Queen Of Blood

CHAPTER THIRTY

The fiercest fighting was happening well ahead of their position. Chad was glad of that. But they were by no means out of harm’s way. Stray rounds whizzed by intermittently. Most of them thunked harmlessly into the walls, but one found the head of a man just behind and to the left of where Chad was standing. Chad felt a tightness in his chest and dropped to the floor, unable to breathe for a moment.

Then Allyson was kneeling over him, gas mask pushed atop her head, panic etched into her strained features. “Chad! Can you hear me? Are you okay? Are you hit?”

Chad sucked in a deep breath and sat up. “I’m fine. I—”

The smoke was thickest at floor level. But now some of it rolled away and he saw a black-clad man prone on the floor. The man had been shot multiple times, including one round that had passed through his cheek. At a glance, anyone would assume the wound to the face had been a mortal one. It was ugly and spectacularly gory. But a closer look revealed the truth. The round had passed through one cheek and out the other, leaving behind a mangled face and a mouthful of shattered teeth. But he was alive. And clutched in his right hand was a 9mm pistol. He raised it and aimed it at the back of Allyson’s head.

Chad snapped out of his stupor and shoved Allyson aside a moment before the 9mm discharged. The bullet smashed into the wall. Chad leaped to his feet and kicked the gun out of the man’s hand. It went skittering down the hallway, disappearing beneath the curling tendrils of smoke. Chad switched the M-16 to semiauto, jammed the barrel against the man’s forehead, and squeezed the trigger. The bullet punched a hole through his forehead and blood fanned out around the base of his skull.

Allyson was on her feet again. She looked at the dead man. Then she looked at Chad and smiled. “You saved my life.”

“I owed you.”

A figure emerged from a doorway to his right and Chad lifted his weapon again. Then he saw who it was and heaved a sigh. “Fuck, man, you scared the shit out of me.”

Jim’s weapon was slung over his shoulder. He wasn’t wearing a gas mask and his eyes were bloodshot and watering from the smoke. Eyes that projected a deep sadness. “All this madness, there’s got to be an end to it.” The continuing sounds of battle failed to mask the haunted tone. He sounded like a man contemplating the end of the world, like a president on the brink of launching nuclear warheads. He looked Chad in the eye and said, “It ends here. I’ll see to it.”

And with that he turned from them and continued down the hallway.

Chad glanced at Allyson. “The hell’s that supposed to mean?”

She pushed her gas mask down and shrugged. “No idea. Let’s keep moving.”

And move they did, following the advance guard to the end of the hallway, then up the stairs to the third floor. They continued to encounter resistance as they progressed through the house, but it thinned out as they gained each floor and they stopped using the stun grenades to pave the way. It just wasn’t necessary and only served to slow them down. Chad followed Allyson’s lead and removed his gas mask. He remained vigilant, but he had a feeling his time as an active participant in the battle was at an end.

Chad didn’t fire a single shot as they moved more quickly through the fourth and fifth floors. The gunfire ahead of them was sporadic, limited to occasional pops. Chad felt almost giddy for a time, buoyed by the apparent quick success of the invasion. Then something troubling occurred to him, the notion that success had come too fast and too easily. Yes, the enemy was fighting back, had even killed a number of the Camp Whiskey men, but the defending force was less formidable by far than Chad had anticipated. There didn’t seem to be that many of them. Thinking about it, he began to feel a touch of paranoia. It was almost as if the enemy was holding something back, only offering a token resistance. Chad looked at Allyson and saw the intent look on her face. He wondered if any of this had occurred to her. Probably not. She was too focused on the task at hand.

He cleared his throat and said, “Hey, there’s something—”

The thought went unfinished as something peculiar caught his eye. There was a bullet hole just below one of the wall sconces. It appeared to be…healing itself. The hole was filling in, the fabric of reality—or appearance of reality—reassembling itself. There was some sort of sorcery at work. If he survived to make a return journey back through this house, he thought it likely he would eventually arrive at the foyer to find it perfectly restored. Upon reflection, this shouldn’t have surprised him. This place was just like the Master’s house in many ways. Bigger by far on the inside than out, for one thing. Populated by a coterie of wayward psycho children turned professional sadists, for another. And sustained by a brand of magic so powerful the mere contemplation of it was staggering. Surely anyone capable of wielding that kind of power was also capable of swatting aside the Camp Whiskey invaders like so many gnats.

Allyson shot him a puzzled, impatient look. “What?” Her gaze remained on the hallway ahead, occasionally drifting to the left or right as they passed open doorways. “Keep your head out of the clouds, Chad. Stay focused.”

The formerly ragged bullet hole had dwindled to a small black speck on the wall. In another moment even that was gone. “Yeah. Right.” Chad shook his head and poked the barrel of his weapon into the open doorway on his right. He peeked around the doorjamb and saw a shivering, terrified Apprentice huddled beneath a desk on the far wall. He moved past the doorway and said, “It’s not important.”

She shot him another puzzled look. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, with little blonde tufts hanging loose at her temples. Her face was grimy with sweat and soot. But it was funny. He felt a sudden and powerful urge to kiss her. She was so amazingly beautiful. He didn’t think he’d ever fully appreciated just how beautiful until this very moment. Somehow she even managed to make combat look sexy.

She arched an eyebrow. “Are you okay? Would you get that goofy grin off your face. We’re fighting for our lives here.”

Chad forced the smile away and nodded. “Right. Sorry.”

They ascended another set of stairs to yet another floor. Chad had lost track of how many floors they’d climbed, but he knew it was a ridiculously high number for a house that looked like a one-story wreck from the outside. But there was something different about this floor. It was wider and better-lit. The light fixtures and wainscoting were more ornate. And at the end of the long hallway stood a massive set of double doors that seemed to reach for the sky. Chad noticed now that the ceiling curved upward, rising dramatically toward the end of the hallway.

One of the men ahead of them said, “Goddamn. I hope we ain’t goin’ in there.”

The man to his immediate left snickered. “No shit. Look at them fuckin’ monster doors. Giants must live in there.”

The other man shuddered visibly and said, “Fuck. Don’t say that. This shit’s been weird enough already.”

Bai was at the head of the decimated column of fighters. She arrived at the double doors and turned her back to them, waited with arms crossed beneath her breasts for what remained of the Camp Whiskey force to assemble before her. Only now, clear of the smoke and exposed in this wide hallway, did Chad realize just how little was left of this force. Their numbers had been reduced by more than half.

Bai spoke. “Victory is our s.”

Then she unsheathed her sword and waded into the loose circle of surviving Camp Whiskey fighters. She was a black, untrackable blur moving side to side across the hallway, the long blade a flashing silver streak of light. The soldiers fell in rapid succession beneath her blade. Most were too startled to put up a fight. One or two tried clumsily to resist, but died in the attempt. It was over almost as soon as it had begun.

When Bai returned her sword to its sheath, the only people she’d left alive were Chad, Allyson, and Jim.

Chad gaped at her. “Why the hell did you do that?”

Bai’s expression was serene. The anger and terror in his tone failed to move her. A little smile darkened the corners of her mouth. “They were no longer necessary.”

Chad’s heart was slamming in his chest. “Yeah? And what about us? Why are we alive?”

Her smile deepened a little. “Because I am of the Order. I am merciless and I do not care about you. But I am true to my word. Survive this and you and your woman will be free.”

Chad’s chin jerked in Jim’s direction.“And what about my friend?”

“He has also cut a deal with the Order.”

Chad’s expression turned quizzical as he moved closer to Jim. “What’s she talking about?”

Jim sighed. “You wouldn’t understand. You don’t need to understand.” He turned away from Chad and looked at Bai. “Let’s end this.”

Bai nodded and moved to one of the huge doors.

She took the knob in one of her small hands, turned it, and pulled the door open. A brilliant white light made their eyes water.

Then Chad glimpsed what was waiting for them inside and gasped.