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Ah. Then I was well and truly fucked. Except –
“The Veil,” I stammered. “Anyone sees us fighting here and that’s it. The Lorica will have your hides for that. Won’t they?” Hey, it was worth a try.
Prudence chuckled. “Bastion’s gotten a little better at magic since you last saw him, Dust.”
“Aww, shucks. Thanks, Prue.” He pointed at the faint shimmer of the force bubble planted around us. “I made a little augmentation. I infused the field with a glamour. It’s a simple matter of bending the light, see. The normals can’t see us in here. It’s like a one-way mirror. Maybe they’ll bump into it – not that anyone’s even wandering around here – but we won’t be violating the Veil.”
“Wonderful,” Sterling said. “Then nobody has to watch when I tear your tongue out.”
Bastion blinked. “I don’t think we’ve met.”
“You people talk too much.” Sterling puffed out a swirl of smoke and stubbed his cigarette out against the pavement. I didn’t even notice that he’d lit one up. How the hell was he staying so calm? I tried to communicate that very same notion with my face, but he just rolled his eyes, ever the bored, immortal man-child. “Let’s just get this over with. Gil, you take the lady. I’ll deal with the pretty boy.”
“Why, thank you,” Bastion said, smiling.
“Gonna rip his face off,” Sterling said. Bastion stopped smiling.
“Guys,” I said. “We can talk about this.“
The flash of azure light from Prudence’s hands told me we couldn’t. Gil dodged in time, twisting out of the trajectory of her punch, his reflexes alarming considering his height and weight. Prudence’s fist drove into the pavement in an explosion of cement and rubble.
Gil laughed. “Jesus, lady. Watch where you put that.”
“Prudence,” I called out, waving my arms. “Stop. This doesn’t have to get violent.”
“Business is business, Dust.”
“But we did brunch today!”
Prudence ignored me. She swiveled her body on one foot, bringing the other careening in a heavy roundhouse, blue fire tracing the arc of her kick. Gil wove again, barely dodging this time as her foot slammed into a newspaper stand. A sharp crack heralded the burst of splinters and ripped, smoldering pages that drifted into the air.
Gil chuckled. “Does the Lorica pay for collateral damage? You just cost someone their living, lady.”
Prudence charged again. “Stop calling me lady. And yes, I’m sorry, but Sully’s Snack Shack is going to be just fine.”
“Good to know.” Gil twisted as he dodged, then spread the fingers of both hands. He groaned as the ends of them burst into flecks of blood and flesh, as massive talons erupted from his fingers. “Hope you’ve got good insurance, too.”
He snarled, then struck. Blood trailed the arc of his first attack as he swiped his talons at Prudence, who danced out of his range unperturbed, unbothered by the grotesquerie and the violence. Was that how werewolves worked? And it wasn’t even a full moon yet.
“We can talk this out. Guys?” But if the rational half of this street fight was already slamming at each other with fists and talons, I didn’t know why I expected Sterling and Bastion to even give me a listen.
Bastion was already on the ground, his hands thrust up to project a shield. Sterling slashed and punched at him, every blow against Bastion’s invisible shield ringing like a flat, glass gong. Any more of that and I knew it was going to break, and like I said, I might have had my issues with Bastion, but I didn’t want him dead.
“Sterling, stop.”
The vampire whipped his head at me, hissing, teeth somehow longer and sharper than I remembered, eyes blazing red. But that was just the opening Bastion needed.
“Get the fuck off me,” he shouted. Radiance pulsed in a flash of light from his open palms and Sterling went flying across the sidewalk, slamming into a wall. He crashed against it like a rag doll, then crumpled to the ground, limbs arranged in ways that arms and legs weren’t supposed to bend.
“Holy shit,” I said. “Bastion, you killed him.”
Bastion dusted himself off and shrugged. “I mean, maybe? What are you doing hanging around with these types, anyway?”
“My new job,” I said, my eyes darting for a shadow that I could at least step to within the bubble. If I could just emerge behind Bastion, knock him out with a blow to the back of the head – but he’d seen me do that enough times to know it was coming. “They’re my coworkers.”
“Interesting company you’re keeping.” He kept walking towards me, head tilted, tugging on his gloves. “Must keep your work so interesting. We’ve been busy at the Lorica, see. Something about a missing Chalice. Heard anything about that, Dusty?”
Oh shit. They knew. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I stepped away, slipping my hand into my backpack, groping around in the pocket dimension. Cellphone, wallet, shit, where the hell was he?
