Then we ran into trouble.
Ahead, on the right, was a big stone building that looked like a state capitol or some old Roman temple or something, and after a second, I recognized it as the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There was a row of yellow taxis and a trio of buses parked in front of the museum’s steps. At least, there had been. One of the buses had been flipped onto its side and was currently on fire, and several of the taxis were burning. A mob of people fled towards the museum’s doors in hopes of taking shelter, and they were pursued by orcish mercenaries wielding axes and guns.
There were a lot of bodies on the ground, and none of them were orcish.
I skidded to a halt a hundred yards from the fighting, and Nora brought the SUV to a stop next to me.
“What do you think?” I said to Riordan, who was in the front seat next to Nora. Russell and Adler were in the back, Adler armed with an M-99, Russell with the AK-47 he had lugged all the way from Nevada. “Do you think we can go around them?”
“Can’t,” said Riordan, his voice grim, and he pointed out Nora’s window. “Look.” I did as he asked and found myself staring to the east down 85th Street. It was kind of like looking down a concrete canyon, apartments rising on either side, but two blocks down I saw a ferocious firefight between a group of Homeland Security officers and a troop of Rebel soldiers. If we went that way, we were getting sucked into a battle.
“Looks like we’re going to have to fight,” said Nora.
“Yeah,” I said. “All right. Let’s go through those orcs in front of the museum. They’re scattered, and those assholes are just shooting civilians. Let’s make them regret it.”
“You strike them first,” said Riordan, lifting his own AK-47. “We’ll follow you and provide fire support. If we get separated, we’ll try to head for Times Square separately.”
“All right,” I said. “Let’s go shoot some orcs.”
I pushed the throttle, and the bike rolled forward, the engine picking up speed. The SUV followed, and Riordan, Adler, and Russell all lowered their windows one-third of the way down, enough to get the barrels of their weapons through. The SUV was armored, and the glass was ballistic, so they ought to be able to withstand at least some bullets. The ragged mob of orcish soldiers heard the approaching engines and started to turn in our direction, raising their weapons.
I learned something useful then. Obviously, it is almost impossible to use a firearm effectively from the back of a moving motorcycle. You need your hands to steer, and even if you were riding behind someone, the constant vibrations would throw off your aim. A barrel twitch of half an inch or so can translate to missing the target by a good four or five feet.
However, as it happens, it’s not all that hard to use magic while riding a motorcycle, at least when you’ve had as much practice as I have. I kept one hand on the handlebars, drew back the other, and cast the fireball spell. A sphere of flame whirled to life above my palm, and I gestured, sending the fireball hurtling towards the orcs. It landed and exploded with a harsh bloom of flame, killing six orcs and throwing several more to the ground. I didn’t hesitate but cast another spell, a volley of lightning globes leaping from my fingers to scream towards the orcs. More dead orcs fell to the ground, and I shot past them, hitting the brakes and skidding the bike.
The orcs tried to turn to face me, which was a mistake. Nora wrenched the wheel hard to the side as she slammed on the brakes, and the SUV skidded to a stop and spun around, so the passenger’s side faced towards the enemy. The orcs turned toward the new threat, which was a mistake, because Riordan and Russell raised their AK-47s and started shooting in neat, controlled bursts. Riordan was a better shot than my brother, but Russell was still pretty good. The orcs started falling, and Adler leaned up over the top of the vehicle and added the fire from his M-99 to the fray as well.
More orcs died. Some of them tried to charge the SUV, howling at the top of their lungs, and I cast another fire sphere. This one was small and tight, and it zipped forward and drilled tunnels through the skulls of the orcs that got too close to the SUV. Another orc realized the danger and turned towards me, raising an AK-47, and I sent the fire sphere spinning through his head and threw him dead to the ground.
“Tigress!” shouted Nora, hitting the gas. The armored SUV jerked forward, and Adler grabbed for balance. “Watch out!”
I looked over my shoulder and saw that the firefight on 85th Street had spilled to the front of the museum. It looked like the Rebels had punched through the Homeland Security officers, and a mob of Rebel soldiers with AK-47s headed towards us. Worse, two of them carried the long black tubes of rocket launchers.
“Goddamn it!” I snarled, and I punched the bike’s throttle. I was really tired of having people shoot rockets at me.
I didn’t know if the SUV had enough armor to withstand a direct rocket hit, but fortunately, we didn’t have to find out. Nora hit the gas, and the vehicle skidded forward and jumped onto the curb, running over the dead orcs, and I followed suit. There were twin plumes of white smoke as both rocket launchers fired, and the rockets screamed across 5th Avenue towards us. One went wild and blew out a window on the museum. The other was much closer and exploded against the sidewalk a dozen yards away. A blast of hot air washed over me, and I had to grip the handlebars and dig my shoes against the footrests to keep my balance. I felt a few hot stabs of pain in my right arm as chunks of debris nicked me.
Russell, Riordan, and Adler all opened up, spraying bullets at the approaching Rebels, and I saw the soldiers with the rocket launchers reloading their weapons. I needed to distract the Rebels so Russell and the Shadow Hunters could keep shooting. I snarled and raked a hand through the air, casting the Splinter Mask spell.
As it turned out, I could also extend the Splinter Mask spell to the motorcycle underneath me.
Silver light flashed around my hands, and seven duplicates of me atop the NX-100 appeared. I sent all seven images screaming towards the Rebels. I had some of the images draw pistols and start shooting, and others started casting spells, fire and lightning dancing around their fingers. The Rebels, confronted by the sight of seven copies of myself hurtling towards them at full speed, did the logical thing and started shooting at them. Russell, Riordan, and Adler kept firing at the Rebels, and I saw more and more soldiers go down. Finally, the Rebels had taken enough losses and scattered, retreating back to 85th Street, and I released the Splinter Mask spell.
“Let’s go!” I said to Nora. She nodded and eased the SUV forward, and Russell and the Shadow Hunters used that opportunity to reload. I pushed the throttle and started the motorcycle back towards the street proper.
Then more things went wrong.
During the fight we had drifted south to 84th Street, and further down 5th Avenue I saw more Rebels spilling from the side streets and hurrying towards us.
“They’re going to cut us off, tigress,” said Nora.
“We’ll have to go right through them,” said Riordan, voice grim. “Just run them down and keep going.”
“Right,” said Nora. “We…”
Then I saw gray shapes emerge from the alleys on 84th Street and charge towards us, their black claws clacking against asphalt.
“Shit!” I said. “Anthrophages. We…”
Behind the anthrophages came three figures in black uniforms, and I felt the surge of magic as they called power. The three Archons hurled a spell at us, and I cast a spell of my own, pulling as much power as I could through my tired mind. White mist rose up in a curtain and hardened into an ice wall between the Archons and us. I did it just in time because all three Archons had thrown fireballs. Their attacks hammered into the ice wall, and it exploded into a gush of howling steam beneath their fire. That was uncomfortable, but a lot better than getting burned alive.
A wave of exhaustion rolled through me, gray mist shimmering over my vision, and I clutched at the handlebars. I hadn’t recovered from the exertions of the last few days, and I was running on a combination o
f adrenaline, sheer terror, and pure willpower. I shoved the fatigue aside. If I gave into exhaustion, I was going to fall off my bike and crack my head against the pavement. And if we didn’t get loose from this encirclement right now, we were all going to die.
“Shoot the anthrophages!” I shouted as the steam billowed past us. “I’ll deal with the Archons!”
The anthrophages rushed towards us, and Russell, Riordan, and Adler started shooting at them. Nora produced a handgun from somewhere and started blasting away through the driver’s side window. I cast a spell as the three Archons strode towards us. More mist swirled around my free hand, and I sent an ice spike stabbing forward. It blurred towards the Archon on the left, and the Elf’s eyes just had time to widen in surprise before the spike hammered into his chest and blew out his back in a spray of frozen blood.
Bet he didn’t see that coming.
The remaining two Archons finished their spells, hurling blasts of magical fire. I cast the Shield spell, straining through the fatigue clouding my mind, and a half-dome of pale blue-white light appeared in front of the SUV. The Archons’ spells hit the Shield, which collapsed in a burst of blue sparks, but I withstood the attack.
“Nadia, go!” shouted Riordan, firing his AK-47 at the anthrophages. He was just as good with a firearm as he was with his Shadowmorph blade, and every time he squeezed the trigger an anthrophage went down. “Cloak and get to Times Square! We’ll meet you there!”
He had a point. Cloaking myself and the NX-100 at the same time would be hard, but I could manage it for a few minutes. Once I was past this firefight, I could keep going to Times Square and wait for Nicholas to show up with the Sky Hammer.
I would just have to leave the SUV behind.
Abandoning the two people I loved most in the world to their fate.
Russell had told me it would come to this, that I would have to choose between his life and the lives of a lot of other people. And if it came to that, if the moment came, he had wanted me to choose other people…
I heard myself growling.
No, no, no!
Breaking my arrangement with Morvilind and losing the cure spells was one thing. But abandoning Russell and Riordan to die in a firefight…no, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it any more than I could have cut off my own hand. I just couldn’t.
So instead of running, I screamed through the exhaustion and cast another spell, throwing a volley of lightning globes at the Archon on the right. The Elf got a Shield spell up in time, and his Shield was enough to block my first four globes. I don’t think the Archon realized how much power I had behind my spell because the remaining two globes punched through his Shield and struck his chest. The Archon screamed, thrashed, went rigid, and then collapsed as my lightning stopped his heart.
The final Archon whirled to face me as the others gunned down his anthrophages. He must have been smart enough to see me as the most dangerous threat. Grayish light flickered around his fingers, and I recognized the spell he was using just in time to prepare my Shield. This time my Shield was grayish-white, and the hammer of telekinetic force the Archon threw at us struck my spell instead. Strain flooded through my mind as my will struggled to hold the Shield in place, but I kept the defense in place.
Russell and Riordan both sent bursts of fire into the Archon. The conventional bullets did nothing against the Archon, but the Elf stumbled as some of the kinetic energy of the bullets drained into him. That staggered him long enough for me to drag together magic for another spell, and I threw a fireball at him. It was a sloppy mess, a sphere the size of my head that wobbled like gelatin, and instead of drilling through the Archon it splashed all over the top half of his head like napalm. The Archon started screaming and collapsed to the ground in a vain attempt to put out the flames, dying a few seconds later.
By then most of the anthrophages had been shot down, but that had given the Rebels time to take cover behind the parked taxis and food carts that lined 5th Avenue in front of the museum. If they had enough time to aim, they would have some marksmen capable of shooting through the gaps in the SUV’s ballistic windows. Even worse, I saw one of the box trucks from Venomhold rolling towards us. For a wild instant, I wondered if Nicholas had stumbled into our grasp, but it was the wrong truck. The Rebels had converted it into a makeshift tank, with armor plating bolted to the side and a heavy gun mounted on the roof. The SUV’s armor might have been rated for small arms and rifle fire, but I doubted it would stop an artillery piece. Or the rocket launchers some of the Rebels hiding behind a taxi were lining up at us.
In fact, I saw several Rebels aiming their guns at me. Sitting on the motorcycle, I would make an excellent target. I thrust out my free hand and cast the Shield spell, putting as much power into it as I could manage. The dome of pale light reappeared in front of me, and just in time. The Rebels opened up, and their bullets bounced off the Shield. I started to pull together power for another spell, and then realized I might not have enough stamina left to hold the Shield and cast another spell at the same time. With my free hand, I grabbed one of the pistols from my belt and started shooting. Firing one-handed with a handgun across such a distance isn’t a great recipe for accuracy, but it did force the Rebels shooting at me to take cover.
“We have to make a run for it!” Riordan shouted. “If we stay here we’re finished!”
I nodded and slapped a fresh magazine into the bottom of my pistol. Riordan was right. But the Rebels and their orcish friends had encircled us. We could retreat into the museum, but that would mean abandoning the motorcycle and the SUV, and I doubted we could make it to Times Square on foot. That meant trying to blast our way out of this encirclement, and I only thought we had about a 50/50 chance of getting through that many Rebels.
I took a deep breath, and then I felt the surge of magical power.
A curtain of mist rolled up from the center of 5th Avenue, shining with gray light. The mist brightened, and through it, I glimpsed the bleak plains of the Shadowlands.
“Shit!” I said. “Another rift way.”
“We’ve got to break for it now,” said Riordan. “Nora…”
A frost giant stepped from the rift way.
I blinked in surprise. It was definitely a frost giant because I recognized the creature’s height and the bushy beard hanging from beneath his ornate helmet. Yet the frost giant wore a design of armor I had never seen before. It looked like medieval plate armor, and it covered the frost giant from head to toe in dull silvery-gray metal. The frost giant also wore a metal backpack of some kind and carried a cylinder joined to the pack by a thick chain.
The frost giant ran onto 5th Avenue, and a dozen more came after him. A score of dwarven soldiers strode into the street, covered in their strange golden armor.
The Rebels began shooting at the newcomers. That was a waste of ammunition. The bullets sparked off both dwarven and frost giant armor. The frost giants responded by lifting their cylinders and pointing them at the Rebels.
Then I realized that the cylinders and their attached chains and backpacks weren’t actually cylinders at all.
They were, in fact, belt-fed miniguns.
The frost giants opened up with their miniguns, and the roar of the weapons was deafening. I don’t know what caliber of ammo those things used, but I saw one frost giant slice a taxi in half with a spray of bullets, killing all four Rebels hiding behind it. Four more frost giants destroyed the makeshift tank, riddling it with fire. The dwarven soldiers charged forward with terrific speed, their armored boots carving craters in the asphalt with every step. They didn’t have guns, which seemed kind of pointless.
At least, it seemed pointless until one of the dwarven soldiers rushed a food truck three Rebels were using as cover. The dwarf reached down and flipped the food truck over with a negligent gesture, turning it over as easily as if it had been an empty cardboard box. But it wasn’t a cardboard box, it was an extremely heavy food truck, and it crushed two of the Rebel soldiers. One of the Rebels ma
naged to get out of the way in time and emptied his AK-47 into the back of the dwarf.
The dwarf took exception to that. He whirled and punched in a golden blur, and the top third of the Rebel’s body dissolved into crimson mist.
Belatedly, I realized that the dwarves’ armor augmented their strength. They didn’t need firearms.
I dropped the sjolmark on the ground, figuring that I didn’t need to carry it now. The frost giants could collect it if we lived through the battle.
“Tigress!” said Nora. “We have to go! This is the only chance we’re going to get!”
“She’s right,” said Riordan.
“Yeah,” I said, shooting a quick look around the battle. The frost giants and the dwarves were tearing apart the Rebels, but that might change at any moment. For that matter, if the frost giants saw us, they might assume we were Rebels. I mean, I looked pretty disheveled, and Riordan and Russell both had passed as Rebels in Venomhold. “I’ll clear the path, you cover me. Go!”
I gunned the engine and sent the bike along the sidewalk, over the curb, and back onto 5th Avenue, heading south towards the Rebels. Nora came right behind me, Riordan, Adler, and Russell holding their guns ready. The Rebels had tried to set up a roadblock there, but now they were rushing to engage the frost giants. I cast a spell, steering the bike with one hand as a fireball whirled into existence above my other hand.
The fireball leaped from my palm and landed among the milling Rebels. The explosion knocked a dozen of them to the ground, and I pushed the bike’s throttle. The motorcycle roared, and I hurtled through the Rebels. Some of them tried to line up shots on me, but Russell and the Shadow Hunters started shooting as Nora drove behind me. Some of the Rebels ducked for cover, and some of them went down and stayed down as the bullets punched into their chests.
I felt a pulse of regret that Russell had to shoot people, then remembered that he had killed Victor Lorenz. Like Riordan had said, Russell had already seen the elephant.
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