Kill as many as you can, Kraven said. Remember, they are soulless.
But as I look at the siren at my feet, I decide he can’t be more than fourteen years old. Some are older, but his one is so young. I can’t help thinking of Frank-whose-name-sounds-a-lot-like-fart. Maybe Charlie did change him. Maybe the sirens really can be saved.
Two new sirens grab onto my wings and rip. As agony shoots through my shoulder blades, I decide maybe I don’t care about their souls. I only want them off of me. I spin around, and before I can think, my knife finds its way into a siren’s stomach. He looks down at it as if surprised he has a stomach at all. Blood spills over my hand and leaks onto the ground, suckled by the Lion’s Hand.
The siren I’ve stabbed is a girl. She looks to be in her mid-twenties and has dark eyes that don’t match the sunny color of her hair. The girl falls back, disappearing into the grass. Guilt strikes through me. Why? Why do I care what happens to her? She made her decision and it was the wrong one. Now she has to pay the price, right? The other two sirens drag me away from her, though I doubt it’s revenge they want. They only want to accomplish what the collectors have laid out for them. Gather their prize. Reap what is owed to them.
I slash my blade across the space and the two sirens leap back. Others are headed in this direction, and when I glance around, I see exactly how outnumbered we are. The liberators were crazy to assume they would win this war.
But the trumpet sounds again, and now I see thirteen jackrabbits racing across the field. They circled around and now they’ll surprise the sirens and collectors from behind. The sirens hesitate, and amidst their rank, I spot two more collectors, Patrick and Zack. They’re back to back and surrounded by sirens. They have their eyes set on Max. My best friend is ready for them. Especially with Blue by his side. Especially when a hundred humans rise from the ground and storm toward the sirens.
The humans have fury in their eyes. They remember the walkers, and won’t let their enemy forget what they took from them. Laura, the woman with the shawl, leads the charging army of flesh and blood, screaming as if death is something they’ve longed for.
More than a few sirens fall back, surprised by this sudden appearance of new fighters. The jackrabbits slam into the sirens moments before the humans do. Lincoln swings an axe above his head. In the distance, I see the black ink staining his hands.
J-A-C-K-R-A-B-B-I-T
Damn straight, I think. Then I crack my fist into a siren’s face. He drops next to the girl I won’t think about as I search for the next siren. The Quiet Ones are in the distance, dragging a human who is already injured away from the battlefield. Cries of pain ring out, sirens scurry over one another, and all around me bodies fight for domination. Amidst it all, I notice something—the sirens are thinning. There are still so many, too many, but some have fallen and others have fled. We’re outnumbered, but we’re angry and we’ve been pushed too far and this time we’re solid as a tree trunk.
Three sirens reach me together, encircling my body. I’m encouraged by what I’ve seen though, so I’m ready to play. I wing whip one siren, punch the other, and backhand the third, just to keep them guessing. I’ve always wanted to backhand someone. Now I have. Pow!
When I’ve disposed of the sirens, I dodge between two more hurling in my direction and race toward Patrick and Zack since I’ve lost sight of Anthony. Kraven is dancing with a siren in the distance, and I call out his name. His head pops up and he levels his opponent before barreling toward me.
“The two, the two,” I yell.
He sees the two collectors I’m referencing and suddenly he’s airborne. He splits the sky in half and sails across the Lion’s Hand. Zack doesn’t know what hits him. One second, he’s upright, the next he’s fifteen feet from where he once stood, a liberator on top of him, growling like a thundercloud.
I reach Patrick on foot, using my wings to batter sirens out of my path. Patrick takes the first swing. I let him. The last time I saw this jerk he was swimming with demons in hell. He must have gotten out, but he’s worse for the wear. Half the flesh on the right side of his face has thinned so that his cheekbone juts out. He looks like a body that’s half decomposed. When I land a kick into his gut, his eyes change. The pupils dilate so that there’s nothing but blackness. His mouth falls open and a hissing, whistling sound emanates from his throat.
Perhaps I’ve underestimated how much humanity is left in Patrick. I curl my wings around myself, trying to bring him closer so that I can attack full force. His blows never come. It’s quiet inside my wings, like I’ve somehow stepped off the battlefield and am now hovering over it all, watching on in silent contemplation.
I get tired of awaiting Patrick’s assault and so I snap my extra appendages back open. He is turned away from me. So are Kraven and Kincaid, a collector. So are all the sirens and humans and jackrabbits and liberators and collectors, too.
I turn to see what’s captured their attention.
When I do, it takes everything I have not to drop to my knees.
43
Horses of Hell
The first thing I see is Rector. He’s dressed in a red garment a priest might wear, and black leathery wings, frayed at the edges, circle over his head in a murderous arch. In each of his hands are reins that connect to two black Clydesdale horses. They are massive creatures, unseeing eyes burning red, silky tails swishing. The horses are unlike anything I’ve ever seen.
Atop the creatures sits two halves of my heart.
On one, Aspen.
On the other, Charlie.
The girls wear white dresses that scream innocence. Their eyes are black, their porcelain-skinned faces blank. Upon their heads is a crown of gold and red. And their souls. I can literally see their souls glowing inside their chests like the ultimate trophy case.
“Do you see my princesses?” Rector roars. I can hear him from here. His voice reaches into my body like worms in a corpse. “Do you see how content they are to be my brides?”
I don’t think. I just run. My legs pump beneath me and my body races across the distance. Everything in me demands death. I want Rector’s head on a stick. Seeing Charlie and Aspen, alive, it’s like I have tunnel vision. There is only them. I’m so close to Rector. He smiles when he realizes we’re about to collide. It’s like that’s exactly what he wants.
Blue gets there first.
Great white wings spread out over Blue’s head.
On his face is a mask of fury like I’ve never seen. It reflects what I feel inside with sniper precision. Blue has never been able to summon his wings before this moment, but watching him now, soaring through the air, it’s like I can’t imagine him without them. All it took was one look at Aspen, and at Charlie, too; one look to remind him what he was fighting for.
He slams into Rector and the ground shudders from the impact. Rector grabs hold of Blue and the two shoot straight into the air like a rocket. Like they’re headed for the moon and does anyone else need a ride? I take my opportunity to rush toward the two girls, who seem oblivious to what’s transpiring. I’m ten strides from reaching Charlie when Zack, the sixth collector, steps out from behind one of the horses.
In his hand is a sword, something he stole from us, no doubt, but not the sparrow. He circles the stallion and comes to stand at Charlie’s side. The sword tip lies at her neck. Zack holds a finger to his thin lips and smirks.
“Shhh…” he says.
Behind me, the fighting resumes. Someone must have hit someone else, and the battle exploded once again. I eye Zack, remembering the way he broke into the Hive. I didn’t know vultrips existed before that night.
I bend my wings over my head, ensure he understands what fight he’s picking. “If you walk away now, I won’t even pursue you.”
Lie.
“I’ll just get the two of them out of here,” I continue. “That’s all I want.”
I’ll get them out of here, and then I’ll blind you so that you’ll never know who it is that stands ove
r your bed at night. It’s me. It will always be me.
The collector shakes his head. “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
“I’m afraid I’m going to murder you then.” I slice my wing across the space between us, trying to take the legs out from beneath him. He leaps over it like an acrobat, like it’s Cirque de Soleil up in here. As soon as he’s on his feet again, he jabs the sword into Charlie’s neck once again, except this time it breaks the skin. Blood trickles down her throat but she doesn’t even flinch. Her mind is gone, her eyes void.
Kraven makes it to the two horses. When he sees Zack’s weapon pointed at our savior, though, he backs away and rejoins the fight elsewhere. While there’s nothing he can do to save Charlie right now, he can eliminate the collectors still in the lurch. Blue and Rector drop back down to the Lion’s Hand, a few yards from where Zack and I face each other.
Rector grabs hold of Blue’s ankle and yanks it so that Blue lands on his back. “I already killed you once.”
Blue kicks Rector in the gut and the head collector doubles over, gasping for air. My friend scurries to his feet and races toward Aspen.
“No, don’t,” I yell to Blue.
He freezes when he sees the weapon at Charlie’s neck.
We’re at a standoff, no one moving, no one speaking. And that’s when Oswald starts yelling.
His voice sounds like it’s being amplified over a grand speaker at an auditorium. The liberators and humans on our side are nowhere close to him. They must have orchestrated this. Now he stands in the center of hundreds of sirens, his frail arms held above his head.
“If you don’t back away from the girl,” he says to Zack, to Rector, “I’ll destroy your army.”
Rector grins, but the gesture is false. “What do I need with them?”
“Without your army,” Kraven interjects, “there will be no one to protect you.”
The Quiet Ones slink closer to Rector, and so does Max. Rector only sees what’s in front of him, and Max is creeping up the back, keeping low to the ground in the tall grass. He has a short knife in his hand. One part of my brain screams for him to stop, but the other eggs him onward.
Rector turns his face to the sky. The moon has finally fallen away, and the first hint of daylight shadows his twisted face. The bones are too sharp in his cheeks, his forehead pushed too far forward. His eyes are dilated and his nose is sunken and he looks similar to the way Kraven did the night of the fire.
Max slithers closer, closer, between the black horses that stamp the earth and plume warm air into the cold. One flicks its tail and slaps Max on the rear. I’d laugh if I didn’t feel like screaming.
I look up at Charlie. She looks like a mirage of the girl I know. The happiness is gone from her lips, the thirst for life gone from her posture. She stares straight ahead, the crown atop her head the only sparkle to see.
“Charlie,” I say.
I can’t help it. She’s been gone for such a short time, but ever since I watched her disappear through that hole in the floor I’ve been eaten alive by hatred. Now that I see her, I remember goodness and hope and all the crap she’s taught me that I never understood.
Rector laughs when he hears me whisper her name. As he does, rage returns so fiercely my ears ring.
“I’ll be the one to end you, Rector,” I say.
Max takes that exact moment to lunge.
44
Choose
Max leaps to his feet, knife shining over his head.
“No!” a new voice calls out.
Max stops. There’s only one person that could have frozen him in his tracks, and she just stepped into view.
“Don’t do it.” Valery’s voice shakes. “The second you touch him, Zack will kill Charlie.”
Rector sees that Max was about to stab him. I expect him to retaliate. I expect him to tear Max limb from limb. Instead, he grabs Charlie’s leg and rips her from her saddle. The second she slides into his arms—the second Rector does what he’s not supposed to do—Oswald explodes.
An orange blast detonates from the wrinkly dude. Even those of us who are out of harm’s way are thrown back. Not a single scream colors the air. Not a single utterance of fear. But when the orange light echoes and fades, a hundred bodies lie still along the ground. We could have set this up a dozen different times and failed. After all, it would take Rector one heartbeat to dismember the old man. He was in the exact right place at the exact right time, with our people out of range, and not a single collector or siren noticed him until it was too late.
Anthony appears. He flies across the space toward Oswald, and when I see his wings spread out across the dawn, I gasp. They’ve been training, too. I always suspected it, but now I know.
Rector has both Charlie and Aspen beneath him. He has a knife. Maybe it’s the one Max had. Maybe it’s a new one. It glitters between the two girls and Rector’s smile glitters, too. This time, his grin lights his face with amusement. He’s so happy right now. Look how effing happy he is.
The skin on his face pulls tighter. Veins beat blue blood to his black heart. “I am going to give you a choice. I must sacrifice both in the name of the one true king, but since I consider myself a reasonable guy, I will let you choose who we start with.”
The weeks of training I’ve endured tic through my head. Defense, Shadow in Combat, Incapacitation, Execution, Wings, Amplification. None of them tell me how to deal with this. What am I supposed to do when a lunatic is crouched over the two girls I care most about in this world, telling me to choose which dies first?
I take two quick steps toward him and he raises the knife higher.
“No, wait,” I yell. “Just…wait.”
Rector does something I don’t expect—he waits. He gazes at me with anticipation, like he’s actually interested in what I have to say. Max stands near Valery, Kraven is behind me, and Blue is out of sight. I don’t know where anyone else is. All that matters now is Rector kneeling between the girls. The two lie in the tall grass so that I can’t even tell who’s who, only that there are bodies in white dresses muddied by the ground.
I inch toward Rector. “Kill me instead. I’m the nuisance. I’m the one who will keep coming for you. If you kill them now, what have you accomplished? If you’re lucky, your king will get his wish. The scales will tip and demons will pour onto the earth without the need for dargon. But I’ll still be here. And Rector, trust me when I say, I’ll kill you in the end.” My wings fold back, a show of submission. “Spill my blood to please your lord.”
Rector drops his head like he’s thinking. He wants me gone. More than anything, he wants to silence my tongue forever. When he raises his eyes, my heart catches in my throat.
“Left or right.” Rector dances the unforgiving blade between the girls’ bodies. “LEFT OR RIGHT?!”
He clasps the knife in both hands and the world falls away.
“Right,” I hear someone yell. “Right!”
“Fair enough,” he grunts. And then he brings the knife down.
The Quiet Ones scream. It’s louder than when they were in the Hive. It’s so loud it eats away every thought I have. It eats any mercy that remains inside my body and replaces it with blinding, cancerous wrath.
Rector jerks his arm up again. He moves with supernatural speed, and the bloodied knife stills in the air for only a moment before coming back down.
He’s tackled from the side by Annabelle.
She leaps to her feet and swings a mallet through the air. Her aim is true, and Rector falls to his side, clutching the back of his head. Annabelle scrambles in the grass and then gathers a girl in a white dress into her arms, half pulling her. “Don’t screw with my friends,” she mutters.
I’m on the ground, diving toward the girl left behind.
I can already see Aspen’s dark hair, the smooth unmoving skin on her chest.
The Quiet Ones stop screaming and the sounds of fighting replace their wail. A hundred or more sirens are dead, but there are many left. N
ow they fight with renewed energy, fueled by their leader’s triumph.
For me though, all is quiet. Time stops. I cover my face and growl into my hands. I can’t do it. I can’t see Aspen’s lifeless face. Not after the dreams I’ve had, not after I was sure she was dead and then seeing her again, alive.
When Rector moans in pain, and I glimpse Anthony fighting with Kraven and two other collectors headed in my direction, I know I can’t wait any longer. I have to get Aspen out of here. I have to get her off the battlefield so that we can mourn her properly.
I uncover my face, and my entire body burns bright like the rising sun.
Because it isn’t Aspen’s lifeless face I see lying in the grass—
It’s Charlie’s.
45
Destiny
The world ceases to spin the moment I see her. Blood seeps from the wound in her chest and stains her virginal white dress. Her eyes are closed, and her mouth is parted. I gather Charlie into my arms and my emotions flick off. I am a stone figure of the demon I once was.
I can’t think. I can’t allow myself to absorb this information or I’ll crack apart. Annabelle trying to get Aspen to safety is the only thing keeping me sane. Blue touches down in front of Annabelle and takes Aspen from her. He says something quickly to Annabelle and then soars across the Lion’s Hand with Aspen in tow.
Anthony charges toward me.
I’m ready for him.
I release Charlie and stand. When Anthony reaches me, I dive over his back, take his head in my hands, and snap his neck. He crumbles to the ground. I retrieve the blade I’d tucked in my waistband, and I stab him. I stab him until he’s a human waterfall, a red cascading display. I stab until my arm shakes. I stab until I’m screaming and I have to stop because the emotions are flooding back into my body and I can’t handle them.
An arm grabs my shoulder.
It’s Kraven.
“Go,” he yells. “Get her out of here.”
Then he’s gone, doing everything he can to keep Rector down. When I see Charlie on the ground, guilt slams into me like a wrecking ball. I forget about Anthony and the cuff I still need to take from him.
The Warrior Page 23
