Page 137 of Dead Vengeance

“They hurt me,” it repeats, scrambling around the table to get to him. But this time it speaks in a new voice. A child-like voice, a cruel sneer ripping long across its scarred and filthy face, the sound a parody of its former mimicry of Jem.

It lurches forward, snatching at Liam. I act without thought, curling a fist, slamming my arm out long with all the force I can muster.

It connects. A dank squishiness meets my knuckles, foul, then bone. Or something that feels like bone. I knock it back, sending it reeling onto the floor where it lands in a heap.

Its head twists a full one hundred and eighty degrees, staring back at me with wide and bright orange eyes. No smile now, just the violence of teeth and a growl that shakes my core. It coils, readies, springs.

This time, Liam’s ready. He throws a punch straight at the creature’s face, and everyone, even Simon, gasps as Liam’s hand moves straight through the thing, as it keeps on its trajectory, landing on top of me. Its claw-like fingers scratch at my neck. I kick a leg out by instinct, knocking it off.

“I’m gonna shoot it!” Liam shouts, pulling the gun from his pocket. “Simon, look away!”

My heart’s instantly thumping for an entirely different reason than being attacked by random hell spawn. Liam, even now, thinking of gun-triggered Simon. Who, as it goes, has disappeared entirely, leaving Fabian on the sofa, watching one scene after another as if it’s a late-night horror movie.

But the thing doesn’t care about him. Or about me either now. It’s locked onto Liam.

And Liam has his gun pointed straight at it.

“Shoot!” Fabian shouts.

Liam doesn’t make a move. He stares the thing down, then, in a deep and heart-rending tone, he asks, “Do you know my brother?”

The question breaks my heart. Liam’s smart. Liam knows the answer already. I know he does. But that hope, that cloying hope, still pulls at him. Still makes him try.

The grotesque lips pull back, a growl reverberating around the room. It leaps. And Liam sets off a blast of plasma that lights the room, connecting with the creature’s head and blowing it into a million little pieces.

Brown-green matter flies everywhere. All over us, all over the floor, the ceiling, the chandelier. Clumps land on every possible surface.

For a moment, we all just stand there, staring at the smoking mess of what’s left of the thing.

Then Simon materialises, taps his ghost cigarette onto a mound of filth, and says, “I told you not to do it.”

“Kraa!” shouts Edgar.

“A lot of help you both were,” I snipe at them.

“Wait,” Fabian pipes up. “Can you punch ghosts, Archer?”

“Hey, yeah,” says Liam, swivelling around to grin at me. “You totally just punched that ghost.”

“It’s a necromancer thing,” I admit, trying to not feel too bashful beneath Liam’s impressed gaze.

“So many necromancer things to discover,” Liam replies, melting me with the note of sex in his voice, even if it’s maybe not quite the time and place, as evidenced by Simon’s eye roll.

The levity is far too short-lived. Liam slams the gun into his pocket and asks, “That’s it, then? Séance done? He’s not there, is he?”

I’m immediately back to reeling, grasping, trying to sort this thing out for Liam in any way that avoids more contact with an unhinged god. “H-he wasn’t immediately here, no. He didn’t come when I called. But—”

“So Tezcatlipoca has him?” His eyes are bright and sure. “Am I right?”

“Who’s Tezcatlipoca?” Simon asks.

Liam shoots him a fast, business-like explanation. “There’s a god in the attic who’s trapped my dead brother’s soul, and I don’t think he’ll stop haunting me or Archer until I steal his mirror back from my boss.”

Simon exchanges a fast, considering look with Fabian, then, “Huh. Didn’t see that coming.”

“Wait…” Fabian’s up off the sofa, stumbling over to Simon, talking to Liam. “Your boss as in my boss? As in Gerald?”

“We don’t know that’s really what’s going on,” I try to throw into the conversation. “It’s all speculation at this stage.”