Tome of Bill (Companion): Shining Fury (3 page)

In the end that hadn’t worked out so well for me, I mused, just as Veronica asked if we could change the subject to something that didn’t involve indecent exposure.

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it,” Kelly replied, the grin apparent from her tone of voice.

“You are such a ho,” Meg said with no real rancor.

“Carpe diem, I say.”

“Stop pushing her into me,” Veronica complained, shuffling around in the backseat.

“She’s been drooling on my shoulder for the last ten minutes. It’s your turn.”

I turned to find the two witches shoving Bernadette’s sleeping form between them. Bernadette, for her part, seemed oblivious to the manhandling.

“Don’t make me climb back there,” I said, the jest escaping my lips before I even realized it.

“Yeah,” Meg replied, “ass paddlings in the name of Jesus are the worst kind.”

“Jeez, Meg!” Veronica gasped.

I was about to ask what she meant, when Meg turned to me from the driver’s seat. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to say that.”

“Say what?”

“The J-word.”

“Jesus?”

“Yeah, I know you guys are a bit sensitive to those things.”

“You guys?”

“You know. You and...” She hooked a thumb in Bernadette’s direction.

I couldn’t help but laugh. “I brought them with me because they can help us, but I’m not one of them.”

“You’re not?”

“No.”

“Seriously?” Kelly asked.

“Yes, seriously. I’ve actually been enjoying the ride a lot more ever since you knocked her out.”

“No shit?” Meg asked, her eyes betraying a hint of surprise.

“I don’t subscribe to their beliefs, no matter what they might say to the contrary. Heck, don’t tell her I said this, but I was raised Methodist. We went to church maybe once a month at that.”

* * *

My
confession
elicited another round of laughter in the car. It’s amazing how something so small could put me at ease. I hadn’t known what to expect when I learned that Christy had formed a new coven. Though she had been accepting of what I was, eventually anyway, her former mentor Harry Decker had turned out to be nearly psychotically obsessed with destroying me. I’d since learned the reason why. I, or someone with my powers at least, was prophesized to somehow destroy all witches and wizards alike.

Even had I wanted to, I had no clue how to accomplish all of that by myself. But no matter how improbable it sounded, apparently a good deal of the Magi, as they called themselves, took it dead seriously.

I debated saying anything about it, not wanting to spoil the mood, but I couldn’t help myself. “Thanks.”

“What for?” Meg asked.

“For not making me feel like a pariah.”

She glanced at me sidelong for a moment, as if wondering what I was talking about. “Christy said you were cool. I trust her judgment of character.”

“I know, but still, she’s not here now. You had no way of knowing.”

“You don’t look like a killer to me,” Kelly said.

“Appearances can be deceiving,” I replied somberly, but then quickly lightened my tone. “For instance, you don’t look like the type who enjoys defiling choir boys.”

“I beg to differ,” Veronica said with a chuckle.

“Bite my ass, V,” Kelly said before addressing me again. “I have a bit of talent as an empath, for real, and I just don’t get that vibe from you. Also, most of this prophecy bullshit sounds pretty out there to me. I really don’t buy into the whole cult mindset when it comes to these things.”

Veronica chimed in with agreement, while Meg elicited a grunt that I took as similar assent.

“I thought it was a pretty common belief in the ... witch community.”

“It might be,” Meg replied, “for those who have drunk the Kool-Aid anyway. Personally, I’m still processing it all. I mean, up until a year ago, I’d never even heard about any of it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, I knew I could do things that other people couldn’t. Made life much easier when it came to doing chores on the farm, but I mostly kept it to myself. I heard my grandmother had the gift, too, but she died before I was born.”

“Then how…”

“Google. One day I decided to see if there was anyone else out there like me. Joined a few chat rooms, mostly filled with delusional wannabes.”

“I met Christy on Tumblr,” Veronica added. “She reached out to me after I commented on a post.”

“Same,” Kelly said.

“Wait, so you’re all fairly new to this?”

“Yep,” Meg said. “Well, Christy obviously isn’t. Neither is Liz. They’re both lifers.”

“Who’s Liz?”

“She’s the fifth member of our coven.”

“Fifth? Where is she? Is she...?”

“We don’t know,” Veronica replied. “She didn’t show up when Christy gathered us so she could tell her side of what happened with the Grand Mentor.”

I’d only caught pieces of that, as I’d been sort of busy being manhandled by vampire thugs at the time. However, from what I’d heard, Christy had turned on her old coven for the sake of her fiancé Tom … inadvertently helping me in the process.

“She’s probably fine, guys,” Meg said reassuringly, dropping her gruff attitude. “Liz is an old school witch,” she continued, turning toward me. “Raised in the system like Christy, firmly indoctrinated in their beliefs, the works. “

Kelly leaned forward. “Yeah, she used to be in another coven, but the mentor there started to get all skeevy with her, requesting one-on-one skyclad
meditation
sessions.” She held up her fingers in air quotes to get the point across. “That’s how she ended up with us.”

“Yeah,” Meg continued, “she was also the main reason we left Brooklyn after the Grand Mentor showed up at our doorstep. I personally thought the guy was a creep, but she took his story at face value and insisted we had to shun Christy.”

“Sucked too,” Kelly said. “I liked living there. It was rent free, and there was a good pizza place right down the block.”

Christy had mentioned that to me. While I was living up in Rochester following my
incident
with Remington, her sisters had moved into Bill and Ed’s building to help out. Next time I saw Bill, I’d have to tease him about the revolving door of women in his place.

That was, assuming we were still in a place where I could tease him about such things. I wasn’t sure about that.

Depressing myself wasn’t exactly helping things, though. “Thanks, by the way, for that energy ball thing you guys set up in the basement.”

“You saw it?” Veronica asked giddily.

“How did the self-sustaining spirit sphere hold up?” Kelly added.

“It’s not called that, and you know it,” Meg chided.

“Yeah, well, what it’s called is stupid. I like my name better.”

“It was working great,” I cut in. “Maybe too great. We were the only building on the block with continual power. We had to put sheets over the windows at night to keep the neighbors from asking questions.”

“That was my first real spell,” Veronica explained. “I mean, the first time I’d ever done any major extra-dimensional magic. What a trip.”

“Yeah, well don’t get used to it,” Meg replied. “Took all five of us to do that one, and I have a feeling Liz isn’t coming back. Pity, too. The prism was a lot more efficient than the generators I had running the farm.”

“And sounds like it didn’t vaporize the apartment building either. Looks like you owe me ten bucks,” Kelly said triumphantly.

“I was hoping you’d forget that.”

“No chance.”

I was sorely tempted to question them further on that, when fate had other plans.

One moment we were talking, and the next I was lurching forward, the seatbelt digging painfully into me, as Meg slammed on the brakes. “What the hell?!” she cried.

Unfortunately, my powers picked that moment to flare to life again, blotting out anything save the white glow of faith.

Thankfully, I was wide awake this time, in control of my faculties, and was able to rein things in quickly following the surprise.

The sudden stop knocked the breath out of me a bit, but it was a lot better than crashing through the windshield.

Meg, to her credit, was already on the move, digging through her handbag and pulling out the high-powered walkie-talkie the Templar had supplied for the trip. Cell coverage was spotty at best these days, so the walkies were to maintain contact in case any of the cars in our caravan fell behind or, in this instance, spotted anything noteworthy.

The blinding light of my power contained, all that remained were the headlight beams of our car and the darkness beyond. It was just enough to see the cow being carried across the road, its hooves a foot above the pavement, and its sides bleeding freely from the two impossibly large claws holding it.

Needless to say, I couldn’t blame Meg for thinking this might fit the definition of
noteworthy
.

“Is anyone else seeing this?” she asked into the device.

I wasn’t even sure what we were seeing. I caught a momentary glance of a wing – leathery and bat-like, but larger than any bat that had ever existed – and then it was gone from our field of vision, the tortured cries of the cow becoming fainter as it was carried away somewhere off to the left of the dark roadway.

“Was that a freaking dragon?” Veronica asked.

“Not big enough. More likely a Wyvern,” Kelly said, her voice far more calm than her friend’s.

“How would you even know that?” Meg asked just as the two way radio blurted to life.

“
See what?
” a Templar voice asked. “
Is there a problem? Please put the Blessed One or Sister Bernadette on.
”

Meg turned to me, disgust evident on her face. “It’s for you.”

I took it with a sheepish smile. There was going to come a time in the very near future when apologizing for the Templar’s spiritual bigotry was going to become tiresome. “I’m here.”

“
Thank the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
”

Yeah, real tiresome.

“
What’s going on? Are you in danger from the foul creatures…
”

“We’re
all
fine,” I interrupted. “I want to know if anyone, in particular the cars directly in front of or behind us, saw anything unusual.”

We’d been trying to maintain a pace of maybe a half mile or so between each car, so I was pretty sure anyone in front of us would have radioed in by now. As for the car behind us, they were just catching up now – their headlights illuminating the interior of our vehicle as they slowed to a stop.

I steeled myself, but then realized what I was about to say wasn’t even remotely the weirdest thing to come out of my mouth in recent history. “I think I saw a dragon.”

“Wyvern,” Kelly corrected. “They’re related to dragons, but smaller.”

I took my finger off the talk button and spun around. “Are you sure?”

“No, but it’s been in every iteration of the Monster Manual since the white box edition. Common sense.”

“You are such a fucking nerd,” Meg replied.

It took me a moment to figure out what Kelly was saying, but then it hit. Bill would have almost certainly appreciated her comment. A small pang of regret stabbed into my gut at the thought. Ugh! I so didn’t need this right now.

I took a moment to recompose myself, wondering if Icons past ever had to wrestle with these feelings of …
indecision
. The heroes of old were supposedly unflappable in their conviction. I was little more than a pale shadow in comparison.

A Templar’s voice again squawked from the radio, and it would be only seconds before I heard car doors slamming. If that happened, we’d likely have a repeat of our earlier incident.

“Do you know for sure what it was or not?” I hissed at Kelly.

“Okay, fine. No. Just taking an educated guess.”

I narrowed my eyes at her, then quickly depressed the button again. “It’s probably nothing. Trick of the light is all. I think we’re all just a bit spooked here.”

“
Rejoice in your faith, Blessed One, and you shall have nothing to fear...
”

“Thanks. We’ll be getting on the move again in a few seconds.”

Before another response could be heard, I lowered the volume until the power clicked off.

“What do you mean we’ll be going again?” Meg asked. “Didn’t you see that thing?”

“Yes I saw it, but I don’t see it anymore. We have no idea where it went, how to find it, or even what it is.” I spared a glance back at Kelly for that last part.

“It’s going to kill that poor cow.”

I was about to blurt out that I didn’t care about a stupid cow, but then remembered Meg’s reaction when Bill’s friends had killed hers. That had almost ended badly. “I like cows as much as the next person. They’re gentle, loving animals, but we need to concentrate on saving people.”

“That thing could be attacking people, too.”

“Yes, it could.” Guilt began to gnaw at the edge of my consciousness. “But we don’t know that for sure.” I glanced out both sides of the car. Nothing but darkness and a few trees, barely visible, stared back. If there were any homes nearby, they were unlit and far from the road. It would be a different story if the sun was shining, but right now, we were looking at a potential snipe hunt – all of it while others were counting on us. “We can’t go searching for unknowns, not now. It’s either saving people who might or might not be in danger, or the ones up in Boston who we know are.”

I left unsaid that, despite Kelly’s proclamations, we had no idea what the creature was or how to defeat it. The curse of being an Icon was that if faced with a challenge, it was almost impossible to back down. Were we to confront that monster, the damnable self-assurance inside of me would rear its ugly head. I would plunge into battle without a second’s thought, never once doubting my abilities. Even now I could feel the need in the back of my mind.

No!
There would be plenty of opportunities to fight the good fight in the hours ahead.

These were the end days and, as much as I hated it, hard decisions needed to be made.

Meg was silent for a moment longer, then she finally started the car and put it into gear. As we began to move again, the headlights illuminated a streak of blood on the road ahead of us.