Burn the Night Read online

  “Hey, watch where you’re going!” the car’s middle-aged male driver yelled from out of his rolled-down window. A thick Mexican accent laced every word. He stuck his head out to continue his tirade. “What’s you problem, lady!?”

  Tistan stopped and turned to face the man. She raised both her clenched fists and slammed them down on his car’s hood so hard her palms left indentations in the metal.

  “If you continue to scream, you’ll be my problem,” Tistan snarled, reaching for one of her sword handles that poked over the top of her shoulders. “In fact, I think this world would be better if I cut that tongue from your mouth, human.”

  “Wow, wow, wow.” Emma ran into the street, grabbing her mother’s arm. She waved away the driver, who had sunk back into his car and gone a pale white color. “Sorry about that; she’s on a sugar high all those coco puffs this morning. I don’t know how they can claim it’s part of a complete breakfast.”

  Emma pulled her mother to the other side of the street. The entire time, Tistan’s eyes never left the frightened driver. She used her right pointer and middle finger to motion to her eyes and then back at the driver.

  “Hey, you can’t be doing that here,” Emma said, releasing her mother’s arm as the two women crested the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street.

  “I wasn’t going to cut out his tongue,” Tistan reassured her daughter in a voice that made it sound like everything was okay. “I was just going to rough him up a bit, maybe take an ear or an eye.”

  “I hope you’re joking,” Emma said to her mother.

  “We’ll never know now,” Tistan responded as the white sedan pulled away. She looked at the store they stood in front of, moving her right hand to the hilt of the sword once more. “Let’s go.”

  4

  As much as Emma thought she should be the one taking the lead inside the shop, she realized arguing with her headstrong mother wasn’t going to get her anywhere.

  The inside of the store had a high ceiling and plenty of light to put Emma at ease. Unlike the tomb she was expecting to enter, the store was cheerfully decorated with pictures of flowers and cathedrals on the walls.

  The musty scent of hundreds, maybe thousands of wedding dresses filled the room. Rows upon rows and racks upon racks lined the majority of the room. Mannequins were set up at intervals displaying wedding dresses that ranged from sleeveless with a plunging neckline to more conservative and layered.

  A man stood behind a waist-high counter to the right rear of the store. A closed door stood across from him on the left.

  “Welcome, welcome,” the man said in perfect English. “How may I help you today?”

  If the man was one of these Vilmar, Emma couldn’t tell. He was older with square glasses. His bald head, narrow shoulders, and average height didn’t exactly scream threatening to Emma. Still, she remembered what her mother said. The Vilmar were masters at strategy. If someone did want to lure Emma into a sense of security, this was the perfect way to do so.

  Emma clenched her fists, feeling the warmth brought on by her power. In a moment, she could use her vambraces to summon a shield or sword. Other items she was less familiar with could be brought to life as well.

  “We’re not here for dresses,” Tistan said, stalking toward the man. Her right hand clenched the handle on one of her weapons. “I’ve seen your kind before. You’re nothing more than a turned human. I would like to speak to your mistress or master.”

  The man ran a thin tongue over his lips, blinking up at Tistan as if he didn’t understand what she was saying.

  “Do you understand me?” Tistan finally made it to the counter where the man stood waiting. “Where is your master? Is he here?”

  Emma was half afraid they were in the wrong place, half too worried about what her mother was about to do to this man at the moment to care.

  Motion behind Emma drew her attention to the entrance they just came through. Dozens of men and woman of all sizes and ages walked into the room. They didn’t seem to be in any apparent hurry. They moved as one, filing into the store until the entrance was clogged with bodies. One of them closed and secured the door behind them.

  The look in their eyes as they stared at Emma and Tistan was unnerving. Their eyes were open, however they looked dazed, as if they weren’t actually seeing anything at all. They looked as though they were under some kind of spell.

  “I think we’re in the right place,” Emma said as the horde of newcomers began slowly moving toward them and forming a circle around the pair. “I don’t think they’re all here looking for wedding dresses.”

  The older man behind the counter smiled before motioning to the door that stood on the other side of the room. It slowly began to open. A dark figure stepped into the room. He was thin and tall, just like the pictures of the Vilmar Emma had seen on General Fox’s smart pad.

  Oh, why didn’t we wait for backup? Emma kicked herself in her mind. A dozen Marines would come in handy right about now.

  The man stood behind the circle of people who had entered the store and now surrounded Emma and Tistan. His dark eyebrows and eyelashes contrasted his pale skin and grey eyes. When he spoke, the fangs on his upper teeth were unmistakable.

  “I wondered when you would come,” he said with the slightest hint of an alien accent. “I hoped you would come. An Arilion Knight. I heard your kind have made a reemergence in the universe. Your order was only legend to me until now.”

  Tistan ignored the Vilmar’s cordial welcome and unsheathed both her weapons. The blades on her slender swords that reminded Emma of katanas glowed with a green sheen. The weapons she used were more than just metal swords. They were coated in what Tistan had described to her was something like a magical liquid that heated the blades and allowed them to cut through other weapons like a warm knife through cold butter.

  Emma tried to keep her cool. This was much harder than she had anticipated while being surrounded by two dozen men and women with dead eyes. Still she refrained from constructing her own weapons, just for now.

  “Your presence is new to me as well,” Emma said, her words slow and deliberate. The last thing she wanted to do now was start to stutter. It was a problem that came from years of being nervous around others that had begun from being bullied in school. “What are you doing on Earth?”

  “I’m glad you can see the reason in having a conversation instead of immediately resorting to violence,” the Vilmar said with a smile as he looked at Tistan’s weapons. He stepped forward to take a place at the front of the gathered circle of his turned humans.

  Emma was able to get a better look at him. He was dressed nicely, in an expensive-looking black suit. A gold chain hung down his neck and stood out against the black button-up shirt underneath his jacket.

  “My name is Desmond Delshire. I’m just a traveler looking for a new home,” the Vilmar said, glancing over at Tistan again. “Much like the Halyna here.”

  “I’m nothing like you.” Tistan bent her knees, ready to spring. She tossed her head back, removing her hood. “I’m not changing the DNA in humans, turning them to fulfill my greater plan.”

  “Oh, that’s what you think I’m doing?” Desmond chuckled with laughter as he shook his head from side to side. The sound made Emma cringe inside. It was empty, devoid of any actual mirth whatsoever. “I’ve only turned those who have come to me. I’ve only taken the ones the humans have cast to the side like trash. I’ve given them better lives.”

  The gathered group of men and woman didn’t look like homeless to Emma at all. Each one of them was clean, groomed, and wore normal, everyday clothes from new jeans to clean polos. Besides the glazed-over look in their eyes, they seemed to be like anyone else.

  Emma did a double take as she recognized a face in the crowd. To her right was the elderly Asian man who had been eating his ice cream when Emma and her mother first teleported into the garment district. He looked at Emma now like a trained animal waiting for the cue from its master.

&n
bsp; “This isn’t a life at all,” Emma said, moving her gaze back to Desmond. “If you really think that, you’re just lying to yourself.”

  “They have food, shelter, clothing; they’re clean and healthy,” Desmond said, opening his arms to take in those gathered in the store. “We don’t have to be enemies. We can come to an understanding. I’ll lay low while I’m on Earth and just take those your society doesn’t want anyway. Agreements such as these have worked on other planets.”

  “I think I’ve heard enough.” Emma brought a purple sword to her right hand. Unlike her mother’s katana-shaped weapons, her blade was heavier. Similar to a long sword, it could be held in a single palm or as a double-handed weapon. “Leave my planet or turn yourself in. Those are your two options.”

  “I wish we could have been friends.” Desmond drew back into the crowd of the humans he had turned around him. He gave a signal with his right hand. “Good-bye, Arilion Knight.”

  The next instant, the lights in the store went out. The only window in the store was next to the front door. A pair of Desmond’s turned threw dark drapes over the window, plunging the room into inky blackness.

  Fear rose in Emma’s heart as she pressed her back to her mother’s. She held her sword in front of her with two hands. Fear, however, wasn’t the only thing rising in Emma. Deep inside her, the will to live, the will to fight the bullies of the world that preyed on the weak rose as well.

  The only light now came from the dull green glow of Tistan’s blades as well as the purple light of Emma’s vambraces and weapon.

  The gathered group of turned around them seemed to snap out of their daze at once. Instead of their stoic stance, they now crouched low, their dead eyes full of bloodlust and rage where emptiness lived a moment ago. They moved around looking for an opening to attack like a pride of lions ready to pounce on their cornered prey.

  “Remember, severing their heads from their bodies is the fastest way to put them down,” Tistan said, still pressing her back to her daughter. “Hold your training close and you’ll be fine.”

  “We really need to start practicing constructing guns,” Emma shouted back over the growling sound coming from the turned. Along with her sword, Emma also constructed a purple bodysuit of thin armor that would protect her from any offensive blow the turned would be able to muster. As far as Emma could tell, they didn’t carry any weapons with them.

  One second they were staring down the turned in the light of their blades, the next all hell broke loose in the wedding dress store. As if the coven of turned were given the green light, all of a sudden, they swarmed Emma and Tistan in one mob.

  The elderly man they had talked to first that stood behind the counter sprang forward, leaping first on the counter and then into the air in a flying attack. He moved like a trained gymnast half his age.

  Emma saw him coming from the corner of her left eye. At the same time, she had three more turned charging her head on.

  And this is why I don’t come to bridal stores, Emma thought to herself as she moved to engage.

  5

  Emma dispatched the first three attackers, charging forward with a wide swipe from her sword that moved from right to left in an upward arc. In this way, she hoped to take out all three charging turned in front of her and pivot all the way through to meet the elderly shopkeeper who descended on her like a trained chimp.

  Emma swung hard, channeling strength into her arms. Her long sword cut through the torso of her first attacker, the chest of her second, and the head of the third. Before she could finish her stroke and turn to the man leaping at her from above, one of Tistan’s green blades swiped up and opened a wound on the man’s face from the bottom of his chin to the crown of his head.

  His forward momentum still carried him straight at the two women, but instead of a manic grin and eager eyes, his body was limp. Emma pushed hard off her mother’s back with her own, opening a space for the dead shopkeeper to sail through before slamming into yet another turned who charged forward.

  Emma struck out over and over again with her purple blade. The proximity they fought in was so close Emma used the pommel of her sword to crack against a skull and placed a booted foot in the sternum of another turned who lunged at her.

  It was like she was stuck in some kind of nightmare. The glow of her armor and sword lit a dozen hungry faces that lunged at her with mania in their eyes.

  “Down!” Tistan shouted.

  Emma didn’t even have to think about what to do; she just reacted. Immediately, Emma went to a knee and ducked. Her mother rolled over her back with her own kicking out at the same time and catching a turned square in the face with a heavy boot.

  “The drapes,” Tistan shouted as she slashed her way forward.

  “I’m on it.” Emma allowed her sword to dissipate. She constructed a helmet over her face and took off like a running back on the way to a game winning touchdown.

  Hands and teeth reached out for her from every corner. Instead of trying to fight them off, Emma rushed forward, making her way to the drapes. The turned hung off her like children. In vain, they tried to bite and then claw at her, but her constructed purple uniform held under their onslaught.

  Emma reached the drapes, ripping them off the rod they were attached to. Instantly, the room was filled with brilliant midday light. She squinted in the sunshine, giving her pupils time to dilate and compensate for the amount of light.

  The turned on her were more annoying at this point than anything else. Emma shook them off, striking out with her fist and legs, breaking bones as she went. One turned in particular was trying to bite at her left leg.

  Emma leaned down and lifted the man, pressing his back to her chest. She placed him in a headlock. He struggled like his life depended on it, but his strength, even as a turned, was no match for Emma.

  She poured her will to fight into her vambraces, which gave her all the strength she needed. As long as her will to fight and win was alive, her vambraces could construct whatever she wanted as well as give her all the strength and speed she required.

  A moment later, the turned in her arms went still. His limp frame dragged against her body, a sure sign the lack of oxygen to his brain had rendered him unconscious. Instead of holding on longer and risk killing him, Emma let him drop to the ground.

  Emma kicked herself for not asking sooner if the result of being turned was reversible. The bodies around her screamed that it was way too late to be thinking about that now.

  The store was littered with bodies. Blood soaked the tile floor and poured from a dozen wounded turned. Tistan stood over one who was trying to crawl on her hands and knees to the rear door Desmond had escaped through. She lifted a green katana over the turned’s head.

  “Wait,” Emma said, allowing her helmet to deconstruct. “Is what Desmond did to them irreversible? Is there a way they can be normal again?”

  “Nope,” Tistan said without sympathy in her voice. She plunged her blade down through the woman’s head below her. “Once the Vilmar get their hands on a host, they can control them. Even when they’re not controlled the turned need to feed. That means more blood, more victims. There’s no bringing them back.”

  Emma’s guilt doubled for feeling a sense of relief. She had to get better at this Arilion Knight thing and fast. What if the turned had been able to be saved? She would have already killed half a dozen of them.

  “This is your first real battle, isn’t it?” Tistan said as she went through the Vilmar corpses one by one and made sure they were dead. “You did well.”

  “There was the fight with the Shay on the beach,” Emma said numbly as she looked at the carnage at her feet. “But this—this wasn’t like that.”

  “Stay focused,” Tistan warned as she moved over to the door that Desmond had escaped through. “The fight is just beginning.”

  Emma nodded. She took a deep breath, calming the sick feeling that grew in her stomach.

  You had to do it; it was self-defense, Emma told
herself in her head as she forced herself to look at the dead bodies. Doing this is saving hundreds, maybe thousands of other lives.

  Emma knew everything she was telling herself was true. Still, it didn’t mask the regret she felt at ending life. On one hand, she knew she would get used to it the more she did it; on the other hand, should she ever want to get used to it?

  These questions would have to wait as Tistan disappeared through the brown wooden door in the rear of the shop. Emma took a deep cleansing breath before following her mother. She had to be careful where to place her feet as the bodies and the slick floor made a morbid obstacle course for her to traverse.

  When Emma finally reached the door, she discovered that instead of an extra room, a flight of stairs led upward to another level. Tistan’s glowing green swords lit the way for her as she used them for light in the dark passage.

  “Why does it always have to be dark?” Emma muttered to herself. “Vampires aren’t bad enough? They have to turn out all the lights?”

  Emma brought a glowing purple sword to her hand again. The contrast felt comfortable in the present moment. Emma knew it was just a weapon, powerless without her; still, it felt familiar in a way that she needed right now.

  Deep inside, Emma felt the will to fight grow. It was still a new feeling for her. Only a few short months ago, she was the stuttering high schooler with no friends, the victim of bullying by pretty much everyone in her school.

  Now she was the Arilion Knight of Earth. A wild sense of power, the will to be everything she could be had been growing in her, like a bear woken from a deep hibernation. Emma knew she was different now. The thought terrified and thrilled her at once.

  Even now, while she crested the steps to reach her mother, who stood at the top of the stairs, an excited tingle of anticipation raced up and down her arms.

  “It’s over,” Tistan said to someone as she stood on the last step and turned to address the dark room. “Let’s be done with your games. Today, you die.”