Prison of Hope (5 page)

“I was told to find a sorcerer by the name of Nate and offer him a way out. You are a sorcerer. Don’t bother to deny it. You’re the only one in town, from what I can tell.”

“You made this yourself, I assume. That’s a good chunk
of magic.”

As with most witch magic, her own energy would have been used to power the device. As if on cue, Sarah raised her sleeves, showing me the three runes tattooed on each wrist.

“That’s quite a bit of power you’ve given yourself,” I said. “You’re playing a dangerous game. I wonder how much of your life you ebbed away just making that.” I pushed the witch finder back toward Sarah.

“The amount of power I can access is hardly your concern.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t about to dissuade Sarah from the course of action she clearly wanted to take.

“So, why do you want me to leave this town?”

“Also not your concern,” she said dismissively. “All you need to know is that you have twelve hours to pack and leave. Don’t come back.”

I rubbed the back of my neck and sighed. “The problem is that I’m not really one to be run out of town without knowing who’s doing the running and why.”

“If you stay, you’ll find out. I was told to offer you one chance. It’s been offered. If you ignore it, then what happens is of your own making.”

I leaned back against the leather seat and crossed my arms. “And what will happen?”

Sarah stood up from the table and placed fifty euros on it. “The meal is on me. As for your question, I’m afraid you won’t get the chance to learn that. Just know, if you stay, your death will be for a good cause. I hope that helps.”

“Not really.” I pushed the plate aside. Any appetite I’d had when Sarah first sat down had evaporated like the heat from the brownie.

“I think the person who sent me here would rather you didn’t die, Nate.
I
have no interest in your ability to breathe one way
or another.”

I looked at her for a heartbeat. “You should know something too. If you come after me, or anyone I care about, I’m going to tear you and whoever you have with you into tiny, wet chunks of smeared meat. I’ll end you and your friends, and then I’ll go after whoever it is you’re working for, and I’ll end them too. You have no idea who I am, Sarah. But if you push me, you’re going to find out.”

She leaned near me and placed a hand on my shoulder. “I’ll look forward to it,” she whispered with a smile before turning to walk away.

“You shouldn’t,” I told her. “It won’t be something
you’ll enjoy.”

CHAPTER
4

I
sat in the restaurant for another twenty minutes, allowing the information Sarah had imparted to ferment in my mind. I had no idea what her plans were or why she would have given me a warning to stay away, but clearly someone expected me to interrupt those plans if I remained. I liked interrupting plans of
people
who threatened me. I was good at it.

Petra reappeared as the customers in the restaurant began to thin out. “You plan on ordering something else?”

I glanced up at her. “You still mad at me?”

Petra’s shoulders sagged, and she shook her head before taking a seat opposite. “I’m sorry for slapping you.”

“Don’t worry about it; at least you didn’t punch me.”

A smile crept onto her lips, but vanished just as quickly a moment later. “What’s wrong?”

I reiterated my chat with Sarah Hamilton.

“So, what’s your plan?” she asked after several moments of silence, once I’d finished talking.

“I’m going to stay around and see what happens. I’m off to see Hades tomorrow with the school, and unless she happens
to ha
ve an army, I doubt very much that his compound is any sort of target.”

“But it is possible.”

I nodded. “Well, then it’s a good thing I’m going. Although anyone attacking Hades or his family will clearly have some sort of death wish.”

My original waitress came over and nodded slightly to me before whispering something to Petra.

“You’re sure?” Petra asked, and the waitress nodded.

“What’s going on?” I inquired.

“Apparently your witch friend is outside in the car park, along with several men.”

“Well she’s either engaged in a very alternative lifestyle, or maybe she didn’t believe I was taking her threat seriously.”

“I’d go with the second one. Which only leaves the question of did you take her seriously?”

“I always take threats seriously.
But
I’ve been threatened by more dangerous people than a witch with delusions of grandeur.”

“So, what’s your plan?”

“I’m going to go see what she wants.”

The waitress walked away after picking up the fifty euros, taking the empty plates with her.

“My waitress told me the name of one of the men waiting out there.” Petra said when we were alone. “Name’s Robert Ellis.”

“He from around here?”

Petra shook her head. “He’s Australian, I think. He arrived a few months ago just before Christmas. Just after a krampus that people had spotted in the area.”

That got my attention. “A
krampus
? You’re sure?”

Petra nodded. “I saw it walking down the road, swinging its chains around. Those fucking horrific bell things were making noise. You can’t really mistake a krampus for anything else.”

In mythology, a krampus was a sort of anti-Santa. It would spirit away the naughty boys and girls to its lair. What it did with them is open to interpretation; some say it drowned the children and ate them, while some suggested it just kept them until they behaved and then brought them back. In most instances the truth is quite far removed from reality, but in the case of the krampus, truth and reality weren’t all that dissimilar.

Krampus don’t care one way or the other about the behavior of the children they steal. They take children back to their lairs and feast on their souls, tossing the corpse of the child into a nearby stream or river when they finish. Unlike animals that need to hibernate during the winter, krampus only feed during the coldest months of the year, before vanishing once spring arrives. Before the tenth century, there were hundreds of the bastards running around, although nearly all of them were killed after it was made illegal to create them.

Like most of the truly horrific creations in the world, krampus were made using dark blood magic. At one point, they’d been human, although once the magic had finished with them, any glimmer of humanity had been extinguished. They were considered a
crime against magic
, and their creation was punishable by death. Apparently, someone was unconcerned about the possibility of such things, if he or she had taken the time and effort to make a krampus and unleash it on the town of Mittenwald.

“How many did it take?” I asked, not really sure I wanted t
he answer.

“None,” Petra said.

The shocked expression on my face said more than any words could have.

“I know,” she continued. “We saw it, or heard it, for two nights, but no one was taken. Most of the permanent residents in town, human or otherwise, are aware of the world they really live in, so after that first night they took precautions.”

“So how did this Robert guy come to hunt the krampus?”

“After the second night, we had a town meeting. They wanted to get Hades to come help before something bad happened.”

“And?”

“He arrived at the meeting and went full-Brody on us all.”

“What?”

“ ‘I’ll catch him for three and kill him for ten,’ ” she said in a gruff voice. “You know, Brody from
Jaws
.”

“I’m aware of the film, yes,” I informed her. “He told you he’d find and kill the krampus for money?”

“Basically, except Robert didn’t want payment as such. He said all he wanted was free accommodation and food while
he sta
yed in town.”

“Is he human?”

Petra nodded. “He didn’t show any signs of being anything else. He had a rifle with him. Kurt told me it was a military one.”

“You know what type?”

Petra shook her head. “I’ve never been concerned with human weapons. Not unless they’re pointed at me, anyway.”

“I don’t understand why, in a town full of people who aren’t human, you let one track something as dangerous as a krampus. Killing one is hard enough work for anything, but a human should have been torn to pieces the second he got close.”

“Robert arrived at that town meeting, where we were about to put forward a motion to get Hades’s help, and explained that inviting Hades to come assist us might set a precedent that meant we’d be running to him every time we had so
methin
g big to deal with. He said that we should at least try to kill the krampus ourselves. He was so damn confident that everyone there agreed with him. It was the strangest thing. Thinking about it, we should have laughed him out the building. I know that no
were
wants to go tracking a krampus—not with those damn silver chains it has—but sending a human out there
was insane.”

“So what happened?”

“Robert took some people who’d arrived with him. They tracked it up to the mountains, and according to them, Robert shot it and it fell down a ravine.”

“Any proof?” I asked, not really believing that a krampus would die so easily.

“A bell. The bullet shot one of them right off the monster. It has a bullet hole in it. I’ve seen it myself.”

We sat quietly for a few minutes as the information I’d just been given swirled around my head.

“What are you thinking?” Petra finally asked.

“That something very weird is happening in this town. Sarah said there are no sorcerers in town. Is that true?”

Petra nodded. “We occasionally get the odd one or two passing through, but none live in town. Why?”

“Krampus are normally a witch’s creation, and having a witch turn up to threaten me while she hangs around with the man who’s supposed to have killed a krampus doesn’t sit well.”

“If they’re setting us up for a con, it’s an incredibly long-drawn-out one. I’ve never seen that woman before, and Robert’s entire bill is setting the town back a few grand at most. They put him in a house near the north end of town. He buys groceries once a week, and that’s the extent of his monetary gain.”

“He’s here for a reason. Otherwise, why not leave once the krampus was killed?”

Petra shrugged. “You know, I’ve never thought about it.”

“Like I said, weird.” I stood up and put another fifty euros on the table. I wasn’t about to have someone who threatened me pay for my meal.

“You need help out there?”

I shook my head. “It’s just going to be a nice little chat between adults.”

“And if they want to do more than chat? You can’t turn my car park into a war zone; there are families, kids in town.”

“A war implies that both sides will get a chance to fight. If it all goes to shit, I assure you, the only things they’re going to be doing is whimpering and bleeding.”

I stepped out into the cold night and breathed out, my breath condensing as I stood under a light attached to the front of the restaurant. Sarah and five other men—one of which I assumed was Robert—were standing together at the far side of the car park, next to two large four-wheeled drive behemoths of one kind or another.

The streetlight above Sarah and her friend’s heads didn’t work well; the only light that reached them was the overspill from those outside of the car park. A small amber tip occasionally lit up as a cigarette was pressed to one of the men’s lips; a second later a cloud of smoke was exhaled.

I strolled over to them, and they disbanded slightly, spreading out around me. “I assume you want to continue our little chat?” I asked.

Sarah smiled. “You weren’t taking me seriously. I wanted a chance to impart just how much you need to leave this town.” She placed a hand on the man beside her.

“And your man Robert and his friends are going to do that?” I glanced at one of the men nearby, the one still smoking a cigarette. “Is
he
going to be able to do anything before he coughs up a lung?”

“It’s regrettable that it’s come to this,” Sarah said, ignoring my taunt.

I laughed. “See, this is why I can’t take you seriously. You’re standing there, all menacing, while your friends circle me, and you’re expecting me to be scared. Unless one of them is a troll in the best disguise ever or something, it’s going to be a short fight.”

“This will make it longer,” she snapped and showed me her bloody hands before slamming them onto the cold pavement.

Waves of power rushed over me as runes of bright red lit up over the tarmac beneath my feet. I’ve had my magic removed before, through runes and sorcerers bands, but what Sarah had done felt like all of my power and energy evaporated into my surroundings. I dropped to one knee as I lost my breath and felt the world spin around me.

“You really are an arrogant little sorcerer,” Sarah said with contempt. She turned to Robert. “He can still take more punishment than a human, but don’t kill him. Just get him in the truck and take him away from here.”

I tried to create a ball of flame in my palm, but it was barely a few millimeters in size and disappeared as quickly as it arrived. Sarah was right: I’d been arrogant. I hadn’t expected her to use so much power.

Sarah staggered back slightly, placing a hand on the bonnet of the truck as the five men encircled closer around me.

Despite the lack of magic, and the tiredness I felt, I shook my head clear of any cobwebs and got back to my feet, albeit slowly. I stretched my back and arms as I readied myself for a
fight. I cou
ld have tried to make a run for it until my magic returned, but there was no way of telling how much area Sarah had managed to put her spell onto.

“You sorcerers are always so preoccupied with your magic,” Sarah said with a snarl. “I wonder how well you’re going to do without it.”

“Okay then, ladies, who wants to get the shit kicked out of them first?” I asked.

The first person to move was the smoker, a huge barrel-chested man, who had removed his jacket, revealing dark tattoos over huge muscular arms. He flicked the cigarette toward me in an attempt to make me lose my concentration, and then darted forward. I stepped back directly into a blow to my kidney from someone behind me. It was hard enough to make me pause as pain rocked through my back, giving the smoker enough time to slam into me, lifting me from my feet. He kept running for a few steps before dumping me onto the nearest car’s bonnet. The air rushed out of me in one go, and he ensured it wasn’t going to get back in by punching me in the solar plexus and then pushing me off the bonnet and onto the cold ground, where I smacked my elbow as I landed roughly.

I rolled away, between the two parked cars, and got back to my feet, only to be kicked in the head by Robert, who vaulted over the boot of the nearest car, sending me sprawling back to the tarmac.

A hand reached down and grasped the back of my jacket, dragging me out from between the cars and throwing me back to the ground, where someone else kicked me in the ribs hard enough for me to lift up slightly. A second kick spun me onto my back. I was getting my ass kicked by humans.
Humans
, for fuck’s sake! If they beat me, I’d never live it down. The once mighty Nathan Garrett, beaten by a bunch of people who didn’t even know what magic really was, let alone know how to use it. Tommy would never shut up about it.

“This is pathetic,” Robert said from somewhere behind me. “Sarah said that sorcerers can’t fight for shit without their magic, but damn, boy, I figured you’d be able to put up a bit of a
struggle
.”