The Beautiful Ashes

by Jeaniene Frost

  Adrian looked at me, then barked out a few words that made the gargoyle halt and, unbelievably, let him go.

  “What are you doing?” I gasped.

  He took my head, his silvery-sapphire gaze almost burning into mine.

  “He can’t fly with all of us, and I’m the heaviest. Brutus’ll take you to the B and B, then you need to cross through the gateway.” A dark, quick smile. “You already know how.”

  I was appalled. “Adrian, you can’t—”

  He pulled my head down, his mouth searing mine in a kiss that matched the blazing intensity in his eyes. Desperation, desire and despair seemed to pour from him into me, but when he broke the kiss and pulled away, he was smiling.

  “I love you, Ivy. I love you, and I didn’t betray you. For the first time in my life, I feel like I can do anything.”

  Then he stuffed the slingshot in my coat pocket, smacked the gargoyle on the side and yelled, “Tarate!” Those mighty wings began to beat at once.

  “No!” I screamed, struggling to get free.

  The gargoyle rose up, no longer encumbered by too much weight. The last thing I saw before we cleared the tunnel and the realm’s eternally dark skyline enveloped us was Adrian turning toward the horde of minions that was almost upon him.

  chapter thirty-eight

  Jasmine screamed in terror the whole way to the B and B. I screamed, too. In anguish. Adrian was strong, but he couldn’t beat dozens of minions when they were armed and he wasn’t. He was going to die, and he knew it, but he’d willingly doomed himself to save me.

  I love you, Ivy.

  I thought my heart had been wounded before. Now, I could feel it ripping wide-open, scalding my insides with the kind of pain that would never heal. There had to be a way to save him.

  As soon as the gargoyle released us at the entrance to the B and B, I started yelling the same word Adrian had used to make it leave him.

  “Tarate, tarate! Go back and get Adrian!”

  The creature only stared at me. Jasmine backed away a few feet, rubbing her arms against the chill I barely noticed in my desperation.

  “If you’re really Ivy, do something to prove it.”

  Do something? Like what, start miming out the letters to my name? Couldn’t she see that I was trying to get the winged monstrosity to save Adrian, yet the stupid thing just kept looking at me!

  In complete frustration, I flipped Jasmine off. She blinked in disbelief, then threw herself at me.

  “Ivy!”

  She started crying in the loud, hiccupping way she used to do when she was a child. I held her with one arm, flapping the other at the gargoyle in a last-ditch attempt to get it to understand that it had to fly. Now.

  The creature chuffed at me in obvious annoyance. Then its wing whipped out so fast, for a second, wild hope filled me. I shoved Jasmine back, screaming “That’s it!” while flapping both my arms. Then I noticed something rolling on the ground toward me. What was—?

  Jasmine shrieked and I recoiled. It was a head, and as it dissolved into a small pile of ashes, I noticed the form to the right of the gargoyle just before it, too, dissipated into ashes.

  The gargoyle angled its wings flat like two massive, leathery blades. Then it took one step toward me, and a burst of motion behind me made me spin around.

  The minion who’d been sneaking up on us turned around and started hightailing it into the woods. The gargoyle chuffed loudly, as if saying, “Yeah, you’d better run!” before folding its wings into two compact piles on its back.

  I wanted to thank it and rail at it at the same time. Yes, it had just saved my life, but it should be saving Adrian’s. Not standing here like a dinosaur version of a knight in shining armor. Since I couldn’t seem to communicate that, I ran to the tree stump where I’d left my supplies. Where there were two minions, there’d soon be more, so I had to get Jasmine out of here while I still could. Besides, maybe Costa and a lot of weapons were waiting on the other side of this realm. If I couldn’t make the gargoyle rescue Adrian, maybe I could find a way to do it myself.

  Once I had my sack, I took Jasmine’s hand and led her into the B and B. Unbelievably, the gargoyle followed us, though it stayed bent down because it was taller than the ceiling. The human residents of the B and B stood stock-still in terror at the sight of a Hound and the winged creature in the house, and I had no way of telling them that neither one of us were dangerous.

  Well, the gargoyle probably wasn’t dangerous.

  I drew Jasmine into Mrs. Paulson’s office, pain knifing my heart again when I pulled out one of the two beer bottles filled with Adrian’s blood. I’m coming back for you, I silently promised, hating myself for what I’d done. Then, because I had no choice, I smeared my hands with Adrian’s blood and started running them over Jasmine.

  She let out a noise that was half whimper, half fearful sob. “W-what are you doing, Ivy?”

  I wasn’t about to waste Adrian’s blood by using it to write out an explanation, so I held my finger to my lips in the universal gesture for silence. Once I estimated that she was covered enough, I used the rest of his blood on myself. Betrayer! those red smears seemed to scream at me.

  My eyes blurred with tears. Yes, I was a betrayer and Adrian wasn’t. Now, to make sure he lived so I could apologize to him for the rest of my life.

  I put the second bottle in the opposite corner of the office, then grabbed Jasmine around the waist and hurtled us both toward the gateway. That push-pull-stretch-puke sensation as we crossed through the realms seemed worse, but we tumbled out into the non-demon version of Mrs. Paulson’s office.

  Unfortunately, we weren’t alone.

  “What the hell?” the young, sandy-haired cop sputtered.

  Right, the guests would’ve called the police after I’d scared them out of here with my rampaging monster act. I let go of Jasmine, but put myself in front of her. If the cop went for his gun, I had a better chance at stopping him since I was faster than Jaz.

  Then something knocked me over from behind. I didn’t have time to register what had caused me to suddenly face-plant before the cop’s head was on the floor in front of me. The rest of him was still up where I couldn’t see.

  I rolled over, stunned to see the gargoyle looming like a dark shadow over me and Jasmine. His one wing was still extended in that chopping formation, and a thump nearby had to be the guard’s body falling next to his severed head.

  “Why’d you do that?” I snapped, only to feel a small “poof” by my face. When I looked again, the head had turned into ashes.

  The cop was a minion. Of course. Detective Kroger wasn’t the only one at the Bennington police department, and who else would investigate stories of a monster at the same inn that doubled as a demonic Brimstone and Breakfast?

  “Uh, good boy,” I told the gargoyle awkwardly.

  “What is that doing here?” a familiar voice asked, his tone heavy with disapproval.

  Zach! I bolted up, so excited to see the Archon in the doorway that I knocked Jasmine over in my haste to get to him.

  “Get me out of this disguise, I need to talk to the gargoyle!” I said in a rush. It hadn’t understood me as a Hound, but maybe Adrian had taught it to speak English.

  Zach touched the top of my head. I knew the instant my disguise disappeared because Jasmine choked, “Oh, Ivy!” and threw her arms around me again.

  I wanted to hug her back. A big part of me even needed to after everything we’d been through, but I was too terrified for Adrian to do anything except gently shove her aside.

  “Brutus, you have to go back and save Adrian,” I told the gargoyle, grabbing the edge of its wing in my urgency. “Please, go back now!”

  The gargoyle cocked its head, the wing beneath my hand quivering. From his expression, he seemed to want to do what I
asked, yet he made no move toward the gateway.

  “Go, now!” I repeated, trying to shove him in the right direction, but the gargoyle was way too heavy for me.

  “He doesn’t understand you,” Zach said, sounding bemused this time. “This must be Adrian’s pet. Why did he follow you here?”

  “Adrian said something to him and he hasn’t left my side since, but that doesn’t matter.” I let go of the gargoyle’s wing to grasp the Archon’s trademark sweater. “Adrian’s fighting for his life, so I need all the weapons you have, now!”

  “I don’t have any weapons,” Zach said, as if the idea was preposterous.

  “Then glamour some up,” I all but snarled. “Didn’t you hear me? Adrian’s going to die!”

  “I can’t. Glamour is illusion—it’s not creating something out of nothing.” Zach’s dark gaze narrowed as he looked at my pocket. “But you already have a weapon, don’t you?”

  I don’t know why, but I backed away, my hand flying to cover my pocket. “It doesn’t work,” I said breathily.

  Zach snorted with something like contempt. “Without faith, it wouldn’t.” Then his expression became deadly serious. “Give me the slingshot, Ivy.”

  I edged away farther, glancing at the invisible gateway. “Why? You can’t cross into a dark realm, so you’re not going to use it to save Adrian.”

  “Demetrius won’t allow him to be killed,” Zach replied, sounding almost careless now. “He may take out his anger on him, but Adrian should survive that.”

  “And that’s okay with you?” I snapped, fury boiling over. “Wait, of course it is. This wouldn’t be the first time you left him at the mercy of demons, would it?”

  Zach’s features hardened, and he held out his hand in silent, imperious command. Give me the weapon, his stare warned.

  He really would just take the slingshot, give it to his boss and call it a day, regardless if it meant Adrian’s torture or death. We can only depend on each other. To Archons and demons, we’re just pawns that they move around for their own purposes, Adrian had said. From the unyielding expression on Zach’s face, he’d been right.

  And I’d betrayed him just as awfully as Zach had all those years ago. I’d believed the worst of Adrian’s words when his actions should’ve shown me that he would never hand me over to Demetrius. In the end, it was our actions that defined us. Not words.

  I glanced at Jasmine, who was looking out the window as if she couldn’t believe she was back in the real world. She was and so was I, all because of Adrian’s sacrifice. Now, it was my turn. I love you, Jaz, I thought, choking back a sob. But you’re not the only one I love.

  Then I looked at Zach. “You might be willing to abandon Adrian again. I’m not.”

  His shout was cut off as I ran into the gateway, leaving him, my sister and the rest of my world behind.

  chapter thirty-nine

  I landed in the icy, decrepit version of the B and B on top of a dark-haired boy, who shoved me aside with a yelp.

  “What the—?” he began, only to stop talking so fast, I whirled, expecting to see a minion or a demon behind me.

  Nothing. I spun back around to see the boy staring at my chest with widened eyes. I looked down—and then yanked the coat together. It had flown open during my tumble, and I no longer had my Hound disguise, so not only had I landed on a kid who looked about ten, I’d done so while mostly naked.

  And being a prepubescent boy, he’d fixated on that even while trapped inside a demon realm. My hand went to my coat pocket, anxiously checking for the slingshot. Still there.

  “Sorry,” I said, then stopped when I saw what the boy had in his hand. He must’ve found the beer bottle of blood that I’d left here.

  “Rub some of that on your arms and legs,” I said quickly. “Then run at the corner I just came through. You’ll come out in the real world, promise.”

  “Are you a minion?” the boy asked suspiciously.

  I let out a snort. “No. In fact, I’m here to kill them and all the demons.”

  “You’re crazy,” the boy scoffed.

  I didn’t believe that I could do it either, but that was the problem. It doesn’t work, I’d told Zach. Without faith, it wouldn’t, he’d replied. And Costa had said, thousands of years ago, a shepherd boy killed a giant with nothing more than a slingshot and blind faith. All right, I had the weapon. Now, I had to find the blind faith. Fast.

  “Rub that stuff on you, and you can get out of here,” I repeated. “Tell the others.”

  “You’re gonna die, crazy naked lady,” he muttered.

  The scary truth was, he was probably right. After Zach’s cold dismissal of Adrian’s situation, I had less faith now than I’d had the last time I’d tried to use the weapon. Let’s face it: it was too hard to believe in a benevolent, cosmic “boss” when his employees were made of so much suck!

  Fear urged me to turn around and run back through the gateway. A far stronger emotion had me pulling out the slingshot and running out of the B and B as fast as I could. Yes, I was probably crazy, and yes, I’d probably die, but if there was even a chance that I could save Adrian, I had to try. Besides, if the Archons’ boss didn’t want the equivalent of a nuclear bomb in His enemies’ hands, then He had to show up—

  The braided rope pulsed with a sudden flare of power. I was so surprised, I almost stumbled during my mad dash up the hill. What had caused that? I hadn’t been thinking anything pious. I’d been thinking that only an idiot would fail to realize the weapon would either work for me, or I’d be delivering it right into the demons’ hands—

  The slingshot pulsed again, stronger this time, until my right arm almost felt numb. The reason why hit me then, and I began to laugh with wild, ragged whoops.

  I didn’t need to have pious faith. I didn’t even need to have complimentary faith. No, this weapon’s batteries ran on the same juices that had kept Adrian going when no one else had believed in him. You can trust my hatred of demons, he’d always told me. That had been his faith. Mine, apparently, was believing that the Archons’ boss didn’t want the slingshot to end up in demon hands. I didn’t trust the Great Being with much, but it seemed that I trusted Him not to be stupid.

  Power sizzled up my arm and light infused the rope, making it glow against the darkness. At the same time, shouts sounded about a hundred yards ahead of me, with more close behind those. With the Hounds dead and the gargoyle gone, minions must be on patrol, and I didn’t have a disguise anymore.

  I stopped running to grab a stone for the slingshot. Since nothing was around except frozen ground, all I managed to get was a ragged piece of ice. I put it in the glowing, pulsating rope, starting to spin it as soon as I reached the top of the hill where the trees abruptly ended.

  The valley spread out below, faint, iridescent lights from the castle showing three minions dashing up the hill toward me. Worse, it looked like a larger group of them weren’t far behind. Demetrius must’ve been hoping I’d come back.

  Well, here I was, armed with nothing except cynical faith and a weapon that hadn’t worked in thousands of years. I spun the rope faster, my emotions feelings like they were whirling in circles alongside the ancient weapon. I was scared beyond belief, yet I also felt the strangest sort of exultation. I was about to die or about to kick some serious ass, but either way, I’d be doing it for Adrian. Prophecies, destinies...they weren’t why I was here. He was, and in life or in death, I wasn’t going to fail him again.

  Raising the weapon, I ran down the hill to meet my enemies.

  The three closest minions leaped forward with such ferocity, they were briefly airborne. At the same time, an incredible surge of power caused pain to rocket through my whole body. Then light shot out from the weapon. As soon it touched the minions, they stopped moving so abruptly, it looked like they’d hit a wall in midair. Anot
her agonizing surge caused those thin streams of light to hit the group of minions behind them. They froze, too, some with weapons still pointed in my direction.

  I staggered, trying not to fall over from the searing sensations that made my insides feel like they were boiling. The beams of light coming from the slingshot kept the minions frozen into place, but the overwhelming pain made me want to fling the weapon aside. My body must have been the power conduit, and if this was what two supernatural blasts felt like, would I survive more?

  Sirens came from farther down the hill. Someone must’ve seen the strange lights and sounded the alarm. I clenched my jaw, trying to keep from screaming as I spun the rope into a tighter, faster circle. This hurt so much, my bones actually ached. Who knew they could do that?

  Then I walked past the first group of minions. If I only had one shot, I needed it for saving Adrian. The lights coming from the slingshot stayed on them, though, until the weapon had glowing strings both behind it and ahead. By the time I reached the bottom of the hill, the castle was in full defense mode.

  Gunfire sounded, making me duck while holding the weapon aloft enough to keep the rope spinning. Another blast of power emanated from the slingshot, the subsequent pain almost driving me to my knees. As soon as that light touched them, the bullets stopped with the same suddenness as on that day in the desert when Zach had intervened. Hope clawed through my agony. The slingshot held the same power as an Archon. It really could do everything it was supposed to, as long as I could stand to wield it.

  I forced myself to keep walking toward the castle. This time, I didn’t duck as a barrage of gunfire came my way. I braced, a cry ripping out of me at the sizzling pain of dozens of bullets being supernaturally frozen in midair. Then more light shot from the weapon, landing on the guards like laser sights on a rifle. The new surge of power had me shaking in torment. I wasn’t sure I could walk, let along keep the rope spinning. The slingshot felt like a thousand pounds of molten agony being funneled from my arm into the rest of my body.