She glared at Ian before giving me a condescending sniff. “We don’t spend much time upstairs. This is all for show, mostly to keep the neighbors off our back.”
“Where is the entrance to the crypt?” Ian asked, peering around the big main room of the church. It was filled with dusty pews, a ratty altar, and a stack of water-damaged cardboard boxes lined against a far wall.
“I’m guessing right there. Oh, hello. Am I right in saying you don’t look much like someone who has been kidnapped?” Movement to my right had caught my peripheral vision, revealing Indigo as she slowly emerged from an arched doorway.
“Who are you— Oh, it’s her.” Aspen gave another of her annoyed sniffs, then, with a foul look at me, moved a few feet away. “She’s nothing but a courier. Don’t waste your time on her—go after John, and do your dragon thing on him.”
“Just a courier?” Indigo stopped in the doorway and leaned against it in studied nonchalance. “I assure you I’m very much more than just a courier. I’m the High Priestess of the Agonized Flesh.”
“You can’t be,” Aspen said, sneering at her. Ian stood still, his hand on his sword and his gaze on Indigo with an intensity that surprised me. “There’s only one High Priestess of the Agonized Flesh, and I’m it.”
Then again, a lot of things surprised me, like why Indigo was evidently not in distress from her recent kidnapping.
Unless it wasn’t a kidnapping at all.
“You were high priestess,” Indigo said calmly. “But my darling John removed you from that position a little while ago and named me high priestess. You will get on your knees and honor me as the conduit to the dark earth master.”
“Hoo,” I said in an undertone to Ian, who had moved over to my side. “That’s not going to go over well with Aspen.”
“Your darling John?” The words shot out of Aspen with the velocity of bullets, and I was oddly thankful she had no arms at that moment, because I suspect she would have leaped on Indigo and throttled her. “That two-timing asshat! That lying, cheating rat bastard! Oh, he is so going to suffer for this! If he thinks he can raise a stink because last month I wanted a girls’ night out, and all the time he had a little floozy on the side—”
“I am not a floozy,” Indigo protested.
“You’re a man-stealing bitch, that’s what you are! You knew full well he was married, and yet you obviously didn’t let that bother you one bit.” Aspen stamped her feet and glanced over at me. “Stinky, arm me!”
“I’ll make you sweaty and sick,” I warned her, pulling forward the cloth cross-body bag we’d used to carry her arms.
“This is important,” she said, glaring back at Indigo.
“Okay, but if you have to barf, aim it on her, please. These are borrowed clothes.” I took out the arms, and bending both at the elbow, stood behind Aspen, holding them so it looked like she had her hands on her hips.
“If you think I’m going to take your perfidy as well as that of my cheating husband lying down, you have another think coming,” Aspen said, stamping her foot again. I raised one arm, pointed a finger, and shook it at Indigo for good effect. “Just as soon as the mage comes and puts my arms back on, I am so going to hex you.”
“I’m sooo scared,” Indigo said with a sneer.
“You ought to be,” Ian said in a low, cold voice. He marched over to Indigo, and before she could do more than back up two steps, he was on her, shoving her against the wall with an arm across her throat. “What is your role in this? Why have you delivered the esprits to the Witnesses?”
“Don’t forget Helen. I bet she had something to do with Helen,” I reminded him, tucking away Aspen’s arms, since her moment of indignation seemed to be over.
Ian continued, “Where are the esprits? What are you doing here? Why did you contact Helen Larson for help?”
“All of that’s none of your business.” Indigo’s voice was defiant, but wheezy.
Ian was silent for a moment, and I knew by how high his dragon fire was that he was considering what the best action would be. I half hoped he’d go dragon hunter crazy on her, but instead, he tipped his head toward me. “Veronica? Take off her arms.”
“Oooh,” I said, coming forward, taking the precaution of first draping the arm-bearing cloth bag across Aspen’s torso. I pulled out the wrath demon’s black sword and made a show of examining it. “Sure thing. Although maybe her legs would be more effective?”
“You wouldn’t dare,” Indigo said with a choking gasp.
I pointed to Aspen and raised one eyebrow.
“You bitch,” Indigo snarled. “I’ll tell you why I put up with that annoying dragon hunter, but only because there’s no way it will do you any good. She heard there were esprits in California and hunted us down, and told me she’d help us get to safety. She wanted to take us to Canada, but I told her I knew of a small town where we’d be safe.”
“So you arranged to come here?” Another piece of the puzzle slid into place. “Why?”
She smirked. “Why do you think? John, of course. I couldn’t shake off the dragon hunter without her becoming suspicious, so I went along with it. Plus it kept the esprits quiet. They thought I was taking them to be dispensed to worthy recipients, and so I am…they’ll go to a primal god instead of even more stupid dragon swords.”
“You self-serving hussy! It was your plan all along to come here and steal my husband, wasn’t it?”
“I wouldn’t really use the word steal,” Indigo said, looking like a cat who’d eaten a whole plate of goldfish. “More like allow him to sweep me off my feet.”
“Oh, I’m not absolving that hussy-imbibing bastard I’m married to of any guilt—he gets the bulk of that. But it makes sense now why you contacted me.” Aspen looked nobly martyred, saying to Ian and me, “She called me two months ago and said she was about to take possession of something that a wrath demon wanted, and would the church pay more for it. Naturally, I had John discuss it with her. It’s clear that the two-timing rat’s ass hooked up with her then.”
“Why didn’t she just hand over the little girls at that time?” I asked.
“I doubt if she had them then.” Aspen pointed with her chin. “Go ahead and lop her legs off. She deserves it after what she did to me.”
“Are the esprits downstairs?” Ian asked.
Indigo pursed her lips but said nothing.
I twirled my sword and moved closer, slashing open the shoulder of her jacket. She spat out a word I wouldn’t repeat in mixed company, and snarled, “Yes, damn you. Now let me go.”
“Oh, I don’t think so.” Ian spun her around, pulled her arms back, and before I could realize what he was doing, had a zip tie restraint around her wrists. “I leave you in charge of the courier, Indigo.”
“Goody,” Aspen said, her eyes narrowing. It was the accompanying small, cruel smile that had me biting back a question about whether she would be okay watching Indigo; instead I followed Ian when he headed to the stairs from which the latter had emerged.
“Restraining me won’t do you any good,” Indigo called after us. “Better you should just leave now, before you are destroyed by the power of the Anguished Witness.”
Ian said nothing, just started down the stairs.
“Do you always carry zip ties with you?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Yes. They come in very handy in subduing mortals, demons, and immortals alike.”
“I bet. I’ll have to get some and add them to my dragon hunter kit.”
“What kit?” he asked, feeling along a wall for a light switch.
“The one I’m going to make just as soon as I get my apartment mucked out and purchase all new things. It’s clear that there’s more to being a dragon hunter than just a sword, so I thought it would be good to make up a kit with first aid stuff, lots of moist towelettes for sword wiping and general demon blood removal, a disposable rain slicker, because honestly, I don’t know if any detergent is up to washing out black bloodstains, and hand sanitize
r. Oh, and I’m thinking a shower cap to keep the hair clean when blood is a-flying. You wouldn’t believe what I washed out of my hair yesterday.”
Ian shot me a look that was two-thirds amused and one-third appalled, but once he found the light for the stairwell, he started down for the basement crypt. After two steps, he stopped.
“What is it?” I asked, bumping into him.
“Look.” He pointed ahead.
I peered over his shoulder but didn’t see anything except dimly lit wooden stairs. “What am I missing? All I see are steps.”
“Look closely at the middle of them. Do you see a pattern?”
He shifted to the side so I could lean forward and study them. “Not really. I just see— Oh.” For a second, I thought I saw movement on the step, like the wood grain had shifted.
“That’s called a banehook. It’s a form of spell cast intended on harming whoever steps on it.”
“Like a magic land mine?”
“That’s a good term for it. Brace yourself for a hard landing.”
Ian turned on the step and put his hands around my waist to lift me up, and with strength that had my inner girl squealing in delight, literally tossed me past the bespelled step and down onto the landing.
I was prepared for a hard fall but still cracked my head on the wall.
“My apologies,” he said, leaping down the stairs and immediately pushing my fingers away from where I was rubbing the side of my head. “Let me see if you are bleeding.”
“I don’t think I am. But I bet I’ll have a big lump there.”
“And I’ll bet you won’t.” Finished with examining my head, he smiled at me, an act that lit up all my insides with a happy glow of love. I wasn’t ready to face the fact that I’d fallen so hard and fast for this strange, enigmatic, troubled man, and yet a simple thing like a smile could make me want to dance and sing with joy. “You are now immortal, remember. Along with being impervious to mortal diseases and aging, you heal all but the most grievous wounds.”
“Except getting your middle punched out,” I said, my happy glow fading away.
“Except that,” he agreed, and with an odd look at me, started down the second set of stairs, taking each step slowly and scanning for any further magical land mines.
We made it to the bottom without incident, finding ourselves in a small antechamber. A couple of broken wooden chairs littered one side, while the other was full of old hymnbooks.
I was eyeing the latter while Ian studied the door. “And here we have a bane.”
“Hmm?” I looked up from where I was nudging aside a stack of hymnbooks, wrinkling my nose as they toppled and released a small mushroom cloud of dust.
“The magic used on this door is called a bane. Like the banehook, it is intended to cause harm to someone who attempts to break it, in this case, by turning the doorknob to open the door.”
Something pale white gleamed in the dust and grime, poking out from under the books. I used my shoe again to move the books, surprised to see a white plastic wand with silver stars bristling at the end of gold filaments. “Huh. What’s Sparkle’s wand doing here? Poor kid must have lost it during the kidnapping. Or maybe she tossed it to let us know she’s down here. What?” The last was said in response to the look that Ian was giving me when I picked up the wand and dusted it against my pant leg.
“If you want to live long enough to be a renowned kickass superhero dragon hunter—”
“I thought I already was?” I asked, waving the wand at him with a half smile.
“—then you need to pay attention, because this is potentially deadly. Look at the doorknob and you will see a particularly powerful example of a bane. Do you see the pattern of it?”
I bopped him on the head with the wand, which must have released the glitter compartment, because a light shower of silver glitter coated Ian’s dark curls. I averted my eyes quickly and decided I’d tell him about the glitter-bombing later. “Let’s see…yes, I see what looks like a triple Celtic knot, the kind you see in old Irish books of hours. What would it do if I grabbed the doorknob and turned?”
“Probably take off your hand. Or the entire right side of your body. Or turn you to stone. Any number of unpleasant events, none of which I recommend, since…” His voice was filled with dry amusement, but his eyes— Oh, his eyes. They were warm with an emotion that answered the call my heart seemed to be sending out.
“Since what?”
He turned back to the door, a little frown drawing down his brows. It didn’t take someone who’d spent years thumbing through psychology magazines in therapy waiting rooms to know his body language was expressing discomfort and a sudden emotional withdrawal. “Since it would likely mean we’d be down yet another dragon hunter, and the mortal world can ill afford that.”
“You don’t have to do that, you know,” I said, wanting desperately to put my arms around him. I could feel the pain inside him, deep and dark and as cold as ice, sending little tendrils of frost spiraling around him, despair trailing in their wake. He was clearly overwhelmed with emotion.
“Do what, exactly?”
“Withdraw from me. Ian, I feel your sadness. I don’t know how I’m doing that, but maybe it’s because we’re both dragon hunters, or we slept together, or Mercury is in retrograde and therefore I’m suddenly privy to your emotions, but I know that you’re unhappy about something, and I have a horrible feeling it’s me. Us. This thing that we have together.”
“This thing called you being in love with me?” he asked with a little quirk to one corner of his mouth.
I’d take teasing by him over profound sorrow any day. “Sure, although it would be nicer if you would reciprocate. Is that what this is about? Are you feeling guilty that you don’t feel the same way about me? Because if it is, you can stop worrying that I’m going to manipulate you into saying you love me, too. I’ve been through far too much therapy covering everything from my emotionally stunted mother to my own quirks to do something like that.”
He sighed.
“Tell me that sigh wasn’t loaded with all sorts of emotions,” I said, bopping him on the shoulder with the wand. It left a residue of silver that splashed down diagonally across his chest. I hoped he didn’t notice.
“No, it was a sigh loaded with the discovery that you pick the worst times to talk about complicated subjects such as emotions and relationships. Now put the wand down and focus on this bane. I will show you how to get around it.”
“Oooh, goody, practical skills.” I tucked the wand into my back pocket and leaned forward to study the pattern that appeared to be etched onto the doorknob and a circle about four inches wide surrounding it. “Proceed, maestro.”
Ian took a step back and kicked the door right next to the doorknob. The wood cracked, and the door flew open in the very best Hollywood style. He grabbed a couple of dusty books and wedged the door open before preceding me into the room.
I’m not sure what I expected a church’s crypt to look like, but I had vague images from an art history class I’d taken in college and assumed there would be vaulted stone archways, massive sarcophagi, and the odd weeping angel or two hovering over some effigy of a Victorian timber magnate or miner who hit it rich two centuries ago. What we found when we entered through a short hallway, however, was a large room, mostly empty except for a long, narrow table covered with a runner of purple velvet and what looked like an altar set up at the far end of the room. To our left was a row of chairs lined against the wall, three of which were occupied by the two little girls and Sasha.
“There you are!” My shoulders slumped a little at the sight of them. I had half expected to find them tied down to medieval torture devices, but although all three were tied to the chairs, they looked unharmed. “We were so worried about you. Girls, are you all right? Those bad people didn’t do anything to you, did they? Sasha, I’ve got a few things I want to say to you, but they’re going to have to wait until a better time. I’m glad you’re not hurt, though.”
“I’m glad, too,” she said, wrinkling her nose and looking thoughtful. “I don’t think I’d like it at all.”
“I tried it once,” the girl named Glitter said, shifting in her chair. “I fell off a swing and made my knee bloody. I wouldn’t recommend it.”
“Interesting,” Sasha said, considering her. “I didn’t know you went in for that sort of thing.”
Glitter shrugged one thin, girlish shoulder. “When amongst the mortals and all that.”
“Good point,” Sasha agreed.
“I have to visit Mrs. Nature,” the other girl, Sparkle, said suddenly, addressing the three people in front of them.
I looked from the girls to where two men and a woman stood, all three armed with guns.
“That’s far enough,” one of the men said, ignoring Sparkle to focus on Ian and me.
I narrowed my eyes at him. He was the man whom I’d seen earlier in the road drawing symbols. That was clearly Aspen’s husband, John Fuller, head of the church and consorter of Indigo.
“Put the weapons down, Witness,” Ian ordered. “You know you can’t kill a dragon hunter, not with bullets or magic.”
The second man glanced at his compatriots, looking nervous. “Er…he has a point, John. Dragon hunters can’t be harmed by mortal means. Everyone knows that.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. They aren’t gods,” John answered.
I had kept an eye on Ian, feeling that as the senior member of our team, it was up to me to follow his lead rather than just charge in and try to get the girls away from the crazy people, but Ian just stared down John, clearly unimpressed by the threat.
“How about this,” I said after Ian remained silent. Maybe he was giving me the opportunity to take charge of a situation? Stranger things could happen. “You let the three girls go, and we don’t go medieval on your ass. Er…asses. Respective asses. Boy, editing yourself while you’re speaking is hard. I just hope Mr. Manny appreciates me trying to be grammatically correct all the time.”
“Who is Mr. Manny?” John asked after a moment’s silence. He waggled the gun toward Ian. “Is that the dragon hunter’s name? If so, we will be sure to add it to the list of those we present to the dark earth master.”