Legends of Astræa: Cupid's Arrow Book 1 (Legends of Astræa Series) Read online

  My phone was ringing. I looked at the screen to see it was Demyan Greco. I froze. The ringing stopped. I exhaled. Then the ringing began again. Crap. He was not going to stop calling me. I had to put a stop to him, so I picked up the phone and answered it.

  “Yes.” No smiles, flirting, or chuckles from me. I felt angry at myself. I was such a naïve person and a terrible judge of character. I had trusted Ash, and worst yet, I had trusted Demyan. He had fooled me far too many times.

  There was an extra long silence on the other side of the line. For a moment, I thought we had disconnected, but then his breath came from the other side of the line. I wished I could listen to what was going on inside his mind through the phone, but distance was a factor. Cursed powers. I glanced out the large window again. It was dizzying to see the city from that height. Ugh.

  “Miss Pearson, do Francis a great favor.” His voice turned magnanimous and cold.

  I felt like crying, like an idiot. Why was his coldness affecting me so much? I hated him.

  “Do. NOT. Try. To. Rescue. Anyone. On. Your. Own.” He knew I knew about Gavril. HE KNEW. How much more did I need to confirm his betrayal? Crap.

  That was so-o not going to happen, and I was so not going to follow his instructions. He hung up. He knew Ash had Gavril and the queen and probably the Sisters. I really couldn’t trust him. Crap.

  Attack was the secret of defense. Defense was the planning of an attack. I had so needed Francis’s and Sun-Zi’s teachings. Who would have known. I shook my head.

  The elevator doors chimed and opened. Muscle Man slid the electronic card key into his front suit jacket pocket. I smiled. That key was my way out of my fancy tower. I was almost certain. He carried a couple bags with exclusive labels printed on the side. I pulled the pieces out. I was happy to see basic black soft wool clothing and leather boots. Black was quickly becoming my favorite color for mischievous behavior. Although I wasn’t completely recovered, I was feeling better.

  “So which city is this place?” I asked him, looking outside the wall-to-wall window. I could devise a surrounding city with tall buildings covering up with the snow flurries, perhaps not as high as the one I was in, a river snaking afar between mounts of snow banks, and a few car lights that moved across the city that looked like diamonds and rubies moving across laced webs of holiday lights over the avenues.

  He answered my question easily. “We are in Montreal, Canada.” This meant this place was close enough to the Atlantic Ocean. St. Mary’s.

  “The snow is so beautiful—is there a place I can take a walk and appreciate the season’s lights,” I took my lucky shot.

  “Mr. Greco insists that you must rest as much as you can,” he added, avoiding more questions. Right. For crying aloud, I didn’t have time to rest.

  So, I was officially a prisoner. Not for long. I had to find my way to rescue St. Mary’s, Gavril, the queen, and her Draugr. Time was moving fast. I had to do whatever necessary to disable my guards before they told Demyan Greco.

  My chance came when Number Two showed up to bring dinner. Muscle Man walked outside my room, letting Number Two take care of me. Good. I just had to contend with one at the time.

  I turned on the TV. I had to be stealthy and fast.

  “Thank you.” I smiled friendly at him.

  He nodded formally, avoiding eye contact as usual. His hands were busy holding the cart. I, on the other hand, was pretending to be changing the TV channels. But instead, I put the highest volume on to distract him. Then pretended I was trying to fix the controller, but I pressed all the buttons except the volume.

  “Oh, God, sorry. I really don’t know how to…” I babbled my explanations like any of the airheads from St Mary’s would.

  He looked at the controller as I handed it to him innocently close. While he was distracted lowering the volume on the screen, I disabled him in a simple move called kyusho jitsu—the death touch that if executed correctly, pressing my thumb for a few seconds onto one of the two carotid arteries—which are located in the neck and essential to providing blood to the brain, can certainly lead to dizziness, unconsciousness, and in severe cases, death. He was flat out, dropping on the floor heavily.

  I wasted no time tying his hands and legs on his back with my bathrobe belt, and just in time I gagged him with one of the soft and fancy pillow covers before he came around and started trying to utter his muffled cussing.

  “Sorry I have to do this to you,” I smiled back at him as I disarmed him and hid his gun under my bed pillows. I found and took the electronic key card out of his pocket and into my black bathrobe pocket. I took the battery off his smartphone and kicked it underneath my night table. I wasn’t going to let them call Demyan Greco. Then, I pulled him inside my bathroom, where no one could see him. Crap. He was very heavy, and I wasn’t ready to use my strength.

  My hearts were beating too fast and about to collapse from the effort. I breathed in and out to calm them. I put the television volume on high again, and ripped the telephone cord from the wall. I was shaking, feeling a tad weak as I rolled the cable in a small bundle and stuffed it inside my bathrobe pocket. I took the other pillow case out of the pillow, rearranged the pillows and bed as if it had just being done. I kept the pillow case handy hidden under the pillows.

  Once I sort of regained control, I opened my door and called out to Muscle Man, who sat on a nice chair next to the private penthouse elevator. He was reading the newspaper. Sweet, he would be in a rush to go back to it.

  “We are having TV problems,” I shouted with faint voice. It wasn’t an act; I was feeling weak.

  He nodded, frowning at the loud volume, and called Number Two by his name. Harris.

  “O, he is by the TV. He can’t hear you with the volume so…” High. I shouted as I led him, leaving me breathless from the effort.

  He came inside the suite after me. I served myself a cup of coffee from the cart. All I had to do was to take his taser from him. I could try my own powers, but I decided not to. I couldn’t rely on my powers not to fry him by accident or not to faint myself because I wasn’t fully recovered from Nicholas’s attack.

  “Hmm. Good coffee. When you are done, you should have some. There is plenty left,” I shouted again, distracting him from the room.

  He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head in suspicion, as if I was totally insane to invite him to have a cup of coffee in a moment like this. He had no sense of humor. He turned his back to me.

  I took the small saucer plate from underneath my coffee cup as he stood by the threshold of my bedroom. I aimed the small coffee saucer toward the back of his neck like a frisbee. Crap. The small plate did nothing to his wide, beefy neck. He just rubbed it as if a mosquito had bit him instead of a well-aimed plate. He turned around with his hand on the taser. The element of surprise was gone.

  I guess I had to create another surprise. Everything can be weapon. I pulled and threw the cart tablecloth to cover his face and arm, particularly the one with the taser. Francis had taught me the difference between a taser and a stun gun, and this was an advance taser that fired two small dart-like electrodes that connected into the hand unit by conductors that would deliver electric current, causing “neuromuscular incapacitation.”

  This specific model could give a person about five seconds of shock time and could be fired as many times as the gun holder wanted. I couldn’t let him disable me. He barely struggled with the tablecloth, and it slipped off him. He smirked, pointing his taser at me. The way I felt, all I could do was avoid his taser after he made his first shot.

  I was faster and lighter on my feet than he was. However, he was stronger, and at this moment, his hand was bound to a taser, and I couldn’t find a way to knock him out. Moving was a great deal. It exhausted me rapidly. I felt like a bull fighter as I grabbed the tablecloth to try to blind him again. I just needed enough time to grab the ceramic lamp on the corner coffee table. I didn’t want to kill him, just make him lose his grip on that taser.

&nb
sp; It broke into a dozen pieces as I hit him on his head. The giant lost his grip on the taser as he fell to his knees.

  The taser bounced next to me. I took possession of it and shot at him. But the giant wasn’t done. He had enough adrenaline coursing through him to stand up and try to reach me. Crap. I wondered what was he eating that made him so powerful. I had no time for any other tricks, so I shot again, and again for a third time. He kept fighting the electric shock while he contorted. On him, it lasted barely three seconds. He couldn’t be human. Suddenly, he stopped fighting me. Crap. Crap. Crap. I panicked and checked his pulse. Ugh, poor thing.

  Thankfully he was still alive, but his body still contorted in pain. Crap. Save Gavril first. Guilt later.

  “So sorry. Nothing personal. I’ll make it up to you next time. Coffee?” I said, sort of apologizing as I knotted the phone cord over his hands and feet together. I gagged him too with the pillow case and took a couple minutes to rest. This had been too much. How was I going to travel and confront evil in this condition?

  I inhaled. I had to. I could whine all I wanted later.

  His eyes followed my steps as I took his large gun fitted with a silencer. Only hitman and serial killers used silencers. I recognized the type of gun. It was a Desert Eagle .44 Magnum Tungsten. I knew then that he had underestimated me, and that I had been lucky he intended to use the taser.

  I searched all his pockets and found another lucky electronic key card out of his suit jacket, found his phone, and took it apart before flushing it. I didn’t really flush it. I just let him think that I had when I dropped the batteries inside the toilet bowl. I placed their phones underneath one of two sinks inside the bathroom.

  It literally took me less than two minutes to dress. Francis would have been proud of me. I grabbed the leather bag, Francis’s phone, and Number Two’s fresh taser. I picked up Muscle Man’s Magnum. It didn’t fit inside my backpack, it was too large, otherwise I would have taken it. My target being Ash supernal, I wasn’t going to need it. I didn’t think bullets could hurt him.

  Crap. So in all reality, it was already a lost battle with or without bullets. I inhaled for strength. Gavril and the queen depended on me. If I could just find the medallion first.

  I ran to the elevator and slid one of the electronic cards, hoping Muscle Man or Number Two wouldn’t be able to run the elevator without them. There were always stairs, but they would never make it before me. I pressed one, and a quick minute later, my senses were overwhelmed at the echoes and music.

  I walked out onto what seemed to be not a street exit, but a gym. I spotted two women arriving from the electric stairs. They hung their thick winter coats over a tall rack before entering the gym. I needed a coat.

  Sadly, my life of crime was expanding to stealing a winter parka. Well, if I was going to face evil, I would think God would try to cut me some slack on brownie points to heaven. I picked a nice red one and continued my exit to the electric stairs. My eyes looked for any hidden cameras as I went down one level.

  It was a lobby of some sort. People sat on large sofas, reading the newspaper or checking their emails on their laptops. Others mingled or carried conversations. A long marble counter dominated the right side of the area. Gratefully, the man behind the counter was a normal human being and not one of Demyan’s zombie-bots. He was dressed in a formal dark suit and tie, but he had absolutely no idea who I was.

  “Oui mademoiselle,” he greeted me.

  “I need to get to the airport.”

  “The storm has the airport closed down, but the train station is open,” he said. Crap. “I can give you updates. Which suite are you in?” he asked me.

  I didn’t have time for updates. His phone line rang.

  I grabbed his attention back. “How can I get to the train station?”

  “Mademoiselle can take the metro from here to la Gare Lucien-L’Allier,” he said, feeling rushed by the ringing phone.

  “There is a subway here? In this building?” I asked.

  He nodded, pointing at the elevator doors located in the center of the building.

  “Go down two floors, and you will find the entrance to the metro,” he said, lifting the phone to his ear.

  I turned away as quickly as I could, praying it wasn’t a warning phone call to hold me. Muscle Man could catch up with me at any moment.

  I reached the elevator doors. There were eight of them, four on each side. The penthouse elevator was not among those doors. I realized then that Demyan’s penthouse elevator was private.

  I had never been on my own and had never taken any public transportation. At first confounded, I found myself looking for directions. I had to take the orange route. I figured out the rest easily after that. However, I had taken too long already trying to get out of this city. I felt better as I stood inside the train station buying a train ticket.

  “I need to connect with the Downeaster train to Boston,” I asked the elder woman with Lucille Ball’s big hair behind the window counter.

  “No trains to Boston. The five fifteen Adirondak will take you to Central station New York. You can get a train connection there,” the woman said. That was in ten minutes. That would do.

  “Okay.” I would take anything.

  “Eighty dollars one way. You will be arriving after midnight,” she recited, not even looking at my face.

  Good. I pulled a hundred out of my pocket and payed her.

  “Platform two,” she said, giving me back my change and the ticket.

  I looked for platform two. There were just three. My phone vibrated in my pocket. Demyan was calling me. I had barely been gone a half hour. I turned off the phone and pulled the battery apart. Standard procedure. Thank you, Francis.

  Now he couldn’t locate me. Next, he would cancel my credit card, but I had enough cash to get me through. I prayed everyone would think the convent was the very last place I wanted to go.

  I kept my eyes searching for Demyan or his zombie men, but I saw no one like them. Not even police or anyone looking for me. Yet I felt as if I was being watched. I felt better as I jumped inside the train and could hide inside. I breathed again when I felt the train moving.

  Then why was I feeling terrible for not following Francis’ instructions? Or Demyan’s? I wondered why. Ultimately, why did I care about him? I should not care for someone who plainly liked to play both sides. I shouldn’t be so trusting of him. On the contrary, I should be very offended that he hadn’t said much of what happened to my father, and I was crazy to still be thinking of his kiss… or the way he looked at me with that cute wicked dimple when we danced.

  FOCUS!

  Gavril, the queen, Marcus, Nicholas, and even the Sisters needed me. The only thing I could bargain with… was just a story. The medallion was just a myth. I didn’t even know if it existed in my time or if I could even vanquish Ash with it.

  I was doomed.

  My friends were doomed.

  Everyone was doomed. CRAP.

  The world was doomed if Ash had the chance to change the world as he wanted.

  Chapter 50

  I sat on the train with my eyes closed, trying to think what to do next. I prayed for inspiration, because at this point I had nothing else left to save anyone.

  If only I had something to bargain Gavril’s life with.

  But I had no clue where to find the medallion, or did I?

  I shook my head, because for someone with photographic memory and mind powers, I was truly a lousy investigator. A terrible one at that. I could look for the medallion the one way no one else could—with my sight, just my sight.

  I inhaled and projected the image of the medallion I had seen in Demyan’s dream.

  Zoom…

  Instantly, I was standing inside Our Lady of the Stars Chapel.

  No…

  No, it couldn’t be. Not that.

  The Sidhe Medallion was encrusted like a carved stone on the neck of the marble statue I had seen every day of my life. The markings in th
e pedestal were of an Occitan cross regarded also as a Cathar symbol, just like the medallion.

  Cathar from the Greek Katharoi, the pure ones.

  Our Lady of the Stars and the medallion hidden away on consecrated grounds just like I had been. Of course. Why couldn’t I have seen it before? So obvious. It couldn’t possibly be.

  Then another realization hit me. Demyan and Francis had seen it in person. In fact, they had peculiarly eyeballed Our Lady of our Stars, but did they know the medallion had been at St. Mary’s all this time? They were the only two people that could find the medallion the same way I had. If they did, they’d never taken it. The medallion was still there as I was directly seeing it. So why did they never take it? Another mystery. Crap. I had literally been looking for the medallion the wrong way and in the wrong places, but so had the Count.

  I gasped for air as I came back inside the moving train. The sound of the rails playing like a constant drumming in the background brought me to a shocking realization.

  Ash was at St. Mary’s waiting for me. How was I going to get to the medallion without being detected first? Did he know where the medallion was? Was that the reason he brought the queen and Gavril into the convent? Crap. Crap. Crap. I shook my head. I prayed that he didn’t know.

  I was going to find out soon. Crap.

  Chapter 51

  The seawater permeated the air aboard the ferry. The heavens, impervious to daylight, had turned dark with heavy clouds about to wash away everything in its path. As I watched the dim light from the big city vanish, I wondered if I should find shelter at Francis’s house. Was it even available? Nuh… too predictable. Should I risk my presence at the little inn? Nuh. That was a red flag. Too risky. I decided against it.

  A woman with her two children smiled at me across the seating lounge inside the ferry as I entered to warm up.