Path of Night

by Sarah Rees Brennan

  Harvey sang softly as he went. Wait, Rosalind. Everybody called Roz by her nickname, so Harvey called her Rosalind, to show she was special to him.

  “Give up. You won’t ever be who you want to be.” The birds’ whisper condemned him. “You’re always going to be who you are.”

  Night fell, eyes gleaming through the leaves. He preferred night to day, but in tonight’s dark his awareness of a threat was acute.

  The wind rose, leaves dancing with darkness. There was a sound like racing paws on the earth. An animal. A pack.

  On the rising wind, Harvey heard a howl.

  Jesus, wolves. Thanks, magic!

  Wolf howls sounded in the night air. Coiling around branches were the smoke demons that had chased Roz. And everywhere there were glaring, staring eyes. He couldn’t put them out fast enough. He would be eaten before an audience of demons, the noise of his own shots ringing in his ears.

  Beneath wolf howls, the crack of bullets and the hiss of flames came a low voice.

  A voice he knew.

  “Nick?” Harvey cried. “Nick! Where are you?”

  He ran toward the sound of Nick’s voice, saying—marble? Surely not …

  Tree roots and stones crumbled away. Suddenly Harvey was falling.

  He landed hard on rocky ground, rolled, and got his gun up. He was in a quarry, surrounded by eyes. He felt like a frog boiling to death in a stone cauldron, with merciless witches watching from above.

  Shadows simmered all around. He was lost in a dark where the only light was eyes. Watching and judging, finding him wanting. Every instinct told Harvey to run.

  The thing he hated most was feeling helpless. He wished he were better, but he could at least try.

  Harvey reached out in the dark.

  The branch lit without burning. It shone, radiant and clear. Like the light of Sabrina’s eyes when she burned the witch-hunters.

  Her father had been an angel once. The light was like that.

  Harvey’d wondered how he would know if a branch was sacred. Turned out it was like meeting Sabrina, Roz, and Theo. You found them and knew.

  He broke the branch off a tree, holding it up high. He left a trail of poison for the demons following him. A witch who loved him had told him about lashardia seeds.

  Harvey walked through the woods toward Sabrina’s house alight with victory. He peered in the kitchen window, and saw Sabrina, Theo, Elspeth, and Lavinia sitting at the table. Sabrina’s face was pinched, and Harvey’s heart clenched.

  He hid the sacred bough, to surprise ’Brina.

  He walked into the kitchen, startled when everybody stood. “Anything wrong?”

  Sabrina threw herself at him. “Harvey!”

  Harvey’s arms went around her as he understood. Oh. She’d been worried.

  “If anything happened to you, I would burn down the world!”

  He smiled down at her snow-white head. She was so little and cute, and fearsome.

  “Guys, take it down a notch.” Theo gave Harvey a sideways hug. Harvey got his arms around both of them.

  “Sorry I left you to die!” said Elspeth. “Mortals don’t matter as much as witches. We live longer.”

  “I wonder if you will,” murmured Lavinia, in her most blood-chilling voice.

  Harvey said: “Lavinia, be nice.”

  Sabrina whirled on Elspeth. “You left Harvey to what?”

  “Sabrina,” Harvey said, before she burned Elspeth to ash, “I heard Nick.”

  Sabrina turned so fast she wobbled, her face alight with love and hope.

  “Nick?”

  Harvey’s throat closed up as he nodded. Yes. Be happy.

  “Roz and Theo saw him, and you heard him,” Sabrina murmured. “Are you sure it was him?”

  Harvey cleared his throat. “Yeah. First I heard wolves—”

  “Nick’s familiar was a werewolf!”

  “That’s cool,” Harvey muttered unhappily. Nick’s familiar couldn’t be a weasel?

  Sabrina frowned. “It wasn’t really cool. But you heard him. What did he say?”

  “It doesn’t make much sense. I think he said Mabel.”

  “Probably a sex demon,” Elspeth announced.

  Harvey frowned. “A sex demon called … Mabel?”

  Magic kept letting him down. Nick was apparently letting Sabrina down.

  “It’s okay!” Sabrina said. “He doesn’t know if he’ll ever see me again. Whatever he’s doing is fine. I forgive him for everything! He’s not in trouble.”

  “He’s in huge trouble,” snapped Harvey.

  “You don’t understand how witches do things!”

  Harvey didn’t. But he knew her. He saw the trouble in her eyes as she twisted her reddened mouth into a blasé witch’s smile. It was one thing if Nick had shown her a wonderful new world of festivals and costumes. It was another if Nick was hurting her.

  “You can’t understand, beautiful mortal,” murmured Elspeth. “But if you—”

  “Mortal,” Harvey repeated.

  “Not Mabel.” The joy in Sabrina’s voice made Harvey smile. “Mortal.”

  “Me. He … knew I was there.”

  Harvey felt bad for thinking Nick would betray Sabrina. He muttered: “Misunderstandings about sex demons wouldn’t happen if Nick called people by their names.”

  “We can’t judge him for temporarily forgetting people’s names while he’s suffering in hell!” Sabrina exclaimed.

  Personally, Harvey could. Then he remembered the sound of Nick’s voice. He’d sounded scared. Nick Scratch, so cool and untouchable.

  “Oh, Nick,” Sabrina murmured, so quietly only Harvey could hear. “We’re coming.”

  Harvey nodded, pressing the hand he was still holding. Then he let her go.

  “Your concern’s understandable, Sabrina,” Elspeth said chattily. “Nick did only date you on Satan’s orders. You must wonder if anything he ever said to you was true.”

  There was a silence. Theo and Sabrina exchanged a guilty look. Harvey thought, shock echoing through him: They both knew.

  Harvey said, voice distant in his own ears, “Nick did what?”

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds,” Sabrina whispered.

  Lies had wrecked Harvey, left him in pieces he was still trying to put back together. He loved Sabrina. He couldn’t bear the idea of her being broken.

  Sabrina loved Nick so much she didn’t even care about the lies. If Nick was Sabrina’s true love, he should be true.

  Roz and Theo had put themselves in danger for that fake. Nick wasn’t worth it.

  Harvey loved Sabrina enough to follow her to hell, but she shouldn’t go. As far as Harvey was concerned, Nick could stay in hell. Where liars belonged.

  Lilith hadn’t tortured Nick today. He’d acquired a shirt, a sword, and the illusion of control. He was hanging on by a burning thread, but in hell, this meant he was doing fine.

  Until Nick turned a corner in the stone maze. He was watching the sparks above as though they were red stars, and he almost walked right into the stupid mortal.

  “Nick?” The mortal was wide-eyed with surprise.

  “You? No.” Nick turned aside and shouted upward at the flying sparks. “I have never been so insulted in all my life, Lucifer.”

  The mortal frowned as though he had serious concerns about Nick’s mental well-being. Nick felt even more personally insulted by Satan.

  “Why are you yelling at the sky?” the mortal asked in a pained voice. “Get a grip, we have to find the others.”

  “What others?”

  “My friends. Sabrina got us to come rescue you.” The mortal scowled. “Believe me, it wasn’t my idea.”

  “Shut up,” Nick said flatly. “You’re not real. Lucifer is rifling through my memories and creating hallucinations in order to break my mind. But—do you hear me, Satan—you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel with this one. It isn’t going to work!”

  The mortal stood there as if this was one more Nick-related horr
or he was forced to endure. He was wearing his stupid fleece-lined jacket, in hell.

  He gave Nick his usual look, as though Nick were a particularly unpleasant magical toad. Because Nick had Sabrina, and the mortal was jealous. Sad for him. Nick didn’t personally know what jealousy felt like.

  “Why would you hallucinate me?”

  “I wouldn’t!” Nick snarled. “Why would I? I don’t even know your name!”

  “Okay,” said the mortal. “So the logical inference would be you’re not hallucinating. Come on, I can deliver you to Sabrina, and not deal with”—he made a small gesture, full of distaste, toward Nick—“any of this.”

  He reached for Nick’s arm. Nick jolted back, remembering Lilith.

  “Don’t touch me.”

  The mortal retreated. “I won’t. Listen …”

  “I will not. You’re not here!”

  “I wish I wasn’t,” the mortal snapped. “I couldn’t let Sabrina go alone, but I didn’t want to come. You’re not worth hell. I know what you did.”

  There was a hissing silence. Nick had known the mortal would look at him like this once he found out.

  “Don’t stop. Tell me how contemptible you think I am.”

  The mortal’s lip curled. “Beneath contempt. Actually. And you always pretended you were so much better than me.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Sometimes I act superior … around people who are inferior to me.”

  The mortal looked down his nose at Nick. “Forget it. If you don’t want to be rescued, you don’t have to be. I’ll tell Sabrina you like it here, and you’re gonna stay.” The mortal nodded. “I feel great about that. Bye.”

  He headed back the way he’d come. The ground was uneven, dropping and rising, ledges and loose earth. Nick watched as the mortal disappeared from sight.

  He wasn’t real. They hadn’t come for him.

  If they had, Nick mentally rehearsed a future conversation with Sabrina. Yes, I let him go off alone and a demon ate him, but in my defense …

  “Bitter merciless Satan, what I have to put up with,” Nick muttered. He ran after the mortal, scrambling down rocks. “Wait up, Harry!”

  The mortal threw an unimpressed look over his shoulder. “Decided to come along, did you?”

  “I’m not buying any of this,” Nick snapped. “But whatever. I’ll amuse myself by insulting you.”

  “How long were you planning to keep insulting me?”

  “Until you die!” Nick responded promptly.

  The mortal stared.

  Nick grinned. “Why not? I have five minutes.”

  “Oh Jesus,” muttered the mortal.

  Nick waited for the walls to collapse and the ground to give way. “You cannot talk like that in hell!”

  “Thought I wasn’t real? I can do whatever I want.”

  One of the heaven-sent, wandering through hell. Surely Nick’s mind wouldn’t have come up with this. Nick was too smart.

  No, he wouldn’t be fooled.

  “Has it ever occurred to you,” Nick said conversationally, “I don’t have to endure your mortal insolence? I could rip your throat out. Anytime I wanted.”

  Said throat was about eye level. Nick glared. He could do it. Any wolf could.

  “Listen, Scratch—”

  “Look, Kinkle—”

  “You know my last name but not my first name? Seems likely!”

  Nick maintained calm. “I only remember your last name because it’s funny.”

  The mortal frowned. “Why’s it funny?”

  Nick brightened. “I’m glad you asked.”

  “Wait, I don’t wanna know.”

  “Too bad,” said Nick, “because—”

  The mortal wasn’t listening. His face lit up in the way it did for only three people in the world. Nick turned, heart hammering in his ears, the frantic beating of a winged thing sensing the sky.

  Sabrina, Nick thought, please—

  It wasn’t Sabrina, or even Roz. It was Theo.

  Roz was Nick’s favorite mortal. The mortal was his least favorite by miles. Roz was Sabrina’s best friend, which meant Sabrina also thought Roz was the best one. Roz believed in Sabrina and was charmed by Nick. He appreciated Roz distracting the mortal so he came up with fewer suicidal ideas.

  Theo was different. Sabrina had told Nick about Theo, and when they met, Nick saw Theo thought Nick was hot, though not in a serious way. Nick figured it would be easy to get Theo on his side.

  Then Theo gave Nick a very clear-eyed look, as though Theo could see through Nick like a windowpane.

  Nick understood Theo had picked the mortal’s side.

  One thing Nick did for Sabrina’s sake was make sure her mortals were all right. Sabrina would be devastated if anything happened to the mortal. So Nick checked in occasionally, to ascertain he hadn’t gotten his fool head eaten by a wild goblin. Usually the mortal was relatively safe in his house, wearing overly large headphones and singing gross mortal songs, and drawing pictures. Sometimes he wandered outside—into the woods full of witches and familiars, the idiot. Sometimes he did so in company.

  Nick had seen Theo and the mortal out shooting cans on fences. They did a weird handshake together. Sometimes they hugged. Nick had heard the mortal tell Theo he loved him. It was sickening.

  Theo’s attitude was the mortal’s fault. Now they’d gang up on Nick in hell.

  “You found Nick!” Theo said brightly. “This is great.”

  Nick sneered: “I don’t believe in you either.”

  Theo gave the mortal a questioning look.

  “He keeps saying we’re hallucinations from Satan and none of this is happening,” reported the mortal wearily.

  “None of this is happening,” Nick insisted. “Sabrina wouldn’t come to hell dragging a pack of mortals. That would be reckless and ridiculous.”

  “Um,” said Theo. “Have you … met Sabrina?”

  The mortal exclaimed: “Theo!”

  “Just saying.”

  Nick couldn’t agree with Theo, because that would be insulting Sabrina, and he couldn’t agree with the mortal, because he’d rather die. He walked ahead. They were on an uphill slope, the maze turning split-level, so Nick could see over one wall to the dark passage below.

  When Nick looked up, he found Theo’s blue gaze on him. Seeing a little too much.

  “You’ve been having hallucinations from Satan? That doesn’t sound good.”

  This apparently hadn’t occurred to the mortal and seemed to disturb him. Now they both looked at Nick, Theo’s gaze bright and knowing, the mortal’s soft and dark.

  The mortal feeling sorry for him would be the last indignity.

  “Nick,” murmured the mortal. “What has hell been like?”

  “Awesome,” Nick snapped.

  “I heard somewhere,” the mortal offered, “hell is other people?”

  “If those other people are you,” Nick said, “could be!”

  From below came the sound of feet marching in unison. Not the rabble of random demons, Nick thought. A cadre of soldiers, sent to apprehend the intruders.

  The mortal shouldered Nick aside so the mortal was in front, moving toward the low stone wall.

  “Theo,” said the mortal, “on my mark.”

  They fired. The ranks fell and scattered, some fleeing, a few heading toward them. Theo and the mortal ducked behind the wall to reload.

  Nick drew his sword and headed toward the demons. The mortal motioned for Nick to stay back. Nick made his own gesture indicating Buzz off, you bother me, and swung. Both the demon’s head and his sword dropped in the dust.

  Two slashed throats later, there was only one soldier left. Nick followed him over the wall, but as he did, the demon pulled Nick down. Nick landed on the rubble with the demon’s slimy tusks an inch from his face. The demon snarled, Nick snarled in return, and the demon collapsed with a sword in its back.

  Nick stared over the dead demon’s shoulder at the mortals, peering at him over the wall. The st
upid mortal was squinting in a slightly uncertain fashion. Theo, the sane one, seemed horrified.

  “Harv!” Theo exclaimed. “You can’t throw swords!”

  “Sometimes I just do things,” mumbled the mortal.

  “I’m so deeply aware of that!” Nick threw the demon’s corpse off and sat up in a rage.

  “I was trying to help—”

  “Help by staying in your home!”

  The sword had gone through the demon and cut Nick, but his shirt was dark and the mortal would get upset. He twitched the torn material aside. Theo’s eye caught the movement.

  Theo tugged on the mortal’s sleeve. “I think Nick’s hurt.”

  The mortal mysteriously stopped being angry. “Oh no. Did you hit your head? How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “Can you not count?” Nick climbed back over the wall. “It’s fine. I heal almost immediately, no matter what they do to me. I think it’s because of Satan.”

  Satan, lurking beneath his skin. Lucifer, whispering low. Typically, the mortal ignored Satan to focus on useless things.

  “What are they doing to you?”

  Nick wrenched his mind away from memories of the pit, and Lilith.

  “What do you care? You don’t like me.”

  The mortal snorted. “What’s there to like about you?”

  Not much. But Nick didn’t want people to see that.

  Nick plunged on. “And this is what I deserve. Right?”

  He knew it. The mortal knew it. He’d known the mortal would think so.

  “No,” the mortal said.

  “What?” Nick asked, after a split second’s hesitation.

  “No,” said the mortal. “Nobody deserves this.”

  Nick scoffed. “Doesn’t matter.”

  “It does,” the mortal insisted.

  Nick took a step toward him, eyes narrowing. “You’re the only one who believes that. There’s no use talking about justice, and respect, and boundaries, and consent. Did Sabrina want to sign the Book, did I want to do what the Dark Lord said? As if it matters what people feel about what’s happening to them. I—I didn’t want any of this. The world doesn’t care what anybody wants.”

  “I care,” said the mortal.

  “That,” Nick hissed between his teeth, “is because you are stupid.”

  The mortal’s face underwent a silent revolution of frustration.