And we jumped.
24
Choke
Aside from the preposterous number of armed men below and the sight of the rapidly approaching gallows stage, there were a few distinct facts that stood out to me as Siren and I fell. For one, there was the cleric I hadn’t noticed from the skimmer—the one apprehensively pacing the stage right behind the stone columns Four and Eight were bound to. For another, there was the dazed look of horror in Four’s eyes as we passed through the invisible boundary of a cloaking field generator and entered his and Eight’s sphere of telepathic awareness.
And then, as I gathered my will to catch the energy of our fall and hurl it into phase one of our master plan, I saw the real kicker. Two thin, dark collars, strapped one each to Four’s and Eight’s throats. Explosive collars.
“Don’t!” Siren all but screamed in my head.
Flustered as I was at the sudden change in plan, I barely managed to catch our fall at all, much less to do anything useful with the energy. We hit the wooden stage hard. Hard enough that we tumbled forward in our efforts to catch our invisible balance while maintaining contact with one another. Hard enough that I lost over half the energy I’d just channeled in a useful rush of hot air.
And hard enough that Siren’s illusion flickered.
For a moment, I wasn’t positive it had really happened, quickly as my limbs once again disappeared from my own sight. Then the scream went up from the crowd, and spread like a wildfire.
“Scud,” came Siren’s mental growl. “What do we do?”
“Just hold the shroud.”
Beyond that, I had no idea what came next. I didn’t need to scan our surroundings to know a full squad of Sanctum Guard were detaching from the perimeter to sweep up onto the stage, or to see that the twitchy cleric was now holding a small black device in his hand, brandishing it in our general direction like a weapon. And that confirmed exactly what I’d feared the moment I’d seen those collars.
The plan had been so simple it bordered on stupid.
Siren and I would fall, covered by her arcane shroud. If Four and Eight were untethered, I’d use the energy of our fall to launch our friends straight back up the way we’d came. Equal and opposite. If they were bound, I’d instead use the energy of our fall to free them, then I’d brute force them up to the skimmer with telekinesis. Either way, Siren and I would be free to slink off stage in the chaos under the cover of her shroud.
Except now, the plan that had been so simple it bordered on stupid, had just gone plain stupid. Stupid, and suicidal. Because now, even if we got Four and Eight out, they’d still only be the press of a button away from instant and explosive decapitation.
Stupid.
But there was nothing for it now. So I reached out and telekinetically yanked what I prayed was the only detonator from the twitchy cleric’s hand straight to my own.
“What’re you—”
“Move,” I snapped, starting us toward the back corner of the stage before Siren could finish berating me for the risky decision.
“Slowly,” she snapped back, crushing my hand in her tight grip.
It was surreal, walking slowly across the wide gallows stage, invisible in plain sight, trying to pretend like the crowd wasn’t positively roaring behind us now, trying to ignore the Sanctum Guard rushing up the steps on either side. I fixed my mind on Four’s bindings and started in on freeing him, letting Siren lead us.
“How do we disarm those collars?” I sent as I finished yanking the first knots loose.
She seemed too occupied to answer. With everything happening around us, I didn’t really blame her. I felt Four’s mind sluggishly reaching out to us now—almost definitely drugged—and the Sanctum Guard were storming onto the platform, their impersonal golden faceplate sweeping back and forth for any sign of us. Down in the courtyard, the sea of civilians was pressing in on the perimeter like they had every intention of throwing demons to the wind and coming to join the Sanctum Guard in the hunt.
This was going nowhere good, and it was headed there at breakneck speed.
I was caught between reaching out for Eight’s bindings and telekinetically shoving some of the Sanctum Guard back down the steps into their fellows when a strong voice boomed out.
“Demon!”
The word sliced through the growing panic of the crowd and yanked me out of my focus, straight to the decorative dais from which is had been shouted. It was almost unbelievable, how quickly the roaring courtyard fell silent. But I was far more fixated on the man who’d spoken, looking down on us from his pedestal, his robes of gold and cream positively radiant in the midday sunlight.
“Reveal yourself, Demon,” the High Cleric called, his voice booming from dozens of amps throughout the courtyard. He raised one hand, and I didn’t need to ask what it was he was holding. “Reveal yourself, or prepare to watch your fellow demons perish before your eyes.”
Another detonator.
The holy bastard had another detonator.
“Stay hidden,” I sent to Siren, letting go of her hand.
“You have five seconds, Demon,” the High Cleric called.
Siren held on tight, tugging me closer. “Hal, we can’t—”
“As soon as I get that thing out of his hand,” I sent, “I need you to have Eight lose.”
“But how—”
“Three seconds!”
“Secure those knots!” one of the Sanctum Guard called from beside Four’s column.
“Two.”
There were too many. Too many Sanctum Guard swarming the stage. Too many frothing civilians beyond. And the collars…
We’d had one shot at this. And we’d missed it. Completely.
“One.”
I wrenched my hand free from Siren’s—right as she dropped her illusion anyway. The two of us winked into sight, side-by-side less than five feet away from the closest four Sanctum Guard.
They whipped their rifles around just in time to catch a telekinetic blast that sent them thudding across the planks and tumbling over the edge along with a few of their friends. Across the stage, another team opened fire. I caught a thick burst of softsteel on my barrier before we ducked behind the last stone column. Not like it could offer much protection.
They had us completely surrounded.
And yet the gunfire had stopped. Looking back to the High Cleric’s dais, I saw why. His holiness held his non-detonator hand high in a closed fist, signifying a momentary cease-fire. Even at a distance of thirty yards, I felt the heat of his stare. He looked at least mildly surprised to see me. Or did, at least, before that surprise caught fire under the weight of his utter contempt.
“Raish…” He handled my name like a particularly nasty strain of throat fungus.
Out in the crowd, I heard a few shouts go up that it was Haldin Raish, that it was the Demon of Gropping Divinity. One excitable zealot began screaming exultations to Alpha for having delivered me to their justice.
For a second, I thought the High Cleric would silence them, that he might continue his prattling with dignity. Instead, he dropped his fist, pointed straight at us, and bellowed, “To arms, loyal servants of Alpha! Let us have done with these foul demons once and for all!”
As he said it, he raised his detonator, clearly not intent on missing his chance in the name of waiting for a more prim and proper conclusion to the ceremonies. I rounded out from the small cover of our stone column, barely conscious of the slug that immediately slammed into my barrier. No time. Not to reach the detonator. Not to save Four and Eight. I stood frozen, watching the High Cleric’s thumb plunging for that switch in slow motion, feeling a depth of helplessness I never would’ve imagined possible for such a brief instant.
Then four solid black figures slammed into the High Cleric, tackling him from his dais.
Onyx Guard, my stuttering brain realized.
Right before the raknoth that’d once been Five slammed to the dais like a falling meteor. The elegant structure imploded under his speeding mas
s like a cheap toy, then exploded into the thick crowd of Sanctum personnel around it as Five ripped loose with a shock wave of telekinetic force.
No sooner had I registered what’d just happened than Seven came thudding down to the gallows stage, hands splayed wide like deadly weapons. The air exploded with a deep thrum, and at least a dozen Sanctum Guard went flying off the stage, half of them clearing the perimeter and the first several rows of the crowd before coming to messy landings. The rest, nearly outnumbered now, skirted toward the stairs, opening fire as they bought space and time to rejoin their allies.
Seven turned to me with a smug grin, of all things, paying little heed to the retreating Sanctum Guard or to the incoming hail of slugs pelting into her ready barrier.
“The detonator,” Siren hissed.
I nearly jumped, so focused on Seven that I hadn’t even noticed her behind me. Immediately I tensed, expecting the raknoth to pounce on my moment of distraction. She didn’t.
Just turned and launched herself at the closest mass of retreating Sanctum Guard.
I didn’t understand. Nor did I understand the screams coming from the direction of the White Tower, where Five was now ripping indiscriminately into the crowd of clerics and acolytes and terrified worshipers, working his way after the High Cleric, who was being rushed from the area by four Onyx Guard while others joined the Sanctum Guard in the futile exercise of trying to stop Five.
Someone grabbed my hand—Siren—and she was frantically trying to tell me we needed to shroud and find that detonator when ahead, Five spontaneously turned from his onslaught and tossed a small, dark something through a high arc straight toward us.
I caught the thing out of telekinetic reflex more than anything. I was too shocked to do anything but stare.
It was the detonator.
I wasn’t sure how or when he’d snatched it from the High Cleric. I wasn’t sure it mattered. Not nearly as much as why the scud one of the reekers had just—
My senses buzzed a warning, and I dipped and spun just as someone thudded down to the gallows stage beside Siren.
“Nice going, scudhead,” Garrett growled.
A swell of gunfire from offstage slammed into my failing barrier before I could even try to answer. I threw my focus into reinforcing the shield my stupefied brain had nearly forgotten about completely. I didn’t have to worry about it for long.
The squad below barely had time to squeeze off a few rounds before Seven came soaring over our heads like a guardian falcon and crashed into their ranks, cracking bones and golden faceplates, sending half the squad scampering for cover while the rest charged in to try their luck with blades.
“What the scud is going on?” Garrett snapped.
“They’re… helping,” Siren said, looking every bit as confused as I felt.
“Like scud, they are,” Garrett said, even as I thought it.
I held the two detonators out to Siren. “Get those collars off of them. Now.”
“Where are you going?” she asked, looking more frightened than argumentative.
I looked back over to where Seven was dismantling a Sanctum squad only to find that she’d finished the task and moved on. To the perimeter line.
“Just get those collars off these two!”
I turned and took off running for the edge of the gallows stage before they could argue, staring in horror at the scene unfolding ahead as I went.
Whether the civilians pushing the front of the perimeter line had seen what Seven had just done to over a company’s worth of Sanctum Guard, I didn’t know. All I knew was that they were mounting the dividers and surging over like they were certain they had the holy light of Alpha’s grace at their backs.
And they were all about to be slaughtered.
The enforcers and the few Sanctum Guard left at the perimeter were left in dumb awe, gaping back and forth between the oncoming raknoth and the suicide militia. Then Seven plowed straight through the perimeter line and let loose like a natural disaster.
I reached the edge of the stage and leapt with all my strength, and then some. Channeled energy crackled through me, and then I was soaring high over the now empty space between gallows and perimeter, headed straight for where Seven was tearing into the crowd.
Only she wasn’t tearing into it, I realized, as I began to arc down. She was punching and kicking, and blasting away with telekinesis. But there were no bloody raknoth claws and fangs at work. Her eyes weren’t even showing the crimson fire that had to be lurking just beneath the surface.
I didn’t have time to wonder why. I just pulled more energy and came down on Seven hard enough to crack the courtyard stone with her scale-free face. I rode her all the way down, catching her wrist and yanking her into a tight shoulder lock before she could out-muscle me. She growled. Energy spiked in my extended senses. Then a wall of force slapped into me—enough to send me staggering backward, but not as much as I would’ve expected. Like being smacked full body by an enormous pillow, rather than the mag train’s worth of energy Seven had just channeled.
The runes were working, then.
I might’ve smiled if I hadn’t been standing knee-deep in the broken sea of the victims I’d already been too late to keep this reeker monstrosity away from.
“What the scud are you doing here?” I growled as she climbed to her feet and turned to face me.
Her grin returned, even smugger than before, and my senses buzzed a warning from behind even as her eyes flicked over my shoulder. I felt Seven drop the telekinetic curtain on me, aiming to pin me in place for whatever was coming. It made it all the sweeter when my new anti-crusher runes kicked in and allowed me to keep moving, much to Seven’s confusion.
What I hadn’t expected though—as I turned control over to my senses and pivoted to the right, sweeping around with an elbow strike—was to catch a wild-eyed civilian in the act of trying to stab me in the back. I’d caught his wrist and broke his humerus before I had time to process that it wasn’t one of the Sanctum Guard. He staggered back with a cry, knife clattering to the stone. Behind him, dozens more looked on the verge of charging in and letting the sheer weight of numbers win the day.
Then Seven gave a throaty scream of, “Alpha will not defeat us!” and charged—not toward me, but straight for the densest bunch of onlookers.
And that was when I understood.
25
Overloaded
It was something I’d never wanted to remember again after the White Hall: just how breathtakingly quickly a raknoth could deal out death to a crowd of unarmed civilians. Seven gave me no choice but to remember.
Three more lay dead by the time I caught the raknoth with telekinesis and smashed her to the ground. I slid my sole dagger free from the sheath, darting forward through the field of abandoned belongings and fallen civilians. Seven didn’t stay down willingly. Or long.
Keeping her pinned for more than a few seconds would have already been hard enough on its own. With the steady stream of true believers rushing forward to bring me Alpha’s divine justice at the point of a dagger, or the blunt face of a makeshift club, though, it quickly became impossible. I dodged and slogged my way through the mess as best I could, desperately trying to catch Seven as she broke free from my hold and leapt back to the slaughter.
“She’s a raknoth!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, batting aside one poorly-aimed cane, telekinetically yanking another’s dagger to my own hand. “Get the scud out of here, you idiots! She’ll kill you all!”
They didn’t listen.
But what I lacked in crowd-turning ferocity, Seven was clearly more than making up for. When I parted through the last few zealots and into a pocket of open space, I almost thought the opposite. Seven was splayed out, still standing but held immobile by what must’ve been at least ten civilians practically piled on top of her, gripping desperately at any limb or part of her they could manage to get a hand on.
I wasn’t sure how the strength of ten panic-crazed humans might match up
against a raknoth’s. Seven, tilting her head back in laughter, didn’t seem all that interested in finding out.
A woman charged in from the crowd and plunged a dagger toward Seven’s heart.
The air detonated with a booming shockwave before the blade fell, and every one of Seven’s brave captors went smashing into the pale courtyard stone, or rocketing into the crowd like human ballistics. All of them but the woman with the dagger, who Seven had caught by the throat and now held aloft for everyone to bear witness as she broke the poor woman’s neck with one hand.
That did it. After that, even the wild-eyed zealots eyeing me like it would’ve been the highlight of Enochian history to pick up where their compatriots had failed and sink a dagger through my demonic heart turned and ran for their Alpha-loving lives in the wake of the raknoth’s mad spree.
I was shaking, overcome with the raw violence of it all, flinching away from the growing pile of bodies, and the memory of Al’Kundesha breaking my dad’s neck as Seven had just done with that poor woman. I clutched at my mismatched daggers, barely aware of the cuts and throbbing aches I’d accumulated from my slog through the crowd. Barely aware of anything but the burning need to bury those daggers through Seven’s head and end this madness.
I started forward, and Seven stepped to match, seemingly content with her work on the crowd for now. I broke into a run. Stumbled as she dropped a mountain of telekinetic force on me. The crusher runes did their thing, mitigating the falling wave of telekinesis, and I staggered forward with the sensation that my armor skin was simply lined with a couple hundred pounds of softsteel.
It wasn’t perfect, but it was better than being smashed to the stone, completely immobile. And even better when I saw the confusion and uncertainty spreading across Seven’s face.
I charged forward with a wordless battle cry, infusing my body with channeled energy as I’d done in Humility—caring little for what it might cost me, so long as I could end Seven first. Her eyes widened, and whether it was a testament to the power I conjured or just her sheer surprise at the fact I was still moving, she went down when I slammed into her with mind and body alike.
Children of Enochia Page 21
