Spellbound

Spellbound

Copyright 2014. All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof
may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever
without the express written permission of the publisher
except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Chapter 1

Stavros didn’t flinch at the reverberating clang of the heavy cell door slamming shut. The guards tried not to cringe under his stony glare. Any other time they would have tested their limits by teasing him, but not today.

His hair was disheveled and dark stubble shadowed his strong jaw. His eyes were darker than oblivion and they could hear his teeth grinding as he turned away from the cell. He didn’t spare them a glance before he thrust a wrinkled manila file against the larger guard’s chest with a bloodstained hand and made for the exit door. The guard exchanged a wary look with his partner.

It wasn’t anything new for Stavros to be silent, but in the least he usually warned them about who was being thrown in a cell. The massive prisoner had been brought in with a burlap sack over his head and his arms tied behind his back so tightly that it was a wonder they weren’t purple. Stavros hadn’t pulled off the sack or even untied him before he wrestled the prisoner in the high security cell and slammed the cage shut. If the mountain of a being in the cell had given Stavros such a hard time that meant they were in for a real treat.

The smaller of the two prepared to open the cell door to unbind the prisoner when a deep growl made him freeze. He looked over his shoulder to find that Stavros hadn’t left. Instead, he was sitting in a chair with his large boots propped up on the rickety desk at the end of the hall. His muscular arms were folded over his chest and his eyes narrowed dangerously as he stared down the guards.

“Do not open that,” Stavros ordered before tipping his head against the wall. His eyes closed and he went silent once more. The guards exchanged another curious look before stepping back.

No one ever questioned Stavros. The man was a grade-A asshole when he wanted to be, which was nearly every second of every day. It was as if he smiled, even in the slightest, it would bring on the apocalypse.
He didn’t ask; he told. He didn’t follow any order given to him, which surprisingly seemed to work out in his favor most of the time. He was dangerous and deadly, and enough stories floated around to back the claims up.

He remained as still as a statue, seemingly asleep. Rumor had it that Stavros never slept, though. It wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone either. Despite those things, the fact of the matter was if Stavros said something like, ‘do not open that’, they listened.

The holding area went eerily silent. The air was thick with
tension so strong that it made the guards’ skin feel too tightly stretched. The stench coming off the prisoner grew fouler by the minute, forcing the larger of the two guards to cover his mouth and nose before his lunch could escape his stomach. Stavros remained unfazed and motionless, though the shorter of the two swore he saw the corners of the cambion’s lips twitch ever so slightly.

When the thick metal door acting
as the only entry or exit to the cell wing opened with rough force, Stavros remained still. Mikhail, their warden, was far from cheery as he looked over his top officer. When Mikhail cleared his throat, Stavros cracked an eye just enough to make contact with him. Mikhail’s thick, gray brows rose, silently questioning why he had been summoned. He took one whiff of the air and used the sleeve of his midnight blue robe to cover his nose. Stavros looked almost amused for a moment.
Almost.

Stavros’ boots dropped to the floor with a heavy clop and he heaved himself upright from the chair to follow the frowning sorcerer. Mikhail shooed the guards back further and peered into the cage. His brow furrowed as his silvery eyes ran over the prisoner.

“Inventive,” Mikhail muttered, gesturing lazily to the burlap and the abundance of enchanted rope tightly
binding thick wrists.

Stavros huffed. “You got it from here? I’d like to shower for the next century.”

Mikhail chuckled and nodded. “I assume your paperwork for this has been filed in the correct place?” he called when the cambion began to walk away.

The detective tilted his head back at the guards shifting nervously. The smaller of the two swallowed hard and nodded; the Records wing wasn’t such a far walk.

“Of course, Mikhail,” Stavros called back, letting the door slam behind him.

Mikhail pushed up the sleeves of his robe and rubbed his temples. “I’m assigning two more guards to your post. No one is to communicate with this prisoner without my sole permission. Nothing to eat, nothing to drink, unless I hand down the orders. Do not go near the cell once those bindings are removed unless you have no value of your limbs, understood?”

Both guards nodded, swiftly and simultaneously. The larger of the two cracked open the folder in his hand and cringed before passing it to his partner. “Explains the smell, don’t it?” he mumbled.

Mikhail gestured an aged hand towards the cell, the burst of magic that was produced dissolved the burlap and binding instantly. The ogre that was hidden underneath immediately snapped his large, rotting teeth, spittle shooting through the reinforced bars. By the bruising and scattered cuts on his face, it was obvious where the blood on Stavros had come from. But injury was no surprise when one single-handedly took down a six-hundred pound ogre that towered over even Mikhail’s tall frame. Mikhail’s firm expression didn’t falter in the slightest as he looked over the new prisoner. The old sorcerer rarely looked fazed by anyone or anything that ended up in his prison. Even Stavros. He gave the drooling, furious ogre a final glance before he sighed and turned to face the awe-struck guards.

“Did he really eat an entire hunting party?”

Mikhail smirked, a bushy brow arching. “And for dessert he ate the poor human family that had decided to go camping that weekend. Don’t underestimate his speed due to his size. You’d do well to remember that. Goodnight, gentlemen.”

The bars shook and furious growls and grunts came from the creature in front of them. The guards took another step back, fingers curled over the weapons at their sides as they settled in for another long night.

“How do you think he’s gonna take to a new partner?” the older of the two guards finally asked.

His coworker snorted dryly. “I think Stavros is going to end up behind those bars within the first week.”

~~

Stavros paused outside the quaint tavern he frequented and sighed into the breeze. Hesian was quiet, not unusual for night on that side of town. That’s what drew Stavros in. No one but those who wanted to be left to their own devices ever bothered to travel over there.

Music played from an old jukebox in the corner and the air was smoky and stale. Only a few of the rickety wooden tables were occupied and the bar was empty. Stavros claimed a stool and tapped his bruised knuckles on the counter.

The bartender, a
curvy witch by the name of Lolita, appeared from the back and made her way down the bar slowly. Her lavender eyes scanned over him with sympathy, and he had to bite the inside of his cheek from snapping at her. Lolita wasn’t a complete pain in the ass, though he wouldn’t admit it out loud. She just liked to pry. And pry and pry.

Her fiery red hair was tied back with a leather strip and her outfit was something that she had no doubt stolen from the closet of a German bar wench. She dropped her elbows on the counter and leaned in.

“What’s up, sugar?” she asked sweetly. He gave her a pointed look that made her ruby lips curl into a taunting smile. “Heard you caught that vampire last week. Bout’ time someone found his ass. Poor humans,” she added as she pulled back to fill a mug.

“Such helpless things, aren’t they?” he muttered. “Should have let the bastard knock off a few more before I took him down.”

Lolita frowned, her lips pressing into a thin line as she shoved his drink towards him. Stavros immediately took the cold mug and tipped it back for a long swallow.

“You don’t mean that. You know better than anyone what he did to those people. I read about the last victims. They were just kids, Stavros.” He didn’t humor her with a response, which she expected. Only after a few drinks could she even expect him to be as open as he currently was. “When’s his sentencing?” she asked, pulling out a rag to wipe the counter.

Stavros’ ebony brows rose with rarely shown amusement. “Don’t know. Mikhail pulled me off the case after I ripped the bastard’s fangs out. I’ll be summoned when I need to appear before the Council.”

Stavros tossed back his mug once more and let the bittersweet ale fill his mouth. It coated his throat with an almost eye watering burn on its way down. The bottom of the mug hit the bar counter with a heavy clank. Lolita cringed, her button nose scrunched and her frown deepened as she slid him another drink. Stavros only smirked before bringing his new mug back to his lips.

“Heard anything about your new partner?” Lolita asked casually. Stavros’ lips curled with distaste.

“How did you hear about that?”

“You’d be surprised what I hear in here. You’re not the only one on the Force that comes here to drown their sorrows, sweetheart.”

“I don’t drown my sorrows,” Stavros scoffed.

“If you say so, honey.” Lolita retrieved two shot glasses from the shelf behind her and filled them with dark liquid from a bottle under the counter. Stavros eyed her cautiously when she slid one towards him. “You’re sitting in my bar, filthy, beaten to shit and smelling like a pile of corpses. Take the drink, Stavros.”

Stavros rolled his eyes and tossed back the shot. Lolita’s expression lit up with amusement when he immediately gasped for the air that had been knocked out of him from the potency. “My own brew, guaranteed to numb those pesky things we call emotions.”

Stavros glared as he stood up from the barstool, blinking a few times at the rush of sudden intoxication thrumming through his skull. He dropped money on the counter and nodded his head towards the smirking witch.

“G’night, honey,” she called after him as he staggered towards the door. Stavros ignored her peppy tone and stepped out onto the quiet street.

A few late-nighters bustled down the cracked cobblestone sidewalks, but none paid him any mind, and that’s exactly how he wanted it. He scoffed at the young couple making out on the side of a building at the end of the street. They didn’t even register he was there as he rolled his eyes and debated arresting them just because he could. The taller of the two beings broke away and tugged the sleeve of their partner, pulling them off into the night with breathless laughs.

He scowled and used what energy he had left to transport himself to his home. No one but himself and Mikhail could teleport into it, or from inside it. Hell, no one other than the two of them could get past the front door unless he let them in. Not that he had visitors; no one was dense enough to bother wasting their time with that.  He kicked off his boots at the front door and listened to the low, quiet thrum of the wards, the walls of magic that would ensure his solitude, for a moment before he went to shower.

Blood and grime ran off his olive flesh and swirled down the drain with the hot water and soap. He scrubbed until he was certain that the smell of decay was gone, grimacing at the scent of ogre and rotting human that his olfactory system would remember for weeks.

It had taken hours to get the bastard restrained and transported to the jail, and even then the fight wasn’t over. Stavros knew he wasn’t weak by any means. Even if he didn’t work out, his kind was naturally more adept with strength than one would expect. Even so, the eight foot tall being gave him a run for his money. He hadn’t even been looking for it. The ogre was on the bottom of his list to search out; it wasn’t his job to deal with something that bottom-of-the-barrel.

He almost felt bad for the saps that patrolled there and had to do the stacks of paperwork while putting on a show of secrecy. They would pass it off as some heinous animal attack, or maybe the remains would be found months later in a river and it would float around on the news for a few days before it was all forgotten. They always seemed to have a cover up for those things, but none of that was of Stavros’ concern, his share was more than done.

He could never understand why anyone would want to willingly patrol in the human world, let alone live there. He tried to avoid the human realm at all costs. Unfortunately, it seemed like he had to go more and more as of late. A majority of rogue beings or criminals trying to escape punishment seemed to end up there. They blended in well with the chaos. It was easy for things to be blamed on gangs, drugs or maniacs. That was why his priority assignment had been such a pain in the ass to find.