I froze as the goblet finished devouring the heart and blood, seeming to swallow it through the small hole at the base of the chalice. Then a line of purple fire raced up the wall in front of us, outlining a door.
Once fully outlined, it began to open away from us with a long, sinister groan, revealing a void of complete and utter darkness.
I shivered, sharing a look with Beckett. He smiled nervously. “Ladies first?” he asked.
Despite everything, I smiled, and stood. Then, just to be safe, I grasped his hand and led him through the doorway. Darkness swallowed us, so complete that I couldn’t even see what we were standing on, but it crunched and shifted underfoot like piles of bones.
The psychotic voices from earlier returned with a vengeance – louder and more insistent – but beneath them all was a deep, dark laughter, as if I had just done the stupidest thing in the world.
I gritted my teeth and led Beckett onward into blackness.
Because there was no longer a doorway behind us…
Chapter 29
After only a dozen seconds of walking across the unseen bones – because I had been counting out loud in my head to distract myself from the voices – we were suddenly standing in a large stone room. The walls were massive gray blocks adorned with torches that flickered with purple flames. Every piece of furniture was ancient and simple, as if we were in some hellish version of an old European castle.
Beckett was muttering under his breath, sounding as if he was praying – or at least thanking god for getting him out of that darkness and the voices.
I gasped, falling to my knees and clutching my head.
My vision rippled violently, shaking, distorting, and jerking like I was seeing through the lens of a falling camera as it crashed down a flight of stairs. The whispers and laughter from the darkness returned with a vengeance, loud enough to physically hurt my ears. Then they were gone, the abrupt silence making my ears pop.
My vision suddenly steadied, but I was no longer seeing the room.
I saw a vision of Kansas City. And then St. Louis. They alternated back and forth, a few seconds at a time in one continuous stream. Both cities blazed – flames as far as the eye could see – and chain gangs of humans shambled in the streets, eyes downcast, chains dragging across broken pavement, and their backs bleeding.
Massive demons – scaled, slimy, fiery, or with skin like stone – whipped and bloodied the humans, laughing at their torment as they forced them to walk in circles for no reason.
The fear from the humans was palpable, but so was their hopelessness. They were broken.
I fell to my knees and did something I couldn’t remember doing in years.
I prayed.
I closed my eyes and began to beg. Not for myself. But for those below me in the cities – those bleeding, crying out, living a life of despair… Those forgotten, broken souls.
I begged, sobbed, and pleaded for someone, anyone to give their strength, confidence, and hope back to them – to remind them what they were…
Beautiful Miracles.
Warriors.
Mankind.
I don’t even know what I asked for after that. It was just an unconscious stream of words and emotion given sound – fueled by my outrage and protected by my heart.
My back began to burn in twin straight lines, my muscles aching and on fire as if I had been whipped across my shoulder blades, or as if someone had poured salt into an open wound. I ignored it, using the pain to shout louder, beg harder, love more.
And as I lifted my eyes, crying, screaming, and grasping the earth with my fingernails, every single demon below looked up with a unified snarl, glaring at me with undying hatred. And the humans woke up, shaking their heads from a daze.
Beyond the skylines of the flickering cities – still alternating back and forth repeatedly – I suddenly saw a giant mountain that didn’t exist in the real world. The impossibly tall peak was ringed in white flame and black clouds.
And like an arrow from a bow, five black lances suddenly flashed down the mountain like racing snakes. Faster than possible, they were at the base of the mountain, and hurtling towards the cities, and the demons spun away from me, screaming in outrage at the oncoming lines of darkness as they formed a flying V formation. With a bell that seemed to shake the world, the two forces met, and existence exploded.
I cried out, gasping as I lay in someone’s lap, back in the stone room, no longer seeing the terrifying vision.
Beckett was stroking my hair, murmuring prayers of his own and rubbing my shoulders urgently, as if trying to calm me. I let out a shaky breath, staring at the room.
“What…” I whispered, unable to sit up straight.
“I have no fucking idea. You fell to your knees and began to pray like the world was ending. You looked like you were being attacked, and that you were fighting.”
“How could I look like I’m fighting while on my knees?” I asked, frowning.
He was silent for a long second. “I… have no idea, but I don’t know how else to describe it. You looked like you were being beaten… But your back was straightening, defying the pain, and your voice kept getting louder and louder, until you were screaming and laughing at the end.”
I relaxed, lying back into his lap. My abdominal muscles ached, as if I had just performed a thousand crunches, and my back was on fire. I looked up at him to find crusted blood around his ears. I flinched, rolling off of him awkwardly and clumsily to grip his cheeks, staring at his ears.
He shrugged, smiling weakly. “You were really loud…” he repeated. “I’m fine, though.”
“I… made your ears bleed?” I asked incredulously. “What was I shouting?”
He shrugged, frowning at me. “I don’t speak Latin, so I have no idea. But at the end you were repeating one word over and over and over.” He met my eyes curiously. “Caballarii,” he said, furrowing his brows.
I blinked at him, keeping my face studiously blank. “Must have been something I heard a Sister say or something,” I said absently.
He studied me thoughtfully, but finally climbed to his feet, helping me to mine. I could read his eyes. He didn’t buy my answer. But he also knew he was out of his depths, and I was his mentor in this brave new world.
I sure didn’t feel like it.
I shoved the word from my mind, wanting to get the hell out of here. I felt like I needed a shower. Because for the second time now, I felt like someone had used me for a mouthpiece, speaking through me.
I shivered, and turned back to the room.
It looked like a terrorist cell. Books, news clippings, religious artifacts, and printouts from random websites were pinned to the wall, strewn about a desk, or lying on the floor.
Several pictures were also pinned to the wall, and I recognized one of them.
Nate Temple.
I shied away from that, but mentally took snapshots of some of the other pictures. Then I heard Beckett taking pictures with his phone. I wondered why I hadn’t thought of that.
He shrugged. “Habit,” he admitted, and then continued clicking away.
I met him with a stern stare. “This isn’t a police case. Swear not to share this information with anyone but me or someone I tell you to share it with.” His forehead creased – not in retaliation – but in thought, as if wondering why I would want to keep it secret. “Or I will burn your phone to ashes right now.”
He finally nodded. “I didn’t plan on sharing it. The layout is important, and can show you things later after you review the items individually. This is a workspace, so the positioning of the items is vitally important to… whoever the hell owns this place.” His face paled. “Also, I don’t fancy returning here. Ever.”
I didn’t look away. “Anyone who sees those images will likely be a target.”
He nodded. “It’s my burner phone, anyway. I wouldn’t use my personal phone for something like this.” And then he continued taking pictures.
I watched him. That
was smart. To think to use the burner over his personal phone, and yet I hadn’t seen him consciously give it any thought. I was beginning to believe that having Beckett around would be incredibly beneficial. He was more competent than most Freaks I knew.
I turned back to the walls, studying them, trying to get a feel for them, imagining Johnathan sitting here, working on… whatever this was.
After Beckett had taken a few pictures, I shuffled through some of the papers and found a large glossy picture of me standing at the steps of Abundant Angel Catholic Church, talking to Roland. But it was clear from the focus that I was the centerpiece of the picture. Roland was simply in the picture with me. The demon photographer had even caught me fully facing him, looking at the camera, which made me shiver.
I couldn’t tell when the picture had been taken, but it had to be fairly recent.
I prowled the room, approaching another wall that was full of maps. I recognized one as Kansas City. Lines broke the city into five separate areas, almost like territories. A picture of Abundant Angel was pinned in place with an ancient bone blade, but seemed to be outside of the five territories.
I turned to another map to realize it was St. Louis. A large picture of Nate with the word DIE!! written with red sharpie under his name, and a bunch of clippings about his companies hung above the map His city was divided into many more territories than Kansas City – several of them had an angry X marked through them, and some lines had been scribbled out as if combining two territories together.
A sharpie between the two maps had been used to write directly on the wall.
WHY MISSOURI???
It was written in a very angry looking script, and in very big letters.
Beckett took a picture of it, and then several of the maps. He placed his hands on his hips, frowning at a desecrated bible on the ground. “I don’t think God—”
As if the word was a catalyst, the table erupted in flames. Black, hungry flames.
I grabbed onto Beckett’s shirt, shoving him ahead of me towards the door…
That was no longer there. In fact, there were no doors in the room. Why hadn’t I noticed that earlier?
Feeling the flames at my back roar as they trebled in size, I stared at our shadows on the empty stone wall, desperately scanning for a crack that would mark the door. I noticed Beckett’s eyes widen as he stared over my shoulders, but judging by the heat, I didn’t need to turn to look. The fire had grown in size, and was about to engulf us. I stared at the wall one last time, and was surprised to find an altogether new shadow on the wall – great big wings, as if a demon was standing right behind us.
Amira.
With no other ideas, and not wanting the demon to slice off my head, I Shadow Walked us out of the room, fearing that it might not work as I planned, judging by how we had gotten here in the first place.
Chapter 30
I stood in the center of a worn, wide, stone bridge. The night sky was a smothering blanket of black, but tiny, faint pinpricks of stars struggled to pierce that veil. The bridge stretched before me and ended in a circle of stone.
Where a throne of smoke wavered.
A shadowed figure sat on the throne, but through the shadows I saw flashes of yellow fire, and great big black wings tucked behind it.
A familiar, feminine voice chuckled with amusement.
I realized, for the first time, that Beckett was gone. I spun to look for him behind me and saw that the bridge extended the same distance back to another circular ring of stone, but the sky was blue, blinding, and full of life. In the center of the stone ring sat a throne of glass, almost transparent enough to miss, as if made of air.
I turned back and forth, from night to day, blinking in disbelief. The line of demarcation was right where I stood on the bridge.
Nothing existed beneath the bridge, just more open sky – night or day.
When I turned back to the demon, she was standing. And she was very, very big. More so than the last time I had seen her. Amira. The first time I had seen her had been in an alley outside the church. She had been shrouded in yellow fog with white hot claws. But it seemed to have been a less vibrant version of her true self.
She was now swathed in yellow flame, her hair fanning out from her head as if she was underwater. Despite the flickering, dancing flames, it was pretty clear to recognize her very feminine form by contours and emphasis – like one could see a burning coal through the flames of a bonfire. From the hips up, she was a hauntingly beautiful woman, but from the hips down she was a goat, the flames actually flickering downward as if mimicking fur. Her cloven hooves were huge, easily the circumference of my head.
“Your toy is safe. For now…” she purred as if talking to a startled puppy.
I squared my shoulders and faced her. Finally, I had my proof that she was still in town. She’d been hiding from me like a little bitch. “You’ll pay for what you’ve done. Stealing the Spear—”
Amira simply cleared her throat, and then grinned with lips of brighter fire than the rest of her face. Her eyes seemed to be focused on my hip. I glanced down to see that I was holding a blinding white spear in my fist, as if made of freshly bleached bone.
I blinked down at it, almost gasping and releasing it in shock.
And I also realized I wasn’t wearing my clothes from earlier. I wore a fashionably short coat designed from straps and patches of leather. The garment was liberally laced with straps and buckles, making me look vaguely dystopian. It also looked like armor. At least thick enough to be armor. I wore similar leather pants and worn, distressed leather boots.
I looked back at the spear, considering. As I looked closer, I saw that the white was infected with veins of black, like tiny fractures across two sections…
As if the weapon was about to break… or had been broken…
Into three separate pieces.
Although somehow re-forged, it still looked weak, as if about to break, or struggling to hold itself together.
I slowly lifted my head to stare at Amira, who was nodding hungrily. “The Spear of Longinus…” she whispered adoringly. “I can still smell Johnathan’s blood on you…” her eyes seemed to roll back into her head and she let out a moan of satisfaction.
“Let’s finish this,” I said in a low tone. “Wouldn’t want you to spend too much time away from your Master, Johnathan.”
The demon blinked at me, and then began to laugh. “Master? Ha! I have only one Master, girl. And He is not Johnathan,” she spat reproachfully. Literally spat, sending a glob of acidic phlegm onto the stone at her feet where it sizzled and crackled, eating through the rock.
“I don’t give two shits who your master is, Amira. But I still want to send you back to that naughty place. Like I did with Johnathan,” I said, stepping closer. As I did, the spear vibrated in my fist, the black veins – like black rings around the wood – began to grow more severe. I took a hasty step back, and the spear stopped vibrating. But the black veins did not recede. Taking even a single step closer to Amira had hurt the weapon. The Holy Spear that had stabbed Jesus on the Cross. Which was somehow in my hands. Was this another vision, or was this real? If so, how?
I took another step back, and this time, the spear began to grow slightly brighter around the black veins, as if healing. I smiled, trying to take another step back, but a sudden presence prevented me, like a wall at my spine. I glared up at Amira, and she nodded slowly.
“My house, my rules,” she said. I simply glared back. She had a point. I had no idea where we were, but I could guess a general location. “Now, as fun as it would be to watch you destroy the Spear by trying to attack me – and I won’t be letting you step backwards to heal it – we are at an impasse. You were fun, at first, distracting my competition, Johnathan. But now, you are merely a nuisance. I think I will kill a few more of your church mice, first. But a quick death won’t do for you. No, you need a grander farewell.”
“What are you talking about, bitch?” I seethed.
> Instead of answering my question, she continued on as if I hadn’t spoken. “How does tomorrow evening sound? Midnight.” She leaned forward conspiratorially. “Well, technically, that’s Noon for me,” she said with an amused laugh. “Meet me at the old Kansas City Bread Factory.” I knew the place. It was now a blighted area of town, having shut down a long time ago. The perfect place for a scrap. “I’ll have a present for you. You should bring one for me, too. Maybe that policeman. He looks positively delicious.” Her fiery eyes grew thoughtful. “As a matter of fact, maybe I’ll bring the policeman…”
I began panting, gathering my power to unleash on the demon, reaching for that cracked door.
The next thing I knew, I was falling, and other than the wind whipping my ears, all I heard was laughter echoing around me like I was in a cavern.
Down, down, down…
I struck something hard and muscular, which grunted at the impact, sending us both down to the ground in an awkward tangle of limbs. I blinked, wondering why it was so hot since the sun was so low in the sky.
A firm hand grabbed me by the shirt and lifted me up. I stared into Beckett’s panicked eyes, and behind him, the entire mansion was in flames.
“What happened?” I rasped, my throat dry. I glanced down at my hand, but saw no spear, which made me very, very uneasy. Had it been my imagination? Amira tricking me?
“I landed here as soon as you did your teleporting—”
“Shadow Walking,” I corrected absently, staring up at the burning mansion, watching as timbers cracked and fell, sending sparks and flame up into the air to join the columns of thick, black smoke in the sky. I heard sirens in the distance, and almost flinched in terror. Then I realized we had at least a few minutes, maybe more before they arrived.
“Fine. Shadow Walking,” Beckett said. “I appeared here, but you were gone. The house went up in flames. You’ve been gone at least an hour! It’s almost seven o’clock. I’ve been yelling your name over and over. I could hear you talking, but I couldn’t find you. What the hell were you doing hiding from me?”
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