Arc 2 Page 17

  The door closed behind them. Together they went into the dark.

  The corridor quickly turned to a stone tunnel bored directly through the earth, and it was every bit as ominous and oppressive-feeling as Jude remembered.

  He had been terrified the last time they'd been down here, walking straight into God-knew-what, knowing only that somewhere down here waited a kidnapped and injured Pixie. Now, he and almost the same group made their way down—plus Pixie. It should have been plus Eva too, Jude thought, and he missed her. More than he even would have expected; she always let him breathe easier. Pixie stuck close to him, and the beam of his pocket flashlight—maybe Jude had the same effect on him. He hoped so.

  It didn’t take long until the dark, twisting tunnels opened up into a large central cavern that seemed nearly the size of the mall itself. Much too big for one vampire, Jude thought with a shiver. How many others had made their lairs here? But there was no question about who had used this place last. Only Cruce could be responsible for the large spatters of what was definitely dried blood on the floor, walls, and in spots of the cave, ceiling.

  Pixie stopped, taking in the large cavern. It was mostly empty, as it had been—except for the crude wooden cross dominating one side. Below it lay several nails and a large hammer. Pixie stared at the implements of torture that had caused him so much pain, not moving or saying a word. Jasper tapped Letizia on the shoulder and nodded toward the side tunnel entrances, beyond Cruce’s lingering accouterments. She unhesitatingly led the way toward one of them, as if she’d spent her life down here, and the two of them moved forward to give Pixie and Jude a moment together.

  “Hey,” Jude said in a low voice, not wanting to startle Pixie out of the reverie into which he’d obviously fallen, but needing to all the same. “You’re still here. You made it out, and you’ll make it out again. I’m right here.”

  “I know.” Pixie gave him a little smile, faint but there. “And it’s really okay, Jude. I’m okay. This is what I wanted to see—it’s not the place where Cruce almost killed me. It’s the place where you saved me.”

  Jude let out a soft sound that was almost a laugh, but instead of amusement he felt a stab of something close to pain. Close, but not quite. He reached out, still awkward as he always was in emotional moments, but at least knowing now that it was the right thing. Pixie leaning into him when Jude wrapped his arm around his shoulders just confirmed it. “I’m... Really glad you’re still here.”

  Letizia moved past them, bringing him back to the present, and set something down on the ground, which Jude was sure she hadn’t been holding before: a large, metal-framed mirror.

  “All right. Everybody come here—let’s begin.”

  Eva hadn’t gone home. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stay inside four walls with her brain buzzing with both frustration and anxiety, that it would just feel like a cage, and she needed to cool her head, both literally and figuratively. Before she said or texted anything else she might regret.

  It was just cold enough outside that she could see the faint fog of her breath. She hadn’t known exactly where she was headed when she started walking through the park—not to the mall, since she didn’t want to see any witchy faces just now. She wasn’t quite so impulsive as to burst into a dark ritual alone and unprepared, but the images of the stones burned in her head like a song she couldn’t forget. They hung over her like the January chill, just as impossible to escape.

  But she hadn’t seen them. Or anything even nearby, she thought with some confusion. Shouldn’t she be able to find them now, even without Letizia’s charm, since she knew where they were? It didn’t make sense.

  Of course, nothing about Letizia made sense right now, she thought, with a surge of hurt instead of the anger she expected. Just when Eva had really been feeling their connection, enjoying working together, being on the same side, the same page, the Witch had ripped the rug right out from under her.

  “Your work is done now, she says,” Eva muttered. “Go home, Eva, she says. Thanks for your help, now get the hell out. Well, fine. I don’t care. Don’t blame me if you end up dead, or whatever vampires end up as when they…”

  She stopped walking. For a few foggy breaths, she stood there, hands in her pockets and not moving. Then she turned on her heel and strode back the way she’d come, toward the mall, and her friends, and stubborn, stubborn witches who pushed people away instead of letting them close enough to—

  She wasn’t alone.

  Unlike most humans, Eva knew for a fact that the shadows were rarely as empty as they seemed. She remembered reading some worrying statistic, that no matter where you went, there was always a spider within six feet of you in some direction. The same seemed to be true of vampires, or the humans who served them—because here he was. Again.

  “Hello… you,” she said, more grouchily than necessary maybe, but the last time she’d had a one-on-one interaction with this kid, he’d been guarding dirt and been a brat. And the time before that, he’d hurled a piece of trash at her, causing her nose to meet a coffee thermos in a very uncomfortable way. She still blamed him for the coffee-stain destruction of one of her favorite shirts.

  The skinny, dirt-smeared boy with rats-nest-hair, glowering up at her with narrowed eyes and a tucked-in chin. He stood directly in her path, just out of the light cast by the nearby streetlight, hands jammed into the pockets of a not-nearly-thick-enough jacket for the cold, wet night. Ordinarily, if a man had planted himself ominously between her and the way home in the dark, Eva would already be making sure her mace was in easy reach, and lining up a kick to his sensitive regions, which would be even more unpleasant thanks to her heels.

  But this guy always looked like he could be taken out by a strong gust of breeze, and she couldn’t bring herself to be intimidated if she tried.

  “It’s Sanguine,” he said grumpily.

  “Gesundheit.”

  “Very funny. That’s my name.”

  “And it’s lovely. Now if you’ll excuse me.” She stepped around him, rolling her eyes.

  “Yeah, you better run!” he rasped, whipping around to face her as she went, but not actually pursuing. “I’m not kidding, get outta here!”

  “I’d like nothing better, believe me,” she muttered, throwing a glance back at him and preparing to shoot back something like ‘you still owe me for that shirt,’ when she stopped dead, mid-word and mid-step.

  He’d stepped into the streetlight’s glow for her to see him clearly. And she didn’t like what she saw at all—because the kid was bleeding. It trickled down from the top of his head, and now that she looked closer she could see that it matted his already almost-solid hair. Half his forehead—the entire left side of his face, really—was discolored, as if it were all one big bruise, so fresh it wasn’t even quite formed. It would be ghoulish when it was done. His eyes were out of focus and too dark, like his pupils were over-dilated; another time she might have figured it was just because he was on something, but now…

  “Listen, kid—San-gween-eh. Am I saying that right?”

  “Close enough.”

  “You look like you’ve got a concussion. At least. What happened here?”

  “Nothing,” he spat, wavering on his feet, but backpedaling out of the puddle of light. “Like I said, keep moving, so nothing else happens. To you.”

  He raised one arm to wipe the blood from his face, and that’s when she saw them—huge, messy, barely-healed puncture wounds on his forearm, wrist, and, when he brushed some of his hair aside, along with the blood, up the side of his neck.

  “Oh, God,” she whispered. “That’s…”

  “That’s what?” he mumbled. One of the bite marks—because they could be nothing else—had reopened, sending a second trickle of blood down to pool in his too-defined collarbone. Jude had told her about them, of course, but seeing them for herself now, she found them much, much harder to ignore.

  “What my friend Jude said when we saw you yesterday? We’ve seen…
something like that before,” Eva said, lowering her voice but willing him to understand with every word, to confirm or deny what she was beginning to suspect. “Exactly like that. On your neck and arms—”

  “Drugs!” Sanguine blurted. “I do tons of drugs. Like just, really, shooting up all day, doesn’t it look like I do all kinds of drugs?”

  “Not really.” Eva shook her head. Had those injuries always been there, weeks and months ago? Had she ever looked close enough to tell, or seen them and forgotten, dismissed him as just another troublemaker? “You do look like you need help. Just talk to me for a second. We know how to deal with—”

  “No! Shut up! Just shut up!” Sanguine exploded, and he took another step backwards and away from Eva, so unsteady he nearly fell.

  “I know where you got those scars,” Eva said, and now, the sound of her voice seemed to hold Sanguine in place like quicksand. “I’ve seen them before. On a friend of mine. A few friends, actually. They were being hurt by a… very bad person. I know it sounds crazy to say out loud, and nobody would believe you, but we do. I do.”

  His thin shoulders sagged as if someone had just placed a heavy weight on his back. His knees shook, clearly around five minutes away from buckling underneath him from exhaustion and sending him crashing to the ground. “I’m telling you, get out of here.”

  “Not going to happen, kid.”

  “Oh my God, why?” his voice went up in pitch until it was half-shout, half-whine. “Why are you still bugging me like you give a fuck?”

  “Because I do give a fuck about what happens to other people, even if they make it really hard!” Forget trying to rein in the four-letter words. Sometimes they spoke the language of her fucking heart when nothing else did. “Which most people do! Even when I probably shouldn’t! But I know what did that to you, and nobody deserves it. And for whatever reason, dealing with ‘em is kind of me and my friends’ job now. It doesn’t pay very well, but that’s the gig economy for you. So drop the bull-crap and—”

  Sanguine scowled. “I don’t know what you’re talking ab—”

  “Do I look like your mom, walking in on you with a joint? Don’t lie to me like I’m your mom, I know bite marks when I see them!”

  Sanguine jerked backwards like he’d been slapped. His usually-pale face lost any bit of color it had, and his mouth hung slack, blue eyes wide and glassy, but not at all vacant or dull. Pained.

  “You’re trying to help me, but I’m the one trying to help you,” he said at last, voice unnaturally high-pitched, dropping only after a rough clearing of his throat. “Listen, it’s over for me. I’m done. You don’t have to be done. I was supposed to—I was ordered to stop you here and distract you but fuck that, I’ve been saying you need to go, but now you need to actually listen to me and get out of here right now, run, before…”

  He stopped, suddenly shutting his eyes, and cringing away from Eva as if she really were going to slap him, even though she hadn’t moved at all.

  “Before what?” she prodded, though the sinking feeling in her stomach gave her a very good idea. Sanguine didn’t open his eyes or lift his head, still looking like he was bracing for a blow. Now, she very much did have the urge to just bolt into a run, sprint away from here as fast as possible and keep running. But there were things you couldn’t run from, and things you needed to face head-on when it was too late to try. A chill shooting up her spine, Eva turned to look behind her.

  She barely had time to register a pair of golden eyes, as cold and bright as polished coins, before the clawed hands flew toward her face.

  Once more, the circle was lit by bonfires, much more brightly than at the time of its last awakening. Instead of just one fire, several burned within it, each stone spire casting long, flickering shadows that radiated out from the center like spokes of a wheel.

  “They’re not coming,” Owen muttered to himself, checking his watch for the fourth time, after several minutes of resentful silence. “Of course n—”

  “Hold the party,” said Wicked Gold, appearing in front of Owen without any sound or sign. It was as if he’d stepped out from behind one of the spires or a tree, but there was nothing near enough for him to hide behind. “Can’t start without the guest of honor.”

  In one arm he held an unconscious human: Eva, who he carried like a sack of potatoes. In the other, there was another nearly-unconscious human; Wicked Gold held the scruff of Sanguine’s neck, who wavered and nearly stumbled upon being released.

  A smear of red crossed Eva’s forehead, but the kind of smear that had been purposely placed there, not from an injury. An intentional mark. Sanguine’s less-precise bruise was turning an angry purple, blood darkening as it dried in his hair.

  “You were late,” the vampire said, punctuating the words with a disapproving slice of his eyes toward Owen, and away again just as quickly. He set Eva down on the ground, not quite dumping her, but none too gently either.

  “I got here before you did,” Owen said flatly. His eyes swept over Eva and Sanguine, taking in the blood and bruises, both ceremonial and otherwise. “And they’re looking a bit worse for wear. I could take care of those injuries before we begin.”

  “Oh, don’t bother,” Wicked Gold said airily, glancing up at the moon in much the same way Owen had checked his watch. “It’s almost time anyway.”

  “M’okay don’t worry,” Sanguine mumbled and shakily climbed to his feet, using the nearest spire for the assistance his master didn’t offer. A concussion seemed likely.

  “Oh God,” Eva mumbled, stirring, eyes squeezed shut as if she were suffering the world’s worst hangover on the world’s brightest morning. “This place again. Why does everybody want these freaking rocks?”

  “You’ll find out,” Wicked Gold said as Sanguine edged a bit closer to the other human.

  “Sorry about this,” he said quietly, though he couldn’t hope to keep a vampire from overhearing. “Believe it or not, misery doesn’t actually love company.”

  If Wicked Gold took offense, he only snorted and turned his attention to the dark woods beyond the circle as if waiting for something.

  “You’re fine, kid,” Eva said, struggling to sit up and spitting out a bit of blood. Thankfully no teeth. “Thanks for…” Sanguine shot her a warning, alarmed look, as if aware of what she was about to say. He’d tried. He’d failed completely, but he’d tried to keep her out of here, and that was something. “Thanks for saying that.”

  “I’d apologize for all this,” Wicked Gold said, turning back to Eva with a passingly sympathetic look. “But I didn’t see any alternative. It’s nothing personal—my goodness, having a personal issue with a human, can you imagine?”

  Sanguine and Owen exchanged a silent glance behind the vampire’s back, and Wicked Gold leaned down closer to Eva’s level.

  “Then what the hell do you want with me?” Eva rasped, glaring up directly into her captor’s golden eyes without a flinch. “I already know how this thing works. You need a willing sacrifice, and my dude, that ain’t me.”

  “That’s absolutely right,” Wicked Gold said with a nod and raise of his eyebrows that almost looked impressed. “And just confirms that I made the right decision in bringing you here. The Witch really has rubbed off on you. But you do serve a purpose here, a very important one.” He raised one finger, long silver claw shining.

  Eva’s eyes widened as they followed the claw’s sharp edge, its slow path toward her. “She’ll come for me, you know,” she said in a shaking whisper. “Letizia isn’t going to let you do this. Even if she’s stubborn and hardheaded and—and everything else, she’s coming and you can’t stop her!”

  “You don’t have to convince me,” Wicked Gold said with a genial chuckle. “Or yourself. I know the Witch is coming for you—and that’s exactly what I’m counting on.”

  Slowly, he pressed the single claw to Eva’s cheek as if wiping away a tear. Then he drew it down, a teardrop of blood in its wake.

  Deep underground, the magic
began. It didn’t look like magic yet, but everyone could feel the building electricity in the air.

  Letizia laid the repaired mirror on the ground and sat down before it. She carefully picked up a bone fragment and laid it on the mirror’s edge, then another, one by one, slowly forming a circle. With the other hand, she sprinkled the dirt Jude and Eva had recovered, forming a ring outside the mirror as well.

  “Letizia,” Jude said, eyes on the bones in her hand, suddenly feeling every single sensible reservation bubble to the surface. She turned to look up at him, still as one of the stones in the circle, expression blank. Jude did have misgivings about this, lots of them, but, he concluded ruefully, he probably should have voiced them earlier, before they were down in the caves about to cast a spell. Bones or not. “Never mind.”

  The Witch laid the final piece of bone and dropped the last bit of dirt. The mirror was complete and unbroken, a surface smooth as a frozen lake at night, and just as dark.

  “Please present the items you’ve collected,” she said in a voice that sounded detached, oddly professional.

  “Here,” Jude said, pulling out the “FOUND” poster and handing it over, as Pixie did the same with his fascist-killing sticker. “Rose-tinted memories, and the hope of a dream with eyes open.”

  “This is perfect,” Letizia said quietly as Pixie placed the sticker on the mirror beside the poster. “You chose well.”

  Pixie said nothing, and Jude figured he was all out of words, an affliction Jude knew well. They’d come back; they always did.

  “And here’s mine,” Jasper said then, reaching out to place two small objects on the glass with a metallic clink. A pair of gold rings, Jude realized, and while he hadn’t seen one in a while, the other he’d seen every day until recently. “A sign of a promise given with the greatest intention.”

  “Jasper,” Jude said quietly. “Those are…”

  “Felix and my engagement rings, yes,” Jasper said, and Jude could hear the rueful smile in his voice. “Don’t worry. It’s not as awful a sacrifice as it seems—his doesn’t fit anymore, and I actually love the idea of getting new ones, and doing the thing right, when the time comes. It seems appropriate, under the circumstances.”