Instantly, she saw me, and I fought the damn Vire whose restraint kept me against the wall. She ran, fast – in my direction – only to be jerked backwards. And that was when I saw the Vire holding her from behind.
I’d never seen a lamb being led to the slaughter but this was what I knew it would look like as she stopped in the doorway.
“NO!” I shouted. “Let her go, Sisera. This isn’t your province,” I proclaimed.
Sisera strolled leisurely across the room until he was standing directly in front of me. “I’d tell you to bow, Jameson Caldwell, but I am fairly certain you cannot follow my command.”
I wouldn’t bow anyways.
“Sartorius won’t appreciate you overstepping your bounds, Sisera,” I said in another appeal to his intellect. My statement was true, and it was the only logical argument I could make.
“Not that it is any of your concern. You will be dead soon enough. But for the rest of you,” he called over his shoulder, addressing the Vires accompanying him, “Sartorius no longer controls this province. After the debacle of your escape, his authority has been revoked. I control the province now.” Sisera ambled to Jocelyn with a speculative stare fixed on her. “You two have caused enough turmoil. It will end here. Unceremoniously.” He tipped his head toward the Vire holding her, a casual, indifferent gesture, as if we were nothing, less than nothing.
“Sartorius is setting you up,” I called out. “Kill Jocelyn or myself, and you’ll never find out how.”
I was wrong. I did have another angle to work.
Sisera came to an abrupt stop, his translucent pasty skin turning whiter, his dark eyes locked on the floor as he considered my warning. It was enough of a sign that the Vire holding Jocelyn didn’t follow through with Sisera’s first command, and that was what I’d been counting on.
Sisera spun on his heel, his head lifting in interest, as he approached me again.
“Convince me that you speak the truth and I’ll consider delaying your death.”
The irony was, in that instant, when I was only trying to conjure up enough evidence to preserve Jocelyn’s life, the truth actually came to me. I had known Sartorius was setting up the rest of The Sevens, but I hadn’t figured out how he would do it, not until now.
With my response formulated in my mind, I opened my mouth to deliver it when I saw the movement. It came from behind Jocelyn. No, from behind the Vire holding Jocelyn, from down the long hallway that led back to the door that we’d come in through last night. They struck with damn good precision, taking out the one holding Jocelyn and yanking her back out of the room before she could fall into the mess they were about to create.
I thought there might be an army coming down that hallway, but I was wrong. Only two entered, and that wasn’t enough.
They were going to need me.
I put my hands against the wall, trying to pry myself from it, as the two of them made their way through the room, dropping one Vire after another. They worked in tandem, their swords swinging with impressive accuracy, so that the last Vire fell only a few seconds after they started. He must have been the one holding me back, because when his heart was punctured, I slid down the wall and slammed into the counter below.
The DeVilles sprinted by me, in a frenzy to get to safety.
Launching myself onto my feet, I ran for Jocelyn, who I found plowing through the junk the DeVilles had collected in the backroom.
“Jocelyn,” I called out, marching for her.
She paused long enough to recognize that I was in the same room as her. She spun around and we collided in the middle, only for her to crumble to her knees, clutching her stomach, as she had done in the shack and in bed.
“It-it’ll…pass…,” she fought to say.
I held her, keeping my eyes on the entrance to the other room. Voices were muffled, but they seemed calm. Maybe Sisera was dead by now?
When she took in a breath and began to stand, I knew she was stronger, healthier again.
“Did they hurt you?” I asked, adding for clarification, “The Vires?”
“No,” she said with a shake of her head before gesturing me back to the stack of junk. “Come on. We need something to fight with….”
“So that’s what you were doing.”
She nodded and continued on.
“Jocelyn, there’s nothing here that will help us.” I glanced at the door. “Besides, I think the fight’s over.”
She froze, listening, and then straightened up. I could tell there was no way she planned to walk into that room doubled over in pain, even if it still lingered. She was far too proud. Sure enough, she went for the door, and I had to slip around her to make sure I went in first.
Sisera wasn’t dead.
He stood where he had been; the two people who had taken down his entourage, swiftly and without injury, stood in front of him, their backs to us.
He seemed to be defiant, but – this shocked me more than anything else, more than anything I’d experienced in my life – Sisera was scared.
Sevens feared no one; they acted immune to it, as if they knew something that the rest of us didn’t. But his eyebrows were creased and beads of sweat were saturating the turban at the top of his forehead.
“Do you have any last words?” his attacker asked. This was another surprise, because I recognized his voice. It was English, or at least I’d always assumed it to be.
Even while staring into the face of death, Sisera would not submit. “I do, Eran Talor,” he said tauntingly and then grinned. “Incantatio-”
At the very same time Sisera began his cast, Jocelyn spoke up. “Eran?”
As Eran turned, the person beside him, the one who fought next to him, dressed in black leather with cut outs in the back between the shoulder blades and wild brown hair, stuck a sword through Sisera’s heart, ending his cast.
And there it was…the death of the very first Seven. It was impossible, unbelievable, surreal. Shockingly, we were the only ones to witness it, this death that would go down in our history books as the day the first one fell. Still, all I could think was…Damn, I’d like to have been the one.
And then the person who took the life of Sisera – a Seven, an untouchable, someone who seemed to be impervious to death – turned around, and I found that the one who had done this was our high school clairvoyant…Maggie Tanner.
Eran didn’t seem to notice Jocelyn or me marveling at what had just taken place. He made sure Sisera was dead, which from my account a few feet away, the rapidly decomposing body he’d left behind looked to be, and then strolled back to us.
“We keep showing up in the same places, don’t we?” Eran remarked casually, his accent only slightly thicker from the exhilaration of the fight.
“Yes, we do,” I said, still trying to wrap my head around what was happening.
“We were tracking him.”
“Tracking?”
By that point, Maggie had joined us; after wiping the blade off on Sisera’s body like a Viking warrior, she sheathed it and came to stand by Eran, smiling as if condemning a Seven to death was a daily occurrence.
“Nicely done.” He leaned sideways to whisper this into Maggie’s ear, as if they were the only two in the room.
“Thank you,” she murmured, gazing up at him, and then turned back to Jocelyn and me. “After we split up at Lacinda’s, Eran and I went back to the Ministry, found this one leaving, followed him here, and…well, you see the result.”
I laughed, unintentionally. This was all just so damn surreal. And then something came to me, in a flash, like it had been sitting at the back of my mind waiting for this moment to come forward. “So you are the allies,” I said more to myself than to them.
“Allies?” Eran remarked, and then appeared to seriously consider it. “Yes, we could be.”
“I think they are,” Jocelyn mumbled. “Maggie was the ally The Sevens said they had captured when they coerced us into that truce. They said they didn’t need a truce because they alrea
dy had what they needed.”
Maggie frowned at the memory, and I was left with the sense that her ego had been damaged for being caught.
“They offered up a truce?” Eran asked, doubtfully.
“A false truce. It was used to manipulate us.”
“Of course…,” he muttered, and, once again, I got the impression that he knew The Sevens better than most did in our world.
“And,” Jocelyn went on, “when we were locked away together, Maggie, you told me that your crime for being there was knowledge…how to kill The Sevens.”
“That’s right.”
“We might have just figured out a part of the prophecy.” I grinned at Jocelyn, and she beamed back at me. It was a small victory, but a good one. A damn good one.
Maggie broke in on our silent victory celebration with, “What prophecy?”
Right, I thought. Of course they wouldn’t know yet.
I wasn’t sure how they’d accept the news, but what could it hurt by telling them? I’d just seen Maggie take a Seven’s life. Everything else seemed to pale in comparison. “There are records that prophesize about what is coming…in our war against The Sevens.”
Oddly, this didn’t seem to faze them. Something else did, however, which Eran addressed. “So, you’ve known about them, the Sevens, for how long?”
“For centuries,” I said, interposing.
“And it never occurred to any of you how unusual it was for them to live that long?”
I couldn’t stop a smirk from coming up. “Longevity isn’t something we lift an eyebrow at in our world.”
“So,” said Maggie, frowning. “They thought they could dominate your culture, your world, as you call it, while preparing for complete domination over the rest of us.”
“That’s right,” said Jocelyn astounded that Eran had come to that conclusion. “How did you know?”
“Because that’s what their kind does.”
Hearing this, Jocelyn settled back on her heels, and paid close attention. “How much do you know about The Sevens?”
“Enough,” said Eran.
But that wasn’t sufficient for Maggie, who grinned slyly. “We know how to kill them.”
“Apparently…,” I said and tipped my head at Sisera’s now badly decomposed body. It was almost as if it was making up for lost time.
“What do you think we should do with it?”
“Well, you’re not going to leave it here,” said Mrs. DeVille from behind me.
I looked over my shoulder at her. “Nice to see you back, Mrs. DeVille.”
I was referring to her physical person as well as her attitude, and she knew it.
Giving me a look of disdain, she turned to leave the room.
“Mrs. DeVille?”
Pausing, she stopped to glare back at me.
“Thank you for not turning us in.”
Her mouth turned down further in blatant displeasure over being involved at all. She grabbed her husband and they began to straighten her naturally disorganized store. Neither of them had any idea that they would need to leave soon because they were in more danger now than they’d ever been. So I made a mental note to ask Mrs. DeVille to send a message to Miss Mabelle and Miss Celia about what happened here, so that they could be the lucky ones to explain how staying in the store where Sisera was killed wouldn’t bode well for the DeVilles.
Part of me wanted to leave Sisera’s body where it lay, as a sign to the rest of The Sevens that he wasn’t worth the effort. But something greater needed to be done with it, something that would get the provinces talking about justice again.
We silently assessed our options on what to do with it, but there was only one way I could envision that would actually benefit us.
“Fear is how The Sevens drive us, our society, our world. Showing the provinces that they are vulnerable would give the people genuine proof that they can be defeated.”
“So what do you want to do?” Eran asked. “Prop him up in a public place?”
I couldn’t decide whether he was joking or not, but he wasn’t smiling.
“No, I’d say we drop him where we can be sure he’ll be found by The Sevens.”
Jocelyn was the first to nod, but Eran and Maggie were close behind.
“The Ministry,” we said together, breaking into grins.
As Eran and Maggie bent down to pick up the body, I realized that I’d never thought of them as anything more than classmates who get more than their fair share of gossip. They probably thought the same about us. Now, we were embarking on a war together, against a mutual enemy, and we all had equal stakes in the effort.
“What do you think we should do after we leave Sisera’s body at the Ministry?” Jocelyn asked openly to everyone, but it was Maggie who responded.
As she carefully picked up Sisera’s now spongy, decomposed shoulder, she laughed under her breath. “We go after the rest.”
9
THE PLAN
IT WAS STILL DARK OUTSIDE WHEN we transported Sisera’s body from the DeVille’s store. After deciding there was no logic in all four of us carrying it to the Ministry, I stopped Maggie and Eran from trying to lift it from the floor. It didn’t look like the thing would make it intact, anyways. Instead, we discussed meeting at noon in the bayou. I gave Eran and Maggie directions to the village and they headed down the hallway discussing whether to stop at Café Du Monde for a bite to eat, casually unaffected by the grim situation we faced.
Jocelyn changed into the clothes Miss Mabelle brought her, black and form-fitting that accentuated her curves. I didn’t know whether to thank Miss Mabelle next time I saw her or make it clear that I couldn’t be distracted by Jocelyn again. I kept the Vire uniform, thinking it might come of some use again. That was the only time we wasted.
We reached France before sunrise, with Jocelyn levitating the body next to us the entire way. The flight was short, ending with us hovering over the Ministry.
It looked different now. Usually, nights were spent with the grounds dark and a number of sentries on the walls. It was guarded tonight too, but there was activity. Lots of it.
Lights – generated by both flame and electricity – marked the most used paths. Along them, Vires walked with purpose, with objectives in mind, levitating supply crates into the courtyard.
“What are they doing?” Jocelyn whispered, in awe of the process.
“It’s called staging. They’re preparing for an attack.”
“On?”
“Us.” I felt myself frowning and corrected it, because we had the upper hand. “Right now, they think they have it all planned out. They see the future and it’s in their favor. Everything is executing perfectly for them, in their tightly controlled world. But we’re about to throw a wrench in their machine down there that’ll send everyone into panic mode.”
“Jameson?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re smirking.”
I laughed, and it actually felt good.
“Are we ready?” Jocelyn asked.
“More than we’ve ever been.”
Jocelyn released Sisera’s body, where it began a rapid plummet. But before it had reached ten feet below us, my head was thrown back and my body arched in a way that made me feel like I was tied to a rocket. And what a hell of a launch! The wind howled in my ears and the Vire uniform I still wore sucked to my chest, flapping like crazy behind me. Jocelyn had never levitated me like that before, and in it I felt the rush of her power. It was…exhilarating, intense, and sexy…an enticing, teasing kind of sexy.
It was also smart because within seconds I looked over my shoulder to find Vires coming after us, their bodies pointed like missiles in our direction.
The excitement I felt for Jocelyn was redirected, and turned darker. I had a strong urge, a fixation to take them on. One by one or all at once, didn’t matter to me. This was my first chance outside the Ministry to avenge us, all of us, for what they had been helping The Sevens do to us for years, and I could feel t
he need for the settling of scores surging in me. Only one factor held me back. Jocelyn would have to be present to keep me aloft, and that endangered her.
Instead, I shoved aside my feelings and told her, “Company came.”
She nodded as an expression of determination began to etch across her features, again, an incredibly enticing look for her. “Hold on,” she said but didn’t elaborate.
Then she dropped us, descending so fast I barely had time to take in the horizon. It was lit, but dimly, and there was something protruding from the earth, a slim, sweeping structure built of open trusses.
The Eiffel Tower. We’re in Paris, I realized.
She set us down on a side street in a shopping district somewhere within the city. Store windows were lit, showing off clothes and jewelry, but there was no sign of anyone in the darkened shops beyond their displays. The drone of traffic carried to us, but I saw no cars anywhere. A street sweeper hummed by us, sipping coffee from his driver’s seat, oblivious to what was about to happen.
In short, we were alone.
Jocelyn exhaled nervously, frantically scanning our surroundings. “There’s no one around.” She stopped suddenly and looked at me. “We shouldn’t have landed.”
As if on cue, the contingent of Vires, ten in all, fell to the ground, their landing on the pavement hard enough to vibrate our feet. And my excitement at the prospect of a fight returned.
“Thought you’d hide in the crowd?” the first one mocked, taking a step toward us. “You’ll need another fifteen minutes, but you won’t last that long.”
“You’re right,” I said. “We’ll be out of here in five.”
To add a little gravy, I grinned at him. He didn’t like that very much, and launched a fist at me. I ducked. Another one followed. I shifted and it skirted me. At that point, I felt like the odds were unfairly stacked against them. Even when they used the elements against me or tried to break into my thoughts with high-pitched chatter to distract me, they failed. When the end came, and I spun around to find Vire bodies littering the street, I actually felt sorry for them.
“Jameson, sweetheart,” Jocelyn called out, her voice shaky from the adrenaline I knew was coursing through her.
Prophecy (Residue Series #4) Page 10
