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

I drew my machete, intent on keeping the vampire away from Father Kinsella. The vampire bared its teeth and lunged, moving too fast for the human eye to track.

But I wasn’t human, and I saw him just fine. Sharp nails screeched against my metallic skin. I heard the snick of teeth, but they couldn’t pierce through. I reached out and grabbed the vamp with one hand, struggling to hold him even with my god-granted strength. The monster fought with the power of madness, but it was weakened from hunger and age, and I was the instrument of a deity.

I swung my machete, and it sang through the air, cleanly lopping the head from its shriveled body. The jaw continued to snap open and closed, and the corpse twitched, making me fear that for once, decapitation might not be sufficient. I brought my boot down squarely on the vampire’s face, crushing the bones and breaking the jaw. Thankfully, the rest of the creature stilled. Ichor and gobbets of dead vampire spattered me from head to toe, and I wanted to lose the contents of my stomach.

Instead, I turned my attention back to Father Kinsella and the vault. The air had grown thick with tension and straining power, and from the concentration on the priest’s face, the demon put up one hell of a fight even with its bonds. The wooden box shook, juddering back and forth as if it might blow apart. Green light, like blinding foxfire, blazed from the sigils and markings, forcing me to avert my gaze. Kinsella narrowed his eyes but didn’t look away, as if he were staring down Lucifer himself.

“…Ut Ecclesiam tuam secura tibi facias libertate servire, te rogamus, audi nos!” Father Kinsella shouted the last of the Latin rite triumphantly, with his arm outstretched and fingers splayed, palm out, as if to shove the demon back to Hell.

The demon shrieked a sound that conjured nightmare images and would forever haunt my dreams. Its infernal voice held the peril of the Sirens and the banshee, sharp like talons scoring against my bones. Kinsella’s eyes blazed with fevered intensity, pitting one man’s will and his unwavering belief against an agent of damnation.

Kinsella lit a match and dropped it into the vault. It caught with a small explosion, and in the crimson fireball that rose toward the ceiling, I saw the leer of a demonic face and the contorted form of its body, right out of the most tortured Medieval paintings. The strange fire rushed upward, spreading across the ceiling, and for an instant, I feared we would all burn. But the demon flames didn’t catch in the concrete ceiling and vanished between one breath and the next, although my ears nearly bled from the demon’s keening.

The fire died as quickly as it had risen, leaving nothing but black ash in the vault and the lingering smell of sulfur and smoke.

Father Kinsella crumpled in slow motion, eyes rolling back in his head, body slack, sinking to his knees, boneless.

Fearing the worst, I caught him, relieved to see the rise and fall of his chest and watched the steady beat of his heart in the pulse at his neck. Only then did I have the chance to check on my friends, worried that the vampire had hurt them. To my relief, they looked dazed but not seriously injured, though they would probably have spectacular bruises.

“Is it over?” West asked as he dragged himself to his feet with the help of the wall. “And how the hell did the vampire get in here?”

I lifted the priest in my arms like he was a sleeping child. Krukis’s magic left me, but I remained easily strong enough on my own to carry the other man.

“They re-patched the plaster and concrete hole in the wall of the ritual room, but no one replaced the words and symbols,” I replied, berating myself for overlooking the obvious, a mistake that could have cost lives. “The vampire had a connection to the demon through the blood ritual. Or maybe the demon called to it, hoping to kill us and get away. But without the wardings in place, the vampire broke through the wall and found its way here.”

Ness helped Sarah to her feet. West glared but said nothing. After all, we three would be leaving in a Pullman car together in the morning, while Ness stayed in Chicago to finish his mission.

“What do we do with the vault?” Ness asked.

“I vote we close it up, spin the lock, and pour new concrete over it,” West said. “Leave it buried and out of reach.”

“Sounds good,” I agreed, as Ness and Sarah nodded. “Although someday, someone is bound to find it and dig it up. They’ll be mighty disappointed to discover that Al Capone’s vault is full of nothing but ash.”

“It would serve them right,” West replied.

Ness let out a long breath and ran his hand back through his hair, looking young and exhausted. “Thank you. It’s just going to take a little while to process all this. It’s…highly irregular.” His smile wavered, but I admired his effort to keep himself together. “And the more I think about it, the more I like the idea of going after Capone for his taxes if we can’t make the other charges stick. Two monsters down, one to go.”

“What are you going to do with the priest?” Sarah asked, nodding toward Kinsella, whom I still held in a bridal carry.

“Carry him to our rooms and let him sleep it off while we all get showers,” I said. “I really need to get the vamp guts out of my hair.”

“I’ll help Ness finish things here and seal the vault,” West said. “You and Sarah go on to the room and clean up.”

We took the service stairs again since I looked like a butcher who’d been on a rampage. Sarah checked to make sure the hallway was empty and then opened the door to our rooms so I could lay