Demon Lord 3: Blue Star Priestess (4 page)

Rory, the four-foot goblin proprietor, emptied a fire extinguisher onto the scattered pieces of his door.  The foam had to have been magically enhanced to deal with dragon
flame it did nothing to the flame and I had business here so I willed the flames away.  He tossed the extinguisher away and peered up at me.  Shorter than Julia, and a lot less cute with vermilion cap and coveralls and dusky green skin, he blinked little rat eyes at me.  “Caine, oh crap.  Look, man, I had no idea she knew you.  I gave the purse back the second I saw the bedroom picture of you two in the wallet.”

What the hell is he talking about?  No matter, now I can get a better deal.

“She was not too happy to know infidel eyes had touched her image.” Having activated my
Dragon Sight
spell had the side effect of making my eyes look like a dragon’s:  the gold iris and vertical pupil made them a lot more threatening.  I put a bit of fake rage in my voice, as if I were on the edge of killing a goblin.  “And I had to hear all about it, endlessly, but I’ll just
tell her
I did something about it, if you give me a good deal today.”

“Okay, no problem, anything you say, Lord Caine.”

Ever since I took a kingdom in Fairy, most goblins and fey have started calling me Lord.  That made me a lord twice over since that was my demon clan title as well.  I still had numerous titles to claim before fulfilling the ancient prophecy the Red Lady had teased me with.

With my
Dragon Sight
active,
I saw all the magic in the room.  Objects glowed, color-coded for type of magic.  Numbers popped up, etched on the air, telling how strong they were.  Everything in front was cheap shit, but through ruby colored drapes, the back room held high-level spell items and potions.

Absently, I pulled jewels out of my coat pocket, the smaller ones from the wooden chest. 

The larger stones were already in my vault.  I put assorted rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and diamonds out on the counter in a glittering spread.  These were high-end stones, flawless and of excellent size.  The jewels would be very good for trapping spells, storing them up for instant release.  Rory could do a lot with them, so I didn’t think he’d stint me.  Of course he’d try not to be ridiculously generous either.  Feigning disinterest, Not-So-Honest Rory looked through the gems, pushing aside the best ones, making a nice pile.

My hand strayed to one of the lesser rubies Rory had passed over.  My fingers caressed the hard planes.  I could tell Rory was almost done; his brow furrowed as he plotted how much to try and cheat me.  We’d done this dance before. 

Waiting, I spaced out for a second, threw the ruby into my mouth like a chocolate kiss and swallowed it. 

What the fuck did I just do?

FOUR

“A
conqueror requires quality weapons, fierce

cunning, hard liquor
—and lots of people to kill.”

                                         —
Caine Deathwalker

The weird thing was, the ruby tasted good.  I wondered if swallowing precious stones was S.O.P for dragons.  There was so much I didn’t know about dragons.  Like, why using dragon-blood tattoo magic always hurt when half of me was dragon, and other magic-users didn’t seem to have to pay this price.  That was something else I needed to look into.

I grew aware of Rory staring at me, clearly searching for words.  “Caine…” 

I looked at him with sleepy, half-lidded eyes.
“I decided to keep that one.” 

He still looked at me like I was foam-at-the-mouth crazy, but with a shrug, he shifted gears to talk business.  “So, Lord Caine, what do you want this time?  Currency or goods?”

“The elixir of flight in the back room, the rest of that tungsten ammo, an ethereal ice flask, and the rest in formless gold.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, I got no problem with most of that, even the
elixir of flight, but the ethereal ice—that’s not only nasty stuff, but illegal most places you’d take it.  I’m not even sure I have any left in stock.”

“Rory,” I pushed the jewels he’d picked closer towards him, “you have a tiny silver flask with a single drop back there and I want it.”

He slid off his stool behind the counter and went into the other room.  I heard him throwing stuff around, cussing the whole time.  He came back after a few minutes with a black metal suitcase.  I assumed the flask and the other items were packed inside—since he no doubt wanted to keep breathing.  “About the ethereal ice, if anyone asks, I did
not
give it to you.”

“Of course not.  What would a goblin be doing with a product jealously hoarded by the royal fey?  It’s not like you have contacts in the Thieves’ Guild who get you whatever they can.”

He gave me a shaky laugh.  “No, that would be ridiculous.  Everyone knows I’m honest … mostly.  It just wouldn’t be good for business if a lot of false rumors got started.”

I opened the suitcase and used my lingering
Dragon Sight
to check out three vials.  The largest held the formless gold: gold in liquid form but without heat, compressed by magic. When touched by a mage, the gold could take any form desired. 

The
elixir of flight vial was two inches tall and one inch wide, and not at all what people thought it is.  Years ago, after five minutes of use, I’d wanted more of the elixir’s god-like power, and had done a great deal of research to see if I could make it myself.  The prime catalyst turned out to be two drops of spinal fluid from an angel, and it had to be given, not taken.  No one in Heaven owed me a favor, so I had to give up that dream, but I did learn that the elixir affects the psi-center of the brain, producing telekinetic levitation.  Because everyone else had a preconception based on the name, they only used the elixir for flight.  It could do so much more. 

The last flask was the ethereal ice.  Anything it touched turned to stubborn ice that resisted melting or breaking under the most extreme heat or shock. 

Satisfied, I closed the suitcase.  “What about the ammo, Rory?”

“I’ll send the 1500 rounds to your home, Lord Caine.”

I gave him a flat, hard stare.

Rory hurried to say, “I’m not going to screw you over.  I know better.”

“You’d lose a good customer, along with most of your internal organs.”

Leaving the shop, I carried the suitcase.  Strolling back to Red-Fang’s shop, I made a few minor stops for merchandise to be sent to the Malibu mansion.  I entered Red-Fang’s place and found Julia back at work on the computer, half a cookie protruding from her mouth like a mutant tongue.  Her gaze flicked up at me, then back to whatever problem was absorbing her. 

I went to the workroom and found Red-Fang surrounded by various books floating midair, slowly orbiting him.  The scrolls floated as well, but held a stationary position in front of him.  He nodded, humming with interest, then all at once waved the books away.  They went back to their places on various shelves.  Red grabbed the remaining scrolls and brought them over to me.

He said, “I got bad news and bad news.  What do you want to hear first?”

“You pick.”

“The white scroll contains orders to infiltrate L.A. and set up operations for some unnamed, Big Event.  The seal
is
an Atlantean house sign, though originally from Lyonesse, an island continent near Sicily that sank much the way Atlantis did.  The other scroll is a mountain giant death spell.  It activated when your mountain giant died.  Had it been able to take effect, and not bounced off, you would have been heavy-duty cursed.  You’d have been driven to kill everyone close to you and then yourself.”

“Wait, go back. 
An Atlantean house originally came from Lyonesse?”

“The House of Casha.  My books say it
came to Atlantis to marry into the royal family.  The House of Casha ruled Atlantis very briefly, temporarily deposing the House of Lauphram, an ancient family feud.”

“
A feud that has resurrected itself in modern times.  Red, no word of this to anyone.” 

“You know I don’t talk about your business—not that I haven’t been offered bribes.”

“Give me a list of who’s been asking.  I’ll see to it they don’t bother you anymore.”

“You know I can’t do that, Caine.  A tattoo artist is like a bartender or a priest.”

“You wish.”  I grabbed both scrolls and added them to the suitcase I carried.  Lugging the luggage and my shopping packages, I left the shop and had no trouble locating the transition point programmed into my magic mirror.  I stepped into a tremor in the air and was pulled through my mirror to my basement workroom In Malibu.  I dropped the suitcase and packages on a desk, and shoved, leaning into the desk until it scooted up next to the mirror.  This positioned my stuff for a quick grab from any of the synchronized mirrors.  I might never need this particular advantage, but similar measures had saved me often enough.

My phone played Old Man’s ringtone,
Tears of the Dragon
by Iron Maiden
.
I checked the incoming text:
EVERYONE IS ALMOST HERE.  YOU NEED TO BE AS WELL.

I sent a reply:
SOON.

I moved over to my new zombie apocalypse suit.  Over the last few months, I’d worked hard to perfect it, but it wasn’t quite done.  The last suit had been stolen and used against me.  Recovering it, I found out the thief-bastard had altered it to fit him, so I’d had to scrap it.  I’d learned from all that; the new armor had hidden security.  Anyone but me putting it on would trigger a magical pulse—a sort of multidimensional positioning system coming on-line.  The system would tell me where it was and trap the person inside. 

The magically reinforced suit was matte black with gold, triad stitching that made it look killer-chic.  The fabric was stronger than Kevlar: a compressed demon-spider silk with dragon-magic lining making the damn thing able to take a lot of damage.  It could even regenerate damaged sections—slowly—eventually getting the job done.  Twin short swords were harnessed on back.  A clip dispenser adorned the spine for rapid reload of my handguns.  Shoulder holsters held my spare set of Berretta PX4 Storms.  Silencers were attached to the holster rig as well as other murderous toys. 

The suit and gear were laxly supported by a cable frame welded to a steel plate, so it wouldn’t fall over.  I dragged the whole thing over to the desk so it, too, could be pulled through from one of my other mirrors.  They were scattered in three locations in this house, but were not three separate mirrors.   There was only one mirror, occupying multiple points in space due to a tesseract spell.  A
fourth manifestation of the mirror occupied an unused suite that was reserved for me at the island clan house.

I took the elevator up to my office, emerging behind the bar.  The place was empty, the lights were out, and the TV was dead.  I pushed a small red button on the back edge of the bar.  There would be a chime in the kitchen where Osamu spent a great deal of his time.  If he heard it, he’d be along soon to service the bar.  If he didn’t show, chances were Old Man had emptied the place and herded everyone off to the clan house.

Waiting for a response, I killed time by making a Dead Rat Shooter, in honor of Julia and her new hobby.  One-fourth ounce of Scotch went into a shooter glass with three-fourths of an ounce of Green Chartreuse.  I set that one aside and started on a cocktail whose name escaped me.  Two ounces of coconut rum joined one and a half ounce of raspberry Pucker Schnapps.  Two ounces of Mountain Dew lime soda went in next, followed by one and a half ounces of melon liqueur, and five ounces of pineapple juice.

At times like this, I felt like a mad alchemist in search of the philosopher’s stone.  There was an ultimate drink out there, and one day I’d find it no matter how many glasses I had to empty in the selfless quest for perfection. 

I threw back the Dead Rat Shooter and savored the flavor as the door opened from the living room.  Osamu came in with a sprightly step, his black suit immaculate, and his thin Japanese face young for a senior citizen.  He crossed to the bar and executed a precise bow.  “Caine-sama, your honorable father has asked me to his home to assist with preparations for the clan gathering.  I made it clear that I would need your command for this, hence I alone am here while all others have gone on.”

I nodded.  “Best combat butler I ever had.”

“I am the only combat butler you have ever employed.”

“Doesn’t mean I don’t have the best.  Have you been practicing your ether-draw?”

He turned his palm and raised it for inspection.  The white scars made by a branding iron were visible.  The demon mark had been my gift to him.  Though not a mage, it allowed him to summon a demon sword that I stored for him in my secret armory.  He could be anywhere around the world, apparently unarmed, only to have the blade materialize in his hand for some heavy-duty killing.  With a little practice, the mental trigger wasn’t hard to use.  The difficult part was keeping firm mental barriers up in the heat of action when the summoned weapon might try to drink his soul.

“The blade never comes by accident anymore, and very seldom tests my resolve not to have my soul eaten.”

“Good.  Just possessing the brand will go a long way to keeping the demons in our clan from messing with you.  Go ahead and relocate to the San Clemente Island compound.  Get settled in.  One thing … wait.”  I opened the small safe under the bar and extracted a Honduran black opal ring from a tray of twelve.  The silver bands were attached to silver circles that protected the stones’ soft edges. 

I put the ring on a napkin and slid it across the bar.  The face was pitch black with gray, blood red, and blue-violet flakes in it.  A rune on the inside of the band made it fit whatever finger it adorned.  “Here, wearing that shows you’re under my command, answering to me alone.  It’s imbued with some of my magic, so I can find you if a demon clansman tries to hang you from a chandelier, or bury you alive.”  I’d learned my lesson the night of the Red Moon, when I misplaced the daughter of a client.  She was somewhat damaged by the time I tracked her down. 

“Certainly something to look forward to, Caine-sama.  Thank you.”

“Just don’t lose it.”

Osamu bowed again.  “I will go and pack.”

I finished the second drink.  It put enough alcohol in my bloodstream to keep me functional.  Fortunately, my next stop on the way to the island was another bar, just the place to pick up news about sinister preternaturals new to the L.A. streets.

A few minutes later, I was in my ’96 Mustang, the garage lights pulling midnight blue highlights out of the paint job.  The automatic door opener hummed.  I was halfway down the drive to the street when I noticed a car idling in front of my house.  The Volvo convertible was lemon yellow with butterscotch leather seats.  The steering wheel was covered in red leather, and a pair of fuzzy red dice hung from the rearview mirror. 

I didn’t know the vehicle or the lanky man in sunglasses sitting against its trunk.  He was black
, with a shaved head that looked like he polished it frequently.  He wore khaki slacks, a black tee, and a black leather jacket that bulged suspiciously.  He had a holster and gun designed not to show itself when the coat was open.  Expensive.  Something about his alertness—despite the relaxed posture—made me think he was ex-military.

Someone’s hired muscle?

I finished backing to the street and turned my vehicle to face the stranger.  If I floored the gas pedal just for the hell of it, he’d have to move damn quick to keep his legs intact.  Just to see what he would do, I revved the engine as if contemplating vehicular homicide.