CHAPTER TEN

Standing in the center of the main clubhouse area, Viper crossed his arms over his chest as he glared at his brother.

"It's not what you think," Darko defended, raising his hands slightly.

Viper shot him an incredulous look. "It's not?"

"No."

Digging deep for patience, Viper took a long breath. "You're stood here covered in blood, and Omen found you looming over the dead body of a male demon outside the Red Rooms. Seems to me that you killed that demon."

"Then, yes, it is what you think," Darko admitted with a brief tilt of his head. "But I had valid reasons."

Oh, this should be good. "Which are?"

"He threw a hellfire orb at me."

Viper waited, but his brother said nothing more. "First of all, that's one reason. Second of all, I doubt this was an unprovoked attack." Darko had a way of making even the most tolerant person blow a fuse. "What did you do?"

He grimaced. "I might have called him a pussy. Things kind of escalated from there."

Viper heaved a sigh.

"I caught him slapping his girl around, and it was obvious he did it regularly," Darko continued. "I don't like that shit."

"Most people don't, and they'd have intervened if they could have. But did you genuinely feel that the only way to deal with the situation was to erase the demon's existence?"

Darko's brow furrowed. As if no other course of action had even occurred to him.

Viper clenched his jaw. "We already have local humans disappearing—that's going to lead to people knocking on our door eventually if we don't get rid of the damn strix fast. You really want to draw the attention of a demon lair as well?"

Darko's expression was the facial equivalent of a dismissive hand flick. "I made his corpse vanish. No one will trace his death back to me. And, if they do, I'll handle it."

"How?" challenged Viper. "By killing them, too?"

He shrugged. "It's the quickest way to get rid of a problem."

Viper sighed again. He did it a lot around this particular angel. In fact, the majority of their club did.

"Why are you riding my ass but not his ?" groused Darko, indicating at Ghost. "He was told not to buy a Deadpool suit. Look at him."

Lounging on the sofa, Ghost pointed at Darko. "Two things. One, I'm wearing a mask, not a suit, so it doesn't really count. Two, this is a Spiderman mask, not a Deadpool one. You need to get your facts right."

"You need to get that mask off your face," Darko countered.

"I second that," Jester piped up from the other side of the room, swiping darts out of the wall-mounted board. "And it don't look like a spider. Just saying."

Viper caught Darko's eye. "Stop trying to divert my attention. We're talking about you, not Ghost—he'll get bored of wearing the mask when you all stop reacting to it. Your problem is a lot bigger. And I'm not talking the issue of a dead demon. I'm talking of how you seem to be using any excuse you can find to kill someone."

Darko inched up his chin. "I was trained to kill. I was made to do it regularly. The Uppers can't then put me out in the world and expect me to be normal."

"They didn't actually put you out into the world," Jester pointed out. "You fell by choice."

"Don't you get tired of being technical?" sniped Darko.

Jester's response was instant. "No."

Right then, Dice teleported into the room. He did a double-take at the sight of the blood on Darko. "You have a run-in with someone? Tell me you didn't do that thing again where you pounce on any reason to kill someone."

"I don't pounce on reasons, my actions are always justifiable. You're not more curious about why he's wearing a Batman mask?" Darko asked, flicking a hand at Ghost.

"Spiderman," Ghost corrected.

Dice angled his head. "I'm thinking it might actually be a Batman mask. I mean, spiders don't have upward-pointing black ears. That does."

A dart hit the board with a thunk just before Jester slid a look at Ghost, who'd yanked off his mask to study it. "I did say it didn't look like a spider."

Viper slowly blinked, thinking that none of the people who watched his brothers warily would ever for a moment guess that these conversations took place between them.

Dice did a double-take as he looked out of the window. "The fuck?"

"What?" Viper tracked his gaze to see— motherfucker —a strix stood outside the chain-link fence at the rear of the compound, looming over a corpse.

"Son of a bitch," spat Jester. "That'll be another of the missing humans."

The strix noticed them looking but didn't scamper. It remained in place and grinned cockily. Viper didn't worry that the little shit would bypass the fence. The entire compound was protected by wards that were powered by his blood—no demon would get through them.

Abruptly, the strix did a one-eighty and dashed across the stretch of unused, barren land that led to a wooded area.

"It could have dumped the body and then snuck off," mused Ghost. "It waited for us to see it. It's trying to lure us to the woods."

Dice nodded. "It won't be alone."

"No, it won't." Viper reached out to their other brothers on the club's ‘channel': Everyone get to the main area of the clubhouse. Now.

They appeared in fast succession, and Viper quickly brought them up to speed before adding, "The strix won't all be waiting in the woods. It's too predictable."

"Where will they be?" asked Rivet.

Hustle rubbed at his jaw. "They'd want to blindside us."

Viper swept his gaze over the land outside. Realization hit him fast. "Mist."

Razor's brows dipped. "What?"

"They're hiding in mist-form on either side of the land beyond the fence," Viper elaborated. "Look. Closely. You can see faint clumps of mist."

"Do we pretend we've fallen for their trick?" asked Jester.

"Don't really have much choice." They could attack from the safety of the compound, but the strix would retreat if they were unable to land any blows. Viper and his club couldn't eat at the colony's numbers if they didn't battle them.

Viper felt his lips thin. He wasn't in the mood for this. Normally, he'd perk up at the prospect of battle. But he planned to head to the pool hall soon, just as he did every Friday. He wanted to see Ella, corner her, coax her into giving in to him.

He hadn't seen or heard from her since he fucked her at his club on Monday night. She hadn't come to him—disappointing, but unsurprising. He needed her to take a step toward him, but he was prepared to make a move of his own; had warned her that he would. Viper didn't want to rush her, though.

Viper slipped off his jacket and placed it on the nearby pool table. At least they wouldn't have to worry about witnesses. The compound was out in the middle of nowhere. It wasn't vulnerable, though—not when it housed a collection of fallen celestials as dangerous as that of Viper and his brothers.

"We teleport outside the fence, forming two lines that stand back to back and fully face the mists," said Viper.

"In our usual formation?" asked Sting.

They'd used such a move in the past during battles. "It'll work best."

Once the others had all removed their own jackets, Darko arched a brow. "We get to play again, right?"

Since Viper had somewhere to be … "Not for too long, so make the most of it."

As one, they shimmered outside—seven forming a line facing the left of their land, the others forming a line facing the right.

Viper didn't hesitate to make a move. He struck with a telekinetic wave that slammed down on the mists from above, forcing them to crash to the ground. The mists flickered, thickened, and rippled before reforming into a row of fifteen strix. Red eyes gleaming with pain, rage, and bloodthirst slammed on the Black Saints.

"I feel bad for them," mocked Darko beside Viper. "I mean, how honestly devastated would you be if your eyes were red? I'd wear contacts for life."

Two strix leaped to their feet and rushed him. Viper hit out with an archangelic blast. The rippling wave of unholy fire rushed out and sliced through their bodies like a knife through butter. Bodies that fragmented into ashes.

The fight turned ugly fast. Hisses, screeches, laughs, the crackling of flames and orbs—all of it echoed across the vast spread of land. Orbs of hellfire and unholy fire bounced back and forth; slamming into bodies, blistering flesh, eating at cloth. The scents of blood, acid, pain, sulphur, and brimstone clogged the air and fed his entity's hunger for violence and death.

A strix propelled itself into the air and landed on Viper, knocking him flat on his back. His breath gusted out of him but, the thrill of battle on him, he didn't hesitate in telekinetically ‘throwing' the strix backward, sending it flailing through the air before it hit the ground hard. He jumped to his feet and slammed it with orb after orb until, finally, it exploded into ashes.

A whip of black fire cracked out and wrapped around his wrist, yanking him to the side. Gritting his teeth as his skin sizzled beneath the boiling heat of the whip, Viper tossed a blazing orb of unholy fire at his attacker, hurtling it right at the strix's face.

The demon's head snapped back from the force of it. Viper took instant advantage of its disorientation—smacking it with a lethal archangelic blast.

Beside him, Ghost tossed a fast-dying strix on the ground and spat. "Why does their blood have to taste like it's been burned?"

On Ghost's other side, Razor shrugged. "We've tasted worse."

A strix leaped at Viper. No, over him. A pale arm then wrapped around him from behind as fangs knifed into his skin. The strix took only one gulp of blood before rearing back with a shriek of pain.

Leaving his acidic blood to kill the demon from the inside out—it made for an excruciating death—Viper switched his focus to yet another strix. He hurled an unholy orb at its head. The demon shifted into a tight ball of mist, avoiding the hit, and just as swiftly shifted back.

Awkward little bastard couldn't just die easily, could it?

Viper tossed out a series of orbs. The strix evaded all … bar one. The final ball of flames wacked its head hard, killing it instantly.

Breathing hard, he took a quick moment to quickly scan the metaphorical battlefield. All his brothers were still standing, still fighting. Several were covered in ultraviolent flames, blasting streams of it out of their palms. The surviving strix were in bad shape—patches of their flesh were black, burned, and corroding. There weren't very many left.

He heard a wrench as Darko plucked off a strix's head. The bodily remains crumbled to ashes. "Bastard tried ripping a chunk out of my throat," he told Viper, indignant. "It seemed excessive."

Viper could only shrug.

More and more strix came his way. Nails raked at him. Fangs punctured him. Whips lashed him. Orbs punched him.

To the music of his brothers' perverse laughter, Viper kept on fighting; pelting the strix with blasts, orbs, and telekinesis.

A hellfire orb crashed into his skull so hard his head snapped to the side. The move sent pain streaking up his neck and made his ears ring.

Another flaming ball came his way. He dodged it, struck out with an archangelic blast, and grunted in satisfaction when his attacker—

Blazing trails of fire raked down his back. Fucking razor-like nails. He pivoted to face his new foe, dived right at the little fucker, and roughly buried his teeth into its neck. The strix burst into molecules, escaping his hold, and darted backwards out of reach.

Realizing that the sounds of battle had greatly dimmed, Viper looked around … and frowned at a cursing Jester, who was wrestling with a bat that was biting at his face, its leather wings flapping at his hand.

Jester snapped its neck, coughing as it then burst into ashes that showered his face. "Fucking. Hate. Strix."

"So you often say," intoned Ghost before puffing out a breath. "Looks like the battle's over."

It did. Jester had killed the last of the strix. Ashes littered the ground and peppered his brothers' clothes and skin.

No one was badly hurt—or they had drunk enough blood to heal any severe injuries.

"That was a decent-sized bunch of strix we just killed," remarked Omen as he approached.

"There'll be many more," commented Razor.

Omen granted that with a stiff incline of his head. "But the colony has taken a good hit, if you count the amount of strix we've killed in total since they shoved themselves onto our radar."

"They sent more this time, but not a lot more," Viper noted. "Like they believed we'd won the last battle by some stroke of luck."

"I reckon the next batch that come after us will be bigger again," Ghost predicted. "But not too big—the queen won't want to have to send any who she doesn't consider expendable."

Omen nodded. "Yeah, we have to remember that these won't be her strongest fighters. She'll be keeping those close for her own protection."

Done with strix bullshit for the day, Viper blew out a long breath as he took stock of himself. "Let's head back. We need to move the human corpse that was left outside the compound. Then I need a fucking shower and change of clothes. Fast." He had a pool hall to get to.