The Counterfeit City

by Jenna Lyn Wright

  Black blood pools underneath me.

  The human city moves on around the wreckage of the evening.

  Around my broken body.

  The neon lights above me begin to swirl and blur.

  And one, searingly bright white, stands out from the rest.

  A skull on the facade of a brick building.

  14

  David is in my arms, and now that I have him back I will stay here forever.

  There is darkness surrounding us, but warm light filtering down from above, and we are dancing. He has his strong arms wrapped around my waist, and he pulls me close to him and ducks his head to whisper in my ear. “You found me.”

  I pull back so I can see his beautiful eyes. “Of course I did. I could never let you go, and it was my fault…”

  He shakes his head and presses his lips to mine. Softly. Gently. “None of that matters. We’re together, for now.”

  A dull thud sounds from off in the distance, but I ignore it. Nothing matters but this moment right now. I have found him. My David.

  “For now? I won’t let you go,” I say, and I try to keep the fear from my voice as I feel myself pull away from him. “What? No…” I claw at him, but he simply smiles as I reach out, my hand grasping thin air as he fades into the distance. “David!”

  Come back…

  The voice is not his, so I do not wish to hear it.

  Another thud. Closer this time. I wish it would stop, it’s distracting me and I have to focus, to get back to him…

  Come on now, come back…

  He is so far from me now he has all but disappeared.

  “David!” My voice cracks and hot tears run down my cheeks. “No! Please don’t go… don’t leave me…”

  My own scream pulls me from the haze I would’ve been happy to stay in forever, and as the darkness recedes, the emptiness that had spread through me as I watched him shrink into the distance is replaced with a searing, white-hot pain.

  I am not alone.

  Bright light stings my eyes, and someone swings the lamp above me off to the side. My vision is blurred by tears and agony, and I can’t make out who exactly is peering down at me.

  “You’ve seen her before?” A woman’s voice. Unfamiliar.

  I am on my back, unable to move, to curl into a ball, and if someone doesn’t make the suffering stop I am going to vomit.

  “Not until tonight.” I know that voice. Male. It’s the driver… “She is a destroyer of cabs. But look at this…”

  A cool, dry hand takes my arm and turns it so my wrist faces up.

  “That’s Lucifer’s mark.” Runner. His name is Runner.

  “Shit.” The woman is displeased.

  THUD.

  “We can’t wait any longer,” she says, and she leans over me so I see nothing but her face. “What’s your name, demon?”

  “G-Gray,” My mouth is sour and my blood sings with pain.

  She pulls back and Runner appears at my side, his eyes wide with wonder. He has a bruise on his cheek and stitches above his eye holding together a silver-encrusted cut. “I swear to Gods I thought you were dead. Like, dead for real and not coming back.”

  For a brief moment, I wish that were true. Guilt and shame wash over me almost immediately, though, and wipe any thoughts of a merciful death away. Any pain is worth the chance to get to David and make things right.

  I need to sit.

  Runner watches me struggle and says, “I wouldn’t.”

  Ignoring him, I pull myself up as fire radiates from my side. “Damnation,” he murmurs.

  “Where am I?” It must be some sort of medical lab, as there is a steel gurney underneath me and a blindingly bright lamp hanging from above.

  The woman comes back. She wears a black lab coat and has her thumb on the plunger of a syringe filled with clear liquid. “You’re in Skull number twenty-six. Off of Twenty-sixth street.”

  “Clinics for Counterfeits,” Runner chimes in. “Erin’s fixed me up more times than I’d like to admit.”

  “How did I get here?”

  “I came to and dragged you in. Grabbed these, too,” Runner says, and waves one copper gun and the diamond dagger with the Kira in the hilt in front of my face. “Looked like things you wouldn’t want to lose.”

  “More important is what’s outside,” Erin says, and jams the needle into my bicep. I try to pull away but she holds me still, and she is stronger than I would’ve thought for such a small woman.

  THUD. THUD.

  “Friends of the demon you killed,” she says through gritted teeth and withdraws the needle. Warmth spreads from the injection point and slithers down through my torso, pooling at my injured side. The sharp pain dulls to an ache, and I can finally take a full breath.

  “Demons. Two,” Runner adds, and he is not helping the situation.

  “You’ve brought the danger right to my door.” Erin strides away and there’s a clang as she drops the syringe into a metal sink along the wall. I see now that I’m in my own separate space, with cloth dividers separating what must be various patient bays where the sick and injured lie.

  “How long have I been out?” If I’ve missed my window of opportunity to get the Dagger…

  “About an hour,” Runner says, and that is far too long.

  Sliding forward, I let my legs dangle off of the table. “I have to go.”

  “And you will,” Erin says as she comes back, placing a hand on my shoulder to push me back down on the gurney. I do my best to push back, but everything hurts and whatever she injected me with has made me slower than I should be. “But not until I’m finished.”

  THUD.

  She glances over her shoulder. “Runner, help me.”

  To my dismay, he puts both of his hands on my shoulders and holds me down. “I can’t waste any more time… I will heal…”

  “Not every time,” Erin says, and leans over me, forcing me to stop struggling and hold her gaze. “Not this time, with an injury that severe. And the more you struggle, the longer it’s going to take to fix you.”

  “We get it. You’re on Lucifer’s clock.” Runner nods to the brand on my wrist. “You want any shot of making it to the Eternal Cemetery in one piece? You let Erin do what she needs to do.”

  THUD. THUD.

  The pounding is getting more incessant, and whatever locks are keeping them out are starting to rattle. It’s clear that they will not stop until they get in.

  Erin moves to a cabinet on the far wall of the room, pulls out three vials of colorful liquid, uncorks them, and pours them into a glass beaker. She swirls the container as she comes back. “Drink this.”

  I down it in one shot.

  “I’m sorry,” she says, just as I double over.

  “Harder, Runner,” she bites out, and I can feel Runner press his whole weight on me to keep me back and flat on the gurney.

  I try to speak, to scream, but my teeth are clacking as my body is wracked with spasms.

  THUD.

  Erin starts to mumble under her breath, and it’s no language that I’ve ever heard before. I can’t tell if I’m hallucinating from the drugs or the pain, but the air around her starts to shimmer like the space above the blacktop on a scorching summer day.

  She places her hand on the side where the glass sliced through me, and I moan in pain.

  “Just a few more seconds.” Runner’s words are soft and I register that he’s trying to comfort me, but the only thing I understand right now is that whatever’s happening to my side is beyond anything I’ve ever felt before. I bite my tongue to keep from screaming until my throat bleeds.

  Erin’s eyes glitter and turn opalescent as the last of the words trickle from her lips.

  The air calms.

  My pain fades.

  She removes her hands from my side. “Sit up.”

  So I do, and aside from the protest of a few sore muscles, I feel… better. I lift the hem of my shirt again and see that the skin has knitted together, leaving an angry,
fresh scar to add to my collection.

  “It’ll have to do,” Erin says, surveying her handiwork.

  THUD.

  THUD.

  THUD.

  CRACK.

  The locks are finally giving way. The sound of metal bending and screeching echoes from the far side of the building and there is a terrible crash as what must be left of the door hits the floor.

  Whoever has come for us, for me, has made it inside.

  Erin turns to us, and to my surprise and admiration, she is not scared. She is angry.

  She jogs around my curtain, waving for us to follow her. We pass rows of partitioned spaces. Most are empty, but a few hold Counterfeits from all subspecies. One has an IV drip filled with blue liquid. Another has its wing bandaged.

  Erin turns a corner at the back of the room and disappears into a doorway.

  We are on her heels, descending slick stone stair down into a room that looks as if it’s been chiseled from the earth, and very much resembles the morgue I woke up in earlier today.

  Here, though, the body drawers are carved directly into the rough walls, and lines of salt and brick dust run around the perimeter of the room. Incense burns, and altars to gods both familiar and not are scattered throughout the room.

  Erin grabs a set of keys from a hook on the wall and hands them to Runner. “Take the hearse.”

  Runner stares at the keys as if she’s asked him to do complex calculus.

  “Eternal Cemetery, right?” She looks pointedly at me. “Well, it just so happens that I have a recently departed woman that needs to see the Baron.”

  Rumbling echoes from above; the trampling feet of the demons as they as they flood the Skull. There is the sound of rustling cloth and surprised cries as they search the patient bays for me.

  “And I’d prefer not to make an enemy of the Devil,” she continues. “You?”

  “Good point,” Runner says.

  Erin points to a door set back in the corner.

  The footsteps from above reach the top of the stairs.

  We slip out of the room just as the first demon hits the landing in the cellar.

  Runner tries to keep going, but I stop, turning back to peek through the crack in the door. He grabs my hand and tries to pull me down the corridor with him, but I yank back away from him. “We wait.”

  He’s about to argue, but then he must see the look on my face because he simply comes back to my side.

  The woman in there saved my life. There’s no way I’m going to leave before I make sure she’s safe.

  Four demons have encircled her.

  I get the feeling we’re not getting out of here without a fight.

  15

  Erin does her best to keep each of the demons that surround her in her view, and between her instincts and her healing powers, I wonder how Lilah never picked her up to join our team.

  A dapper demon with a pocket watch and chain attached to his vest is the only one who has spoken so far. “You didn’t hear us knock?” he asks, toying with her.

  To her credit, she takes none of his shit. “We’re short-staffed.”

  She runs her eyes along each of the four. “Which one of you is injured?”

  “You will turn them over to us,” Pocket Watch hisses, and to be fair, apparently he’s not going to take any of her shit, either.

  Erin frowns. “Them?”

  The demons continue to slowly circle her, their movements slow and languid and preternaturally smooth. To watch the dance is oddly dizzying.

  “Or, if you prefer, just her. The new one. Surely you noticed the wreckage outside. A rogue demon is causing chaos all over the city.” From across the room, I can see Pocket Watch’s eyes flash as he leans toward Erin and says, “It is our responsibility to put her down.” He nods his head toward the wall containing the body drawers. “Unless she did not survive?”

  A demon with red streaks in her hair breaks the circle and moves toward the drawers. The other two, both in white vests that match their white-blonde hair, close the gap in the circle she left behind. Demon siblings, maybe? Can that happen? I’m going to need to take Mina up on that offer of a Counterfeit education after I survive all of this. If I survive all of this.

  Red Streaks moves closer to the door that leads to the hearse.

  Closer to us.

  Behind me, Runner ducks down and whispers, “We need to go. Now.”

  I hold up a hand. We’re not finished here, and I’m certainly not going to bail when the demons just across the threshold are tightening their circle around the woman who saved my life.

  Erin shoves her hands into the pockets of her black lab coat. They’re deep enough to hold a syringe or two, and I hope she’s kept some of whatever she injected me with earlier handy. “If none of you is injured, you’ll need to leave.”

  “Confirm the death of the new one.”

  Erin spins to face Red Streaks. “Step away from those drawers,” she says, and shoots a glance back at Pocket Watch, “and go back to Hell.”

  Pocket Watch’s eyes go black, and his thin lips twist up into a cruel smile. “I was hoping you’d be stubborn. This way is much more fun.”

  I reach into my waistband and realize that I only have one copper gun left. The other is either lost on the street or left behind somewhere upstairs. That means limited bullets. I unsheathe a dagger instead. Behind me, Runner says, “How many of those do you have?”

  “Do you know Nicodemus?” I ask, keeping my eye on what’s unfolding beyond the door.

  Runner lets out a low whistle. “Oh yeah. A lot, then, is what you’re saying. More than a few weapons.”

  “You’ve still got the diamond dagger, right? You know how to fight?”

  “I prefer very aggressive driving,” he answers.

  In the morgue, two demons are closing in on Erin from the sides. Red Streaks has moved away from the body drawers and is slowly approaching the door we’re hiding behind. Her eyes are narrowed and she’s sniffing the air.

  Pocket Watch stalks toward Erin.

  Here we go.

  I flip the dagger so that I’m holding the blade, kick open the door, and fling the weapon at Red Streaks. It lodges into her heart with a dull thud, and there is a comical moment where she looks at it, then me, with wide, disbelieving eyes, before she drops to the ground and begins to smoke.

  Pocket Watch roars and lunges for Erin. She dives away, scrambling to hide behind an altar, but he manages to grab her by the ankles and drag her back.

  I race past Red Streaks, yanking the weapon from her body as I go, and launch myself at the blonde demon closest to me. It’s only been a handful of seconds since I revealed our presence, and he’s still confused as to what’s happening. I clarify it for him by spinning around and slashing the blade across his windpipe.

  Black blood splatters on the stone floor and all over his pretty white vest. Shame.

  His twin tackles me, driving the air from my lungs and sending the dagger flying. We crash to the ground, rolling over the cold, rough floor and slamming into a table that Erin must use to prepare the bodies. Bowls and medical instruments clatter to the ground as the table tips over.

  “Runner! Little help!” I yell and point toward Pocket Watch and Erin.

  The diamond dagger flashes in his hand, but Runner scrambles away from the fight, racing to the body drawers where he crouches to grab something.

  I take an elbow to the nose, and my eyes blur with tears. Locking my legs around Blonde Twin Number Two, I roll, managing to get on top of him. My dagger is gone, but a scalpel has landed next to me, and I snatch it up and shove it into the demon’s eye. He’s dead before he can scream.

  I look up to find Runner racing toward Pocket Watch with a handful of salt he grabbed from the perimeter of the room. He flings into the demon’s face and Pocket Watch shrieks with rage and pain as it sizzles on his skin. With his grip on her ankles loosened, Erin flips over, pulling something that looks like a stethoscope from her pocket, and wr
aps it around Pocket Watch’s neck. She yanks hard, tipping his head back and exposing his throat.

  I race to them, grabbing my dagger off of the floor as I go, and slam it into the side of Pocket Watch’s neck.

  Erin lets go of the instrument and scrambles back as Pocket Watch’s blood sprays out onto the floor.

  Runner stands over us, panting, and after glancing around to make certain that all of our attackers are dead, he says, “Well, that was really something. Can we never do that again, please?”

  Though we’ve won, though the four demons who came to kill us tonight are slowly fading to nothing before my eyes, the adrenaline is fading, being slowly replaced with an icy dread.

  Since I was thrown into Counterfeit City, I’ve barely outrun a Lunatic and was nearly killed by demons. I may have beaten whatever attacked me on the subway platform, but the foes I’ve fought have been extraordinarily more difficult to dispatch than anyone I ever encountered when I was human.

  Victory is no longer a sure thing for me. Whatever I was expecting, I underestimated this place. “I’ve never asked for help before. Not in a fight, not for anything,” I say quietly.

  “Hey, I didn’t do much,” Runner says, shrugging.

  “That was a vicious salt throw, Runner,” I say, going for humor to take the edge off of my fear. “I thought you were a pacifist?”

  Even the ever-so-serious Erin chuckles at that. “Don’t forget my brutal usage of a rubber tube,” she says and swings the stethoscope-type thing like a lasso. She glances toward the stairs. “There will be more, but I can handle them. I promise. I have reinforcements I can call in.”

  Runner takes the keys from his pocket and jingles them. “Shall we?”

  I stand and hold out my hand for the diamond dagger. “Shall you?”

  He hands it over with a sheepish smile.

  Erin stands, brushing dirt from her pants. “Those were some moves. No wonder Lucifer sent you to do his dirty work.”

  That’s me.

  Great at being the worst.

  16

  We race away from the cacophony of midtown in a hearse that looks like Cinderella’s carriage if she’d been attending a ball for the prince of Pandemonium. Black, of course, but with spiky iron detailing and large, silver hubcaps with the spokes twisted into the shape of a skull.