Band of Demons (The Sanheim Chronicles, Book Two) (16 page)

She watched the Headless Horseman turn and move down the street.

You didn’t answer me
, she thought again, uncertain if she could even be heard.
What was that thing that attacked me?

A dead man,
the voice came back.
When we find him again, you can rest assured of that.

And that laugh—that terrible laugh—echoed again down the street and through the night.

You may wonder why I put all this to paper.

Why should I, Robert Crowley, help my fellow Princes of Sanheim? Am I just contributing to my own destruction? Wouldn’t it be better for me to horde my wealth of knowledge like some miser in a dirty hole, hoping it may give me the advantage I need to survive?

But my friends, I am not your enemy.

There is another who has manipulated us, haunted us, cursed us. He has turned us against one another while he watches, chuckling at his own amusement. He set this damnable cycle in motion—and only by understanding this can we truly be free.

Some of you may already know Sanheim, Lord of the Dead. You might have seen him in your dreams. Others have heard only whispers and rumors of his dark deeds.

With no shame, I tell you that Sanheim has stalked my nightmares since I was a child. Even before I could walk, Fara warned me of him.

Sanheim is an angry, jealous deity. I don’t understand why he granted us some of his power. All I know is that since the Bear’s time, he has been fighting to take it back. And he has been playing us for fools in the process. 

The Bear believed that this world was all that mattered and he was content to let his domination end there. T’Noughn, the Serpent, didn’t have time to worry about such things.

But the Spider was different. He knew the true stakes of the game. Just one cycle after T’Noughn killed the Bear, the Spider defeated his
cennad
and began planning. It took him only three years, feeding in the dark off warriors and maidens who crossed his path. When he confronted the Serpent, it was no contest.

But the Spider didn’t stop there. He ruled the tribe, plotting and hunting the two Princes who came after him, adding their power to his own. And after more than a century had passed, the Spider amassed his strength… and vanished.

No official history can say where he went, but I know.

He challenged Sanheim himself. He battled for the Land of the Dead.

—Robert Crowley, 1871

Chapter 15

September 27, 2007

Kate waited in the cemetery for the Horseman to arrive. She was worried. Not about his safety—of that, there was never much doubt. What bothered her was how close tonight’s events had been.

Even at full tilt, the Horseman had arrived only just in time. He had been making his now nightly ride through the county when Kate sensed—rather than heard—someone in a panic. Like it had been with Lord Halloween and the graffiti artist, Kate could see the woman’s thoughts, which were filled with terror while being pursued by a horse. The Headless Horseman had rushed to help.

If he hadn’t thought to throw the flaming pumpkin, it would have been too late. As it was, they had only accomplished half of their mission. The woman was saved, avoiding another murder that would be tied around their neck.

But the mystery of who was attacking them only deepened. Kate had initially assumed the horse was borrowed or stolen—a real horse, in other words, taken from a stable nearby.

But that assumption had proven incorrect. A real horse would have fled from the Headless Horseman, of that she was certain. Which meant… what, exactly? As for the rider, she had only a faint glimpse of him. The Horseman had been locked in combat and she had been focused primarily on helping the woman.

The Horseman was still riding through Leesburg in the hopes of finding some trace or clue to their enemy’s location. But so far, there was nothing.

She walked among the gravestones in Union Cemetery, frustrated and angry.

They had been keeping watch every evening for the past week, ever since they discovered another Prince of Sanheim was out there. That and reading, of course—trying to learn as much about the history of those who had come before them as possible.

She heard a horse coming toward her. A minute later, it came pounding into view and stopped next to her, kicking up dirt and clay as he did so. The Horseman dismounted easily and came toward her, grabbing her by the waist.

This would be easier, my love, if you had a head to kiss me with
, she thought.

The Headless Horseman changed then. The horse faded from view gradually until it disappeared. The Horseman shimmered for a moment and then was gone.

In his place stood Quinn, who looked momentarily disoriented. He glanced around the cemetery as if unsure where he was or how he got there. It was always this way when the transformation happened. Kate didn’t know exactly where the Horseman ended and Quinn began, or vice versa.

“Give me a minute,” he said.

For all his confusion, she had to admit she was more than a little envious. His powers had such a definable form, whereas hers… She was still just Kate Tassel. She had no idea what she was capable of—and what she was supposed to be. She now wished she had a
cennad
—a physical form that embodied her fears. Maybe if she had been tested, like Quinn, she would at least know what she was.

“Be careful what you wish for,” Quinn said, and looked at her with his stunning blue eyes.

He was the same old Quinn, and yet… she sensed something different about him. If the Headless Horseman retained some of Quinn’s memories, she wondered if the fictional phantom was beginning to rub off on the man himself. Immediately after he transformed back, he seemed
darker
somehow, more dangerous. His voice was even huskier, more guttural. She had a feeling that if he walked into a bar right now, most men would instinctively give him a wide berth. Women, on the other hand… Kate thought the new look made him seem even sexier.

She stepped forward and kissed him.

“You seem angry,” she said when they pulled apart.

 “I almost had them,” he said.

“So you agree it was two of them?” Kate said. The Prince of Sanheim was always two people. But with Quinn, he was the horse and Horseman simultaneously. She hadn’t been sure but she didn’t think that was the case with their enemy tonight.

“Any normal horse would have fled,” he replied. “One of them was the rider and the other was the horse.”

 “Interesting,” she said. “Are you sure? Maybe they are like you and can be the horse and rider at the same time.”

The two walked through the cemetery. October was nearly here and it was cold outside. Fallen leaves swirled around them as the wind blew. Neither one of them felt cold, though. It was as if this was their natural environment.

“No,” Quinn said. “We are a single unit in two parts. That was how Washington Irving saw us—and it’s how I created the
cennad
. We’re linked. The ones I fought… I don’t think it was the same. They
felt
different.”

“Is that a weakness or advantage?”

“Weakness,” Quinn replied immediately. “We move in tandem, the horse and the rider. They seemed… divided.”

“Fascinating,” Kate replied.

He had learned more than she had initially supposed. Facing another Prince of Sanheim was daunting. Like them, it would be a man and woman united in body, mind and soul—both presumably able to take a form of something that haunted the dreams of men.

But what form? And which was which?

“The man was the rider,” Quinn said, reading her thoughts. “I’m sure of it.”

“Looks can be deceiving, my love,” she said.

 “I sensed it,” he said. “I don’t know how else to explain it.”

“So she’s a horse?” Kate said, sounding disappointed. “How pedestrian.”

“We don’t know that,” Quinn replied. “All we know is that’s one of her forms. She may not be limited to one.”

“You are.”

“But you aren’t,” he said. “Last year, when you faced Lord Halloween, you took the form of your mother, remember?”

“And for all we know, it was a one-time thing,” she said. “Or maybe I can only turn into my mother, did you think of that? I bet Freud would have a field day with that one.”

“It would be worse if you could only turn into your father.”

“Good point.”

“My point is I doubt that’s your only transformation,” he said. “I think the Prince of Sanheim is more conceptual than that.”

“As for the rider…”

She let the words hang out there.

“I don’t know,” Quinn said, and the frustration was obvious in his tone of voice. “Everything went so fast. I was more worried about his sword and stopping him from killing that woman. I know this: he’s arrogant, stubborn and cocky. He thinks he was playing with me.”

“You knocked him off his horse,” she said. “He might not think so next time.”

“No, he will,” Quinn replied. “It was a game to him. The woman was a plaything to him. Just a bait to anger us in death or draw us out in life. It was all the same to him, either way.”

“What’s his agenda, I wonder?” 

“I think it’s pretty apparent—he wants to kill us,” Quinn said.

“Crowley’s book makes it quite clear that any person who defeats his
cennad
then faces the previous Prince of Sanheim. What was it he said? ‘Neither can claim the true title of the God of the Dead while the other is living or unbowed.’”

“Right,” Quinn said. “So we’re facing the previous Prince of Sanheim.”

“Or the one before that, Quinn. You keep discounting that possibility. This appears to be a survival of the fittest kind of thing. This Prince could have been around for more than a hundred years.”

“He can’t go back too far—whatever happened to Crowley, he didn’t get knocked off by some horse-woman.”

“We don’t know what got him, so it’s best not to make assumptions,” Kate replied. But she didn’t think he was wrong.

Although they had translated the book, it continued to frustrate her. For one thing, some of Crowley’s account of himself conflicted with what she thought they knew. He was supposed to have become the Prince of Sanheim in 1873, when he hosted his notorious ill-fated party. Instead, it seemed clear he had fought and defeated his
cennad
—which he carefully did not reveal—three years earlier. That raised several questions. Why the deception? Did Horace Camden simply have it wrong, or did Crowley purposely mislead Horace? It was clear now what Crowley’s agenda was—defeating Sanheim—but uncertain what had actually occurred to him.

It also provided no clues as to who they were facing now.

“Still stewing?” Quinn asked, and brought Kate back to the present.

 “Yes,” she said. “What I can’t figure out is why the other Prince of Sanheim disappeared tonight. They seemed so intent on drawing us out. And they succeeded.”

Quinn shook his head.

“I have a theory,” he said.

Kate turned to him in the cemetery and waited.

“I don’t think they expected us to save the woman,” he said. “It’s just a hunch but I think they were surprised when I ran off with her.”

“You might be right,” she replied. “The Headless Horseman isn’t exactly known for his mercy.”

“He is now, Kate,” Quinn said. “This wasn’t some guilty banker. Even then, I would have saved him. No one deserves to die that way, alone and afraid. No one.”

Kate knew enough to be silent on that one. She didn’t agree, but they had had this fight too many times already.

“I felt him, Kate,” he continued. “He was going to go after… what was her name? Maggie?”

“Yes.”

“He was going to go after Maggie,” he said. “Do you know why? Bloodlust. Whoever our attacker was started chasing Maggie as a game. But he wanted to finish her off just the same. He would have, too, if I hadn’t gotten her away.”

Kate smiled at him and leaned in for a kiss.

“It’s not that I disagree, honey,” she said. “Maggie was innocent. We may differ on who, exactly, deserves to be scared to death, but she wasn’t one I would pick.”

“You’re missing the point,” Quinn said, and he still sounded angry. Kate couldn’t quite figure out why. “They didn’t expect me to save her. I think they assumed I could care less.”

“If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t have shown up,” Kate said.

“No, no,” he said. “That’s just it. They thought we would show up because this is our turf. It never occurred to them that we might actually care for the people who live here. They are living proof of what I’m talking about.”

“I’m not following you,” Kate said.

“I told you when we first became the Prince of Sanheim, I worried its power was corrupting,” Quinn said. “However long they’ve been the Prince of Sanheim, that corruption has now sunk so deep they don’t even think of it anymore. They thought nothing of killing the banker and nothing of killing someone totally innocent. Worse, they were surprised that I felt differently.”

Kate noticed he said “I” instead of “we” but didn’t mention it.

“I hear you,” she said.

“Do you?” Quinn asked. “We’ve been round and round on this. I like being the Horseman. Hell, I love being him. There is no fear, no doubt, no hesitation. The night belongs to me, to us. But he’s dangerous, too. If we want to beat these people, I’m all about it. But you have to promise me we won’t become them. When the next Prince of Sanheim shows up, we aren’t going to hunt them down and kill them.”

Kate nodded. She hadn’t been thinking that far ahead.

“Let’s just concentrate on surviving this ordeal, okay?” she asked. She put her arm on his. “I’ve told you before: we won’t lose ourselves. You didn’t tonight. You saved a woman, remember? The Headless Horseman was the good guy, at least for once.”

“Good,” he said, “because it’s just the beginning. I know what they’re going to do next.”

“What?” Kate asked, but she saw it in his mind as clear as day. “No, they wouldn’t go that far.”

“I may have saved a woman, but I’ve also shown a tremendous weakness,” Quinn said as if he hadn’t heard her. “I’ve shown them that I care. Not only about the town, but its people. We have to be ready again, every night. Because unless I’m wrong, it’s now open season on the town of Leesburg—hell, on the whole damn area—until they get what they want.”