Discount Armageddon: An Incryptid Novel Read online

  None of the fallen cultists had shoes even remotely near my size, and while they’d kept my weapons in the antechamber—thank God—my clothes were nowhere to be found. Dominic solved the problem by picking me up and toting me toward the exit. I considered protesting, but decided that having fully functional feet was more important than my pride. Besides, anything that gave him something to focus on beyond changing his mind about killing William was probably a good thing.

  Candy walked at the front of our little group, looking as lovesick as a teen who’d just met her Disney Channel idol for the first time. Sarah brought up the rear, and smirked every time I looked at her over Dominic’s shoulder.

  So I guess you’ve converted him through the power of your naughtiness and flexibility. What are you going to do with him?

  “Shut up,” I hissed.

  Dominic cast a startled look my way, then looked back to see where my attention was. Seeing the smug look on Sarah’s face, he chuckled. “Whatever she’s saying to you, it can’t possibly be as bad as the argument we’re going to have when we get back to your apartment.”

  “What argument is that?”

  “The ‘never run off to get kidnapped by another snake cult’ argument.” He sounded completely serious. I raised an eyebrow. “I’m quite serious. I think I aged six years tonight.”

  “Wasn’t he beautiful?” asked Candy.

  There was a pause while the rest of us tried to make sense of this apparent non sequitur. “Yeah, Candy, he was gorgeous,” I said carefully.

  “If you like ’em tall, dark, and scaly,” added Sarah.

  Candy sighed dreamily. “Yeah,” she agreed.

  Okay, that was weird, thought Sarah.

  Lay off, I replied. She just met her first boy. She’s allowed to be a little weird.

  You mean that was the male of her species? Sarah’s expression mirrored her mental “voice,” all shock and awe. Wow. Talk about size really mattering …

  My laughter lasted for the rest of our trip back up into the light.

  Dominic and I reached Dave’s Fish and Strips an hour later, fully dressed and ready to kick some bogeyman ass. Ryan and Istas met us there, the latter looking even grumpier than usual. Both of them glared at Dominic. I put my hands up, relishing the feel of having sleeves again. “Back down, both of you. He wanted to come, and after the little stunt Dave pulled last time, I didn’t think it would be bad to have the backup.”

  “If you’re sure,” said Ryan, still eyeing Dominic with suspicion.

  Istas was more direct. “If you interfere in any manner with our continued survival, I will play skipping games with your intestines while wearing your lungs as a hat.”

  “That’s fair,” Dominic agreed.

  “Enough,” I said. “Let’s go kill a bogeyman in the most painful way we can think of.”

  “Works for me,” said Ryan.

  The main club hadn’t been cleaned up at all—even the bodies of the fallen servitors were still there. I paused to retrieve several of my knives. “Poor bastards,” I said, and pulled a knife from a servitor’s shoulder. “They deserved better.”

  “So did we,” said Istas. I followed her gaze to the white smear of Tooth Fairy dust on the bar floor. Her parasol was next to it, more battered than ever. She stooped to retrieve it, hugging it to her chest. “Mayhem now, please.”

  “Right this way.” I picked up my last knife and started for the manager’s office.

  Dave’s darks were on, turned higher than I’d ever seen them. They filled the hall for three feet on either side of the door, making it impossible to tell what was in the actual office. I stopped at the edge of the darkness, shouting, “Dave! Come out here right now and I won’t let Istas have you!”

  Istas shot me a hurt look. I mouthed “I’m lying,” and she calmed, returning her attention to the wall of shadows between us and our target.

  There was no answer from the office. “This is a limited time offer, Dave. We’ll come in there if you make us.”

  There was still no answer from the office. We waited a few minutes, until I was absolutely certain Dave wasn’t going to come out. Istas started to growl.

  “Oh, fuck it,” I said, and strode into the blackness.

  Finding the office door was a matter of finding the wall and feeling my way along. I kept a knife in one hand, groping along the wall next to the door for a light switch with the other. I kept waiting for Dave to grab me and yank me away from the safety of the walls, but it didn’t happen. My fingers found the switch, and the lights came on, leaving me first blinking and then staring at the scene in front of me.

  “Verity! Do you—” Dominic rushed into the room with Ryan and Istas close behind him. All three of them stopped, joining me in staring at the ransacked office. The filing cabinets were open and empty, and Dave’s computer was missing from the desk.

  “He’s gone,” I said. “The bastard pulled a runner.”

  “Well, fuck,” said Ryan.

  Epilogue

  “All’s well that ends with only minor lacerations.”

  –Alice Healy

  The dinosaur wing of the Museum of Natural History

  Six weeks later

  THE SKELETAL TYRANNOSAURUS LOOMED OVER ME like something out of a horror movie, showing teeth longer than throwing knives and claws capable of gutting a human in less than a second. I looked thoughtfully up at it, wondering what it must have been like when it was ruler of the world. Did it think? Was the Tyrannosaurus one of the first intelligent cryptids, here and gone before the planet even thought of hairless apes?

  “I’m sorry I’m late.”

  “It’s okay. I’ve been bonding with the dinosaurs.” I gestured toward the skeleton. “Sort of makes you feel small, doesn’t it?”

  Dominic gave me a look, half-amused, half-exasperated. “You remain the strangest woman I have ever met. How can this impress you, given what we’ve seen?”

  “Hey, Bill’s a lot friendlier than this guy ever was.” William was also likely a lot happier, since he was now being pampered and cosseted by no fewer than forty-eight buxom representatives of the female of his species. Candy had taken over leadership of the Nest, thanks to her defeat of Betty and her early bond with William, who called her the sweetest of his “dearest ones.” She’d actually started smiling after that. It was a little creepy, but better than being scowled at all the time.

  “True enough.” Folding his hands behind his back, Dominic joined me in contemplation of the Tyrannosaurus. Finally: “I take it things have continued well in my absence?”

  “Pretty well, yeah. I’ve had a few auditions, nothing serious, and James has mostly forgiven me for letting him get stuffed into a closet. I had to promise him it would never happen again.”

  Dominic grimaced. “It won’t. Not at my hands, anyway.”

  “Good. As for work, Kitty’s running the club—Dave was her uncle, and he either left her the place or her boyfriend is a really good counterfeiter. Either way, she says we’re getting new uniforms, and that makes her okay by me.”

  “Excellent. And your cousin?”

  “She changed hotels again, and she’s added some physics courses. She seems happy. I don’t have a clue what she’s talking about most of the time. That’s always a good sign with Sarah. How was your trip?”

  “It was … interesting.” Dominic glanced my way, measuring my expression. “My superiors were quite skeptical of my report at first, until I showed them a tail from one of the deceased servitors. They now believe that the disappearances were due to giant alligators in the sewer, which I fought alone. I made no mention of dragons or cultists … or of you. You remain a cryptid in your own right, so far as the Covenant is concerned.”

  “And to think, once that would have been an insult coming from you. Are they keeping you in Manhattan?”

  “For now. I take it you will also be remaining?”

  “Are you kidding? My family has been waiting for this opportunity for longer than I
’ve been alive.” They’d come back from the basilisk hunt the day after things got bad, and Antimony was still sulking about not getting to kill any snake cultists. Mom and Dad, on the other hand, had a seemingly inexhaustible font of questions, all of them centering on the dragons. Big surprise, that.

  “I see.” He paused before saying, delicately, “My superiors wish me to continue my assessment of the need for a purge.”

  “How are you leaning so far?”

  Dominic’s smile was strained, but it was there. “This has been very educational so far. I look forward to seeing what else this city has to teach.”

  “It’ll be an adventure.” I took a step closer to him, leaning up onto my toes, and kissed his cheek. “Call me.” Turning on my heel, I walked toward the museum exit, leaving Dominic standing alone beneath the skeleton of a prehistoric killer. The past isn’t the future. Dinosaurs can become dragons, and that meant there was hope for Dominic, if he wanted to take advantage of it. Either way, I needed to go home and call my father to let him know that Dominic kept his word—the Covenant still didn’t know we were alive, and we were free to continue as we were.

  There are times when I really love my job.

  Price Family Field Guide to the Cryptids

  of North America

  Aeslin mice (Apodemus sapiens). Sapient, rodentlike cryptids that present as nearly identical to noncryptid field mice. Aeslin mice crave religion, and will attach themselves to “divine figures” selected virtually at random when a new colony is created. They possess perfect recall; each colony maintains a detailed oral history going back to its inception. Origins unknown.

  Ahool (Acerodon ahool). Large, batlike cryptids with monkeylike heads. The ahool are cooperative hunters, and host toxic bacterial colonies similar to those found in Komodo dragons. An adult ahool can be the size of a large dog. They are territorial, vicious, and always prepared to attack.

  Basilisk (Procompsognathus basilisk). Venomous, feathered saurians approximately the size of a large chicken. This would be bad enough, but thanks to a quirk of evolution, the gaze of a basilisk causes petrification, turning living flesh to stone. Basilisks are not native to North America, but were imported as game animals. By idiots.

  Bogeyman (Vestiarium sapiens). The thing in your closet is probably a very pleasant individual who simply has issues with direct sunlight. Probably. Bogeymen are close relatives of the human race; they just happen to be almost purely nocturnal, with excellent night vision, and a fondness for enclosed spaces. They rarely grab the ankles of small children, unless it’s funny.

  Chupacabra (Chupacabra sapiens). True to folklore, chupacabra are bloodsuckers, with stomachs that do not handle solids well. They are also therianthrope shapeshifters, capable of transforming themselves into human form, which explains why they have never been captured. When cornered, most chupacabra will assume their bipedal shape in self-defense.

  Dragon Princess (Homo draconem). The dragon princesses are humanoid cryptids believed to have evolved alongside the now-extinct great dragons. They have no special powers, save their ability to withstand extremes of heat, and their unerring ability to make money. There are no males of their species. We don’t know how that works, either.

  Ghoul (Herophilus sapiens). The ghoul is an obligate carnivore, incapable of digesting any but the simplest vegetable solids, and prefers humans because of their wide selection of dietary nutrients. Most ghouls are carrion eaters. Ghouls can be easily identified by their teeth, which will be shed and replaced repeatedly over the course of a lifetime.

  Johrlac (Johrlac psychidolos). Colloquially known as “cuckoos,” the Johrlac are telepathic hunters. They appear human, but are internally very different, being cold-blooded and possessing a decentralized circulatory system. This quirk of biology means they can be shot repeatedly in the chest without being killed. Extremely dangerous. Origins unknown; possibly insect in nature.

  Lamia (Python lamia). Semihominid cryptids with the upper bodies of humans and the lower bodies of snakes. Lamia are members of order synapsedia, the mammal-like reptiles, and are considered responsible for many of the “great snake” sightings of legend. The sightings not attributed to actual great snakes, that is.

  Lesser gorgon (Gorgos euryale). One of three known subspecies of gorgon, the lesser gorgon’s gaze causes short-term paralysis followed by death in anything under five pounds. The bite of the snakes atop their heads will cause paralysis followed by death in anything smaller than an elephant if not treated with the appropriate antivenin. Lesser gorgons tend to be very polite, especially to people who like snakes.

  Madhura (Homo madhurata). Humanoid cryptids with an affinity for sugar in all forms. Vegetarian. Their presence slows the decay of organic matter, and is usually viewed as lucky by everyone except the local dentist. Madhura are very family-oriented, and are rarely found living on their own. Originally from the Indian subcontinent.

  Oread (Nymphae silica). Humanoid cryptids with the approximate skin density of granite. Their actual biological composition is unknown, as no one has ever been able to successfully dissect one. Oreads are extremely strong, and can be dangerous when angered. They seem to have evolved independently across the globe; their common name is from the Greek.

  Sasquatch (Gigantopithecus sesquac). These massive native denizens of North America have learned to embrace depilatories and mail-order shoe catalogs. A surprising number make their living as Bigfoot hunters (Bigfeet and Sasquatches are close relatives, and enjoy tormenting each other). They are predominantly vegetarian, and enjoy Canadian television.

  Tanuki (Nyctereutes sapiens). Therianthrope shapeshifters from Japan, the tanuki are critically endangered due to the efforts of the Covenant. Despite this, they remain friendly, helpful people, with a naturally gregarious nature that makes it virtually impossible for them to avoid human settlements. Tanuki possess three primary forms—human, raccoon dog, and big-ass scary monster. Pray you never see the third form of the tanuki.

  Tooth fairy (Pyske dentin). Tooth fairies are small—no taller than the length of a tall man’s hand—and possess dual-lobed wings. Their dietary habits are unpleasant, and best left undiscussed. Do not leave unsupervised near children.

  Waheela (Waheela sapiens). Therianthrope shapeshifters from the upper portion of North America, the waheela are a solitary race, usually claiming large swaths of territory and defending it to the death from others of their species. Waheela mating season is best described with the term “bloodbath.” Waheela transform into something that looks like a dire bear on steroids. They’re usually not hostile, but it’s best not to push it.

  PLAYLIST:

  Here are a few songs to rock you through Verity’s adventures.

  “Just Dance” Lady Gaga

  “Kids With Guns” Gorillaz

  “We Are Mice” Azure Ray

  “Manic Monday” The Bangles

  “Whipped Cream” Ludo

  “U+UR Hand” Pink

  “Fingerprints” Katy Perry

  “America” Bree Sharp

  “Nobody Move, Nobody We Are Scientists Get Hurt”

  “Secrets” One Republic

  “Snakes and Ladders” Basia Bulat

  “Corrupt” Karissa Noel

  “House of Wolves” My Chemical Romance

  “Dead is the New Alive” Emilie Autumn

  “Bad Moon Rising” Rasputina

  “Beauty Has Her Way” The Lost Boys Soundtrack

  “Maps” Yeah Yeah Yeahs

  “Susan” Aimee Mann

  “Rumor Has It” Adele

  “Do You Recall” Royal Wood

  “Sugar” Thea Gilmore

  “Oisin, My Bastard Brother” The High Dials

  “Hammer to the Heart” Tamperer

  “Ramalama (Bang Bang)” Roisin Murphy

  “Back Against the Wall” Alan Parsons Project

  “Cowards in a Brave New World” Kim Richey

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:

  Discount Armagedd
on marks the beginning of my second urban fantasy series, and my greatest thanks are extended to Phil Ames, without whom this series would not exist. Betsy Tinney endured my endless questions about the world of professional ballroom dance, while Kate Secor put up with my insistence on watching every single episode of So You Think You Can Dance (sometimes twice).

  The tireless machete squad provided proofreading and editorial services, with yeoman labors being performed by Will Frank, Ryan Nutick, and Priscilla Spencer. Amy Mebberson and Bill Mudron supplied incredible artistic interpretations of my characters. Meanwhile, back on the ranch, Chris Mangum and Tara O’Shea made sure my website and graphic needs were met with sleep and élan. I couldn’t do this without them.

  My agent, Diana Fox, never lost faith in me, even when I explained that my latest project involved fighting evil through the power of ballroom dance, while Sheila Gilbert and the entire team at DAW worked to make this book a thousand times better than it was to start. My cover artist, Aly Fell, was a dream come true. I am so blessed.

  Thanks to Kate Secor and Michelle Dockrey for sharing my time with fictional people, to my mother, for cat-sitting during convention season, and to Jude Feldman and the staff at Borderlands Books, for everything. Any errors in this book are entirely my own. The errors that aren’t here are the ones that all these people helped me fix.