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  Dark Goddess

  Sarwat Chadda

  New enemies, new romance, and new horrors,

  Billi's back, and it seems like the Unholy just can't take a hint.

  Still reeling from the death of her best friend, Kay, Billi's thrust back into action when the Templars are called to investigate werewolf activity. And these werewolves are like nothing Bilil's seen before.

  They call themselves the Polenitsy – Man Killers. The ancient warrior women of Eastern Europe, supposedly wiped out centuries ago. But now they're out of hiding and on the hunt for a Spring Child – an Oracle powerful enough to blow the volcano at Yellowstone – precipitating a Fimbulwinter that will wipe out humankind for good.

  The Templars follow the stolen Spring Child to Russia, and the only people there who can help are the Bogatyrs, a group of knights who may have gone to the dark side. To reclaim the Spring Child and save the world, Billi needs to earn the trust of Ivan Romanov, an arrogant young Bogatyr whose suspicious of people in general, and of Billi in particular.

  Dark Goddess is a page-turning, action-packed sequel that spans continents, from England to the Russian underworld and back. This is an adventure of folklore and myth become darkly real. Of the world running out of time. And of Billi SanGreal, the only one who can save it.

  Sarwat Chadda

  Dark Goddess

  The second book in the Devil's Kiss series, 2010

  To my wife and daughters

  I came upon a small child, the daughter of a local farmer. She was no more than four, with shining eyes and curling auburn hair.

  I devoured her. Her flesh was most delicious.

  – Confession of Pierre de Gévaudan, December 1767

  1

  THE ROTTWEILER’S HEAD LAY IN A BUSH, JUST OFF the snow-sprinkled path. The body was several yards farther, its chest carved open so the ribs stuck out of the skin like a row of gruesome lollipops.

  Billi covered her face with her sleeve. The cold night air was fresh with January frost, but the corpse stank of spilt intestines. The dog was, had been, brutishly big, but its size had not saved it from being torn apart.

  “Well?” asked Pelleas as he searched farther along the path, scanning the ground with his flashlight. They were on the edge of the woods, spiny trees to one side and a low hedge bordering a white-coated field to the other. The dense snow clouds of the day had lifted, leaving the velvet-black sky hazy with starlight and the crescent moon. The sky over London never looked like this-vast and fathomless.

  Billi snapped off at wig and used it to bind her long black hair in a loose bun. She leaned over the corpse, directing her flashlight at the wounds. She’d seen the pictures of the other slaughtered victims, but the artificial eye of the lens had made them seem remote, fake even. This was sickeningly real. She poked at the body with a stick and grimaced as semi-congealed blood oozed from the gaping tears. They hadn’t been made with knives-that much was obvious.

  They’d been made with claws.

  Without touching, Billi spread her hand carefully over the line of the wounds. Five ragged talons had been dragged through the dog’s guts. Judging by the depth of the cuts, the beast was big. “Definitely a loony,” she said.

  Pelleas peered over his shoulder. “You mean werewolf, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  Pelleas was a stickler and didn’t like the slang she and the other squires used. They had a whole directory for the Unholy. Loony. Fang-face. Goat-head. Casper. The list went on and on, each squire adding something new.

  Billi straightened and adjusted the sword tucked into her belt, resting her hand on the leather-bound hilt. She’d brought a wakizashi, a single-edged Japanese short-sword. It had been her godfather’s and she hoped that something of his strength still lingered in it. She clicked the blade out a few inches, just enough to see the flashlight glisten on the deadly, mirrorlike surface, then slammed it back in place.

  “This the one?” Billi asked.

  Pelleas inspected the corpse. He’d been hunting loonies most of his adult life, and to him a claw wound was as individual as a fingerprint. He lowered his fingers into the gaping holes, checking their depth. He smiled grimly.

  “Yes, it’s Old Gray,” he said, wiping his bloody fingers in the snow. “At last.” Pelleas scratched his arm and peered around. He’d come close to it in Dartmoor, only for it to escape and leave him with a scar that ran from his elbow to his wrist. Billi knew Pelleas had very personal reasons for hunting this creature down. He wasn’t the first to disguise revenge as duty.

  They’d been hunting the werewolf for over four months, following its bloody trail from Cornwall, Devon, through the southeast, all the way to here-Thetford Forest in East Anglia. Thirteen dead across five counties. Werewolves were territorial and only went off reservation if they were hunting something, or someone, very special.

  “I wonder if it’s looking for an Oracle?” Billi said as she peered into the thicket of branches, seeing nothing but darkness.

  “Another one like Kay?” Pelleas tapped his rapier against his leg. “Doesn’t seem likely, does it?”

  No, it didn’t. People like Kay only came along once in a lifetime, if you were lucky. Billi stared down at the dog, and her hand locked rigid around the sword hilt. Kay had been more than an Oracle. He’d been her best friend since they were ten, and the one person she’d cared about. Then he’d turned into something more. But now he was lying in a grave on the Kent coast. For a moment Billi felt lost; she wiped her face, but there was nothing there to wipe away. Kay was gone and she had a job to do, here and now. Dwelling on the past solved nothing.

  “You sure it’s not one of the Bodmin pack?” Billi asked, wanting to think about something else. But Pelleas shook his head.

  “The Bodmin werewolves aren’t the problem. They haven’t hunted humans for the last six years. Arthur saw to that, remember?”

  “I remember.” How could she not? Her father had fought the alpha male and chopped its right arm off. God, she could picture that severed limb, dripping blood all over the kitchen table, like it was yesterday. That night she’d learned her father and his friends weren’t just porters at the Inns of Court. Maybe her life would have been better if they really were servants. Instead of being the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Jesus Christ and of the Temple of Solomon.

  The Knights Templar.

  Like her.

  Ever since that duel, the Bodmin werewolves had stuck to the accord between Templar and wolf; the Templars left them alone, and they left humans alone. No, this was a rogue, a wolf driven mad by bloodlust. It needed to be put down. Billi scanned the bloodied snow around the body. A row of pawprints ran alongside the ripped-up torso. The imprints were deep, just the balls of the feet with wide-splayed toes. The snow hadn’t settled into them, meaning they’d been made recently. Billi shivered as she peered into the black net of bristly trees.

  “I’m calling the others,” she said. “The werewolf could still be-”

  Abranch creaked.

  Instantly the Templars clicked off their flashlights.

  Bad bad bad.

  Ever so slowly, Billi and Pelleas sank down to their knees. Something snorted loudly, and a growl rattled out of the darkness. Billi went down onto her belly, burying herself in the muddy snow, using it to cover her scent. Some of it trickled down her collar, but she didn’t dare shiver. Her fingers tightened around her scabbard and she forced every muscle still.

  A brittle twig snapped as the loony came out on to the path, five or six yards from where they hid. All Billi could see was a huge black silhouette, almost seven feet tall, wrapped in sinewy muscle and its ragged pelt. It raised its face skyward and howled at the sickle-edged moon.

  Old scars were carved into its mangy gr
ay fur. Pelleas’s monster, just as he’d described it. It stepped forward on reverse-kneed legs, coiled and ever ready to leap, its disproportionately long arms ending in uneven yellow-ivory talons. Its tail must have been bitten or torn off in some long-ago fight, leaving just as tub. Billi took in the demonic green eyes that gazed at the moon. The werewolf turned its snout this way and that, its black lips peeled back into a grotesque grin, fangs slimy with spittle.

  Billi pushed farther into the snow as the beast’s eyes grazed her. The werewolf’s body tensed, and its long hairs quivered as it gave a guttural hiss. Had it seen her? Billi dragged her hand over the sword hilt. Despite her training, despite the steel, she felt a cold dread slide over her, colder than the snow.

  A bush shook as a second werewolf emerged. Billi let slip a sigh as Old Gray’s attention shifted to the new arrival. This beast was in its prime, heavily muscled, its fur thick and red, claws bright and razor-sharp. Its eyes were the same green as the older monster’s, and instantly Billi knew they were kin, not just by the eyes but in the way Big Red mimicked the elder’s stance and movements. Old Gray grunted at the younger werewolf.

  They launched forward, bursting through the hedge and loping over the field in a blur. Moonlight lay silver on their backs, but within seconds they were fading.

  Pelleas sprang up. “Quick, Billi! What’s over there?” He pointed his rapier toward the far edge of the field where the wolves had run.

  Out there? Billi racked her brain. She’d checked the map only an hour ago… “A farmhouse.” Oh no.

  Pelleas swore and pushed himself through the hedge.

  “Pelleas,” Billi hissed. “The others.” Their eyes met. Two knights might take one werewolf, but the odds shifted badly one-on-one. They should wait for reinforcements. But she could see the fire in his gaze. Pelleas was rake-thin, but as tough and fast as a whiplash. He wasn’t going to let the werewolves go, not after having lost them the last time.

  “It’s our duty, Billi.” He jumped over the hedge and ran.

  Duty. Always duty. It was their duty to fight, no matter what the odds, no matter who the foe. To fight and, if necessary, to die.

  Wasn’t that what Templars did best? They called it martyrdom, but it amounted to the same thing. Wasn’t it one of the Templar Rules?

  You shall keep the company of martyrs.

  They needed backup, and now. Billi’s thumb hammered out farmhouse on her mobile as she flicked her sword free from its scabbard. Wakizashi aloft, she turned her body sideways and tried to use her long legs to clamber over the hedge. It scratched and pulled at her, but eventually she broke through. She ran after Pelleas.

  2

  A HOWL, PART BESTIAL CRY AND PART HUMAN SCREAM, ripped through the night air. Billi pumped her long legs harder, closing the gap between her and Pelleas. But as she caught the glint of moonlight on her naked blade, the dread slowly gave way to something else-excitement. Fire rose up through her guts, along her arteries and into her heart. Her knuckles whitened as they gripped the sword hilt tighter.

  Ahead she heard glass shatter, then more screams-these very human.

  “Come on, Billi!” shouted Pelleas. He was over a low wooden fence in an instant.

  She hadn’t gone far, but Billi’s heart pounded in her chest as though she’d run a marathon. She tumbled the last few yards and crashed into the fence. She knelt there, shaking her head clear. Howls, screams, and Pelleas’s battle cry echoed. She wiped the snow off her face and saw Pelleas charge into the house, rapier raised. Then she heard a man’s cry, cut off suddenly and ending with a spluttering cough.

  Any sane person would turn around and get the hell out of there.

  But what part of Billi’s life had ever been sane?

  “Deus vult!” she screamed, scrambling over the fence and steaming toward the farmhouse. Broken glass from the French windows littered the yellow paving slabs. Billi jumped through the door frame and into the kitchen.

  A man was dead. He lay askew on the flagstone floor, his chest ripped open and his lifeblood pooling around him. His legs, still in a pair of striped pajamas, twitched, but just for a moment.

  Old Gray, snout and teeth red from its kill, moved warily in front of Pelleas, searching for an opening past his deadly steel. Behind it, Big Red had finished its own murderous work. A woman wearing a blood-washed dressing gown leaned against the coarse brick wall. Her eyes bore only the dimmest life. Big Red seemed to be holding her up, its right paw pressed against her chest. Then it slowly pulled outits talons, each one coming free of her body with a sticky slurp. The woman slid gently down the wall.

  Billi froze. Suddenly her sword seemed puny against those dripping talons. These were natural-born killers, bred to it through thousands of generations. Every ounce of muscle, every inch of bone, was built to slaughter.

  “Mummy!” The scream drew everyone’s attention. Kneeling at the top of the wooden stairs was a blond girl, maybe eight or nine, wearing a pair of pony-print pajamas. She stared at her parents’ corpses, her face deathly white. Then she turned and ran.

  And so did Old Gray.

  Pelleas slashed the air, and the old werewolf backed away. Billi darted through the sudden gap. The werewolf spun and Billi ducked as its claws swiped the air. The five lethal blades clicked together but caught only a few strands of her black hair. Billi took the stairs in three bounds, leaving the carnage in the kitchen behind her. She reached the top of the stairs just in time to see a door slam shut. She ran to it and twisted the handle. Locked.

  “Open up!” Billi cried. The white door had vasilisa fixed to it in small wooden blocks. A few bounced off as Billi smashed her sword hilt into the thick wood. “Let me in, Vasilisa!”

  The stairs creaked.

  “Pelleas?” Billi looked down the corridor. Please, please let it be him. “Pelleas?”

  A long lupine head appeared out of the darkness, and predatory green eyes glowed. Its snarl was deep and low, so elemental that the air quivered. Big Red stepped closer, dragging its long, still-bloody claws along the plaster, digging deep grooves along both walls. There was no way past it. Behind Billi was a window and a thirteen-foot drop. She was trapped.

  “Vasilisa…” But the door remained firmly locked. Billi backed away, wakizashi held firmly in her right hand, its tip pointed directly at the werewolf’s heart.

  They were a few feet apart. Red’s black lips crept into a snarl, letting Billi see each of its murderous canines. It leaped.

  The charge knocked Billi over and sent the sword flying. Red dug its claws into her shoulders. Billi shoved her feet into its belly and pushed as she rolled backward. She almost didn’t make it; the beast was heavier than she’d thought. Her legs trembled, but she squeezed every ounce of power she had into the throw, and suddenly the werewolf tumbled over her and crashed through the window. Its howl broke into a yelp, and there was the sound of more glass shattering outside.

  Then silence.

  The floor swayed as Billi stood. Her muscles burned with pain, and blood streamed down her back from the claw wounds. She leaned her head, eyes closed, against Vasilisa’s bedroom door.

  “Open the bloody door. Now,” she whispered.

  There was a click and a light scurrying of feet.

  “Thank you.”

  The girl sat in the corner of the unlit bedroom. The house was quiet, and that wasn’t good. Billi couldn’t let that bother her; she had only one priority and that was getting out of here. But where was Pelleas? Was he still alive? She closed the door and pushed the bolt. Then she went to the window overlooking a long front garden. Thick vines covered the wall, and a trellis ran from the guttering down to the ground. To the side she saw a greenhouse, the roof broken where the werewolf must have fallen through, but nothing stirring within. In the far distance headlights were coming down the country lane that passed along the farmhouse garden.

  Dad’s coming, thank God.

  “Come here, Vasilisa,” Billi said, grabbing her arm.

>   “No!” Vasilisa squirmed and scratched, but Billi just tightened her grip. Vasilisa scurried back, knocking over her bedside table. The lamp broke, and Billi caught sight of something shiny rolling across the floor.

  It was one of those Russian dolls: open it up and there would be another inside. Then another inside that and so on. What were they called? Whatever the name, it was beautiful. Delicately painted with a red-and-gold shawl, flowers on its blouse, its cheeks rosy. So polished it glowed.

  “Ow!” Billi cried. Vasilisa hung on to her, her tiny white teeth sunk deep into Billi’s wrist. “Let go!” She shook Vasilisa off. The bites left a neat arc of red dents. Didn’t the girl get it? Billi was trying to save her!

  “Where’s my mum-”

  Billi slapped her free hand over the girl’s mouth.

  Something was scratching at the door.

  “Pelleas?” Billi asked.

  It sniffed under the gap at the bottom of the door.

  Billi’s guts turned cold. Pelleas wasn’t coming. Not ever.

  “Want grrrl,” it snarled. The wolf’s voice box mutilated its speech, but Billi heard clearly enough. She glanced back at Vasilisa. A lot of people were already dead because of this girl. “You had better be worth it,” Billi muttered. The door groaned as powerful arms pushed against the wood.

  The older werewolf, it had to be. Maybe if she was quick, Billi could shove her sword under and slice it. She reached for her belt.

  Bollocks. No sword. She’d dropped it fighting Red. Big bloody bollocks.

  The door jumped in its frame as the werewolf charged. It howled as long vertical cracks broke open on the door.

  Billi pressed her bleeding shoulder against a heavy wardrobe and pushed. It slid along the wooden floor until it caught on an unseen edge. Billi pushed harder and it tilted, then crashed down in front of the door.