“He knows the one marked to lead us. Did he tell you?”
“Lead you where?” She looked in my direction. The others followed her example.
They ignored me. “Don’t mess with us, human wench. Tell us what we want to know or we’ll kill your master.”
Oh no.
“My what?” Allison bristled. “Excuse me? Did you call me a wench? What are you? Like a little gang of pirates?”
The leader slapped her face so hard her head spun. A red welt appeared instantly over her cheek. Her eyes welled with tears.
“Do you know the nymph?” he demanded.
I covered my mouth with one hand.
She rubbed her swollen cheek, fury burning in her eyes.
“Tell me what you know!” he screamed. Spittle flew from his lips.
I texted Liam again. HURRY 9-1-1 NOW
The room flashed green. I whipped my head up. The men wielded various sizes of light swords and light hooks in their hands. Their features morphed and their muscles bloomed. Allison’s eyes rolled back in her head.
“Allison!” I ran to her in slow motion. My legs moved like they were encased in quicksand. I couldn’t reach her in time.
Her knees buckled and her forehead smacked the counter’s edge, throwing her head back. Her bottom hit the ground a second before the side of her head bounced against the tiled floor.
“No!” I dove to her side. “Allison, open your eyes.” I cupped the back of her head in my hands. Warm sticky blood oozed between my fingers and over the tiles beneath her.
The little bell rang again and I sobbed in relief.
“What the hell?” Buddy’s voice sent a wave of icy terror through me.
I jumped to my feet. “Buddy. Don’t. Allison fell and hit her head. Can you call nine-one-one? I need ice and a compress to stop the bleeding.”
He stared at the light swords, unhearing. He lifted the EMF meter from his belt and it lit up like Christmas.
“Don’t worry about them. Allison needs us.”
“Leave,” the leader commanded Buddy.
Buddy left. He walked past the windows and disappeared.
“Do you know Oliver Hale?” They closed in on me behind the counter, weapons drawn.
“He’s my neighbor.”
“Are you his wench also?”
“No.”
“Is the nymph here?”
“I don’t understand.” My fingers itched to adjust my headband. My gut curled into my backbone. I couldn’t make a run for it and leave Allison. Where the hell were the Hales and their massive entourage?
The back door creaked open and clicked shut. The men turned their heads in unison.
“Who’s there?” The leader extended the tip of his sword toward the kitchen and his henchmen crept toward the back door.
“Where can I find the one marked as our leader?”
“Aren’t you the leader?” I played dumb, dropping back to Allison’s side. I turned away so he couldn’t see my lying face.
“Heeyah!” Buddy lunged to my side from the hallway beside the kitchen. He held a long shiny sword in front of him. A large silver cross hung on a chain around his neck. “This is my sword, you gargantuan mother effer. I don’t know what you are, but your light saber’s on sale this week at the closeout store. This, however, is a genuine katana sword. It’s dipped in Holy water and blessed by the priest. Guaranteed to cut through your inhuman flesh like mashed potatoes. I suggest you leave my store before you see for yourselves.”
The sword vibrated in his trembling hands. “Call your friends back here and get out.”
“Humans,” a henchman scoffed behind us.
Buddy and I turned toward the sound. Light sliced through the air beside me. Buddy gurgled and his torso fell to the floor. His legs, hips, and waist followed.
“Ah!”
Blood sprayed over me. I wiped frenzied hands across my eyelids and mouth, clearing the hot spray. Tremors rocked my body. The killer looked into my eyes.
“Forget,” he commanded.
I slid on my knees over blood-slicked tiles to Buddy’s side and hovered my hands helplessly in the air. His killer knelt beside me and tossed Allison’s limp body over one shoulder.
He looked into my eyes. “Go to your neighbor and tell him the Stians have his wench. Tell him to bring the marked one and the nymph. Then forget I asked.”
I nodded in my best impression of a trance. It wasn’t a hard pretense. My emotions and mind were detaching from reality by the second.
The motley crew filed out the front door. I ran my fingertips over Buddy’s eyelids as the door sucked shut behind them. “I am so so very sorry,” I sobbed.
I swallowed my instinct to call 9-1-1 and lifted Buddy’s keys from the chain on his belt. Decision made, I turned out the lights. I flipped the “Closed” sign in the window. The Stians carried my best friend to an open top Jeep at the corner.
I stepped into the night on trembling legs and suppressed the limitless sobs bubbling in my throat. My shaking fingers fumbled over his keys, scratching the door of his car every time I missed the keyhole. Behind the wheel of Buddy’s Jetta, I said a prayer for my entire town and the whole of civilization then headed in the direction of the open top Jeep.
I sent Liam one more text. Buddy’s dead. They took Allison. I’m following so they don’t get away. Please find us fast.
Chapter 22
The inside of Buddy’s car smelled like him: spearmint and coffee. Fuzzy blue dice hung ironically from his rearview mirror. I blinked tired, tear-blurred eyes at the small town before me. Nothing was as it seemed. I had been deceived for so long. Jagged thoughts spiraled through my heart, ripping me open further every second. Images of Buddy on a floor covered in his blood. Allison beside him. Her limp body flung over a monster’s shoulders.
I couldn’t separate the feelings of responsibility from reality. My grade school friends had been murdered for sharing my birthday. Now my boss was dead. My best friend was abducted. Allison and Buddy had been helpless against things unseen. I saw, and I’d done nothing. And the monsters wanted Justin, too.
A whimper escaped my quivering lips. I wiped tears with my blood-soaked shirt, unintentionally streaking my face like a warrior. I sobbed at my reflection in Buddy’s mirror. I’d wrung my hands in the fabric before touching Buddy’s steering wheel. I was ruining his car. Buddy had loved his car. Another sob racked my aching body. He’d loved the deli. He’d loved our town. I ran one wrist under my stinging eyes and dripping nose. Everything I touched ended with blood. With death.
The replica Civil War era streetlights did little to illuminate the night-cloaked roads. I refused to turn on my headlights, terrified of what attention they might bring. The Jetta pulled through town at a crawl, surrounded by darkened lawns and homes masked in shadows. Unless the Stians left town, I could find Allison here. Zoar was in my blood. Every hay bale, every Mail Pouch barn, every landmark for miles burned in my memory. The neighbors were my friends. I grew up with their kids. This was my home.
The ravens perched on mirroring light posts as I crept down the street in Buddy’s Jetta. As I passed, they launched in synchronized flight, landing moments later on the next set of lights, like a creepy parade route made for me. I screamed and clamped a palm over my mouth when my phone vibrated against my leg. I wiggled it free from my pocket and tears fell over the screen. Liam.
Two words. Deli Closed.
My head shook left and right as I typed one handed, navigating the narrow roads with the other. Gone.
I swallowed a brick of heartbreak. They were gone.
My phone rang. I wiped my eyes with my bloody sleeve and the screen of my phone with my fingertips. Liam.
“Hello,” I croaked. I pressed the speaker function, freeing my texting hand to clear my eyes like a human windshield wiper. The blood on my vibrating hands had thinned to pale pink, diluted by tears.
“Where are you?”
His voice was salve to my broken heart.
“In Buddy’s Jetta. I’m looking for Allison. They took her.” I sucked in short breaths, unable to find composure. The road before me opened into a wide stretch of country. The speed limit increased, but I couldn’t take the chance of missing the Stians where they lurked. I fumbled one hand over the buttons and levers, searching for parking lights. The loss of streetlights slowed me to a crawl. Every second they had Allison was a second I lost to those bastards. I pounded the wheel.
“She’s hurt. She’s bleeding. She hit her head.” I pressed the gas pedal a tiny bit farther as I wound through a section of road with tree-dense hills on my left and a ravine on the right. “Buddy’s dead. They cut him in half.” Each word stood on its own.
The roar of an engine blared through my phone. “Where are you?”
“Passing the ravine outside of town.”
“Pull over.”
“No.”
“Callie, don’t be ridiculous.”
My mood changed. Fury coursed through my veins. “Where were you? I texted you. We needed you.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” The pain in his voice broke my heart again. If I survived the night physically, I’d never return emotionally. There was no coming back.
“Oliver stopped returning my texts an hour ago. When I couldn’t reach Justin either, I went to his home and his parents informed me Justin and some of his friends took the horses out.”
His friends. Oh, no. No. No. Not Justin, too. “Which friends?”
“We don’t know. Oliver is the only one of us unaccounted for. I gathered the Mahonings and went to the trails where Justin took Oliver and me riding. Reception is awful. We found no signs of Oliver or Justin, so the Mahonings and I parted ways when I got your messages. I went straight to the deli and called you when I found it closed. The Mahonings divided. Some will rally the clans at Hale Manor. Others will clean up the diner and get your friend’s body to a proper hospital. The rest will join me shortly.”
“What if they kill her?” I couldn’t lose Allison. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I pressed the pedal harder.
Headlights appeared in my rearview mirror, racing toward me at twice my speed.
“I see you,” Liam said. “Now pull over.”
“No.”
“Callie. Listen to me. Pull. Over.”
“No.” I sobbed and wiped tears in a panic. If I stopped, I’d never find her. If I stopped, she’d die. If I stopped, I might never start again. My heart thundered awkwardly. I couldn’t survive this. This time the words rang true in my desperation.
I would die tonight.
“Callie? What’s happening?”
I pulled the Jetta into the grass at the ravine’s edge. Tears stopped forming. Numbness erased the pain. Liam parked beside my door and jumped out. He ripped my door open and gasped.
“You’re going to the hospital. The others can go without me.” He unbuckled the seat belt I didn’t remember buckling and lifted me into his arms.
“S’not my blood.”
He opened his passenger door and slid me inside his car. My head lolled against the seat. Eerie peace climbed over me. Liam touched my head, neck, ribs, and abdomen with careful fingers.
“Oh, praise Zeus.” He cracked open a water bottle and poured it over my head.
“Ah!”
“There you go. I can’t find any wounds. Are you certain this isn’t your blood? None of it? Are you positive?”
“Caw!” The ravens landed on the hood of Liam’s car, peering through the windshield at us. “Caw!”
“Yes. I’m not hurt.”
Liam sighed and fell to his knees beside the car. He examined the pair of enormous birds on the hood. “Fine. Change of plans. You’ll stay at Hale Manor and I’ll assign you a protective duty.”
The ravens beat their wings.
“No.”
Liam’s face twisted into an ugly scowl. “Yes.”
“If I’m going to die tonight. I’d rather be with you than a group of strangers in the house I’ve feared for my entire life.”
“What do you mean, if you die tonight?”
“Caw!”
“Shut. Up,” he snapped at the birds.
“Please, take me with you to find Allison. I want her to know I tried. You can save her. You can help her forget.”
“Why do you think you will die?”
I shook my head. How could I explain it? I knew this was my last night as surely as I knew I loved him. It didn’t matter how either came to pass, only that both were true. How I spent my final hours would say so much more than words ever could. I wanted people to remember I’d fought for what was right. I’d stood by my friends. I’d loved.
Liam closed my door and got behind the wheel. “Are you sure the Stians went this way?”
“No. They started this way, but it took me too long to get moving. They could be anywhere.”
The ravens lifted off the hood, flying a few yards away from the headlights.
The car moved swiftly over dark country roads, hugging curves and sailing over mountainsides. My phone buzzed and Liam snagged it from my hand. My fingers ached from the grip I had on it. I stretched and curled them in my lap.
He pulled over. “Allison?”
I sat straighter.
“Very well.” He tossed the phone in my lap and retrieved his from the cup holder. “They have them at the Dover Dam. We’re about three minutes away. She’s with me. Alive.” He peered at me from the corner of his eye. The muscles in his jaw ticked.
Our car swerved onto the road, tossing gravel behind us. “You will stay in the car when we arrive at the dam. The Stians don’t know your importance to me. If they did, you’d be with Allison right now. Don’t think for a moment about leaving the car. Putting yourself in harm’s way won’t help her and it will distract me.”
I couldn’t agree or disagree. My harried mind slid over horrid memories of Buddy in pieces and worse possibilities in my immediate future.
“Tell me you’ll stay.” Liam turned his face to mine, ignoring the road.
I stared ahead blindly.
Liam growled. “Your involvement will cost lives, Callie. Guaranteed. Do you understand? Stay in the car.” He parked alongside the dam and kissed my cheek. “I’ll return with your friends.”
I shook my head. His words were lies.
“I assure you. There is a plan here. We’re old and wise. Don’t be afraid.” He kissed my temple. Tears squeezed free from the corner of his eyes. “Your love has strengthened me, as Allison’s has strengthened Oliver. We owe you, and we’ll right this imbalance as we were called to do. You must trust.”
I nodded.
Liam hesitated before shutting his door and jogging into the night.
The roar of water from the dam penetrated the window between us. Liam’s car sat alone on the roadside, cooling in the cold autumn night. The moon was a sliver of white beneath a blanket of grey. Clouds sped across the sky on harsh autumn wind.
My phone buzzed. Allison’s face appeared on the screen. A text. On the dam.
I leaned my forehead against the glass for a better view. The monstrous cement dam stood tall over pounding waters. Trees loomed at the river’s frothy edge. A small set of stairs wound down from the road to a narrow walkway where a metal guardrail separated tourists and fishermen from their deaths. A second set of stairs led up. Those stairs gave access to a small maintenance building on the dam and stopped at a ladder. The ladder rungs led to a thin cement walkway atop the structure. The ladder had haunted me as a child. I’d worried for the workers on duty and people who ventured out for a dangerous thrill. Mom had assured me no one ever climbed the ladder unless completely necessary. I hadn’t believed her. Tiny movements on the sky-high walkway caught my attention. Tonight the ladder was necessary.
The ravens flew in wide circles overhead.
I texted Liam. On the dam. Then I climbed from
his car, covered in Buddy’s blood and gooseflesh as the wind ripped through my wet clothes. Allison’s scream pierced the night. I moved toward the ominous metal ladder on silent feet, pulled by destiny, broken by imminent loss. Recognition dawned. Hers was the scream that woke me every night. Somehow, I’d known this night was coming for us.
My eyes and ears strained against the darkness and roaring waters. A blink of green ignited over the dam. Thunder rolled. This was it. Rain pelted the ground, burning my frozen skin with each icy torpedo. Clouds thickened in the sky like smoke, masking the sliver of moon. I slid on gravel, stumbling and falling before hitting the concrete path around the dam. A sign with information for tourists stood before me. The maintenance building was protected by a chain link fence. The gate swung open in the wind. A large padlock lay broken on the ground. Wind whipped hair into my eyes.
“Release them.” Liam’s voice carried in the air.
“Nice of you to show up, Watcher.” The voice from the diner, Calder, stung my ears.
I stayed in the shadows on the deck below the maintenance catwalk, where the men spoke. Leaning over the edge provided a view of the gathering above me. Liam wasn’t in sight, but a knot of large silhouettes stood near the railing over my head.
“It is my duty,” Liam responded. “Release the humans. Return my brother. Do this and avoid war.”
The group chuckled.
I edged to a stop directly beneath them. The water twenty feet below was deep and angry.
“In case you haven’t noticed,” the first voice boomed, “the Stians are in charge now. The Hales are no more. Zeus has removed his favor from you and we have grown in number. We came to stop the prophecy, but this is better. With no more Hales, the prophecy means nothing. We’ll meet each new Viking. They’ll join us and I’ll rule them. Your balance is over.”
The group raised their arms to heaven.
“Show us your favor,” their spokesman called.
Lightning struck the metal beam above me. The clansmen roared in approval.
“Release the humans and I’ll come with you.” Liam shouted against the thunder.
They laughed.
“You won’t surrender. I’ll take your life with my hands and be rewarded with great victory!” White light flashed overhead. “We battle.”
Prophecy Page 26
