Michael (The Curse) (The Airel Saga, Book 3: Part 5-6) (16 page)

“Have we got a problem, girlie?” Ellie said, bristling.

“You bet your pointy blue hair we do,” Airel said calmly, “if you keep insulting Michael like that.”

Ellie rolled her eyes and wore a mocking expression that said,
You’re ridiculous.

Airel moved very quickly, getting past Michael, who was seated between them, in an instant. There was a little plume of dust. In a crouch, she grabbed Ellie’s shirt front and pulled her face to within inches of her own. “Look,” Airel said, “I have had it with you. Cut it out. You know what I mean, too.” Airel held her there for a moment.

Ellie turned her head away slowly, looking down and smirking. “Relax, doll. I don’t want your man-boy. Though he is pretty cute.”

Airel jerked her around. “Shut up.”

“No, really,” Ellie said, looking back up, meeting Airel’s threatening gaze. “I don’t. I’ll give you your little show of force this time round, girlie. But don’t do it again, ’kay?” Ellie placed an index finger on Airel’s forehead. “Or you’ll regret it.” She pushed her lightly away.

Airel stood fully to her feet, releasing her. “Whatever.” She looked down the tracks and saw a faint light. “Hey …”

Michael stood up and joined her, looking down the tracks to the west. “Looks like our ride’s finally here.” His arm rested comfortably at her hip. He pulled her to him as they waited in the darkness under the bridge.

CHAPTER VII

“HERE IT COMES,” MICHAEL shouted.

My pulse was racing, but I tried to control myself, tamp the energy down a bit. The sunrise was on the way, but it was still dark enough for us to get away with what we were about to do.

The only one I worried about was Kim. I worried more and more about her, actually.
What is going on with her? Poor thing. She just needs some rest.
I hoped she’d be able to hop the train. Though it was only moving by us at about fifteen miles per hour, given how bad Kim was looking, I didn’t give her much chance to actually make the jump when it came time.

And the time had come.

“This is it,” Michael shouted at us. “Get ready. Look for a handhold or a step or something.”

Everyone tensed, bent at the knees beside the rumbling tracks as the train went by. We were all dialed in on the boxcar, “bird-dogging it,” as my dad would have said.
I miss him,
I thought, but immediately pushed the thought from my mind.

As it approached, we all started jogging, pacing it.

To my shock, Kim took off first. At a dead sprint, she leaped up to the train car with ease, duffel and all. Standing on a foothold, she wrapped one arm through a handle and extended her free arm toward a small door, unlatching it, sliding it open and then jumping inside.

She poked her head back out. “Come on, guys. Let’s go.”

I guessed she was motivated for that hotel room I had promised.

Ellie was next. She moved gracefully, like an athlete. Before I knew it, she was up and inside with Kim. Michael, running along beside me, said, “Ladies first.”

“Oh, you would,” I grumbled. I dashed for it and quickly made it inside as well. It was easier than I thought. I forced my way back to the door, nudging Ellie and Kim to one side, away, looking for Michael.

He was already up on the step and swinging in. He met me full force, crashing into me, wrapping me up and knocking me back inside the boxcar. “Oops,” he said, kissing me lightly on the lips. “Glad to see you here,” he said.

I blushed in spite of myself, and I could feel the heat crawl up my neck and spread across my cheeks.
How can he do that to me, every time?
I thought back to when we kissed on the side of the road and my skin prickled.
He was so … so yummy.

“Hey. Where’d everybody go?” I called out to Kim and Ellie.

***

IT MADE ME NERVOUS to think of waiting around in some small town knowing that the Brotherhood would be looking for us—and their missing Brothers—with bloodlust crazing their every action. Plus, the FBI would be on high alert after the crash.

The train car was filled with large crates and boxes. We had to squeeze around some of them as we moved through it, looking for a place where we could all spread out a little, maybe even rest. The best we could find was a little nook created by the irregular shapes of different crates all shoved together.

A little patch of rough wood plank floor was ours, perhaps four feet by four feet. It was dry and we were all alive and well. I figured we would stay reasonably warm by staying close, using body heat. That it was dry made the most difference. The four of us crammed into the space, each one taking a corner. Michael sat at a right angle to me, our legs entwined together, his strong arm pressed firmly against my shoulder.

Ellie and Kim sat as far from us and each other as the small space would allow. It struck me then that Ellie was a misfit in our little bunch. I wondered why she stuck with us—or allowed us to stick with her—besides the obvious, anyway; that we were all looking for Kreios to some degree or another. She was definitely a square peg in a round hole. She didn’t like any of us—that much was true. I did have to wonder, though, how far I could go with her, how much I could trust her.

She seemed bothered, I thought, whenever she talked to Kim. And since Kim was my best friend, I was a little put out. I wanted to say,
Hey, jerk face. Watch your mouth around my friend.

“So,” Michael began, “I’m still trying to wrap my head around how the Brotherhood nailed us.” The crate he leaned against was all marked up with stenciled Chinese lettering. “I thought it was just … odd, you know, how they could find us with such accuracy. And speed.”

“And that was only one small group, too,” Ellie said. “El forbid we should have run into many more, much less an entire clan.”

“Yeah,” I said. I had wanted to get to the bottom of that question from the moment the Brotherhood had shown up. “How did they find us?” I looked at the faces of my companions. Nobody knew anything, as far as I could tell.

“Did anyone else think their strategy was a little off?” Michael asked.

“Like how?” Kim asked.

“I mean, they didn’t …they didn’t …” Michael dug around for words. “They weren’t shoot-to-kill types. Does that make sense? I mean, it’s almost like they were just there to waste our time, to harass us.”

“Yeah, but why would they do that?” I asked.

It was dead quiet for a second.

“It’s almost like they were there to see what we were made of,” Michael said. “I know if I wanted to size up my enemy … I mean, if it was my call, and I was up against an enemy force that was, say, an unknown quantity … that I would send scouts. Or a strongman, like they did. Throw something serious at the situation and see what happens.”

“Well, we saw what happened,” I said.

“Yeah,” Kim said. “Airel kicked butt.”

“Yeah,” Michael said. “And I’m just wondering if we won back there. Really. Or not.”

“I don’t get it,” Kim said.

“I do,” I said. “I guess what you’re asking is, ‘what did we gain back there’—right?”

“Yeah,” Michael said. “I mean, I know what it appears to be on the surface. We won, they lost. We took them out.” He paused. “But I’m unsettled about it, when it’s all said and done.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

Michael looked into my eyes. “I don’t like that those three anti-Cherubs showed up.” He gestured to Ellie. “I talked about that with her. That kind only shows up when there’s something really big going on.” He paused again. “I have a few ideas, but I don’t like what I’m thinking.”

Ellie’s eyes flashed and she shook her head. “Don’t look at me.”

Michael sighed. “We’re a walking target. Somehow.” He looked at me. “They could have been tracking us using your phone.”

“How about your phone, Captain Connected?” I was annoyed. “Or even the ice queen here,” I said, motioning to Ellie’s vivid blue spikes.

“It doesn’t matter how they found us,” Michael said, “because in the end they found us and saw what we can do.” He looked at me again. “They saw that you have the Sword.”

Ellie burst in, “How do you know?”

He stopped. All was quiet, save for the swaying, creaking motion of the train, the clack of the trucks as they rolled over the gaps in the rails. “And they saw,” he continued, his gaze moving from Ellie back to me, “that you know how to use it. That you can call it up at will.”

He looked at Ellie and Kim. “What other reason would they have to allow us to do away with one of their strongmen and his Brother? Those two were enormous, very strong. And then, what did the anti-Cherubs do? They just took off.”

I looked down, the seriousness of the situation becoming clearer.

“And you can bet that intelligence has already been shared with the powers that be,” he said. “Fact is, we were played back there.”

“What for?” Ellie said. “That is the question you should be asking.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, growing irritated again.

“You’re asking how they found us so quickly, right? How they found us, how they managed to draw us into all-out battle? And then how those three managed to get away from us, all the while making us believe we should be happy about it?”

“Dude,” I said, “we kicked butt. The end.”

Ellie rolled her eyes at me, waving me off.

“What?” I asked. “And by the way, Ellie, thanks so much for all your help back there. Thanks for taking the easy targets and leaving the strongman to me,” I said. “I really appreciate your faith in my skill as a warrior.”

She glowered at me.

“If I didn’t know better,” I said, “I’d think you had your own agenda.”

“Careful,” Ellie said.

“Maybe it’s you,” I said. “Maybe you led them right to us. Maybe you led them to us and then shoved me to the front of the battle lines so that I would be forced to reveal that I carry the Sword. Or maybe you just wanted to see me killed.”

She just looked at me.

“Hey, relax,” Michael said. “It doesn’t matter. All we can do now is stay off the phones and keep out of sight.”

“Ha,” I said. “That’s pretty lame.” A thought crept into my mind:
Is he the one who tipped them off? Is he still working with the Brotherhood, and I’m too blind to see it?
Before I said it, I wished I could retract it, unsay it, but I couldn’t stop myself: “Maybe it was you. After all, you used to be one of them.”

I stung him. Bad.
Airel, you stupid, stupid girl.

I looked away from him, and my eyes landed on Ellie’s face. I detected the faintest smirk of satisfaction. I was shocked at that, at her, at myself. I looked to Kim, but she wouldn’t look at me. She just stared down at the planks in awkward embarrassment.
Great. I’m such a fool.
I couldn’t look at him; I was too ashamed of myself.

“I don’t like this,” Kim said. “We
were
careful. We’ve been using cash and stuff. They just came out of nowhere, as if they knew the exact road we were taking and what we were driving. Plus, there was that cop.”

It was uncomfortably quiet.

All our questions remained unanswered. All I had done was add more confusion to the pot and stirred it in real good.

“Maybe it’s you,” Michael’s voice broke in. I looked up, feeling wild and dizzy suddenly. He was looking at Ellie. “I mean, we don’t know you at all. We don’t know if you are who you say you are.” His jaw was set, his eyes narrowed. He would not look at me. “Do we?”

“Listen, you,” she said to him. “I’m not the one who stood by idling with a stick in my hand back there. I was busy cutting demon-possessed flesh to ribbons.”

“I was looking after Kim.” he said.

“So you say. But who called it on, eh? What brought them to us,
right
to us?”

“Hey!” I said, placing a hand on each of them. “Cut it out, you guys.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Michael shoot me a glare. I clamped my mouth shut and my gut balled up into a knot.

Kim stood up abruptly. “I can’t take this anymore,” she said, whimpering. “You guys are too much for me.” She struggled, wriggling into and through the small space between the crates and the wall of the car. “I’m gonna go find my own spot now.” She was gone before any of us could say a word.

Ellie stood. “Me too. You two lovebirds enjoy.” She was gone too, following in Kim’s wake.

I assumed they would each find their own little patch of boxcar paradise, quite apart from each other, given all the love I felt bouncing off the walls. The problem was, Michael and I were finally alone. And I couldn’t bring myself to look at him.

***

KIM FOUND A DARK little hole in the crates and crawled inside it, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around her legs. She could feel something in her head nagging her mind. It felt like an inner-ear itch, but deeper, something she could never hope to get to, something from which she could never even hope to find relief.

She rubbed her temples.

She reached into her sweater pocket and touched the Bloodstone. It was warm; it calmed her mind to know that it was there. It scratched the itch and the effect was glorious—tension melted away. But the scratching drew blood, and when this inner wound began to congeal it would only itch more, profoundly. Who would have thought such a pretty little thing could mean so much? Who would have thought that moment on the cliff, when she lay in the dirt, afraid, angels and demons having finished their scuffling death contest all around her, that she could find such a salve for her ragged mind?

It was a drug. Really. One she now needed. One she would guard like a jealous lover.

“She knows. You need to keep it from her; she wants to use it against you.”
The whisper in her head grew louder as the itch vanished.

Am I losing my mind?
she thought. She didn’t think so, but this—the voices, the needs, the hunger to know—it had to stop. It was overpowering.

“It’s not you, Kim, but her.”

Who? Airel?

“No. Ellie. Or maybe … maybe it’s Michael and Ellie together.”

Yes, Michael.
He was the real enemy. He had bewitched everyone with his handsome face and charm.