bedeviled & beyond 06.5 - bedeviled & bah humbug (12 page)

I’ll be there in a blink.

No! Darma!

The air shimmered beside me and Darma was suddenly there.

I glowered at her. “I told you to stay put.”

She glowered right back. “You’re not the boss of me, Astra.”

“You’re not the boss of me,” I repeated mockingly. “I don’t think you understand how dangerous these little guys are,” I told her.

“Actually, I do. Unlike you I didn’t skip my Rare and Dangerous Christmas Creatures lectures. I also know their one and only weakness.” She gave me a snotty smile.

As the Big Guy is my witness, I wanted to smack her ’tween the eyes.

“Do
you
know their weakness, Astra?”

My glare deepened as I struggled to find a way not to ask her for the information she was dying to give me. Maybe literally. Finally I huffed out a frustrated sigh. “Oh all right. What’s their weakness?”

Darma shook her head. “I’m not going to tell you. Come on, let’s go find these little jerks and mete out some halfling justice.”

Oh, good Him! I was stuck working with an idiot riding a gargoyle sized ’tude. We were never going to survive the current mess and enjoy another Christmas. I stomped after her as she headed for the nearest store. “Where’s the mall Santa?”

“Hopefully still hunkered down in the sausage factory.”

“You were supposed to be protecting him, Darma.” I knew I sounded petulant. I couldn’t help it. On her best days, my sister brought out the worst in me. And it didn’t appear to be one of her best days.

“He’s fine. We can protect them all if we take out the elves.”

Above our heads a loud speaker came on and the reedy voice of the lead Ninja blared out at us. “Greetings shoppers! Welcome to the Angel City Mall. We’re so pleased to have you in our clutches. Your hostesses today will be serving up some fake Santas for your execution pleasure. Thanks to mall management, God rest their beady little souls, you’ll get to watch as fake after fake is turned into atmospheric gas for his crimes.”

The speaker squawked and sounds of fumbling ensued. Then a timid, breathless voice emerged from the speaker. “Help me, somebody please!”

I wasn’t sure, but I thought it was the voice of the Santa Darma was supposed to be protecting. The elves had gotten him. I glared at my sister. “Nice work.”

She paled slightly, her lips tightening with pique. “Well look at the bright side. If I hadn’t left him there they would have gotten me too.”

“Nice, Darma.”

She shrugged. “I’ll save him. Again.”

There was a scuffle above our heads and a disheveled Santa with a fabric belly sticking out beneath his shirt and his beard drooping from one ear was suddenly flung over the railing. His screams were shut off as he exploded and, to my horror, filtered down on us in the form of fake snow. We jumped sideways to avoid getting mall Santa in our hair.

“Wow,” my sister said. “They don’t mess around.”

I was too angry to respond. After counting to twenty and doing thirty seconds of deep breathing exercises, I managed to wrench a fairly calm, if terse, request from between my clenched teeth. “Tell me what their weakness is so I can kick some Ninja elf ass.”

She sighed. “All right. Come on. I have a plan.”

Bent frunkin’ gargoyle toys. We were swimming with the turd sharks in an ocean made of pee. My sister had a plan.

I ducked in behind her as she slipped into a nearby store. It wasn’t until she told me her plan that I tried to scream. I would have too. If she hadn’t stuffed that pair of Christmas socks into my mouth.

~SC~

A mere half hour later we slipped from the store. Well, Darma slipped, I had to be dragged out, kicking and screaming. In the end, the clothing pole I grabbed almost saved me when it wedged crossways into the door. But Darma touched the metal and it disintegrated beneath her power. I crumpled ungracefully to the ground, my see-through skirt around my ass.

“Man up, Astra.”

“I am not going out into public in this get up.”

“If you want to save all those people out there you’ll not only come out here, but you’ll do what I told you to.”

My stomach twisted with horror. “I can’t do that.”

“You have to.”

“Have you
met
me?” I asked my sister. “I’m hardly a femme fatale, Darma.”

“You don’t need to be. These guys have been virgins for a thousand years. Why do you think they’re so cranky?”

I shoved to my feet and tugged on my wings, trying to decrumple them. “If they’ve stayed virgins for that long they’re probably good at resisting. There’s no way they’re going to fall for this.” I indicated my barely covered form that was twisting into itself in sheer horror. I was basically nakies under all the sheer and wispy clothing. The only redeeming feature of the outfit was the frunkin’ icy over the knee boots I was wearing. If only I could pull the cuffs of the boots up to my boobs.

“Stop being such a baby, Astra.” Darma tugged her own wings straight and snapped her fingers. She became sparkly. “Come on, Astra. Do it.”

“Good, Him! If anybody finds out about this I’ll never be taken seriously as a kick ass demon slayer again.”

Darma rolled her eyes. “Just do it!”

I snapped my fingers and turned myself into a twinkling star with big boobs that everybody in the mall could see if they looked, a slightly too wide rear end...ditto...and skinny legs that were at least partially covered by a pair of boots, which I fully intended to keep as recompense for my supreme embarrassment.

Darma slid a look over me that ended with her lips only twisting slightly with disgust. “Let’s go.”

After skulking around and watching for several minutes, we discovered the elves were patrolling the upper levels of the mall every five minutes. Two upper levels, two Ninja elves, two make-believe sex sprites to accost them.

Darma narrowed her gaze on me and pointed to her eyes with two fingers, then pointed to the balconies above our heads with the same two fingers.

I glowered at her, whispering, “What the hell does that even mean?”

Expelling air, Darma lowered her head and responded in a harsh whisper. “I’ll take the second level, you take the third.” She disappeared with a soft pop.

Closing my eyes, I pulled air into my lungs in an attempt to find my Chi. It didn’t work. I was so far from my Chi I’d be lucky to find it with a premium pair of hunting slugs from Saturn. So I gave up and popped onto the third level. I landed just behind a small island with a single palm tree in the middle. Pretend Christmas presents surrounded the tree and a sparkly fake angel spread her wings with make-believe benevolence above them. I spotted the Ninja elf halfway down the mall, completing his circle around the floor.

Swinging my arm sideways, I took out the fake angel. “You’re cramping my style, angel. I don’t need any competition.” I eyed the pile of bent metal and glitter on the floor. “Even fake competition.”

The elf peered into a store window and I stepped up onto the little tree island, arranging my wings tidily at my back. As he turned in my direction One wing slid back down to an awkward angle. There was nothing I could do about it. I was clutching the tree like a pole dancer, my hips gyrating suggestively. I forced myself to stop when I realized it looked like I was humping the tree.

The elf halted, his mouth falling open.

I smiled and he jerked as if he’d been struck.

Oopsies
!

I toned down the smile and tried cocking a hip. “Hey, big boy.”

He frowned behind the Ninja mask.

Okay, poor choice of words.

“I mean...you’re looking very handsome in your Ninja suit.”

I wiggled my booty, drawing his masked gaze toward my least favorite body part. Fighting a grimace...and the desire to hide my ass behind a couple of the fake packages at my feet...I crooked a finger at him. “Come hither.”

His frown deepened. “Who the hell are you?”

I lifted my eyebrows in feigned surprise. “I’m a sexy sprite.”

He glanced around. “Is it Halloween?”

Surprise slipped into a glower on my face before I could stop it. When he saw my expression he reached for his blade with stubby fingers. “You don’t look like any sexy sprite I’ve ever seen.”

I forcefully shoved a smile back onto my face. Though he looked worried, he didn’t slice off my head with his blade so I thought I was doing okay. “But don’t you think I’m sexy?” I fluttered my heavily painted lashes.

His frown deepened. “Well, yeah, but after a thousand years of no sex I pretty much find that palm tree sexy.”

“Good point. Why don’t you come over here and give us a kiss?”

“Us? What, you and the palm tree?” He waggled his brows. “A threesome?”

I swallowed back a swear word. “If that’s what it takes.”

The air behind the elf shimmered and Darma appeared. She had a Ninja mask wrapped around one arm. She assessed the situation in a blink and shook her head. Then she reached out and zapped the elf on the back of his head and, as he slipped bonelessly to the ground, pulled off his mask. “You’re pathetic, Astra.”

I climbed down off my tree and strode in her direction. “I told you I’m not any good at this.”

She shook her head. “That was the most terrifying thing I’ve ever seen.”

I shrugged. “Hey, at least I distracted him.”

Darma twisted the mask around her upper arm. “Help me pull this mook into a niche somewhere.

Grabbing a stumpy arm, I jerked my head at the collection she was starting. “Mementoes?”

“The masks are the source of their power, Astra. Without them they’re weak as kittens.”

I dropped the short, muscular arm and the elf hit the ground with an umph sound. “Seriously? Why didn’t you just tell me that? What’s with all the virgin meets sprite stuff?”

Darma shoved him into a dark corner with her foot. “The virgin stuff is so we can get close enough to steal the masks, Astra.” She rubbed her hands over her translucent skirt. “Yeesh! How have you survived all this time without me?”

I turned, stalking away. “God knows,” I murmured crankily.

CHAPTER 3

“Astra Q Phelps!”

I looked at Darma, my eyes wide. “It’s the leader. I can’t let him see me like this.”

Darma glared my way. “Then don’t.”

Shaking my head, I moved over to a cluster of fake-snow-painted palm trees situated next to the glass railing. I poked my head through the palm, looking down two levels to the tiny troublemaker standing in the midst of ceiling debris. “What’s up, elf?” My eyes widened as I spotted the cringing, middle-aged woman kneeling on the hard mall floor next to him. He held his short but deadly blade against her fleshy throat.

“I haven’t seen any news reports about dead fake Santas. Or anything about the real Santa coming to the Angel City mall.”

I narrowed my eyes. “How am I supposed to get either of those things done with the building magicked?”

The elf shrugged, the action slicing his blade into the woman’s fat throat. She gave a little scream and crumpled into a heap on the floor. The elf looked down in surprise. “Oops.”

I shoved through the palm, placing my hands on top of the railing. “What did you do?”

The ninja’s blade spun on the air and floated into its sheath on his back. “She did it herself, Phelps. I didn’t do it.”

“You put your blade to her throat.” My knuckles were white with anger and I could hear Darma growling behind me.

“Yeah, but I didn’t tell her to throw herself at it.” He shrugged again. “You have thirty minutes to either produce another fake Santa for us to execute or get the real one here.”

I frowned, unwilling to bring Santa into a dangerous situation even to save a bunch of innocent humans. “What are you going to do with the real Santa?”

Rather than answering my question, the ninja elf...I really needed to find out his name...crossed stubby arms over his chest and glared up at me through his mask. “Are you sparkling, Phelps?”

I jerked backwards, letting the palm leaves cover everything but my face. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

He cocked his head and took a step. “Why are you hiding in that potted palm?”

“I’m not hiding. I’m...” My mind raced, trying to come up with an excuse that made sense. Finally I settled for one that was ridiculous but hard to disprove. “I think better sitting among the trees.”

Behind me Darma snorted. I kicked a foot in her direction and was pleased when it connected with soft flesh. “Ow, stop it, Astra.”

The elf shook his head. “You’re really weird, Phelps.”

“Yeah. But I get shit done, elf.” On that less than cogent response I tucked backward and turned to my sister.

She was glaring at me rubbing her thigh. “You’re so violent.”

I lifted an eyebrow and indicated my sparkly, see-thru dress and crooked wings. “I have anger issues. As anyone dressed like this would. We need a better plan.”

In the hour since Darma had somehow talked me into donning tissue paper and pretending I was a sex sprite, we’d managed to tag four of the ninjas. Unfortunately, by my count there were still eight left.

She huffed her disgust. “This is working, Astra.”

“Not fast enough. You heard him. We have a half hour to produce a Santa for the elf.”

Darma cocked a hip. “How do you propose we do that?”

I started to pace because it helped me think. I didn’t get far. My limp wing drooped toward my feet and I got tangled up in it, stumbling forward. I would have hit the ground but I managed to catch hold of a bench and fall into it instead.

As my butt slammed into the hard, molded surface, Darma’s snotty voice sliced the distance between us. “Stop screwing around, Astra. We’re down to twenty-five minutes.”

Energy sizzled in my palms and I ached to fling it at her. But I had a big problem to disentangle and I needed her help to solve it. So I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, forcing myself to calm. I didn’t make it all the way to calm but I did manage to tamp it down below a killing rage. After a moment my eyes shot wide. I had the germ of an idea. I stood up, ripping off the drooping wing, and then the other one. “Okay. Here’s what we’re gonna do. I need you to find the humans.” I took off across the mall, toward an unmarked metal door.