Elysium Girls

by Elysium Girls (retail) (epub)

  But Zo was looking in a different direction.

  From the north, a storm was rolling in, miles high and wide as the horizon. In the distance, Elysium’s sirens blared, the echoes rising like birds and getting lost in the roar of dust.

  Deep within me, the old fear rose. My blood went cold. My breath began to come in gulps. My heart felt like a canary, clanging against my rib cage, desperate to escape.

  “Shit!” said Zo. “Shit! Shit! Shit! We’ve got to go!”

  We sprang into action, pulling bandannas and dust masks over our faces, looking for cover, as our horses stood, eerily still and unspooked by the coming storm.

  “Everyone take cover!” Judith said.

  “There is no cover!” Cassandra shouted.

  With Mowse behind her, tying her homemade dust mask, Susanah worked trying to tighten our horses’ screws. “Come on, come on, come on!” she said. There was a spark, and she jerked her hand back. The horses’ lightbulbs blinked, then went out completely. “Shit! The static electricity! We’re stranded!”

  My breath came in short, sharp spurts. My knees shook, threatening to buckle. What were we going to do? What could we do? Dust Dome. It was our only chance. But I couldn’t cast that spell. Not like last time. I ran to Asa on the ground.

  “Asa!” I shouted. “Asa, wake up! There’s a dust storm!” I shook him, but he would not wake. And without Asa, what could I do?

  The wall of dust roared closer.

  “You know Dust Dome, right?” Olivia said, her voice carefully steady. “Pulvarem something… you got the stuff for it?”

  “Last time I couldn’t do it!” I said. “Asa had to help me, and look at him!”

  “We’ll do it together, all right?” said Olivia, her eyes on the wall of dust blackening the sky.

  “But you don’t have any power!” I said, yelling now over the wind.

  “I can copy yours!” she shouted. “Come on! We don’t have much time!”

  I nodded, my throat dry. With shaky hands, I began mixing the ingredients. Hare’s blood and fur, seashell dust and eggshells. I gave half to Olivia, and she followed my example, smearing it on her hands. The wall of dust roared closer, the air suddenly cold and full of electricity. The horses’ eyes blinked crazily. The girls got down, putting their hands over their heads, securing their dust masks and bandannas. Susanah put her body over Mowse’s.

  I closed my eyes. This is it. I can do this. I have to do this. I reached out a bloody hand to Olivia. She took it, and I felt the magic surge as we raised our joined hands to the sky.

  “PULVAREM FIRMAMENTUM!” we shouted, the magic flowing through us and out of us and into the sky. The clear dome of magic rose around us, high and tall and broad, doubly strong with both of our magic, and as the black dust spewed and flowed over everything, all went dark and quiet, the roar of the storm silenced by the dome. Darkness. Silence. I felt for all the world like we’d been thrust underwater, and the only sound to be heard was the frantic, painful beating of my heart, the rasp of my breath, and the endless pleading of my mind. Please let it hold, please let it hold, please let it hold.

  But then the magic surged between us. Everything went black—darker than black—and I knew that a vision was happening, just as it had with Asa, just as it had with Trixie. I was seeing Olivia’s truth, and I was powerless to stop it.

  It was dark, nighttime, in a house that I knew. Someone was very close, and a female voice was whispering in the dark.

  “Me lastimó, Olivia… no dejes que… no dejes que me lastime…”

  Olivia’s voice answered her, shaking with quiet rage. “No lo dejaré, Rosa. Nunca te lastimará de nuevo… te lo prometo.”

  And as Olivia began to softly sing a Spanish lullaby, Rosa began to cry, a pitiful, heartbreaking whimper.… My mind reeled. I had heard this voice before. I had heard this crying only weeks ago.…

  And it was over. Just like that, it was over. We stumbled, dizzy, our hold on each other breaking. Then we looked up. Above us, the Dust Dome stood, holding strong and sure, even under the strain of the storm. Despite all my fear, despite the storm and all its howling, it held.

  “You heard that.…” Olivia gasped. “You heard…?”

  “I didn’t mean to…” I panted, my brain hurting with magic and confusion. “I wasn’t trying to.”

  “I know,” she said. “I know you didn’t mean to. Just forget about it, all right?”

  There was no malice in her voice. Still, we didn’t look at each other. I had seen something so intimate, so private, that it didn’t matter if it was an accident or not. But, more than that, I couldn’t look at her, not knowing what I knew, not if what I was guessing was true.

  “All right,” I said.

  The only light came from the horses’ eyes flickering on and off, and in that ghostly glow, the other girls were crawling out of their protective balls, pulling their dust masks and bandannas down and looking up at the swirling darkness overhead.

  “This is your magic,” Olivia said. “We did it, Sal.”

  Pride bloomed in my chest where disbelief had been only moments before. We had done it. Exhausted, I sunk to my knees in the dust. And as the dust raged, impotent beyond the shimmering dome of our magic, I let myself smile.

  Asa woke and squinted upward. He could see that they were in what looked like a big fishbowl with howling darkness all around. Dust Dome, he remembered. Sal must have cast it—without him this time. She must be so proud, he thought, smiling. Craning his neck, he looked for her and found her soon enough, sitting around a fire with the other girls, looking even more thoughtful and far away than she usually did. Her hands were stained with blood, and so were Olivia’s. Olivia must have helped cast it. At that moment, Olivia must have felt his eyes on her, because she looked down at him and smiled. He felt a surge of what he knew by now was deep affection, and did his best to smother it back down. But, he thought sadly, what did it matter now anyhow, now that he’d already been disarmed and blown so far off course that his mission was all but impossible to complete?

  Above him, the mechanical horses stood in a row, their eyes glowing uniformly again. In the flickering light, he saw that his arm had gone completely daemon. Beneath his shirt, he could feel that some of his chest had too. He focused some magic and slid the human illusion down over the daemon parts again. It was secure now that he was well-rested, but it felt flimsier this time. If he was honest with himself, it had been getting less and less reliable, and he knew it would continue to do so as the end drew near. But he didn’t want to think about that right now. So he didn’t. Instead, he got up, dusted himself off as well as he could, and went to join the girls by the fire.

  “Well, look who just woke up,” said Judith. “Morning, sunshine.”

  Zo moved over for Asa to sit next to her, but he stood, looking out the dome of magic at the swirling black dust. Something about this storm was odd. Sinister. It set his human heart beating fast and erratic, but he didn’t know why.

  “How long has this storm been going on?” he asked.

  “Over an hour,” Cassandra was saying, casually twirling a ball of light between her fingers. “It’s very strange, don’t you think?”

  “I didn’t think there was this much dust in the world, much less Oklahoma,” said Judith. “Good thing we’re out of it.”

  Asa gave the dust one last look and sat down next to Zo.

  “I’m hungry,” said Mowse, leaning against Susanah.

  “We’re going to have to do something about food soon,” Zo said. “But we can’t go out in that.”

  “We’ll just have to wait for it to stop, I guess,” said Olivia. “There’s nothing else we can do.”

  Around her, everyone looked grave. But there in the dome, Asa’s pulse quickened. There was a presence in the darkness beyond the magic. Something was out there. Something was coming. He scrambled to his feet.

  “N-no,” he stammered. “No, no, no, no, no…”

  “What’s wrong?”
said Sal. “Asa?”

  The girls rose, looking around them, confused. But Asa’s eyes were on the dust outside the dome of magic. Something was moving toward them in the darkness. Something big. And he knew who it was looking for.

  Then they saw it: eight feet tall, broad, with empty eye sockets and a wide mouth. All the air went out of Asa’s lungs.

  A Sentinel, Dust Soldier, sent by the Sisters, just as he’d been dreading. Sent to take back what Asa had been given, because he had failed. Terror seemed to set his every sinew on fire.

  Panic filled the dome like poisonous gas. Everyone rose and clutched at their weapons, palms slick with fear.

  “We’re trapped!” Judith said. “We’re trapped in here! What are we going to do?”

  “But why is it here?” Olivia asked, coming to stand next to him. “What does it want?”

  “Me,” Asa croaked, his mind pulsing with dread. “It wants me. To destroy me, because I’m no longer useful.” He gulped. “I have to go to it. I have to accept my punishment.”

  Olivia pulled a knife from her pocket and flicked it open.

  “You’re useful to us,” said Olivia. “And if it wants you, it’s gonna have to go through me.”

  She looked at the other girls. Gravely, they nodded. And, to Asa’s amazement, they formed a protective circle around him, a circle within a circle, Sal fumbling with her spell components belt, Zo with her guns, Olivia with her knife, the rest with only their bodies. They would do this for me? Asa marveled. For a daemon?

  Susanah pushed Mowse into the circle with Asa, and Asa picked her up and held her. Her small body was shaking.

  “Are we gonna be okay?” she asked.

  “Shhhh,” Asa said. “Just hold on to me, okay?”

  They stood, waiting, as it kept up its steady, silent march toward the barrier of the spell, its curved sword dark and wicked-looking even from its sheath. Then it stopped just outside the dome and looked up as though assessing it.

  “M-maybe it won’t be able to come inside,” Judith said hopefully, but Asa knew better.

  It put up its hands against the barrier, looking for a moment like a great, terrifying mime. Then it broke through the dome as if it was no more than a sheet of rainwater, and like water, the dome closed behind it. It unsheathed its sword and came forward. Gunshots rang out as Zo took aim and fired over and over. But each bullet simply disappeared into it.

  “Entflammt!” Sal shouted, sending a ball of fire shooting toward it. It stopped for a moment, but only its outsides were damaged. Sal tried another spell, hurling rocks at it with wind, but it deflected them with a frighteningly fast slice of its sword. It marched forward, never quickening its pace, never slowing as it healed from Sal’s fire spell.

  Mowse clutched Asa tightly.

  He saw Olivia tighten her grip on her knife, saw her bend her knees as if to run. He grabbed Olivia’s shoulder.

  “Are you insane?” he said. “Look at that sword! Look at its arms! You’ll be dead before you get within striking distance. Besides, their skin can’t be penetrated with magic or weapons alone.”

  “Well, what can hurt it?” Olivia hissed.

  The Dust Soldier marched closer.

  Asa racked his brains. “Back… back in the day, before I was given a body, lots of cultures wrote about great holy wars between the angels or the gods. And a lot of them talk about… what was it…” Asa snapped his fingers. “Enchanted weapons! We could enchant something… something long range… of course, it’s still eight feet tall, but…”

  “All we’ve got is a pocket knife,” said Olivia, her eyes on the Dust Soldier.

  “No,” Susanah said, her eyes full of fire. “We’ve got just what we need.”

  Without another word, Susanah broke from the circle and ran to the line of mechanical horses. She leapt up into the saddle of her own horse and began working with her screwdriver, up and down the horse’s back.

  The Sentinel advanced, its eerie eyes on Asa, its pace steady, unhurried. Asa’s palms sweated.

  Up on Susanah’s horse, there was a metallic shing sound, and they turned to see Susanah pull a long, pointed metal pole out of the horse’s spine. Already, it glowed with a strange blue light.

  “How’s this for an enchanted spear?” Susanah shouted.

  “My magic…” Asa said. “Of course!”

  “Yah!” Susanah said, kicking it into action. The horse was rattlier than usual, seeming as though it might fall apart without the piece Susanah took from it, but Susanah paid no mind. It reared in a soundless, mechanical whinny, and they galloped toward the Dust Soldier, Susanah on its back, holding the spear out in front of her like a knight. Asa held his breath, not daring to let himself hope. There was a clang as it blocked her first attack with its sword. She made her horse rear, then turned and pivoted, bringing the spear up. She tried it again, but the Dust Soldier lashed out with the flat of his blade, knocking her horse on its side with an enormous crash. Susanah leapt off as it fell, taking the spear with her, and faced the Dust Soldier down.

  “Susanah!” Mowse cried. She struggled out of Asa’s arms and ran into the fray.

  “We’ve got to help her! Come on!” Zo said.

  They ran forward, Zo, Judith, and Olivia grappling onto the mechanical horses, trying to undo metal poles of their own from the horses’ spines.

  The Dust Soldier kept on in its dogged pursuit of Asa.

  Then Cassandra muttered something, threw some dust, and suddenly there were six Asas, all equally terrified. They shuffled themselves like cards on top of his own image, then flew to different sides of the dome. The Dust Soldier stopped and watched them, confused. The others, glowing metal poles in hand, galloped to join Susanah. They jabbed and thrust at the Dust Soldier as it slashed at Susanah. Susanah swung her makeshift spear at it, and their blades locked.

  “Help me hold its sword!” Susanah grunted, her arms straining. “Then get it, Judith! We have to protect Asa!”

  The girls charged forward, and Olivia leapt off her horse, adding her spear to the weight of Susanah’s, pushing the sword down. From behind them, on horseback, Judith raised her spear overhead, and Asa held his breath as she threw it like a javelin. It flew, spearing the Dust Soldier straight through the chest. It dropped to its knees, clutching the weapon. There was a flare of magic, and then, to Asa’s astonishment, it began to come apart, to dissolve, until the Dust Soldier was no more than a pile of black dust on the ground with the wickedly curved scimitar lying like a metallic smile in the middle of it. And all went silent again. Outside, the dust storm thinned and cleared altogether, leaving the day as bright as it had been.

  And it was over.

  Gasping, Asa fell to his knees, hardly daring to believe what had happened, what had been done for him. They had done the unthinkable. They had destroyed a Dust Soldier, and they had done it for him. A daemon would never, could never. They just weren’t capable of something like that, not for someone else. That was something completely and utterly human.

  That is how I want to be, Asa realized then. That is what I want to be. Human like that.

  And then they were on him, hugging him, screaming.

  “You’re safe now!” Mowse said, wrapping her arms around his neck. “You’re safe, Asa!”

  “They’re gonna have to try harder than that if they want to take you from us.” Olivia smiled at him, and Asa’s heart beat so hard he was afraid it would leap out of his chest.

  “What’s Susanah up to over there?” he heard Cassandra say.

  Across the dome, Susanah was standing over the pile of black dust, looking down at it. He saw her spit into her hand, then reach down and mix her spit with the black Sentinel dust.

  “What are you doing, Suze?” Judith said.

  “We won,” Susanah said, a strange tone in her voice. “My horse and I. We won our first battle.”

  She spread the black dust and spit mixture over the palm of her hand, then pressed it to her horse’s flank, leaving a black ha
ndprint stark against the metal.

  “Black is for victory,” Mowse explained softly.

  Susanah stood back and admired it, her expression one of deepest pride. “Come on,” Susanah said. “Let’s head back home.”

  CHAPTER 20

  1 WEEK

  AND

  1 DAY

  REMAIN.

  The nightmare returned again that night, blazing and terrifying and worse than it had ever been before. This time, I had seen the people of Elysium leaving the city and running from the flame. Trixie had been among them, and her aunt and uncle, but the flames had caught them and swallowed them whole. Only Mother Morevna stood between the city and the flames, but as I watched, the flames began to climb her long black dress, and as the skin on her tattooed hands began to blacken and peel away, I heard that familiar, familiar voice: “¡Ella viene! ¡Ella viene hoy!”

  I woke sweating, shaking, and when I touched my face, my hands were wet with tears. I kept seeing Lucy’s face as she climbed the walls, and every time my heart twisted more and more painfully in my chest.

  I couldn’t hide from it anymore. I had to do something to keep this from happening. I took a deep breath and readied myself. I had to go get Asa. Wildcard or not, he and I had to figure out what we were supposed to do. We had to figure it out and go back, with or without Olivia. Olivia… I had to tell her, no matter what the result. She had to know. But how did I breach such a subject after so much time? So much pain?

  I racked my mind as I dressed, brushed my hair, pulled on my boots. But when I went into the kitchen car for breakfast, I knew something was wrong. The room was quiet. Food sat on plates, growing cold. A game of checkers Mowse and Cassandra had started lay half-finished.

  “What do you mean, gone?” Olivia was asking.

  “North of the ravine,” Zo was saying. “That whole area of desert… it’s just… gone. Like it had never been. Like it dropped off the face of the earth. Like the earth ends there.”