The Brightest Embers

by Jeaniene Frost

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said quickly. The last thing we needed was for them to freak out over who Adrian was. “We’ll need all of you to arm up with whatever you’ve got, and if you have any mirrors on the island, they need to be broken. Now.”

  Sebhat pulled out a satellite phone. I would’ve been impressed that he had one, except the pilum suddenly yanked me so hard to the right, I almost bashed myself into a tree.

  “Ivy!” Adrian tried to help me, but I pulled away, breathing hard. I didn’t trust what would happen if he accidentally brushed against the pilum again. Ever since I set foot on this island, it had been powering up, until it felt like it was starting to burn me even through the layers of towel.

  “Don’t come near me, Adrian,” I said tightly. “It’s too dangerous. The pilum’s power is growing, and it’s being pretty specific that it wants me to go to the right, not straight.”

  Sebhat came closer. The way was so narrow, we’d been walking single file. Adrian’s tall, broad shoulders left most of the monk’s face hidden, but I could still see some of Sebhat’s face, and his expression was reverent.

  “The spearhead is to the right as the crow flies, but the climb is too steep and the jungle too dense that way. You must follow us up this path until we reach the clearing.”

  Adrian glanced up at the sky. What had been a small spot before now stretched to a cone shape, and the sky was darkening by the moment. “Whichever way we go, we need to hurry.” To me, he said, “Don’t suppose you can use the staff to slow down the onset of the eclipse and buy us more time?”

  What was meant as a laugh came out as a gasp as new flares of pain shot up my arms. The towel might keep my hands from erupting in burns on the outside, but the pilum now felt like it was burning me on the inside, too.

  “Doubt it.” The intensity of the pain made my reply more snippy than I’d intended. “For one, my tats haven’t activated because the demons aren’t here yet. For another, I might have been able to blast away some clouds, but I don’t think I can stall the alignment of the planets. Lastly, it’s taking everything I have to keep holding on to this pilum, so don’t expect more from me, because I’m about done.”

  The look Adrian gave me briefly made me forget how it felt like fire had replaced my blood in the worst possible way. For a second, all the anguish he’d been hiding came out, and seeing it seared me in ways that my physical pain never could.

  “It’s okay, Ivy,” he rasped. “You’re right. You’re almost done.”

  I closed my eyes. I hadn’t meant it that way, but he was right. I was almost done, permanently. Yet if I looked at him one more moment, I might throw away the pilum, my destiny and the lives of all those trapped people just to see that awful pain leave his expression. Out of everything I futilely wished I could change, hurting Adrian was at the top of that list.

  But I couldn’t change that, and no matter how it tore at me, I had to look past it. “Call your people,” I said to Sebhat. “Tell them to get their guns and break their mirrors. We’re almost out of time.”

  We started back up the path, and I walked those first few steps with my eyes still closed. Only when I heard Sebhat talking into his phone did I open them. By then, Adrian had turned away, yet the shadows that no one else could see had grown until they rose behind him like a living storm. If I was tempted to throw the pilum away, Adrian had to be fighting every cell of his combined demon and Judian heritage not to yank it from my hands and destroy it.

  I couldn’t say anything to help him with this fight. This one, he had to do by himself. I knew he was strong enough, but it took only one moment of weakness to ruin everything. So many lives depended on both of us being at our best for just a little bit longer. We couldn’t fail. We couldn’t.

  Adrian’s head suddenly whipped around, then he pointed up. “A plane’s coming in very low. Is that normal around here?”

  Sebhat shaded his eyes with his hand as he looked up. “No,” he said in a concerned tone. “Not that type of plane.”

  We quickened our pace up the steep trail. When we reached a small clearing at the top, the plane flew directly overhead, and a thick white cloud released from the back of it. It landed on the island in a way that reminded me of crop dusting, but there were no fields to fertilize here. When a new, even more intense pain suddenly hit me, I thought I knew what it was.

  “Poison gas,” I said, covering my nose with my sweater even though I doubted that would help.

  “No,” Adrian spat. “Something else.” He gave a hate-filled look at the pale substance falling all around us like a thicker, sandier version of snow. “The ground has been cursed.”

  What? “I thought you had to enclose a place in circles made from powerful dark relics to do that, like you did when you held Blinky under the church.”

  “That’s one way.” Adrian’s tone was as dark as his shadows. “But if you’re in a hurry, you can saturate a place with the ground-up bones of hundreds of minions, and that will turn even hallowed ground into cursed earth.”

  I looked at the pale substance with a disgusted sort of understanding. Minions, like demons, turned to ash when they died, so they didn’t leave behind bones that could be ground up. That meant Demetrius and the other demons would’ve had to keep the minions alive while they hacked off their limbs in order to harvest their bones. No wonder such heinous torture resulted in cursing the earth of whatever it touched.

  The sun was more than half hidden by the shadow of the moon now, and a sudden chill swept through the air as darkness descended. The ground was cursed, the sky was darkened and we all knew what would come next.

  Adrian met my eyes, his shadows swirling madly around him, and said, “We’re out of time. You have to run, Ivy. Don’t wait, don’t look back and don’t let anything stop you.”

  I knew he was right, yet I still wanted to say that I loved him, I was so proud of him, and a thousand other things. Instead, I turned and ran in the direction where the pilum was leading me. It took all of my willpower, but I did it.

  The attack came ten seconds later.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  I HEARD SCREAMS behind me and gunshots ahead of me, yet I didn’t slow down and I didn’t look back. I wouldn’t be able to keep going if I did either, and I had to go on. The demons were here; my tats lighting up and sending new agony through me were proof of that, as if there had been any doubt as to who was behind the sounds of attack. No, they were here, and so was the spearhead. Either I or they would wield it soon, and I had to make sure that it was me.

  I ducked when the wide green leaves of whatever vegetation populated this jungle suddenly exploded next to me. More gunfire strafed the brush around me, this time coming from the opposite direction. Great, I was caught in the cross fire between armed bad guys and armed good guys, yet I couldn’t leave the path. The brush was too thick, so I ducked as low as I could and hoped that somehow the power of the pilum would make me bulletproof.

  It didn’t. I knew that when I suddenly stumbled after the next volley of shots even though I hadn’t tripped. I hit the hard earth of the well-worn path like a sack of potatoes, although I managed to keep my grip on the pilum. In that dazed moment when I first hit the ground, I decided it was a good thing that the pilum had burned my hands even through the towel. They were probably welded to it now.

  I felt blood spill out of me when I stood up, but I didn’t look down to see where I’d been shot. I couldn’t stop to treat my wound and seeing it would only upset me. Either it was bad enough to kill me, or it wasn’t. I was already in so much pain that a little more wouldn’t make a difference.

  When I was able to run again, I smiled. Those trapped people still had a chance. Come on, I urged the pilum. Give me a little of your energy so I can move faster.

  Whether it did or a new surge of adrenaline hit me, I didn’t know. But soon, I was able
to move easier. I ran up to a small building with a red roof that must have had monks holed up in it, because gunfire erupted from the windows as I approached. Thankfully, none of it hit me this time. Maybe being the only woman on the island was now an advantage. If the monks could see me, they must be able to figure out not to shoot me.

  A horrible vibration shook the ground, and the building began to collapse far too quickly to be structural deficiency. By the time I was thirty yards away, it had crushed onto itself in a way that was all too familiar.

  Demetrius. Of course he was here, and he couldn’t be far behind me if he was doing that. I quickened my pace, ignoring the new tiny, bright specks in my gaze that meant I was in danger of passing out. I couldn’t do that. I had to hang on a little longer. The sun was completely blocked by the moon’s shadow now, but in a few minutes, the eclipse would be over and the sun would be shining again.

  I ran past what looked like a primitive courtyard, yelling, “Stop the demons behind me!” at the orange-robed monks who looked like they’d taken up tactical positions around it. They couldn’t kill Demetrius, of course, but maybe they could slow him down and whoever he’d brought with him. It pained me to realize that even if they did, those monks were as good as dead. So was I, but although none of us could save our own lives, if we fought hard enough, we could save other peoples’ lives. All I had to do was make it to the spearhead in time.

  The pilum suddenly flared with so much power, the force of it caused me to stumble again. This time, I caught myself and didn’t face-plant. Instead, I half staggered, half ran toward a small wood-and-stone structure that I glimpsed through the palm fronds ahead. As if confirming that this was where I needed to go, the pilum shot forward, until it felt less like I was running and more like it was dragging me.

  The draw was so potent, I ran right into the door as if I were a cartoon character. Then, head ringing from the impact, I forced the mind-numbing pull of the pilum aside enough to try to turn the small metal doorknob.

  It didn’t budge. It was locked, and none of the orange-robed monks were inside to let me in, or around it to open the door. Maddened, I kicked the door with all the seething need that the pilum filled me with to reach what was inside. The wooden door flew inward and landed with a thud, but a new rush of liquid made my sweater stick to my stomach and the top of my jeans feel soaked.

  I still didn’t look down. This time, it wasn’t because I knew that seeing the severity of the wound would upset me. It was because whatever warding had been blocking my hallowed sensors from detecting the spearhead was now broken along with the door.

  Power slammed into me with the force of an oncoming train. It would have thrown me backward if not for the pilum yanking me forward with equal intensity. Between the two incredible forces, my feet left the ground, and I found myself flying into the small hut much like the door had when I kicked it in.

  I landed on the door and immediately shoved it aside. I also shoved aside the brightly colored woven rug that covered most of the floor. The spearhead was beneath the hut’s wooden floor. I could feel it, and that wasn’t only from all my hallowed sensors exploding within me. Now that it had been released from the muting effect of the wards, the power of the freed spearhead briefly caused the entire hut to shake.

  It also filled me with a near-demented need to touch it. I dropped the pilum and started to tear at the floorboards with my bare hands until I realized I needed something stronger. These were thick wood planks at least two layers deep, and I was now bleeding too heavily to be able to smash through them with nothing but my fists.

  Shelves filled with various items lined the walls of the hut. Most of the objects on them were useless for my needs, like all the pottery pieces and the strange metal globes hanging from chains in the corner nearest me. But in the other corner, I saw a very large thick metal platter. That wouldn’t break easily.

  I grabbed it and began slamming it against the floorboards. Wooden shards flew in every direction and the planks dented. Encouraged, I started hammering at the boards with even more fervor. After a minute, the first layer broke. I kept slamming the metal platter down, using all my strength, until the area where I knelt became stained red with my blood.

  A deafening bang suddenly filled the room, and I was knocked over. I didn’t understand what had happened until I looked up and saw Demetrius in the open doorway holding a smoking gun. Either my brain was starved of oxygen due to blood loss, or the parts that were still working were being driven by an insane need to get to the spearhead, because I wasn’t at all afraid. Instead, I was furious.

  “You shot me? That’s low even for you!”

  Demetrius laughed, a cruelly pleased sound that only pissed me off more. “Are those really what you’re choosing for your last words, Davidian?”

  He blocked a lot of the doorway and it was still dark from the eclipse, so I didn’t see him behind Demetrius at first. I might not have seen him at all, except those twin red orbs stood out against the midnight-blue backdrop of the sky. But those eyes glowed with the same tapetum lucidum that caused most animal’s eyes to shine, and I knew of only one large, flying creature with eyes that big and red.

  Brutus! I had no idea how he’d gotten here, but I couldn’t be happier to see him. I also couldn’t be sure, but I thought I saw Brutus pull back his lips in a vengeful grin as he soared right toward Demetrius’s unsuspecting back. Never let it be said that a gargoyle couldn’t hold a grudge with the best of them.

  “Why are you smiling?” Demetrius demanded, the smirk wiping from his features.

  “You’ll see,” I said, and flattened myself onto the floor.

  Demetrius turned—and Brutus slammed right into him. The momentum from his aerial assault took out most of the small hut, too, as demon and gargoyle plowed right through it. Stone, wood and countless pieces of pottery rained down on me, yet I stayed flattened on the floor until the worst of it stopped.

  Even those few seconds felt like too long. The spearhead had me in its thrall, demanding that I free it. I began digging through the debris, heedless that I spilled more of my own blood with every strenuous movement. I found the pilum and tucked it next to me, then shoved enough of the hut’s ruined remains aside to find the partial hole I’d dug into the floor. Once I did, I grabbed the heavy metal platter and began slamming it into the floorboards again.

  “Ivy!”

  I was so engrossed in my task, I barely looked up even though I was surprised to hear Costa’s voice. “Good, you can help,” I told him. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

  I caught Costa’s grin out of the corner of my eye. “I came with the gargoyle, of course.” Then Costa’s smile faded as he got a good look at me. “You have blood all over you.”

  “I know. Grab something heavy and help me bash into this floor. It’s under here. Only one more layer.”

  He touched my back. “I think you need to—”

  “I don’t,” I interrupted, knowing what he was about to say. “Any second, one of the other demons could come. Demetrius isn’t alone—you had to have seen that when Brutus flew you over the island. Stop arguing and help me, or find Adrian and help him.”

  Costa sifted through the debris until he found a thick metal rod that could have been one of the hut’s former support beams. Then he began slamming it into the wood floor harder than I’d been able to for the past couple minutes. Between both our efforts, we soon broke through the last layer of floorboards. My breath caught as the platter I was using clunked against something long and hard wrapped inside cloths of crimson, purple and gold.

  At last, the spearhead! I dropped the platter and reached for it, but Costa grabbed both my hands.

  Startled, I looked at him, and a beautiful smile wreathed his features. “Thank you, Davidian.”

  My last thought before everything went dark was Demetrius...

 
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  “OH, YOU’RE AWAKE.”

  I recognized the voice. It was Demetrius’s real one, not the very impressive fake he’d used when he’d shape-shifted into an exact replica of Costa. Yeah, I was awake, although I didn’t know why. Demetrius had me and he had the spearhead. I should be dead, not waking up. I almost wondered if I was dead, except the dead couldn’t possibly hurt this much. At least, I hoped not.

  “I have to tell you, Davidian, when that gargoyle slammed into me, I wondered if the spearhead wasn’t here and this entire thing had been a clever setup.”

  Demetrius’s voice was so cheery, I kept my eyes closed a little longer. The only thing worse than listening to him gloat would be seeing him gloat. But then I heard an extended moan from another familiar voice, and my eyes snapped open.

  Adrian was in the corner of whatever room or building we were in. I couldn’t tell which because all the windows had been blocked off, and the interior was so plain that it could have been part of the monastery, or it could have been a freestanding hut. Either way, the floor was sprinkled heavily with what I now knew to be ground-up minion bones. The eclipse might be over, but the combination of cursed earth plus shuttered windows blocking out any remaining sunlight meant that Demetrius had time to gloat. He had all the time in the world.

  The bodies of several monks were scattered across the floor, and at least two dozen living minions filled the room, too. It wasn’t small, but with all of them in it, it was now standing room only. Of course, they were giving Adrian a wide berth, and for good reason. His shadows were extended as far as they could reach, their tips formed into knifelike points that stabbed at everything around him. Thick metal chains covered his legs and his torso, and he must be injured, because blood seeped out through them. More blood covered his face, and some of it had gotten into his eyes. He’d obviously put up a ferocious fight, but just like me, it hadn’t been enough.