The pillar was all one piece except for a recessed panel that served as the backdrop for the writing. I held my breath and pushed, trying to break it, as much as it shattered me to do so, while causing the least amount of damage possible.
Instead, I heard a click. I pushed harder, and the panel dropped down to reveal a cubicle. A wall of energy hit me, sending waves of electricity arcing over my skin and pulsing through my body.
Which was cool. No, it was super cool. But what had me closing my eyes, basking in the moment, was not the fact that I’d found the heart. It was the fact that in the past ten minutes, I’d become Indiana Jones.
My coolness factor totally skyrocketed. I couldn’t wait to tell everyone.
A box sat inside. An ornate cube about three inches square. As though it were a living entity, it vibrated with power and strength. I’d felt that power before. It surged and breathed and wrapped its tentacles around me. But what I was remembering couldn’t possibly have anything to do with that box.
I reached in to get it when a flashback hit me. A flashback of all the times characters had to reach inside a dark, scary place in movies only to pull back their hands to find them covered in spiders. Or snakes. Or stinging beetles.
I braced myself and wrapped my fingers around the box, praying the panel wouldn’t shoot up and cut off my hand when I picked it up.
Only then did I remember I should have brought a counterweight to replace the box so I wouldn’t trigger a springing mechanism that led to my ultimate death and dismemberment. Hopefully in that order. Not that doing so worked for Indiana.
With shaking fingers, I lifted the box and eased it out, breathing a sigh of relief when I cleared the opening. I examined the ornate box. The stone matched the surroundings, a light powdery gray, but it was solid. Heavy. The weight would suggest that it was simply a carved cube without a hollow interior. If that were the case, we’d come a long way for nothing.
But the box had called to me, just like Pandu said it would. Surely it opened somehow. Or perhaps the writings on the outside meant something.
This looked like a job for Garrett.
A few seconds after I took the box out of the cubicle, the panel slid back into place. A tremor of sheer panic shot up my spine. I stopped and listened, not that I was nervous or anything, but according to the Indy franchise, if something unfortunate were to happen, it would be right about now.
I looked at the little girl. “Do you hear anything?”
She stood beside me, watching my every move, her dark eyes curious.
I reached up and twisted a curl around my finger. “Are you Livia?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she reached forward, took a strand of my hair, and wrapped it around her fingers. At least we were communicating on some level. Hair was a universal language.
“I’m going to call you Livia for now, okay?”
Before I stood to leave, I studied the box, trying to hold my phone for the light and turn the box this way and that, looking for some kind of release latch. Though I couldn’t find one, I hadn’t seen one on the pillar, either. Maybe, like the pillar, there wasn’t a visible mechanism on the box.
I poked and pushed and pulled, testing every side, trying to spring a lock or slide a section. Nothing worked until I pressed on a sharp corner. It pricked my skin and drew blood. I pulled back and shook my hand, but it had loosened one edge of the box and let me swing it to the side.
Again, power pulsated out. I closed my eyes and chanted, “Please don’t be a heart. Please don’t be a heart.”
I cracked my lids to narrow slits and peeked inside. If it had been a heart at one time, it had turned to powder, but I didn’t think so. I had a feeling this was something else. Blinking back to reality, I turned the box over and watched as a fine white dust filled my palm.
This was most definitely not a weapon. What on Earth could I do with this besides throw it in my enemy’s eyes? Oh, wait, Shade demons didn’t have eyes.
Then I looked closer. Sprinkled throughout the powder were tiny flakes of gold. They sparkled in the light, and with each twinkle of metal, realization took hold.
The box couldn’t have held more than a cup of the powder, and the flakes were less than a tenth of that, but I knew what they were, and an icy dread curled inside my chest.
“Why would Pandu want me to have this?” I asked Livia as I returned the powder to the box and closed the lid. I stuffed it in my jacket pocket.
She giggled.
I took a stab and asked in ancient Greek, “Would you like to come home with me?” Because that didn’t sound creepy at all.
Livia giggled again and pointed to something behind me.
I turned just in time to see a massive black lion take a swipe at my face.
I stumbled back, tripping over own feet, and fell on my ass. His two-inch claws missed me by a centimeter at most.
What the fuck? Where did a black lion come from? The chamber dead-ended, and he’d come from the end that died. And were black lions even a thing?
He hunched down on all fours, readying to pounce, his massive size cluing me in to the fact that he might have been a supernatural entity. One I’d certainly never seen before, but I was beginning to realize there was a lot I hadn’t seen, especially when considering the fact that there were as many dimensions as there were stars in the heavens.
Scrambling to my feet, I grabbed Livia and took off through the narrow passageway. No way could he fit. Then again, no way could he have emerged out of a wall.
“Artemis!” I yelled, running through the passage. Then I remembered. If I couldn’t materialize in here, maybe she couldn’t, either.
Livia clung to me, but every time the lion drew close, she giggled and held out her hand to pet him. Maybe they were old friends. Maybe he belonged to her and he didn’t like the fact that I was basically abducting his owner, but I didn’t want to leave her down there. She’d been there for centuries.
I had a feeling, though, and this could be the movies talking, that the lion’s sudden and inevitable appearance was due to the fact that I’d raided the tomb.
Then it hit me. I was the raider of the lost pillar. I was the tomb raider!
Oh, my God, I was so cool. I had to tell people. If I died in these catacombs, they’d never know how nifty I’d become in my last seconds of existence.
After making it back to the catwalks—thank goodness, because I was so bad at directions—I vaulted off the metal grate and took a shortcut through one of the ancient chambers, knocking off a couple of rocks that formed a tomb while climbing up a wall of stone steps.
The lion roared, shaking the metal grating I was trying to climb back onto. Running with a little girl in my arms and climbing with one arm was not helping the situation at all. Just as I got a leg up over the grating, the lion took another swipe.
Its claws made contact, ripping through my jacket and sweater and into the sensitive flesh of my back. I bit back a scream, conserving my energy to get me up and over the edge, but it stung like fire. And its claws had hooked into my jacket.
It jerked me back to the ground and pounced to maul me. I flipped Livia and covered her with my body while the lion went to town.
I’d never been mauled by a lion. Especially one the size of a small house. But I decided right then and there, as it tore into my shoulder and clamped down on my head, that it was an experience I never wanted to repeat.
Livia held on to me. She wasn’t scared until the lion’s claws caught her arm. They cut into her and left three gashes for their effort. That’s when she became afraid.
She’d been here for centuries with no incidents. I’m here for five minutes and I bring hellfire down on her head and everything else in my path. ’Cause that’s how I rolled, apparently.
I pulled her closer as she sobbed into my chest. The lion swatted us into a corner. We hit the stone with a loud thud, the force knocking the wind out of me and filling my vision with stars.
Since we were all
but subdued, the lion now took its time. Walking forward with purpose. Its gait slow and steady.
That was when I saw a small tunnel in the shape of one of the tombs: flat on the bottom and arched on top. But unlike the other burial plots, this one went all the way under the stone walkway on which they’d built the catwalks.
I figured it had been a drainage tunnel of some kind. Either way, it was our chance.
I reached into my pocket and grabbed my pepper spray. Even though it was a million-to-one shot, I had to try. I pointed it at the lion as he knelt in front of us, ready to chow down, and sprayed it into its face.
It reared back, sniffing and snorting, and I ran for it. Or, well, hobbled for it.
It caught on quickly and took another swipe, but I ducked and dove into the tunnel.
I dragged us through it, careful of her arm, and emerged on the other side. Which was only about ten feet away from the original side, but hopefully the lion wouldn’t figure that out for a while. It was still trying to swat my feet, to hook its claws and wrench us out.
As quietly as I could, I got to my feet. The girl had her arms in a vise grip around my neck. I went as far across the chamber we were in as I could before having to climb back onto the catwalk.
Stealing onto another tomb, I looked over the catwalk. I could see the lion’s back on the other side, its hindquarters in the air as it still tried to get us out of the tunnel. But it wouldn’t take long for him to figure out we were no longer in there.
A wave of dizziness washed over me. Probably because the lion had just had my head in its jaws. My brains in its teeth. I got the feeling he was trying to make up for every time a lion forced to perform in a circus had wanted to do that to its trainer.
Aware of every sound I made, I eased onto the catwalk and backed away, waiting for the lion to look up. Waiting for my luck to end. Naturally, it did.
The moment I saw the pitch blackness of its eyes, I turned and sprinted. It tore after us, both it and a massive dump of adrenaline spurring me on. With the sharp twists and turns of the catwalk and the narrow passages, the lion’s enormous body had difficulty catching us a second time.
Blood ran in rivulets down my right leg and soaked the back of my jacket, but the shot of raw adrenaline kept the pain at bay. I wiped blood out of my eyes and prayed we were getting close to the exit. We had to be. No matter what Reyes had told me in the past, in this place the alternative was death. And if I couldn’t die like he’d said, an hour with the grumpy lion would’ve surely made me wish that I could.
With every step I took, I tried to dematerialize. It didn’t work. Whatever they’d protected this place with was powerful. Almost as powerful as the gold flakes I had in my jacket pocket.
The girl sobbed again, and I knew another attempt on our lives was imminent.
It was too fast. The lion. I could feel its breath on the back of my neck just as the exit came into view. It was gated and locked, of course, but the closer I got, the less resistance to dematerializing I felt.
The girl buried her face in the crook of my neck, and I dove forward just as the lion’s claws hooked into the side of my head, piercing my scalp and whipping my head back.
But we’d reached the outer edges of the protected haven. I dematerialized, and its claws lost their hold and slipped through me.
I landed on the greens outside the entrance to the necropolis and stumbled, taking the girl down with me. The sun was about two inches from settling on the horizon when a man in a black suit and tie blocked the view.
“Mrs. Davidson,” he said, casual as you please, “I need you to come with me.”
17
You had me at, “We’ll make it look like an accident.”
—T-SHIRT
I lay back, not sure I could even move much less go with Mr. Man in Black. But he had several friends to help him out should I refuse.
I’m not ashamed to say I’d considered dematerializing just to spite them, but I really wanted to know how he knew my name. Almost as though he’d been expecting me.
The thing about dematerializing was it did wonders for the flesh when it’d been shredded by a ginormous—yet, admittedly, beautiful—lion beast. But seriously? A lion?
Still holding Livia, I clamored to my feet. I didn’t have a graceful bone in my body, but right now I was more worried about their bones.
“What the fuck?” I yelled, glaring at them. “What’s with the fucking lion?”
Yes. I knew I was on holy ground, but sometimes a girl had to use profanity to get her point across.
They exchanged glances, and then one of them spoke into a radio at his wrist. It was all very Secret-Servicey.
“Can you walk?” the first one asked me. Medium height and blond, he had a foreign accent, definitely not Italian. South American, I just couldn’t pinpoint the precise location. If I had to guess, I’d say Colombia.
“I’m fine,” I said, jerking out of his grip when he tried to take my arm.
“You don’t look fine.”
My clothes had been shredded and were soaked with my blood. Reyes was going to flip.
They escorted us—or me since I doubted they knew I was carrying a centuries-old departed child—to a waiting car.
“Look, no offense, but I have somewhere else to be.”
“This won’t take long, Mrs. Davidson.”
“I hope not. There’s a shower calling my name.”
He just stood there, his expression stone.
“Fine.” I climbed in and leaned back against the dark interior.
Blondie got in on the other side, and the rest of the rat pack followed in another car. We pulled up to an official-looking building and walked in, passing through a security checkpoint without being stopped or searched.
Blondie sat me down in what I assumed was his office.
“As you know, we’ve been keeping an eye on you for some time.”
I couldn’t help an indelicate snort. “Since I was born.”
“Before, actually.”
“Look, I need to get back. Someone is expecting me, and he does not like being kept waiting.”
He turned on a wall of screens from dozens of security cameras and pointed to one outside the gardens. It was focused on Reyes. He paced back and forth like a caged animal, stopping every once in a while to glare up at the camera.
“You need to send someone out there and tell him I’m okay.”
Blondie smiled. “We did. He’s on his way to the hospital.”
I nodded. At least he knew. “Are those what I think they are?”
He had a stack of files on his desk. I only knew they were about our gang because the top file had the name Charlotte Jean Davidson in bold letters across the label. I wanted to ask them what font they used but felt now wasn’t the time to make chummy with the enemy.
“Would you like some fresh clothes?”
“I’ll be back to my place in no time,” I said, picking up the file, “so no worries.”
He let me. I balanced it in one hand and, reaching around Livia, thumbed through it, a little surprised at everything they knew. This was going above and beyond, and privacy was something I was quite fond of.
The next file in the stack was Reyes’s. I picked it up as well as I rubbed Livia’s back with my other hand. They had all of Reyes’s names. All of them. Rey’aziel. Rey’azikeen. First son of Lucifer. Even the Hellmaker. But one that surprised me most was the Dark Star. That’s what Pandu called him in his books. A children’s book.
I didn’t question it, though. They were boys with too much time on their hands.
I picked up another folder. “So, what am I doing here?” I asked, tamping down the sudden spike of ire when I read the name. Elwyn Alexandra Loehr. Beep. And, yes, even Stardust.
“We didn’t see what was coming.”
Inside, someone had written under her name, The perfect balance of light and darkness. The boundary between heaven and hell.
“Do you usually?”
He’d taken me aback with the words his army. The term tightened around my throat like a noose. Beep had an army, too, but his would be ruthless. Cruel. I wondered if, when the time came, Beep could sink to his level to win humanity.
“We’ve been waiting a long time for someone to find the Tonna.”
The stone box in my pocket. They’d probably had cameras down there as well.
“I suppose you’re going to try to take it from me.”
“Not at all, but we would like it back when you’re finished.”
“Finished with what?”
The smile he graced me with had absolutely no sincerity whatsoever.
I plucked the next file off his desk and stilled. Amber Olivia Kowalski. Trying again not to react, I opened the jacket. They knew everything from the premonitions she’d had at a school carnival to her two-hour death and the fact that she could now see the departed.
Quentin was next. Then Pari and Nicolette and even a file on Garrett, who had no supernatural abilities at all. And the stack just kept going.
But I’d had enough. I raised my gaze back to his.
“As you can see, we’re keeping an eye on you and yours. Just in case.”
“In case of what?”
“There are times when even a beloved dog needs to be put down.”
And just when I thought we were bonding.
I raised my chin and said in my softest voice, “You watch us from your ivory towers like you know us. Like you could control us. Like you have dominion over us.” I stood and leaned across the desk until my nose was barely centimeters from his.
No matter how hard he tried to hide it, concern spiked within him. Probably because all the papers he had on us, all the files, were now swirling around us.
It was a cheap trick, but I needed to get his attention. I knew the entire thing was being filmed, which was fine. It would give the archdiocese something to talk about.
Then, one by one, the papers caught fire, every record they had on us reduced to ashes in seconds. Of course, I didn’t think for a moment those were the only copies. They’d almost certainly transferred everything to digital years ago, but it was fun to watch them burn, anyway.
Summoned to Thirteenth Grave Page 18