It was hard to tell with Rabbit.
Finally he said, “For what it’s worth, I think it sucks that the First Father’s magic has trapped you the way it has. It’s not fair that you don’t have a choice whether to serve or not, and, well…” He scanned their faces, though she didn’t know what he was looking for, still didn’t know what he saw. “Anyway. I’m sorry for your loss.”
He said something else, but Cara couldn’t hear him over the sudden rushing in her ears as his words kicked up memories of one of the things she was seriously trying not to think about: the last funeral she attended.
I’m sorry for your loss,
the priest had told her, and most of the people who filed past the grave had spouted a variation on the theme. She had made the right noises, forcing herself to act the hostess because there was
nobody else left to carry the burden. Her mother was in that fresh-turned grave, her father just standing there beside her, staring through the people who stopped to shake his hand and murmur something they thought would comfort. And the fourth member of their strange little family—her so-called foster brother, Sven, who hadn’t been any sort of brother at all—hadn’t even shown up. He was off diving the Great Barrier Reef, he’d said by way of a voice mail, and couldn’t get there in time. So he hadn’t even tried.
That wasn’t the first time Sven had let her down, but it had been the final proof that he cared far more about his adventures than the people who loved him.
Shit. Don’t go there. And for gods’ sake, focus.
This wasn’t about her and Zane, wasn’t about her and Sven, wasn’t about her at all. It was about completing the ritual and showing the
winikin
that she wasn’t dumping all of the traditions. Just the ones that didn’t make modern-day sense.
Realizing that Rabbit had started the funerary rite, she winced and made herself dial back in.
“We ask the First Father, the Hero Twins, and the gods themselves to take the
winikin
Aaron Rockwell up into the sky to be reborn,” he said, reciting from memory, though she’d told him he could read it. “Since what has happened before will happen again, we will see you anew, brother, in the next cycle of life.” He lifted an oblong bundle wrapped in gray cloth, which he opened to reveal a thin, narrow stone spike that had been carved to resemble the barb of a stingray’s tail and sharpened to a deadly point. He turned and handed it to Cara.
Her stomach churned as she took the smooth, thin stone, but there was adrenaline alongside the nerves
now. The funeral ceremony was one of the very few rituals that called on the
winikin
to make their own blood sacrifice, bringing it very close to an actual spell. And there were recent hints that the
winikin
could do magic, after all. But although Dez had lifted the stricture forbidding the
winikin
from working magic—he too had been put in place to shake things up—none of them had been able to manage even the simplest spell. More, a search of the Nightkeepers’ vast library had failed to turn up any hint of how a
winikin
was supposed to work magic, or even whether it was possible. She kept hoping, though. And given the nature of the magic and its dependence on blood sacrifice, it was tempting to think that Aaron’s death might open the floodgates.
As she slid her fingers along the spine, all other thoughts fell away, leaving only her awareness of the pyre and the others gathered around her, the sudden tension in the air.
Please, gods,
she whispered inwardly. Then, steeling herself, she set the spine to the tip of her tongue, then closed her eyes and, with a quick, jerky move, drove the bloodletter deep and yanked it free again.
Pain flashed and her stomach lurched as blood filled her mouth, making her want to gag at the salty tang. Instead, she let the blood pool in her mouth, then stepped forward and spit out the mouthful of mingled saliva and blood—both sacred to the gods, who had given their blood to create mankind in a land where water was scarce.
Optimism flared for a nanosecond… and then died. Because when her offering hit the pyre there were none of the red-gold sparkles the Nightkeepers talked about seeing when they dialed into their magic, no buzzing
hum in the air. All she got was a throbbing tongue, a gnarly case of muck-mouth, and a solid reminder that none of the prophecies ever even mentioned anyone besides the Nightkeepers fighting in the final battle, never mind using magic to do it.
Exhaling, she passed the spike to Zane, who took it without comment and made his sacrifice in grim silence. The others did the same, all the way around the circle until the bloodletter returned to Rabbit, who touched it to his lips and then tossed it on the pyre. Overhead, the storm clouds had blotted out the sun, turning the scene dark and gloomy, though the air didn’t really smell of rain.
Rabbit looked around the circle again, as if he wanted to say something else. But then he shook his head, focused on the funerary bundle, spread his fingers, and called fire in the old tongue with a whisper of
“Kaak.”
Energy crackled and a gout of flames erupted from the base of the pyre. The fire geysered upward in a blaze that rose ten, then twenty feet, and the air went suddenly scorching, burning Cara’s skin.
Whoa!
She stumbled back, shielding her face with her arm as the churning in her stomach suddenly increased a thousandfold. “Rabbit, dial it down!”
“I can’t!” His eyes were wide, his face ashen as he tried to beckon the power back into him. “It’s not working! The magic is—”
Crack!
A huge lightning bolt lashed up from the fiery pillar and speared into one of the black storm clouds. Cara screamed, heart clutching as the cloud freaking
detonated
, fragmenting into dark chunks that plummeted toward the earth, trailing vapor. The missiles hit in a circular spray around them, impacting meteor-fast,
shaking the earth beneath her feet and digging huge craters that spewed dirt and broken stone.
“Form up!” Zane shouted over the roar of the fire and the aerial cannonade. Some of the
winikin
responded instantly, scrambling into the four fighting teams; others stood and gaped.
“Get close together,” Rabbit yelled. “I’ll shield!”
Cara went for her wristband, hit the panic button that would broadcast on every available channel and trigger the alarms back at the main mansion, and shouted, “Mayday! Mayday! The funeral is under attack!”
“Come on!” Natalie grabbed her arm and dragged her into a stumbling run toward the others as Rabbit started casting his fiery orange shield spell around them.
Catching sight of movement, Cara missed a step, and the churning in her gut suddenly condensed to a hard, cold pit of terror. “The craters! Look!”
Shiny black shadows writhed within each pit, and then boiled up and over to become dark creatures, huge animals that had been twisted into hideous monsters.
Gods!
What
were
they? How had they gotten inside Skywatch’s shields? She saw jaguars, foxes, eagles, owls, all black and slick, their pelts glued together into slimy spikes by a sticky coating, as if they had just been born, fully formed, from the underworld itself.
Gods!
The demons screeched and roared as they materialized, a dozen of them and then more, landing with earth-shuddering thuds and casting around momentarily before they oriented on the
winikin
and began to move. They were slow at first, uncoordinated, as if learning to use their bodies. But that didn’t last long.
Rabbit shouted, “Cara, move! Come on!” He waved
to the single gap that remained in the fiery shield, left open for her and Natalie.
Heart pounding, Cara bolted the short distance remaining and shoved Natalie through. “Is everyone—” She turned back and broke off with a gasp as she caught sight of two stumbling figures lagging behind, recognized them.
“Zane!”
He was coming toward them half carrying, half dragging Lora, who had been a decorated cop in the outside world, but now was limp and sobbing.
Cara’s breath froze as a shadow rose up behind them: a huge eagle with a minivan wingspan and a talon spread the size of a human head, coordinated now and flying with fiendish intent, its coal red eyes locked on its prey. It was maybe a thousand feet from Zane. Eight hundred. Seven.
He wasn’t going to make it.
Her heart went
thudda-thudda
, but she didn’t let her voice shake as she said to Rabbit, “Give me your gun.”
His eyes blazed. “No fucking way. I’ll go.”
“You need to protect the others.” The demons were homing in on the
winikin
huddled within his glowing shield.
“I— Shit. Here.” He tossed the MAC-10.
“Go!”
She caught it, fumbled it, then got it in a two-handed grip. The machine pistol still felt strange in her hands even after all the training she’d had, as if her body knew on the DNA level that she wasn’t made for fighting. But she hung on to the weapon, fingers slipping with the cold sweat that suddenly bathed her as she wheeled and bolted toward the stragglers.
The demon eagle was very close to Zane. A few hundred feet, if that.
Do it,
she told herself.
Just do it!
Heart
thundering in her ears, she fired over his head, wasting the first burst and then sending a wobbly line of bullets stitching across the creature’s torso and left wing. The beast screeched and its wing beats faltered, but it stayed in the air, locking onto her with blazing crimson eyes. The fury in them—the pure
evil
—froze her momentarily in place. This was the enemy they were going to be fighting during the war, she realized with sudden sharp horror. Not the
xombis
or any other sort of possessed human, but the demons themselves. And these were the smallest of them.
Oh, gods.
She couldn’t do this.
They
couldn’t do it. There was no way a dozen magi and fifty-some
winikin
could fight an army of these things and win.
“Cara, no!” Zane waved her off with his free hand, his expression going wild. “Get back!”
Snapping from her paralysis, she bolted toward him, toward the demon, her legs moving while her brain screeched,
Wrong way!
But she skidded and got to Lora’s other side. Imagining the demon’s hot breath on her neck, she screamed,
“Move!”
They ran for the shield, legs pumping, but Lora was deadweight, dragging them down. Rabbit extended a tendril of the shield, trying to meet them halfway, but it wasn’t enough.
Hearing the snap of feathers, Cara twisted around and muffled a cry of terror at seeing the creature nearly on top of them. She fired off a burst of jade-tipped bullets into its gaping mouth, but this time the bullets just seemed to piss it off more. It screamed and reached for her, claws spreading into a ring of wickedly curved blades.
“Down!” Rabbit bellowed.
Zane yanked Lora to the ground and Cara hit the
deck a nanosecond behind them as the mage unleashed a huge fireball. A crackling roar seared over them and then the fiery missile slammed into the raptor, driving it back and away. The eagle was instantly ablaze. It screamed and flailed its flaming wings, then fell with a sickening thud that jarred the ground beneath them.
Cara and Zane lunged to their feet and dragged Lora up, but from within the shield, Natalie screamed, “Look out!”
Whipping around, Cara let out an, “Oh,
shit
,” at the sight of a huge, rangy, doglike creature bearing down on them. Its fur was mottled black and stuck up in spikes fouled by the ropy saliva that slicked its jaws and chest, coming from a mouth that showed huge fangs and barbed ivory teeth.
Throat closing with bitter panic, she yanked away and shoved Lora and Zane toward the shield. “Move!”
“No, damn it.” Zane spun back, eyes fierce. “Let me—”
“Go. That’s an order.” She got between them and the oncoming beast, heart thundering in her ears as she told herself,
You’ve just got to slow it down long enough for Rabbit’s magic to recharge
. They had trained on scenarios like this. Now it was time to put that training to use. Aware that Zane had followed orders—whatever he might feel for her, he was a soldier at heart—she aimed for the dog-creature’s legs and fired.
She got two shots off and then heard a sour
clunk
as the machine pistol freaking jammed.
“No!” She yanked at the receiver arm that had come loose, locking the bolt, but it didn’t budge. The huge dog—wolf?—seemed to understand what had happened. Its gleaming red eyes lit and it accelerated, jaws gaping.
“Run!”
Natalie screamed.
Cara spun and bolted. The shield was farther away than she thought, the demon closing fast. Panic spurted, along with a thought of,
Oh, gods, this is it
. And then the world did a weird slow-motion thing around her.
She saw Zane shove Lora into the shield and turn back for her, but the beast was too close, too fast. She could hear it right behind her, could feel the jarring thud of its feet through the worn soles of her boots and smell its rotting stench. Her body tensed for pain, for fear, and incredulity flared at the knowledge that she wasn’t going to make it. She was going to be the second
winikin
to die in battle, wasn’t ever going to get the chance to live the life she wanted after the war. Her breath sobbed.
Please, no
.
She glanced back just in time to see the huge creature rock onto its haunches, preparing to spring, and—
“Cara, get down!” The words came from the other side of her, in a deep voice that jolted her like lightning and sped the world back up to normal once more.
Before she could react, a gray-and-buff blur raced past with a bloodcurdling howl of rage, and the hard, heavy weight of a man’s body slammed into her, knocking her out of the demon’s path and taking her to the ground. Her rescuer wrapped his arms around her and rolled them as they hit, so he took the brunt and cushioned her fall.
There was sudden warmth, solid muscle, and the yielding, unfamiliar press of a man’s body. And not just any man: She caught rapid-fire impressions of sun-bleached hair against deeply tanned skin, stormy blue eyes, and an air of wildness that defied the high-tech armband and warrior’s garb. Their legs tangled, and when they stopped rolling, he was on top of her with his
hips planted firmly between her thighs. Instead of untangling himself, he reared up over her on one arm and lifted the other to summon first a shield and then a huge fireball, and although her brain was struggling to catch up, her soul already knew exactly what was going on.