Page 2 of All Hallows Trick (Sick and Twisted #3)

CHAPTER ONE

DEATH

T he dress looked like blood in the moonlight, pouring over the poisonous goddess like a wound spilling vital fluid. My whole body locked at the sight of Nightmare, awareness that each and every one of us was injured hammering at my chest. Tor had passed out in Misery’s arms, Miz was weak and traumatised by the woman strolling casually closer, Virgil shook uncontrollably, backing up three steps until he was behind us, and Cat, my little bride, was unconscious in my arms. So fucking vulnerable.

Panic cut off my air. I needed to get them to safety, needed to get them as far away from here as possible, but I didn’t know what to do. Going to my domain would kill Virgil. Cat would kill me if we left him, but she was my priority. I’d rather Cat hate me alive than love me dead.

A shield slammed down around us, and I hid my discomfort at how weak it was, the darkness a veil instead of a wall. Shit. Shit!

Nightmare’s laugh grated every nerve in my body. I dragged a slow breath in through my nose, my hands flexing where they held Cat to my chest, fingertips pressing into her thighs, her back. I wouldn’t lose anyone I loved. I refused to.

“Is that the best you can do?” the goddess of nightmares asked, nearing at a casual, unhurried pace. She knew we were fucked.

“Stay back!” Misery snapped, his voice sharp but breathy. I wanted to lock eyes with him and silently promise he’d be okay but I didn’t dare take my eyes off Nightmare. And was it even true? Could I keep him safe when weakness rampaged through me like poison? There was something wrong with those creatures in the woods we left behind, beyond the fact they’d been engineered in a cottage on the grounds of Ford School of Medicine. A wound dealt by them shouldn’t have weakened a death god, let alone two, and they certainly shouldn’t have knocked Tor out.

“Stay back?” Nightmare asked in that harmless voice that did nothing to convince a single one of us she meant no harm. Her eyes widened, one pure white bleeding down her cheek. I looked at that eye in grim satisfaction, but satisfaction wouldn’t get us to safety. My heart slammed harder, faster. “But you have my terror. I can’t stay back when you’ve stolen something from me.” Her gaze went beyond us, her red-painted mouth tilting into a cruel smile, transforming her from a beautiful, ordinary woman to the monster she was. “Two somethings. Hello, Virgil. I knew you’d escape your cage sooner or later. Shall I pass your love to your creator?”

Virgil had frozen, but her words were a match struck against phosphorus. He exploded into motion, testing the stability of my wards until I felt them tremble. His teeth bared, sharper, longer than any mortal teeth, and the sound that rattled from his throat was nowhere close to human.

I held Cat tighter, exchanging a swift glance with Miz as he backed up. It would be wrong to use Virgil as a distraction so we could escape, but I was far beyond the white morals of right and wrong. My girl had been attacked, hurt, kidnapped by her own friend, and transformed into a creature none of us quite understood the ramifications of.

“M’up,” Tor slurred, lurching in Miz’s arms so suddenly that he dropped to the floor with a grunt. “Why’s my head merry-go-rounding?”

“You were hurt, you fucking idiot,” Miz snapped, grabbing Tor’s shoulder as he lumbered unsteadily to his feet. “Are you strong enough to go home?”

“Nobody’s going anywhere,” Nightmare declared. I jolted at the crackle of her magic, a power surge compared to the sad spark I had left. I held Cat in trembling hands, my heartbeat rapid. There were no good options, but letting indecision freeze me to the spot while Nightmare came closer wasn’t one of them.

Tor’s head whipped around, rage twisting his face the second he saw her. Calloused brown fingers slashed through the air in a move I’d seen reduce people to shredded skin, shards of bone, and boiling blood. Nothing happened. Tor shook his hand out like that would make his power work and thrust it forward again.

“Time to go,” I said under my breath, flicking a glance at Miz as I sent another thin veil into the shields. “Grab him.”

The skirt of Nightmare’s dress poured across the old tarmac like fresh blood as she reached Virgil, his fear overpowered by rage for the moment. I hope you survive, I thought, and turned to Miz just as he grabbed Tor. I had just enough power left to take us back to my castle, but nothing besides that. Even now, I felt the shield around us shudder, buckling under the force and weight of Nightmare’s sheer magic and—

A gunshot tore through the hushed quiet of the dark island road, so loud that I staggered back on instinct, taking rapid inventory of my body, searching for the wound. It was Nightmare that staggered, the crimson of her dress darkening around her torso.

“Get away from my friends, you psychopath!” Honey Livingston stormed down the hill beside the winding tarmac road, the moonlight making her skin and hair silver, limning the double barrel of the shotgun she held in front of her. The hot muzzle sent curls of steam into the frosty night.

I cut off the shadows ready to carry us home. Cat might hate me if I left her brother to die, but if I abandoned her brother and her only remaining best friend, she would die, too. A slow, insidious death of the spirit and the heart. I couldn’t do that to her.

“Tor, grab onto me,” I ordered, my voice coming out in a rush, nothing like the cool composure I should have possessed. My heart thundered, my head a little faint. I had to protect them. I couldn’t lose them. I couldn’t be alone again. The physical weakness was spreading, and on its heels raced panic, and we were still standing there in the middle of the road.

“You can feel it, can’t you?” Nightmare asked, her voice sharp around the edges now. “All the pieces are falling into place. Everything is so close to ready.” She locked eyes with me, locking me in place, freezing my magic even as I reached for it. Fear was inescapable, a mire that sucked me in, burying me until I could only choke on the mud. I could lose them all, right here. “Your downfall, finally delivered to your doorstep,” she gloated.

I jumped when Tor grasped my shoulder, the scent of blood thick around him. His back had been clawed, his thigh ripped open, and the copper scent of it mingled with the gunshot bleeding down Nightmare’s stomach until I choked on it. I didn’t feel my own injuries, only the weakness, the lack of my power. I’d never been this afraid. Never.

“Why?” Virgil demanded, his voice mangled with bestial fury. I tried to shake my head at him, to tell him to stay silent, to avoid angering her. I was a death god but it was my own death and the ones of the people I loved that I felt creep nearer, nearer…

Honey raised the gun again when she skidded down the bottom of the hill, and another blast tore through the night, making me jump. Gasping, I stumbled back.

I’m supposed to be strong. I’m supposed to protect them. It was my job to keep them safe, but Tor was bleeding on me and Misery was slowly crossing the road towards Nightmare, pushing against his instinct and terror like a strong wind, wading through the mud of trauma. Because Honey and Virgil were inches from death, and Cat loved them. They could not be lost.

“Tor, take Cat,” I ordered quickly, trying to hand her over and swearing when he slumped into me.

“Trying,” he slurred, fingers grasping at my shirt. “Sorry.”

Pain gripped my chest and I wanted to soothe him but there wasn’t the time. I could do nothing but stand here, supporting them. No, that wasn’t true. I could wrap us in shadow and whisk us to the castle, but what would happen in the minute I was gone? A minute was long enough for Nightmare to sink into Honey’s mind, turn the shotgun on Virgil, then command Honey to blow her own head off when he was dead. It was long enough for Nightmare to take control of Miz again. Or to kill him.

I couldn’t move. My feet refused to shift from where they glued to the tarmac, my knees starting to shake at the pressure building inside me. I needed to run. I couldn’t shift an inch. I needed to put Cat down and attack Nightmare. I couldn’t unclench my fingers from her.

Nightmare turned at the shot, her movement eerily slow. Cold sent another shudder through my aching bones when her eyes brightened, one white, one as black as water at night. I’d seen it before, that look, in the middle of Ford’s unnamed forest when I’d been summoned to find Misery broken, Rosalind’s corpse splayed across his arms, and Nightmare gloating on the banks of the lake with that exact gleam in her eyes.

Honey’s shot went wide, blasting harmlessly into the night.

“Missed,” Nightmare purred, taking a single step towards Honey. I could see the mortal shaking from this distance, the gun rattling in her hand. No wonder the second shot had missed. Virgil stepped smoothly into the space between her and the goddess before Nightmare could get closer.

“You know what was done to me,” he said in a voice rife with violence, “and you know what I’ve become. Do you really want all of that unleashed on you? Because I won’t hold back. You made me into this, but I’ll fucking use it. So go on, tempt me.”

Nightmare’s laugh was no louder than a whisper. “I can smell the antidote on you from here, subject. You’re no threat to me. But it’s delightful that you think you’d earn even a gasp of fear from me when three death gods occupy the same space.”

When she said the words death gods her eyes poured over the dark road until her eyes settled on Misery. Not because she hated him like she hated me. Cold skated through every vein in my body. No, she fixed on him because she knew I loved him and hurting him would hurt me. Not again. Never. Again.

“Nightmare!” I shouted, projecting my voice as loudly as I could, my magic sluggish to respond. “I’m tired of you dancing around your true goal. Ignore them. Put your wrath where it truly belongs.”

“No,” Tor slurred, his hand grasping weakly at my shirt. “Stop.”

“Death,” Miz warned without turning from Nightmare.

But I’d had enough. I was so fucking tired of the people I loved suffering because of me. Without looking away from Nightmare, I bent and laid Cat gently on the ground. Tor wasn’t in a fit state to guard her, and Virgil was busy protecting Honey, but I wouldn’t let Nightmare past me. I’d hold the damn line and keep her from all of them, no matter what it took.

My heart beat so hard it tried to take flight from my chest as I walked through the sheer gauze of my shield, bare cobwebs left to keep them safe. Nightmare’s eyes settled on me, hatred shining through them. I’d barely uncovered the source of her rage. This whole campaign couldn’t be because the man she loved died as all mortals die. It felt bigger, felt more. She couldn’t wage war against a whole island because of one death.

“Protect Cat and Tor,” I breathed to Miz, reaching out to squeeze his arm, the touch grounding me, shoring up my determination. “They need you.”

“Death,” Miz warned, desperation squeezing his voice.

“They need you.” I tightened my grip on his arm, then forced myself to let go, my palm burning, frantic to hold onto him. Instead, I put distance between me and Misery, walking closer to the nightmare goddess. I had no illusions about overpowering her. If she wanted us dead, we would be dead in a second. The only reason we were breathing was to suffer a bigger, grander death.

“Honey, kill the subject,” Nightmare ordered without breaking my stare.

Honey lifted the gun, her hand shaking less, but when the blast went off, Nightmare staggered back, clutching her arm. Nostrils flared. Teeth bared on a fierce hiss. Virgil was unharmed.

“How?” Nightmare hissed, her face a mask of ugly rage. I walked faster, my breathing rasping.

Honey scrambled backwards, Virgil following her down the road towards us, both of them palpably terrified.

“Oh god, she’s gonna kill me,” Honey squeaked, jumping when Virgil grabbed her arm and pulled her faster, the two of them running past me to where I’d laid Cat on the ground.

“Not if I can help it,” I heard Virgil growl.

I didn’t look back. Couldn’t look away from Nightmare as she seethed, the true monster of her on full display. Her head tilted, long wine-red hair spilling over a pale shoulder as blood spilled between her fingers. She held my stare and finally replied, “Not yet.”

Her words struck me like a prophecy. I stood in the road, a lone shield between her and the people I loved. A suffocating doom gathered in my chest when crows began to gather along the walls and hills to either side of us, alighting on trees, fluttering to the grass, landing anywhere there was space.

“Your demise belongs to me,” she snarled, “but not yet. I want you broken and crawling before I—”

Her stare snapped over my shoulder and my skin tingled all down my back. What was she looking at? What was happening? What had caught her attention? What was it?

“I think you’ll find,” came a deadly voice that made me want to weep, “every last part of this man belongs to me. Even his demise. So back the fuck off, Nightmare.”

“Stay back,” I warned Cat, holding a trembling hand behind myself.

I knew by the crunch of feet on tarmac she’d disobeyed, and it was suddenly impossible to breathe.

“Cat,” Virgil warned.

Nightmare drew herself upright, her back straight, her hand falling away from the wound in her shoulder. “Come with me, my terror, and I’ll leave your men alone.”

“Like I’d believe a single word from your deceitful mouth,” Cat snarled, her voice so clear, so close. My heart nearly collapsed in my chest when her hand wrapped around mine, fingers sliding into the empty spaces between mine, clinging tight.

I watched the words hit Nightmare, watched her eyes flash with warning, her chin lifting, fingers twitching at her side. I braced for pain, tightening my grip on Cat, ready to push her behind myself so I took the brunt of Nightmare’s attack.

Stillness—pure utter stillness —fell over every person standing on the road at the high, piercing noise that cut the night. Out of place, completely incongruous, and the part that sent a shock of warning through me; it came from none of us. Not my loves, not Virgil or Honey, not Nightmare who spun and latched her bleeding stare onto something in the distance.

With a chill, I looked beyond the goddess, my gaze spearing through the darkness until moonlight caught on… what the fuck was that?

“Is that… a veil?” Cat whispered at my side. She tipped her head back to give me a baffled, panicked look. I squeezed her hand, keeping her close as I retreated quickly, my steps careful on the tarmac. We could use this distraction to get away from Nightmare. All of us, unharmed. It seemed like a fairy tale, but here was a chance, a single opening. I wouldn’t waste it. I wouldn’t—

That sound cut through the silence again, so obviously a whistle that I didn’t know how I hadn’t placed it the first time. It rose and fell in a series of four notes.

“Um,” Cat whispered, pressing close to my side. “Why’s there someone in a veil whistling the wedding march?”

She was right. That was the wedding march. I fought a shudder as I turned, pulling her with me when I broke into a run.

“What the fuck is happening?” Miz demanded, supporting Tor against his side. Honey and Virgil stood close around them, faces pale.

“Not a clue. Let’s go—”

Cat inhaled sharply, her attention elsewhere. I looked back down the road at Nightmare and the veiled figure to see tanned hands push back the long white lace, baring a masculine face dominated by freckles and vibrant blue eyes. Tor groaned, dropping his head on Miz’s shoulder.

“Who are you?” Nightmare demanded in a voice so guttural it made my stomach knot.

The veiled psychopath scoffed but didn’t reply to her, raising a hand to wave frantically at us instead. No, I realised with a growl that restored some of my strength. He waved at Cat.

“Hi, lioness!” he shouted with bright excitement. “Do you like my veil?”

Miz exhaled in relief when darkness swept like an ocean of ink around us, throbbing with power and protection.

“It’s not mine,” I said urgently, my eyes meeting his as the shadows enclosed us, lifting us like a benevolent giant’s hand, carrying us away from the moors. “The magic isn’t mine.”

At least as the magic tore us away from Ford’s End and deposited us wherever it chose, I hoped the giant’s hand was benevolent. But I could do nothing to save us it if wished to cause harm.