Netherworld II: Blood Potion No. 9 (27 page)

I’ve never been so furious, not even
with the monster that killed me. If I could have murdered Hazel in
cold blood at that moment, I would have done it with a smile on my
face.

I had to stop this. I needed more
power. I turned and ran from the room as he continued to beat the
poor woman, his high-pitched giggles more profane than any sound
I’d ever heard before.

I ran down the hall until I found the
great room, tastefully furnished and with the requisite
over-the-top home theater system desired by any man carting around
testosterone in his body. As sunlight lazily drifted through the
picture window I sucked power, begging myself to hurry, hurry as
the terrible sounds of the whip cracking and Fizz’s screaming
continued. It had never seemed to take this long to absorb power,
not even when I’d been reduced to a wraith seven months before and
fought for every little erg to salvage my existence. I guess when
you’re trying to save another and you have to listen to their
agony, it screws with your head that much worse.

As soon as I got those telltale tingles
in my fingers and toes, I materialized back in Hazel’s dungeon
behind the creep. I grabbed the first thing that looked like it
might do as a weapon; a thick wooden rod darkened with old, dried
blood. Not thinking about who he might have used this thing on and
how much damage he would have inflicted, I wound up like a major
league baseball player and swung, smacking the witch right on the
back of the head. It made a marvelous thud, and he fell to his
hands and knees, the whip dropping from his fingers.

“Get off her, you sadistic monster!” I
yelled and let him have it again between the shoulder blades. He
hit the floor with his face, the sound a thick thud. I laughed.
When you’re loaded on power, the strangest things seem
funny.

Fizz stopped screaming, sagging in her
chains as blessed unconsciousness claimed her. Hazel rolled over on
his back and blinked slowly at me.

“So you’re Fizz’s friend. I thought she
was lying about that possession shit, but I should have known she
didn’t have enough brains to make something like that up.” His
voice sounded slow and thick. He seemed dazed. I was only sorry I
hadn’t hit him harder, making him as out of it as his
victim.

I thought about telling him C.K. was
dead and the cops were on the way, but good sense stopped me. If
Hazel knew he had nothing to lose anyway, he might just haul off
and kill Fizz simply because. Besides, I didn’t know that Bane had
remembered Hazel carting off the stripper. He might not have asked
for a rescue when he called for help. He’d been in a pretty bad way
at that time.

Instead, I tried appealing to Hazel’s
humanity and sense of right. Silly Brandilynn. “So now you know
she’s innocent. She didn’t do anything wrong. Let her
go!”

He grinned at me, as if his nose wasn’t
swelling from its intense introduction to the floor. “I’m having
too much fun. I bet I can have even more.”

He started to mutter incomprehensibly,
and the air around me grew thick and electric, sapping the energy
I’d gained. The wooden rod dropped from my hands, and I knew I had
to leave or suffer just as bad as Fizz. I sure couldn’t help her if
I was trapped by Hazel.

It was still hard to abandon her here
with this monster. Praying I could get help back here in time, I
escaped to Bane.

The scene around Bottle’s car was a
mishmash of yellow tape, cops crawling around, and police cars and
two ambulances swirling colored lights. Someone had found Bane a
blanket to conceal his nudity since the shift had destroyed his
clothes. He stood nearby with a couple of shifter cops, watching as
paramedics tended the now conscious Bottle who peered around with
dazed eyes. They checked her blood pressure and shined a light in
her eyes. She still seemed pretty out of it, answering the medics’
questions with unintelligible mutterings.

I hurried to Bane as one cop, a
rattlesnake to judge from the black and gold scales that crept from
his neck to his cheeks, said, “Dispatch says your field office is
sending a couple of agents.” He rolled his slitted eyes.
“Humans.”

Bane gave him a crooked smile. “I’ll
take what I can get.”

Snake Man and his weregator partner
exchanged grins, the kinds when one race of person is mentally
shaking its collective head at another. While they shared a moment
of resigned contempt for the norms, I went to a nearby cop car and
drew some power. Escaping Hazel’s spell had managed to drain me a
bit, and I needed Bane to see me.

I materialized in front of him and
concentrated on putting in an appearance. The three shifters jumped
satisfyingly. I would have enjoyed it but for the thought of Fizz
still under Hazel’s tender mercies.

Bane said, “Brandilynn?”

The gator’s eyes were fit to bug out of
his gray-tinged face. “Holy crap. Is that a ghost? You don’t see
those too often.”

I spoke fast, having been in too much
of a hurry to grab a whole lot of energy for this. “Hazel has Fizz
at his house! He’s going to kill her!”

Bane blinked then looked at his
companions. “Did either of you catch any of that?”

The rattler shook his head. “Her lips
were moving for the brief instant I saw her, but I couldn’t make it
out. She looked pretty upset. Girlfriend?”

Bane snorted. “I wish. Just a very good
friend. You’ll have to try again, honey.”

Darn it. Back to the police car.
Materializing was probably the hardest thing to do, and I had to
take in energy to the point of being high to make it happen.
Looking at all the tracks of the many feet that were treading over
the dirt beside the road gave me an idea though.

I tugged at Bane’s blanket to get his
attention. I kept tugging until I had him pointing in the direction
I needed.

“Brandilynn, what is it?” he asked, the
gentle concern in his voice warming my frantic heart. The shifter
cops looked around for me, their faces still awed to be dealing
with a ghost.

I knelt by my patch of dirt and
concentrated all my power into one finger. I started
writing.

Bane stepped closer, the two weres
behind him. Officer Snake squinted at my work. “Fizz? Hazel’s
house?”

Bane nodded. “I figured that’s where he
took her. Help is on the way, honey. Is she still
alive?”

Gold stars for Bane. Despite everything
he’d had to deal with, he hadn’t forgotten Fizz, had already sent
the cops her way. God, I hoped they were on time.

I scratched ‘barely’ in answer to
Bane’s question, and he whispered, “Damn it.” I wasn’t put out by
the profanity, not with the situation being what it was.

I didn’t want Fizz to be dead. I didn’t
want to know if the news was bad. Yet I couldn’t stand here and
wait around to catch up on everything. Steeling myself, I zapped
back to Hazel’s property.

Chapter 15

It was probably stupid to try to
materialize directly in Hazel’s dungeon, but I went for it anyway.
It rejected me. With authority.

I had only an instant of facing Fizz’s
limp body in the chains before I was flung out of the house, beyond
the clearing it sat in, and into the surrounding woods. It also
took my extra oomph I’d gained from all the power grabs I’d made
today. I must have gone through half a dozen trees before landing
on my butt on the pine needle strewn ground.

It didn’t hurt, but it didn’t feel all
that good either.

I got to my feet, registering all the
cop cars clustered at the clearing opening and lining the long
driveway up to it. The rescue party had arrived. A thick shimmer,
like a gauzy curtain, lay between the house and the mostly human
police officers keeping cover behind their cars. I saw only two
shifters among the law enforcement. No vampires, since it was still
daylight. There should have been more paras. Where were they
all?

Hazel had warded the holy heck out of
his property, keeping the cops from gaining access. One paunchy
uniformed officer had a bullhorn, and he was using it. “Stan
Laughton, release the woman immediately and give yourself
up.”

A siren wailed as more troops
approached. I walked past the line of cars, coming right up to the
ward line. I had more sense than to touch the thing. I looked
through it to the house, which seemed to shift and shiver behind
the protective spell. No answer came from that direction, no sound
at all. The silence seemed ominous to me. What was Hazel doing in
there?

The sense of foreboding grew, and I
heard mutters of the cops behind me. I glanced over my shoulder to
see them shifting nervously, as if aware of a coming doom. I
thought it might be another spell, one designed to crush its
victims with fear. Hazel was good at what he did, and I had a sense
that I’d been lucky to escape him.

Bullhorn Cop spoke again. “Stan, you
need to quit with the spells. Don’t make this worse for
yourself.”

A black van pulled up to the end of the
line of patrol cars. The Para Patrol had arrived, the witchy
version of a SWAT team. Well, it was about darn time. I was pacing
and fretting as half a dozen people, all wearing warded
bullet-proof vests, piled out of the van.

Bullhorn Cop was at it again. “Witches
have arrived to take down your wards, Stan. Give Annie up and let’s
do this so no one gets hurt.”

I had an urge to slap that bullhorn out
of his hands. “Too late. She may already be dead. Do something,
stupid!”

The six witches came closer to the
clearing, but not too close. Three men and three women made up the
group. They found a small space where they formed a circle. A chant
in some language I didn’t know, probably the Latin witches seem to
love so much, rose in the air. They lifted their hands, holding
wands in their rights. I watched as they sketched wards in the air.
It didn’t really seem to be doing anything until I looked back at
Hazel’s house. Then I saw a second filmy curtain had gone up
between the cordon of cops and the first spell line.

I scowled. Knowing the witches could
hear me, I yelled, “What good is that going to do?”

I found out when several gunshots rang
out from the house, and the bullets were deflected off the good
guys’ spell shield. “Okay, smart call,” I muttered.

Officer Bullhorn gave his final
warning. “Last chance, Laughton. We’re coming in.”

As if in answer, there was another gun
blast. Simultaneously, Hazel’s dread spell lifted and his curtain
ward came down. I didn’t think twice. I teleported myself into
Hazel’s torture room, sure I’d find Fizz dead.

The first thing I noticed was Hazel
sprawled on the floor under the window, the top part of his head
missing. A sawed-off shotgun lay between his splayed legs. The
window and wall were sprayed with blood and gore. Hazel had bowed
out of the party, the big coward. Of course, if Fizz was dead he’d
be facing the death penalty for her murder. Georgia still burns its
witches at the stake in such cases.

Yeah, Hazel had taken the easy way out.
Pretty gruesome, and as soon as I confirmed to myself there was no
sign he was sticking around in ghost form, I wasted no time turning
my back on him to check on Fizz.

I could hear the thumps of booted feet,
the calls of the incoming cops yelling, “Clear!” as they made their
cautious way through the house’s interior. I knew they were
hurrying as fast as was prudent, but seeing Fizz hanging there
motionless, her chin resting on her chest, blood all over her, made
me want to scream at them to get their butts in gear. She was such
a mess, no doubt scarred for life. But her chest was still rising
and falling. He hadn’t killed her. She was getting her second
chance at life, and I’m here to tell you, those second chances are
precious.

The first cop, Officer Bullhorn
himself, entered the room, his gun pointed at the uncaring Hazel.
“I got him! He appears to be dead.”

“No, he just installed a skylight in
his skull, you jackass” I smarted off, irritated beyond belief.
Sheesh.

As his brother cops joined him, he set
to work rolling Hazel over and handcuffing him while two others
kept guns pointed at the witch. No kidding. They cuffed a dead guy
missing the top of his skull. Must be SOP or something, I guess. Oh
well, at least three other officers were now tending to poor
Fizz.

A dark haired cop talked on his radio,
saying “Send in the paramedics. We’ve got one wounded, one dead in
here,” as Hazel’s pockets were emptied. Others searched the room
for the keys to the manacles that kept Fizz hanging. I located them
first, sitting on a shelf along with a cattle prod, a ball gag, and
something that looked suspiciously like the knife dildo in that
serial killer movie starring Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt.
Shuddering, I concentrated the bit of power I had left into my
fingers and flicked the keys onto the floor, where two cops fell on
them like cats on a pigeon.

I looked on with approval at how gently
the policemen took care of Fizz, lowering her carefully onto the
floor away from any blood or other nastiness. There was nothing
more for me to do here, and I was starting to feel like a fifth
wheel. I left the terrible scene, thinking I’d witnessed way too
much blood and violence since the night I’d died.