Godfather, I thought to myself. I’d called him Godless when he’d tried to get too chipper a few minutes ago. The irony of it all—if not for the macabre scenery—was not lost on me. A Greater Demon—an angel who had chosen not to follow his daddy, God—was excited to be my Godfather.
Which really made me begin to doubt my mother’s sanity. I mean, who chose a Greater Demon to be a God-father? It was kind of in the freaking name. Maybe the hospital had been experimenting with some new pain meds when she had me.
Because all these obviously rational thoughts contradicted the Blood Bond connecting us. And he’d given me the choice to come here—even kneeling at my feet less than an hour ago, giving me the option to kill him if I thought he was lying. In a crazy, broken-home kind of way, his actions over the past few years had checked out.
Which left me sitting on the fence, debating which way to lean.
I felt him watching me, so I turned to face him. “Why did you really choose to work for my mother? Agreeing to become my Godfather?” I asked, not buying his earlier answers.
This strong, charismatic, authoritative man…bit his lip, looking extremely uncomfortable. “You wouldn’t believe me,” he finally said.
I narrowed my eyes. “True. And you’re still going to tell me.”
He sighed wearily. “First Corinthians, chapter thirteen.”
I grabbed him by the collar and slammed him up against the door, banging his head against the wood and very seriously considering choking him to death. “Don’t you dare joke about my mother like that. She loved Titus, not you.”
Because that was the passage about unconditional love.
Despite my aggression, Samael nodded patiently. “Entirely true.” When I still didn’t let go, he jerked his chin towards the castle. “We have more important things to worry about inside, Callie…”
I grunted, letting him go forcefully. “We’re not finished with this conversation, Sammy,” I finally muttered.
He beamed excitedly, despite my obvious displeasure. “Nicknames. Alright, Call—” He cut off abruptly, scratching at his jaw, obviously unable to come up with a nickname since my real name had already been shortened.
Excalibur had become Callie.
Because I’d learned that when my mom wasn’t auditioning the worst of the worst to be my Godfather, she’d been bonding a piece of Excalibur into my very soul. The Name. Thankfully, it no longer resided inside of me, having been transferred to an old leather sheath locked away with Pandora in Nate Temple’s Armory.
But once I finished my date with Dracula, I was supposed to personally deliver the sheath to…well, someone in St. Louis. I wasn’t even sure who. I’d been on such a wild excursion in Kansas City over the last few days that I hadn’t even bothered asking Nate about it. I’d had enough on my plate. And why worry about the little things when probable death had been on my calendar?
I walked past Samael to enter Castle Dracula, shivering at the thought that I was walking into the mouth of a Beast.
Because that was exactly what we were doing. Much like Nate Temple’s mansion in St. Louis, Castle Dracula harbored a Beast—a celestial entity of some kind that had successfully bonded with the sprawling castle so that it was actually a living, sentient being.
The humans who had been able to successfully bond with Beasts had been known as Makers—and Makers were to wizards what wizards were to non-magical humans. Their thoughts were literally magic—they could think something and make it become reality. No middle steps.
If a wizard wanted a fireball thrown at you, they had to draw heat from their surroundings, ignite it, and then draw more energy from the air to get the necessary propulsion to throw it at you. Not hard, but several steps.
If a Maker wanted a fireball thrown at you…ya’ just became a flamer, bro. Period.
Because Makers were empowered—or assisted by—the Beasts clutching their souls like parasites.
Except sometimes Beasts chose locations over people. Ever heard about the Bermuda Triangle? Beast. Volcanoes that erupt out of nowhere? Beast. Certain places around the world that were famous for giving visitors some extremely strong sensation—whether it be fear, bliss, romance, et cetera? Beast, Beast, Beast, Beast-cetera.
Nate Temple’s mansion was possessed by a Beast named Falco—not needing a Maker to keep it in line.
Castle Dracula was no different.
So as I stepped through those doors, I was—quite literally—walking into a set of open jaws. And I was pretty sure I could feel the Beast inhaling my scent with a purr of anticipation.
The only way out was to find the Beast’s gag reflex.
According to Samael, there was a weapon deep within the center of Castle Dracula, and it was the only thing capable of ending the Master.
Dracula’s Bane.
Ripping out Dracula’s tonsils was pretty much our only goal on this field trip. Otherwise it was just an elaborate, $6.99, suicide-mission-special.
Chapter 2
We entered a marble hallway that was at least thirty paces wide, the ceiling about fifty feet over our heads—not as high as the roof I had seen from outside, letting me know there were more levels above us.
I had a feeling that was going to become a theme, because I’d gotten a chance in the courtyard to look out over the walled estate. Now, I wasn’t a distance-ologist or anything, but the enclosed place seemed to stretch across miles of rocky hilltops. It was easily the size of many small towns I had traveled through in Missouri, complete with parks, dozens of cobbled streets, vibrant gardens, an observatory, a labyrinth, a small lake, cemeteries, and towers—lots and lots of towers. I’d seen a handful of stone staircases designed to look like serpents that encircled towers the size of small skyscrapers. Some of the structures were detached from the castle proper, broken up by the outdoor areas, but most were interconnected in a tiered, sprawling monstrosity of elegant spires, titanic stairways, jagged cliffs, stone keeps, and bridges as wide as small highways that looked engineered to withstand the weight of multiple armored tanks.
I knew the interior of the castle would take just as much getting used to, anticipating that most rooms, or sections, of the castle would be as large as department stores. The scope of construction—especially for the time period when it had been built—blew my mind. It was astonishing to consider something similar being built today. It would have taken hundreds and hundreds of years without modern-day, heavy equipment.
Of course, I was entirely certain that Dracula had cheated, using his Beast to bring the castle to life.
If I hadn’t taken the time to study the castle from the outside, I might have passed out upon setting foot in the marble hallway.
Even though this room had no windows, long, heavy drapes hung down from the ceiling nearest the walls, stretching all the way to the floor like smears of blood. A ten-foot-wide, spongy, violet carpet stretched across the full-length of the room, starting where we now stood and ending at a set of black double doors.
Fun fact—according to Drac Daily, streams of blood built into the floors were making a comeback in the upper echelons of interior decorating. Or maybe he just wanted easy access to his drink of choice—like a professional football player having fountains of Gatorade throughout his home—because scarlet streams of flowing blood lined either side of the purple-carpeted path, emitting an inviting, bubbling, gurgling sound. They looked deep enough to wade in and too wide to jump across. Something about it really set the mood for me, making me feel welcome.