“Yes, it’s a problem!” Dante cried. “This thing only has eight inches of clearance off the ground!” He swore as the car bounced and the chassis scraped over a rock.
Rory concentrated on steering around the biggest stones, hoping they wouldn’t wrench a wheel off, or bend the axle. Then she would be forced to leave the two men behind and run the length of the aqueduct, instead. Even though Dante and Sasha were slower and weaker, she didn’t want to do that.
She didn’t want to be alone.
Her heart had been thudding heavily since she had spotted the open door on the garden shed. Later, she would have to figure out how she would live with her role in this. For now, she would work to fix it.
Once the car reached the rough track next to the chain link fence, the way grew smoother, although the Viper still bounced and wiggled its way over every single little rut. Rory kept her eyes on the way ahead.
“Oh, what I would give for a four wheel drive right now,” Dante said from the back.
“We’d lose speed,” Rory said shortly. “Watch the aqueduct,” she added.
“Why? How fast are we going? The fence is just a blur, I can’t judge,” Dante said.
“You don’t want to know,” Sasha said, his voice toneless.
For long minutes, they stayed silent while the car bucked and shook.
Rory saw something ahead, not yet picked out by the headlights. She turned off the lights and tried to keep one eye on the track in front of the car, while also looking ahead.
“Jesus!” Dante breathed. “I can’t see a fucking thing.”
“Rory can,” Sasha assured him.
“There’s something ahead,” she said. “Up there, where the open water starts.”
The wide, open aqueduct section started a quarter mile ahead. White water rolled, frothed and streamed down the steep hill sections. In the inadequate moonlight, the water seemed to glow.
Where the enclosed pipe section began, there was a small building attached to the side.
“Is that…? Yes, it’s Nial’s Acura,” Sasha said.
Rory spotted the low, dark shadow of the car off to the side of the building. That made the building bigger than she had first thought. It also made the aqueduct larger than she had supposed, although she had not been able to look at it properly since careening off the highway.
“He got here before us?” Dante breathed.
“He got to use highway for most of the time,” Rory pointed out. “I got stuck with a goat track.”
Dante snorted laughter from the back seat. She could hear the strain in his voice.
She eased the Viper to a stop next to the Audi and turned the engine off and opened the door. Sasha thrust her knife and scabbard into her hand and got out, too. Rory flipped the driver’s seat forward so Dante could clamber out. He shoved the rifle toward her and used both elbows to squeeze out.
Rory looked around. Now they were stopped, she could hear a low hum from the building. It was a deeper rumble beneath the endless swish and hurry of running water. There was a sign riveted to the door of the low building that had “L.A.D.W.P” at the top and lots of warnings about electricity and other dangers beneath.
Dante cocked the Glock and put it back in the holster under his arm, then loosened the knife on his belt, while Sasha checked his load.
“They’re inside,” Dante said, looking around.
“Let’s look around, first,” Rory said. Instinct told her to be cautious, to quarter the area first. There was something about this she didn’t like, that was making her more uneasy than just the idea that the health of millions of Angelinos depended on what happened in the next few minutes.
“You’re the boss, boss,” Dante said easily.
Cautiously, she approached the building, the scabbard in her left hand, which would let her draw it quickly. The small hairs on the back of her neck, which had laid inert for centuries, were trying to stand up and were prickling painfully.
The door with the warnings signs on it was in the middle of the short side. She passed it and eased up to the other corner of the building. Then she peeked around the edge.
Nothing. The ground was empty of everything except stones. She stepped around, moving slowly, every muscle and sinew braced to let her jump back if she needed to.
Still nothing.
She walked down the length of the long side, which lay in shadows, for the moon was shining from the southwest and was almost set for the night. She stepped slowly and noticed the low rumble was increasing the closer to the end she drew. If this was a pumping station, or a measuring station, or some sort of monitoring point, there would be all sorts of equipment inside, all of it requiring power to run. Either the power lines were buried or the building had its own generator, which might explain the muted roar.
There was a small square inset in the wall, at about head-height. As Rory drew near, her hair was pulled forward by a sucking wind.
She stepped back, startled, looking at the square, then moved closer again. The same thing happened and she looked at it, considering.
“What is it?” Sasha asked her, speaking in a near-whisper. “I can’t see shit in this light.”
“A vent of some sort. It’s taking air in, though.”
“Climate control?” Dante suggested.
“That sounds reasonable,” Sasha said. “Heaven knows, the heat in this city in mid-summer is god-awful. It would be even worse inside a sealed room with all that equipment running.”
“Sealed,” Rory breathed. “Air in, only.” She swallowed, her fear leaping. She still couldn’t fully understand why she felt fearful, which made it worse. Hurrying now, she moved back around to where the door was set and tested the handle. It opened without resistance. She stepped back and let the door swing open on its own.
Inside was a black shadow. Even she couldn’t adjust her vision fast enough to compensate.
“Rory.” Sebastian’s voice. “Get in and shut the door.”
She beckoned Sasha and Dante inside and stepped in and shut the door behind them. Then she blinked until she could see properly. “There are no lights?” she asked.
“The fire took them out,” Winter said. She stood with her hand laid flat against another door, only twelve feet beyond the outer door, with her head down while she “listened” in her special way.
“I didn’t know you could see inside inanimate objects,” Sasha told her.
“I can’t. I’m feeling for heat. The fire is on the other side of the door.”
“So is the rest of the Pyrrhus,” Sebastian said. He sounded unhappy.
“We got here just as the fire broke out,” Nial said. “There were raw wires everywhere inside. They shorted the power to start the fire.”
“The fire will set off the Pyrrhus,” Rory said.
“Not if the fire goes out first,” Winter said. “It’s a sealed room. As soon as the oxygen burns up, the fire will extinguish.”
“Shit,” Dante breathed as Rory drew in a sharp breath. Now she understood what her fear and her prickling intuition had been trying to tell her.
“What?” Sebastian said.
“There’s a vent,” Rory said. “On the other side of the building. It’s pulling in air. Pulling in oxygen. The fire will burn until the Pyrrhus ignites.”
The silence was loud with unspoken thoughts.
Nial’s eyes narrowed. “We have to shut that vent.”
“You can’t go in there,” Sebastian said quickly. “There’s Pyrrhus all over the floor! You won’t get to the end before you drop into it.”
“I’m a vampire,” Nial said coldly. “I heal instantly.”
“You can’t go in,” Winter told him. “You’re needed out here. But I can go.”
Rory could find nothing to say. Her horror was almost total.
“No!” Sebastian cried, rounding on Winter.
“I can heal, too, Bastian,” Winter told him. She had a hand on the heavy sliding mechanism now. “I can get to the vent and
shut it down. Then the fire goes out and everyone is safe.” She pushed down on the slider, working it open.
Sebastian lunged for her. Nial leapt toward her, too. Neither of them properly reached her. As soon as their hands made contact with her arm, their bodies were thrown violently away.
“Sorry,” Winter told them gently as they sprawled against the wall. She looked at Rory. Her eyes were very large. “Don’t let anyone open this door once I’m inside. If it opens again it will let in oxygen and this won’t work. The door must stay sealed.”
Rory nodded, even though the acknowledgement was the hardest thing she had ever done.
“You can’t let her go in there,” Dante breathed in her ear. “She’ll die.”
Rory shook her head. She had already computed the odds of success, almost as soon as Winter had said she was the only one who could survive in there. “Maybe not,” Rory told Dante. “She’s the only one who can try. If no one tries, we all die and so does most of the city.”
Winter nodded at her.
Rory gave her a small, stiff smile.
Winter took a breath, a big one that lifted her shoulders. Then she pushed the door open.
Roaring, crackling fire sounded. Black, thick smoke billowed out, making the air acrid. Rory’s eyes stung and she blinked, even though she had no tears to clear them with.
When she could see again, the door was closed.
Sasha opened the outer door, swinging it like a giant fan, sucking out the greasy smoke.
Nial recovered from Winter’s defensive attack first. He scrambled to his feet and lunged for the door once more. Rory barely got there first. Her hands smacked against his chest and she shoved as hard as she could. It just barely held him back.
“She’ll die,” Nial said, his voice low. Hoarse.
“Maybe,” Rory replied as evenly as she could. She felt sick, yet there was still one small window of hope. “If you open this door, she’ll die for no reason. She can save everyone, Nial. Give her the chance to try.”
Dante’s arms came around Nial’s body, holding him in a bear hug from behind. Nial struggled, although Dante was incredibly strong for a human and held on.
Sebastian slid past the struggling pair, trying to get to the door. Rory tackled him full-back style. Her shoulder rammed into his middle and took him off his feet. He landed hard and she pinned him down with her knees as he lay dazed.
Sasha was helping Dante now and both of them were holding Nial down as he struggled like a beached fish. Until suddenly, with a choked sob, Nial grew still. He rolled his head to one side to look at Sebastian.
“You’ve killed both of them,” he whispered and closed his eyes.
Chapter Thirty-One
Nial didn’t speak after that. He didn’t move. He wasn’t unconscious, yet he wasn’t properly conscious, either.
Rory asked Dante and Sasha to walk him out to the Acura and put him in the back seat. She carried Sebastian out and propped him next to Nial.
Then she braced herself for the work ahead. “Call Garret and Roman,” she told Sasha. “Patrick, too. They will keep their heads and we’re going to need help with this.” She didn’t consider asking Marcus or Ilaria. They had suffered enough and this would tax everyone’s nerves.
Sasha wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, smearing soot over his cheeks. He pulled out his phone.
Dante had his back to the room. His shoulders were shaking.
Rory rested her hand against the back of his shoulder and he stiffened. “Don’t ask me to go in there,” he said, his voice muffled. “I’d follow you to the ends of the earth, but this…I can’t do it. I can’t face what we just did to her.”
“Winter knew what she was doing,” Rory said, as calmly as she could. “She played the only end game that could give us a win.”
“It’s not a game when people die,” he said woodenly. He glanced at her over his shoulder. His cheeks were as damp as Sasha’s.
For a moment, Rory envied them the surcease of tears. She had cried enough, though, when she was human. It made up for all the times she had not had the luxury of tears.
“Dante, I need you,” she said gently. “You and Sasha, both. Nial is not functioning properly. The others will be lost without him. We have to think for everyone for a while.”
“What can we do?” Sasha asked. He had come over to her side and he put the phone away. The soot on his cheeks had clear tracks where his tears had washed it away. He sounded very tired.
“There’s a nylon tarp in the trunk of the Viper. I will use it to wrap up…for Winter.”
Dante straightened and turned to face them. He sniffed hard. “I’ll get it.”
She nodded. “Thank you. I’m going carry the remaining Pyrrhus out to this room. When the others get here, they will need to distribute the bottles among all the cars. All except the Viper.”
“Why not the Viper?” Sasha asked.
“It’s too low to the ground,” Dante said. “Bumps,” he added.
Sasha’s lips parted. “Right,” he said uneasily. “I wish we’d never made the stuff,” he added, his voice low.
“It is what it is,” Rory told him. “Something may yet come out of this.”
“What good could possibly emerge from this?” Dante asked, his tone bleak.
“I’m not sure yet,” Rory replied. “I just know I won’t let Winter’s death be meaningless. Not if I can help it.” She heard the sound of distant engines. “There’s the first of them, coming now. Go and get the tarp.”
She pushed open the door to the inner engine room. This time she felt no reluctance. She had spoken truly, without fully realizing until she had said it that she really would not let Winter’s death go to waste. Winter could not have survived the smoke and the corrosion of the Pyrrhus, although she had known that before she went into the room. Rory felt a fierce pride for the woman’s heroism. She would make it mean something. She would ram Winter’s death down the gullets of every Summanus out there if she had to. They would pay for this.
So it was easy to push the door wide and chock it open with the brick sitting just inside the door. Black smoke belched out at the motion of the door, but there was no more crackling of fire. The smoke had simply had nowhere to go until Rory opened the door. She let it dissipate.
Dante thrust the tarp at her and she took it and stepped inside, picking out her footing carefully, glad of the rubber soled boots she was wearing. They weren’t proof against the Pyrrhus pooled on the floor, although the soles were thick enough that they wouldn’t be eaten away before she was done. She could strip them off once she was out of the room.
So she picked places where the Pyrrhus was thinnest and moved into the room. The deeper pools were where the floor was already being eaten through, forming craters. Soon the whole building would be destabilized and would collapse, but not before they removed the danger of Pyrrhus in portions large enough to generate a massive explosion.
Movement from the corner of her eye made her look around. Both Dante and Sasha were carefully following in her footsteps.
“I thought you couldn’t come in here?” she asked softly.
“You need help. You can’t do it by yourself,” Sasha replied.
“I want to help get her home,” Dante added.
Rory’s heart swelled. “Together then,” she said.
* * * * *
The grim work was finished swiftly, once Roman, Garrett and Patrick arrived. They took the news heavily, yet understood the need to stay calm and hold it together. The Pyrrhus was moved out of the building, into the waiting cars.
Then Rory refused all help to deal with Winter. She lay her body on the tarp and folded it over her with gentle care.
Then she lifted her fingers to her damp cheeks and wiped away the pink moisture and looked at her damp fingertips. So. There were still tears inside her, after all.
“This doesn’t end here,” she told Winter. “I’ll win this for you and for Nial and Sebastian. For all of us.�
�
Then she carried her out.
* * * * *
“Now what?” Dante asked, his voice low in deference to the silence of the house and Nial’s still figure. Nial was standing, looking out the window. Rory doubted he was seeing anything. He hadn’t moved from the window in over four hours.
Sebastian was in bed. He hadn’t emerged since Dante and Sasha had put him there, when they had returned from Sylmar.
As Rory had predicted, with Nial unable to function, everyone was looking for leadership. For decisions. She had to step in for a while.
“You said you had something in mind,” Sasha said.
“I do,” Rory said. “I just can’t do it by myself. I need specific help and it doesn’t seem fair to ask any more of anyone, tonight. I was going to wait.”
“This is a war. Waiting is a luxury for times of peace,” Nial said from the window. He still didn’t move.
Rory drew in a breath, riding out her shock. “Are you sure, Nial?”
He turned to look at her. The expression in his eyes was bleak. “Will your plan win the war?”
“It might.”
“Odds?”
“About even.” She winced.
“That’s better than the odds you gave humans three weeks ago,” he pointed out. “What changed?”
“Winter sacrificed herself.”
Nial froze.
“I won’t waste what she did,” Rory added softly. “If her death can bring about victory, I think she would be happy with that.”
Nial breathed in. He let it out. “She would,” he said slowly. He moved toward the seating area, walking with a stiff gait, as though his muscles had seized up. His face was drawn. Looking at it, Rory had no trouble accepting that he was over fifteen hundred years old. It showed.
“Call everyone together,” Nial said heavily. “Then make your play.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Burbank Peak, Santa Monica Mountains.
The flat bowl in the Centre of the foothills was almost completely filled with people. Rory took in the numbers and felt a touch of awe. She had merely asked Roman how one went about calling the Serene Ones. He had said nothing of gathering hundreds together to do it.
Blood Ascendant (Blood Stone Book 5) Page 31