Damnation Marked (The Descent Series)

by Reine, SM

  They fled over the trail together, gripping one another’s hands to keep close, and the SUV pursued. Elise could imagine Malcolm driving it, grinning that manic grin he got when he was drunk on excitement instead of alcohol, and she kind of wished she had shot him before jumping.

  Sagebrush flashed past them in the night. The desert was a blur of motion, and Elise moved purely on instinct.

  The SUV began closing the distance between them.

  “This way,” Elise said, taking a fork that narrowed and twisted through rocks too large for the SUV to climb over.

  The highway waited on the other side.

  “There!” Yatam said, dragging her around a boulder to a crevice under the road. It was small—barely big enough for both of them lying down.

  They squirmed inside, shoulder-to-shoulder.

  The SUV roared toward them. The spotlight slid over their hiding place—and moved on.

  Elise held her breath as the engine noise grew. Tires splattered mud on her arm as it rushed past, but it didn’t stop. The Union hadn’t seen them dive into the hole.

  Yatam moved to climb out, but she held him back. “Wait.”

  Her heart pounded as she waited to see if they would circle around. The sound of the SUV faded into the distance.

  “Now,” he said, and they scrambled onto the empty highway.

  The SUV was still searching the hills, but it was going in the wrong direction. They stayed low to the median and continued to run.

  It was a long way back into town.

  “Were you in Reno before I summoned you?” Elise asked, the words choppy and short through her heaving breaths. He nodded. “What’s going on?”

  “The wards around all the gates have fallen, but my sister has yet to open them,” Yatam said. “I’m not certain why.”

  “I spoke to her earlier—told her I could kill her. Maybe she’s waiting for me.”

  He shook his head. “She would not wait if she knew another choice was available. She must not yet have what she needs to open the gates.”

  “There are no angels to open the gates for her.”

  “I know.”

  “But you can open them. If you had left, she wouldn’t be able to open the gates and destroy the city. She wouldn’t be able to kill herself. Instead, you are giving her exactly what she needs to achieve her goals,” Yatam said. Elise clenched her jaw and nodded. “Then why did you stay?”

  “She’s possessed my boyfriend, and I can’t exorcise him. Yatai is too powerful. He’ll die if I can’t kill her.”

  “But you’ll have to die to accomplish that,” Yatam said.

  She released his hand and ran faster.

  Under her breath, she muttered, “I know.”

  The Union had been using the freeway to evacuate people, so they hadn’t destroyed I-80 heading east out of town. But their barricades were still in position, and they were well guarded. Spotlights illuminated the road, guards paced along the barrels, and someone had clearly told them to watch for Elise, as they were scanning the night with binoculars.

  A few hundred feet away from the barricade, well beyond the edge of lights, Elise and Yatam stopped.

  She dragged a motorcycle out of a truck stopped on the westbound freeway. It was an older model Kawasaki, and it made a strange popping noise when it started, but it did start. Better still, it had two helmets.

  “Get on,” she said, tossing one to Yatam.

  He held it away from him with a finger hooked under the strap. “What is this?”

  “It’s protective gear.”

  “I am five thousand years old,” he said.

  Elise pulled her helmet over her hair, lifting the mask so she could see him. “And now you have a mortal skull that can get crushed. Put it on.”

  Yatam reluctantly obeyed and climbed on the bike behind her, hands wrapped around her waist. “Are you skilled in operating motorcycles?”

  She had ridden dirt bikes with Anthony before. It couldn’t be that different.

  “Sure. Why not?”

  Elise avoided the Union barricade by backtracking a mile and taking the Lockwood exit. She didn’t have problems balancing on the heavy motorcycle, but the tires were slick and wide in comparison to a dirt bike’s. They wobbled on the turns, the engine protested when she shifted, and it was a jerky ride down the exit ramp. Yatam’s arms locked tight around her midsection.

  They drove through the quiet, empty night, skirting Union patrols and winding toward the waiting ruins of the city.

  The air grew thick as they drove down the main street. Every inch of the ethereal ruins had turned to shadow, half of the buildings had rotted, and the smooth white bone of the gates was now obsidian. Elise paused at an empty intersection and pushed up the mask of the helmet again.

  It was quiet—too quiet, considering the way that the Union teams had been mobilizing. There should have been a fleet of SUVs and tanks and gunfire.

  But nothing moved.

  Yatam lifted a pale hand and pointed at his condominium. The top floor was ripped open, and dark energy radiated into the air. “My sister is waiting for us.”

  Elise dismounted and dropped the helmet. “Then let’s get going.”

  Her legs felt heavier with every step toward the condo.

  She was sore. She was tired. She was weak. And she didn’t want to go into that building.

  Elise stopped in front of the glass doors and tipped her head back to look at the top of the condominiums. The shadow was greatest there, like the crux of a gathering storm. The dark gate that she had fought so hard to protect was suspended over the parking garage across the street.

  She put a hand on the door to the lobby, but she didn’t open it.

  Elise closed her eyes and took a deep breath. I’m not ready to die.

  But Anthony’s family had shed enough blood for her.

  She lifted her chin, straightened her back, and stepped into the building.

  The lobby still had all the hallmarks of a high-class establishment—nice floors, the bell desk, fancy geometric paintings. But it was so much darker than the last time she had gone inside. The shadows were so deep as to be tangible, and Yatai’s presence dripped from the fashionably tan walls and the desert mural by the elevators.

  It took Elise’s eyes a moment to adjust. When they did, she realized that it was darker along the walls because there were corpses piled there—corpses in cargo pants and polo shirts. At least a dozen Union kopides.

  So that was where they had gone.

  She had to step over a boy who couldn’t have been older than seventeen to push the elevator button. It didn’t work.

  “Guess we’re walking,” she said.

  They found the stairs covered in ichor. It trickled down the steps like a waterfall, oozing off the metal banisters and sliding across the floor. Yatam climbed onto the first step, and the shadow parted to allow him to pass. “Stay close.”

  She followed on the step behind him, her face all but pressed between his shoulders, and the ichor closed behind them as they ascended.

  The climb was slow. More Union members had died in the stairwell, and they obstructed the landings. Elise tried not to look too closely at all the hardened obsidian skin as she passed. Her boots rung out on each step, muffled and flat.

  What did criminals think of on their way toward the executioner’s chair? Did they think of their crimes and the people they loved? Did they feel regret?

  Elise didn’t dare consider any of that. Instead, she counted the floors as they passed. She lost count after ten. And then she counted breaths, heartbeats, the blinks of her eyes—quantifying the gestures of her last moments.

  It felt like they climbed among the bodies and shadow all night, but it couldn’t have been longer than half an hour. Eventually, Elise’s foot sought out the next step, and didn’t find it. They had reached the topmost landing, and all that waited for them was a short hall and the door at the end.

  She stared at it, feeling numb.
r />   Something touched her hand. Elise looked down. Yatam had curled his fingers around hers. He gave her a smile that might have been comforting, coming from anyone else. “Five thousand years, Elise. It may be difficult for you to understand, but what we are doing is a blessing. You should be filled with joy.”

  She shook off his hand. “Sorry if I’m not dancing.”

  “You can face death with reluctance and tears, or you can greet it with a warm embrace,” Yatam said. “Either way, we are both about to die.”

  He pushed the door open.

  The condo was the way they had left it—roof torn open, Nügua poised over the basin, and the darkest gate across the street. The Union’s scaffolding had spread across the block and formed a honeycomb of metal over their heads. The ashen night smelled like fire and death, and a haze drifted over the wooden floors.

  But there was someone new standing there, too. Her skin shimmered with translucence, more like a specter than a woman. Her face had the same pleasant curves as Yatam’s. A satin dress the color of rubies hugged her curves.

  Yatai was wearing her true face for once. But the lone wing hanging from her shoulder blade didn’t belong to her. Half of the feathers had fallen off to bare glistening bone.

  She had affixed one of Nukha’il’s wings to her back.

  Yatai stepped forward to greet them. Brother, you look unwell.

  “Thank you.”

  I’ve waited so many years for this. Let’s be quick to greet oblivion.

  And that was it. Time to bleed.

  Elise drew one of her knives and bit back a grunt of pain as she slit open her wrist.

  Yatai’s fingers were delicate on her arm as she lifted it to her plump red lips. Her tongue darted out, sleek and slimy, as though an amphibian lived behind her teeth.

  The caress of Yatai’s flesh against hers wasn’t as sensual as Yatam’s had been. Nausea crept down Elise’s spine, and it took all her strength not to pull away as the demon tasted her.

  “Do you feel it?” Yatam asked.

  Sudden fury blanketed Yatai’s features. What is this deceit? She dropped the arm and stepped back. I feel nothing! I am unharmed!

  Her brother faltered. “Impossible. A mere taste of it weakened me perceptibly.”

  That is not the blood of a kopis. It is mundane, as flat and flavorless as dirt!

  Elise stared at her bleeding wrist.

  What had changed? Why had her blood damaged Yatam, and done nothing to Yatai?

  An image flashed to mind—the needle in her arm, and James leaning against her bed as he poured life into her veins. He might have been acquiring her abilities as kopis, but he hadn’t become a Godslayer, too. And she had taken on his blood.

  Which meant her veins ran with his power—not hers.

  “Shit,” she said.

  Yatai laughed, high and chilling, but it quickly turned to sobs. The Godslayer cannot slay gods. Am I greater than God, or is she too weak? It is the same result—I live on! She staggered toward the edge of the condo.

  “Wait!” Yatam said, stepping in front of her. “Look, sister. Look at my veins! Listen to my heart! Do you see?” But she didn’t seem to care. She gazed up at the gate with tears streaming down her cheeks. “You can’t open the gates with only a wing. It takes two marks—two angels—to open a gate. Be at peace—we can resolve this without destroying all our children!”

  Yatai turned the endless pits of her eyes on Elise.

  I do need two marks. That’s true, isn’t it?

  She threw out a hand, and shadow erupted from her fingertips.

  Darkness engulfed the side of Elise’s body. It overcame her in a rush, swarming from her fingertips to her shoulder.

  She shouted and tried to pull free, but there was nowhere to go. Yatai’s ichor clung to her like spider webs.

  Frost washed over her skin. Pain, swift and sharp, drove through her forearm.

  Something snapped like celery.

  It took Elise a moment to realize that it was her bones.

  She wrenched herself backward, and the shadow let her go. A terrible sensation ripped through the muscle and shot fire over her nerves. The tendons stretched, then tore. Elise stumbled and fell.

  Her right arm did not go with her.

  She stared at her elbow. Below it, there was nothing but a ragged stump gushing blood in time with the beating of her heart.

  Elise could move her elbow, and it made the remaining inch of arm wiggle.

  Her forearm, her wrist, her hand—all gone.

  It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt.

  Yatai stretched out her arm. The cloud of shadow briefly drifted over her, opaque and amorphous. When it dispersed, her right hand was gloved.

  Elise’s stomach lurched. That glove matched the one that was still on her left hand—black and fingerless. But Yatai hadn’t just stolen her glove. She had affixed the entire forearm to her body like Nukha’il’s drooping wing.

  There we are. Two marks, Yatai said. Thank you.

  She flapped the wing and rose into the air, perfectly balanced, as though she had a matching set.

  The pain finally caught up with Elise.

  She cried out and fell to her knees, gripping the stump tightly. It hurt—oh God, did it hurt—and she needed it to stop—but pressing her hand into the wound only made it burn worse, and letting go made it feel like she was dying, and Yatai had taken her goddamn arm—

  “We must move,” Yatam said.

  That was a lot of blood.

  Elise’s vision fuzzed. Yatam’s arm scooped her from the ground before she could fall.

  “You’re in hypovolemic shock. You’re without at least twenty percent of your normal blood volume.”

  “I can’t breathe,” she gasped. Her fingers gripped the ragged stump, slick and raw.

  “You can breathe. As I said, it’s only shock.” Yatam wrapped an arm around her waist, keeping her on her feet as they lurched toward the edge of the roof. “You’ll likely survive, with medical treatment.”

  “My arm—”

  “Yes, very unfortunate.”

  “Unfortunate?”

  Her pulse was fast but weak. Her vision blurred. She stumbled.

  James. She needed James. He could fix anything.

  Her knees gave out.

  The room flipped upside down as Yatam threw Elise over his shoulder. The rush of blood from her injuries to her skull made everything darken. “Keep the limb elevated and try not to fall,” he said. It sounded like her ears were filled with water.

  I’m drowning.

  Yatam’s body shifted under hers, and she clung to his shoulder with her good arm as he climbed the rubble that used to be his ceiling to reach the roof. Her stump smeared blood down his spine.

  The view of the ethereal ruins was excellent from the top of the condo, and hanging from Yatam’s back oriented her so that the black cobblestone streets were below her. The ruins seemed dizzyingly distant.

  Yatam approached the Union’s scaffolding and gripped one of the metal poles for balance. “Yatai!” he shouted.

  Elise twisted and saw the mother of all demons floating toward the darkest gate, her body seemingly inverted.

  Yes, brother?

  He set Elise down gently. Rolling over almost made her lose consciousness.

  Yatam stepped to the edge of the roof, arms spread wide. “I am mortal! Her blood is what I claim! You must listen to me!”

  Yatai’s crying laughter whipped over the wind.

  Are you certain?

  “Allow me to share my blood with you. We can die together!”

  She returned to him. Elise lurched to her knees, preparing for Yatai to attack again, but the demon didn’t seem concerned by the writhing of a one-armed kopis.

  Yatai wrapped her arms around Yatam, embracing her brother. Her skin was moonlight and milk against his darker flesh. He buried his face in the shadows of her hair as her hands stroked his neck and back.

  “It’s been so long, sister.�
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  Indeed it has, Yatai said. So let’s see if you’re right.

  She wrenched her arms apart.

  Yatam’s upper half severed from his hips.

  Elise wasn’t sure what she expected to be inside of him. Nightmares didn’t have organs—not like humans did. They were built of sludge and shadow. Given that Yatam had fathered all nightmares, she wouldn’t have been surprised to see him simply gush black fluid.

  But he wasn’t black on the inside. He was red—so very red.

  Viscera spilled over the cement like that of a butchered steer. His legs rolled several feet away. His upper body splattered at Elise’s feet.

  Panic surged through her. She stumbled and failed to catch herself. She slammed onto her side on the stump of her arm.

  Elise cried out.

  My brother, Yatai murmured, her voice filled with sadness and pride. My love. She kneeled in front of his torso, smoothing Elise’s gloved hand down his face. Mortal indeed, Yatam. Mortal indeed.

  She jerked his head off his shoulders. It severed with a wet crunch.

  Yatai placed his head over hers, replacing her ghostly, incorporeal face with his. Yatam’s features were so similar to hers as to be nearly indistinguishable. As soon as his ragged neck settled on her shoulders, his eyes blinked, his mouth twisted, and he smiled.

  “Good,” Yatai said in her brother’s voice. It was only a touch deeper than hers. “My brother and I will end this the way we came into the world—together. That’s the right way to do it. Don’t you think so, sword-woman?”

  The world swirled around Elise. She tried to sit up, and failed.

  Yatai swept away without waiting for a response, ascending once more on Nukha’il’s broken wing.

  Elise struggled to focus. He’s dead. She’s still opening the gates. She has two marks. I’m alone.

  The pain didn’t matter. The blood didn’t matter.

  She couldn’t let Yatai reach the gate.

  Elise crawled to the edge of the scaffolding. The ladder reaching toward the dark gate looked impossibly, nauseatingly difficult to climb with only one hand. She couldn’t do it—not with the red haze of agony clouding her mind and sight.

  She took the notebook James had given her out of her pocket. “Please, please, please,” she whispered like a mantra, focusing on the word to keep her consciousness.