by Steve McHugh
“So we just wait for them to steal a car and then grab them at the border? Your people are still in charge there, yes? Or we get them at Thunder Bay.”
“Unfortunately, I don’t think it will be that easy. Layla is much more powerful than she was when I first tried to grab her, and her father is a known problem. I want them brought here, in the town. Letting them get to Thunder Bay when we’re about to take the city will create unknown issues. It can’t be allowed to happen.”
“And how do we ensure they come into town?”
Nergal smiled. “That’s where you come in. This is your final chance to get Layla and Caleb. If you fail again, it will be the last time you fail anyone. I gave Elias several chances to capture the girl and he failed, too. I had hoped that sending a woman to capture a woman would bring about better results.”
Kristin ignored the remark.
“Women are weak,” Nergal continued. “My ex-wife was weak, Abaddon is weak, Layla is weak. I had hoped you would change my thoughts on the matter, but so far, you’re just as weak as they are.”
“What about Fenix?” Kristin asked, hoping a new topic would stop her wanting to hit Nergal. “He claims he can’t tell us the location of Hades’ compound. Have the others we took with him managed to give anything up?”
Nergal shook his head. “My people are looking at one of the bracelets we recovered from the dead at the prison, but there appears to be some sort of blood curse mark on it. They’re not sure what it does yet and, considering how potent and deadly blood curses can be, no one is willing to start poking at it. We have prisoners who didn’t take to the spirit scrolls; we’ll use them as guinea pigs when the time comes.”
“How many umbra are at Thunder Bay?”
“Enough. Most of the scrolls brought to the Texas compound in the last few shipments have been useless. We managed to get lucky when we found a large number in Turkey, but it appears that most of them were never completed. Out of ten thousand scrolls, maybe a hundred have spirits attached. Of those, maybe twenty will be able to fully bond with a drenik and become a full-fledged umbra. The rest will die before they get close. And with our helpers in Louisiana no longer capable of doing anything, we’ve lost a large hub for bringing in test subjects and scrolls. We have a sizable number of them here at the compound; I considered forcing the inhabitants of the town to use them, but I’d rather see how the war goes first without having to create a second problem of hundreds of newly-forged umbra.”
“I assume Abaddon has gone?”
“She’s in the town. At some diner having breakfast, I believe. She brought a masked woman with her. I have no idea who she is, but the pair of them are not annoying me at the moment, so thank heavens for small mercies. Besides, I’m going to Thunder Bay, so they can do what they want. Actually, maybe the diner is a good place for you to talk to them and find out what they plan.”
“And what is your plan with Red Rock once we have it?”
“My plan is of no concern to you,” Nergal snapped. “You know only what I can be bothered to tell you. I talk to Abaddon because Arthur made it clear I have to. You are an assassin. A delivery person. You are whatever I tell you to be. You are not important enough to know my plans. I plucked you from the prison cell because I wanted to see what would happen when you bonded with a spirit scroll. You were an experiment, nothing more. The fact that you worked is a miracle I hadn’t expected. Do not go around thinking you are worth more to me than that.”
Kristin bowed her head slightly and left without a word. She usually ignored the way Nergal treated women, and so long as she kept busy, she didn’t really consider the way he spoke to her. She thought that he’d picked her from the cell because he’d seen something in her that would be of help to his plans. It had become increasingly obvious to her that she was never going to be the worthwhile member of his team that she’d hoped to become. The thought upset her. She didn’t want to be taken for granted. She didn’t want to be spoken to like she wasn’t worthy of respect. She could not kill Nergal, although the thought had crossed her mind. He was too strong, too dangerous. So Kristin took her anger and frustrations out on others. Maybe she would need to leave Nergal’s employ sooner rather than later. But first, she wanted to talk to Abaddon. And she wanted to kill Layla.
Abaddon was closest, so that was her first destination. It didn’t take Kristin long to find weapons for the mission and head out in one of the cars in the parking lot. She picked a silver Audi RS5 Coupe because it looked good and had a trunk that was just about big enough to stuff someone in, a fact she knew from firsthand experience.
Kristin pulled into the diner’s parking lot, paused, and looked up at the building directly in front of her. The diner resembled something out of the 1950s: all chrome and glass with a red roof and red trimming. The door was at the side of the large establishment. The sign above the diner said Suzy’s, although Kristin had no idea who Suzy was. With the car window wound down, she caught the smell of coffee and bacon. She hadn’t eaten yet, so maybe there was time.
Kristin looked around at the apartment buildings nearby. It was still early, so most people were inside, which was probably for the best. She considered what she was going to say to Abaddon. The spirits in her head no longer talked to her. The force of Kristin’s personality had all but swallowed up the two inside the scroll, changing her in only minor ways, so they were no help. She’d absorbed them as soon as she was able; the drenik, too. It had tried to control her and had been rudely surprised to see what the inside of Kristin’s psyche housed. She didn’t control the drenik—she wasn’t sure that anything could—but it appeared to be less than happy to talk to her now, and that was how she liked it.
Kristin pushed the thoughts aside, wound up the window, and opened the car door, stepping out into the crisp morning. She’d been angry when arriving at the compound and angry when leaving it, but the drive had calmed her somewhat, and she now noticed that she was not dressed for a cold morning. She walked to the diner, opened the door, and stepped inside, feeling warmth wash over her.
Apart from two waitresses and the cook, Kristin spotted five people in the diner: one Sheriff’s deputy, an elderly couple, Abaddon—who looked up from her coffee and spotted Kristin—and a woman sitting across from the necromancer, who also looked up at Kristin. She wore a black mask with a red slash across her eyes and had no food or drink in front of her. She wore what appeared to be some kind of leather armor.
Apart from Abaddon and the woman, everyone in the diner was dead. Several had slit throats, although, as Kristin stepped over the body of the Sheriff’s deputy, she noticed no obvious signs of trauma.
Abaddon motioned for Kristin to sit next to the masked woman, which she did without comment.
“Nergal sent you here,” Abaddon said, taking a long drink of her coffee.
Kristin nodded. There didn’t seem to be much point in lying to her.
“He wants to know what we have planned?” Abaddon asked.
Another nod from Kristin.
“I want you to work with me,” she said.
“Behind Nergal’s back?” Kristin asked. She wasn’t overly against the idea, she just wanted to know up front.
“Yes. Nergal does not have Avalon’s best interests at heart.”
“What does that mean?”
Abaddon took another sip of coffee. “He has orders to go to Red Rock and secure the realm gate for Avalon’s forces. I believe he wishes to take Hades’ territory and claim it as his own. That realm gate is too important to fall into the hands of someone who does not have Avalon’s back.”
“That would force him to go against Avalon,” Kristin said. “Why would he do that?”
“He is arrogant,” Abaddon said. “He is unhappy that I have as much influence with Arthur as I do. And I think he’s been planning this for some time.”
“How do you know this?”
“I have people in Nergal’s operation. I’ve been informed of how he treats you. I thought you
might enjoy some revenge.”
“Did you get Layla Cassidy?” the woman asked.
“No,” Kristin admitted, irritated at having a stranger question her.
“She’s a feisty one, isn’t she?” the woman said with a chuckle that made Kristin’s skin crawl, although she couldn’t have said why.
Abaddon stood and passed a small detonator to Kristin. “I’ve placed the charges. So you’re going to use it to prove your worth to me. If you decide not to bother blowing the place, then I’ll know you don’t want to work with me and will treat you accordingly. And if you do . . . well, if you do, then I’ll wait for you outside of Red Rock. At a small town by the name of Nipigon.”
“I never said I’d work with you,” Kristin said.
“I know, but at some point Nergal will try to have you killed. You failed him twice, and even though it was not totally your fault, he won’t see it that way. He’ll come for you.”
Abaddon and the mystery woman left the diner. Kristin waited for several seconds before leaving. She drove the Audi down the street, stopping at the mouth of an alley. She got out and pressed the detonator, happy to see the diner explode. She wasn’t sure if she trusted Abaddon, but she knew not to trust Nergal. At some point, he would decide she was no longer worth keeping around. Before she made a decision, Kristin wanted to know exactly why Abaddon was so interested in the Red Rock realm gate.
16
Layla and Caleb were already in Winterborn when the explosion happened. It felt like the street itself rocked, but the sound, fire, and smoke made sure they knew it could have only been one thing.
“I told you this was a bad idea,” Caleb said. He’d been against them going into Winterborn from the beginning, and his arguments hadn’t lessened in the hour since they’d arrived.
“We need transport,” Layla said. “We needed clean clothes, considering we both had blood on ours. And now we need to figure out a way around the border guards, because there’s no way they’re not working for Nergal.”
“So we need a tank,” Caleb said.
“Going around the checkpoint is out. I can’t imagine swimming across the river is going to do anything but get us both killed. Umbra or not, we both still need oxygen to breathe. We can’t fly, and we don’t have a boat to go around. Going through is our only option. And yes, you’ve mentioned several times that this is Nergal’s territory, which is why I told you to behave.”
“We’re not getting through this town without a fight.”
“A fight I’m okay with. A fight after walking through rough terrain is something I’d rather avoid.”
They were in an alley behind a row of houses with wooden fences that were easily a dozen feet tall. When they’d first arrived in the town, they’d managed to break into a clothes shop and steal clean clothes and some backpacks to carry supplies when they finally found some. Layla had tried to use the phone in the office, but it hadn’t worked, leaving her to wonder if the whole town’s communication network had been shut down.
The pair made their way through the early morning streets, as more and more people streamed out of their homes trying to figure out what had caused the explosion. Layla listened to their words of concern, of fear, and more than a few hopes that no one had been caught in the blast.
A crowd had gathered at the end of the street that the diner had been on, and the sheriff and his deputies had placed a cordon around the area so the fire department could do their job. Layla fought the urge to pull up her hood; she didn’t want to look suspicious.
They moved around the crowd until they reached the alley on the other side of the street. They ducked down it and jogged toward the end.
“Okay, we need to figure out where to go from here,” Caleb said. “Getting out of town isn’t going to be as simple as stealing a car.”
“This town has the compound where my friends were taken,” Layla said.
“You want to go find them? Because that will get us killed.” Caleb spoke with real anger. “I raised you to be smarter than that.”
Layla stared at her father for several seconds. “Have you always been like this? Were you like this when I was a child? I don’t remember. Were you like this when Mom died?”
Caleb’s expression grew dark. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what, Dad? Don’t talk about Mom? Don’t talk about her fear of you, or how she’d be alive today if you hadn’t been a psychopath? Or don’t talk about how not once, when you were killing people, did you think about us? Which part shouldn’t I talk about?”
“I told you before, I loved both you and your mom. Her death . . . is something I will never stop regretting.”
“Death? She was murdered. Don’t you know that?”
“Murdered?” Caleb asked, confused. “No, I read the report. It was a car accident.”
“She was killed by a man named Elias,” Layla told him, wondering how he was going to take the news. “He was supposed to use me to get her to tell them where you were, but she died in the attempt. It was ordered by Nergal.”
“And this Elias?”
“My friend Chloe killed him.”
“Nergal is responsible for your mother’s death, and for you becoming an umbra. For so much pain and suffering. Why have you not killed him?”
“Two reasons,” Layla snapped. “One: I’m not a bloody assassin. Two: he’s Nergal. Irkalla could do it, probably Diana, Persephone, and Hades, too, but all of those names belong to people who are thousands of years old. I’m not strong enough to fight Nergal. Not yet. He’ll get his, though, I’ll make sure of it.”
Caleb sat down on the sidewalk, his head in his hands. “If we’re to do this, I’m going to need my band off. It’s not about trying to track anyone; I’ll need my strength, my healing. I’m too limited with this thing on.”
“No.”
“I can kill people whether I’m wearing it or not.”
“I just told you Mom was murdered, and you ask me to remove your band. I’m not an idiot. You’ll be stronger, faster, less easy to hurt, and frankly a lot more dangerous to everyone in your way. You’ll go after Nergal, and now isn’t the time. No chance. Get up. We need to go.”
“So we just hand ourselves in and hope for the best?”
“No, not so much,” Remy said, stepping out of the shadows of the alley beside them.
Layla hugged him. “How long have you been following us?” she asked.
“Since I found out you’d been taken. Kase and I took off after you and found the car and a dead Cody. I assume your dad’s work, yes?”
Layla nodded.
“We weren’t there long before a bunch of guards arrived, so we followed them back here. You weren’t hard to track. I found your scent from the car.”
“Where’s Kase?”
“Just outside of town with the others. Diana, Harry, Irkalla, Zamek, and Chloe, all of us lived through last night. Most of Kristin’s friends did not. Also, we have backup.”
“Who?”
“Persephone. She’s— Well, the best way to put it would be to say she’s angry. Very angry.”
“What about Thunder Bay and Red Rock?”
“Thunder Bay is under siege, and Nergal’s army is currently moving through the remains of the city killing anyone who isn’t on their side. Red Rock is evacuating, but it’ll take hours. We’re going to head there as soon as we can.”
“What about Jared, Fenix, and the others inside the compound?”
“We don’t know for certain that they’re in there,” Remy said.
Layla looked at her father. “You try anything, and Remy will kill you.”
Remy smiled.
Caleb held up his wrists. “I have no intention of doing anything at this exact point in time.”
She sighed and removed a key from her pocket, unlocking his sorcerer’s band. “I want to know where Jared and Fenix are,” she told him, still conflicted about having removed his band.
“Do you have anything of theirs?”
Layla shook her head. “If I’d had something of theirs, I’d have gotten you to track them long ago.” She passed him Kristin’s dagger. “This belonged to a clone of Kristin, I don’t know if that makes any difference, but you can see around the person you’re tracking, so I’m hoping you might be able to see where Kristin is. Maybe get an idea if Jared and Fenix are in that compound.”
She passed the dagger to Caleb, but held on to the hilt. “Don’t screw around with this,” she said. “Please.”
Caleb nodded and took the dagger in his hands. He closed his eyes and opened them a second later to reveal his entire eyes were dark blue, like two perfect oval gems. It lasted a few seconds before they changed back to his normal color.
“And?” Remy asked.
“They’re in there. I saw Kristin talking to Jared in his cell. That’s it. Only a few seconds, but he’s definitely in there. I can’t say more, though. I’d need something that the original Kristin held to get a better look, I think.”
Layla looked at Remy. “I think I have a plan.”
“You’re going to get inside that compound, aren’t you?” Remy asked.
Layla nodded. “Hopefully, yes. They clearly want us, and I would really like to get our allies free. And maybe give a little back to that Kristin woman.”
“Handing ourselves in seems like a bad idea,” Caleb said.
“I wasn’t going to hand myself in at all.”
“Whatever you do needs to be fast,” Remy said. “Nergal is heading to Red Rock, and if that realm gate falls, bad things will happen. Persephone didn’t go into details, but I got the feeling there’s a very good reason they want to destroy the gate. And that reason isn’t just to do with the refugees they’re sending through it.”
“Okay, we need more information about the compound,” Layla said. “If we can get our people out as quickly as possible, we can hopefully hurt Nergal here in Winterborn.”
“Most of the troops appear to have left already,” Remy said. “It’s barebones back at the compound.”
