Good thing, too, for at that moment I felt Devona's mind reaching out to mine.
Look stage left.
'Stage left' meant Scream Queen's left and the audience's right. I directed my gaze where Devona indicated and saw a female ghoul waving an autograph book in hope of getting the singer's attention. Ghouls are basically humanoid, hairless and ivory-fleshed, with thick reptilian lips and double rows of sharp teeth. They're voracious gluttons, but while the males tend to be obese, the females tend to be thin to the point of emaciation, though they eat just as much as their opposite gender. Different metabolisms, I guess. Neither male nor female ghouls were particularly pleasant to look at, especially considering they never wore a stitch of clothing.
Kakophonie's song built toward its climax and ended on a series of thunderous notes that made the floor vibrate dangerously. I wondered if Sinsation's architecture could stand up to the punishment or if the band would literally bring down the house before their set was over. Scream Queen shrieked one last time as the final note sounded and then she bowed to wild applause and cheers from the audience. The ghoul jumped up and down and thrust her autograph book toward the banshee singer, but I was already moving, as was Devona and the rest of the team. There was nothing about the ghoul's appearance to rouse suspicion, but I was certain Devona had gotten a psychic 'hit' off the woman, marking her as a likely suspect, and we had to intercept her before she could make her move.
Which was far easier said than done, given how crowded the club was that night. I'd moved close to the bar, which meant that everyone on the dance floor was between me and the stage. I started shoving my way through the crowd, making liberal use of my elbows and shouting, 'Security! Let me through!' but neither tactic helped me make much headway. Tavi had been sitting at the bar, so he had the crowd to contend with too, and while Scorch and Bogdan had been stationed on the dance floor, neither was all that close to the stage. Only Devona was near enough to reach the ghoul before she could get to Scream Queen and she headed toward the bald, naked autograph seeker, pushing people out of her way with surprising strength. Devona may only be half-vampire – and a petite halfvampire at that – but she's still plenty strong. And while she doesn't possess any telekinetic abilities, she was able to employ her telepathic powers to mentally urge the concert-goers to move aside and while many of them didn't get the message – or if they did, chose to ignore it – a good number did make room for her to pass, bewildered looks on their faces as if they weren't quite sure why they'd done so. I was impressed anew by how much Devona's psychic skills had improved since we'd first met. She'd worked hard to develop her powers over the last few months, and the results were paying off now.
But before Devona had gotten halfway to the ghoul, Scream Queen noticed the woman waving her autograph book and, gracious star that she was, reached down to take it and quickly scrawl a signature before the next song started. She handed the book back with a smile and then gave a nod for the band to launch into the next number. The ghoul gave a strange smile, almost as if she were enjoying some private joke, before turning and beginning to head away from the stage. That struck me as strange. If you were a big enough fan to want an autograph, why would you leave after getting it, especially when you'd only gotten to hear one song? But Scream Queen looked unharmed as the band started in on another tune that had more in common with a ten car pile up than music and I began to wonder if Devona had been wrong about the ghoul. After all, she was heading away from Scream Queen, who was most decidedly not abducted, so she appeared to be no threat. Maybe her real interest in the autograph lay in its monetary value and she was eager to get on with the business of finding a buyer. As I said before, ghouls are gluttons and all the food they shovel down their gullets doesn't come free. But then Scream Queen opened her mouth to sing and I – along with everyone else in the club – realized that something was seriously wrong when no sound came out of her mouth.
Her fellow band members realized it too. They stopped playing and stared at Scream Queen with expressions of puzzlement that were rapidly edging toward outright alarm. The patrons in attendance were equally confused and shocked and the entire club fell quiet as everyone waited to see what would happen next.
Scream Queen drew in another breath and then opened her mouth once more. She squeezed her eyes shut and her neck muscles grew taut. She was clearly attempting to release a note with some real power behind it, but just as before, there was only silence. It seemed the Scream Queen had lost her voice. But that was OK: I knew where it had gone.
I started heading toward the ghoul.
TWO
I didn't get there first, though. Devona had telepathically broadcast her warning about the ghoul to the entire team and all of us were beginning to converge upon her. Scorch was faster than any of us with the exception of Tavi, but she was closer to the ghoul than the shapeshifter was. She became a blur as she wove swiftly through the crowd and she intercepted the ghoul before the creature was halfway across the dance floor.
Scorch said something to the ghoul, but I couldn't hear what. Even though Kakophonie wasn't playing right then, the confused audience were talking loudly amongst themselves, and even though I had a good view of Scorch and the ghoul, I couldn't read lips. Inwardly I was raging at Scorch for approaching the ghoul directly. We knew how dangerous Scream Queen's would-be abductor was and confronting her head-on was more than reckless – it was downright suicidal. And unlike Scream Queen's former bodyguards, Scorch only had one head to lose. But that was Scorch: she lived for fun and as far as she was concerned danger was just another flavor of fun.
The ghoul was taller than Scorch by a good head and a half and when she raised her right hand and displayed her claws she looked like a most formidable figure, one against whom a mere teenage girl wouldn't stand a chance. But in Nekropolis judging by appearances is never a good idea.
The ghoul pulled back her hand, no doubt intending to slash out with her claws and lay open Scorch's throat, but before she could move Scorch decided to show her opponent how she'd gotten her name. Bright orange flames erupted all across Scorch's body and the ghoul – not to mention those audience members in the immediate vicinity – took a startled step backward. Scorch's fire burned hotter and brighter, the flames completely obscuring her form, but she didn't scream, didn't so much as move a muscle. The fire expanded, the flames stretching outward, rising upward, and then just as suddenly as they'd ignited, they extinguished, and where a moment before a teenage girl had been standing, now stood a seven-foot-tall, powerfully muscled, red-scaled demon. Scorch's true form was that of an infernal monster from the old school: pointed ears, baleful yellow eyes, mouthful of wicked-looking fangs, curling ram's horns, a row of serrated scales trailing along her spine, and a sinuous reptilian tail complete with an almost delicate little arrowhead shape at the tip.
The ghoul, who no longer had the advantage of height over Scorch, quickly recovered and lashed out with her claws anyway. Only now instead of having a throat covered with tender girl flesh, Scorch's throat was covered with shiny hard scales, and the ghoul's claws skittered off them without doing any damage. In response Scorch gave the ghoul a truly disturbing fangfilled grin and slapped her own clawed hands onto the ghoul's bony shoulders. As soon as the demon's flesh came in contact with the ghoul's Scorch released her flame and fire spread out from her palms to engulf the ghoul.
'No, dammit!' I shouted, not that I figured Scorch would hear me. Too many people were doing their best to get the hell away from Scorch and the ghoul and they weren't being particularly quiet about it. I knew that Scorch could control the intensity of her flame – as a fire demon that was her specialty – and she wouldn't kill the ghoul unless she had to. But I wasn't worried about our suspect getting fried; I was worried about the autograph book she still carried. We'd been assuming that the ghoul's plan had been to abduct Scream Queen, but now it looked as if she'd only been interested in stealing part of the singer: namely, her voice. I wasn't exactly sure how the ghoul had accomplished it, but it seemed clear that Scream Queen's signature in the autograph book had been an integral part of the spell. And if Scorch's flames reached the autograph book and turned Scream Queen's signature to ash, maybe the spell would be broken and the singer's voice would be restored to her – or if the signature was destroyed maybe Scream Queen's voice would be lost forever. While the latter prospect didn't strike me as much of a loss to Nekropolis's music scene, Scream Queen was my client – well, technically she was Devona's client – and I was determined to protect the banshee's voice by whatever means I could. Unfortunately it looked like there was nothing I could do to keep Scorch from incinerating the autograph book.
However, the ghoul – or whoever was masquerading as the ghoul – was prepared. As demonflame spread across her ivory-colored skin she appeared to reach into her side, sliding her long clawed fingers bloodlessly into her
