by Godwin, Pam
“Don’t you dare wiggle.” He rested his hand on my hip.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” But dream of it was exactly what I did.
In the light of daybreak, I opened my eyes to find Jesse watching me from inches away. Thoughts shifted in the depth of his gaze. Lost in his secrets.
I could tell by the height of the man at my back that Roark was curved around me.
“Did I wiggle?” I whispered.
The air between us thickened. He touched my cheek, his thumb padding my bottom lip. “You make things damn difficult, darlin’.” His husky Texan accent shot my heart to my throat.
I crooked up my mouth and took his thumb with it. “I try.”
He dropped his hand and raised his eyes to the ceiling where the sun pierced through the seams. “Wake your snoring priest. We need to keep moving.”
The spirally patterns of rhyolite formations guided us through the mountains. Our mounts kicked up the volcanic soil and nibbled at the sparse vegetation. The ever-present risk of following the pebbles down the steep unpredictable ledges kept us alert. Falling to our deaths seemed to be the only threat. Still, my pulse roared with the occasional clap of wings or the flash of a shape sprang by the shading slopes.
That night, we camped beside a geothermal spa. Everyone took turns bathing and guarding. Then we slept along the edge on the soft bed of moss. Jesse, Roark and Michio split the guard over me. When it was Jesse’s turn to sleep, he took Roark’s position at my back.
On the third day, we guided our weary mounts over glaciers, sand, grass and volcanic rock. A terrain battling for identity, the plains and buttes pushed steam from its pores and blotted the horizon with billows of vapor.
We followed the sound of moving water and when we reached the river, we stood in awe of the powerful surge dropping in towering multi-level waterfalls.
Michio pointed to a charred rock wall near the lowest level. “We’re here. Landmannalaugar.”
Amidst the geologic chaos, a leafy-covered steel door hung from the face of the ridge. My eyes followed the hyaloclastite ledges up, up, up to the ice-capped peak.
“The labs are through there.” Michio pointed at the door and alighted the horse. “Inside Hekla volcano.”
Of course they were. His hands clutched my waist and he slid me down. Then he turned toward the door, fisting his cane. The tip glinted with blades.
A tumult twined my insides, something I hadn’t felt since Reykjavik. We hadn’t seen an aphid since then. Why was that?
I released the carbine from its mount on the horse and Michio tapered his eyes at me. The tingling dimmed. I shook my head.
“Evie.” Roark appeared in front of me. “Wha’ is it?”
“I don’t—”
A giggle bounced along the rocky backdrop and raised the hair on my nape. I’d recognize my daughter’s sweet laugh anywhere. My shoulders bunched to my ears. “Where’s Jesse?”
Roark hovered so close his breath wisped my hair. “Den’ ye get buggered looking for him all the time?” He raised my chin and read my eyes. “Talk to me.”
I swallowed around a lump. The door to the labs blew open and snicked closed. “Something’s wrong. Why didn’t they come out to greet us?”
“The tunnels are deep and there’s no surveillance,” Michio replied. “But I agree. Something feels off.”
Annie’s singsong chant tiptoed across the lava field and carried above the roar of the waterfalls. Her high-pitched vibrato brushed by me. The door swung open again and slammed.
Jesse’s fingers interlaced mine. “Annie wants us to follow her in.”
I flinched. “Would she lead me into danger?”
Roark placed a hand on my elbow. “Good thought. She did lead ye to the Lakota.”
Jesse grinned and waved his hand toward the door. “After you, priest.”
Shoulder to shoulder, Michio, Jesse, Roark and I crept through the icy tunnel. Darwin slinked by, nose to the ground. Tallis and Georges trailed. Ivar and sons guarded the entrance.
We moved deeper into the volcano. Eventually, the frost melted from the walls and the air warmed. The dirt below our feet ended. Metal platforms stretched over the sloping ground to the flickering lights ahead.
Michio raised his voice over the clanking of our boots on the grates. “I haven’t been here for six months, but there were forty scientists when I left. We should’ve run into someone by now.” He nodded at the bend ahead. “We’re approaching the hub.”
Weapons at the ready, we stepped around the corner and onto an expansive balcony overlooking a pit. Scaffolding layered the multiple levels below. Tunnels and rooms branched in every direction.
We approached the railing. Our boots crunched glass. Broken equipment and workbenches were tossed across every level. Bullet holes chipped the rock walls, the metal platforms, and the furniture. I strained my eyes, scouring every nook and shadow. Not a single body, dead or alive.
“Zut alors,” Georges whispered from behind us.
“Let’s split up,” Jesse said. “Tallis, Georges, back here in thirty.”
We dispersed. Artificial light splashed over empty hallways and labs. We tossed bunks and tore out storage rooms. The facility was a shambles, the scientists gone. I leaned against the railing on the bottom level and rubbed my temples.
Jesse perched at my side. “It was the Drone’s army, wasn’t it?”
Michio nodded, lines fanning from the corners of his eyes.
A thrum bloomed in my chest and set my teeth on edge. Annie’s voice drifted from the hallway behind us with eerie clarity.
Connect the dots. La. La. Lala.
Jesse shot his eyes to me. Heat rushed to my ears. Then our heads turned toward the hall. The tail of a skirt whipped around the corner. We darted after her.
“Evie?” Roark called after me.
“It’s Annie,” I shouted over my shoulder.
Hm. Hm. Hmmm.
Connect the dots…
Every bend brought us another empty corridor, but Annie’s rhapsody didn’t falter.
We skidded at a dead end. Tiny pale fingers curled around the frame of the last doorway. The fingers whisked away. We followed with Michio and Roark on our heels.
Inside was another a storage room. Her voice muffled from within a tall cabinet.
La. La. La. La.
I trained the carbine on the cabinet door and swallowed. Jesse opened it. An entrance to another room. We stepped through, Jesse first.
A beaker crashed next to his head. Then a keyboard hit him in the chest. He nocked an arrow.
A spindly man hovered in front of a cage. He held a shaky soup can over his head. “Be gone.” His voice trembled.
“Michio,” I whispered, “Do you know this man?”
He stepped around me and shook his head. “You understand English?” he asked him.
The man nodded.
“I’m Dr. Michio Nealy. I work for the Shard. I’ve been on an undercover mission. You might have heard—.”
“Aiman Jabara?” He dropped the can, eyes bulging.
“Yes.” Michio took a step closer. “And you are?”
He thumped his chest. “Njall.” His eyes darted to the cage behind him and his chin dropped to his chest as he stepped to the side. “Her name Frida.” His English broke through a heavy Icelandic accent. “My wife.”
A hiss sprayed from the cage. Dull hair webbed her pallid face in thin strands. A hospital gown clung to her sunken frame. Tiny pupils flicked between us and a heavy rasp pushed from her lungs.
My heart banged against my ribs. Her gaze moved my feet closer. Until she opened her mouth. A tube slid in and out. Finger-like bits wiggled over the moving parts.
“I come after you left, Dr. Nealy,” Njall said as we stared at the cage. “For my wife, you see.”
“What happened here?” Michio eyes remained fixed on Frida.
“Lots of boom boom. I hide here. A week, maybe.”
Damn. We missed them by a mere we
ek?
“Kona.” He pointed to me. “She cures? The Shard hoped.” He grabbed Michio’s arm, pulled him toward the cage. “Please.”
“Her name is Evie.” Michio’s tone was possessive as he stretched to his intimidating full height. “I’ve only tested her blood in the lab. Frida would be an experiment. You understand?”
“Please.” Puffy red skin weighted his eyes.
Michio searched my face. “Evie?”
“What do I need to do?”
He made a list of supplies and sent Jesse and Roark down the hall to collect. They returned a few minutes later with syringes, vials and a dart gun. Then he pricked my arm, filling a hollow reservoir of a tranquilizer dart with my blood.
Capture gun loaded, he aimed it at the cage. Njall shoved his fist in his mouth.
The dart sailed and landed in the nymph’s throat. She thrashed and dropped to her knees and a painful spasm erupted in my gut.
The next few moments bludgeoned by. Every sound, every stir was punctuated by a pounding in my head. Frida writhed on the floor of her cage. Annie’s chilling hum crept through the hall. And hundreds of vibrating strings knitted over my ribs, around my spine and fisted my stomach.
My lungs wheezed. I clutched the pain in my belly and ran toward the door. An army was coming.
Annie’s lilt chased me through the corridor. So did Jesse and Roark.
At the platform, Roark’s arm blocked my advance. “Aw Jaysus, your eyes.”
I didn’t give a shit how freaky my eyes looked. I fisted his cassock. “There’s an army outside. Help me stop them.”
His muscles stiffened. “Damn the devil’s hairy bollocks.”
Jesse stood next to him, brows drawn and jaw jerking. I snapped my fingers in his face. “I’ll need you, too.”
Roark’s sword swooshed as he slid it from his leather scabbard. “Get bloody on with it then.”
We united with Tallis and Georges on the balcony and updated them as we flew down the tunnel. I shed my coat and top as I ran. Roark and Jesse did the same.
The ringing in my gut whirled in a circular motion and spun up my spine. How many spots would I walk away with? Oh hell, I just needed to walk away.
“Alis volat propriis,” Georges panted at my back. “They say you fight like them, Spotted Wing. I will savourer le show.”
I huffed and burst through the door. Sweet lord, it was so cold I had to force my limbs to cooperate.
Across the field, two aphids looked up from a hollowed out body turned on its side. Daylight shined through the hole in the chest. Long blond hair swam around it. Goddammit. Ivar? His son?
One aphid snarled. The other clicked back. Their orbs turned to me.
Human screams rode in on the wind and my bones shivered.
“Stay with her, Beckett,” Roark said. “Tallis and Georges with me.” They darted for the river, where the shrieks quieted.
Oh, Roark. His name jumped into my throat and died there. He could handle himself. He’d come back.
Hundreds of insectile bodies shimmered on the horizon. A mile away? I trained the carbine on the two feeding. Could I hit the eyes at that distance? Jesse’s feathered arrows shifted in the quiver on his bare back.
“Give me an arrow, Jesse.”
He scowled at me.
“Can you make the kill shot from here?”
“Can’t you hold them while I run over there?” he asked.
“And give the army time to move closer?” I held out my hand.
He plucked out an arrow and pressed it into my waiting palm.
I punched the ice pick tip into the crease of my elbow. The burn reached my fingertips.
“You’re mad,” Jesse said.
Blood flowed onto the point. Then I handed it back to the still scowling Lakota. “You don’t have to hit the eyes. Trust me.”
He nocked the arrow and let it fly. It pierced the widest target, the chest of the closest one. The bulging body jerked. A flickering current danced through me.
The aphid flopped to the ground and exploded in a fountain of innards.
The remaining bug raised a claw. It snapped and snarled with quivering jaws. The approaching army stopped.
A howl barreled next me. Jesse was actually laughing. I wanted to laugh with him until I saw Roark sprinting back, his face twisted in rage.
“Beckett,” he yelled. “It’s Ivar, his sons.”
Jesse stilled beside me. “They’re all dead.”
Roark skidded before us. “Something like that. I’m sorry.”
My heart sank.
“Evie?” Michio’s voice turned me around. He scanned the horizon then my face. “How are you holding them?”
I shook my head. “I’m not. They’re nervous. It won’t last. What about the nymph? Did it work?”
My answer shuffled out of the door behind him. Njall carried his wife, both squinting in the sun. Her face was sallow and her arms hung, but blue irises glowed in her human eyes.
“It worked, Nannakola. Just one injection of your blood and Frida’s human genes reactivated. She’s confused…doesn’t remember anything since the infection took over. I’ll run some tests—”
Whoosh. Whoosh.
My stomach turned over violently. A cold voice swept up my spine. Eveline.
I jerked up my head. From out the sky, a black form shot toward us. Waspy wings blurred in flight. Muscles jerked under a soaring sable cape. Claws and teeth shot out.
My guardians appeared in front of me, weapons raised. But the Drone’s onyx eyes were locked on Frida. His body turned in mid-air and Njall screamed.
Deep in the fundamental heart of mind and Universe there is a reason.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO: LIFE, THE UNIVERSE, AND EVERYTHING
Frida’s cries joined Njall’s as they rolled away from the outstretched talons of the swooping shadow.
The Drone landed in a crouch, wings tucking under his cape, his body blocking the door to the lab and Njall’s intended escape.
Njall scrambled back, regained his footing, and half-walked, half-ran toward the waterfalls, his gait hindered by Frida’s limp body bouncing in his clutch.
I drew myself up as tall as I could and sighted the carbine around the swell of muscle flexing against me. I steadied the aim on his chest. Squeeze.
The bullet skidded somewhere behind him as he rose from a crouched position he hadn’t been in two seconds before. “Try harder.”
Exhale. Squeeze.
That one pinged off the door. He stood beside it, the sun ringing his black eyes in red, their maddened depths locked on the lumbering escapees. “She’s human.” A hiss pushed past his fanged jaws. “So why is she emitting a pulse like one of my own?” He cocked his head. “It’s residual. Fading.” He bored his eyes into mine and floated forward. “There’s only one explanation.”
Jesse’s bow stretched beside his cheek. ”Back the fuck up.” His arrow plinked off the rock wall, missing the Drone’s side-stepping blur.
A blast of wind grabbed hold of the Drone’s cloak and thrashed it against his boots. “You murdered my brother, Eveline.”
Roark raised his sword in a two-handed grip. “Aw now, me girl might’ve taken the ballbeg’s knob, but ’twas me who relieved him of his cranium.”
A roar ripped from the Drone’s throat. “Even you, priest” —he spat the word— “are not immune to Allah’s judgement. It will be an honor to cast you into hell’s fire.” His eyes jerked across the lava field, targeting Njall’s retreating back. “But first, I must deal with the creature who carries Eveline’s blood”—he glanced at Michio—“for she, too, now sustains the missing element for my serum.”
The terrifying truth of his words robbed my arms of strength and the carbine took a nose dive. He didn’t want a cure, just an antidote for his own fucked up mutation. Then he would resume the design of his perfect race. I grappled to readjust the barrel. A wall of muscle supported my
back as Michio stilled his most effective weapon, his body.
The Drone had been faster than me in every confrontation. But was he faster than a bullet? I aimed the carbine—God, Buddha, the Great Mystery, fucking make me a believer—and squeezed the trigger, again and again.
He shot to the sky in a snap of wings, bullets dusting where he’d stood. Mother fuck. His hellish shape whipped across the field and dove past the swarm of aphids chasing Njall. Then he rose from the chaos, Frida’s body lolling from his grip in a misshapen arch, Njall arms stretching skyward and clawing at air. His gut-wrenching lament for his wife turned to gargles as heaving shadows fell upon his back.
I fired rounds from too far away. My heart sprinted as did my feet, a string of Irish curses chasing me.
The distance closed, aphid eyes bursting with black blood under the spray of my volley. The flex of Roark’s shoulders followed the fluid swing of his sword. Bodies separated at the neck. Purpose tightened his freckled face and hardened his jade eyes. The fierce protection he put into action swelled my chest. It wasn’t just the heart of the world’s last woman that propelled him. His fight was born long before the virus, on the sectarian streets of Northern Ireland where young boys were beaten by the cruel fists of soldiers.
We slaughtered our away through the pile and reached the center. Gone was Njall’s torso. In its place, a still-quivering knot of mutilated organs.
A tremor moved through me and the dagger’s hilt wobbled in my hand. I soared it end-over-end, ceasing another mutation. Another loss to mourn later.
Between my rounds and Jesse’s arrows, we annihilated the last of the immediate threats as the distant horizon swelled with more.
Above the carnage, the Drone bounced between the air and the ground in an oddly insectile movement of legs, and landed on a steep ledge over the highest waterfall.
I retrieved the blade from Njall’s eye socket and reloaded the carbine. “The added weight is slowing down his flight. We can catch him.”
My guardians exchanged looks.
“What will he do to her, Michio?” I glanced at the Drone atop his rock belfry. How far away he was up there, but close enough to see his black soul dancing in his eyes.
