Fury Rising (Fury Unbound Book 1)

  The Abomination’s signal lit up my Trace with a neon frenzy. From where I was, I could smell the faint scent of char. They all reeked with it—an acrid scent of burning flesh and wood. My instincts kicked into high gear. Time to hunt and destroy. Hecate was leaning over my shoulder—I could feel her whispering to me through the dark of the moon, through the tattoo on my neck—triple snakes for the Triple Goddess—wound into an intricate pattern. Venomous images embodying my shadow magic.

  I’d have a better chance of taking the Abom down if he didn’t know I was coming, but it was only a matter of seconds before he picked up on me, and then my advantage would be long gone. And in that body? He wasn’t going to be easy to handle. Not here, out in the open.

  “Queet?”

  “Here. What do you need?”

  “He’s big and he’s strong. I need to meet him on the Crossroads.”

  “Fury, that’s a big risk. You know what shifting over to the Crossroads does to you. The aftereffects are nasty. Honestly, are you telling me that you are willing to risk yourself for Tommy-Tee? Think about it.”

  “I don’t have time to think about it. Look—he’s fucking huge. He’s at least a foot taller than I am, and the minute he hears me breathe, he’ll turn. Then, I won’t have a clear shot to his soul-hole. If I have to fight him here, it’s going to be bad. Real bad. If I take him to the Crossroads, I’ll have my full power there.”

  A half-beat. Then, “Go. Do what you need to. I’ll contact Jason as soon as you cross over and meet you there.”

  I surged forward and within seconds, I raced past the Abom, past Tommy-Tee, and was standing in the middle of the intersection. Thank gods there was no traffic.

  “Hey, freakshow! How about a real dinner?” I waved my hands and shouted at the bruiser, trying to get his attention.

  Startled, I heard Tommy-Tee stumble over a chord as he lost his place in his song.

  The Abomination turned my way. The next moment, he broke off stalking Tommy-Tee and made a beeline for me, darting into the road at breakneck speed.

  I waited, biding my time, breath pent.

  Tommy-Tee was too fried from years of being hooked on Opish to understand what was going on. He took a step toward the edge of the sidewalk.

  “Queet, do something. Keep Tommy-Tee off the road.”

  Queet swept past—I could feel the gust—and he slammed into Tommy, knocking him back with the force of his currents. Having a spirit guide who could mimic a poltergeist was handy at times.

  Tommy-Tee landed on his butt on the sidewalk and I took that moment to make my move. The Abom was almost within arm’s range of me. I swept my arms up, clasping my hands together over my head. A flash radiated as I closed my eyes and focused on my destination. The street shifted and blurred, melting around us, as the world lurched and then—we were on the Crossroads.

  Chapter 2

  So, the Crossroads. A misty, fog-shrouded place where all worlds met. At the Crossroads, worlds merged and met, and possibilities multiplied.

  Plenty of Elder Gods worked only from the Crossroads, and every one of them had his or her own space, including Papa Legba. From the beginning, I had thanked the Fates profusely that I wasn’t bound to him. Strong and alluring, he was also deadly. The Greeks could be rough, but I remained grateful I had been thrown in their camp rather than sent the Santeria/Voodoo route. My path was steeped in death enough as it was.

  I was standing on a barren intersection of three dirt roads, with endless fields stretching all three directions. Next to a low cauldron in the middle of the juncture stood a sign. I knew what it said. I’d been here before.

  Stand at the Crossroads

  State your claim

  To seal the deal,

  Strike the flame.

  I wasn’t here to make a deal, so I ignored the little voice spurring me on to tempt the Fates. Nope, I was here to keep my nose clean and focus. I was here to send the Abomination back to where it came from and that’s all I was going to do.

  And there he was. Opposite me, near the edge of one of the fields. He looked confused, which gave me an advantage. I wasn’t about to wait for the shock to wear off. I had to get behind him while I could. The one vulnerable place on Abominations who were in-body was their soul-hole, a spot at the back of their necks where they had infiltrated their host. Whoever had lived in this body was long gone, sucked dry by the Abom.

  Queet appeared by my side. He was translucent, but on the Crossroads, I could see him clearly. He moved toward the left of the Y.

  The Abom cocked his head, staring at him, looking more confused than ever, which wasn’t surprising. Queet’s energy signature packed a buttload of astral resonance. Which was all jargon, meaning Queet presented as a juicy morsel that would tempt any Abom out on the hunt for food. He’d make a tidy appetizer.

  We waited to see if the Abom would be stupid enough to take the bait. Abominations generally fell in two categories. On rare occasions, we got a live wire, super smart. In those cases, it usually came down to a life or death match. Much more commonly, we got hold of the ones who were so focused on their hunger that it made them reckless. Queet was setting himself up as a target, giving me a better chance to slip around behind.

  I forced myself to wait.

  Patience. The Abom will move past you and you will attack. You know how to send them back to Pandoriam. You’ve done this before. Breathe…just breathe slow and soft and easy.

  The waiting was hardest. Every time I thought it would get easier, but it never did. Spirits were bad, but Abominations were far worse. I’d dispatched dozens of these creatures over the years, but it never got any better. I was the best in the business, and still, the fear always scrabbled at my throat as I headed into the confrontation.

  Come on, I thought. Move. Go for it.

  The Abom paused, glancing at me. I slid my hand up to my neck, around which a golden pendant in the shape of an “F” hung, dotted with rubies. It, too, had been a gift from Hecate. She had given it to me when I turned twenty-one. I wrapped my fingers around it, feeling the power grow within the necklace.

  Wait…breathe…breathe…

  For a moment I thought he was going to ignore Queet and charge me, but then, Queet sent out a flare, his aura sparkling around him in a blaze of fire. That seemed to decide the Abom. He charged.

  Poised to swing in behind him as he went past, I began whispering the charm.

  “Three roads meet, three roads divide.

  Swept apart by Hecate’s tide.

  Dog and lion, snake and moon,

  I summon forth Hecate’s boon.”

  The power leaped from the necklace to my hand and I grasped the hilt of my sword, swinging the blade up and round as it blazed with a crimson light. I leaped behind the Abom, a blur of motion. Out here on the Crossroads, I was lightning fast and the powers of being bound to Hecate reverberated through me. If I could hit his soul-hole dead center with my blade, I could short-circuit him and send him packing back to Pandoriam.

  Queet swirled into a tall vaporous funnel and swept toward him as I connected my sword with the base of his neck, hitting square in the center just below where his cervical spine connected to the skull.

  The Abom let out a scream as a wild, twisting vortex of icy-cold flame flowed through me. The energy wracked my body even as I drove the blade into his soul-hole. A thousand pinpricks rattled my nerves and it was as though we froze, held in stasis by the force of the magic itself. Then, slowly, the magic began to weave its way over his body with a web of deep indigo sparks, creating a glowing fishnet to bind him up.

  Hecate was riding me hard. She always knew when I was out calling on the Crossroads. She didn’t question, merely reached out and touched the connection that bound us together. In that single touch, the magic flared higher and harder, and the Abom let out a screech that echoed through the barren Crossroads. Then in another fraction of a second, there was nothing left as he turned to a
sh. A gust of wind picked up the light feathers of the charred body and fluttered them away.

  The breeze died as I stood, panting, my sword dragging beside me. My hands were a blistering lattice of welts. I felt like I’d grabbed hold of a live wire, shuddering under the weight of a million sparks racing through me. My ears rang and I could barely see anything beyond the flash of light that had temporarily blinded me. The only thing holding me up at that moment was the fact that I was on the Crossroads and not back home. But in the back of my mind, I knew I couldn’t stay here long—it was dangerous to linger.

  But I couldn’t leave quite yet. As I turned, I knew who would be standing there. Sure enough, there she was. Hecate, wearing black leather pants and a crimson bustier. A crimson cape fluttered from her shoulders. Her hair cascaded down to her knees, jet black, and her eyes were the color of twilight. Across her forehead, she wore a circlet of three silver snakes, entwining to hold aloft a shimmering black moonstone cradled in a crescent moon. That symbol had been tattooed onto my neck, marking me as hers.

  “Come see me tomorrow. There are worrisome things afoot. You’re overdue for your monthly check-in, anyway.”

  I had expected the chiding. “I’m sorry. I’ve been…” But there was no way to end that sentence so it would excuse me. It didn’t matter if I’d been sick, or tired, or just stubborn. Every month, every Theosian was bound to meet with their Elder God.

  In Seattle, we met with them at the Peninsula of the Gods. I’d been punished before for breaking the rules. It occurred to me that the first time around had been bad enough, so maybe I didn’t want to push it a second.

  “Sure. What time?”

  “I’ll text you in the morning. Otherwise, you won’t be able to remember after this. Meanwhile, I know you’re hurting for cash, so I’ll engineer a job for you. Take it. Beggars can’t be choosers, and the networking you establish will help with what is coming down the road. That much old Pythia has allowed me to know.” She paused. “The Oracle is in a testy mood lately.”

  Another pause and a frown. “Fury… You realize that I don’t throw you willy-nilly into danger for fun. You are bound to me. All my Theosians are agents of divine justice and you all seek out the dangers of the world who seek to upset the balance.”

  I nodded. Hecate was harsh, but she wasn’t unfair, and more than once, she had let me skip out or screw up on something that a number of the other Elder Gods would have punished me for. The one time she had taken me before Themis to be punished was the one time I tried to walk away from her. I had been fifteen. Hecate had no choice in the matter.

  “Yes, Lady. I know.”

  “Good. Now, get off the Crossroads. You’ll need help getting home. Queet, I know you’re there. Show yourself.”

  Queet appeared, looking disgruntled. He disliked the Elder Gods even more than he disliked being a spirit guide. “Yes?”

  “Help her get home safely, whatever it takes. And make sure she’s awake by 8:00 a.m. tomorrow. She won’t remember this very well, I’m guessing, given the extent of the magic that ran through her body, but she needs to be up and over to see me. Now, off before you both feel the effects from staying out here too long.” And blink…she was gone.

  Queet swept over to my side. He couldn’t shore me up, I couldn’t lean on his shoulder and let him help me home. But he forced me to stare into his eyes.

  “Time to go home, Fury. Come on. You can do this. It’s time to go back. I’ll summon Jason the minute we hit the other side. He’s not far, he won’t take long to reach us.”

  I wavered, a wave of confusion washing over me. The Abom was gone. Hecate was gone. I couldn’t stay here, but somehow, the opening to Seattle seemed lost in the mist. As I searched for it, Queet pointed it out. He reached inside my mind and flipped a switch, and suddenly I could see what I needed to do. Shaking, I followed the flicker of light—a flowing green arrow of energy was how I saw it—and the next moment, everything shifted and once again, I was standing in the middle of the street.

  Solid ground felt too real to me, too substantial. My knees began to buckle. Queet was once again a misty vapor floating around me.

  “Queet… Queet…?”

  “Are you okay? Fury? I’m going for Jason.” Queet’s soft voice surrounded me. He couldn’t do much except cushion my energy on the astral plane, but even that little bit helped. One step at a time, I struggled over to the sidewalk, forcing my feet to move. Every muscle in my body hurt so bad I could barely think. Every drop of energy I had in reserve had vanished.

  Tommy-Tee was standing there, guitar in hand, staring at me. “Fury? You need help, man? You want some Opish?”

  I shook my head. “No.” My voice sounded like a croaking frog’s. “I need to get home, Tommy. I don’t know if I can make it by myself. I need help to get home.”

  Dropping to my hands and knees, I rested my head against the sidewalk. Being on the Crossroads always sapped me, leaving me a cold, whimpering mess. If I hadn’t had to fight the Abom, I could have dragged my butt home, but the energy I had expended on the creature had wrung me dry and there was no top-off at the astral filling station before leaving.

  Tommy-Tee put down his guitar and knelt beside me, rubbing my back. I wanted to shake him off—any touch at this point was irritating, but I couldn’t even do that. I whimpered as he muttered, obviously worried.

  “Fury, are you okay? Where were you? What was that thing that was coming after me?”

  I wanted to beg him to shut up. Even the distant rumble of traffic and the hum of the neon lights were too much for me to handle. But I could barely open my mouth, let alone speak. I managed to curl into a ball on the sidewalk, holding my head, and Tommy-Tee just sat beside me rubbing my back. He very kindly picked up my sword—ignoring the burns that must have hit his fingers as he touched it—and slid it back in the sheath hung over my shoulder.

  I don’t know how long I stayed that way—it couldn’t have been more than five minutes—before I heard Jason’s voice.

  “Kae? Kae… Talk to me, Kaeleen.”

  I was having trouble focusing. A blur of two faces looked down at me. One, I knew, was Tommy-Tee. The other, I surmised, was Jason.

  “Jason, man. Fury’s fucked up. She needs to get home.” When Tommy-Tee was worried, I knew I was bad off.

  Jason. Thank gods it was Jason. “Help…please…” I managed to croak as I started to shiver in the chill of the night.

  The next moment, I felt myself being swept up—I was in somebody’s arms. I was coherent enough to know that it had to be Jason because Tommy-Tee could barely carry his guitar. The Opish had eaten away at him so much over the years that physically, he wasn’t even as strong as a feeble old man.

  “Let’s get you back home. Queet let me know what was happening.”

  I tried to nod and say yes, but it came out a garbled “Uh…”

  “Queet, go ahead and unlock Fury’s door. I know you can do that, so get a move on. I’m taking her home now.” And we were moving. I closed my eyes, the swaying motion of Jason carrying me oddly comforting, but at the same time, I felt vaguely nauseated. He kept quiet, though, knowing too well how much sound affected me at this point. Then we were in a vehicle and it moved slowly but surely. It could have been a car or the Monotrain, for all I knew.

  After a while, his voice cut through the fog again. “I’m going to carry you up the stairs now, Kae, so you may feel like you’re being bumped around a little. I’m sorry in advance.”

  And up we went. The swaying became a series of jolts, but I managed to keep myself from crying even though every shudder felt like it was pummeling me with a sledgehammer. My muscles ached, my stomach was knotted, and I had the migraine from hell blowing up in my head. But then, it finally stopped and I heard the squeak of my door, and we were inside. A moment later and the movement stopped. I was on my bed—I could tell that much from the familiar feel of my comforter.

  “I’m going to get you
r clothes off you now and tuck you into bed. Queet said you were out on the Crossroads. Don’t bother trying to answer—you don’t have to. I know the smell of char. Abomination?”

  “Mmm.” I could manage that much now that I was home. My head was beginning to spin, though, and it wouldn’t be long before I passed out.

  “You have a message on your phone. Want me to read it and tell you what it is?”

  My phone…a message…that’s right, I always put it on mute when I went out hunting. “Mmm.” Again, the one word I seemed to be able to master.

  There was a brief silence, then Jason’s hushed voice. “Fury, Hecate texted. She wanted to remind you that she’s going to call you tomorrow morning.”

  I tried to say something. I tried to feel anything other than nauseated. But as the room began to swim for real, I gave up. I managed a “Wake me?” but before I could hear what Jason answered, a chasm opened up below me, and I went tumbling into the deep black void that claimed me every time I fought out on the Crossroads.

  Chapter 3

  Early morning brought with it the numbing chill of rain and wind. I had a mild hangover from being out on the Crossroads, but as usual, I woke early and managed to drive some of the pain out of my shoulders beneath the steaming shower spray. I dressed quickly—a burgundy corset, leather shorts, shiny black buckle-boots with chunky heels that laced up to my shins, and my leather jacket. I couldn’t wear anything that might interfere with reaching for my whip.

  Along my right leg, from mid-outer thigh, coiling down my leg to end right above my ankle, was the tattoo of a flaming whip. Only it was no mere tattoo. When I needed to, I merely slapped my hand against my thigh and the whip appeared in my hand, a coil of energy that took form when I needed it. Hecate had tattooed it there, herself, when I faced my mother’s killer. I could never lose it. Nobody could ever steal it, for the astral weapon would vanish if anybody else ever tried to take hold of it. It was the perfect weapon.