Page 13 of Witch Queen

Mae had reluctantly agreed. Since the hospital in the basement of the main headquarters of the coven was out of action, she would have to sneak the corpse into the mortuary at Grandview General to carry out the autopsy.

“Steve would kill me if he knew what I’m about to do,” Mae murmured as they drove into the underground garage beneath Vlad’s apartment building.

“He still can’t get the higher-ups to grant you an extension on your leave?” Nikolai said.

“No.” She grimaced. “At this rate, I’ll be without a job soon.”

Nikolai refrained from telling her that the combined wealth of all the covens meant she could live out the rest of her life in gold-plated luxury and eat all the cake she wanted. He knew how she felt about using money she hadn’t earned for herself.

She must get it from her parents.

They’d just gotten into the lift to Vlad’s penthouse when Mae startled.

“Oh.”

Nikolai frowned. “What’s wrong?”

“I just felt Cortes and Anya’s cores in the building.” Mae’s expression grew puzzled. “That’s strange. They weren’t there a second ago.”

She stiffened the next instant. The hairs rose on Nikolai’s arms. He could sense something in the distance. Something sinister.

A vile pressure thickened the air, drawing a gasp from them both. The cabin trembled.

Nikolai’s eyes widened.That’s?—

Crimson lit up Mae’s pupils. “There are hellbeasts in the building!”

Brimstone’s hackles lifted.

Nikolai’s pulse quickened as he reached for his magic. His spear manifested in his hand, brimming with the pale light of his Moon and White Magic.

CHAPTERFIVE

A foul stenchflooded Mae’s nostrils when they emerged on the landing outside Vlad’s apartment. Relief shot through her.

She couldn’t sense the incubus or his familiar.

A violent burst of magic brushed against her cores just as Nikolai reached for the door handle, its taste as familiar as her own. She grabbed the sorcerer’s arm and yanked him aside a second before the door exploded outward and crashed into the opposite wall.

The giant hellboar that had smashed into it left a bloodied trail as it slid to the floor, golden sparks sizzling inside the six-inch crater in its chest. The red light in the monster’s eyes faded.

Mae’s stomach roiled when the creature’s dead form collapsed into inky threads that vanished with a hiss of corruption.

“What the hell?!” Nikolai mumbled.

A scream came from inside the apartment. “Enrique,no!”

The chilling power of Anya’s Illusion Sorcery drenched the air.

Mae scowled. “Let’s go!”

The inside of Vlad’s penthouse looked like a bomb had gone off. Broken glass and debris crunched beneath their feet as they closed in on the sounds of the battle. Mae’s heart lurched when they came in sight of the living area.

Cortes stood in the middle of the floor, his eyes and those of his bird familiar Popo blazing with a fierce light as he braced against the bull-like monster towering over them. The sword in his right hand sparked against the beast’s wicked horns while blood dripped from a nasty wound on his flank and soaked into his suit.

The muscles and tendons in his left arm bulged where he hung on grimly to the whip he was using to stop a hellwolf from shredding Anya to pieces, the bright cord raising the sickening stink of burning flesh as it scorched the creature’s hind leg.

The wolf snarled and snapped its jaws inches from the witch, heedless of the pain, claws scraping deep grooves in the floor.

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