by May Dawson
"Ellis," Jacob called from down the hall, his voice rough. "You sure about your plan going across the roof?"
"I'm wearing my sneakers," I called back.
"Just talked to Ryker. They left the keys in the Rover—if no one stole it—"
"It's a nice neighborhood, Jake."
"That's exactly where you go to steal. Ask me how I know. Take your mom and get out. We'll hold them off and meet you at the house."
"I'm not going without you."
"I thought we talked about you fucking listening sometimes, Princess."
"I thought we talked about you not being so fucking bossy."
"I can't go out that way," he said. "They put up wards that block out the uninvited. Including anyone with angel or demon blood. I guess they think no one wants us."
"Aw, I want you, Jakey."
"Would you go?"
I glanced at my mom, expecting her to be horrified by the angels and demons talk, but she was rubbing her wrists and seemed nonplussed.
"Why don't we all go out the back door? Take a drive together?" I asked Jacob.
"The Company has reinforcements on the way. There's a Company battle mage blocking the back. We've all got to fall back, vut first we have to get you and your mom out of here. Go, Ellis. We'll keep them busy."
"One second," I told my mom, squeezing her forearm. "I'll be right back." I glanced over her outfit; she'd been tied up in pearls and a blazer. "Put on something... sporty."
"I've got a great feeling about this," my mother said. Because I come by my cynicism naturally.
I ran down the hall, my feet pounding down the hall. Jacob stood in the hall, his sword braced in front of him easily. His tall, lean frame twisted when he heard me coming, and he quirked his lips at me.
"No goodbyes, Ellis," he said, but he shifted his sword to one hand and pressed his palm to my cheek like it was a goodbye. "I'll see you at the house tonight. You can do this on your own."
"I know," I said. I threw my arms around his neck, squeezed him, for just a second, and I felt his hard-muscled forearm catch me around the waist, squeezing me back.
I couldn't have handled this on my own a few weeks before. But I was changed already by these men and their love. And my training hadn't hurt, either.
"See you on the other side," I said.
He kissed my forehead, his soft lips skimming my hairline. He squeezed me one last time and then I felt him pull away, straightening. There was a blast downstairs; the back door being breeched.
"Get out of here, Princess. I've got your back."
He always did.
They always did.
12
"I'm not criticizing," my mother said, flinging her leg over the window jam, "But how exactly do you know it's an easy path to the ground from here?"
"I wouldn't have snuck out of your room, Mom." I balanced carefully on the roof tiles, taking a seat, and then reached back up to offer her my hand to steady her. "That just isn't practical."
She climbed out beside me and sat down heavily. She stared down the pitch of the roof, although we were sheltered here from view of the front yard. For a second, I didn't hear any gun fire, but the quiet didn't calm my rapid-beating heart. What was going on with my boys out there?
"Let's move," I said briskly, pushing down my fears for them. I began to sidle along the roof, keeping my heels braced in front of me, digging them down into the tile so I wouldn't slip. The two of us made our way along the roof to where it met the garage.
"This is where it gets wild," I told Mom.
She sighed. "You did this at least once, didn't you? This isn't just something you're making up as you go along?"
"Are you really going to be happy with either answer?" I leaned back, feeling the roughness of the roof through the thin material of my t-shirt. "Now we just have to slide on down and then it's easy to slip onto the garage roof. From there it's an easy jump to the ground."
I leaned back, wanting as much of my body against the roof as possible to slow my descent, and then let myself start to slide. I controlled the slide carefully with my heels. I could still feel myself accelerate more than I wanted, sliding fast, just out of control. My elbow slammed into the roof. The skin peeled off my elbow against the rough roof tiles. I bit down hard on my lip, stifling a cry as my skin burned away; I couldn't afford to draw attention to us.
When I was close to the edge, I threw my head back and my arms out, using every bit of my body to stop my motion. My feet rocked against the rain gutter, but the gutter held. I scrambled back up slightly, getting myself securely on the edge of the roof with my feet planted. From here, I could see the edge of the chimney that more-or-less blocked us from view, and I could see massed black vans and trucks that lied FBI. Because, you know, that was definitely how the FBI rolled. How stupid did they think the neighbors were?
I looked back up for my mom, ready to gesture her down, but she was already sliding. Her stiff blond blow-out was blown back by the breeze as she slid, and her teeth were gritted, as if in pain. I reached out to stop her momentum. I slammed my arm across her chest the same way she used to throw an arm up if she had to stop suddenly when she was driving.
"You never did this before, did you?" she hissed.
"I was a good girl. But I thought about it a lot." I swiveled my body, ready to make the jump onto the roof, and glanced back. No one seemed to have sighted us.
So I let my feet dangle for just one second over the garage roof, before I planted my feet against the siding to give myself more momentum. Before my common sense and my fears could kick in, I jumped.
The garage roof was almost flat. And I almost stuck the landing.
I went down hard on one knee, but I scrambled to my feet immediately. I turned around to check on my mom, shaking off the pain. I could feel how it had jarred all the way up my kneecap through my thigh. I knew that tonight, it would be sore, and one of the boys would kiss it tenderly until all the pain faded away. So I backed away stiffly and gestured my mom forward.
She jumped down. For a second, she was suspended in the air, all grace, like I thought of my mom. Then she landed hard and stumbled forward. I dove forward to catch her.
"Thank you," she said, as I held her by the elbows, steadying her on the roof. There was wonder on her face when her eyes met mine. "What did they teach you at that school, anyway?"
"Not much," I said, already turning to make my way across the roof. We had one more jump to make and then the run for the car ahead of us.
But that wasn't true. At the asylum, I'd discovered who I was meant to be, even if it took longer for me to grow into the Lilith. Even if I still hadn't finished growing. As evidenced by how many things I'd fucked up lately with the Nimshi situation.
This jump was going to be ugly with my knee. I winced as I jumped, knowing it was going to hurt when I came down. I twisted in mid-air, taking the impact more heavily on my left leg. I landed awkwardly and sat down abruptly in the grass. Pain arched through my knee, but I was already pushing myself up on my feet again, turning to check on my mom.
She jumped down next to me, stumbled forward, but caught herself.
I grabbed her hand in mine. Together, the two of us took off running through the neighbor's yard. I heard someone shout behind us, but we were turning around the neighbor's house. I could hear my mom's breathing, fast and shallow, beside me as we ran for the Rover.
We reached it just as one of the Company men burst into the yard behind us. "Get in," I yelled at my mom.
I turned back. Fire. Fire. Fire! I told myself frantically. I could feel equally frantic bursts of heat against my palms, but when I raised them to attack, the wisps of fire seemed to puff out.
I saw the barrel of a gun pointed my way, but then suddenly it was gone. A second Company man knocked the gun sideways. "We have to take her alive!"
Right. That good old tactical advantage.
I closed my eyes as they ran toward me, imagining a dark room, a boy's lips on my thr
oat, the flicker of a flame on the nightstand, the sweet scent of fresh grass or sawdust or sour wine. My boys.
And my hands were full of flame.
I threw the fireballs, one after the other, straight and hard. One of the men juked hard to one side, falling to the ground; the other fireball lit up the other man's shirt, and he screamed, trying to beat down the flames.
I threw myself into the driver's side of the car, slamming my door shut, before they could get themselves together again.
My mom had already climbed into the passenger seat, and she was already leaning over to twist the key in the ignition.
"Get us out of here, Ellis," she said.
"You never liked how fast I drive," I said, putting the car into drive, pressing my foot against the ignition.
I felt the force of our momentum push me into the back of my seat. The back of the car fishtailed.
"I'll give you a pass today," she said. "Listen, there's one thing I need to tell you in case, God help us, we don't get another chance to talk."
"We will," I said. "I have it on good authority God is on my side. In some grand, overarching sense, anyway. Even if He never helps me find my keys, not once."
"What happened to Ash isn't your fault," she said. "It was mine. I just didn't know it then."
My lips parted in surprise. I didn't know what to say to that, so I just said, "I've got to get us to the highway."
That was what I wanted to hear most in life since my sister died. It isn't your fault.
"I should have known the Company would come after you two," she said. "I was stupid. I should've run with you, fast and far. I thought I could keep you safe."
"Mom, what are you talking about?" I took our turn too hard, and as I swayed forward, desperately hanging onto the steering wheel, I realized I should really put my seatbelt on.
"Seatbelt," Mom reminded me sternly, pulling her own seatbelt across her chest. She glanced in the rear-view mirror and her eyes widened. "We've got company."
"Literally," I said. I yanked my seatbelt across my lap, clipping in. "What's going on, Mom?"
I took another right, and then realized that in the blur of adrenaline, I'd taken the wrong turn. We were heading toward the park, not the on-ramp for the highway.
There was a black "FBI" van right on our bumper.
I stomped on the accelerator. The car's speed climbed to its max, the needle at the far right. The world was a wild blur around me. We just had to get through the park and then I could take a left out onto a main street, and we would be within a mile of the highway.
The tires popped.
The noise was incredibly loud in my ears, and then the car began to slide sideways, out of my control.
"Hang on," I told my mom, at the same time she said, "Hang on."
We glanced at each other for one long second. There was nothing else to do, anyway, as the car began to roll, sliding down the embankment to our right. A grove of trees seemed to loom large ahead of us through the window.
"I've got bad luck for car accidents," I said.
"You're still alive," Mom said. "Can't be all bad."
Let’s hope.
The car tipped over to one side, and then rolled. I squeezed my eyes shut, determined not to black out this time. I had to protect my mom. I had to get on the run again. If the Company took me, I would fight them; I would never give Mr. Joseph what he wanted. But if they captured my mom, it was a different story. I wouldn't stand to see her tortured if I could help it, just like I would never have let anything happen to Jacob if I'd been able to prevent it.
I held onto the steering wheel so tightly that my hands ached, and I felt my body tumble back and forth in the seat helplessly, thrown against my seatbelt. My head was heavy and my neck ached. I think I screamed.
But if I did, I don't think my mom could hear me over the sound of her own screams .
Just stay awake. Just keep breathing.
Just hope you're still God's unlikely favorite, the one He won't let die easily.
13
When the car came to a stop, we were upside down. The belt against my lap and chest hurt, since all my body weight was suspended by it; I could feel the space between my ass and the seat as I hung forward. Knowing the fall was going to hurt, I reached down, fumbling along the seatbelt until I found the buckle. I pushed it down. My angle was awkward, and I had to try again, wrapping my hand around the buckle and pressing the button with more force.
The seatbelt fell away from me. I slammed into the fabric ceiling of the car. I felt like a tumble of limbs as I tried to get my door open, but it was bent in and crumpled. No matter how frantically I pushed, I couldn't get it open.
Mom groaned as she reached for the door handle. She pulled on it and then pushed, and I saw the door give slightly.
"Undo your seatbelt," I said, reached over the center console to try to help her. I unbuckled the clasp. She threw her hands out to try to catch herself on the ceiling below, but fell on the side of her neck with her legs against the window. She groaned again and, since her legs were on the window, she kicked the door open.
"They'll be right behind us," I said. "We've got to move."
"How did they get ahead of us?" she asked, already crawling out of the car. I crawled behind her.
"I think they used magic to pop the tires."
"Magic," she repeated.
"I'll catch you up and you can tell me all about how Ash wasn't my fault," I promised her. "In the mean time..."
I glanced over my shoulder. A black FBI van parked at the edge of the street, and the doors flew open.
I reached out and grabbed her arm. Together, the two of us limped desperately for the cover of the woods.
The highly flammable woods.
I was terrified of setting my hometown ablaze, but I couldn't think of anything to do besides hunker down while we waited for the boys to come to our rescue. And, in the meantime, to turn anyone who threatened us into barbecue.
We crossed a long yellow-green field, the waving grass up to our knees. I looked back over my shoulder, trying to keep moving, and saw a handful of men fanning out behind us, guns drawn. Their FBI jackets looked pretty convincing from here.
"You're going to be the talk of the town," I told Mom. "All the neighbors will want to know what you were doing in that house. Go ahead of me, they won't shoot me."
She looked at me in alarm, so I grabbed her shoulder and gently nudged her forward slightly, putting my own body between her and the men chasing us. I was slow anyway. My knee was stiff, but adrenaline kept the pain at bay. I kept tripping on the rough terrain, my knee locking up on me every time as red-hot pain ripped up my thigh. Eventually, this knee was going to bring me down to the ground.
But hopefully I could get us some cover before that.
We reached the tree line, where evergreens and maples intermingled, the maples in full green bloom. We ran into the woods, and when I looked back, all I could see was the tangle of tree limbs and seemingly endless tree trunks. But I knew they were there.
"Help should be on the way," I told my mom, even though I didn't know what kind of state the boys were in. Terrible things flashed through my mind. How lucky did they have to be to all come through a battle like that unscathed? The thought made my chest tighten. I reached out to knock on a tree trunk, even though I've never been superstitious.
"What kind of help?" Mom asked. "As far as I could tell, that was Bad Guys Vs. Worse."
"Sorry they tied you to a chair."
"They duct-taped me. That's a step below tying."
"Well, you haven't changed either. Always a customer service complaint." I grabbed her elbow and tugged her along with me to one side, where an old stone wall had crumbled into disrepair. Quickly we loped along it, finding the place where the wall was tallest, almost up to my waist.
We couldn't keep running. I could barely stay up on this knee. I turned and caught her elbow, ducking low to hide behind the fence and pulling her down to hide wi
th me. "We'll take a stand here."
"Take a stand," she repeated. "I shouldn't have let you watch all those action movies."
I hunkered down behind the wall and watched the quiet woods in front of us. The wind rustled the leaves of the trees.
"How do I help?" Mom asked.
"Just trust me," I said. I felt a pang, thinking about my mom throwing me out of the house for the same powers I was using now. "And then don't disown me."
She winced. "Ellis. I'm sorry."
"It's all right, Mom." I didn't know if it was or not, really. I felt so much having my mom hug me again. But I didn't have the time to process any of it.
Let's just say it's all right for now, and survive to figure out the feelings later.
I heard a twig break out in the woods, a sharp crack like it had snapped under someone's boot. "Get down," I mouthed to my mom.
She ducked beneath the line of the stones. I ducked too, holding my hands out in front of me with my palms up. I closed my eyes so I could shut out my mother watching me, and my own worries about what she would think. But in the darkness behind my eyelids, images of what could be happening to the boys right now bloomed. I shook my head to myself, trying to clear away my fears. Worrying wouldn't help them right now.
I thought of the fire pit behind their house, crackling away, throwing orange sparks into the night air. My boys sitting around it, drinking beer out of amber bottles, bantering with each other. So much love and so little of it said between them, but still, the warmth was always there.
And the warmth was in my palms, too. Mom gasped.
I opened my eyes.
"I hardly ever set things on fire by accident now," I whispered. "But sometimes, I do it on purpose."
I knelt, favoring my right knee, and popped my head back up over the wall.
Just in time to see the first man step out from behind a tree, only twenty feet away from me.
I cocked my arm back just as his eyes found me. His eyes grew wide. He ducked to one side, but it was too late. I'd already launched the fireball through the air.