Chicagoland by Gail Martin (important books to read TXT) 📕

“There’s the vault,” West said, pointing to a rectangle on the floor where the concrete was notably newer than the rest of the area around it. He opened our gear bag and pulled out two sledgehammers, while Ness took up a machine gun, and Sarah handled a Colt 1911 loaded with silver bullets like a pro.

We each took a few swings at the concrete, but I realized after the first round that with my god-touched abilities, I could probably do this on my own. I just needed to find a way to point that out without damaging West’s ego. Fortunately, he came to the same conclusion.

“Don’t you have some kind of super strength? Why am I bothering?” If he saved face by noting it himself, I was fine with that.

Goggles protected my eyes as I put my whole unnatural strength behind a swing with the sledgehammer, but shards still flew. They didn’t cut me since my skin had gone metallic, and I hoped everyone else had the good sense to stay well back. The force of the strike reverberated up my arm, but since my bones were temporarily steel, it didn’t hurt.

That one full-powered swing did twice as much damage as West and I did together. Two more swings shattered enough of the concrete, and West could start using a folding camp shovel to remove the rubble. A couple of taps and the door of the safe was revealed.

“Hey Padre,” I called to Kinsella. “Are you ready for this?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I’d noticed the priest chanting and carefully placing candles and the borrowed relics around the room. He didn’t seem to need any help translating the obscure words and phrases painted on the walls, which deepened my suspicions that he was some kind of Vatican super badass.

Finally, Kinsella turned back to us. “Alright, it’s as warded as I can make it. Let me check the safe for traps.”

By the time we shoveled out the debris, the actual safe was a foot below the level of the floor. West sent a coating of salt across the lead door, then climbed out, letting Kinsella take his place. I stepped aside as well since I take up a lot of space.

Kinsella ran his hands just above the surface of the safe, palm down, hovering about an inch over the metal. Suddenly a tangle of symbols and sigils flared to life, glowing like fire, covering the entire surface.

“Protections,” he said. “Warnings against evil. Bindings on demons. Some of these are obscure and…it’s a strange juxtaposition.”

“Capone was a do-it-yourself witch,” I supplied. “I think he was making it up as he went.”

Kinsella grimaced. “It worked—to a point. But they’re weakening. He must have been doing something to continually refresh them.”

“Would blood from a powerful vampire be a component in a spell like that?” I asked.

Kinsella’s eyes widened for a fraction of a second. “Yes. It would.” He shook his head. “Shit. That’s some very dodgy dark magic.”

West cracked his knuckles loudly. “You ready for me yet?”

“Yeah,” Kinsella nodded, hopping out of the vault-shaped hole. “Have at it.”

We stood back and made sure West had silence and plenty of light. I didn’t realize that safe cracking was part of the Fed training program, but West obviously had talent. Moments later, he hauled the heavy door open.

“Don’t touch anything,” Kinsella warned. “There’s something with real power in there.”

I could feel it, a frisson of tainted energy against my skin. Krukis’s magic reacted instinctively, creating a barrier and pushing back.

A box with intricate carvings blurred in my vision, pulsing with otherworldly power. I’d lay my bets it imprisoned the demon, especially when I saw the mess of symbols that covered its surface, painted on and carved into the wood. Next to it were several bags of yellowed linen, bulging with their contents. They didn’t look like much, but I felt the power rolling off them. Finally, I saw a clay tablet with strange markings, stained with what I feared might be blood.

“What do you make of it?” I asked Kinsella.

“The demon is bound in the sigil box,” he replied. I nodded since that matched my assessment. “The pouches are gris-gris bags. If Capone did them right for this particular usage—and I think he did—they’re made from a shroud that was wrapped around a corpse nine days in the ground.”

That sent a shiver down my spine, despite Krukis’s magic.

“And the tablet?” West asked. I would have laid my bets that this part of the adventure hadn’t been included in his training.

Kinsella bent closer to get a better look without touching. “Can’t say without examining it, but my best guess would be a binding spell. Probably immersed in the lake water and written in dove’s blood.”

Damn. Self-taught or not, Capone showed potential.

“Do you have the items you found—the ones from behind the other safe?” Kinsella asked. West took them out of his pocket and handed them over carefully. The priest received them like they were a ticking time bomb. He looked up to meet my gaze. “It’s exactly as we suspected. He turned these into ritual items for his spell casting. They must have had a very deep resonance with him.”

“How do you want to play this, Padre?” I asked.

“I’d like you to assist me since you have some additional protections,” he said. “And that leaves the rest of you on guard to keep us from being interrupted. Once we start, don’t let anyone inside, and don’t break the salt line.”

“And the demon?” Ness asked as if he couldn’t quite believe he was saying those words.

“If my hunch is correct, the demon didn’t want to be bound,” Kinsella replied as he unpacked items he had brought with him. “It might rather be back in the Pit than stuffed in a box and buried, so it could go back willingly. But demons are opportunists, and if it gets away from us, it might decide to stick around and cause trouble. If that’s the case, I will happily