Eye of the Storm (38 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

I wake up at five o'clock in the morning to Gryfflet shaking my shoulder.
 

"It's ready," he says. "Carrick and the others are already at the park. If you want to say goodbye to anyone, now's your time."

Sitting up, I push the warm blanket off me. The cot creaks. "I can't do that," I say, my voice sounding too loud in the early morning darkness. "But thank you."

I didn't bother to undress before crawling onto the cot. All that I need to do is run a toothbrush over my teeth, take a piss, and belt on my swords. By the time I'm back from the bathroom, Gryfflet's tapping one finger against his thigh.

"Why are you so nervous?" I ask him. "I'm the one who's hellbound."

He stops tapping. "Everything about this makes me nervous. The demons could be waiting until you take off to hit us, the Summit could implode, anything could happen."

No cities have fallen since San Diego, and I understand how he feels. Everything feels precipitous. I notice that he doesn't include a possible betrayal by Asher on his list. We take a side door out of the Summit, into the stale air of our rotting city. There's no one around. The sky, still dark, could be any sky if it weren't for the smell. Things are dying.
 

Gryfflet's got a small satchel slung across his back, I imagine full of spell ingredients. It's strange walking out into the night and being relatively certain that we won't encounter any hellkin between us and our destination. Unless you count me or the shades.

"Do you trust Asher?" I ask. It's the same thing I asked Carrick.
 

"Yes," Gryfflet says without hesitation. "With the qualifier that I think she wants to save the world. I trust her to want the world saved. She's no hells-zealot. If she thinks you'll get the facts you need by hopping into hell, she might be right."

"And her gag spell is powerful enough that there's really no way around it, no way to help her the way you helped Alamea."

Gryfflet shakes his head. "Whatever that spell is, it's beyond anything I've ever seen before. It's old magic. Raw magic. The kind that came before witches working on green energy and security systems and the odd glamour. The Summit gagged Alamea with a more run-of-the-mill spell. Illegal outside the Summit, mostly effective, but it has loopholes if you know where to look. Which, since Alamea's only ever around Summit witches for the most part, nobody would be looking. Asher showed me."

I let myself brood on that knowledge as we walk. Old magic. Since I know about as much magic as I know about the chemical makeup of dinosaur turds, I don't have anything to add to this part of the conversation.

The air around us smells like a flooded basement mated with a junkyard. That the world around us has changed so much, so quickly, sets my nerves to jangling. I miss the sun. I miss seeing even the smattering of stars through Nashville's light pollution. I miss the moon and winds that blow more than the reek of rust. Sadly, I don't expect it'll smell any better where I'm going.

It doesn't take long to walk to Centennial Park, and the Parthenon stands like an enormous tomb across from the lake. There's movement in the colonnades, and my mind feels momentary relief at the proximity of the shades. I can feel Carrick, Sol, Luna, Jax…

"Where's Evis and Mason?" Panic replaces the relief I feel.
 

"They're safe." Jax comes trotting down from the steps leading up to the monument. "You'd know if they weren't."

"But where are they?" Even though I hate goodbyes and unilaterally decided not to give Mira one, a hypocritical part of me stings at my brother's absence. And Mason's.
 

None of the shades say anything.

Irritated, I pace on the browning grass. In summers, this grass is lush and green and feels good between bare toes. Now it's dead. My body buzzes with annoyance and that tinny spike of adrenaline. And fear. I'm scared.
 

"How long do you need to set up?" I ask Gryfflet.

"Not long." He ducks under the strap of the satchel across his back and unzips the pouch, pulling out a few bottles and what looks like a rock collection.

I both want to throw my arms around the shades and to go hide on the steps of the Parthenon until Gryfflet is ready for me.
 

"I don't think anything will manage to come out when you go in," Gryfflet says, "but I don't want to risk it. I'll need the shades to stay close when it starts."

"They're right here. You can talk to them."

Gryfflet gives me an annoyed look, rattling the rocks. The bottles clink when he bumps them.
 

I shut up.

Maybe I've made the wrong decision not going to see Mira. I don't know if it would have helped anything. It might have even changed my mind, and I can't second guess this decision. Not now. I'm the only one who can do this. Sol and Luna could go, but whatever knowledge the sixth hell might hold, I need it undiluted.
 

My brother's presence grows close in my mind, and my heart leaps, temporarily distracted from Gryfflet's preparations.
 

Across the scrubby lawn, Evis appears, coming from the direction of the Summit. I want to run and meet him, but instead I wait for him to reach me.

"I had to see her," he says simply. "Carrick told us. I was careful when I snuck in."

I don't have to ask to know that he means Eve.

"She looks like Kelby," he says. "But much smaller. And she smells good."

Apparently my brother has more of a parental instinctive attraction to the smell of a baby than I do.
 

"I don't want her to die," Evis pronounces.
 

"Neither do I. None of us do." I'm not surprised when Evis takes my hand and holds it for a moment.
 

Everything feels too quiet.
 

"Okay," Gryfflet says, about a century before I could possibly be ready for this.

He stands up, brushing dead grass off his knees. In his hands is a quarter, but the face of Pushmataha is obscured by a resinous substance, into which Gryfflet has stamped a symbol that looks like a pair of ox horns. I want to snatch it out of Gryfflet's hands and scrape the resin away, to see the familiar profile of the Choctaw man who almost singlehandedly routed an English battalion and a small horde of hellkin alike in the forests of what is now Virginia. For some reason, the sight of the coin in Gryfflet's hand triggers panic.
 

Mason and Mira aren't here.

Gryfflet hands me a small glass vial on a metal chain. "You'll have to crush this to come back. It's borosilicate glass, so you'll have to use the hilt of your sword or a rock or something. The portal will open where the droplets fall. My blood is in it, so you should pop back wherever I am."

"But not like…inside you, right?" The momentary image of me ripping a portal open through Gryfflet's body gives me a shiver.

"No," he says. He doesn't have to look so surprised that I'd be smart enough to think of that eventuality. Gods.
 

I clasp the vial's chain around my neck and tuck the glass under my leather jacket. It's cold against my skin.
 

"Are you ready?" he asks.

"No."

"Ayala."

"I know." I can't help the dampness that suddenly blossoms under my arms, at the back of my neck.
 

"The other Mediators are going to be waking up. Someone could see unless you get going now."

"I
know
." I do. I really do.
 

I haven't flinched back from anything yet, but this — this is different. This isn't a few slummoths in Percy Warner Park. It's not a house blowing up in Seattle. It's not Gregor Gaskin torturing Mason in a hells-zealot safe house. This is the source of all those things. This is me walking into hell with two swords and the maybe-mistaken belief that these demons won't kill me because they want me alive. This is me in my stupid, selfish, failure at people skills, not giving Mason or Mira the chance to say goodbye to me.
 

I've already made my choice. It's done. This has to be done, and it has to be me.
 

Evis throws his arms around me, and a moment later, Jax and Carrick and Sol and Luna follow.
 

From Sol and Luna I get a flash of an image, of a path leading into a rocky crevice of jagged white stone and that too-bright light of the hell they've seen. It's like they're trying to show me the way. Maybe they are.
 

But surely the hells-hole I'm going into could open anywhere in that world.
 

"No," says Luna. It's one of the first times I've ever heard him speak. He shows me again, and this time I think he's remembering and letting me watch.
 

The hellkin who formed up at Gregor's call before, Luna remembers. He remembers standing with Sol and the third shade, the one I killed, among a horde of demons ready to invade Earth.
 

Of course. They would have more control over the hells-holes. They've been using them for eons.
 

"Thank you," I say, and I try to project my gratitude through the bond I share with him. Luna beams at me.
 

I turn to Evis. "Tell Mira I'm sorry. Tell her I couldn't bear the thought of seeing her one more time and knowing it was probably going to be the last."

Jax looks startled. "You're coming back."

Carrick puts a hand on Jax's shoulder. He understands that me coming back is wishful thinking.
 

"Tell Mason I'm sorry too. Tell them I love them. And tell Alamea that Nashville has always been lucky to have her." This is what I hate. Not that I've ever done this before.

A breeze blows across the brown lawn, bringing with it the stench of death.
 

"Fuck it, Gryfflet. Do it."

My heart gives a skip. I'm glad I refused breakfast.
 

He looks at me, and for the space of a breath, his face is writ of pity.

Gryfflet drops the quarter in the grass and begins to murmur. His eyes go cloudy, and I can feel a swirl of magic.
 

Then I feel a surge of anxiety from the direction of the Summit. Whipping around, my eyes meet Mason's. He's sprinting across the lawn at full speed, and he's got someone in his arms.
 

Mira.
 

There's a tearing sound behind me.

"Ayala!" Gryfflet yells. "Be ready!"

"Wait!" Mason barrels toward us, almost a blur as he runs. No wonder he's carrying her; he's moving so quickly I half-expect to hear a sonic boom.
 

"I can't stop it now!" Gryfflet's voice from behind me sounds taut, like a wire stretched just to breaking point.
 

Mira tumbles out of Mason's arms and lands in mine. "Gods damn it, Storme," she says. "Ayala."

She's almost as out of breath as Mason. Her eyes are puffy and pink, her nose matching. I can't imagine how fast Mason must have been running if he's panting. I've seldom seen a shade so much as gasp.
 

"I'm sorry," I say into her hair.
 

"I understand."
 

Looking over Mira's shoulder, I meet Mason's eyes. He comes to us and places one hand on my shoulder.
 

There's no time for me to say anything else. Gryfflet grunts behind me, and I feel a cold wind that brings with it a scent of hard rock and sulfur.
 

"Storme," Gryfflet says. "You've got to go now."

I pull away from Mira — or try.

"I have to do this, Mira."

"I know, you crazy, badass bitch. I'm going with you."

I give her a panicked look, a thousand thoughts rampaging through my mind at once. The hellkin will kill her in an instant. They need her here. Warring emotions like joy-terror and grief-relief flood me.
 

"Ayala!" This time Gryfflet's voice booms like an enormous bell.
 

I take Mira's hand. The portal is open, that same shimmery veil obscuring the bright landscape beyond. It shines like the sun we've lost in the gloom of the pre-dawn morning. I don't see any movement through it, but that doesn't mean we won't find a horde of hellkin on the other side. For a moment I let myself feel the cold squish of grass under my shoes and the dank air on my face. It may be polluted, but it also may be the last breaths of Earth I ever get.
 

A burst of warmth from the shades bolsters me. Mira and I look at each other and run for the portal. We launch ourselves into the shimmer. A deafening crack sounds through the air, and pain lashes my body from hair to boots. I can't feel Mira's hand. For a moment I can't feel anything at all.
 

I hit something hard right in front of me.
 

Not in front. Under. I'm flat on the ground. Hard, stony ground. Not grass. Bright.

"Mira!" I shout her name, forgetting all my common sense.
 

She doesn't answer. Shoving myself to my knees, I retch once, my stomach heaving. No breakfast. Good choice. Rocks dig into my knees.