Reign of Evil

“You’ve been influenced by the movies, I can tell. You expect us to be stoic, silent, strong, rugged. That sort?”

She nodded. “That’s closer to what I expected.”

“We do that sometimes. But that’s also why we have Commander Holmes around. He’s our official stoic, silent, strong, and rugged SEAL team leader.”

“Enough already,” Holmes growled.

Walker pulled off the A3 into Godalming and followed Sassy’s directions until they came to a quaint house on a side street. One-story, made from stone, and with what looked like a thatched roof, it was right out of a storybook. He watched Sassy walk up the sidewalk in her dress and high heels. This whole experience seemed like it was out of a storybook. Witches… the commonplace, almost casual references to magic and all things magical… supernatural creatures… and faeries. Not the faeries that populated the stories he’d read when he was a child, but the faeries from which those stories originated. And much like the stories from the Brothers Grimm were watered down over the ages, so had the complexity and terribleness of these faeries.

She was gone for ten minutes, during which time the only sound inside the SUV was the occasional sweep of the wiper blade and the panting of the dog. When she returned, she wore black jeans and black high-tops with sparkles. A black blouse peeked out from her black down jacket. She wore a baseball cap with a picture of a witch on a broomstick inside a circle with a line through it. Holmes got out and let her in. She carried a heavy canvas bag, which she deposited on Yank’s lap. She slid into the seat, keeping a smaller bag on her lap.

“What’s this for?” Yank unzipped it and his eyes shot wide. “Sweet.” He pulled free a short sword made from a black metal.

YaYa leaned over the seat to peer into the bag. “What’s that?”

“Gladius,” Sassy said.

YaYa reached out to touch it, but Yank moved it out of reach. “As in what a Roman gladiator used?”

“As in what the common Roman soldier used. But this is no antique.” Yank tested the heft and weft. “My guess is carbon steel.” He counted. “There are six in here.”

“A gift. They’re gladius machetes. The young lady who helped me out has a boyfriend who works at a knife store. She talked him into letting us borrow them.” She smiled flatly. “You’re supposed to return them as good as new.”

Yank snorted, then turned the metal over in his hands. He stared at it the same way some men stare at a beautiful woman.

YaYa managed to reach in the bag and pull one for himself. He sat back in the seat beside Hoover, who could care less about the dull-colored piece of metal. “You’re giving this to us in order to…”

“Kill the hounds,” she said.

“And whatever other beegees there are that don’t like bullets,” Laws added.

Walker felt himself flinch when she said kill the hounds. He was acutely aware that Jen’s soul had somehow been co-opted and used to form one of the creatures. The idea of killing her all over again, killing her soul, made his breath shallow, his chest tighten. He fought back the emotion that threatened to take over his face and swallowed hard as he stared into the dawn of Christmas Day.

“What’s in the other bag?” Yank asked. “More goodies for us?”

“In a way. I need each of your body armor and those mask things you wear.” She unzipped this bag and pulled out a few small bottles of what looked like paint and a tiny brush. “I’m going to put protection runes on you. These runes will be from the Elder Futhark runic language, which is about two millennia old. Elhaz was used by the Norsemen when they invaded, ironically, to protect them from Christianity. Because of its rich history in the Isles, I’ve found it works considerably well against nature spirits, which you could call Tuatha.”

Yank turned to her. “I’m not giving you my armor or my ballistic mask.”

Holmes sighed. “Give it to her.”

Yank tried to draw in the other SEALs with pleading looks, but no one was biting. “But we can’t be sure if she’s—”

“Enough of that.” Holmes shrugged out of his body armor. “Do mine first and make it pretty. Walker, we going to sit here at the curb for the rest of the day?”

Walker shook out of it and put the SUV in gear. Soon they were heading toward Farnborough. When he hit the M3, he turned left. They’d traveled about ten kilometers when Holmes got a call from Preeti. A few moments into the conversation, he told Walker to pull over. There were no turnoffs, so he had to pull far to the edge. Luckily, there was hardly any traffic.

After a few moments, Holmes hung up and let them in on the conversation.

“Looks like the Red Grove is marshaling its forces. Preeti’s been monitoring the CCTV cameras and discovered that there are seven roadblocks, all at major intersections that would bring us to Glastonbury Tor.”

“But we’re not going there,” Laws said.

“As it turns out, their roadblocks have put the whole area out of reach.”

Ever in need of a fight, Yank shrugged. “Why not run them? We have the firepower.”