'Til Death (part thirteen of fifteen)

‘Til Death

A Trick Molloy Mystery

©2009 Michael A. Stackpole

Part Thirteen

I didn’t have long to wait. Pizza and beer metabolize fast and not always well. The magick I used kicked some extra life into the bacteria in their guts. Nothing explosive. They got the bloat. Loosen the belt, rip a fart that could kill a buffalo, then decide your guts need attending-to.

Nikolai and Ivan got up and practically raced for the toilets. Ivan had to use the women’s side. Didn’t matter. They closed the doors and I used the zip-ties to bind one door-knob to the other. When they finally decided to emerge, they’d be thinking someone was playing a joke on them.

Boris was intent enough on a pneumatic blonde in the video, that he never even noticed me slip into the office. Stun-gun to the neck took the fight out of him. He rolled to the floor. I zip-tied his hands and ankles together, gagged him and used two zip-ties to keep the wad of napkins in place. I hit him with another jolt. It helped keep him down, and because I wanted to.

I did owe him, after all.

I crossed back to the cage and picked Irina out from the women huddled on the floor. Magick made quick work of the padlock. I opened the gate and woke her by clapping a hand over her mouth. “Quiet. Lou Sandberg sent me. Let’s get out of here.”

She smiled against my palm.

I pressed a finger to lips. “Wake the rest of them, keep them quiet, and get them ready to go. I have to open the other cage.”

Again, she nodded and then set to work. I got out and reached for the other lock. Blue light flashed from my palm. It filled the lock, squirting out through the plate seams, then the catch released with a click.

I smiled.

That would be the last time I smiled for a good long while.

Turpeluk sucker-punched me. I caught the itch of talent a heartbeat before a stream of golden fire slammed into my back. The force smashed me into the fence. My forehead bounced off a post. I rebounded and started to fall, but got my left hand under me.

My right came up, dropping a blue shield between us. He hit that hard, hard enough to pick me up and drive me into the fence again. The chainlink rattled but held and didn’t hurt, except where his first attack had melted my shirt onto my back.

I came down on one knee, shrank the shield and strengthened it, then flicked my left hand forward. Four silvery disks arced out and slashed at his legs. One missed. He blocked two. The last one cruised through his left knee. His leg buckled. It hurt like sin, and pissed him off.

Good rule: don’t piss off a guy who is triggered to the gills and is obviously badder than you are. I’d had that lesson drilled into me before. I’m a slow learner.

Turpeluk was a hell of a teacher.

His next shot shattered my shield and forearm. I flew back into the fence. Felt like I was in a blast furnace. Then a fist-sized golden sphere spun down. Caught me in the temple. That was all she wrote.

Consciousness faded before the pain ever did.

I woke up when the bucket of water hit me. The shock gave me a moment of clarity before pain became my reality. Turpeluk had used my zip-ties to secure me to the cage wall. Ankles together. Arms out straight. He hadn’t bothered to set my right arm. Just stretched it out good. Hurt like the devil. He’d locked a chain around my waist. I wasn’t going anywhere.

Neither was Irina. She’d been crucified with zip-ties, too. Tears wet her face, dotted the medical smock she’d been given to wear. She was trying to be brave. Turpeluk discouraged that, and really didn’t care how he did it.

Nikolai and Ivan had dragged Boris out and left him at Turpeluk’s feet. Boris’ eyes were almost all whites. Turpeluk stood there, one foot on his neck, as if the great white hunter with a prize.

“Mr. Molloy, you are very annoying. I use you as message, but you do not understand that. You are tenacious. This is good trait, but not in enemies.”

I think he expected some sort of wiseass answer from me. I didn’t oblige him.

He extended his right hand, stiffening the fingers. A golden glow rose from within his hand, then became a blade. He reached down and stroked it very lightly over Boris’ neck. A thin line oozed blood.

“I want you to understand what will happen to you—to you and Irina. You are liabilities. Boris is liability. Because of him, I must find new location for girls. And Irina must die to show others rebellion is foolish.” He studied me. “She dies because of you. You know this.”

“And?” I would have shrugged, but that would have hurt too much.

“You do not care?”

I was in a lot of pain. My back, roasted. My arm broken and bearing a lot of weight. The rest of me feeling grossly sunburned. My head pounding. Still, the one thing I knew was that if Turpeluk believed hurting Irina would hurt me, he’d hurt her very badly. She was dead. So was I. No reason to make the dying unpleasant.

“I was paying a debt.”

“To man who is now dead.”

Irina gasped. “Nyet!”

“Da.” Turpeluk smiled. “Very dead.”

“You should know. You had him whacked.”

“His death was tragedy. Yours, on other hand, will be pleasure.” His hand swung lower, but did not slow at all. The magick edge sailed through flesh and bone. Boris’ head lolled to the side, then spun on an ear. He stared at me, his jaw working for a bit.

Turpeluk stepped over the dead man’s thrashing body. The golden light on his hand shifted, fragmenting. For a moment little golden blades sheathed every finger. Then the energy shifted again into a scintillating ball of lightning bolts. His hand became a Tesla coil arcing off all sorts of crackling energy.

He closed with me and held his hand up before my face. Ozone filled my nostrils. “This will hurt, Mr. Molloy. Very much.”

I looked him in the eye, but said nothing.

Then he punched my broken arm with his other fist. Bones ground. I screamed. I had no choice. Pain jolted through me, then pulsed angrily from my arm. I gasped for breath, barely able to catch it.

Turpeluk chuckled. “Before I am done, you will cry out for your mother, then beg to die. And, if I am amused, I may grant your request.”

If you are enjoying this story and don’t want to wait for the last four parts to make it to this blog, I’ve collected the entire story and you can purchase it from The Stormwolf Store. It costs $3, and your purchase goes to supporting more serial fiction like this.

If you were wondering how we got here, please visit the Stormwolf Store. The short story “The Witch in Scarlet” is the Trick Molloy tale that immediately precedes this one.