacho laughed. “You watch too much television.” He crouched and nearly touched his nose to the kid’s. “Do we have a deal?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Make your brother into a monster.”
“That’s not a choice.”
Atamehacho shrugged. “What’cha you gonna do when they come for him? Bad boys. Bad boys.”
“Fine.”
“The Laws are explicit.” He gave the kid space.
“Throw in Zeus’s son.”
“Kid.”
“Give Zeus the heroic death.”
Atamehacho stood and considered the dais. “Only if there are no outstanding debts, leans, or mortgages on his soul.”
The kid nodded. “A full life.”
Atamehacho snorted. “I’m not a vegetarian.”
“What?”
He waved away the question. “Deal. Zeus’s soul finds a happy reward, his son is saved and lives a healthy life, you get a loyal and protective brother, and I get your brother’s soul. And you say?”
“I accept.”
Atamehacho made a keep-going gesture.
“I give you his soul.”
Atamehacho frowned.
“Fine. I give you my brother’s soul.”
“Yes!” Atamehacho jumped into the air, floated, pirouetted, and landed. “There will be fire on ice tonight.”
The kid shook his head. “That’s it?”
“Oh, no. I need a pint of your blood. …” He chuckled. “Just yanking your chain. That was just a domino. You still have to keep him from becoming a monster. We aren’t allowed to do the heavy lifting, but doors and windows are now open. Seek and now you can find. So, you better get running. Hopping? Flying?” He brightened and wagged his finger. “You get flying. It’s strange to think of humans as being able to fly.” He shrugged. “Fly, little dude. Fly.” His voice rumbled through the room like thunder.
Atamehacho stopped being there. Gone—faster than a dream fades—faster than the light vanishes after flipping the switch.
The kid laid Zeus's head back onto the floor. “I wish we could have been friends. I think I would have liked you.” He looked up and out into the night beyond the flashing lights and started running.