Dead of Winter (31 page)

“Oh,
ouais
, we'll just use you as a human shield.” Jack raised his brows. “Not having it.”

“We've come this far, and we will save her. Aric, you're going to blow the door, and Jack, I'm coming with. If you two try to leave me behind, then you better shackle me.”

“We would be walking eight icons into their lair,” Aric grated. “They will be ruthless.”

I pleaded with my eyes, telling him,
Selena's being punished for things I
did. You know better than anyone what I was like back then. If we don't save her, I won't be able to live with myself.

When he still wouldn't relent, I raised my hands again, claws extended. “How much blood do you think it'll take to bore a hole through a mountain?”

He muttered something in Latvian.

“I know that look.” Jack shook his head ruefully. “Doan worry; she'll give you your balls back as soon as she's done getting her way.”

I lowered my hands and squared my shoulders. “Getting my way—or
leading
the way?”

Jack raised his own hands in surrender. “Lead on,
peekôn
.”

To Aric, I said, “What are you packing?”

“It seems I can deny you nothing.” With another foreign phrase, he crossed to Thanatos, took a small cloth bundle out of his saddlebag, then returned.

Jack's curiosity was blazing. My own as well.

Aric gingerly unfolded the edges of the black material (because of course it was black). His eyes sparked as he revealed . . . a shimmering silver baton.

I gasped. “That's one of Joules's!” Engraved metal gleamed. “How did you get it?”

“I caught it from the Tower, long before he was Joules.” In a dry tone, Aric said, “He shouldn't have minded, since he threw it away.”

I found my lips curling. “Why didn't it explode in your hand? You could have lost your entire arm!”

“I took it out of the air, catching it as one would an egg. Loss was possible. But so was gain.” Aric gazed down at me. “Without risk, life grows stilted, no?”

Jack watched our interplay keenly.

“You've seen this baton before, Empress, on one of the shelves in my study. Next to the crowns of the many monarchs I have felled,” he added, no doubt for Jack's benefit.

Aric had safeguarded all of those treasures in his home for eons. But now he'd taken one off his shelf, out into the world—because
he
was out in the world.

He was no mere observer. The Endless Knight was interacting with us—
living
. Aric was right; he
did
evolve.

“It's priceless, yet you'll still use it for this?”

He inclined his head. “For you.”

Was he willing to part with one of his possessions because he thought he would have a life with me? If I didn't choose him, would he go back to stasis? To misery? “Why did you bring it?”

As if a switch had been flipped off, Aric's gaze went cold. “Lest we ran afoul of the Emperor.”

Once we'd rescued Selena, I would get to the bottom of Death's animosity toward that card.

“Is that goan to have enough juice?” Jack eyed the baton, then the bunker door, and back.

“From what I understand,” Aric said, “the firepower is dependent on how hard it's thrown—and I'm far stronger than Joules.”

Jack cast me a look:
I can't even with this guy.

“In any case, I'll aim for your explosives on the door.”

Dragging Milo with us, we took cover behind a rise of rock about a hundred feet away. Aric manipulated the javelin until it extended to its full length.

Milo must've realized what Death held. He went buggy-eyed, yelling into his gag.

“Ready?” Aric surveyed us. “When I throw, I'll cover the Empress. Because—armor.”

“Just do it, Reaper!”

He took aim, exhaled a breath. Lips thinned, he launched the javelin, unleashing that harnessed aggression of his.

The spear's trajectory didn't arc, just sped in one line. Like a bullet.

He hunched down, covering me right before it hit. The blast reverberated from the door.

The mountain quaked, the ground rumbling. Gravel rained from the ridge shielding us. As the percussion subsided, smoke billowed.

Had we succeeded?

The air began to clear . . . revealing the warped door. Metal had
melted
, leaving a huge hole.

Aric had done it! I wanted to hug him, but I quashed my excitement. This was only step one.

Besides, he looked anything but celebratory. “Don't make me regret that, Empress.”

We approached the entrance with caution. Foreboding red emergency bulbs flashed from the interior, the only source of light.

Jack had his bow at the ready in one hand, Milo's jacket collar in his other. Aric had unsheathed both swords. My claws dripped.

We stepped inside an industrial-looking transition area. Bulky pipes, oversize bolts, welded plates. Orange graffiti covered gray metal walls. In Goth lettering, someone had repeatedly painted:

SMITE STRUCK FALL MAD

In the flashing red lights, those ominous words appeared to move. The same words Matthew had told me.

Jack shoved Milo forward. “Only one way in.” The room had no doors, just an elevator.

“This must be a trap.” Aric swept his gaze.

“Come on, Reaper? You want to live forever?”

“I don't recommend it.” To me, Aric said, “When we face them, you can't hold back.”

“I won't.” Much. I made my way to the elevator. “The twins wouldn't have expected us to get in so they might not have traps in place. They could be rushing to do something as we speak.” I pressed the call button. “We should
hurry
.”

The doors yawned wide. Inside, fluorescent lights flicked on and off like those red bulbs.

Aric hastened past me to enter first, sheathing his swords. “Let me look around.” After a few moments, he motioned for me to join him. Behind us, Jack booted Milo inside.

Lit buttons showed thirteen floors. The numbering was reversed; the second floor was below us.

So many levels? This place was like a subterranean hive.

“Should we torture Milo for their floor?” Aric yanked the man's gag away. “Do you have something to tell us?”

We didn't have time. “Aric, look at the buttons. Hard.” With his superhuman sight . . . “Can you see which one's been used most?”

He scanned them. “The six button has the most wear. Fitting, since it's the Lovers' card number.” He pressed it.

Milo went ballistic. “You trespass—you have no right! We're the just defenders, the righteous in this game. We are love's destruction!”

As the doors slid shut, Aric moved closer to me. Under the crackling lights, Jack and I shared an uneasy glance.

My heart thudded when we began to descend, seeming to inch to the next floor. “I am the lizard's tail. I am the tail.” Milo kept blathering that. “I'm shed when we're caught.” He'd said the same thing last night.

What could he mean? Sometimes when a tomcat caught a lizard, the creature would shed its tail, allowing it to escape.

My eyes widened. “Push the emergency stop!” The twins were going to sacrifice their father. We
had
entered some kind of trap. They would bet on me surviving, regenerating for their torture. “We have to get out of here!”

But Aric was looking up—at the access hatch that had just opened.

A girl peered down, a replicated tableau glimmering over her.

With a giggle, the Violet clone dropped a grenade into the cab—and slammed the hatch shut.

Jack had told me about grenades.
Once you pull the pin, a grenade is not your friend.

And most exploded within five seconds.

One thousand one . . .

Aric dove for it, just as Jack did. Collision. Cursing. I couldn't see what was happening in the wavering lights.

One thousand two . . .

Milo kicked at their faces, so I slashed him with my claws. Aric caught the grenade.

One thousand three . . .

He vaulted upward, punching that hatch so hard it flew off the hinges. The Violet clone shrieked. Jack snatched me in his arms, pressing me against the wall. “Brace yourself.”

One thousand four . . .

With a yell, Aric lobbed the grenade straight up through the opening. The only place he could.

Where the cables were. The
brakes
.

One thousand five—

BOOM!

We . . . dropped. Free fall. That feeling of weightlessness wrenched a scream from my lungs.

“I got you,
bébé 
! We'll get through this. We'll get through—”

Landing.

Bone-jarring impact. Grinding metal. Stabbing pain?

The force pitched Jack from one side of the half-crumpled cab to the other. I was held fast. With a swallow, I peered down. A piece of metal had skewered my waist, just over my hip.

Stone and debris plummeted onto the top. The clone gave a cry. More rocks bounced, then spilled through the opening, blood-smeared from the girl above.

I needed to
move
. Stifling a scream, I stepped forward, nearly collapsing.

“Evangeline!” Jack's hands searched me for injuries. “Christ, you bleeding?”

“I-I'll be okay. Are you hurt?”

“Non.”

“Aric?” I asked.

“I'm fine. Milo's been better.”

He was rolling on the floor, moaning in pain. Stones continued to fall.

Jack gazed up. “We got to go before we get buried.”

Aric unsheathed a sword to pry open the mangled cab doors. “Or before another carnate drops more explosives.” He wrenched one of the doors from its track; it clattered to the floor.

Holding my side, I gazed out into a dimly-lit warehouse. Were those pallets of canned food?

Over the falling rocks, I heard snarling.

Jack snapped a glow stick from his coat pocket, tossing it. The tube skipped across the floor.

When it stopped, I lost my breath.

Bagmen. What must be hundreds of them. All branded.

Milo laughed. “The tail. The tail. Now the cunning lizard gets away.”

With crazed snarls, the horde charged.

Jack shoved me at Aric. “Get her out!”

As Aric lifted me to the hatch, Jack hauled Milo up and tossed him to the oncoming Baggers.

Ignoring the pain in my side, I scrambled to the roof, past the dying clone. A boulder rested on her crushed torso, like she'd caught it.

She smiled at me serenely, as if she were on a train, heading off on an adventure.

As if we'd be sure to meet again. Then her lids slid shut.

More rocks fell, pinging me on the head. A big one connected. I staggered, seeing four of the dead clone.

“They're goan to overrun us.” Jack drew his pistols, picking the Baggers off.

“Climb up here!” I'd thought he and Aric would be right behind me.

The snarling grew louder and louder.

“If we don't stop them”—Aric's swords flashed out—“they'll power their way through the top of the cab.”

I raised my gaze. “There's another floor, maybe thirty feet up.” The doors at the elevator stop had been blown wide from the grenade. Red lights pulsed from that landing.

Jack snapped, “Get her out of here, Reaper. NOW!”

Before I could argue, Aric leapt up to join me, grabbing my bloody waist. He drew back to the opposite side of the shaft. “You can do this.”

“Do
what 
?”

He tossed me. I flew upward, arcing toward the opening.

Oomph
. The edge gouged my wound as I landed, half of me inside, half clambering.

“Climb, Empress!”

My boots scrabbled against the uneven shaft. Before I could hoist myself in, pain shot through my head.

Another rock? Cracked skull? Blood poured down one temple. My glyphs flickered. With the last of my strength, I hauled myself up into some kind of storage room.

Louder snarling below. No more gunshots.
Jack?

I couldn't release my thorn tornado without risking him. Poison
wouldn't work on them. I had no ground to grow vines, no plants to revive.

I flopped onto my front and shimmied to the edge. “Aric!” I saw him through a frame of dripping blood. A crimson slick gathered around me, pooling over the lip of the floor. “Don't leave him!”

After a heartbeat's hesitation, he seized the coil of severed elevator cables, ripping them free. “Deveaux!” He threaded the length through the hatch. “Grab hold!”

“Got it! Go, go! Fuck—they're in!”

In one motion, Aric heaved on the cable and vaulted toward me. Midway, he lost momentum, snagging the edge of the floor with the tips of four fingers. “The mortal's caught on something.”

Jack dangled halfway out of the hatch; Baggers scrabbled to drag him back down, clinging to his feet.

Cable in one hand, crossbow in the other, he fired. For every Bagman he killed, two more took its place.

Hanging by his fingertips, Aric grappled to heft Jack—and the chains of Bagmen suspended from each of Jack's legs. A Bagger tug of war. “Can't hold this for much longer. The mortal's probably been bitten.”

A rock the size of a soccer ball struck the back of Aric's head, knocking his helmet off.

It fell. . . .

Snagged by a small jut of stone—right above the rising tide of Baggers.

“Must have that.” Aric's gaze darted from where it balanced to Jack and back. How long before he dropped the “mortal” to save his all-important armor? What if he
didn't
drop Jack?

If I lost them both . . .

Never again to see Jack's clear gray gaze.

Aric's unguarded smile.