(Skeleton Key) Game Master Read online

  The Game Master

  Copyright 2016 Scarlett Dawn

  First Edition

  All rights reserved as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. No part of these publications may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the Author. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Cover by J.M. Rising Horse Creations

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Copyright

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  Gargoyle

  King Hall

  Blood Tree: Silver Edition

  The bastards were watching me. They were there. Shadows peeking from behind the trees.

  I didn’t give a damn.

  Silently, I squatted and placed one red rose on the manicured grass of my father’s grave. The chilly breeze brushed my red curls across the side of my face. I didn’t push them away, allowing a stray curl to tickle my chin. Under the clouded night sky, I rested my hand on my father’s cold gravestone and traced his name with the tip of my right index finger.

  Brandon Creed.

  I wouldn’t cry.

  Not here. Never in front of my father’s killers.

  Weakness wasn’t a sentiment I could afford.

  “Goodbye,” I whispered.

  I exhaled slowly, lifted from my crouch, and looped my thumbs into the straps of my backpack. I turned into the nightfall, the ground sporadically highlighted as clouds traveled below the moon. The area was uneven, grass and tree roots meant to trip, but I walked deftly through the graveyard, sidestepping random gravestones on the hike to my truck.

  Keeping my body language straight on my destination, my gaze darted to the right, keeping a close eye on the shadows moving through the treeline. They were good, some of the best actually, but my father had trained me. They had only gotten lucky when they killed him—three assassins versus one.

  I was an assassin’s daughter.

  The stalking assholes had taken my father out—one shot to the back of the head—in the lone bathroom at our local gas station. It was a coward’s shot.

  My father had been the best. He’d deserved a real fight.

  I needed to regroup, go to one of our safe homes off the grid. Plan my strategy. I’d seen their faces. Hell, I’d even had dinner with one of the bastards a few times in our home. And these men wanted to take me out—permanently—but not before they decided if I had talked to anyone.

  Tossing my backpack into my truck, I hopped inside and started it. I peeked in my rearview mirror and snorted quietly. The shadows were racing to the black sedan under two large oak trees near the edge of the property. It was evident they only thought me a typical eighteen-year-old girl. My father had always told me to play the part when his friends were over, not who I really was—an eighteen-year-old who was trained in martial arts, weaponry, and surveillance.

  So, I had.

  It was a benefit now. “Thank you, Father.”

  I put my truck into gear, turned my lights on, and pulled my backpack closer to me before driving over the gravel. My truck bumped along the rutted lane before it landed on the asphalt parking lot. Keeping my thoughts calm, I concentrated on the thin road leading to the exit, to the gate I’d broken earlier. The graveyard was closed at this hour, but it was appropriate to say my final good-bye in the dead of night—before I skipped town.

  My eyes flicked to the rearview mirror again, and my heart flew into my throat. They were tailing too close now. I jerked the wheel, barely missing a tree, bringing the tires back onto the asphalt. My eyes were wide on the headlights shining in the reflection of the mirror.

  I swiftly yanked my gun out from under my shirt.

  It was apparently time.

  They’d watched all they needed to.

  I glanced back to the road before I missed my turn onto the main thoroughfare. Using one hand, I took a right past the broken gates. I bore down as my truck bumped over the curb directly before an oncoming car. Ignoring the blare of their horn, I snuck another look into my rearview.

  My grip tightened on my gun. I waited.

  Clicked the safety off my gun.

  My nostrils flared as I ran a red light.

  They followed through. It was time.

  That was enough for me. I yanked the wheel and took a hard right turn. I pointed my gun over the back of the bench seat and squeezed the trigger. The window shattered, and glass flew out onto the road and into the bed of my truck.

  An alarm went off from the business I drove past, their windows breaking, the sound barely heard over the ringing in my ears from the report of my gun.

  My gun was still pointed. The air rushed inside and rustled my hair. “Dammit.” I had missed.

  I tried to reason this out, to think fast.

  A mere beat ticked by.

  There was no reasoning this out.

  I yanked my gun back down to the seat and concentrated on the road. This wouldn’t be a joy ride now. I quickly jerked the wheel, swerving around a parked bus dropping riders off.

  Grinding my teeth, I glanced into my rearview.

  The black sedan was gaining.

  Turning the wheel, I took a sharp right, deviating between two cars and putting space between my truck and the black sedan.

  The black hair of the taxi cab driver I passed rustled in the wind my truck had created. Light poles zoomed by in my peripheral as I pressed down on the gas pedal. The pedestrians on the sidewalks became a blur. Traffic lights had no meaning. They were only objects running opposite which I had to evade.

  I stuffed my gun back into its holster and grabbed the wheel with both hands. The rearview mirror no longer held the black sedan in its view. I was losing them. At the next turn, I slipped into an underground parking garage and stopped my truck behind a concrete partition.

  I whimpered a few times. Banged my forehead against the steering wheel. It was time to ditch my cherished truck. The vehicle my father had bought me on my fifteenth birthday. I sighed heavily and shook my head vigorously.

  It was just a material object.

  Everything I actually needed my father had taught me.

  It was all stored up in my mind like Christmas presents waiting to be unwrapped. Tiny, precious gifts. Each one used during a tragic circumstance of survival. Just to be stuffed back into their protective wrappings to use again when my luck ran dry.

  I rotated my head on my shoulders and pressed on the gas pedal, heading toward the nearest parking space. I’d leave my truck here and walk on foot, hide in the shadows.

  The black sedan shot into my view, swerving toward my truck.

  “Shit!” I growled.

  I slammed on the gas, determined to make the exit ahead on the right, but the assassins’ sedan was faster. It zoomed forward and cut me off right at the exit, Tboning my truck.

  “Christ!” I shouted, slamming on my breaks, hearing the crunch of metal. There was no stopping it at this speed. My truck plowed into the back of a small car. My arms flew forward, a harsh grunt escaped my lips as my chest jerked against the constricti
ng seatbelt and my air bag deployed. Smacked in the face with it, I sat stunned until I started coughing. A slight mist filled the air.

  I blinked repeatedly. “Snap out of it, Arizona.”

  I shoved the airbag down, throwing my truck into reverse. I slammed on the gas, seeing the three black-haired, black-attired assassins jumping out of the sedan. The barrels of their guns were pointed right at me.

  I cursed profusely when my truck’s engine only revved, the grinding of metal harsh in the air. “Come on, come on.”

  The bastards merely smiled as they stalked forward. I twisted the wheel right and left, trying to disentangle my truck from the wreckage. My tires squealed against the pavement, smoke blowing in the air followed by the smell of burnt tires.

  Then it finally moved—like a broken toy. Two wheels were flat, chugging on the left side, but it moved. My chest hurt as my heart beat frantically, pumping against my breastbone as the assassins raced back to their sedan. I quickly released my gun from its holster and took aim.

  I fired. Two shots.

  Both shots hit true. Two of the men hit the concrete.

  The one with small scar directly above his right eyebrow, the one I’d had dinner with multiple times, smiled, flashing his teeth. That guy enjoyed the chase. It was there in his hard eyes.

  He was the one who had shot my father.

  And now he understood I knew how to play.

  I took aim on him. Zeroed right on his forehead.

  Pulled the trigger, no fear in my heart.

  No apology in my eyes. This was protection.

  Not revenge. Never for revenge.

  I wouldn’t slip that far down the black hole.

  My father’s killer wasn’t fast enough.

  He went down, too.

  Sirens suddenly blared nearby, alerting a new situation.

  “Argh!” I screamed and slammed my head back against the headrest. I wouldn’t be able to evade the police in a busted truck, and their sedan was just as wrecked.

  Breathing heavily, my chin trembled the barest bit.

  I couldn’t go to jail. The police wouldn’t see this as protection. They would call it a gang shooting or some crap.

  My gun went back into its holster. I unbuckled, grabbed my backpack, and climbed out through the back window with care. Glass crunched beneath my boots as I walked across the bed of my truck. My gaze caught on a man peeking out from behind another concrete partition. My guess was he had called the police.

  I climbed over the gate of my truck and jumped to the ground, my landing jarring my shins. I pulled one strap of my backpack over my right shoulder and raced in the opposite direction of the spying man. Cars and more cars. Until I saw a black door on my right. I veered to it.

  The doorknob wouldn’t turn.

  I glared and kicked the locked door.

  However, my eyes caught on a shiny object on the ground. My brows puckered, and I bent to pick it up. It was a skeleton key made from thick glass. It had a skeleton head on the grip, and at the other end, there were two ‘teeth’ to unlock a door. It was only four inches long, but it had to weigh—at least—one pound.

  My head cocked as I eyed the door in front of me.

  The sirens were dangerously close.

  I was running out of options.

  The key fit into the lock on the first try.

  I turned my wrist, and the lock clicked.

  I heaved a sigh of relief and opened the door, hurrying through the bright opening. But when I tried to grab the key, it was no longer there. It had…disappeared.

  “What the hell?”

  I needed to hide, not search for a missing key.

  I blinked and slammed the door closed. When I checked to see if it locked automatically, the knob wouldn’t turn. The door was locked, no one able to enter.

  Too late I understood if this were a dead end, I wouldn’t be able to leave, either. My brows puckered, and I quickly turned around to see where in the garage I had landed.

  Except I wasn’t in the garage.

  I was standing on a covered porch.

  And it was daytime.

  I shook my head hard and scanned my surroundings again. I was on a porch. The sun was out, not the moon. There was a small, light brown dirt road in front of the…cottage’s…porch I was standing on.

  I moved down the two steps, each wood plank creaking beneath my feet, and stopped right before the road. Brown dirt sprinkled the soles of my black boots. Across the road were trees. Lots and lots of trees. The brush was so thick I couldn’t see more than twenty feet through it.

  I mumbled in awe, “This isn’t right.”

  “Bad timing on your part, dear.”

  I stopped moving. My head swiveled left and right, in an attempt to find the individual who had just spoken. But there was no one nearby. My brows furrowed as I cocked my head. While I couldn’t see anyone, there were people headed in my direction. I could hear shouts in the distance, all sounding as if they were frightened silly.

  “Down here.”

  The afternoon sun beat down on my forehead as I snapped my attention lower. I stared for a full minute. I couldn’t comprehend what I was viewing.

  There was a tree stump about waist high to my right. On it sat a red frog. That frog had green moss wrapped around its lower section as if it were modest and wearing pants.

  Its mouth opened. “I don’t blame you for staring. I am a handsome devil.”

  My jaw dropped, and I took a quick step back.

  The frog was talking. To me.

  Had I hit my head trying to escape those goons?

  “Are you a fly eating creature?” the frog asked, staring at my wide-open mouth. It sat back on its haunches and raised its front arms. The right one tapped on its cheek while it watched me. “I thought you were intelligent since you look like the rest of the humonas.”

  My mouth bobbed. “I’m not trying to catch flies.”

  I must have hit my head.

  The frog’s lips curved up. It was smiling.

  I stared. “You were making a joke, weren’t you?”

  Its red head bobbed. “Yes. It helped, didn’t it?”

  My brain was addled. “Actually, it did.” I stepped forward and squatted in front of the tree stump. My eyes were level with the talking frog. I eyed him closely, evaluating his very human nature. “Are you real?”

  “You’re not hallucinating if that’s what you’re asking.” The frog used his right front arm again and pointed behind me. “You should really run. You couldn’t have arrived at a worse time.”

  I tore my eyes from the frog and glanced over my shoulder. There were now people racing on the dirt road, headed our way. Their eyes were wide with terror, their old-era simple clothing stained with streaks of brown dirt. Some wore shoes and others wore only mud on their feet. There were about fifty of them.

  I whispered, “Where am I?”

  “You’ve landed in the country Terlant.” He tipped his head to the door. The front door to the rundown cottage. “A humona occasionally comes out of there, but the cottage has been vacant for years. And the door can’t be opened from this side. Not without the skeleton key.”

  “Humona?” My attention snapped back to the frog. “Terlant?”

  “Humona. Your kind.” Its head nodded. “And Terlant. In the realm of Baaz.”

  I stared. The people were getting closer. “I’m not on Earth?” I lifted my hands and probed my head with my fingers. I didn’t feel any bumps from a fall. “Is this another joke you’re making?”

  “I never joke about magic.”

  “Magic?”

  “Are you going to repeat everything I say?”

  “Probably, until it makes sense.” A few racing individuals flew past me, their terror palpable. I watched as they ran as fast as they could, their chest pumping hard and sweat dripping down their faces. “What are they running from?”

  “They’re trying to flee from the Royal Guard.”

  I blinked. I d
idn’t repeat his words this time. I knew all about fleeing people. It was time to roll with the punches for right now. “Are these people criminals if they’re running from the Guard?”

  More ‘peasants’ dashed passed.

  “Yes. There’s been a prison break. The royal family is extremely displeased by this turn of events. Their Guard was overtaken when the prisoners revolted against their living conditions. It’s been the talk of Terlant for the last week. And, it appears, the Guard has finally found them.”

  I straightened and watched a large group of them pass, only a few stragglers left behind now. “I wasn’t a prisoner. I won’t act like I was.”

  The frog snickered. “That won’t help you, not with the royal family on a rampage. I suggest you run, dear. And fast. Very, very fast.”

  Apparently, I had jumped from one horrible situation to another. Just on a different…realm? I glared down at the frog. “You have a name?”

  “Of course.”

  I cracked my neck and stretched my arms over my head, preparing to run like the rest of them. “Is it a secret?”

  “No.”

  My eyes narrowed further.

  The frog was smiling again.

  “Not funny, Ribbit.”

  His smile faltered. “How did you know?”

  I laughed outright. “Now, that’s funny.”

  He winked. He freaking winked. “My name’s Kingsley.”

  “It’s an honor…” Right! “…to meet you, Kingsley. I’m Arizona Creed. And I’m sorry for what I’m about to do.”

  His head tipped back. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, you see, I’m in a place I know nothing about. You, on the other hand, seem to know the gossip. So I’m going to kidnap you.” Before he hopped off the tree trunk, I grabbed his body in a firm hold. I brought his face up to eye level. “I truly am sorry for this.”

  He sighed, his tiny arms hanging over my finger. “It’s not the first time. And it won’t be the last.” Kingsley wasn’t upset. He was annoyed, his tiny forehead crinkling. “But don’t jiggle me. I have a very sensitive stomach.”

  I snorted and unzipped my backpack.