So far he had only come at us in one shape at a time, and although that had never been spelled out as part of the deal, I’d assumed it was. Looked like I was wrong.
His interim form resembled a blurry amoeba, and Devona was having a tough time holding on. In a flash, I understood what he was going to do: he intended Devona to lose her grip on his fluid transitional form and fall into Phlegethon. If the river’s mystic green flame didn’t kill her, the Lesk which swam within it surely would.
“Devona, jump!” I shouted as I raised my gun and fired.
The last silver bullet struck Amon in the chest-or rather where his chest would have been if he’d been solid-just as Devona launched herself up and over the Lord of the Wyldwood. Devona landed easily on the bridge as the amoebic Darklord pitched backward over the rail and plummeted soundlessly toward Phlegethon’s fiery green embrace.
I tucked my empty gun into my shoulder holster and hurried over to Devona. She was covered with blood, but it was impossible to tell if any of it was hers.
“Are you okay?”
She wiped a smear of blood from her mouth and nodded. “Do you think it’s over?”
“It’s possible Amon is more vulnerable in his transitional state and the last silver bullet did him in.”
“Do you believe that?”
“I believe Darklords are very hard to kill. Let’s get out of here before-”
A gigantic reptilian head rose up before us, fiery green water trickling down its black-scaled hide.
“Too late, zombie.” The voice of Amon’s British hunter guise, the one that annoyed me so much, boomed out of the Lesk’s serpentine mouth. I’d never seen one of the great beasts close up before, only the black lines of their backs as they plied the waters of Phlegethon. The creature was far larger than I had imagined, and looked something like a snake encased in black armor. Its brow was spiked, and it had a row of bony serrated triangles running down its back. And of course it possessed Amon’s feral yellow eyes-eyes full of fury and hunger.
“Let us go, Amon!” I shouted. “We played by the rules of your challenge and beat you, fair and square!”
Amon laughed, a harsh, brittle sound, as of a thousand bones breaking.
“The Hunt has only a single rule, little man: victory belongs to the strongest and swiftest.” He hissed and his jaws opened wide in preparation to devour us.
“What of Honani, Darklord?” I yelled.
Amon paused and narrowed his basketball-sized eyes.
I reached into my jacket and removed the soul jar. “This container is what I used to draw Honani’s spirit from his body. Honani remains inside. All I have to do to release him is pry open the lid.” I gripped the lid in my fingers. “If I do, his spirit will be set free to wander Nekropolis for eternity. Or maybe he’ll end up in the Boneyard as one of Edrigu’s servants.”
Amon’s head swayed slowly back and forth as he regarded me.
“You told us earlier that despite being a mixblood, Honani was still one of your subjects-one of the family, as you put it.” I gave the jar a shake. “Well, here he is, Amon. Are you going to abandon him just because his body now belongs to another?”
Amon hissed softly. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
“How did you know it when you pretended to be Arleigh?” I countered.
Amon considered. “Very well,” he said at last. “Place the jar on the bridge and you may go.”
“Nothing personal, but I’d rather keep it with us until we reach the other side, if it’s all the same to you.”
Amon laughed again, and I was surprised to hear no malice in it. “Go on, then!”
We backed toward the Sprawl side of the bridge, keeping our eyes on Amon the entire way. When we reached the far side, Amon touched his serpent’s nose to the bridge and flowed into his English hunter body.
I set the jar on the bridge and Amon gave me a little salute. “Well played, Mr. Richter. Well played, indeed. I haven’t enjoyed a Wild Hunt this much in decades.”
“I’m glad you liked it,” I said wryly. And Devona and I turned and hurried into the Sprawl before the lord of the shapeshifters could change his mind.
From now on Amon would have to add a corollary to his rule about the Hunt: sometimes victory doesn’t go to the strongest or swiftest. Sometimes it goes to a desperate dead man with deep pockets.
NINETEEN
“So that’s the infamous House of Dark Delights,” Devona said, sounding less than impressed.
The Sprawl’s best-known brothel was located on the southeast end of Sybarite Street, and the Descension Day celebrating was a bit more subdued here, mostly because by this time a majority of partiers lay on the sidewalks, in the gutters, and in the alleys, unconscious or worse, robbed of whatever darkgems they’d had in their pockets, and more than likely missing several pints of bodily fluids and an organ or two. At least it was easier to get around in this neighborhood for those us who remained ambulatory-if you didn’t mind stepping over all the bodies, that is.
The House sat between a casino called, ominously enough, Bet Your Life, and a soul-modification parlor (slogan: When you’ve done everything to your body that you possibly can) called Spiritus Mutatio. The House of Dark Delights was a pleasant-looking three-story building painted white, with green shutters and matching shingles. There, the dark is all on the inside.
The facial lacerations Amon had given Devona were almost completely healed by now, after snacking on a couple blood-ices she’d purchased from a street vendor along the way.
“It doesn’t seem very well protected-especially for this part of town,” she said. “No fence surrounding the place, no bars on the windows…”
“You’re good with wardspells, right?” I said. “Try checking out its magical defenses.”
Devona closed her eyes and concentrated. A few seconds later her eyes snapped open, and she looked at me with an expression of shock. “The spells protecting the building are almost as strong and complex as those warding my father’s Collection!”
I smiled. “Bennie doesn’t like to take any chances.”
“Bennie?”
“The owner and operator,” I said. “I just use Bennie. It’s makes things easier.”
Devona gave me a puzzled look, and I told her she’d understand soon enough. As Devona had pointed out, there’s no fence around the House of Dark Delights, and we strolled up the front walk, onto the porch, and I knocked on the door. The first time I’d come here, no one had warned me to knock first. I made the mistake of reaching for the doorknob, and as soon as my undead flesh came in contact with the metal, I found myself blasted across the street and through the front window of Les Escargot, a gourmet restaurant run by giant snails. The food’s supposed to be great, but you wouldn’t believe how slow the service is.
The door opened, and an extremely large and muscular mixblood lyke was glaring down at us-one that I knew well. After all, I’d seen him, or at least his body, walking out of Skully’s only several hours ago.
“Lyra?” I said hopefully. I was thinking of how I’d traded the soul jar containing Honani’s spirit to Amon for our freedom. Had the Darklord used his powers to force out Lyra’s essence and return Honani to his rightful body?
The mixblood glared at us for a moment longer before dissolving into a fit of giggling. “Darn it! I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep a straight face!”
I started to sigh in relief, but Lyra scooped me up and gave me a vicious hug, squeezing the rest of the air out of my lungs. When she put me down, I half expected to collapse to the porch in a mass of dead flesh and shattered bone. But luckily my skeletal system had withstood Lyra’s affectionate embrace, if only just.
“What are you doing here, Matt? And who’s your friend? She’s cute!” Lyra turned to Devona and started to smile, but she frowned instead. “Hey, didn’t I see you at Skully’s when I walked out? I was kind of muzzyheaded from the transfer into this body, so maybe I’m wrong, but I could’ve sworn-”