I took a few more steps. “What are you saying?”
Tommy shook his head. “Just be careful, Nix. I turned my life around. I tried to make things better. To change. I couldn’t make it happen.”
“Help me kill him, Tommy,” I said.
He lifted his head and I was close enough to see the wounds that had been inflicted on him. Deep slices had cut the meat of his cheeks off, and both eyes had been dug out, leaving gaping, bloody holes. I breathed in sharply through my nose. “Who did this?”
“The Shadow and his minions.” He groaned the words. “He’s coming for you, too. He won’t hold back now. He will kill you even though Dad wants you alive. He wants you for something to do with the deal he made, but the Shadow wants your soul for his master.”
First the leather-bound book Dinah and Eleanor had told me about with the details of the deal, and now this?
“I had nothing to do with that deal Romano made.” I may have been there and saw it go down, but I had nothing to do with it. Did I?
“Doesn’t mean that Dad didn’t put you into the bargain somehow. You were a minor when he made the deal, he had the authority to fucking hand you over if he wanted.” He let out a sigh. “Just be careful. This whole thing is a trap for you.”
His body jerked suddenly, and three bodies spread out of the shadows around him, their hands on his body as it bucked and writhed under their touch.
I didn’t even have to ask my guns to switch it out. I squeezed off two rounds of the incendiary bullets and lit the small cell, dispelling the shadows. They ran, hissing and snarling from the light.
“Go,” Tommy said. “Go and . . . tell Bear I tried.”
I backed up and Killian went with me. “Where to, lass?”
Muscles tense, I flicked through Genzo’s memories of the jail, finding what I was looking for in a few seconds. “If it’s a trap, there is only one place Romano would set it up. There’s a pit they created for training. That’s where they’ll be waiting.”
“And Noah?”
I started back the way we’d come, my eyes searching the shadows for more minions or the Shadow himself. I searched my mind for the Yakuza that was with Noah. The image inside my head flickered and then I could see the Yakuza as if he were on a closed-circuit TV. He tipped his head, his braid sliding to one side, acknowledging me.
The reversal is in, but it needs time to flow through the pipes.
“I will set it off. Just wait by the gates,” I said.
“It’s in?” Killian’s eyebrows shot up. He didn’t question how I knew.
I nodded. “Yes. Let’s go.”
Through the jail we went once more. In the distance, here and there, were the sounds of howls. A few gunshots echoed to us. But still no people. The Yakuza were all centering around the entertainment pit, waiting on me.
I put a hand on Killian as we drew close. “You are my backup. I need you to go around to the top of the pit and be ready to throw down from there. I will go in.”
“You want to walk into the trap on your own?”
I shrugged. “I know it’s a trap, so is it still a trap?”
He cupped a hand around my neck and pulled me close. Our noses touched. “Do try and get out of this alive, Phoenix.”
“I’m a survivor,” I said. “I hope you are, too.” I pushed him away, watched him go the direction I’d given him.
I stood there, letting the moments tick by. This was the turning point. Nothing would happen from here on out if I just didn’t move. The Shadow wouldn’t come for me. No Ikimono monsters would hunt me down. They were waiting on me.
But Bear would be there, too, and that pulled me forward . . . I moved to take a step and then went still. A coppery tang of blood floated on the air and I spun, both guns coming up but I was not fast enough.
I caught only a glimpse of her eyes and sharp teeth before Vivian slammed into me, taking me to the floor and smashing my head against the concrete. Then I saw nothing but darkness and stars.
Dinah screeched and I squeezed her trigger, hoping to hell I was pointing her at Vivian and not my own body.
“I’m going to kill her!” Dinah roared.
“Oh, your daddy is going to be so happy with me,” she whispered in my ear and then gave it a lick. “I do wish I could taste your blood.” The lick was followed by a nip. I tensed and she slammed my head into the concrete again. Warmth pooled out under my scalp. My arms and legs were numb and I struggled to keep my eyes open.
“Gag jam,” I whispered and both Dinah and Eleanor clicked under my fingers.
“What did you say?” Vivian lifted her head, her mouth smeared with my blood. I tipped my wrist, holding Eleanor so her muzzle pointed at the Magelore, and pulled the trigger.
A wad of gag jam wrapped in a waxed capsule shot from Eleanor and slammed into Vivian’s cheek. The gag jam spread over the Magelore’s face, covering her nose, mouth, eyes and then even her ears, making her completely blind to everything around her. I rolled to the side and puked as she stumbled away from me.
Not a good sign, but what did I have left to me but to get up and keep going.
“You okay?” Eleanor whispered. “Talk to us, Phoenix.”
“Concussion, a bad one.” The walls spun and danced as I sat up. My fingers went nerveless as I sat there. Vivian crashed around me fighting to get the gag jam off but only making it worse, spreading it to her hands and binding them to her face, too.
I scooted back and leaned against the wall, my body unable to do much but sit. My stomach heaved and I puked again, the stuff sliding down the front of my suit because I couldn’t even turn my head.
“Get up, you have to get up!” Dinah yelled from where I left her on the floor. “Bear is in there, waiting for you.”
“I know. I can’t save him like this.” I spoke but the words were slurred. “I can’t save him like this.”
“Phoenix,” Eleanor said, “you are an abnormal. You are a survivor, and if there was any time to embrace it, this is it. I know what you are. I know what you can do and you must trust me. If you have never trusted me before, trust me now.”
I let my eyes fall on her. She was next to my left foot. Vivian crashed into the wall across from me and slid downward. Not dead, not dying, but unable to do anything about her predicament. She flailed and banged, the background noise to my confusion and struggle to understand what Eleanor was saying.
“What am I?” I asked. “How do you know what I am?” I shifted my foot so I pulled her toward me, though even that small movement made my head swim and my stomach tighten in anticipation.
I managed to get her to my left hand and touch the grip, running my fingers over her name etched deeply into the otherwise smooth metal. “Eleanor, tell me.”
The moment stretched and pulled, like a giant rubber band, that when it snapped back, the pain would be a slap in the face.
Eleanor shivered under my hand. “I was never supposed to tell you, Phoenix. This was a secret you were never to know, but there is no one else who can help you. If you had continued on in your life with Bear and Justin you would never have had to know.”
I swallowed hard. “I can take it, Eleanor.”
Her words were drops of acid in the life I’d known, in the person I’d thought I was.
“You are like I was, Phoenix. I was like you. I had fire in my soul. I had power in my blood and you are the same. Find the fire inside you, and let it burn through this. Let it heal the wound.” Her words were hard, demanding not unlike when Zee had trained me.
I didn’t need to ask what would happen if I didn’t find the fire. Bear would either be killed or end up being raised by my father. Ikimono would spread. Killian would die.
Romano would win.
That was unacceptable.
I closed my eyes, and tried to find that fire she spoke of. Like walking through a dark hall, the interior of my mind was empty of any fire. Just darkness everywhere. How the hell did I find fire in my soul?
“It’s not there.”
“Look harder or you will die and Bear will die with you. Your mother named you Phoenix for a reason,” Eleanor snapped. “Do it now!”
The words were a slap and I found myself digging deeper into my body than I’d ever thought possible. My breathing slowed, along with my heart rate; beat by beat I fell into a trance.
“Keep going,” Eleanor said softly, her voice lulling me as Simon had done. As Zee had done. “Deeper, past what you see in your dreams, deeper past the memories you know, to the depth of your DNA, that is where you will find the fire.”
I sunk into her words, into her voice, and a flickering strand of DNA appeared in front of my closed eyes. Spinning and dancing, the three strands opened to me and I dove into their depths, feeling a warmth brush against my face, pulling me forward.
There in the darkest recess of my mind, in the base of my very makeup, a flame flickered, and beckoned to me.
Fear lanced me, and I pulled back, terrified that if I touched it, I would no longer be who I was. I would not be the woman I’d fought so hard to become.
“Do not be afraid,” Eleanor said softly from what felt like inside my head, “this is your destiny, Phoenix. This is your strength. A weapon like any other.”
Her words calmed my fears, because I understood weaponry.
Now, I was the weapon. And I would master this new tool like I did all the others.
I looked again. The fire burned with all colors, but the hottest was a blue that looked not unlike electricity. I reached for it, and it danced along my fingers and skin. I clenched my hand around it, drew it to my chest, curled around that blue flame and then I let it go. The flames flew over my body, stripping me of any pretense I had clung to that I was a normal.
The last of my defenses were gone. I was not human, and neither was Bear.
But I was beginning for the first time to see that perhaps, in order to survive my own family, being abnormal was a blessing.
A gift even, one from the only person in my childhood who had loved me. “Thank you, Mom,” I whispered.
The wound in the back of my head healed, and I sat up, the world no longer spinning. “Holy shit, will it always be like this?”
“Yes,” Eleanor said. “Now that you have connected with your power, you will always heal this fast. Now, let’s get your son.”
I scooped her up, then Dinah. “We are having a fucking long talk when we get out of here, all three of us.”
“Done,” Eleanor said, “but let’s get out of here first, shall we?”
“Yes, we fucking shall!” Dinah yelled. I pointed her at the slumped-over Magelore and squeezed the trigger twice into Vivian’s neck, the bullets shattering through bone and flesh. Her body jerked and her head slumped sideways, hanging by only a thread or two of flesh. With a spinning kick, I booted it the rest of the way off and sent it rolling down the hall.
That would slow her down.
“Why not use the electricity?” Dinah asked. “I could have fried the shit out of her.”
“Saving it for someone special,” I said with a smile as I strode toward the entertainment arena and the trap that waited for me.
The arena doors were wide open and I stepped through, knowing full well what I was doing. Knowing I was putting my life on the line in the belief that the Yakuza would help me.
As soon as I crossed the threshold, the doors slammed behind me and a steel panel slid over them, barring any escape or rescue attempt from that direction, at least.
A slow clap echoed through the air. I turned, and found myself staring up at Luca Romano on a platform above the top of the walls of the arena.
“Well, well, Phoenix. What do you think? That I didn’t know you were coming?”
I squeezed off three shots, two from Eleanor and one from Dinah. He staggered back under the bullets, and went to one knee. I stared up at him, a terrible hope filling my chest. I wanted him dead, but I wanted Bear back more.
“I know those didn’t hurt you. I won’t kill you, Romano. Just give me my son,” I said.
He laughed at me, slapped his hands on his thighs and dusted off the spots in his chest where the bullets had hit. “Oh, I think not. I think you’re going to work for me again, Phoenix. If you don’t . . . well, let’s just say you aren’t going to like what I do next.” He snapped his fingers and I stared as they dragged a tall young man forward. He’d grown in the five months since I’d seen him last. A spurt maybe, and his hair was longer, shaggy around his face, and oh, God, it was him, it was my boy alive and in the flesh.
“Bear,” I called up to him, struggled to say his name around the love and grief welling through me. He shook his head and it was only then that I saw the gag over his mouth and the grief burned off in a blaze of fury. “You will fucking well let me talk to my son or I will bury you right here, Romano.”
“I thought you might say that.” He smiled down at me as he grabbed Bear by the arm and threw him over the guardrail. I dropped Dinah and Eleanor and ran for him. I was too far away to catch him completely, but I was faster now and I made it as his feet touched down. I caught his upper body, keeping him from slamming to the concrete.
“Keep him safe, if you can, Phoenix. If not, call a truce and I will save you. I will save you both and you will be mine forever,” Romano said. I looked up at him, truly seeing his face for the first time in years. He was gaunt as though he carried a weight he could not carry on his own. He’d aged even since I’d seen him last.
“You need me,” I said.
“I do.” He nodded. “But I’ll settle for your son if I can’t have you. The question is, will you give your life for his?”
I tightened my arms around Bear, wanting to just hold him for a moment, but he pulled away and yanked the gag from his mouth.
“Don’t touch me.” He snapped the words and he might as well have punched me in the face. I sucked in a sharp breath.
“What did he do to you?” I whispered because I could barely breathe.
“He opened my eyes. My grandfather.” Bear’s eyes hardened, narrowing so that he looked so much like my brothers and father I thought my heart would stop.
“Would you save him now that he hates you, Phoenix? Save him, if you dare. If not, I will.” Romano leaned over the edge. “You have two choices. You will die tonight, Phoenix, or you will agree to work for me. Either way you choose, I keep the boy.”
Bear nodded, his eyes flicking away from mine. “I’m staying with him.”
This was not my son. This was not the boy I’d rocked to sleep, that I’d cradled when a nightmare chased him into my room. The boy who’d been so kind and—
A grinding noise spun me around and a portion of the wall slid open. Darkness reigned behind it and I realized I had no guns on me, nothing but the backpack which held a couple grenades, flashbangs, and Linx.
Linx.
I whipped the bag off my back and yanked it open. I pulled Linx out and held him out to Bear. “Take him. He can be any tool. He can help you survive.”
Bear eyed me like I was handing him one of the grenades after pulling a pin. I stared at him, though my instincts were screaming at me to turn and grab my guns. This was my son, and I wasn’t leaving him defenseless.
Carefully, he took Linx.
“Knife, Linx,” I said, and he shimmered and shifted until he was a solid fourteen-inch blade with a rounded handle that fit Bear’s smaller hand. I turned my back to him, though it was an effort. “Stay behind me.”
“Why, why would you try to save me? Don’t you hate me for being born, for ruining your life and taking you away from killing?” Bear threw the words at me and they landed hard on what was left of my heart.
The darkness gaping at me like an open maw held the skittering of creatures coming our way. Creatures that would kill us both if I didn’t kill them first.
I ran forward, as the first wave of what could only be Ikimono monsters flowed out of the darkness. My first reaction was to stop and star
e, to try and piece together what exactly I was seeing.
The base model seemed to be dogs as Genzo had said, but I couldn’t be sure because what they’d become was . . . not dogs. But creatures that had canine features, here and there, and not much else to identify them as man’s best friend. Wings, claws, forked tails, and double heads. Heads that were nothing but a mouth that snapped directly out of a neck, tongues that rolled out like tentacles, suckers and all. Behind them came creatures on two legs, abnormals that had been twisted by the Ikimono.
But in the mass of it was a dog I knew even if it was only by the twitch of the top of the same ears. Impossible, yet there he was, as if he’d always been waiting on me.
“ABE!” I screamed for him and he lifted his twisted head and woofed at me. He wore a collar, with a tiny blinking light on it.
None of the dogs attacked, none of them had rushed me. I kept moving forward, headed for Dinah and Eleanor in a crouch.
“Ladies. I may need you to fire on your own,” I said. They were both pointed in the direction of the oncoming creatures.
“We can’t,” Eleanor said.
“Bullshit. Dinah does it. And this is not the time to argue with me,” I snapped.
Dinah huffed, but she didn’t deny what I’d said.
I watched the dogs, watched them sniffing the area. They were—for the moment—ignoring me.
And then the little light blinking on their collars went from a flashing green to a steady red. The two-legged abnormals behind them wore the same collars and the same transition of colored lights.
En masse, they froze, and turned their faces toward me, a rumbling growl rolling through them one by one until it was a symphony of growls that made the hair on the back of my neck stand. The abnormals let out a war cry, their bodies turned into weapons I would never survive.
I locked my eyes on Abe. “Abe.”
He shook his head once and then let out a deep snarl as he pushed his way to the front of the pack. His back feet were twisted into talons and a pair of wings pushed their way out of either side of his spine. His bottom jaw was split down the middle and stuck out at an angle to either side of his face.
Blood of a Phoenix (The Nix Series Book 2) Page 29
