Page 8 of Icy Reception (SOS HOTEL #9)

CHAPTER 8

Victor moved —like he does—so fast I didn’t see it until the spinning axe stopped dead, suspended an inch from Zee’s shocked face, held there by Victor’s unwavering grip on its handle. “Midnight,” Victor snarled.

Zee immediately sprang into action and slammed the bell. Ding! Ding! Ding!

Victor lowered the axe, spun on his heel, and marched for the axe murderer with enough determination in each step that he clearly meant to take the man’s head. I considered suggesting we keep him alive to get answers, but really did not want to get between Victor and his target.

Victor raised the axe.

“Holy fuck a stick,” Zee gasped, probably from watching Victor get his murder on, but he could also have noticed how the section of paneling under the stairs quivered and jerked apart revealing an opening beneath.

What was it the clue had said? Paths once knew.

“Look out!” I barked. The big bulky axeman had moved so fast he blurred, just like Victor could do, blinking from one place and appearing right behind him. Victor spun, axe on a path to take the man’s head from his neck, but he grabbed the axe, stopping Victor’s attack mid-swing.

Victor’s strength was second only to mine.

The axeman had to be a Lost One, especially now we knew he could move like a vampire, but the only Lost Ones I knew to be as bulky as him were gargoyles. Alive, then dead, then alive again? What was he?

The axeman thrust out a hand, slammed his palm into Victor’s chest, and smacked him off his feet, launching Victor through the air. He smashed through the stair treads in an explosion of splintered wood, and dropped out of sight into a void beneath.

“Victor!” I bolted into the secret doorway under the stairs and found him dusting himself off at the top of a narrow opening, with a stone staircase spiraling down into darkness. He plucked shards of wood from his messy hair. “This is a challenge.”

A roar shook the air. “Trespassers!”

Zee slammed into me. “Alright ladies, down the secret stairs we go, unless you wanna dance with a fuck-off angry wrestler who moves faster than Vic and hits harder than Adam.”

“Indeed.” Victor turned on his heel and jogged down the stairs into the gloom.

I followed, then looked back and whispered to Zee, “Is the axeman following?”

Hunched over, Zee ducked his head so his horns didn’t scrape the ceiling. “Not unless he’s shrunk.”

He was right, there was no way the axeman would fit down these stairs. “Where did he come from?”

“No fuckin’ idea. Hey Vic, he’s the same guy we dumped in the closet, right? ”

“Yes. The very same.” Victor slowed his descent as the staircase tightened further. “Although clearly alive.”

“You’re an expert on dead people... how come he’s stomping around?”

“I do not believe that being is alive. He does not have a heartbeat, and is as cold as ice. Like a corpse. Hence we believed him to be one.”

An undead axe murderer. “Oh dear.”

“I suspect he’s some kind of supernaturally animated guardian put in place to protect this hotel, or something in it. Or just to keep others out.”

“Like a robot guard?”

“Yes, especially as he accused us of trespassing. But he’s constructed of stone and electronics. A kind of golem, if you will.”

Okay, so this hotel had a supernatural security system. “Do you think someone activated him?” I asked, as we shuffled onward, down each tread, going around and around, deeper beneath the hotel. As the temperature dropped, my breath misted in the gloom.

“It’s possible. Or he’s automatically triggered.”

“A mean burglar alarm,” Zee said.

“Yes. To protect the secrets this hotel harbors.”

“The golem probably had the key on him this whole time, and it fell out in the closet.”

“That is likely,” Victor agreed.

“But we didn’t trigger him, right? We haven’t actually done anything to the hotel, have we?”

“No, but the new management may have. I suspect their takeover triggered the golem, and they’ve been keeping people locked in their hotel rooms to keep them safe... and to keep the golem’s presence a secret.”

“Imma just say it... Was kinda suspicious that Wes didn’t show, and bam , a grumpy golem throws an axe at my face. Just putting that out there.”

It was a little suspicious, but Wesley may have had other reasons for not being at our meeting. The management may have gotten to him before he could meet us... or he could have changed his mind, as Zee had been very clear about not wanting a vampire to tag along.

“You know I’m right.”

“Probably,” Victor admitted.

“Point to the sexy demon. And thank you Lord Fancy Fangs for the save, it was very welcome. Also, you’re so fuckin’ hot when you go feral. I need to get into more fights just to see you lose your cool.”

“You’re welcome, Zodiac, but please refrain from unnecessary confrontation. I do not enjoy my feral state, as you say.”

We shuffled further down the narrow staircase, and while the ambient light from the foyer dimmed, a fresh, cool-blue light illuminated the way ahead. Gooseflesh prickled over my arms. Whatever was down here, it was cold and probably not all that welcoming.

Why were we doing this again?

Victor hesitated on a step and turned. “Adam?” He’d heard my teeth chattering.

“I’m good.” Just as long as I didn’t stay in the cold too long. I’d begun to learn that maybe I might be more susceptible to the cold than Victor or Zee.

The tight spiral stairwell finally fanned open into a low-ceilinged cellar made of brick archways and chambers with metal doors, four on each side. Cool mist and an eerie blue light seeped out from beneath each of the chamber doors.

“What is this creepy-ass place?” Zee whispered. He was able to stand upright now that the curved ceiling arched high enough to accommodate his horns .

“Bomb shelter?” I guessed, uncertain. It seemed sturdy enough.

“Wine cellar.” Victor approached the nearest chamber door and peeked through a small window. “Hm.”

“Hm?” Zee echoed, then strode to the next doorway and stooped to get a look through the tiny window. A rectangle of blue light illuminated his face. “When you said hm , what you actually meant was what the fuck, right? Because that’s a whole lot of what the fuck in there. Kitten, take a look.”

I really did not want to do that. “Do I have to? It’s bad, right? Just tell me. I don’t need to see.”

Zee rolled his eyes. “We can’t leave, we’re heroes, blah blah,” he whined, in a terrible imitation of my voice.

Shivering, I stepped up to the door, stood on my toes, and peered over the bottom edge of the tiny window. Inside, enormous glass containers held frozen people, like giant human popsicles lit by eerie blue light. Cold steam wafted off them—the same vapor mist that was crawling under the doors.

“The mist you see coming off the frozen individuals is condensation in the air,” Victor said, still gazing through the tiny window. “The frozen people are cooling the air around them making the water vapor in the air condense, forming a miniature cloud. It’s really rather beautiful.”

Zee and I both stared at Victor.

He looked over and blinked. “What?”

“You do see the dead people, right?” Zee asked him.

“Of course. But you have to admit, science is fascinating.”

“Not while we’ve got Frosty the Fuckin’ Psycho Snowman adding people to his icy collection we fuckin’ don’t.”

“We don’t actually know who’s doing this,” I pointed out. “Or why.” But it was creepy, for sure. Stepping back from the door, I blew into my cupped hands to try and thaw my fingers. The cold was in my bones now, making them ache.

“Why would a riddle on an ancient key bring us down here?” Zee asked. “I’m not seeing any treasure, Kitten. This is the opposite of treasure... it’s trouble.”

“Perhaps there is something else in the cellar?—”

“Hel-lo?” A faint trembling voice sailed toward us, coming from another chamber deeper inside.

We all turned toward the end of the cellar where the eerie blue light seemed brighter.

“Or, we could just leave?” Zee suggested. “I liked my plan the best—don’t get involved, walk away, live to fight another day, avoid creepy voices and stay alive. Let’s fuckin’ go.”

“The opportune moment to extract ourselves from events has long passed,” Victor explained.

“Well fuck, you didn’t say there was a time limit on checking out.”

While they muttered to each other, I approached the final door on the right, following the raspy voice. Was someone alive down here?

Standing on my toes, I peered through the little window, just like the last door, but this one was all misted up, obscuring whatever was inside. It had to be another frozen-person chamber, right? And if it was Eddie, then we may be able to save him. Taking hold of the metal loop handle, I gave it a twist and the door popped open an inch. More wispy condensation rolled out.

We hadn’t come this far to back away now. I had to know what was inside.

I pushed the door open some more, let the mist waft over me, and took a step inside.

“Eddie?” I whispered.

A figure took shape in the murk.

“Adam?” Zee’s voice tugged on half my attention, while the rest focused on Eddie emerging from the gloom. Wait... not Eddie. The figure wasn’t male. Tall, slim, and... sparkling? And the woman’s grin glistened with transparent icicle teeth.

“You’re not Eddie,” I yelped.

“Trespassers!” she screamed, unleashing a halo of bright blue light.

I leaped back and slammed the door on the sparkly ice witch. Oh-kay, time to go.

A heavy weight slammed against the door, rattling its hinges. She was not a happy witch.

I spun on my heel and made for Victor and Zee.

“Uhm, are we going now?” Zee asked. “What about the axeman?”

I grabbed his arm, dragging him toward the stairwell. “Let’s take our chances with the golem.”

The door exploded outward, flew across the cellar, and shattered against the wall, and in its wake drifted the sparkling crystalized woman wearing a dress of cascading blue diamonds—or a whole lot of ice, I couldn’t tell, and wasn’t sure I wanted to hang around long enough to figure it out.

She flicked a hand, and in the next moment Victor was between us. He grunted and stepped back, stumbling into me.

“Oh, hell no, bitch. You touch Daddy Vampire, you die!” Zee lunged as I caught Victor, keeping him upright as he wavered on his feet.

The ice witch flung another shard at Victor, but Zee’s tail snatched it from the air and flung it back. It smacked her between the eyes and shattered, stunning her. Zee poofed behind her, grabbed her around the waist, and tossed her back into the chamber. He plunged in after her.

I got a look at Victor, and the blood on his shirt.

“I’m alright,” Victor snarled, yanking an icy shard out of his shoulder. “But Zodiac may not be if she?— ”

Zodiac poofed in front of us and spun, reaching over his shoulder to try and grab the stake of ice sticking out of his back. “Bitch stabbed me in the back!” Victor moved fast, yanking it out, then brandished the bloody stake as a weapon.

“Zodiac, are you able to continue to fight?” Victor asked him.

“Pfft, this ain’t nothing my god powers won’t heal.”

A hail of jagged ice erupted from the ice witch’s chamber. Victor shoved Zee to one side, taking several to the gut, and buckling as he took icy stake after stake.

Rage erupted in my veins. I’d seen enough.

“Hey!” I marched forward. Ice flew at me, struck my thigh, my hip, and one shard whizzed by my arm, but by then I was inside the wispy cloud where the ice witch glowed blue. Her eyes widened with shock—her icicles hadn’t stopped me—and that shock gave me an opening. I grabbed her neck and flung her against the cellar’s back wall.

“Lady, I do not want to hurt you, but I will if you hurt them .” I flung a hand behind me, gesturing at my two wounded partners.

She didn’t seem to be listening, and rising to her feet, vapor poured off her as a cloak of cloud.

Whatever she was, it was powerful. But not my kind of powerful.

If I got my hand around her neck again, I could snap it in two, but I really, really did not want to do that. “Listen. I am a nice person. Most of the time.” I lowered my hands, fingers twitching. “We don’t want to hurt you.”

With a vicious snarl, she snapped, “Get out of my house!” And as she flung out a hand, a wall of ice sealed the cellar behind me, trapping me in the far end with her. Any second now, Zee would poof inside... and she’d stake him through the heart. I saw the intent in her eyes, but maybe the brittle cracks of fear too.

Uncertainty, confusion. Was she scared of us?

“Stay out there, Zee! I’ve got this.”

But as I turned to find the ice witch’s jagged teeth bared and her blue eyes blazing with arctic power, I was not at all certain I had this.