She doesn’t sound like a victim when she says this. Just like a very, very pissed-off female who’s ready to reap vengeance.
“Our keeper will be back soon,” she says to Meredith. “It will be your only chance to get the key.”
Meredith nods, and then ushers us back to the cell we emerged from. The seconds feel so full of life, and I want to grab every one of them and keep them tucked away for when I’ll need them again. Jaxen pulls me against him, pressing my head against his chest, and holds me tight… almost as if he realizes he may never hold me like this again.
“Someone’s coming,” Meredith says, keeping watch by the cell doors. A second later. “It’s him. Get ready.”
“Kat, stay with Jezi,” I say.
She nods.
There’s no time to think as my pulse quickens, filling my arms and legs with temporary strength. Meredith runs. We follow. Commotion entails as magic is thrown from her palms. The demon roars when her spell hits him in the chest, and then he tries to rush her, his steps almost shaking the ground.
“You!” his sinister voice bellows. “I knew you’d return!”
Evangeline and Lukah let out a ripping howl as they shift behind me. I summon a flux to each hand and run beside Jaxen after him, trying to head him off before he slams into Meredith.
One punch to the stomach and Jaxen’s flying backward. I swing my arm, trying to land my dagger into the demon’s stigma, but it’s as if he senses it because he has me dangling in the air by my throat. I try to tug on his energy, anything to get him to drop me, but my vision is wavering and my mind feels funny as I tug and tug on air, unable to get a good breath.
Get the amulet! I tell myself as my hands claw and dig for anything I can. I see it hanging with the key on a piece of string around his neck, and hope kicks into full gear.
Lukah, covered in fur and baring his teeth, slams into the side of the demon. I hit the ground hard as they roll and roll, and then Lukah yelps and is heaved to the side. He hits cell bars and then falls, unmoving.
Evangeline has fully shifted, eyes blazing.
She and the demon circle each other as Jaxen picks himself up from the ground and crawls over to me, checking my neck. I tell him I’m okay. Pushing away the burning, raw ache to my throat and my eyes, I try to zone in on the necklace still looped around his neck.
Jezi and Katie are saying spells, along with Meredith, trying to weaken the demon as Evangeline takes the first strike. She nips at the demon’s leg, and then the demon swipes at her. She jumps out of the way, and then her teeth catch hold of his swinging hand and she starts thrashing and twisting like a wild animal.
I tug on his energy as he roars out, letting it fill me. He’s strong. Doesn’t drop right away, and it feels like I’m wrestling with a force as strong as steel.
But I know I’m stronger.
One deep breath, and then I tug harder. He looks up from Evangeline, eyes landing on me as his legs wobble.
Jaxen throws his flux at the demon, but misses because Evangeline’s pulling the demon backward by the arm, harder and harder, growling louder with every movement.
Jaxen runs for them again, flux in hand, going for his stigma as Evangeline lets up, and then pounces on the demon, teeth digging into his neck.
I think she’s going to chew his head clean off.
The harder she chews, the more the demon’s head wobbles back and forth, until his hood wiggles free from around his head and the chain wrapped around his neck breaks free.
Meredith grabs for it and turns, shoving the key into Claire’s cell.
Jaxen falls back on his ass, almost as if he’s just seen a ghost. “Get off,” he says, his voice deathly low, and I think I hear him wrong, but then he says it louder. “Mom, get off!” He’s tugging on her wolf form, but she’s relentless. Tar-like blood oozes from the side of the demon’s neck as his eyes grow sluggish and his struggling falls flat.
With every blink, I’m trying to make sense of things.
She doesn’t stop.
Jaxen doesn’t either.
I’m right behind him, ready to stab the demon, but Jaxen grabs his mother by the stomach and shoves her off him, her legs kicking me in the face, knocking me backward.
“Jaxen, no!” Jezi screams as the demon tries to find his footing. He’s struggling to get to his feet as I try to gain my bearings and stand. Reach out for his energy so I can drain him once and for all as Jaxen fights to hold his mother down.
But it’s then that I see the demon’s face. That I realize what’s happening as the demon storms toward Jaxen and his mother.
I think we’ve finally reached the center of hell because this can’t be real. This can’t be happening.
The demon lifts Jaxen up by his throat as Evangeline fights to get back on all fours.
I aim, ready to do what Jaxen couldn’t.
Jaxen’s eyes find mine. “No, Faye. Don’t.”
“I have to!” I shout as the demon squeezes harder and harder, fueled by rage.
Evangeline growls, crouching, ready to pounce.
Jaxen isn’t looking at me anymore. He’s staring into the demon’s eyes as he says, voice strained, “Dad, please. It’s me. It’s Jaxen.”
MY LEGS FEEL FULL OF cement. My brain finally bursting into awareness.
That face. It’s the same face I saw when Jaxen shared his childhood memory of his father with me. Only his eyes aren’t full like Gavin’s. They’re black, pitiless orbs filled with hate.
Evangeline’s wolf form falls away as she stands and grabs a hold of the demon’s arm, shaking him. “Charles, don’t! He’s your son. We’re here!”
I’m so caught off guard that I almost don’t notice Meredith pulling a flux from inside her robe. Stalking toward Charles with a gleam of redemption in her eyes. And I think about not stopping her. About letting her kill the demon who’s choking Jaxen out.
But then I think about my parents. How I would do anything for them, and how I’d pray that someone would take mercy.
I harness all of my power, find Charles’ energy, and pull harder than I ever have before. Drop to my knees, watching Charles collapse, letting go of Jaxen, before I black out.
“Faye?” It’s Katie. She’s shaking my shoulders. Snapping her fingers. Calling my name again and again, panic seizing her voice by the throat.
As I jerk upright, terror kicks me in the gut. I take quick inventory of everyone around me, trying to catch up.
Jaxen’s hovering over Charles as Evangeline rubs her hands over his cheek, distress burrowing in the wrinkles of her face. Meredith is helping Claire out of her cell, amulet in hand. Jezi’s healing Lukah, and I’m looking back at Kat.
“How long?”
“Just a couple of seconds.”
I struggle to my feet, trying not to think about how I feel like I just spun in too many circles on a merry-go-round. “We have to move. Weldon,” I say, swallowing back the urge to vomit. I hold my hand out. “Give me the amulet.”
Meredith stops helping Claire and turns. Pulls the necklace from around her neck, dropping it in my palm with a solemn nod. The amber stone is small, about the size of a quarter, and has a brownish liquid in the hollow center that sort of looks like… like blood.
“Thanks,” I say as I unzip the front of my suit just enough to reach the inside pocket over my heart where the photo of my parents rest. Dropping the amulet there, I zip my suit back up.
Claire stops using Meredith for support. Juts her chin in the air and stomps her way over to Charlie’s unconscious form. We wait as she peers at him, sneers, and then spits on his face. “Why is he still alive?” she demands.
Jaxen jumps to his feet, but his anger dissolves the moment he looks into Claire’s battered eyes.
“Because he’s his father,” Meredith says, pulling on Claire’s arm.
Claire’s lip curls. “He’s no one’s father. Not anymore. He’s a monster. One of Bael’s mindless prisoners. You’d be doing yourself, and him, a
huge favor by taking him out.”
Jaxen’s shoulders are tense, but he doesn’t retort as I thought he would. His anger peels away like layers of paint until all he’s left wearing is the color of sorrow.
“He’s starting to wake. We need to make a decision,” Evangeline says, looking torn between Lukah, who’s just now sitting up, and Jaxen, who so desperately wants to cling to the hope that his dad can be spared.
I feel the scratching at the back of my mind again as my stomach constricts in pain. Weldon.
“I have to go,” I say to Jaxen, ignoring the rest. “He’s running out of time.”
Jaxen’s jaw twitches. He looks at me with a mixture of fear and sorrow, and then turns back to his mom and dad.
“Go,” Evangeline says to him. “I’ll stay here.”
“He’ll kill you,” Jaxen says, the words barely audible.
“No.” She presses her ring. “He won’t.”
Jaxen grits his teeth, and then turns. “Do you know where the machine is from here?” he asks Meredith, scraping his way back to the matter at hand.
She looks to Claire. “That’s where Weldon is. We can surface now, with Evangeline, or we can go with them. It’s your decision.”
Claire doesn’t hesitate. “We go with them. I’ll lead the way.”
Katie and Jezi are ready, but I stop, grabbing Katie’s shoulders. “Katie, please. Stay with Evangeline.”
Her face scowls. “No, Faye. I told you—”
“I need you to. I need you to do this for me. I need you to survive and find happiness. Otherwise, this is all for nothing. Please.”
She looks to the side. Bites her lip. “O-okay.” She hugs me tight before stepping back, looking torn with her decision.
“Let’s go,” I say to Derek, Jaxen, Jezi, Meredith, and Claire.
We run for what feels like ages, descending further and further into the sweltering heat of the Underground. There aren’t any demons in our way to stop us, and I’m not surprised by it. Clara has carved out a path for me to follow.
A free pass all the way to wonderhell.
There are distant sounds of gunfire and war cries that sends blood rushing through my veins. An urgency to be in the midst of it all pushes me forward with an intense desire to fight alongside our people.
“It’s around these corners,” Claire says, gun in hand.
“Earpieces on,” Jaxen calls out to us.
I click mine on.
“This is it. We’re heading into the Exanimator now,” Jaxen says into his earpiece.
“Do you need assistance?” Sterling asks.
“Not yet,” Jaxen says. “We have Claire.”
“And Charles,” I hear my dad say. “We’re securing your mother and Lukah now. Charles is still under and being taken to a cell in the correction facility.”
“Good,” Jaxen says, the pain in his voice thick.
“Faye?” It’s my dad again.
“I’m okay, Dad. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
Mack cuts in. “When we see you’re in the machine, we ignite the bombs. The spell should linger long enough for the moment Mourdyn wakes.”
“We’re here,” Claire says as we stop at the end of a hallway. Around the corner is a large opening into a deeper part of the earth. Like a large cavern.
“Good luck,” Sterling says, and then we switch off our earpieces.
“This is it,” I say, taking Jaxen’s hand in mine.
Jezi takes my other hand. “Together,” she says, and then we cross through.
WELDON’S HEAD HANGS, CHIN TO chest, within the restraints of the machine.
Claire gasps.
I run, blinded by the need to get him out of there. Jaxen’s yelling at me to slow down, to stop, but I don’t. I run until I’m not running anymore. Until my back and my head slam against concrete, and then my entire world is flipped upside down.
My head’s dizzy. Feels like it’s been cracked open like an eggshell. Warmth pours over my forehead. Blood. Everything’s spinning, I’m spinning, and I think there’s something around my ankle. I reach out to slow myself, but my fingers are grabbing at air.
I spin and spin, and every time I come full circle, I try to focus on what’s happening.
Jaxen’s running toward me, shouting my name.
Exanimator.
Wall.
Claire’s fighting off a demon, screaming out for Weldon to wake up.
Exanimator.
Wall.
Jaxen skids to a stop, flux in hand, when Jezi screams for him.
Exanimator.
Wall.
The spins are slowing until I stop.
Jezi’s pinned to the ground by a demon as Jaxen looks to me, tortured between finding a way to cut me down and helping her. It’s then I realize I’m strung up in the air like a wild animal, dangling by my ankle a good twenty feet in the air as my blood covers the ground below.
“Go!” I shout at him.
Ignoring the cutting, ripping pain around the flesh of my ankle from the rope digging in, I thrash and spin, using my core to lift me up high enough so I can slice the cord holding me up. My flux moves through it like butter, and I brace every part of me as I freefall.
A second later, I’m slammed against the uneven, rocky ground. Splinters of light fissure through my eyes. My back… I can’t get enough air and the pain is so intense… taking over every cell in my body. I think I might be broken in half. I think… I think too much because I’m better than this. Stronger. Trained and prepared for this exact moment.
Shut it off, I tell myself, flipping my internal switch. A deep breath. Get up!
I clamber to my feet, clawing at the ground while the world sways as if I were on a rocking boat. When my eyes find solid ground, everything happens so fast. Too fast.
Jaxen stabs through the stigma of the demon choking Jezi, and then another appears behind them.
They vanish.
I’m searching for them, screaming out, when Claire runs past me, heading for Weldon.
I turn, following her, and then nearly fall on my butt when another demon appears right in front of me, grabs a hold of Claire, and then vanishes.
“No!” Meredith screams behind me, but her screams are cut short. By the time I turn, she’s gone.
This can’t be happening.
A second later, slow clapping fills the inside of the strangely quiet cavern. A cavern I now stand alone in.
“That was easier than I thought it would be,” Clara says as she steps out from behind the Exanimator. “But then again, I did lead you right to me, like a mouse to a cheese trap. I tried to tell Bael a silly little snare wouldn’t stop you, but then I stopped myself because I thought it’d be amusing to see you scramble like a little piggy trying to break free.” Her head tilts as an evil grin spreads like the black wings of a vulture across her face. “I’m glad I didn’t. Watching your little boyfriend, the very same man I told you would be no good for you, choose to save his partner over you was the most entertainment I think I’ve had all week.” Her eyes narrow on me. “And it sure does feel good to say I told you so.”
I’m vibrating by her ridiculous assumption, but I try to shield my expression. Stand firmer and taller than I ever have in front of her. My gaze sweeps across the cavern, checking for any sign of anyone else I might encounter. I don’t bother using volation.
Nothing. It’s just Weldon, Clara, and me.
“What did you do with them?” I ask, trying not to sway back and forth on my feet as fear sends my mind in overdrive. Telling myself they’ll be okay. They have to be okay.
There’s something off about her. Something shaky in her cocky smile, like maybe this place is starting to get to her. “If you don’t mind, I’d prefer this to be an intimate show between old friends. It’s been a while since I spoke with my sister, and we didn’t really part on good terms, so I’m feeling a little stage fright today. You know, with this being such a monumental moment and all,
” she says with a sneer. “Besides, I have to have a little ammunition when it comes time to barter with Mack. I think they’ll do a good enough job.”
“You’re sick,” I spit out, lips curled. She isn’t wearing white this time. She’s dressed as a Darkyn in black robes, holding her beaked mask in her white-knuckled hand. She seems somewhat… nervous. The cold hardness in her eyes has morphed into a maniacal look. Like she’s a few loosened screws away from being certifiably insane.
I guess she wasn’t as strong as she thought she was.
I walk toward her, slowly, as if I’m approaching a poisonous snake. “This place is getting to you, isn’t it?” I say, waiting for the rise I so desperately want to get out of her. Anything to throw her off and keep her under my control instead of vice versa.
“You know, Claire said the same thing the last time I visited her while she was being tortured. She actually thought I came to save her. I guess she thought our sisterly bond went farther than that. She doesn’t understand how hard I’ve worked to get to this point. The sacrifices I’ve made.”
“Like Claire, Mack, and your self-pride?” I mutter out, nearing her. “Looks like you’ve won,” I say, the sarcasm thick in my words as I look around the barren cavern. “Traded a life of luxury and respect for a bat cave. Inspirational.”
Her eye twitches.
“For you information, Faye, I’m minutes away from waking the greatest witch who ever lived. When he sees all I have done, I guarantee you I’ll be swimming in luxury.” She squints at me. “Too bad you won’t be alive to see it.”
“Faye?” Weldon stirs, barely able to lift his head. Blood has leaked from the corners of his eyes, nose, and ears. The color of his skin has taken on a sickly shade I can barely stomach. He looks half-shifted into his demon side, with dark veins spread under his eyes and over his cheeks.
“Pitiful, isn’t he?” Clara says, halfway to me. She stops and looks over her shoulder at Weldon. “He just doesn’t know when to give up. He just won’t—” She pulls at her hair. “He just won’t freaking die!”