More footsteps.
Chet turned, saw a figure silhouetted against the flames, sword in hand and wearing a red scarf. Chet snatched out his knife, the angel knife.
“Chet?”
“Ana?”
“Oh, thank God.” She rushed up, slipped an arm beneath his, and helped him to his feet. “We need to get out of—” Shouts, more men heading their way from out in the dark. Chet and Ana headed off, Ana supporting Chet as he hobbled along as fast as he could.
Souls dashed in all directions, but Chet noticed that the Edda were all going the same way—up a short rise and into a cluster of boulders. Chet pointed after them. “That way.”
They headed up the slope and Chet soon found he could put more and more weight on his knee, until finally he was walking on his own.
They topped the rise and Chet glanced back. The amphitheater lay just below and he could see bodies everywhere. He caught sight of Yevabog’s cage, lying on its side. He was trying to see if she was still inside, when a figure walked past her cage—a tall man in a fitted long coat and knee-high boots carrying a spear.
“Gavin,” Chet whispered.
Ana tugged him. “C’mon. We need to go.”
The man stopped and looked up, as though he sensed Chet was there—those dead eyes searching the hillside.
A horse topped the rise in front of Chet. A man wearing a green jacket sat in the saddle, carrying a torch in one hand and a musket in the other. He spotted Ana, then Chet. His eyes grew wide. “Hey! It’s him!” he shouted, pointing the musket at Chet. “Don’t you move.”
Chet dove forward.
The musket went off; dirt and rock exploded next to Chet’s head.
Chet slashed the angel blade across the horse’s leg, cutting the animal down at the knee. The horse shrieked and toppled, throwing the rider. The man had no sooner hit the dirt than Ana hacked into his neck with her sword. He screamed and Ana hacked again, silencing him.
“They’re over here!” someone cried. More men on horseback, carrying muskets and torches, were riding up the slope. Chet locked eyes with the lead man. It was Carlos.
“Go!” Chet yelled, pushing Ana. They dashed over the rise, Chet running as fast as he could to keep up with her. The rocky dirt crumpled beneath Chet’s feet and he stumbled into Ana, knocking her over, sending them both sliding down a steep incline.
They landed among a cluster of boulders in a dark ravine. Chet could see the horsemen far above searching for them.
“They’re down there!” someone shouted and several muskets went off. The dirt kicked up around Chet and Ana and they fled.
CHAPTER 55
Gavin propped the god spear against the boulder, looked down at his gut. A sword hilt protruded from his stomach, the blade sticking out his back. Normally he would’ve wrapped both hands around it and tugged it out. But he had only one hand remaining, the other gone at the elbow. The fighting, there at the end, had been fierce. A group of zealots had rallied, made a final run to save their god.
Gavin set the blade point against the boulder and pressed back, pushing the pommel outward. He wrapped his remaining hand around the hilt, and tugged, gritting his teeth as he twisted it free. He let out a grunt, tossed the sword, and slid down, taking a seat against the stone.
He watched the shadows of the dead flutter in the dwindling blaze of the burning bones, saw Carlos heading toward Veles. Veles lay on his back in the dirt, surrounded by Carlos’s men, his great antlers broken, his hands and hooves gone, what remained of his arms and legs bound. Carlos walked up and stood over the god, the flames underlighting his smug smile. “Should I bow? Would that please you?” Carlos asked, then spat in the god’s face.
Veles stared up at him, his mouth a jagged wound, his eyes wet with bloody tears.
Carlos nodded to his men and they shoved a sack over Veles’s head, tying it tight around his neck with a cord of rope. “You like fire. Like burning souls. Well, where you’re headed you’re going to know what it is to burn.” Carlos kicked the god twice, hard in the head.
Gavin fumbled beneath his long coat and tugged out his satchel. Sat it on his lap and untied it with his remaining hand. Several ka coins spilled out. He plucked up three, shoved them in his mouth, and chewed.
He scooped up the remaining coins, dropping them back into his satchel, then leaned against the stone and waited for the ka to do its magic. Ka coins were as important to him as his bullets and he always tried to have a good supply on hand, even eating them mid-battle when he had to, fighting while his wounds healed. He’d determined that fighting in purgatory wasn’t always about how strong and fast you were, but about how much pain you could endure. How well you could fight with your gut sliced open, your leg broken, or half your face missing. Gavin had long since lost count of how many wounds he’d suffered. Only knew that if he’d been a living man, he’d died at least a hundred deaths by now.
The warmth seeped down into Gavin’s arms, his legs, and wrapped itself around his wounds. He closed his eyes as a wave of relief washed over him. He’d come to enjoy the itchy crawl as his flesh wormed itself back together. Slowly his arm and hand returned to flesh, his deep wounds healed. But as usual, they didn’t heal completely. Always with a slight scar, a reminder—his flesh was riddled with them.
Gavin pushed up onto his feet with the spear, grunting against the pain. He didn’t have time to wait for his wounds to fully heal; there were things he needed to attend to. He left the amphitheater and headed into camp, stepping over bodies and through the smoke of smoldering wagons, the smell of burning ka not too unlike that of flesh. The screams were dying out, replaced with the moans and groans of the wounded.
Gavin found himself searching faces. “The boy’s not here,” he said under his breath. “You know it.” He scanned the hilltop, the rise where he’d thought he’d seen the kid, and decided he’d either run off or was lying dead somewhere.
Gavin spotted what he was looking for: a tall wagon bearing Veles’s banner. He walked to it, stopping as something ran toward him out of the smoke. It was a tiger, its eyes terrified. Gavin watched it run past and disappear into the night, then climbed up into the wagon.
He found two men pillaging the god’s cabin. The men spun around, swords on guard, looking ready for a fight.
“Get out,” Gavin said flatly.
The men got a better look at who they were dealing with, and decided to leave.
Gavin rifled through the cabinets, closets, and chests, ignoring the furs and jewelry until he found what he was seeking. He tugged a small brass box out of a woven basket and sat it on the floor. It was locked; not only that, it had no latch or keyhole. Chet drew one of his guns, jabbed his thumbnail into a wide flat screw in the handle, and gave it a twist. The handle flipped loose, revealing a red copper key hidden within the recess. Gavin took the key and touched it to the box. A thin line of blue light ran round the box and the lid popped open. Gavin quickly placed the key back in his revolver, and the revolver back in his holster. He glanced over his shoulder, then flipped up the lid. He pushed aside several copper rings and pulled out something heavy wrapped in blue velvet. He unrolled the velvet, letting four silver stars fall into his hand.
Gavin sucked in a quick breath. “Four,” he whispered. “Four of them!” He’d attained a small piece of god-blood long ago, about the size of a dime. It had served him well; he had rationed it over several years. He now held four complete stars. He could hardly believe it.
He pinched off a flake, barely larger than a nail clipping, and held it up. He knew the risk of taking god-blood without a god to craft it, had seen a man rupture after taking a bite not much larger than what he now held between his fingers. He placed the sliver in his mouth, and closed his eyes.
It hit him fast, hard, pressure building from his core, swelling and throbbing outward. He let out a groan, clenched his eyes shut, gritted his teeth, and doubled over, clutching his stomach, fighting to contain it. And then, just when he thought his g
uts and bones would tear from his flesh, it subsided, the throbbing turning into a pulse, like a heartbeat. He leaned back against the wall, let out a long breath, let the warmth, the vitality pump through him. He smiled; it was like when he was young, alive and full of vigor, like a shot of whiskey with cocaine, a feeling he could take on the world.
“Gavin?” someone called. “That you?”
Gavin slipped the stars inside his coat, and stood. The world blurred, then came into focus, sharp focus—no detail escaped his notice. He could see and hear with startling clarity.
“Here,” Gavin said.
The Colonel pushed through the curtains, saw Gavin, and a big grin let up his face. “Gavin! Gavin! You did it!” The Colonel stepped forward, clutched Gavin’s shoulders, and shook him. “By heaven above you did it!”
“There’s copper,” Gavin said, nodding to the chest.
“Copper? How can you worry about such things at a time like this? You’ve just taken Veles. You’ve taken a god. Think, Gavin. How many souls can ever say such a thing? You’ve got to learn to celebrate these moments. You don’t get many like this.”
Gavin hefted the spear, handed it to the Colonel. The Colonel took it, admiring the gold blade. “Ah, the God Slayer. Such a gift. Such . . . a . . . gift.”
“And not without a price,” Gavin said.
The Colonel’s face sobered. “Don’t start, Gavin. We’re in it now. There’s no going back.”
Shouts came from outside. The Colonel walked out onto the platform; Gavin followed.
Carlos and his Defenders rode up below—seven of them on horseback, a small cart behind one of the horses, Veles in the bed, bound and half-covered beneath a tarp.
Carlos gave the Colonel a salute, a big grin on his face. “We’ve done it!” he called.
The Colonel saluted back. “We most certainly have.”
“Have to get a move on,” Carlos said. “The fuse is lit. Too many got away into the canyons. Word’s going to spread real fast.”
The Colonel nodded and the men rode away.
“Feel that?” the Colonel asked Gavin. “Revolution. It’s in the air.”
PART FIVE
Lethe
CHAPTER 56
Thunder rumbled in the distance. A drop of rain slapped against Ana’s cheek. Black clouds rolled overhead, damping what little light there was. She couldn’t believe it would soon be dark again, that they’d spent the night and most of the day walking through this gorge, this endless maze of cliffs, boulders, and passages, all leading in different directions, doing their damnedest not to fall into holes and bottomless chasms, and still getting nowhere.
“And you’re sure it was your grandfather?” she asked Chet.
“It was him.”
“But he was with them? With those raiders . . . with Carlos?”
Chet didn’t answer.
“Doesn’t that concern you? I mean, do you really think . . .” She was trying to find the right way to put it. “Chet, are you sure you want to find him now?”
“I have to.”
“What’s that?” Ana said. Whispers, almost hissing, drifted down out of the dark pits and caves around them, causing her flesh to prickle. “This can’t go on forever,” she said. “Right?” Chet bit his lip; she could see his frustration. She thought neither one of them wanted to state the obvious, that this was purgatory and for all they knew these canyons could go on forever. Or that maybe they were wandering around in huge looping circles, or worse, they could be headed for Hell itself.
Ana scanned the towering black cliffs. They seemed cut from obsidian or some other glassy rock, slick with razor-sharp edges and impossible to climb. They’d tried twice and both times ended with one or both of them falling.
“Hey,” Ana said. “Look. Tracks!” This time, they weren’t their own. Their path intersected a much larger trail, the dirt along the trail kicked up by dozens of horse hooves.
“They have a wagon, too. See there.” She pointed to two grooves atop the tracks. “You think it’s them? Some of Carlos’s crew?”
“Doesn’t much matter,” Chet said. “Just so long as they lead us out of here.”
They fell in with the tracks and for the first time in hours, Ana began to feel a little hope, then a few more rain drops hit her—big raindrops. A minute later the rain started, quickly turning into a downpour. Water began to flow beneath their feet, the trail turning into a small brook.
“Christ,” Chet said.
“What now?”
“The tracks.”
The water was washing away the tracks.
“Damn,” Ana said. “Let’s just hope this rain lets up, or we’ll be swimming out of here.”
A long shriek rolled down the canyon, like claws on a chalkboard. It seemed to go on forever, making Ana’s teeth hurt.
Chet’s face was grim. “We can beat this,” he said, picking up the pace. They moved along as fast as they dared, but the sky grew darker, the rain fell harder, splashing down the steep stone. The canyon fell into darkness and soon they could barely even see the trail. Ana thought she caught movement, shapes there and then not, in the flashes of lightning.
“Look out!” Chet shouted as lightning revealed a fissure dropping away before them. Ana tried to halt, but her foot skidded out from beneath her. Chet caught her before she fell, pulling her back from the fissure.
“We can’t keep going!” Ana shouted. “Not in this.”
Chet shook his head. “We have to.”
“Chet, we can’t see a thing.” The water was almost to their knees now. “There!” she yelled, pointing to a nearby ledge about twenty feet off the canyon floor.
Chet nodded reluctantly and followed her as she climbed up the rocky slope. They found a small cave beneath the ledge. It was dry and out of the wind. Ana crawled in, collapsing on her back, and let out a long gasp. Chet entered and sat next to her, his back against a stone. A screech echoed down the canyon. It was the same sound they had heard earlier, but much closer. Chet pulled out his knife, keeping watch on the entrance.
Thunder rumbled over as the rain drummed down. Ana closed her eyes and tried to pretend she was a little girl back in San Juan, listening to a thunderstorm from her bed. Chet placed a hand on her shoulder and she clutched it. A small gesture, but right then, right there, it meant everything to her.
Slowly, she drifted off to sleep.
CHAPTER 57
Senoy watched Lamia walk out onto the porch. In the dim moonlight, the ghost of her former beauty still lingered, the Lamia he’d fallen in love with, the Lamia of before—before the great tragedy, before Gavin shot her, before time wore her down.
She closed her eyes, basking in the moon’s pale glow.
He crept closer, staying to the shadows, studying her like a connoisseur before his most beloved painting—the grace of her long neck, her fine bones. He craved to touch her, to stroke her flesh, hold her hand, felt his heart fit to burst. How much of my love, this overpowering longing is true, he wondered, and how much is her bewitchment? Do I care? If a spell makes me feel such, then I prefer to stay under it always. The world is but a glamour anyway, all smoke and mirrors.
He stepped closer.
“I know you’re there, my angel,” she said. “I hear your heartbeat.”
He smiled at that, knowing his heart no longer beat, that it was as dead as his flesh, that if not for his will and the power of his celestial spirit he would be nothing but a pile of rotting bones.
She opened her eyes, peered down upon him. And if his heart had been alive, it would’ve thrummed. “Lamia, my love.”
“Is my guardian watching over me?” Her voice was lyrical to his ears. He knew it was all part of her magic and still it did nothing to spoil the sweetness.
He stepped out from the shadows and she couldn’t hide her shock. “Senoy . . . why, you’re withering away.”
He grimaced, wondered how many more ways he would have to pay for his folly. Lamia had known, even all those
years ago, the power of the key Heaven had bestowed upon him. She’d teased and beguiled him with promises of what she could do if he allowed her to use it. Had vowed she could unlock a spell to mix their blood, turning his celestial spirit to flesh. He’d scoffed until she’d reminded him that she was an ancient blood weaver. Had she not used her blood on God’s own beloved humans, twisting them into her vessels of immortality? “Why not dare?” she’d asked. He had dared and she had done it—a thing impossible. He closed his eyes, recalling the feeling of warm blood pumping through his flesh, the rush of those minutes, those precious minutes of life that he had had before Gavin shoved the knife into his chest, before Gavin had killed his flesh, trapping him within his own corpse for all these years.
“Come,” she said, walking over to the porch swing. “Sit with me.” It had been so long since she’d allowed him near, he was sure he’d not heard right. She beckoned him again and he clearly saw she was motivated by pity, not by any desire to share his company. He wouldn’t quibble, wouldn’t allow what was left of his pride to stand in the way of any invitation.
He walked up the steps, carefully stepping over the bells. She patted the seat next to her and he sat down, mindful not to bump her, knowing how much she hated his touch.
“I hear you’ve sent Chet away on a fool’s errand.”
“You have eyes and ears everywhere.”
“Why do you do this to yourself?”
“Don’t leave me, Lamia,” he said, hating the plaintive tone of his own voice, hating himself for breaking his own promise to never again play the heartsick fool.
She looked at him then, not as an equal, certainly not as a lover, but as something sad and pitiful.
“The boy will return,” Senoy said. “Just give him time.”
“You are a shameless, wicked creature, Senoy. Betraying Chet’s trust, using him for your own means.”