“Find . . . a phone.” His eyes were still blearily vacant, and his tone was slow and slurred, as if he was talking in his sleep. “Malik.”
“We’re in a park. I don’t even know which park. And why the hell do we need more trouble? A Malik got us into this mess!” I wonder if he’s still locked in that room? She felt a sharp pinch of weary guilt, shook it aside. Looked up, rain stinging her cheeks and forehead.
Holy God. There were streetlamps, shining orange, on the hill above them. Streetlamps meant a street, which was better than slogging through this mud and underbrush. And what was even better, they looked normal, there wasn’t a hint of that funny glow on them. Thank you, God. Thank you.
“Call . . . in,” he insisted. “Chess.”
“All right, let me find a phone. We’ve got to get up that hill. If it’s a jogging path it means Simons Park, and they have phones on the main jogging loop. Can you make it up the hill?”
“Will,” he mumbled, and his head dropped forward. He kept moving, though, as she scrabbled up the slope, fighting through branches and greenery. Blackberry vines tore at her jeans, swiped a line of fire across the back of her right hand, plucked at her hip. The rain kept coming, kissing her face with cold, sharp needles. Ryan’s arm was heavy and limp across her shoulder. Her left hand cramped, her fingers curled under the waistband of his shredded jeans, she could feel hot blood soaking through the tough denim. Each time she yanked on him, trying to help him stay upright, a fresh jolt of ripping pain tore up her arm.
It seemed to take forever to reach the top of the hill, and when they broke through the last screen of clutching branches and vines Chess let out a sobbing breath of grateful wonder, her vision returning to normal with a subliminal snap. It was Simons Park, and they were on the main jogging loop. And there, in its yellow box, was an emergency phone for joggers and bicyclists. Oh, thank you. Thank you, God. “I don’t have any quarters,” she managed, pulling Ryan out of the underbrush and onto the paved trail. “You think they’ll take a collect call?”
Ryan lifted his head. She glanced up, and her heart began to pound. His eyes were rolled back into his head, and he looked asleep on his feet. He’s not okay. Neither of us are okay. God, help us out here, please? Just a little more help, and then you can retire.
“Number,” Ryan mumbled. “Number . . . ”
They made it, haltingly, to the yellow box. She propped him against it and reached out, trying to look everywhere at once while she picked up the receiver. Wonder of wonders, a dial tone sounded in her ear. “Number? What number?” If he can’t think of it I’m going to have to call Charlie. But she can’t come down here when there’s demons around. Oh God, they could be in the trees even now. She checked the sky. Getting lighter by the minute. She had never been so happy to see dawn.
Ryan recited a long string of numbers, she faithfully punched them in and was rewarded with a click. Please don’t tell me I have to deposit a dollar in quarters—
“Code in, please.” The voice crackled in her ear.
Chess gasped. “Code?”
Ryan recited another number. “314428-Henry-Zulu,” she repeated. Please, help me out here.
“Holy shit!” The voice was young, male, and almost squeaking with surprise. “Where’s Ryan?”
“Right here next to me,” she managed, sagging with relief. “This is Francesca Barnes, I’ve got an almost-dead Drakul here and a bunch of blue-eyed demons looking to eat me for lunch. I’m in Simons Park, on the jogging loop, and I could really use a little help. Oh, and Paul? That motherfucker turned us in to the Inkani. I left him locked underground, and I’m bleeding and I’m glowing like a Christmas tree on crack, and you had better be able to help us, or so help me God I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I know it’s going to be drastic.” She had to stop to take a breath. Rain needled the sides of the phone booth, drumming its tiny fingers incessantly. Ryan closed his eyes, slumping against the side of the box, his shoulders loose and his hands dangling. He looked even more tired than she felt, and she wished he could talk to her.
There was a click, and a new voice came on. This one was older, male, and very calm. “Miss Barnes? This is Abraham Shelton, Deputy Master of the Order of the Dragon, West Coast Division. We have a lock on your position and are sending transport and cleanup. The first team is in your area and should reach you in ten minutes. How badly are you hurt? And what’s this about Paul and the Inkani?”
* * * *
“We’re calling it a home invasion.” Abraham Shelton was a thin man with café-au-lait skin and curly black hair cut severely short. His face was a statue’s, perfection burnished to a fine sheen, and his eyes were wells of calm, brown darkness. “The police report will state that you escaped your home and wandered around in shock. The library’s put you on two weeks paid leave.”
Well, that’s mighty nice of them. Christ, you people are really serious about this sort of thing, aren’t you. Chess’s bandaged hand itched. She took another gulp of the scorching coffee, wishing she could wake up a little more. She’d slept for eighteen hours straight, according to the clock on the nightstand. She wished she could sleep for another twenty-four. Her knife dug into the side of her belly, they’d given her a new sheath for it.
The room was nice, if a little soulless: heavy four-poster bed with a red comforter and designer-matched sheets and pillows, a nightstand with an artful arrangement of white carnations, a gas fireplace and a window seat. Rain beaded down the window, an autumn storm she was very glad not to be out in the middle of.
The Malik “team”—four Malik and six Drakul, the Drakul glowing the same way Ryan did—had melted out of the shadows of the park, nearly scaring the life out of her and prompting Ryan to try to peel himself away from the phone to face them. It had taken some doing to calm him down, but he listened to her voice, and they had been bundled into a not-very-legal SUV that had suddenly appeared on the jogging path, in blithe disregard of its own weirdness.
To wake up here, in this nice little room, had been equally relieving and terrifying. Relief because there weren’t any funky demons around, and they had even brought her fresh clothes and let her take a shower; relief because a tall, blonde medic had come to bandage her and check her for broken bones or concussion. And terror because Ryan was nowhere in sight, and nobody would tell her where he was; terror because the weird double-vision, normal world and glowing lines of force, hadn’t gone away at all.
“That’s really nice,” she said finally. That’s uber-swell. Considering that it was one of your goddamn Malik that turned me over to the goddamn demons in the first place.
No, she was not feeling charitable at all. “Where’s Ryan?” she asked for the fifth time. “Is he okay?”
Shelton sighed. He had pulled a straight-backed, red-velvet chair up to the bedside. Chess perched on the rumpled covers with her coffee cup. She wondered idly if they would bring more food, she’d tucked away six pancakes and a pile of scrambled eggs and was having longing thoughts of nice crispy bacon to top it all off.
“The Drakul’s recovering, he’s in the dormitory with the others. This is a . . . a delicate situation.” His tone plainly said he didn’t think much of the situation itself. “On the one hand, you’re the first potential we’ve been able to lock onto and bring in, for a very long time. And if what you’re telling us is true, it was the Drakul who resisted corruption and the Malik who turned traitor. Which has never happened before.”
“Not to your knowledge,” she returned, her eyebrow raising. “If what I’m telling you is true? Are you calling me a liar?”
He held his hands up, placating, the loose sleeves of his red sweater falling back from his muscle-corded wrists. “No, not at all. Not at all. But this is very . . . irregular. There are certain . . . rules.”
Is he talking about what I think he’s talking about? “In other words, you want to punish Ryan.” You son of a bitch, she added silently.
His calm brown eyes met hers. He studi
ed her for a long time, the brushing of rain against the window oddly soothing.
A welcome flare of irritation sprang to life right in the center of her chest. “Look, Mr. Shelton, I’m going to put this into terms you can understand. Ryan’s the only one of you inept jerkwads I trust. You want me to help you out, you want me to do something because I’m one of these Golden thingies? Fine. But only if you leave Ryan alone. He’s my Drakul, and he stays, or no dice.”
Shelton shrugged, crossing his long legs. “If we withdraw our protection, you might have to face the High Ones again.” But his mouth twisted down bitterly. “We’re not willing to compromise your safety, even though the Drakul has broken . . . certain rules. It was a very irregular situation.”
Damn right it was. Feeling slightly more justified, she settled back into the bed. “So what are we talking about here? When do I get to see him?”
“You may not be able to do him much good.” Was there a slightly cruel smile touching his lips, or was that her imagination? “He’s already fading.”
She barely realized she’d bolted to her feet, the coffee cup hitting the wine-red carpet and letting loose a flood of scalding liquid. Shelton stood, too, his eyes widening in a way that told her whatever reaction he’d expected, it wasn’t this one.
Chess drew herself up to her full height, her right hand dropping to the hilt of her knife and her face freezing, the little tic in her cheek starting. It was, again, Mom’s patented You-Are-Aware-I-Am-Potentially-Deadly? expression, and she saw with satisfaction that even though this man had a head and a half height on her, he still was no match for one of her mom’s Looks. “Where. Is. He?”
And damned if that faint golden glow didn’t start again, swirling in the air around her like colored oil on water. Great. Am I going to turn into a light bulb every time I get pissed off?
There were, she supposed, worse things. Like running in the dark and feeling a blue-eyed demon behind her. Goosebumps spread over her skin.
“There’s no need for—” the man began hastily, his eyes turning round as quarters.
“You listen, and you listen good. You’re going to take me to Ryan right now, posthaste, young man.” I sound like Charlie. “And you’d better pray he gets better. Because if you let him die, I am going to be all over you like white on rice. And believe me, after the week I’ve had, I am one librarian you do not want to mess with.”
That sounds good, Chess, but how are you really going to force him to do anything? Her practical side spoke up about ten seconds too late, for once.
Doesn’t matter, she told herself. I’ll do what I have to, even if I have to search this whole goddamn place. He’d find me—he did find me, no matter what they did to him. And I’m bloody well going to find him.
Shelton shook his head. “Fine. You win. But you don’t understand. They’re animals, Miss Barnes, and you’re not equipped to control him should some of his more aggressive tendencies—”
“Listen to yourself.” She didn’t bother to disguise the disgust in her voice. “He’s not an animal, you son of a bitch. He’s a person. Now get your ass in gear. Where is he?”
“You’re determined to—”
She glared at him, the golden light still swirling in the air. “You better believe it, mister. You don’t want to see how determined I can get.”
He visibly gave up. “Then you’d better come with me.”
Twenty-Two
Drifting.
It was gray, the place where he drifted. Infinitely gray, the world turned to comforting cotton-wool static. Nothing left to fight. Nothing left to do but lie still, staring blindly into the grayness, and feel the welcome numbness as it slid up his arms and legs, increment by increment, searching for his heart. When it reached his heart the gray would turn to black, and he would be released.
It didn’t matter. He had done . . . what? Something. He had kept someone safe, and that was all that mattered. Now there was nothing left to do. Nothing but lie here and wait.
Sometimes people spoke softly, his brothers keeping watch as a vigil for the dead, some leaving, some arriving; their silence was laced with the subliminal hiss of demons watching what could well be their own fate someday. Despair turned to numbness, grief turned to apathy, the will to live sapped, gone, forgotten. The body healed itself, in fits and starts, but that was of no use.
Not now.
“Oh, Jesus.” This voice cut through the gray, flushing it with gold for a bare moment.
The thought was slow. What? Stretched out like taffy, the single word hung in the gray mist.
“Jesus Christ. What have they done to you?”
Stinging, a faraway pain. He turned his attention away, fretfully, seeing the gray mist again. Let me go. Just let me go.
“Ryan? Orion!” She sounded close to weeping, and something jabbed him in the side. “Goddammit, wake up!”
Another voice intruding, this one smooth and male. Malik. One of the commanders. “You can’t bring him back. He’s too far gone.”
“You stay out of this, you son of a bitch.” Coldly furious. The woman’s voice was familiar, so familiar it almost roused his interest. The demon stirred under the floor of his mind, a hurtful flower blooming.
No. Go back to sleep. Just let it go. Nothing more to do here, nothing more to see. Just go. Just let go.
More prickling pain, in faroff territory he recognized as his fingers and toes. Tiny needles jabbing, jabbing; each one a thin diamond star of pain. Like a frostbitten limb slowly waking up, like the painful scrape of sunlight . . .
“Wake up, goddamit! I’m not finished with you! Wake the hell up, Ryan! I’m talking to you, you big dumb jerk! Get up! I need you!”
That sent another uncomfortable spike of interest through him. Need me? Nobody needs me. I did what I had to do. Now let me die.
BLAM!
The impact jolted him; the sound of open palm hitting flesh. He heard a sharp collective intake of breath. Something against his side, two dimples of pressure on either side of his hips. The blow smashed through the shell of gray haze, white light bursting against his eyes, something pressing against his chest.
BLAM!
Again. The light burst through him, the demon rising snarling through layers of apathy, chemical adrenaline flooding his bloodstream, the listlessness shaking itself away. His hand shot up, closed around something soft and fragile. But gently. Exquisitely gently.
Ryan blinked. A low rumbling growl died in his chest; his pupils shrank, trying to deal with the sudden influx of light. “Quit it.” He tried to make the words forbidding, could only manage a whisper. Why was his body so heavy?
Shock. Bodily systems shutting down. Jesus. What the hell—
He peered through the glare of light, slowly making out a familiar face, framed by the low ceiling of a Drakul dormitory. He could barely remember being dragged in here while they were setting the dorm up. The Order had probably moved in here in a hell of a hurry.
Chess’s eyes were now mostly dark-gold, the hazel that remained merely flecks. She had braced her knees on either side of his hips, and her hair was loose, falling forward over her shoulders. She wore a blue V-neck sweater that made her skin look even more flawless, and she had the fading remains of a terrific black eye. The gash in her forehead had healed nicely. She smelled of Malik healing-sorcery, and of gold, and of female, the familiar scent he filled his lungs with, staring up at her, her wrist trapped in his fingers.
And she was crying. Tears spilled down her cheeks and high color flushed along her cheekbones, she looked frantic.
She was so goddamn beautiful it robbed him of breath.
Life returned in a rush of color and sound. He was vaguely aware of the presence of other Drakulein, watching with bright eyes and reined interest. The Deputy Master also stood by the bed, his arms folded and his dark eyes narrowed. You sadistic bastard . . . He buried the thought. They’d made Shelton a commander because he had a habit of losing Drakul. What was he doing here? An
d with Chess?
He blinked again. What the hell’s going on? Chess? In a Drakul dorm?
We made it. She’s safe. Relief burst inside his chest, exquisite relief. What the hell was going on?
She let out a sound that was half a sob, half a sigh. Her left hand, wrapped in a white gauze bandage, was knotted in his shirt. At least the other Drakul had cleaned him up and dressed him before putting him in a bed to die.
“You idiotic, infuriating, brainless—” She seemed, for once, to run out of words, and tipped her head back, her jaw working. Ryan observed this curiously.
Finally, her chin came back down, and she fixed him with a glare he was exceedingly happy to be alive to see. “Don’t you dare die on me!” she finally settled for saying, with barely-controlled violence. “We’re partners, remember? Don’t you dare die!”
He searched for something to say. His mouth opened. “Your bedside manner could use a little work, sweetheart.”
For a moment he thought she was going to try to tear her hand free and slap him again, and he decided he’d let her, if only because the thought of her skin touching his made a bolt of fire go through him. Instead, her arm relaxed. She let out a long, sobbing breath, her shoulders dropping. He was suddenly, acutely aware of her weight against him.
“Don’t call me that.” She swallowed. “Are you . . . they said you were . . . ”
He was acutely aware of other eyes watching. “I’ll be all right. Are you okay?” That was the important thing. She didn’t smell hurt; but the sudden stinging scent of her fear lashed him into full alertness, smashing at the remaining gray, cottony numbness. The demon stretched inside him, strangely satisfied—of course, he’d let it out. And it had feasted on blood and violence.
She nodded, biting at her lower lip. “Let go, I need to sit down. I spilled my coffee.”
What? “What happened?” Clue me in, sweetheart. The last thing I remember is you telling me to stand up since you’d . . . what? Killed a High One? His skin chilled again, at the thought of her facing that alone.