She stepped closer, giving me a better view of her face. Her red hair was a mess, her face covered in silver blood, black soot, and sewer grime; her clothes were ripped in places and long scratches that had yet to heal peppered her flesh. Her changed appearance didn’t make her less intimidating, it simply added to the reality of her brutal nature and the fact that she would do whatever it took to survive. It didn’t help that her sword dripped silver blood on to the ground as she spoke. I didn’t doubt she had every intention of adding Damian’s blood to the already
drenched weapon.
Nguyen eyed the sword with more respect to its deadly nature than Damian did. It was obvious he knew the full lethal possibilities of the sword. He knew it was a weapon that could kill a Watcher. Damian was not as informed; his eyes were wary but not aware. Nguyen’s eyes circled the hall, and I sensed him plotting his escape. I kept up my struggles, hoping Anna’s animosity at Damian would distract him long enough for me to break free of his resolute grip.
Damian laughed nervously and spread his hands. “It was just business…you know how that
goes,” he said as if his attempt to kill her was nothing more than an office email.
“No,” she stated flatly. “I know how to kill. That’s my business,” Anna said through clenched teeth.
Damian dropped me without warning and started forward to meet Anna, confident enough in his abilities that he thought he would win the fight. The meeting did not go well. As Nguyen picked me off the ground, gripping me by my upper arm to prevent my escape, Anna ran her silver
sword into Damian’s black heart. Damian’s eyes were surprised as he felt the cool steel end him.
Anna removed the sword from his chest and toppled forward, his body lifeless. She crouched down and turned him over. Using her sword, she carved out his heart with a few deft moves and placed the bleeding heart into a small bag at her side. Finished with her vengeance, she stood and eyed Nguyen with a deadly expectation that he would attack as well. I sensed her eagerness for the fight, though her eyes suggested she would let him start it.
Nguyen was not so eager. His eyes narrowed as he continued to search for an escape route, and the tunnel started to fill with a dense fog. He started backing up, dragging me after him as a shield against her sword.
“You’re a weather man, huh?” Anna said as the fog grew denser. “But you can’t bring lightning down here, can you?” she mocked, a laugh ringing throughout the space.
His expression told me she was right. His main weapon was gone, and I sensed he relied on it too much. From the fight he and Daniel had, I knew he was not the fighter Anna was, and he knew it.
He had to find another way past her. Through our connected touch, I felt Nguyen counting the time we had left until the bombs blew us all up. How much of that precious time had we wasted running these corridors? How to get past Anna, so he wouldn’t be forced to take a longer route to freedom? He, above anyone else in the tunnels, knew the cost of lingering too long.
The conclusion he came to was one of utter selfishness. It was one that would change my life forever. Around building the fog bank up, he decided that his life was more valuable than taking me to Marcus. He blinked and the fog stopped swirling. It dropped away to reveal Anna only feet from us, her sword sweeping the corridor in dangerous arcs as she searched for us. Without giving her time to come at him with her sword, he threw me at her. I stumbled forward, hating the way everyone kept tossing me around like a rag doll, and Anna jumped out of the way
instinctively. Nguyen used her distraction to run past us, headed for the exit. Anna let him pass without killing him; she wasn’t as interested in him as she was me. I froze at the touch of steel just under my chin as I prepared to run back to find Daniel before it was too late.
“Death would be easy,” Anna told me coldly. “I could slit your throat and leave you here to burn in the trap Damian has set.”
“I have a better idea. How about you let me go, and we never see each other again?” I countered.
“I have a different idea,” she said.
“We party like its 1999?” I asked hopefully.
“I take you home with me and let my boss retrain you. It will be a lot of fun watching your will crumble and your allegiances shift. I think if I take you, Lorian might even forgive me for not having the sword. You will be my redemption.” Her eyes were full of a crazy hope I knew could never be a reality.
“You’d better hope not…” I said. “Redemption and I tend to disagree.”
She smiled a ridiculously happy smile, ignoring my snarky reply. She was still lost in the delusion she had created for herself. Then, for the second time in a day, she punched me in the face. I was unconscious before I hit the ground.
A humming whine interrupted the dark dreams of different places. It started out low, becoming part of my dream, before it gradually grew louder with my slow return to consciousness. It was the first thing I was aware of. It pounded through my sore head in a constant state of sound. I groaned without opening my eyes and put my hands to my head to try and block out the pain.
“Owww,” I said in pain, everything hurting as I moved.
Chains rattled with the movement of my hands, making me aware of the feeling of something
foreign on my wrists. Whatever was on my wrists was heavy and cut into my skin when I moved my wrists too far. I opened my eyes to locate the reason behind the hum and the strange chains I had been place in.
The chains were easy enough; they were the first thing I saw. Heavy manacles bound my wrists, and the chains ran in a ‘v’ down to my feet, then onwards to the floor. Heavy bolts in the floor kept the chains in place. The chains were sharp silver. I looked away from the chains for more clues to my situation and saw that I was on an airplane. It was a jet, far from a big airliner, but there was no one else in the small area. It had the feel of something a famous person would ride in, something they bought specifically so they wouldn’t have to sit with the general populace. I would have been impressed had I not been scared out my mind.
“Oh, you’re awake. I thought you would sleep all the way to L.A.”
I looked away from the opulent decorations of the airplane, and saw that Anna was beside me on the other side of my seat. Her face and hair were still grimy from our time in the sewers, but she looked better, happier.
“We’re going to L.A.?” I asked around my dry throat.
She looked at me oddly. “Where else would we go?”
“I’m not up on where crazy people go when they abduct people,” I said tartly.
“You must be newer than I thought…L.A. is the center of the war. It is where Lorian and Darian fight for what is rightfully Lorian’s. It is where Lorian will claim his final victory. It is where-”
“Yeah, yeah, crazy war talk…got it,” I said, interrupting her.
“You would do well to check your words where I am taking you. They are not so lenient,” Anna warned me.
“Considering you keep hitting me, I can’t imagine what’s worse,” I said dryly.
Anna’s smile in response was terrifying. The humming increased, and we started to roll forward, a low swoop developing in the pit of my stomach. I had never been on a plane before; Ellen had always driven us where we needed to go. It wasn’t exactly how I wanted to remember my first plane trip. The fear at not knowing what to expect from the flight was trumped by the fear of what landing would mean. Landing would probably mean I would never see Daniel or my family ever again; it would mean the death of me.
I tried to pull my hands out of the shackles as the plane stopped again and the hum switched tones, almost as if the engine were revving up. I knew there would be no chance of escape once we were in the air…unless I suddenly sprouted wings midflight. Still struggling against the unbending silver steel, the hum grew louder, pounding against my ears, and the plane lurched forward. I stopped fighting against the shackles and grabbed the armrest at the sudden
movement. We zoomed down
the runway then lifted into the air, the lurch in my stomach
growing with our rise in the air. In silent fear, I waited for the plane to level back out.
“My first flight was on a Zeppelin,” Anna said conversationally as we leveled out, noticing my fear. “Aircrafts have improved since then.”
“A Zeppelin?” I asked, curious despite myself.
“My first kill in the service of Lorian. The Zeppelin and the Watcher, both, did not survive.
There was a fire…an accident. I almost didn’t make it off.”
“Pity…” Her mention of a fire reminded me of what we had just left, and the bomb Damian had left as his parting gift. It reminded me that Daniel, Alex, and Spider had still been down there when I had been knocked out. “What happened at the nest?” I asked.
“It blew up. Your friends are dead.” The bottom dropped out of my stomach at her words. “But, don’t worry. Soon you will have a new home and a new family,” she added. “It will be the best family you will ever know.”
“You don’t know a damn thing about home or family,” I spat.
I started twisting my hands in the manacles again, trying to not be obvious about it. I decided I would escape at the airport in L.A. I had long hours to get them free, but I was determined to free them now. I wouldn’t trust her words that Daniel and Alex were dead, I would find out for
myself…and that meant I had to escape. There was no other way.
“Even if you get your hands free, it won’t matter,” Anna told me calmly, having noticed despite my subtle attempts. “I am faster and stronger.”
I stopped struggling against my chains with a sigh. “I’m more stubborn,” I told her.
“We will see,” she said calmly.
She settled into her chair and picked up a book. She flipped to her place mark and started reading, not even bothering to keep an eye on me. I knew, despite the way she seemed totally engrossed in the words, that she was aware of every shift I made, every breath I took. It would take a lot to escape from her…more than I had.
Annoyed she might be right I looked out the window, to avoid looking at her. Grey clouds
passed by the window, blocking the view below. We could have been over New Orleans or New
York; it was impossible to tell. I watched the moisture of the thick clouds boil over the wings, thinking hard. I had been in a lot of sticky situations, situations that I hadn’t thought I would get out of, but I had never been in a situation like this one. I was alone, without anyone to help me escape. I had nothing beyond the trinkets in my pocket and the certainty I was headed toward something I wasn’t sure I was equipped to deal with.
I shifted in my seat in agitated impatience, unwilling to sit still and quietly accept my captivity.
As I did, the picture of Daniel pressed against my leg. It wasn’t my necklace – it wouldn’t protect me from the dark – but it was a reminder. A reminder that no matter what darkness lay ahead, I would face it as Daniel had faced it. I would stay brave and I wouldn’t give up hope no matter the odds.
Whatever else New Orleans had done for me – the magic it had left in my soul – it had taught me to not fear the unnamed future. It had taught me to not be afraid. My time on the streets, with the kids and with Alex, had taught me that courage went beyond acting selflessly – it was in
continuing to live when living felt impossible.
With the knowledge that I wouldn’t give up hope, that I would keep fighting until there wasn’t a breath left in me to fight, I flew on to the city of angels, watching the clouds roll over the angled wing of our private jet as a marker of the distance between me and the past I had come to know. I trusted the past to get me through the future; I had never been more dependent on it in my entire life.
I hoped it would be enough.
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